the blue book is now available on amazon

Exciting News!  The Blue Book is now available on Amazon!  And not only that, but it also has a bunch of new content!  I've been working for the past year or so to write an opening reflection for each chapter and I'm really excited about the end result.  I hope you will be too.  So please spread the word.  Tell your friends that the strange blue devotional book that has always been so hard to find, is hard to find no more.

*Update: Thanks for the great response!  Glad to see the book still seems to be helpful to so many in making space to hear God's voice and know of his great affection.  Since the book has been released on Amazon I do, however, find that I miss the contact with many of you.  I miss hearing the stories of how God has used the book in your life or ministry.  So, if you have the time, I would love it if you would just leave your comments here, or drop by Amazon and give a review.  And, as always, feel free to email me with your Blue Book story if you'd like.  I love hearing them. Blessings, Jim

a question for the new year

“He was in the world, and thought the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.  He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.  Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” John 1:10-12)  

It all starts with recognizing.  So much of the spiritual life revolves around what we recognize and what we don’t.  We cannot receive someone (or something), if we do not first recognize that they are there.  And the receiving is vital to the believing and the becoming.

So maybe the question we should ask, as we come to the end of one year and the beginning of the next, is “What, O Lord, do you want us to recognize?”  How do we need to recognize what God has been up to over the year gone by, and how do we need to recognize what he wants to do in the year ahead?  How has God been at work within and around us?  What people or things or events brought us to life?  And what disrupted or disturbed us?  What dysfunctional patterns and habits need to be broken, and what godly habits and practices need to be cultivated?

For how can we ever hope to take God up on his constant invitation to a deeper, fuller, richer life, if we don’t stop and recognize, both the life we are currently living, and the life he longs to live in and through us?  So, let’s take some time over the next days and weeks to do just that.

grace and truth

grace and truth
are not contrary
but complimentary
not opposites
but two parts of
a beautiful whole
 
they must be held
together in union
to have their full
power and efficacy
 
grace without truth
is only pretense
a cheap nicety
civility at the expense
of substance and depth
 
while truth without grace
is merely brutality
disguised as goodness
a dangerous weapon
in the hands of a child
 
one without the other
is incomplete
both are essential
in order to live
the way we were
intended to

submission

If I’m totally honest, I have to admit that all too often I set the agenda and expect God to act accordingly.  But that’s not how life with Jesus works, just ask Joseph and Mary. (Luke 2:41-50) He is the one who plans the itinerary, not me.  I am called to follow him, not vice versa.  It’s funny how often I get that backwards.

simeon and anna

Of all the people in the temple that day, only two noticed.  What was it about Simeon and Anna that made them different?  Was it their age and wisdom?  Was it their experience, the fact that they had both seen a lot of life come and go?  Surely there were others in the temple that day who were the same age.  Or was it simply the fact that they were both watching and waiting?  They were both longing to see the consolation and redemption of God’s people.  They were not so wrapped up in their own needs and concerns that they failed to notice what was right before their eyes.  They were paying attention, while the rest of the world was not.  Somehow they were able to see the Savior wrapped in swaddling clothes.

O Lord, help us to be like Simeon and Anna.  Help us to live our lives with our eyes peeled for your arrival, within and among us.  Help us to not get so caught up in our own issues and agendas that we miss your coming, this day and every day.  For you are ever and always the God who comes.  Come, Lord Jesus!

light

the light shines

in the darkness

and the darkness

has not overcome it

has not

cannot

will not

do not be surprised

however

when darkness

puts up

a hell of a fight

just remember

that light wins

joy to the world

let every heart

prepare him room 

easier said than done

slow down

declutter

let go

make space

take time

prepare a place

pay attention

open the door

welcome him in

receive your king

joy to the world

“Let every heart prepare him room.”  The preparing of our hearts to receive our King is no easy matter; it is something that will take both thought and effort on our part.  It will not just happen on its own; we will need both intention and discretion.  There are things we will need to let go of and things we will need to hold on to.  It will mean having to say “no” to some people and things, in order to say “yes” to the One who comes and makes his dwelling among us.  It will take some decluttering and some rearranging.  It will take some sitting still and some being silent.  It will take the making of space and the taking of time.  It will take open hands and longing hearts.  After all, what good is the bringing of joy into our world, if the world is not paying attention?

out with the old

My Dear Child,

Why do you hold on so tightly to those old and familiar ways of being that stifle and limit and hinder my life within you?  Why do you refuse to let go of those old patterns and habits, in order that you might finally experience the newness and the life and the freedom I so desperately want for you?  You can’t have your cake and eat it too.  You can’t keep holding on to the old and expect to be able to receive the new.  Receiving requires open hands.  Thus, letting go is a prerequisite.

I know the old is warm and comfortable, but it has such a low ceiling.  Every attempt at life and growth and freedom will lead to you hitting your head on that which you are unwilling to part with.  I want so much more for you than that.  What are you so afraid of?  Just trust me.

