Lori Stanley Roeleveld's Blog, page 44

The Bible Verse None of Us Believes – at First

Some days you feel like the warrior you are because of Jesus.

Your armor glints in the sun. Your soul senses the power of the risen Christ within you and you itch for a front-line assignment. The enemy is before you, ever at work, but greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world is the motto emblazoned on your shield and you sink your teeth into the truth of it. You follow the One of the divine pronoun and believe the lower case he is already defeated, you have only to step into your freedom to see victory.

This is not one of those days.

Today, you remember once feeling like a warrior and somehow you know it must still be true, but there is no glory where you lay. Your armor is on but it’s soiled and covered with dried blood – yours and the blood of fellow warriors. You fell, wounded, during that stint on the front lines where it didn’t feel like sure victory but instead, like a mouthful of gravel, confusion, noise, discomfort, and pain. You take by faith this will not be in vain but right now the enemy whispers into your ear where your helmet has gone askew that you’ve failed your King and have become of no use in the battle.

You huddle beneath your shield like a child beneath her bed in a storm and the motto is small comfort now, more like a lullaby you remember from childhood than a warrior’s call. From your back, you stare at a sky blackened with strange fire. How will He find you when He returns, a soldier drained of strength who once fought well but now cannot lift a head unless someone should mercifully assist?

And it is, in this moment, that the heartless, relentless forces of darkness rally against your section of the wall. That place you are called to defend and to build is hard under enemy assault. You hear them coming, see the line of approach, but your limbs won’t obey your command to move. This is it. This is the moment you are revealed as a failed soldier before your King, whom you love, who gave His life for yours. You are not worthy.

Suddenly, you hear His voice in Gideon’s story. Gideon who hid from the enemy. Gideon of the small army. Gideon of the people who stood no chance. Gideon of the people of the field forced to defend against a mighty force that terrorized his section of the wall. This voice now speaks to you: “The Lord is with you, O mighty man of valor.”

You answer with Gideon’s words: “Please, sir, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

And the unchanging King responds to you: “Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; do not I send you?”

Go in the strength you have.

Go in the strength you have.

“But, Lord,” you respond, “I have no strength for this going. I have no might of my own.”

And a voice more true than the voice of evil speaks firmly into your ear as the Arm of the Lord sets your helmet into place, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

And you respond with the words the Holy Spirit gave to Paul who knew shipwrecks and beatings and imprisonment and days of bloodied armor: “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

And you hate this verse as much as you love it but the arm of the Lord reaches down and burns it onto your breastplate. As the sparks fly you stop resisting His ways, yield your own glory, and find your strength strangely, powerfully, supernaturally renewed. From this fragile place, a mighty warrior is reborn. This verse you’ve spent years almost not believing suddenly appears like a passageway through a wall of giants.

And the enemy senses a turn in the direction of the battle.

Need an encouraging moment in song? Listen to My Heart will Trust in You

The Bible Verse None of Us Believes – at First https://t.co/ZOeaNLFLpI#amwriting#strength#Warriors#spiritualwarfare

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) July 1, 2016

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Life Without Sex – A Secret Truth Known by Millions

Once I watched a zombie movie with my daughter.

Not my usual fare but it fascinated me because I saw a correlation to the times in which we live. The speed at which the zombie virus spread from person to person is similar to the rapid-fire spread of deception in modern times.

There are so many lies in the air these days that H2O has been more accurately refigured as H2O3D (D for deception).

One prevalent lie is that some people want to outlaw love when really love has never been the issue. We are all free to love. Always have been and will be throughout eternity.

The Bible supports this when Paul writes, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23 (ESV)

Against such things there is no law.

We are free to love but love is God’s idea. In fact, God is love and both the God of the Old and the New Testament are the same. God has consistently loved us from creation to now and one thing He has demonstrated is that love expresses itself through truth.

The issue of concern has never been love. The issue has always been sex. There are laws and boundaries about how we use our bodies and how we treat other people’s bodies written into the fabric of our design by the One who created us.

Somehow, in the midst of the great rebellion, the rhetoric, the speeches, posters, and parades, the notion that sex is the ultimate freedom, the ultimate happiness, the ultimate expression of our humanity became the truth de jour. But it’s a lie.

There are literally millions of humans – “fully alive, wholly passionate, entirely valuable, fascinating, worthy of admiration and love, contributing positively to the planet” humans who are NOT having sex.

They are leading full lives. They are completely adults. They contribute, communicate, engage, participate, enrich us and make our lives more colorful, more joyful, and more stimulating all without engaging in intercourse with anyone.

They pursue and achieve life, liberty, and happiness without sex.

Some people live without sex because they are single (never married, divorced, or widowed) and choose to obey God’s commands. They’d like to have sex but exercise self-control, displaying their love for God through obedience. There is nothing lesser about their lives or about them as people because they aren’t engaging in coitus.

Some choose celibacy due to their vocation, their inclination, or in order to focus on a particular mission in life. Others haven’t chosen not to have sex they’ve just prioritized other passions.

Others live without sex within marriage relationships for a variety of reasons – a partner’s illness, mutual consent, physical capacity of one or both, separation by distance when one is called to serve miles away and the other must tend to business on the homefront, separation due to confinement, a partner’s mental state, household conditions that make privacy a rare thing, one partner’s trauma, a time committed to prayer, or simply age.

