Unshackled Moments ~ March 31 ~ Faith When Facing The Cross

Faith is not believing that God will make things work out the way that we want or would like. Faith is accepting and believing that God will turn any and every situation to good and will ultimately bring Him more glory and be better for us than anything we could devise ourselves. It is remembering that it is not about us but about Him, but that because of His great love for us, whatever He allows in our life will ultimately bring us closer to Him and make us more like Him if we cling to Him despite our circumstances, turn to Him rather than away when things get hard and scary, and align our will with His.

Lord, even when I face things that frighten me and look like disasters, help me follow Your example from the Garden of Gethsemane and say not my will but Yours be done. Help me to remember that Your plan is always good and better than my ideas, but that sometimes the pain of the cross must come before the victory of the resurrection.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 30 ~ Break The Chain! Ten People in Ten Minutes

There is a phenomena on social media that I have seen so often I almost don't notice it anymore, as I usually scroll on by without paying it any attention. But in the last few weeks I have been inundated with today's modern equivalent to the religious chain letter. Basically the messages are some variation of "God wants to bless you, and if you pass this on to ten people in the next ten minutes He'll do something good for you." Some actually say that God will do us a favor if we'll show we're not ashamed of Him and post, and the worst include a negative consequence for breaking the chain.

Part of me feels like what's the big deal? Why even be concerned about this or address it? In a way it's encouraging, because the folks extending the chains have a desire to be blessed by God, and that's awesome! There's an understanding that God desires to bless us, and that's a good thing. But living an Unshackled Life is about breaking chains that keep us from relationship with the Father.

Wait, how is this preventing relationship? These chains play into the deception that the enemy wants us to believe, the untruth that in order to "get in good" with God we have to earn His acceptance and blessing. There is nothing you can do to make God love you any more than He already does. You can not earn His grace or favor. It's a gift. He is a friend, closer than a brother, who already did the biggest favor for all of us by dying for us. He doesn't want you to try to earn your way to Him, because He's already done it. He wants us to realize that we can come into His presence empty handed, like with a best friend.

We give Him all of us, and He gives us Him. Yeah, it's not close to a fair trade for Him. He's worth so much more than all of me comes close to, but that's what He wants. There's no ritual, no rite, no chain post, not going to church, not praying x amount every day that makes us OK, that qualifies us for favors from God, that earns us His attention. All He wants from us is us. He wants us to surrender our hearts, not just a part but the whole of it.

And when we surrender our self and will to Him, He brings us to Him, forgives us, blesses us with adoption, with relationship with the Creator of all, with purpose, peace and joy. We have all the grace needed to have relationship with and to walk with Him. So, surrender self to Him and give Him your will, and He will bless you! This is truth! God loves you as you are, not as you should be! You don't have to jump through hoops to make Him smile! All you have to do is want Him! How amazing is that?!

If you pass this on to ten people in the next ten minutes something good may or may not happen....you might help break someone else's chains and help them see that they are free to go to Jesus without performing tasks or accomplishing any feats of service. This isn't Greek mythology or a fantasy quest. There are no feats of strength or acts of loyalty that gain us an audience or show wer're worthy of being helped. It's life, and God's already done everything necessary for us to be blessed and have relationship with Him!

Unshackled Moments ~ March 29 ~ Where Were You God?!

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

Matthew 27:46

For·sak·en (fərˌsākən) ~ past participle of forsake: abandon, cast aside, desert, disavow,  discard, disclaim, disown, drop, jilt, leave, leave high and dry, leave in the lurch, leave stranded, renounce, throw over, turn one's back on, walk out on, wash one's hands of.

Why?! God where are You!? Where were You!? How could You allow.....?! It hurts to feel forsaken, to feel like God Himself has rejected us and left us hanging. It makes us angry and confused. We've all been there. Even Jesus felt it. The most agonizing part of His death for you and me was not the stripes on His back or the nails through His body into the wood. It was the first and only time He felt the Father turn His back and leave Jesus alone, to literally leave Jesus hanging.

After C. S. Lewis lost his wife to cancer, he called out to God for comfort but sensed no reply. Confused, he asked, "What can this mean? Why is He so present a commander in our time of prosperity and so very absent a help in time of trouble?"

When the unthinkable happens, when evil things happen to good  people we cry out for help to an all powerful God. And when we've cried out with everything we have, with everything we are and the innocent child still dies, the accident victim never wakes, the disease slowly but surely wins, the rape is not stopped, the drought continues and the crops wither, the flood still takes the home, we are overwhelmed by the pain and the feeling of being forsaken.

We know that we are not perfect, but if we had the power to stop it, to fix it, if we were all powerful we would never allow such a thing. So if God is good how could He let this happen? We can't imagine sitting back and letting the innocent and good people suffer and die without doing something. And neither can God. He looked across time and saw every hurt, devastation and evil that would be done to me and every evil I would do and decided to do something about it. Out of perfect and unselfish love He determined to come, to become human like me, like you, and to suffer an excruciating death and to even feel forsaken for our sake. Jesus was abandoned by everyone, including the Father, when He never came close to deserving it, because He loves us.

He made a way to fix the problem of evil that was a an unfortunate byproduct of the free will necessary for true relationship.  Jesus experienced truly being abandoned by the Father while He was on the cross so that when we feel isolated and forsaken we can run to God. He wants to heal our hurts and comfort our heart I can't explain why He doesn't always remove or repair the situations we face on this side of heaven, but I know from experience that if we go to Him rather than away, He is there to wrap His arms around us and hold us while we cry. He is there to comfort and love. We can grow closer to Him and discover His goodness and love in the aftermath of evil in a way that we can never know otherwise.

Abba, help me to run to You rather than away from You. Help me to remember that feeling abandoned doesn't mean that I have been. Jesus was abandoned so that I don't ever have to be, regardless of what it feels like. Be my comfort and my strength in face of fear and pain. Show me Your love and draw me to You, even when my anger and confusion make it hard to trust. I choose to believe that truth that You are good and that You care despite what I may sometimes feel. As I do this, heal my hurt, remove my anger and help me to see and experience the truth of Your goodness and love.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 28 ~ Be Like The Lad

“There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two small fish, but what are they among so many?” Then Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had given thanks He distributed them to the disciples, and the disciples to those sitting down; and likewise of the fish, as much as they wanted.

John 6:9-12

There was a lad who had a sack lunch, some bread and a couple of small fish. There wasn't much there. Perhaps it was enough food to fill the boy up, perhaps not, but it wasn't enough to be sharing and still have enough to eat. And there was a need. Five thousand men, and countless women and children were hungry and in need of food. The disciples asked Jesus what was this little lunch worth in the face of such a great need. It's a logical and understandable question. The lunch was all the boy had, and how easy it would've been for the boy to say, this can't help much so I should keep it, and at least that way I won't be hungry. I don't have enough to help so I won't do anything. But instead he gave it all to Christ. The little he had he did not hold back, and as a result, everyone got fed, and there were left overs. God loves to give, and when we give without holding back, He always does something amazing with it.

Lord, I want You to do something amazing with and in my life. Help me to be like the lad who held nothing back. Let me not feel overwhelmed by the need that I am powerless to provide for but rather to trust that no problem is beyond the solution of Your power. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 27 ~ Waiting For Power

Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.

Luke 24:49

The disciples had spent three years walking with Jesus, being taught by Him and seeing His miraculous work. They had been there, and fled, when it appeared all was lost, but had seen the power and plan of God overcome everything as Christ returned from the grave. They spent time with Jesus after the resurrection.

After the resurrection they had the greatest understanding of all the teachings of Christ that they'd ever had. The knew the prophecies regarding the Messiah had come true. They were inspired and excited to follow God and grateful for the access to the Father they had now that they'd been forgiven and the veil  had been torn. But even with the emotional boost that came from seeing and spending time with the Risen Lord and all the training and knowledge they had, they couldn't walk it on their own. Jesus told  them to wait for the power of the Holy Spirit.

