Daily Readings at Southeast

Victory in the Wilderness The wilderness is a place we visit, not our ultimate destination. If handled correctly, you will experience victory in the wilderness. As a youth pastor in the late 1980s, I’d been in my passion-drained wilderness for what seemed to me way too long. I was beginning to wonder if  any  change would come to my struggle.  Shortly before trouble began with my direct boss (who would try to discredit and fire me) and while I was in prayer one day, the Spirit of God revealed to me that change was coming. “You will be removed from being youth pastor,” He said, “and I will send you to churches and cities from the east coast to the west coast of America; from the Canadian border to the Mexican border; to Alaska and Hawaii . . .” I told Lisa what I’d heard from the Spirit, and the two of us pondered all of this in our hearts. We didn’t share it with anyone else (except for a pastor in a different state). God had said He would do it, and I knew that if it was...

Spring Up, O Well! I recall several instances in dry seasons when I would try to pray and found it difficult to get a refreshing drink of living water. One such time, I took my tent to a state park for a time of prayer and fasting. That night I prayed, then I read, then I began to sing songs of praise. I spent approximately three hours doing these things, and it seemed that I was getting nowhere. Nothing seemed fresh—I was as dry as could be. Very disappointed, I finally crawled in my sleeping bag and tried to sleep. During the night, it seemed as if all the demons were having a celebration—I didn’t sleep very well. I tossed and turned, wondering why God was not revealing Himself to me. The next morning, I went outdoors and began walking the paths of the state park, praying in the Spirit, but still feeling very dry. This went on for another hour and a half.  I finally looked up and said, “Lord, I guess I am in the wilderness.” My thoughts were,  I might as well go home and qui...

Spiritual Strength Training Obedience through tests, trials, and temptations develops your spiritual strength in a similar way to how physical strength is developed from weight lifting. If you’re able to lift a 145-pound spiritual challenge, but God has a plan or position that requires the capacity to lift 185 pounds of opposition, persecution, temptation, and trials, He won’t permit it—you’re just not strong enough. Instead, He will allow the training process to commence. He will permit—He won’t author—perhaps a 155-pound trial that will further test but not overwhelm you. For example, maybe somebody gossips about you and spreads a rumor. Instead of countering the attack by defending yourself and spreading gossip about that person, you, in obedience to God’s Word, choose to say nothing and bless instead. That’s great—you lifted the 155-pound test! Now it’s on to the next level—165 pounds.  If you continue to obey His Word through the permitted adversities, your training continues ...

The Gold Standard Several decades ago, when I was still a young man just beginning in ministry, the Lord showed me during a time of prayer that He was going to begin purifying my life. I got so excited, I told Lisa, “God is going to remove my impurities!” I proceeded to tell her all the undesirable things God would be removing. (She may have even added a few I had left off the list!) Then, for the next three months, nothing happened. As a matter of fact, things worsened in my life, and I was even more in need of purification. I went to the Lord and asked, “Why are my bad habits getting worse, not better?”  “Son,” He responded. “I said that  I  was going to purify you. You have been trying to do it in your own strength. Now I will do it  My  way.” I had no idea that I was about to move into my first wilderness journey and that it would last eighteen months. Please understand—God is not looking for an outward form of holiness. He wants an inward change of heart—fo...

A Positive Perspective A spiritual wilderness does not have to be a negative time if we are eager to obey God. I know this sounds counterintuitive, but the desert’s purpose is quite positive: to train, purify, strengthen, and prepare us for a new move of God’s Spirit, resulting in us becoming more fruitful.  Unknowingly, when entering the wilderness, many people panic and behave unwisely. Without understanding, they search for and do the wrong things. An example might be a radical change in career or changing from one church to another—any drastic move in their life that they think will bring instant happiness or restore what was normal. For a single person, it might be leaping toward a new relationship after the hurt of a painful breakup.  If you search for an escape route before understanding why God has you in a particularly dry situation, you unwittingly prolong your wilderness time. This may cause more hardship, frustration, and even defeat, because you don’t understand t...

Growing Pains The Christian life has some parallels to how a child grows.  When I had entered my first spiritual wilderness experience, it was as a spiritual infant. At the time I had a great natural example in front of me—my son Addison, who was about eighteen months old.  Lisa was a great mother, so when Addison whimpered, she was right there to care for him. In a flash he would be in her arms, enjoying the sustenance and comfort as he breastfed.  But then Addison, as does every child, needed to grow toward maturity. With all our boys—we have four—the time came when they needed to feed themselves. Oh my, what a mess—I’m sure you know what I mean! They try to eat, and half the food is all over the high chair and the floor.  During this time, children become frustrated with their parents because they aren’t spoon-fed like in the past. They whine and cry as you try to be a responsible parent. When our sons were flinging the food around, we wanted to jump in and take o...

Where Are You?  Have you ever had a time where it seemed like the Lord was so close that all you had to do was whisper His name and He was  right there  and answered  right then ? But then the time came when you left Him one message after another, and He seemed to have totally disappeared from your life. Maybe that’s where you are now and your question, which you want to shout in the stillness, is the cry of many who find themselves in a dry and difficult place: “God, where are You?!” I experienced my first wilderness season as a young believer while living in Dallas, Texas, during the early eighties. As I naïvely entered this barren season, I felt like I had been abandoned by God. Before this, all I had needed to do was cry out and the Lord would instantly respond. I remember Him quickly answering the most trivial of requests. His presence was so near, evident, and strong.  Now, I just could not figure out what was happening. I was on my knees, day after day, c...