There is nothing lesser about any of these people. They aren’t less free than people I know having casual sex with many partners. They aren’t less viable than people I know having healthy sex lives within marriage relationships. They aren’t less happy or less contributing to society or less creative than anyone else. You know these people, too, but sometimes you’re unaware because they’ve gone silent in a society that elevates sex to an equal standing with inhaling and exhaling.

They see themselves portrayed in movies, sitcoms, and talk shows in unflattering and deceptive ways. The world says that if a person isn’t enjoying a “healthy” sex life then they are set aside, dried up, washed out, lonely, rejected, unfulfilled, less than. Someone to be pitied, mocked, fixed, or treated by professionals.

So those living full lives without sex have gone silent.

Sex is a glorious invention of God and should be celebrated in context but the world is full of God’s glorious inventions. In elevating one to a status nearly equal with God, worthy of full devotion and worship, we blind ourselves to all the others and make an idol of what was created rather than letting it reside in its rightful position below it’s Creator.

Sex is glorious but so is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Self-sacrifice is glorious as is creativity, intellect, worship, music, conversation, the wonders of nature, and the harmony of emotional intimacy.

All the horn-blowing and mocking can drown out the myriad of life’s pleasures that exist for those willing to order their priorities according to God’s plan. True, not every person living without sex is happy about that condition but how much greater is their unhappiness because our society constantly tells them they’re somehow less than the rest? How much greater their unhappiness because each morning they must swat their way through webs of societal deception about this one human activity?

God is a vast being and we are created in His image. There are myriad ways to express love. Sex is one. Just one.

It’s wise to remember the zombies. The dried-up undead are the majority who have been infected with the virus. The living may be in the minority but they are, in fact, alive.

If you’re living without sex, this is a secret you likely already know but remember you are a full, viable, worthy, engaging, creative, powerful human being capable of expressing love and worthy of receiving it.

Against such things there is no law.

Life without Sex – a Secret Truth Known to Millions https://t.co/sk1Ex5xtB3#TruthfulTuesday#truth#amwriting

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 28, 2016

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I Wrote This Post for You. Yes, YOU!

I wrote this post with you in mind.

Yes, you. You’ll understand why shortly.

God has given some of you ideas no one else has. Ideas for things that have never been done or read or heard or seen before. Maybe it’s a ministry to someone no one else is reaching or to a group others have tried to reach but not in this particular way. Perhaps it’s a story, a film, or a song that’s like none you’ve ever experienced but you just can’t shake the idea. It could be a plan to enact. A work of art to create. A venture that must be tried. A trip He’s impressed on you to make.

But, there’s a problem.

You don’t know anyone else who’s done it this way or told it this way or tried it this way before. In fact, you’re not fully certain it’s from God because it seems so wonderful, you can’t imagine He’s entrusted it to you. Or it seems so big and you feel so small. Or the details are still awfully fuzzy. But, when you pray or read your Bible or worship, the idea floats back and it does feel like a God thing.

You’re tempted to try it out on someone else.

Let me warn you about that. You see, every great work or movement or creative venture began as a tiny little idea conceived in the heart and mind of a human inspired by the Holy Spirit. There is nothing Satan likes more than to destroy life immediately following conception and this goes for life-giving ideas. Just as a baby needs time in the womb before others will find it appealing, so, too, do most new, inventive, creative, innovative, biblical ideas. Bring them out too early and the likelihood of their survival plummets.

So, do what God did at the start of creation. Hover over this idea. Or what Nehemiah did when it first occurred to him to rebuild the wall. Mull it over alone – maybe just bring your horse along. Spend hours alone on a hillside just like David did as a young shepherd, discussing the idea with God. Spend days in the wilderness feeding on locusts and wild honey like John the Baptist. Be alone with God with this concept and He’ll breathe life into it. He’ll let you know when it’s time to bring it before others.

I know what you’re thinking.

If this is such a great idea, why hasn’t someone else done it, tried it, built it, designed it, written it, composed it, created it, or capitalized on it? If this is such a great idea, why hasn’t anyone else had it?

Probably they have. When God wants to get a word or a work or a movement out, He looks for willing humans. I’ll bet a lot of them let the idea die within them. But, I’ve prayed for better for you.

With every new concept, someone has to dig in and find the courage from God to try it for the rest of us.

This past week, I watched as the three phoebes who hatched out in the nest in the overhang by our kitchen door discovered they had wings. At first, they had no clue what potential they contained. Finally, one tried fluttering them and he landed out of the nest on our concrete back step. I startled him by approaching and he fluttered into the driveway. He was making great progress but didn’t get enough lift to rise above my husband’s car. Smack! He fell stunned back onto the gravel drive.

I retreated to the porch and watched him recover his bearings. After a time, he began to chirp and I heard another chirp as momma bird gave him a call to follow. He figured out, again, how to propel forward but without enough lift – Smack! – this time he plowed headfirst into my car. Again, he slowly recovered until momma bird chirped him home.

The next day, upon my return from work, I spotted the daring little guy hanging upside down from our screen door. The other two sat a little further now from the nest with their heads cocked watching him try to disentangle his feet from his snare. I tapped the screen gently and he flapped hard, sailing off, this time clearing both the cars. I cheered him on and went about my evening. Not long after, I realized all three birds had flown.

This is how it is, isn’t it. Most of us cling to the nest, the comfort of what we know, until one of us listens to God’s urging that we might want to try out our wings.

When we do, we’re initially bad at it. We start out well but we plow into obstacles we didn’t see coming. We try again and run into even bigger barriers. Sometimes, we get caught up in the unexpected and find ourselves hanging upside down waiting for rescue.