No matter how close we are to God, no matter how much we have learned and understand about spiritual truth, no matter how grateful and excited we are about God's grace, we still can't walk with God, do what's right or walk in freedom on our own power. Each day we need to wait on the power of the Spirit. It's by His power that we can overcome, walk free and live in right relationship with our Creator. That's why we need to start each day by seeking God. That's why we need to begin anew every day with the understanding that we need His help to manage and control our lives. His power is what makes us clean and gives us the ability to live in a manner worthy of the calling to walk with Jesus.

Abba, help me to always remember that know matter how much I learn and grow in relationship  with You that it will never be me that is able to please You, but rather my surrender and submission to Your power within me. Help me to start each day in Your power so that I can live it throughout the day and end the day as close or closer to You than it began. Amen.

The Judas In All Of Us

Dalyn Woodard shares his thoughts on the "Villain of Villains," Judas, and what we can learn from him and the ways we often act like him. The message, "The Judas In All Of Us," is about 35 minutes long and was recorded at Nacogdoches Christian Fellowship on Wednesday, March 25, 2015. It's our prayer that you are blessed and ministered to as you listen. May God bless and keep you.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 26 ~ The Riding Tip

I've ridden motorcycles for years. I love to ride. After spending 7.5 years in prison, one of the things that I did as quickly as possible upon my release was to buy another motorcycle. It felt great to be back on the road with the wind on my face and two wheels underneath me. It seemed to all come back. They say you never forget how to ride a bike, and I took that to mean motorcycles as well as bicycles.

After riding for a couple of years without a license I decided to get legal. Even though I had had a motorcycle license for years before my incarceration, because of the way that the laws had changed I had to take a training course to get my license. I passed the course easily, and nothing changed with my riding other than I was finally legal. Still, despite all the riding I did and the refresher course, something felt off.

For some reason for the past 5 years or so I have felt uncomfortable on curves in a way that I don't remember ever feeling insecure in the years I rode before my almost decade long break from the road. I chalked the feeling up to having a bike that didn't handle as well as my old one, a windshield that acts a bit like a sail, and actually caring whether or not I live or die now. After my wreck a couple of years ago, the feeling grew worse. I once loved snaking back roads, but I had learned to dread them.

Yesterday, as I road home from work, I met another rider on a curve. He was flying and  had his bike leaned over to the point where the pegs nearly scraped the pavement. We waved at each other as we met and continued on our way. A casual encounter that lasted only a second or two changed everything for me. I noticed his body position in the middle of that vicious curve. Suddenly I realized that I had been riding through those curves out of position, and that caused me to be and feel slightly off-balance. I rode in a position that logically seemed safer, but in reality was more dangerous and caused me to have to go much slower in curves in order to stay in my lane and on the road.

On the next curve, I shifted my body into the position that I had seen the other rider in. As I did, it felt so right. I thought, "How did I forget this? How come I never regained this habit in all these years I have been riding again?" I felt stable and secure. I entered the curve and felt the bike hug the road like my old bike did. I accelerated out of the curve and nearly shouted for joy. It felt so good to be back. The ride home was much more enjoyable and yet safer from that moment on. I felt a peace in turns that I haven't had in what seems like forever.

I once knew this little trick of body position to make curves safer, but when I stopped riding for a while I lost the habit. When I returned to riding I knew something wasn't right, but I was unable to diagnose the problem or remember on my own. The teaching I heard didn't help. The safety course didn't change anything. A brief encounter with another rider who was doing it right wordlessly corrected 5 years of incorrect body position and brought to remembrance truth I once knew but had forgotten.

We can be like that rider I met in the curve. We need to worry less about saying the right thing and instead just make sure that we go through our day in the correct spiritual position. We can inspire and help someone just by meeting them on the road of life. We might never know. But staying in position with God could help someone get back where they need to be, help them get to a place of security in God and, maybe, even save their life.

Abba, help me to stay in position with You. I never know when just passing by someone might be the encounter they need to help see the way to life and freedom in You. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 25 ~ Our Dangerous Power

Nothing hath separated us from God but our own will, or rather our own will is our separation from God.

 –William Law

The free exercise of free will formed the first rift between God and people, between Creator and creation. God wants real relationship with us, and the only way to have that is for us to have a real choice in whether we want to reciprocate His love for us or if we'd rather live our lives focused on ourselves. So, we have the choice to walk in and by the power of our own will, trying to please ourselves, living for ourselves and ignoring God's love and will for us. 

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. ~ Romans 8:35-39

When we surrender and accept God's acceptance of us, align our will with His, then nothing in our circumstances, nothing created on earth, nothing from hell, nothing that comes against us, can separate us from God. But we can, like the Prodigal Son, choose to turn and walk away, to follow the siren's call of our selfish will, and when we do that, we do something that no one else can do. We separate ourselves from God. We put the veil back together and restrict our ability to enter His presence and hear His voice and feel His love.

Abba, help me not to cut myself off from You. Don't let me separate myself from who You are and relationship with You. Keep me close to You as I go through this day submitting my will to Yours. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 24 ~ Wrestling In The Garden

You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.

Hebrews 12:4

Jesus, completely God and completely man, had a wrestling match with Himself in the Garden of Gethsemane. The part of Him that was all man felt the fear about what was soon to happen to Him. He wanted to find another way. He wanted to escape the cross. The anxiety, anguish and sorrow overwhelmed Him to the point that He felt like He was dying (Matthew 26). His Spirit, all God, knew that the plan and will of the Father was the only way. He wrestled with and defeated the temptation to do His own will (the will of the man part) instead of the Father's will. He settled the argument with surrender. "Not My will but Yours be done."

Jesus stood up after that time of prayer ready to face all that would come, starting in the next few minutes. He would be betrayed. Every friend who ever promised to have His back and ride with Him to hell and back ran away and deserted Him. One of His best friends would deny even knowing Him. He would be lied about, misquoted, and framed in a horrible farce of a trial. He would be beaten, mocked and crucified. Let the pain begin with a kiss, Jesus was ready. Why? because He resisted the will of His natural/fleshly self and surrendered to the will of the Father. 

It wasn't easy. In fact, this battle took so much out of Him that the stress caused blood vessels to burst, and Jesus sweated drops of blood. We can't do this. We're not capable. The author of Hebrews knew this to the point that even with the length of time it would take to deliver a letter he didn't fear writing that none of them had resisted sin and the flesh to the point of sweating blood. We just can't. We, on our own, will cave long before that point. But the Spirit that settled things at Gethsemane lives in us, and He is able to give us the power and strength to line our will up with God's. Once the will is surrendered, the battle is over, no matter what comes.

Abba, thank You for making it possible to walk with You. Thank You for giving us the power to surrender and the strength to obey, because without the added aspect of Your Spirit, I go running from the idea of Gethsemane in my life. Not only can I not resist to the point that Jesus did, the sweating of blood, I can't even go to the garden to try. Thank You for Your love for me. You are good. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 23 ~ Who Built This House?

God is the architect. I am the builder. –Unknown

I came across the above quote this morning, and I have to admit that at first glance it sounds pretty good. God is in charge of the plan, but we have to do our part, we do the work. But as good as this sounds, it's a little off from the right idea. This forgets the truth of my helplessness and powerlessness. I agree with the truth and idea that I have to do my part. I need to give everything I have and am to the process, but as a laborer at best. Carpenter's helper is probably a more accurate job description.

The builder still has some power over the process. The architect designs the house, but it's the builder who is charge of getting it done. The builder will make the day to day decisions as to how, when, where and more. The builder is actually the one in charge on the site, the one the workers know and see. I can't afford to give myself that kind of power and control over building the house of my life. I must remember that I am a lowly, unskilled laborer. I will place the board where the Architect and Builder say, cut it to the length He says, and place the nails where He wants. I don't make the choices, I just do as I'm told. Where I insert my knowledge and skill into the project is where the house gets a little off-square at best. I don't want that.

Psalm 127 tells us, "Unless the Lord builds the house, They labor in vain who build it."