Love,

Abba

a new thing

“See, I am doing a new thing!  Now it springs up, do you not perceive it?” (Isaiah 42:19) 

We live in a day and age when we are between the first and the second advents.  Meaning, we live at a time when God has come, God is continually coming, and God will come again.  The reason that’s significant is because we do not just sit idly by and wait for some distant day when God will finally arrive and make all things right and whole once again, we keep our eyes peeled and our hearts attentive to what God is doing here and now, both within us and among us.  Jesus told us himself that, “My Father is always at his work.” (John 5:17)  Thus, God is always coming into our lives and our world in new and beautiful ways, if only we have eyes to see it.  There is already a new thing that he is doing, our job is to perceive it, embrace it, and enter in to it.  This very day, God is saying, “I am here.  I am at work.  I am doing something new and beautiful within and among you.  Join me!”  God has come, God is coming, God will come—it’s the beauty of Advent.  

new things

When God talks about “making all things new,” (Rev. 21:5) he is not necessarily talking about new in time (neos), although that may be true as well, but new in quality (kainos).  That’s why he says, “I am making all things new,” rather than, “I am making all new things.”  It is a subtle, but significant difference.  And one that we would do well to pay attention to. 

For if we take “the old is gone and the new (kainos) has come” (2 Cor. 5:17) in the quantitative (neos) sense, we will have the wrong idea about what is really happening.  We will be looking outside ourselves, rather than looking within.  We will be expecting something to come out of the blue, rather than something to grow deep in the soil of our soul.  

But if we take this newness in the qualitative (kainos) sense, we are much more likely to be able to see what God is really up to, and embrace it.  God is making us qualitatively different; not from the outside in, but from the inside out.  That's how the life of the Spirit works.  And I, for one, am so grateful.  There is something really beautiful about a God who cares about the quality of my life.  A God who is constantly forming new things in me that are more beautiful than I could ever imagine or dream about.

zechariah's prayer

luke 1:67-79

my son

my dear one

how long i have waited

for the day of your arrival

and even now

on the very day 

of your birth

i must already

begin to learn

how to let you go

for you do not belong to me

but to the one who formed

and made you

the one who

dreamt you into being

the one for whom

you must

even now

begin to prepare the way

so my job

as your dad

is not to hold onto you

but to let you go

and to allow you to become

all that he made you to be

what's it going to take

luke 1:18-19

what’s it going to take

for you to fully believe

that what I say about you

is really true

i sent angels

i performed miracles

i spoke through prophets

i even sent my son

what more can i do

O Lord, forgive me when I allow life’s circumstances to make me doubt the goodness of your heart.  Forgive me when I let the voices around me and within me determine my value and my worth, rather than your unfailing love.  O Lord, what’s it going to take for me to really believe that what you say is really true?  Lord, have mercy.  Amen.

she said yes

“I am the Lord’s servant.  May it be to me as you have said.” (Luke 1:38)  

So God came to a teenage girl and asked her to do what was unimaginable.  And low and behold, she said, “Yes!”  From that moment on, everything about her life was totally out of her control.  She placed herself completely in God’s hands.  And in the days and years that followed, that pattern would continually repeat itself; Mary’s big yes to God, would be followed by a million other yeses.  Each and every day she would be asked to surrender and to trust.

That’s the way life with God works.  He comes to us, asks for our yes, and then the rest of our lives is simply a matter of trust and surrender.  We do not get to dictate or control what our yes means.  We do not get to determine the terms and conditions of our yes.  Yes simply means yes.  We are his servants, not he ours.

So listen carefully.  God is asking for a yes from you and me as well.  What will our answer be?

O Lord, give me the strength and the grace and the courage to say yes to you today, whatever you may be asking.  Amen.

emmanuel

most often you come

in ways few would notice

not high and holy

but meek and lowly

a stable

a manger

a star

a teenage girl

small and quiet

hidden and lowly

humble and obscure

as if you wanted

to slip into your world

unnoticed

except by those

paying careful

attention

made perfect

heb. 2:10

what was it

about suffering

that made you perfect

for they seem

such odd bedfellows

yet in you the two

became one

was there something

in the lowering

and the emptying

and the taking on

of our flesh

that was necessary

for your becoming

or was it merely

the truest expression

of who you really are

was it something

about the sharing

of our humanity

that made you perfect

a desired union that

only shared suffering

could accomplish

whatever the case

if you were made

perfect through suffering

how could we expect it

to be any different

for each of  us

help us to accept

your invitation

to allow suffering

to do its work

in our hearts

and souls as well

return

mark 13:32-37

when i return

what condition

will my house be in

will you be

running around

picking clothes

up off the floor

quickly trying

to do the dishes

or fix the broken

shutters

frantically stuffing things

into closets

and underneath

the beds

or will you be ready

for my return

because all along

you lived as if 

today were the day

bridegroom

     matt. 25:6

will you be ready

when i come to you

today

for i am always

coming

will you have oil

for you lamp

will you be awake

and alert

will you come

out to meet me

or will you be

so consumed

by your own

issues and agendas

that you miss me

completely

light

you come

into our darkness

and we are finally

able to see

you illumine

and you uncover

you reveal

and you expose

by you we see

all that is beautiful

and all that is terrible

and we are invited

to become like you