The thing is, our Father God is always ready to chirp us home, to free us from every snare, and to wait nearby, patiently, as we learn that if we flap hard enough, if we truly commit, we can fly. And then, those who have cocked their heads and watched us try and fail and finally succeed, well, they find their wings, as well.

So, maybe you’re the bird with the inkling of an idea. I wrote this post for you. We desperately need you. The Body of Christ is rooting for you, depending on you, waiting for you to trust God and try out your wings. Sure, it’s not going to look like a thing of beauty immediately but keep trying.

Maybe you’re the bird on the beam nest-side. I wrote this post for you, too. Intercede for your crazy brother. Pray for your risk-taking sister. Watch them like a hawk and believe that what you see in their lives is possible also in yours.

Then, baby, take flight. Who knows what heights He’s designed for us to explore?

I wrote this post for you – YES, YOU! https://t.co/n0L2N5gbtk#learningtofly#crazyidea#amwriting#writinginnewengland#phoebes

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 24, 2016

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What the World Needs Now is Better Wine

Something has always baffled me about Jesus’ first recorded miracle. It seemed so pedestrian, really. He’s at a local wedding and Jesus’ mother learns they’ve run out of wine.

This seemed unfortunate but not really a devastating circumstance. Surely not something I would imagine requiring divine intervention. It is kind that Jesus has compassion on the host and turns the water in six stone jars into wine but was His first miracle truly inspired by a desire to spare a family from social embarrassment?

For years, I’ve mulled it over, considered it, prayed about it, meditated on it, and frankly, trusted there must be more to the story.

Now, I realize, you must stick with a marriage for many years, through trial, through sorrow, through frustration, through failure, through sickness, through hard times, and through boredom to truly appreciate the miracle at Cana.

My husband and I just celebrated our 28th wedding anniversary and around the same time, dear friends celebrated their 30th. When my friend, Jim, announced their thirtieth on Facebook, dozens of people commented on the joy of a long marriage, even proclaiming that love gets even better after forty years! The sheer number of friends extolling the benefits of long marriages and expressing appreciation for their spouses after decades of life together inspired me. There were plenty of references to hard times, but the general message was that love improves with the years.

It seemed almost revolutionary to witness this testimony in a culture that celebrates youth and young love. We don’t talk about this subject often for some good reasons, I suppose. In my experience, the modern church works hard to be sensitive to those who have felt shut out and marginalized in the past. We want to care gently for those who have experienced the devastating pain of divorce and never lead them to feel lesser than for in truth, they are not. We all have brokenness in our lives and there’s no place for judging one type of brokenness as worse than another. Because of this sensitivity, we try to be careful with our celebration of long marriages.

But, in a society that is ever enamored with youth, with newness, and with the intense passion of young love, those of us who have been married for a long time have a responsibility to those coming after us to speak up and say, “It gets even better!”

It was in thinking about this that I suddenly understood the significance of the miracle of Cana.

Our marriage has been like many others. We’ve had some wonderfully joyous times and we’ve had times when I’d just have soon walked away from the whole sorry mess. Of course, we began with intensity, with passion, and with a joyful newness of love but somewhere along the line, we both ran out of love for one another. At some point, we couldn’t remember the point. Our jars were completely empty and suddenly it seemed what was once a celebration of true love teetered on the verge of disaster.

That’s when I learned, however, there is a better love than the one I originally offered my spouse. I am now eternally grateful that I ran out of my own watered-down version of love because when I did, I turned to Jesus for a miracle. He showed up, just as He did at Cana, and transformed the watery love in my stone-cold jar of a heart into a love that was better than the first, so that my husband and I can truly say, “Amazing, Lord, you’ve saved the best for last! Our marriage is better, richer, sweeter, and deeper than it was when we began.” And it’s all because when we ran out of love, we went to Jesus and received our own miracle.

Marriage is such a pedestrian affair we take the miracle of it for granted. While movies are filmed about young love, novels are penned about forbidden love, and songs are composed about heart-breaking love, millions of marriages quietly testify to the steadfast, enduring, rock-solid persistence of God’s love for His church.

Many of us have reached that empty-hearted place and faced the temptation to abandon what seemed like a dry, cold jar of what was once a promising elixir of love. When we run out of love, the world says it’s time to move on. Don’t be fooled by those of us who have been married for decades. It hasn’t all been wine and roses. Sometimes it was wine glasses hurled at bedroom walls and fingers dripping blood from thorns.

We know from the wedding at Cana, though, that when the wine runs dry, there is a source for better wine. Running out of love becomes, then, a gift, a nexus between us and the love that excels above all others.

The world truly does need love now, right now, but we need a better love than what we can muster of our own making. Can you get love from a stone? The answer is yes. If that stone is in the hands of Jesus, you can get a better love than you even imagined at first, a love that will fill you with such joy that all of life becomes an eternal celebration.

What the world needs now is better wine https://t.co/lSfqEaV9SE a higher love is available #whattheworldneedsnow#amwriting#FaithOverFear

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 21, 2016

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Christians Should Stop Lying to People

We need to stop lying to people. Maybe it will help if we stop lying to ourselves.

We say all the time that people will find answers in Jesus Christ. That’s only partially true. I’ve followed Jesus for over fifty years and I have some answers to some questions but at times of great personal or public tragedy, even mature followers of Jesus struggle to endure. Answers pale when babies die, the innocent suffer, or terrorists strike close to home.