Abba, help me to remember my place in the construction of my life. Let me not labor in vain or damage any further Your plans. I want to do it Your way. Instruct me step by step, board by board, nail by nail. Amen.

Why Communion?

Dalyn Woodard shares on The meaning, purpose and seriousness of The Lord's Supper. The message, "Why Communion?," is about 36 minutes long and was recorded at Nacogdoches Christian Fellowship on Sunday, March 22, 2015. It's our prayer that you are blessed and ministered to as you listen. May God bless and keep you.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 22 ~ A Different Source

“The sun shall no longer be your light by day, Nor for brightness shall the moon give light to you; But the Lord will be to you an everlasting light,"

Isaiah 60:19

We have learned in life to look to the world around us for our light, for the supply of our needs. Our energy, inspiration and purpose for living are tied to what we see, feel and know in the physical and material world, because from the beginning that's all we know.

God made the material. He placed us in this realm. But this reality was never intended to be our everything. It's not permanent. It is a reminder and hint of something better. Even before the end of this creation, before the new heaven and new earth is present, we can be guided by a more precious and faithful light than the sun and moon. When we follow the Creator and look to Him as our source and to relationship with Him as a purpose rather than chasing and reacting to material things, we can have light, warmth and energy that never falls short, that never fails, that never ends. The joy, peace and love we know in our life worth living will not vary with the times, seasons or circumstances, because it will not come from or be based on anything changing or circumstantial.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 21 ~ Spring Is Here!

Spring is finally officially here. As of yesterday afternoon, our little planet has crossed over from winter to spring. And the truth is that it doesn't look or feel that much differently than last week did. That said, it's a drastic change from last December 20. The seasons transition a little at a time. Previews of Spring appear between cold northers of Winter. The snow falls and then the sun shines. A flower blooms here and there, and we say Spring is on the way.

Before too long it seems like more spring and less winter. Sometimes that happens weeks before the calendar shows the start of Spring, while some years and in some places calendar Spring may be here a while before the snow stops falling and melts away. The seasons don't really care about the dates we put on our calendars, and they do change. But lasting change isn't instant. There may be a period where Mother Nature seems fickle and unable to make up her mind between cold and comfortable. One minute or day the temperature will climb into the 70's, and just when we rejoice about not having to bundle up, here come the freezing temps again. But sooner or later, it will happen. Maybe not precisely according to the calendar, but the jackets will be gone until Autumn begins giving previews of her arrival.

We rejoice when Spring begins to make her advances, and often grumble when Winter surges back, fighting for one or more last gasps. But when Winter reappears for a moment, we don't give up on Spring. We know she'll be here for good before long.

Why can't we do that with our life?  God's promises are more to be counted on than the change of the seasons. Heaven and earth will pass away, but the Word of God remains forever (Matthew 24:35). That means when He says He came to set the captives free, to free the oppressed, and to complete the work He begins, we can count on it. Sometimes our freedom comes in an instant, but more often than not, it comes more slowly, a little bit of progress towards newness with shadows of the old mixed in, much like the transition from Winter to Spring.

Don't give up on the new life and freedom of Spiritual Spring. Don't assume that a day of cold and freezing rain means that Winter has returned and the bondage is permanent. Don't believe for an instant that God has failed to keep His word or that you have somehow failed and been rejected because you can't keep walking in the new without any hints of the old. If you could only skip back to compare the transition to the harshness of Winter at her worse, you'd see the change so drastically you couldn't help but declare the change miraculous. But since it's slow, we don't feel all that differently from day to day. But believe me, the change is happening. It may not be when we expect, or on the day we mark on the calendars of our lives, but there will come a day when even the hints of the past will be gone and nothing but Spring remains.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 20 ~ But God

The children of Israel had been slaves for 400 years. Moses gets a message from God promising freedom and a life worth living in a better land, the Land Of Promise. But when he tells Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, he is denied and ignored. God preforms awesome miracles and displays of power, to show that His people are indeed to be released. This is not a mere man's desire, but the Creator Himself wants to provide freedom for His people. But after each miracle, things actually seem worse for the children of Israel as Pharaoh retaliates.

Finally the slave master is broken, and those in bondage are free to go. But Pharaoh changes his mind and pursues to take back those whom he has lost to God. The people find themselves in an impossible situation. The water before them, an element of the world that they can not control or overcome. Behind them a massive army, their worst nightmare come true as their former master comes to take them back into bondage in a fury that promises to make things even more miserable and painful than before. There is no possible hope but God. But God.

God loves letting us and the rest of the world know that victory over our difficulties, freedom from our bondage, the defeat of our enemies was only possible because of Him. No, it's not an ego thing. It's an important message so that we don't forget where and to whom to turn, so that our lives tell the rest of the world where they too can find freedom. That sounds good, but in order for it to be clear that God did it, things have to get impossible enough that there is no hope but God.

If Moses quit declaring to Pharaoh the demand of God to set the captives free because things seemed to get worse, he would've missed the miracle, and the people would've stayed slaves. He himself would've been made a slave. If Moses and the children of Israel had turned their back to the sea and tried to wage war with the army of Pharaoh, they would've been slaughtered and or taken prisoner. They had no hope of winning on their own. And if they looked at the wall of water and refused to trust God, if they were too afraid to step out in faith and move through the sea because God made a path rather than ships, the battle would've been lost. But by realizing that God would do what He said He would, by understanding it's God and His way or not at all, the children of Israel gained their freedom from the most powerful nation on the planet at the time.

Whatever our area of bondage, no matter how powerful our master that has enslaved us, God is more powerful. He desires to free us and restore is, if we will let Him. He does all the work. It's only by His power and might and grace that we have any hope. But we can't quit before the miracle happens, before we see the fulfillment of the the promise. We can't turn back, or fight on our own, or give up because there's no way. We need to remember but God.

Agents Of Love

Dalyn Woodard shares on responding to the immorality, hatred and hurt we, as believers, encounter. The sermon, "Agents Of Love," is about 38 minutes long and was recorded at Nacogdoches Christian Fellowship on Wednesday, March 18, 2015. It's our prayer that you are blessed and ministered to as you listen. May God bless and keep you.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 19 ~ Grab A Better Bike

I know this is a joke, it's humor, but there's a truth in it that's heartbreaking. This is an attitude that I can relate to all too easily. We have become ingrained with the idea that gratification should be instant and that we should have what we want to the point that it overpowers everything else in life. The salt of selfishness, of what's in it for me, of take care of me first has been poured to heavily into our food, It's all we can taste most times, and we've forgotten what food is supposed to taste like without it, how much better it can taste, what life is really all about. 

If we do a+b+c, then we feel we have the right to demand that God do D. If we want to live for ourselves for a moment, not all the time, just this once, we do it. After all, it's easier to get forgiveness than permission. If God doesn't answer our prayer, our way and now, if not yesterday, then we quickly turn to some selfish pleasure or desire to feel better or we'll try to play God and answer the prayer for ourselves.

We've become selfish spoiled children spiritually, and it's sad. Because while living this way will hurt others, we're really robbing and hurting ourselves the most. If  we were great at being selfish instead of just good at it, we wouldn't settle for the trash we grab.We could have the best. God wants to give us something so much better than a bike. And that doesn't mean He always denies us the bike. I've gotten some pretty nice "bikes" (what I want) from God these last few years, and each one has been a better bike than I could steal, 

When we deny self and live for God, we get more. Make sense? It doesn't make sense to me either, but it's true. I look at my life today and feel like, "Wow, all this and heaven too!" Whereas when I lived like the boy pictured above pleasure felt so fleeting, and misery my norm. There is a better way. Grab a better bike by waiting to see what Daddy plans to surprise you with. 