“Grace for Both Sons” The older son was indignant after seeing his father’s actions. This older brother may have worked hard and faithfully tended the fields, but he was lost in his father’s house. There was no awakening. There was no honesty. There was no action. The truth is, he, too, was a prodigal son. He, too, had a heart that was far from the father. He too was lost, but he didn’t see it. Tim Keller puts it this way, “The bad son was lost in his badness, but the good son was lost in his goodness.” You may never have been to a Distant Country. You may have an impressive religious resume. You may have followed all the rules. You may have read this entire book thinking of all the people you know in the Distant Country who really need to hear it. But I wonder if you are the one Jesus has been talking to all along. Luckily, when the older brother was in the field, the father left the celebration and went out to him. He engaged the son directly. What does this tell us about God? God lo...

“ACTION – Time to Get Up” Action is where a lot of us get stuck. We know what needs to be done, we have stepped out onto the platform, but we just can’t move. It’s one thing to have the awakening and even to be honest about what we need to do. It’s another thing entirely to take the leap. In Luke 15:20 we read the simple phrase that changed the story of the Prodigal Son. Jesus simply said, “So he got up…” He took immediate action. He recognized that it was time to get up. It was time to do something. And unless our story reads, “So he got up,” or “So she got up,” then nothing really changes. This is where AHA stalls out for so many of us. We have an awakening moment, we even find the strength to be brutally honest, but we never get around to actually doing anything different. We spend much of our lives stuck between honesty and action. You might be reading this and thinking, “I agree with you, but I just don’t feel like doing anything about it.” It may sound a little cold, or perhaps a...

“HONESTY – Honesty that Brings Healing” Most Christians understand and accept the importance of being honest, both with themselves and with God. In 1 John, the Bible tells us that when we confess our sins to God, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The Bible also says that Jesus took the punishment we deserve upon Himself when He died on the cross. Jesus died for my sins, so that when I confess them, God forgives them. Usually, we tell ourselves that it doesn’t have to go any further than that: “If I’m honest with myself and with God, that’s enough.” But AHA requires more. James 5:16 speaks of confessing our sins to one another and praying for one another “so that you may be healed.” When we are honest with God about our sins, He forgives us, but when we are honest with others, we find healing. What does “healing” mean? Well, the practice of confessing our sins to one another holds us accountable and helps us find the encouragement we...

“HONESTY - Talking to Myself” We see the second ingredient (Brutal Honesty) of AHA in Luke 15:17: “He said to himself…” There was no one else around. It was just him and the pigs. Sometimes the hardest conversation to have is the one you have with yourself. Brutal honesty begins when we look in the mirror and speak the truth about what we see. AHA requires you to tell the truth about yourself to yourself. The Prodigal Son was honest with himself about what he deserved. That kind of honesty is difficult. We’d prefer the awakening without the brutal honesty. Like the wife who wakes up to her critical spirit but refuses to say, “I have been wrong to be so negative. I know my husband needs my encouragement and support, but I’ve just complained and criticized.” Like the husband who realizes his sexual sin but refuses to say, “My pornography problem has created a wedge in my marriage and has hardened my heart toward my wife.” Avoiding brutal honesty will short-circuit lasting change. When th...

“AWAKENING – Erasing Famines” Recently I read about an experiment done by psychologist Jonathan Haidt. He came up with a fascinating hypothetical exercise, which went something like this: Participants were handed a summary of a person’s life and asked to read it over. Participants were then asked to imagine that the person was their daughter. This is her unavoidable life story. She hasn’t been born yet, but she will be soon, and this is where her life is headed. Participants then had five minutes to edit her story. Eraser in hand, they could eliminate whatever they wanted out of her life. The question for participants was: What do you erase first? Most of us would instinctively and frantically begin to erase the learning disability and the car accident and the financial challenges. We love our children and would want them to live a life without those hardships, pains, and setbacks. We would all prefer our children’s lives be free from pain and anguish. But ask yourself: Is that really ...

“AWAKENING - Coming To Your Senses” Often we miss the alarms sounding in our lives because we’re not sensitive to them. The soft harp alarm won’t do the job—it’s going to take the blaring alarm to wake us up. So instead of responding to the alarm early, we keep hitting snooze. The alarm grows louder and louder until eventually it is so unpleasant we can’t ignore it any longer. So we wake up, rub our eyes, look around to find the prodigal sons pigs surrounding us, and wonder how it came to this. Here’s my question for you: Are there alarms sounding in your life right now? In Scripture there are a number of examples of how God sounds the alarm. Often times the alarm sounds early on to wake us up before things have fallen apart. Sometimes people think they have to hit rock bottom before they come to their senses, but what if God is trying to wake you up right now to save you from heartbreak in the Distant Country later? 2 Chronicles 36:15 speaks of how God sounds the alarm to warn his peo...

“The Recipe for AHA” My wife has this cookbook at home, a gift from our wedding. It’s called “The Three Ingredients Cookbook.” She would want me to tell you that she doesn’t really use it. When she cooks, there’s typically more than three ingredients involved. The truth is that I am the one who uses “The Three Ingredients Cookbook.” On the rare occasions I’m allowed in the kitchen, this cookbook is my go-to cooking companion, because honestly, three ingredients is about my culinary capacity. One of the things I’ve learned the hard way is that when using The Three Ingredient Cookbook, all the ingredients are necessary—no, absolutely vital. This is the downside to The Three Ingredient Cookbook. You can’t cheat. If you only use two ingredients, it doesn’t work very well. The same is true for AHA experiences. I’ve listened to the AHA experiences of hundreds—if not thousands—of people over the years. I’ve studied numerous transformation experiences of key figures in the Bible. With striking...