We cannot treat a relationship with Jesus like an answer key to life’s multiple-choice quiz. It’s not like that. We aren’t meant to be satisfied with answers anymore than an astronaut is meant to be content with a visit to the planetarium. Jesus didn’t die to supply us with answers and answers aren’t the panacea they’re made out to be, after all.

The Internet is writhing with answers in the wake of recent events. There’s a market for quick answers and so, of course, there are those ready to meet the demand. But, as we consume these McTruths, we’re left less satisfied than we imagined we would be, even when they contain some element of biblical reasoning.

We cannot reason ourselves through suffering and pain. Answers don’t comfort us when evil plots our destruction, when a beautiful voice is silenced too soon, a baby is stolen from this life in a heartbeat, or fifty souls depart this world in a spray of premeditated rage. When darkness descends, we don’t need answers, we need light.

Stop telling people they need to seek answers. Stop trying to supply them. Instead, encourage them to let their questions drive them to the waiting arms of the risen Christ. He has more than answers. Answers are the appetizer to the feast prepared at His table. Jesus has life, light, truth, and eternal salvation. He is the remedy. He is the balm. He is the One we seek. He is like no other god.

Little gods. Inferior idols. Lesser deities. Ineffective objects of worship abound. In the wake of tragedy, we learn what our gods are made of and we have an opportunity to re-evaluate our allegiance. Most dangerous is when we worship ourselves, when we imagine that humans can provide our own salvation.

It’s been with us since the garden, the desire to deify ourselves, to create little kingdoms over which we rule, to control people, circumstances, and even the greater God. You must admit, we are pretty cool. Humans have amazing capabilities and tremendous achievements. Sometimes, I want to worship us, too.

We’ve all felt the draw, haven’t we? In the presence of a great leader, artist, musician, healer, or beauty, our hard-wired bent toward worship triggers the static, ratchet alarm of a Geiger counter detecting the source of a possible target of our devotion and without the warning of God’s word, we might just bow down to our own reflection.

I get it. In my lesser moments, I want to be worshiped, too. I’m a recovering glory stealer. That’s often, admittedly, why I stand so close to God – for the hope, perchance, that some of the admiration aimed at Him might fall on me. But, as amazing as we are in our moments of greatness – the heights of our arias, the pinnacles of our careers, the tops of our game, the firsts in our fields, it’s easy enough to draw back the curtain and expose the Oz of our existence simply by turning on the evening news.

Countries invade weaker nations. Meth-head parents leave their children to wander alone, hungry and cold, in the woods. Murder-suicide among the rich. Sex-trafficking among the poor. And us, the little gods, lacking for answers within ourselves. No match for the problems we create, never mind for systemic woes or catastrophes of nature.

The headlines remind us there is much we cannot control. We lie to ourselves and say there are always steps we can take. Sometimes there are but often, despite every effort, evil marches walks right into our sanctuaries –  those places we feel most safe –  churches, homes, nightclubs, concerts, theme parks – and drags us under into a dark cave where we cannot breath. To the place where we are aware of our need for rescue.

We are so small. And yet, He has designed us for a greatness of our own when we align in proper relationship to Him. Then, we are amazing; we just aren’t gods. When the people united to build the Tower of Babel, they had the right goal – they wanted to reach heaven. God divided them, foiling their efforts, because they wrote Him out of the equation. His message to them? You were designed for heroic undertakings, you were intended to reach Heaven but it matters how you get there. The path to Heaven is through Jesus. He is Life. He is Light. He is the Way.

The airwaves buzz with answers this week. Talking heads and politicians claiming to have the answers that will be humanity’s salvation. And a the darkness whispers – “Yes, keep the people searching for answers. Promise them answers in this back alley over here. No, maybe, they’re in that palace or that courthouse or that boardroom or that voting booth. Keep looking for answers.”

And too often, the church joins in but we have to stop. Because the truth is, not only do we not have answers, answers aren’t really what people need. What we have is Life. Light. Salvation. Truth. What people need is Jesus. He is the Only One who can save us from our lesser gods.

Handing someone locked in darkness an answer just makes them a person with an answer in the dark. How much better would it be to call them out into the light?

Christians should stop lying to people https://t.co/8jK2AtIGOA#ChristinaGrimmie#OrlandoAlligator#OrlandoNightclubShooting#amwriting

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 16, 2016

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Accounting for Lifeblood Shed in Orlando

The news greets you on your phone only seconds after you silence the alarm. It’s the notifications you see. So many from the Associated Press you know there’s been an incident.

Your first thought is where? Mentally, you locate your people.

You disregard the number, twenty dead and forty-three wounded because it’s a first count, sure to grow. You think to yourself that by now you know the drill and that, alone, makes you sad. Orlando. Night club. Gay community. Possible terrorist connection. You place the phone back on the stand and close your eyes against the week you already see forming.

Through the window, you spy a lovely summer day. The wind moves the leaves in trees that are still untouched by ravenous caterpillars and the light dances through them. Birdsongs fill the air and you think somewhere children laugh, couples dance, and seniors rock on porches listening to the fiddle or guitar. But elsewhere phones are ringing and there are knocks on doors followed by weeping, gathering, and more weeping as loved ones hear that the child they raised or the one they loved or the friend they cherished or the sibling they wrestled are among the bodies left on the night club floor. Throughout the day, numbers will become names will become someone’s sorrow.