Abba, help me to wait on You for what You have for me. Help me not to live for my own desires and whims. I know that what You want to give me is better than even what I want for myself, and when they are the same, then Your way and timing makes it something that lasts longer and fit perfectly. Today I will, with Your help and by Your grace, act like Your loving, respectful child and not like a selfish, spoiled brat. Amen 

Unshackled Moments ~ March 18 ~ Reversing The Birthday Blues

Today is my birthday, my 44th. This is often one of the roughest times of year for me, but this year has been better. Over the past several years, this day has become more and more something I celebrate and less and less a day I dread. I have found a life worth living, and a life worth living is worth celebrating.

Forty-five years ago, God weaved together the genetic code that would become me and made someone that is just like every other human He has made and at the same time is as unique as a snow flake. He put together a wonderful plan and dream for what this group of cells could be, could do and how wonderful the relationship would be between the two of us. By worshiping at the altar of my own will and serving King Self, I damaged those wonderful possibilities. But God is a powerful and creative Artist. No matter what mess I made, He adapted His plans. He remained ready and waited for relationship and to turn my mess into His masterpiece.

The same is true for you. You truly are fearfully and wonderfully made by an Artist who has always been able to see a masterpiece in you, even when all you can see is a mess. If you give Him the mess, you can watch the transformation, and enjoy as life takes on purpose, peace and joy. We can celebrate our birthdays, and every day, and no longer curse the dawn or the day of our birth, as the beauty of what our lives can be is revealed. It's the easiest thing you'll ever do, because  He does all the work. It's the hardest thing you'll ever do, because it requires us to surrender our clay to the molding of the potter. But only through death to self is there joy in life.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 17 ~ Dreams Of Me

I may be the only one who does this, but I sometimes fantasize about being able. If somebody mistreats me or disrespects me, if I don't watch it I'll catch myself imagining myself back in the situation or in a future similar situation where I have the perfect quip or comeback to stop it from hurting. Or maybe I  am able to turn around and walk away, not out of love, but because  I have no fear of the negative consequences and I have found or created a better situation. Or maybe I can give that person that look that backs them down and shuts them up without me having to raise a finger.

When I start hurting from work, it's so easy to fantasize about suddenly being good at something else or being able to erase my criminal record and get a job I  would love more where I make enough and work less. Or I'm able to figure out the mathematical formula to pick the numbers and win the lottery. Maybe I just find the $300 million ticket in a parking lot.

I know all the right words to help my hurting friends and bless those I encounter. I actually am able to fix and control those things in my life and the lives of those I care about that in truth or so beyond my ability it breaks my heart. I can jump in my mental time machine and go backwards or forwards and fix it all, have the skills and the smarts or maybe just the will and the chance to succeed. I can....I...

And honestly, therein lies the problems. My heart and mind  are turning to the absolute  fantasy of me being my own answer and or someone else's. But this  is a fantasy which could never happen, things getting better because I become the answer, the solution.

How much better would it be if it were the other way. Maybe when the circumstance, situation or relationship came to mind, if my imagination kicked in, I could imagine me getting totally and completely out of the way and letting God have full and complete control. Suddenly the Spirit is driving the car, and He knows the words that save me and the others, it's the look of compassion that Christ showed so well that stops the escalations or the look of pure forgiveness that endures them. It's God who opens the doors or grants the power and grace to bear the heat and pressure of the present place. It's God...God who does the work, gets the glory, makes the impossible happen.

Maybe one of the reasons it can at times be so hard to surrender my will to His and do it or go through it His way, is I still wish I could somehow keep my will, keep control, succeed and "serve" God. Surely I could have my birthday cake and eat it too? I can celebrate who I am and my own accomplishments, go through life being able to get and do what I want through my own power, strength and ability, and yet somehow still manage to have a good relationship with God. I can do it all myself, not really need Him and still be spiritually OK and have relationship with my Creator.

No way, I truly have a better chance of winning the lottery without buying a ticket. And I don't want it to happen. There's something amazing about how life keeps getting better the more I learn to lean on Him, the more I surrender, the more I accept that I can't, He can and I should let Him. But maybe it'll be easier in reality if it stays true in dreaming as well.

Abba, I need You, and I can't do this, whatever this is, on my own apart from You. Help me not to desire approval from my self and from others but rather only seek to please You and get closer to You. Let my idle, hurting or upset mind even keep You in Your proper place of King in my mind and life, of Director of my play, of Master of My Universe so much that when the time comes in reality to choose Your will or mine there's no hesitation to surrender. Let the meditations of my idle mind even bring me closer and not fuel any desire or hope to be my own answer. Jesus I acknowledge You as Lord and declare that You are the answer, both in reality and in fantasy. There is no where that it is proper or safe for me to be self-reliant. May I lean on You always, even in my daydreams. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 16 ~ You're God's Cherry Pie

Today's Unshackled Moment is a six-minute audio message originally delivered at Nacogdoches Christian Fellowship on March 15, 2015.

Priming The Pump

Dalyn Woodard shares on putting ourselves in position to be led by the power of the Spirit. The sermon, "Priming The Pump," is about 48 minutes long and was recorded at Nacogdoches Christian Fellowship on Wednesday, March 11, 2015. It's our prayer that you are blessed and ministered to as you listen. May God bless and keep you.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 15 ~ The Message

Early on in my journey down Recovery Road, I learned something important, two somethings, in a way, Maybe I should say that I learned two truths that turned out to be two opposite sides of the exact same coin. First, came devastation when a human being made a mistake, hurt me and let me down. Imagine that happening if you can. This person seemed to have it all together, whatever it is, to have the kind of recovery I wanted to have and to know how to get it, to know the Book backwards and forwards and to have the answers. This was a person who was qualified and good at carrying the message. Forget E.F. Hutton, when this  Elder Statesman spoke, everyone in the room listened.

Then one day, this messenger got it wrong. And not just a little wrong either. Way wrong. I quote from the book was explained in a way that meant the exact opposite of what the book said. The Messenger had misquoted the Message and taken it totally out of context. Suddenly everything from the Messenger I had soaked up like a sponge became suspect. I went in private to the Messenger and shared with them what appeared to be  a mistake. The Messenger agreed they'd missed it on that message and thanked me! Then within a couple of months politely  invited me to attend a different meeting. It broke my heart. In truth the two instances were probably not related at all, and the invitation was revoked with tears and apologies. This person is a dear friend  of mine today, but I test the message against the Book and the Spirit of Truth whenever this messenger speaks. The best, most together, wisest, most experienced messengers make mistakes. The Message is pure, the vessels are not. That's why we are told to test everything we are told and taught against the book and by the Standard of the Spirit of Truth (Yes, that includes any and every Unshackled Moment).

Lesson two came in the same place but with a different messenger. This person didn't have anything  anyone wanted. More people wished the poor person would move on than even wanted to help and be of service to this sap. When the person opened their mouth, the members of the group cringed, people tuned out, whispers of conversations began here and there, and the timing finally felt right to get up and go to the bathroom. I was as guilty as anyone of ignoring the words spoke by this would be messenger, until one day during a meeting I couldn't seem to get anything out of, no matter which of and how many of the "good" messengers shared. I hurt so much, and nothing seemed to get through  that wall of pain in around my mind. Then this person no one really listened to, including me, began to babble about something. I don't remember. I do remember almost getting up and leaving. This meeting, this day was shot, or so it seemed. Why suffer through any more of it?

As I collected my keys and things to leave, the person said something similar to what they usually said, but this time it was slightly different and for whatever reason I was able to hear. The donkey in my eyes had become a Messenger of Truth in an instant. I didn't get up or leave. I teared up and spent the rest of the meeting thinking about that Message I'd received. I left changed. I left a little more healed. The lesson remains with me years later as true and as powerful as anything given to me by any of the respected few I honored with my attention and trust.

Lord, help me to remember that it's all about my ability to hear and receive Your Message, regardless of where or when it comes. Remind me that you can use the driver who cuts me off, the donkey whose braying bounces off the walls with annoyance, the friend and the respected example all equally well if I keep my heart right and open to You. May I never over trust the trusted or reject the despised so that I accept falsehood or miss truth. Let me get what You need to me to get wherever the place and whoever the source, and may I be protected from error as well, as I put every message through the Truth test. Amen

Unshackled Moments ~ March 14 ~ Have Some Pie

There's a joke that goes something like this: A teacher brings some things to class to use as object lessons in understanding shapes. She pulls out a small case and points out the rectangular form. Then she pulls out a pie and declares the pie to be round. Little Johnny raises his hand and says, "but pie are squared." Groan or laugh as you will.