And the death toll rises as you shower and dress for worship. Fifty souls. Someone brings Orlando up at prayer time and those wise enough to avoid the news until now are quietly informed. There’s a familiarity in the prayer, a sense of deja vous, a hint of futility you immediately renounce. Is your love growing cold? Not if you can help it. Not if Christ provides the warmth, the heat, the fire, but it’s tempting, isn’t it, to imagine not feeling anything at these tragedies any longer? Tempting and terrifying all at once. Lord, deliver us from callousness.

You run a diagnostic check on your soul. Are you saddened for those who’ve died? Yes. Are you moved by the numbers, the reports, the plight of the first responders, the survivors? Yes, but it’s becoming too commonplace. You’re not as moved as the first time shots were fired. How many shooters does it take to numb you completely? A warning light flashes on your emotional dashboard – it may be time for a tune up.

At home, the talking heads are saying what they always say and the shooting has multiple graphics on social media before lunch is through. It’s a record number who have died in an election year, no less, while you were listening to the children sing their Bible songs today, so you brace for an explosion of coverage and whisper a prayer against those who see that number now as a bar to surpass.

The President speaks and it’s the same speech – Paris, Newtown, San Bernardino. You could recite it now. And there is caution from some quarters and war cries from others and you tread water in the middle thinking that hate is hate is hate no matter the source. Even the news casters sound jaded – comparing the first eye witness reports to other shootings and exercising caution – we know from the recent past to check facts, to let initial emotions crash on the shore of social media like a first wave, to wait because these things take time to confirm. And you wonder, again, if it’s useful to assign massacres beautiful memes or photo filters on Facebook. If someone guns down my loved one, I don’t want the incident to have a logo or a theme song.

And watching the news coverage, you do feel something – disgust at those who pounce on these deaths to promote their political or religious agenda, their social plans. If you ruled the world, there would be twenty-four hours of silence. The line between life and death is a holy portal. You remember being in the room the day your cat breathed her last and even that felt like the holiest of transactions – a final breath. When fifty souls leave the planet in one bloody spray, we should all just shut up and simply listen to their souls cry out.

And you have no answers. This won’t end. There will be more. The numbers will rise. The dragon knows his time is short and will spare no avenue to wreak destruction on the earth. So, you do what you know to do – you lean on Jesus, you press into His great heart, you read His word, you mention the names of those who mourn in prayer, you tune into His presence as you watch the footage of body bags and flashing lights and still photos of the shooter.

Suddenly you wonder if fear truly is your greatest enemy. Hardness of heart, cold love, numb cynicism and callous apathy appear on your soul’s horizon and you think there are ways to die even if your heart keeps beating. Jesus, show me how to stay alive in a world intent on killing our souls, you pray. Resurrect the lesions that appear on my spirit with each new massacre. Do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from evil, from apathy, from dead air in our souls.

Now is a time to mourn. God will demand an accounting for each soul who fell in the early morning hours. “And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man.” Genesis 9:5 This is a surety. They did not die unnoticed, unwitnessed, unseen by the One True God. You know this as you know your own name because He has promised it in His Word. “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.” Matthew 10:28-30

Jesus saw them fall. Each one. He knows their names before they appear on the victim’s website. He heard their last heart beats, their thoughts, their cries, their prayers.

He will hold our hearts and restore the hard places in our souls, loved ones, if we bring Him this pain or this numbness whichever rises first to the surface of our prayers. Deliver us from evil, from cold hearts, from fear, and from falling prey to the evil one no matter which way he comes for our souls.

God bless those who mourn and God bless those who grow weary of these violent days. He can make us able to stand even as we weep with those who mourn. Jesus reigns and He will have the final word.

Accounting for Lifeblood Shed in Orlando https://t.co/JZz2GvKWC6 God will have the final word. #Orlando #PulseNighClubShooting #Jesus

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 12, 2016

Trying to Tone Down Jesus

I gave Him the once over.

Me:     “Okay, fine. You can come with me when I meet these people for dinner but you need to wear clothes designed in this century – something simple like jeans and a T-shirt. And, I don’t know, can you handle a hat?”

J:         “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”

Me:     “Nothing. I mean, I like it, but that’s me. It’s a little dated, that’s all.”

J:         “Are your friends into fashion?”

Me:     “No, I just want them to like you and it will help if you show up looking like you fit in. Why make your clothes a stumbling block? Is it that big a deal to wear something more culturally relevant?”

J:         “Not at all. I’d be happy to update the wardrobe.”

Me:     “Good, and, okay, don’t get offended but . . .”

J:         “Something else?”

Me:     “I’m just hoping that you’ll stick to positive topics – you know, nothing too controversial.”

J:         “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Me:     “Well, you know how you are. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like you. I love you, even, and I’ve gotten accustomed to the range of topics you expound on at the drop of a hat. I even agree with you on most things, you know that.”

J:         “Then, I don’t see the problem.”

Me:     “Look, I’m not asking you not to be you, just tone it down a little until my friends get to know you better. Is there anything wrong with that?”

J:         “How fragile are these people?”

Me:     “They’re not fragile, they’re just sensitive about some things and you can be, well, sort of, offensive.”

J:         “Offensive?”

Me:     “That’s the wrong word. Not offensive, just, unconcerned with people’s opinions of you.”

J:         “We’ve been over this. I’m not concerned what people think of me.”

Me:    “I know that, and it’s something I love about you but I do care what people think of me.”

J:         “Fine, then you avoid controversial subjects but I’m going to talk about whatever comes to mind.”

Me:     “There you go again. I thought we were friends. Look, you know your business but I know this group of people and you’re not going to get anywhere with them by jumping into touchy topics. Just trust me on this.”

J:         “Funny you should mention trust.”

Me:     “And, there’s one more thing.”

J:         “I can’t wait to hear it.”

Me:     “Just for this little meeting, I’m going to stick with your title. No need to get all caught up in calling you by your first name.”

J:         “My name is an issue.”

Me:     “You know it is. I don’t know why but there’s just something about that name.”

J:         “There certainly is.”

Me:     “Well, there’s nothing wrong with calling you by your title, right? Or your generic name. Or whatever. I mean, you know who I’m talking about even if I just refer to you as God, or Lord, or Messiah, right? That’s what’s important.”

J:         “So, you think your friends don’t want to hear you say Jesus?”

Me:     “I knew you’d understand.”

J:         “But I don’t.”

Me:     “Seriously, you understand everything. You know that people stay calm and accepting if I refer to you as God or the Lord but as soon as I say the name, Jesus, it escalates everyone’s comfort level.”

J:         “I don’t have as much problem with that as you do.”

Me:     “Right, so, can you just do this for me, friend?”

J:         “No.”

Me:     “Just like that. No.”

J:         “Just like that. If we’re best friends and you love me and you want me to go with you then I am who I am and anything you do to try to hide that or tone it down is just plain disrespectful and unloving.”

Me:     “I don’t want to be that way, I just . . .”

J:         “You just care what other people think.”

Me:     “About you.”

J:         “You mean, about you.”

Me:     “Fine. Yeah. I care what they think about me. I wish I was more like you.”

J:         “Now, we’re talking. I can make that happen.”

Me:     “How?”

J:         “Take me with you everywhere you go and let me be exactly who I am.”

Me:     “That sounds really scary.”

J:         “It is, for you. But don’t worry. I’ll be right there. ”

Me:   “So, I’m sorry about before. Forgive me?”

J:      “Forever and ever. Let’s go meet these people. Wait a minute – is that seriously what you’re wearing?”

**For this weekend only, it’s Christmas in June! My publisher  has made Red Pen Redemption FREE on Kindle! Be sure to drop on over to Amazon and download your free copy or gift it to a friend. I’d love to hear your reaction on Amazon when you’re through. Be warned, though, Helen Bancroft is not a sweet woman and Red Pen Redemption is not a sweet story – but it just may change your view of your entire history.

Trying to Tone Down Jesus https://t.co/21BfNuSwA4 #politicallycorrect #amwriting #Jesus What happens when we try to get Jesus to behave?

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 11, 2016

Act NOW! This is Not a Drill.

All the best illusionists know it’s vital to divert the crowd’s attention – to distract, disconcert, obfuscate, lead astray. When attempting to determine a magician’s trick, the real trick is not to look where he is directing your attention. All grifters, cons, scammers, and frauds work on a similar platform. Flash engaging smile at the mark, gain attention, keep talking, win trust, rob ‘em blind.

This week on the news, an old widow wept for her treasured engagement ring purloined by two young men who offered to pave her drive. While one escorted her to the basement for a jug of water, the other stole her memories and her trust. And this was barely news, a footnote, a warning, a cautionary tale. Most viewers quietly blamed the weeping lady for not seeing through the crafty smiles, the kindness con.

But deceivers practice deception like Olympians practice salchows, shaving seconds off their turns, and sticking their landings. They devote themselves to their craft like crazed composers, starving artists, driven poets. The tail end of the most insidious scam is to leave victims blaming themselves. That’s the money shot, right? The audience shaking their heads at the target of the crime while a silent fan club forms for the scammer marveling at how he pulled it off and got away. The master magician quietly whispers, “Who do you want to be like the most? The foolish victim or the wise thief?”

We live in a deluge of deception, the age of the lovely lie, the savvy spin, the enticing evasion, the fair falsehood, the tale. Magicians are no longer confined to the stage at the Bellagio. What happens in Vegas no longer stays in Vegas but crops up in D.C. and the Heartland, and Rome. As if every world citizen was issued a beginner’s magic kit at birth, so only the strongest willed reject the urge to dabble in deceit.

So lost in a labyrinth of lies, are we, we cannot answer basic questions without polling our friends. Is it ever okay to molest the unconscious? Are unborn babies fully human? Is marriage a God-created mystery? Is gender a fraud or God’s design? Are there many roads that lead to God? Are all religions equal? Is Jesus the only way to salvation? Does the Christian God know how to love? We spend our days on social media or the lunchroom at work or before the barking screen and believe the lie that these are hard questions to answer. The moment we open His Word, we find they are not. To deter us from that, the talking heads squawk that there are experts in theology, Biblical scholars, and serious, serious Christians who’ll testify that no one can understand the Bible, that there are no clear answers, that it’s all a mystery.

They lie.

They believe a lie and they perpetuate the lie. But you don’t have to trust me on this. You have a Bible. You can read the truth yourself. You’re no fool. You made it through elementary school, you navigated the channel menu on your television, and you figured out how to file your taxes. You can read a story, a parable, a book of history, or a letter to a church and understand the words. Besides, it isn’t just any book. God guides those who ask. And there are helpers. Sound teachers. Reasoned apologists. Intelligent, scientific followers of Jesus. I’m not saying every answer is simple but there is more we can know for sure than the deceivers will concede in their soundbites.