Today is Pie Day, where nerds and mathematicians around the world recognize and celebrate the truth that never changes of the value of Pi. Pi is a mathematical truth that helps us understand orbits, gravity, the way DNA folds and so much more. That little number, 3.14, with a continuing sequence that never ends, goes on and on and effects our lives. It helps with the design of drugs that improve health, the design of buildings and bridges that involve arcs and circles in the architecture, and even with the study of cricket's songs. The truths of science and life are worth celebrating. Today is even more special to some as the calender and clock will reflect and remind of this truth with even greater accuracy than usual. Twice today, in the morning and evening, at 9:26:53, the clock and calendar will reflect the first 10 digits of this amazing number rather than the normal annual three digits.

Today is also Albert Einstein's and my little brother's birthdays. I celebrate another truth besides Pi, the truth that the One who is Truth and has established truth has the power to lead and call us to understand, reveal and teach that truth, as Einstein did when he become willing to understand that there's always more to truth than we currently know and stretch the limits of possibility. And in celebrating the birth and life of my brother I see the power of the Spirit of Truth to restore lives and relationships. I see the awesome blessings that come into life, the life itself, that comes from surrendering to the Creator of all, including truth, and the damage that is done to us, others, life and relationships when one or more of us step away from the truth.

My brother is a blessed man, with a wonderful family and a life that, at least from my perspective, is quite successful. But he has his problems too, and his life is not perfect. His life, like all of our lives, is best in the areas of and as a result of times of understanding, responding to and following The Truth. Times when the truth is not as clear have been far from perfect. And our relationship has suffered due to the destruction of his older brother, me, rebelling against The Truth. My rejection of truth tore our relationship to shreds at time, but when we both surrendered to and accepted the Truth of who God is, healing began and restoration became possible.

Truth, unlike some believe, is always truth. It doesn't  change. Our understanding of it may change, we may even learn what we thought was true wasn't. It was once believed that the world was flat. Some say that truth changed when we learned that planets are round. But it's always been true. That truth simply wasn't as clear at one point. Like 3-14-15 at 9:26:53 is a better reflection of the truth of Pi than most years, as we get closer and closer in relationship to the Creator of truth, the power and peace of truth is more and more evident in our lives. That's something to long for, to strive for, and to celebrate.

So let us look at our lives today and celebrate those times and areas where the truth is clear. And let us surrender our understanding along with our will to our Creator so that we will be open and able to receive the truths that are yet to be revealed and to see our lives and relationships restored. And if you get a chance, enjoy a piece of pie and thank God for truths that increase healing and understanding and never change.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 13~ Reacting To Wasps

I straddled my motorcycle and rode to work on a morning with the air thick with moisture. Although it wasn't raining, my clothes were damp by my arrival at work due to the high humidity that sat heavy like a light fog. I parked my bike in my normal spot under the shade of a tree and out of the way. I removed my helmet and "do-rag." I immediately felt pain on the top of my head, almost as if someone had grabbed a handful of my hair and yanked it out. But that's not what had happened. A red wasp had fallen from the tree above me onto my head and had promptly stung me before falling on to the ground. It appeared to be struggling to fly for the few seconds that it took for me to react to the unexpected sting and to stomp the wasp into the mud.

I hadn't gone near any of the areas where we'd already spotted wasps becoming active. I wasn't near anything that would normally be a wasp hang out and inspire caution. I have never seen any wasps near where I park. I didn't do anything wrong or differently than normal, but none of that mattered as I had to deal with the itching, burning and pain of the sting for the next several hours.

Life can be like that. Sometimes without provoking or causing anything ourselves we suffer the effects of a fallen world. We don't stray from our path, we're not outside of God's will for us, and yet, without warning we feel the pain of sin and evil fall on us, stinging our soul. People exercise their free will all over us, and it hurts. But people aren't wasps. When they sting and hurt us, we aren't to stomp them into the mud. We are instructed to pray for those who hurt us and bless those who curse us. Sometimes the hurts and attacks we suffer at the hands of others truly have nothing to do with us. We have no part in the instigation or cause. We simply parked in the drop zone of their pain, frustration and anger. Our part is our reaction.

If we react with love, only possible by the grace of God and the presence of the Spirit within us, we keep ourselves free from a spiritual allergic reaction that  can make us sick. Sure it may still hurt for a while, but the poison doesn't have to become a part of us. We can let it go, and we can heal. And we may just find that a Godly reaction helps bring healing to the one who hurt us.

We should also remember that being hurt doesn't mean that God doesn't love us, it isn't always a case of what goes around comes around. We don't have to beat ourselves up or lose faith because it seems evil had a chance to hurt us. We're going to have trouble and pain as part of life in a fallen world. Sometimes we bring it on ourselves, and sometimes life just happens all over us. But whether we have some minor irritation and pain that heals and fades quickly or a wound that goes deep and festers and nearly kills us is not dependent upon the poison but on our reaction to it. If we can get out of the way and let God control our reaction, it will never be severe and sickening, but if we act out in the power of our own nature, the resulting pain can cause horrible pain, bitterness and misery for us even more than the one we stomp in retaliation.

Abba, help me to respond to life's difficulties and the pain others cause with the stings of their brokenness as You would have me. Soothe my wounds with Your balm and comfort me with Your love and peace. Amen

Unshackles Moments ~ March 12 ~ More Better

O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty land Where there is no water.

Psalm 63:1

I am not a morning person, and verses like the one above have made me grateful not to be under the law more than once. Whenever I have tried to make myself get up early to pray or read Scripture because I start feeling like that is what you're "supposed" to do I have failed miserably. But not too long ago, I felt not a "should" get up early but rather a desire to really get to know Jesus more and to spend more time with Him. I prayed and asked that if He would provide the grace to meet with me that I would get up as early as it took to both start my day with relationship time and to more faithfully in frequency minister through writing these moments. Those who may have noticed that for a while now these Unshackled Moments have been close to a daily occurrence can note that some progress has been made. It's definitely been a blessing in my life regardless. It's  not about the frequency of writing going way up. It's about more, one of my favorite words. More. More of Jesus. More time with Jesus. More power. More of God in my life. It's about more better. And yes, I know that is atrocious English, but it's a great goal.

I have felt better. My days have been better. I've seen an improvement in multiple areas of my life and walk. That's made it easier to keep getting up early. I had even started often getting up and turning off my alarm before it went off on most days and getting up without hitting the snooze on the other days. If you only knew what kind of miracle that is, you'd be greatly encouraged, but while all this has happened, there is still the me who is not yet changed. The old me, the natural me, the natural body rhythms that God gave me when He created me and my natural reactions to those tendencies are still there.

And that last sentence is why I hate Daylight Savings Time. I had enjoyed the progress I had made. I loved that I didn't have to struggle to get up that hour early any longer. It had almost become natural in that it had become a part of the routine. Suddenly, for no reason, I had to start over. I have to get up an earlier than my body thinks it should to be in the same place I was in less than a week ago. I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't get complacent. My attitude hadn't changed, and neither had my motivation. It hadn't become a should. But it did become hard again, at least as hard as it was at the start.

My reactions, who I am had to be overcome again. It hasn't been instant. The first morning I had to get up after the change I hit the snooze button six times. Horrible performance. If this were a legalistic should thing I probably would've felt like a failure all day. Instead I just felt like I'd had to rush through my morning conversation with Jesus, and I didn't like that because it felt like something missing. It felt as though I hadn't eaten breakfast spiritually, and I went through the day trying to play catch up with my hunger and energy levels. So I asked for help to get back to the place I had been. This morning I only hit the snooze three times. Already I have cut the delay in half. I'm 15 minutes away from where I want to be. Today I can rejoice in the progress and not beat myself up over the lack of perfection.