Now is the time. This idea that someday you’re going to get to know God or that eventually you’ll spend time reading the Bible or that at some point you’ll go deeper in understanding your own faith is part of the delusion being pumped into the oxygen with the slight calming scent of lavender. Now. We need to know Him now. We need to read the Bible now. We need to understand what we believe now.

While the greatest show on earth is playing out on center stage in our living rooms every night and the circus master directs our attention to the distraction, events that will actually determine our futures are occurring in obscure places – quietly, subtly, like a noxious undetectable gas piped in through well-disguised vents. Like the second thief who stole the lady blind while she chatted merrily with the young man who was so helpful to retrieve water from her basement.

Social engineers introducing legislation making our thoughts and words a crime, censoring the expression of our beliefs on Facebook, outlawing them in our children’s schools. Dictators quietly imprisoning our brothers and sisters in far off lands. Terrorists enslaving our beautiful daughters in countries with names we can’t pronounce. A public celebration of a resurrected false god, Baphomet, tolerated like Olympic entertainment in Switzerland at the opening of a tunnel – met with barely an outcry. Our faith a standard punchline on our own airwaves.

Now is the time, loved ones. It isn’t wise to join the deceivers. It is better to be that trusting old woman robbed of her jewels than the thieves who think they’ve gotten away. They haven’t. No one gets away in the end. You know how I know this? I read the Bible. I immerse myself in God’s Word. I put it into practice and dig in deep to understand the greater truths.

Now is the time to know what we know. To hunker down with what we believe. To prepare to withstand the tsunami of lies, the gathering storm, the coming day.

What is your plan? We worship a living God and He’s waiting to partner with you in this. To guide. To encourage. To reward. In June, read the gospel of Matthew, in July, read Mark and Luke. In August, tarry awhile in John and don’t stop. When you finish one gospel, read it again. Listen to it on CD. Talk about it with friends. If it raises questions, GOOD! Seek answers.

We know how to prepare for hurricanes. We don’t delay. We procure things. We secure things. We insure things. How much more should be attend now to our souls and minds before the whirlwind taking form on the horizon?

Don’t take my word for it. Don’t take anyone’s word for it. YOU have access to the words of the Living God. He invites you to experience His truth firsthand. Now, loved ones. Do it now.

Act now! This is not a drill! https://t.co/iPEy0NoKn1 #Baphomet #endtimes #amwriting #Bible

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 9, 2016

Discovering Freedom in All the Things You’re Not

Do you ever lose track of who you are?

It’s so easy to do. Pressure at work. Ministry demands. Family obligations. Creative urges. Financial concerns. And with summer here, we often connect with others who haven’t updated their vision of us in a long time, creating a whole new layer of dynamics.

It takes some of us years to understand the difference between laying down our lives and letting others yank them from us. We sometimes think being like Jesus means saying yes to every request for help or ministry, putting on patience and long-suffering like spiritual hospital scrubs, and meeting people’s expectations of what a Christian should be. We can be led to believe that losing ourselves in Christ means disappearing into other people’s needs, into other people’s ideas of what we are to be about in this life.

We forget that Jesus was a disappointment to many people. That’s right. Jesus wasn’t the Messiah many expected. To a lot of Israelites, He was a letdown. Still, that didn’t make Him change course. Jesus knew who He was and, just as vitally, who He was not.

He is perfectly equipped, then, to help us see when we’re making sacrifices He hasn’t asked us to make. He never called us to be everything to everyone. Trying to be what we’re not saps energy from being what He did design us to be. Part of the secret of staying on course is knowing who we are in Him but the other part is knowing who we’re NOT.

In John 1, the apostle makes a point of telling us that John the Baptist was NOT the light but he came to bear witness to the light. Even in biblical times, it must have been easy to get lost in other people’s expectations. The crowds demanded that John identify himself. Imagine if the people following your ministry asked you if you are possibly the long-awaited Messiah, Elijah, or the Prophet, as they did John? That could be either a temptation for your ego or a goad to try to live up to their heady expectations.

John, though, is clear with himself and with them as to who he is not. He is not the Christ. He is not Elijah. He is not the Prophet. John’s calling was to be “a voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord’ as Isaiah the prophet said.” John 1:23 ESV

John understood a simple but profound truth. If a person is designed to be one thing, he or she is not designed to be another. As we embrace what we are not, we become freer to be who we are.

In the Body of Christ, a hand is designed to serve multiple functions, a heart to serve only one but where would the hand be without the beating heart? And if the hand tried to be a heart, how could the heart perform the functions of the hand? Each part needs to embrace its design and understand, also, what it is not called to do.

Maybe this is the season for you to ask God to help you know, not only who you are, but also who you are not. Many artists will tell you it’s just as vital to see where NOT to draw lines as it is to know where to draw them. They refer to it as “negative space.” That’s the area that surrounds an image. It helps define boundaries and bring balance to a work of art.

Imagine the relief of remembering we aren’t all called to do everything all the time for everyone. There is a holy security in knowing who you’re not. Some of us spend too much of our lives trying to live in our negative space but if we respected the boundaries God’s drawn around our design, we’d find ourselves in sharper focus.

Listen to that voice crying in the wilderness. Many are called to keep their heads about them while others are called to lose theirs for the sake of the kingdom. Because John knew who he was not, his voice still cries out to us today, even though he was one who lost his head.

What has Jesus not called you to be, loved one? The answer may just set you free.

I am so excited for you all to read my next book, Jesus and the Beanstalk (Overcoming Your Giants and Living a Fruitful Life) due to release September 20, 2016! It’s just around the corner. Soon, I’ll be able to share the first chapter but today, I’m thrilled for you to see the beautiful cover design! It’s available for preorder from online bookstores and the bookstore down the street from you! I think you’re going to love it and I know God has plans to use it to help many people unleash their giant-killing potential!

Discovering Freedom in All the Things You're Not https://t.co/DdPRsfzrIz #JohntheBaptist #amwriting #freedom #faith #calling

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 6, 2016

Do You Ever Act Like Adam?

Did you ever act like Adam? Find yourself hiding like great-grandma Eve? Probably not. Maybe I’m the only one.

Recently, I felt like something for five minutes. You know, I felt my potential. Glimpsed my worth.

Then, I read another woman’s blog and it was brilliant. God’s going to use her, not me. That was my thought – or the arrow, anyway, that struck it’s mark. Everything I am, she’s more. Plus, she has more followers. I can just tell. And then, I viewed her About Me page and, of course, she’s thin, so I believe God likes her more.

And I almost shared her post but instead, I crawled into some backroom of my soul and didn’t click. In refusing to make her bigger, I made myself smaller and not in the good way that John the Baptist said “I must become lesser so He becomes greater” but in the bad way that emerged when the disciples fought about who was greater.

Five minutes off a mountain top and I’m worried that the infinite God has a limited stash of grace and this stranger has been granted my portion. What’s wrong with me? Seriously, after a lifetime of following Jesus, What. Is. Wrong. With. Me?

The simple answer would appear to be insecurity but I’m not that insecure. I also have an enemy who whispers lies into my ears as I descend the mountain, makes my hands itch for golden calves and house idols as if they’ve ever been a part of my personal history. But that’s not the whole she-bang.

There’s also my greed. Yes, I want to serve God. Yes, I’m grateful for every life my words touch. Grateful, humbled, and in awe of God’s power. I’m also a glory thief. There, I said it. Sometimes I stand close to God, not for God, but so that some of His light will fall on me, make me visible, heal old wounds of not being seen by tap-dancing in His peripheral spotlight.

Recognizing this, I unload a dump truck of self-condemnation over my own head but God reminds me He baptized me once and I’ve no need to do it again – especially not in this self-stoning way. And I wonder why not long ago I was rocking along secure in Him and now I’m limping like a soldier returning from the front.

I try to hide from God in shame for my greed, ashamed of my weight because it’s a failing, ashamed of my failure to click that woman’s blog and expand her reach for fear it would erode my own. I huddle under the shrubbery of my shame fully expecting Him to find me and issue a scolding that will lead to repentance. How did I get here? A few extra pounds. A broken left foot. Sweltering heat. Weariness. Sin nature.

He catches me off guard. He’s waiting for me in the shrubs. He’s been expecting me to hide and He says, “This isn’t what you think. I’m not angry. I orchestrated this moment. I planned to ambush you on the way down this mountain. You’re more than this. You’re more than what you know to be true on the mountaintop. You’re more than how you feel when those pounds are gone. You’re more than the numbers on your blog. More than how well you stand when your bones are whole. Find your whole self in me. I’m calling you out. I’m calling you to me. Allow me alone to define you so mountaintop or valley, you will be sure-footed in the journey.

Come to me all you who are weary – of trying so hard, of never being enough, of always wanting more, of defending against the enemy’s drone, of limping, of dragging our broken selves around, of an envy ambush descending from the heights.

So, there under that broom tree, I cuddled up to God and agreed with His plan that I should strip off every false identity and find my whole self in Him and since I’d learned the obvious lesson, I figured there was no sense in retracing my steps and sharing that other writer’s blog – you know, because others would like her stuff better than mine. Then, I looked at Him and smiled because, of course, I had to share the blog but not as some sort of punishment or retribution or stale cracker lesson but as a raised fist to the enemy, as another step into my freedom, as a commitment to a greater story, as a step out of the boat.

He wants to show us things we can only see if our eyes are completely on Him. He wants us to color with hues we haven’t even imagined. To write stories we’ve lived well first. To silence the enemy not by plugging our ears but by taking His hand in front of the firing squad and whipping off the blindfold knowing the bullets cannot silence our voices even if they leave us bleeding in the square. He wants us to seek our definition in His dictionary, to look in His wallet and see our photos, find our first attempts to step into our true selves taped to His refrigerator.

I remember cruel words thrown like stones at the forming self of my youth – “What are you, trying to be something?” So I ask Him. Is that wrong? To want to be something?

The lie, He explains, is that I’m not something already. And when He wrestles false notions of myself from my hands, it’s only to free His original design. He doesn’t love us because of what we do. He doesn’t even love us because of what we are. He loves us because of what He is. That loves sees through, that love transforms, that love reveals, that love is the kindest, truest, most pure light. In that light, I shine, I am brilliant, I fluoresce.

Perhaps, I suggest, I should climb out of the shrubbery.

He smiles and stretches out His hand to me. “Let’s go read that writer’s blog and leave a comment to encourage her, “ He suggests.

Why not? I agree as I feel my soul expand.

In what shrubbery are you hiding, loved one?

Do you ever act like Adam? https://t.co/Hw0hEWNw2z #amwriting #Christian Are you hiding from who you really are? #found #freedom

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) June 1, 2016