This is not a boast. Oh look, I get up early to spend time with God, you should too. No. I don't really care when you spend time with God. Those late night hours can be a true blessing. No, when you spend time with Your best friend is between the two of You. I just hope that you can see Jesus as the best friend you've ever had and want to spend time. But we all have goals to improve our relationship with our Creator. I hope that our motives are about that relationship and not anything to do with "shoulds," or that they'll grow into the right motivation. Regardless though sometimes we start to make progress in whatever area and WHAM, something happens. Before we know what hit us we feel as though we're right back at the start or worse. But we're not. We've already seen what works. We've learned to take the steps to surrender that lead to victory.

The war is won, but we may lose a battle here and there. It's not always something we've done or allowed by falling short in any way. It can simply be a fact that life happens. But as long as our motivation is to get to know God better and better, we can see these setbacks as something that temporarily caused us to see our friend less and renew that closeness as quickly as possible. It doesn't have to be something to beat ourselves up over. It doesn't have to involve "shoulds." And when whenever we want more of Jesus, He honors that.

Thank You Lord that it's about relationship not requirements. Help me not to feel condemnation when I feel I fall short in my side of the friendship between You and me but rather simply instill a desire to get back together like I would with a great earthly relationship and friendship. I want more of You Lord. More relationship. More time. More closeness. More better. Amen

Unshackled Moments ~ March 11 ~ Getting Close

As a child I had some friends whose attitudes my mother didn't exactly approve. They seemed a little too smart alecky, rebellious ant talked back too much. I think  perhaps my mother disapproved of their parents more than the children themselves, but she didn't like the way that they acted and felt determined that her son would not act in such a manner. She never said that these friends were a bad influence on me, but I do remember multiple times where she would comment that I'd been hanging out with them too much as evidenced by the fact that I began talking and acting like them. Her observation usually proceeded an adjustment of my attitude.

Even today I have a friend that if I spend a lot of time around my wife immediately can tell. "How much time have you been spending with him?," she'll ask me. "Why?," I ask. Her response is most often along the lines that I am starting to sound like him.

The point is that when I spend a lot of time with a particular person I begin to act a little like them, to like some of the things that they like that may not quite be within the normal parameters of my likes, and even my gestures and expressions can be effected. I guess it probably goes both ways with others seeing me in the friends that I spend a lot of time with.

The point of the Spiritual life we live is relationship with Jesus. We constantly strive to improve our conscious contact with God. How can we measure that closeness? Attitude and behavior. We can talk a good talk, but what do others see? If we're spending a lot of time with God, if He has become our friend and not just our bail bondsman, others should see Him in our attitudes and actions. It's nothing we have to try to do or force. It's a natural by product of closeness and time. Let's get so close to Jesus that those around us see Him in us more and more.

Lord Jesus, thank You for Your love and friendship. You have promised to be closer than a brother if we will draw close to You. Help me to get so close to You that  others see You as much, if not more, than they see me in all I do. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 10 ~ Pick Yourself Up

Social media is full of inspirational positive quotes to inspire self-improvement and persistence. They've become so standard it's easy to agree with the message and go on without even thinking about it.

Quotes like:

Take a deep breath, Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start all over again. ~ Frank Sinatra

Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, only this time more wisely.

Your life only gets better when you do. Work on yourself and the rest will follow.

Failure doesn't come from falling down. Failure comes from not getting up.

There are many more, usually printed on a pretty picture or eye-catching design, but I think you get the idea. I've realized that these seemingly positive memes and quotes are dangerous to me. They are subtle invitation to exit my road onto another where the bridge is out in a few miles. But they sound good! Surely I am over reacting? Aren't I just being picky? Yes, I am being picky. There is a map that shows me how to get where I want and need to go, and which roads don't get there. I don't want to waste time on my journey, or worse wind up lost, so I need to pay close attention to the map and be picky about my route.

Just because 2 roads both go North in general does not mean that they end up even close to the same location. I take a northern route from here to Seattle and one from here to New York, but they are on opposite ends of the country. It takes more than general direction to be the right road. And what is wrong about these quotes, these ideas and the philosophy behind them is subtle but serious.

I admit that I am powerless on my own strength to manage my life, to overcome my own bondage, to live life as I want to and should, to walk with God. I need a power outside myself, the grace of God, to have success, victory and a life worth living. So, I surrender my will and life over to the care of God to be infused with said outside power. This is the truth that has started me on a journey to freedom. I have never seen it fail. But the above quotes, and ones like them, are not about reliance on God's power and strength. They all rely on me looking and finding somewhere in myself the power and drive to get back up and keep trying. Success doesn't come from continuing to try. It sounds good, but it's a lie. Success in the things that matter comes from absolute and unconditional surrender.

The power within myself may help me get back up, but it will never keep me from failing again. I am not God, and I can't pull myself up by my bootstraps. Determination only makes failure hurt more. Continuing to get up and try to walk on the power of my inner strength and determination will only prove insanity by repeating actions that always give the same result, failure. But surrendering the fight, refusing to try to get up on my own and calling out to God, these things make a difference. His power leads to freedom and victory and a life worth living in a way that my fortitude and determination never can or will. People may say that I am weak or less than because I am using God as a crutch. No, God is not a crutch. In my experience, God's power is a stretcher, because I can't even limp my way into a life worth living and into freedom without Him and His power and grace.

Failure is not falling down. It's refusing to see that I need to be picked up and carried to get where I need to be. ~ Dalyn Woodard

Unshackled Moments ~ March 9 ~ Watching Peter Walk On Water

And Peter answered Him and said, “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.” So He said, “Come.” And when Peter had come down out of the boat, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink he cried out, saying, “Lord, save me!” And immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?”

Matthew 14:28-31

Yesterday I watched Peter walk on water. I'm being serious. His name wasn't Peter, and the physical surface may not have been actual H2O, but a man trusted God, took a deep breath, stepped out of the boat of his comfort zone and went walking to where Jesus called him. It was awesome. It was beautiful. It was filled with stumble starts, breaks in gait and a couple of near misses on the fall or sink front. But He did it. And I hope that today he's rejoicing in the faith he showed in the walk and the faithfulness of the Savior who called him and brought him safely through the stroll rather than doubting or beating himself up for any perceived imperfections or failures in how the walk was made.

It makes me wonder how Peter handled his stroll on the waves in the hours, days, weeks and years to come. If you're like me, you tend to focus on the fact that he got out of the boat and walked on water! How amazing! Sure, he got out there and got scared, but it's so awesome that Jesus was right there. The second he cried out for help Jesus reached out and saved him. When I look at Peter's story, I see faith and grace and deliverance and the miracle power of God working in someone's life. That is what I saw yesterday as well, which is why I started this by saying that I saw Peter walk on water.

But what if I had been Peter? Well, first there's a good chance that part of Matthew 14 wouldn't have been written because I like the security of the boat. I'm not sure that I would have asked Jesus if I could come to Him. If Jesus called me, I'd like to think I would've stepped out in faith and obedience and taken a timid step onto the water, but to ask? Then, if I had done it exactly like Peter and my nature didn't come into play until after we got back into the boat and the wind stopped (v. 32), how would I have looked at what happened?

I would love to say that I'd go leaping and dancing and praising God at getting to walk on water and shouting of His saving grace. But I know me. That little part at the end of v 31 where Jesus says, "O you of little faith, why did you doubt?" would've killed me. Little faith? If I need more faith than it takes to step out of the boat in a storm and walk on water, I'm screwed. Lord, you might as well pull the plug now, because I'll never have enough faith to please You.

Or why did I get so caught up in the situation that I took my eyes off Jesus, got scared and started to sink? Seriously, I knew it was impossible when I started out, so like Jesus asked, why did I doubt? After the first couple of steps shouldn't I have been running on the waves in complete trust like a child who truly believes the pond is frozen enough to support his weight? Yeah, I could beat myself up for that doubt and stumble for years, so much so that I never got out of the boat of my comfort zone again, at least not on my idea. Jesus calls, two or three times so I know that I know He wants me on the water? OK. I'll try to squash my fear and respond to His call. But that wondrous cry of "Lord, if it's really You out there in the storm of the unknown, in the impossible and far beyond the safety of the good ship Comfort Zone, if it's You, tell me to come, and I'll come!," that volunteering, it's probably not happening.

Peter continued to step out into the realm of the impossible. I don't know how often he answered the call and how often he asked to be called, but he walked on water more than once. I believe my friend from yesterday will step out of the boat again, and I suspect that it'll be easier and the walk a little more steady and confident next time. But they've inspired me. I want to get out of the boat. Even as I write the words of the last sentence my stomach tightened. Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it, right?

I want to do more than obey and get out of the boat. I want to volunteer. I want to keep my eyes on Jesus and my stride steady, but if my eyes get on me and how impossible it is for me to walk on water and I start to sink, I want to be as quick as Peter to cry out to my Savior for help and deliverance. Then, when He saves me from my self and my fear, I want to walk with Him back to safety or on through to the other side of the sea, if that's what He chooses and watch the wind stop blowing. I want to take the words of Jesus as a compassionate reminder that He's got this, He's got me. I don't have to ever doubt that. I want to see in His eyes the joy that He got from me wanting to come to Him and for getting out of the boat rather than beat myself up for slipping back into self. I want to dry off, hug Jesus, thank Him for saving me, and get back on the waves. Because it's on the waves that the miracles happen. It's walking on the water that shows others the power of God and the way to Jesus.

Lord, if it's You out there beyond my comfort, call me, and I will come. Help me, and I will walk, even through and on the impossible. Help me to keep my eyes on You and off me so that I will not fail, but if and when I do sink, be quick to save me and let me see the joy in Your eyes and not disappointment. Let my walk with You be so filled with the impossible that can only happen because of You that others call to You and get out of their boat. Thank You for calming the winds in my mind and life, for quieting the storms when I lean on You. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 7 ~ The Land Of Promise

“‘For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. 28 Then you will live in the land I gave your ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be your God.

Ezekiel 36:24-28 NKJV

This is a message specifically for Israel from God through Ezekiel, and I would be extremely hesitant to take it out of that context and claim these verses as a promise to His New Testament church. That said, this message to the nation He chose to bring the Messiah through was a nation that belonged to God, was called by God and loved by God. The truths about God's love, desire for, and the treatment of those who belong to Him found in this prophecy transcend one prophecy and show God's methods and motives in relationship with His people.

So, in this passage to an ancient people we find principles that hold true and apply to our lives today. If we will turn to God and surrender to His love, if we will simply accept that we are accepted and become His, He will draw us to Him out of the places of pain, strange and misery. The land of brokenness will no longer have to be our home. He will bring us back to the place we were always meant to be, where we can live a life worth living and be the best us that we could ever be. We will come home as one released from prison.

We have come to the place where we know we can never be clean again. Those like me who spent any length of time in addiction to alcohol and drugs have more than likely been places, done things and seen more that we can't take enough showers to wash away. Even those whose areas of bondage never took them to the gutters and dungeons where some of us dwelled but struggle with truly liking, much less loving, you. then there is an innate understanding of not being clean, of not being right, of not measuring up, of not being enough. God not only can make us clean, He desires to, more than we desire to be and feel clean and well. He wants to wash away the stink of where we go without Him, remove the grime that we've been covered in for so long we thought our spirit was naturally dark, when in truth we were created pure as fresh snow. God wants to restore us to that state we were created to be.

Once we surrender to Him, He will set us free. It's ironic but true that the only way to find life is to die and the only way to be free is to give up our will. But God's love makes our surrender the start of a relationship, not forced slavery, and He will set us free from the bondage in our lives, our addictions and habits and selfishness and from the idols, those people, places, things and feelings that we chased because the attracted us at first, but that once we gave them the keys to our heart they moved in, took over and beat us to bits day by day.

Living locked up will make one hard. When we've spent time in bondage, we become callused, bitter, untrusting.... Our hearts become stone. We can't seem to make the transformation go the other direction. But God wants to heal and restore us because He loves us, and we are His. He is the first heart transplant surgeon, and for thousands of years been taking out hearts of stone and replacing them with human hearts capable of love, care and compassion. We simply have to place our stony hearts in His care. He does all the rest.

And then the best part, the relationship begins. God moves in with us. He sends His Spirit to live in the depths of who we are, where we begin and end. His Spirit is the influx of power within that makes it possible to live clean and well, to have a life that produces love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, a life worth living rather than the chaotic, out of control, impulse driven and selfish life of bondage, brokenness, lonely, painful and miserable existence that resulted from the reactions of our self will run riot.

We become His. We know love. We are moved to and live in the Promised Land. No, it's not in the Middle East. It's in relationship with our Creator and Daddy. We get to live in, and by the power of, and with the joy and peace of love. We can hold on to the misery that comes with running our own life or we can have the restoration and freedom that comes from fully surrendering to love.

Daddy, help me to be quick to return to You when I wander off and quick to remember that I am Yours and You are mine and that in Your love is the better place and way to live, in You is freedom and restoration. Thank You for cleansing me, for healing me, for bringing me home. Your love is the very definition of awesome. I love you. Thank You for Your love for me. Amen

Unshackled Moments ~ March 6 ~ Motivation Makes All The Difference

"The negative idea of Unselfishness carries with it the suggestion not primarily of securing good things for others, but of going without them ourselves, as if our abstinence and not their happiness was the important point. I do not think this is the Christian virtue of Love. The New Testament has lots to say about self-denial, but not about self- denial as an end in itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to take up our crosses in order that we may follow Christ; and nearly every description of what we shall ultimately find if we do so contains an appeal to desire."

~from The Weight of Glory by C.S. Lewis

Motives matter. My motives matter to me and effect me. There are some things that I do that no one but God could ever guess my true motivation, and I may not even know it unless I am willing to look honestly at the depths of my heart and ask myself that all important question of why? Motives matter because walking with God is a condition of the heart, and He desires relationship and response to Him and His call out of love rather than grudging obedience out of fear.But motives also matter because the right motive makes service easier. 

I am a somewhat lazy man. I don't like increasingly my work load for no reason; I am a firm believer in the adage work smarter not harder. When I helped my father haul hay for a living I learned things about lifting in such a way as to make the shape and weight of the hay help rather than hinder moving it (understanding physics is not a total waste after all) and learned from my father to think first and move second so you don't have to pick that bale of hay up one more time than is absolutely necessary.  There is some virtue to this type of thinking, but it can also lead to non-virtuous behavior. In my case, I never understood the point of making my bed. What a waste of time.  No one was going to see it anyway. If someone knew me well enough to get to see my bedroom then should whether or not I make up my bed really matter? After all, I'm just going to mess it up when I lay back down, right? 

So I never made up my bed of my own volition. This caused me problems for a while in prison. I remember a period of nearly week where morning after morning I went toe to toe with an officer who came by and tried to make me make up my bed while I refused. The rules and not getting in trouble just weren't motivation enough to make me do it, and the more pressure came to bear the more a part of me wanted to get stiff necked and say "you can't make me." Let's face it, without some rebellion I never would've lived  a life that led to prison in the first place, right? After a while I made up the bed because it was easier than the fight, but I resented it. I hated doing it. I did it to escape consequences, and therefore whenever the opportunity came to blow it off that's exactly what I did. I never made my bed unless I had to.

Fast forward to a couple of years after my release. I married Leah and learned something about her. I don't know why (I don't need to understand why), but it makes her happy for the bed to be made. I learned that little fact and began making the bed. Not because she nagged me to or asked me to or because anyone made me. It doesn't upset me or make me angry. I don't feel imposed upon. You see, I love her so much, and I love to see her smile. And I don't know why, but I do know that it makes her smile when I make the bed.

It's selfishness that makes me hate to make the bed. It's selfishness that makes me make the bed. Really, it is selfishness either way. I love that smile, and making the bed is such a little thing to exchange for such a great reward. Love makes it easy. Love makes it enjoyable to do something I once fought to the point of being sent to seg to avoid doing. The cure for selfishness is not unselfishness. C.S. Lewis is right. It's love.  Love is still selfish, but the fruit is wonderful rather than miserable. If walking with God didn't give me freedom and a life worth living, if relationship with God didn't have more and greater reward of joy and peace and more than anything else I had tried I would keep looking for something  else. But relationship with Him is worth living for. It is worth dying for. It is worth choosing what makes Him smile over what I prefer the easier more pleasurable choice. When the motive is love for God and love for others, we can sacrifice our own needs and desires easily, for something we need and desire even more. But when we're motivated by "have to" and doing without instead of doing for someone else, then the same act of self-denial becomes a painful chore that brings only bitterness and resentment.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 4 ~ Personal Injustice

My wife and I recently watched the movie The Giver based on the book by the same name. For those who haven't seen it or read the book, I don't want to spoil the story, but one aspect that is a major element is that this society is built on sameness and total compliance. Anyone who doesn't fit in the neat little box of the society or steps outside of the norm is "released" from life. It seems horrible to our sensibilities that failure to fit the mold should be a death sentence.

That's why we sometimes have such a problem with the idea of God's society built on Holiness and Perfect Righteousness. It doesn't feel right. It doesn't seem fair. Why? Because none of us can fit the mold. None of us can live up to the standard. Under the strict and narrow restrictions of righteousness we all are in line to be "released" from life and relationship with our Creator. The difference between this truth and the fiction I started with is that God loves us. He desires relationship with us more than we have ever desired it with Him. He altered creation, moved heaven and earth and sacrificed His Son to make sure we don't have to be "released" from His presence. His love, grace and mercy cover very aspect and area where we fall short.

I bring this up to remind us that if we look at all the places and ways we have fallen short of perfection there is no way that we can stand before Perfection Himself and declare that we deserve any place with Him. If we ever get a glimpse of how much He really loves us, we fall before Him with hearts broken from gratitude at the injustice of our forgiveness. We know what we deserve in a perfect society, we know  we don't come close (not even the best of us), and we know that He accepts and welcomes us anyway. How amazing that glorious grace! How excellent His mercy!

Now we belong to Him. We can never be expelled or released from Him, not even the worst of us like me. Understanding this truth and the forgiveness and mercy that granted us this gift we must endeavor to remember our own pardon when faced with being wronged by others, when what is going on in our lives feels unfair and unjust. Even the best of us has been forgiven much and received pardon. Let us not be like one sentenced to death who minutes  after receiving that saving call from the governor and being removed from the gallows turns to the judge and demands our right to see the one who committed an infraction against us be hanged.

We need to turn the debts against us over to God to either forgive or act justly on our behalf as He wills and the heart of those who wrong us dictates. God refused to hold His rightly felt grudge against us and demand that we be punished for the times that we've rebelled and broken His heart. We must not hold on to our "righteous" anger either.

Father, only You are perfect and have the right to demand perfection in relationship, and yet You give grace rather than cling to Your rights against me. Help me to be quick to forgive and to be even quicker to let go of the anger that comes from being unfairly treated. I know that You will be generous and forgive those who hurt me if they seek You, and I pray that they make that turn to You. Bless those who are unjust toward me today, and help me to stay focused on Your grace and all You've done for me, so that no matter what the situation I can walk in the peace that passes all understanding and comes only from being close to You, which is only possible because I have been forgiven so very much. Thank You for Your love and forgiveness for me. Amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 3 ~ Bending God To Our Will

When we come to Christ, we surrender our will and lives to His care, direction and will. We surrender our will, considered crucified with Christ and become ruled by Him and His will, guided by the Holy Spirit. We must take care not to flip the coin.

All too often, we let the old nature of self rise up and try to control God. We pray and say that we're asking for God to help, or heal or direct or whatever. But in truth there is no request. We demand that God act. And not only must He act, but He is to do what we want Him to, in the timely manner we feel fits the situation and in the way we want. We want what we want and we want it now, exactly how we ordered it. We look at verses that say things like if you really believe you can ask anything of your Father and it will be given to you out of context and in a material, earthly manner rather than a spiritual one. We act as though faith or our good deeds mean God is obligated in some way to follow our lead and direction and do what we want.

But we've got it backwards. We were bought at a great price, the blood of Jesus shed for us on the cross. We didn't purchase God. He purchased us. He gets to do with us as He wills, not the other way around. That's how surrender works. We surrender unconditionally to Him, and in return He gives us forgiveness, a clean slate, power to walk rightly, freedom from the bondage to self and sin and anything and everything else that we want and or need freedom from. The best part of the deal is that He adopts us as His children and brings us into relationship with Him.

We hear people say, "I've accepted Jesus." It would be far more accurate and life changing to realize that at the worst of our worst, at the point of our deepest secret shame, Jesus accepted us. We deny our self, bend our will to His and follow Him. We do not demand our desires and rights, bend His will to ours and take Him down our path. He is God. He is Master. He is Daddy. We are created by Him and for Him, and without Him we have no life, whether we acknowledge that truth or not. We are servant, and we will never know true joy and purpose until we step into the role. We are His children.

When we remember that, we begin to live according to His purpose and plan rather than get frustrated and disappointed that He doesn't seem all that interested in our plan. We find a life worth living rather than one soaked in fear and lit aflame with anger and bitterness. And when we need to do something in service to Him and to get to know Him better, we can trust that if we ask Daddy for that thing to be done, He will do it.

Abba, draw me closer to You today. Help me to live Your will and not mine be done, to really live it from the heart and not just say it. Help me to remember the truth in the paradox that if I will lay down my will and life for You, then I will have a life better than the best of my wildest dreams. Thank You for being Lord. Help me to stay right sized today and not try to bend Your will to mine. In Jesus' name, amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 2 ~ The Gate In Our Fence

"God has put a gate in the fence. His name is Jesus.

If you follow Jesus long enough and far enough, you'll eventually trespass into the impossible."

~ Mark Batterson

I opened my computer, still a bit groggy from dragging myself from the depths of my dreaming and out of bed, and got ready for my morning reading. The Facebook tab came up before the email tab where I have my links to my readings, and I glanced at the page while waiting for the others to load. A barrel racer posted a photo of a book page and mentioned that it talks about Jesus and some things she'd been teaching. I looked at the photo. Someone had underlined the above quote, and I can see why.

I didn't take the time to read the rest of the page after the quote jumped out at me, but I did look up the book and added it to my "to read" list. I'm surely taking it out of context, as I have no clue about the context, but this is where the quote led my thoughts.

The statement is so very true. We all have walls and fences in our lives, fences between people and relationships, fences built in the past that block where we can and cannot go today and in the future, fences that keep us in bondage to substances and or activities rather than roaming free on the thousand pastures our Daddy owns, and fences between where we are and where God wants us to go. If we try to tear down the fence, we may get some temporary freedom and movement, but the fence is usually rebuilt quickly and stronger. After the one who wants us fenced in sees we have an area of escape in our strength and will, he adjusts his fence building to remove it.

Now we are even more fenced in. So, we can attempt to climb over the fence, but the fence gets built higher and higher, and each time the fall of failure to make it to freedom hurts more and more until we give up on going over to freedom and settle into captivity. Or we try to crawl under or through the fence and somehow just end up scratched and cut up from the barbs and covered in the dirt and muck and stuck.

The simple fact is that the fence builder is more cunning than we are, and he just won't quit trying to fence us in. Freedom is fleeting, and failed escape attempts discourage continuing to try. But God made a gate in our fences that the fence builder can't touch. Not only did He make a gate, but He made it where even a child can open it. Jesus is indeed that gate, the Way, the Truth and the Life that leads to relationship with the Father and freedom. We can leave the pen of pain and bondage into the freedom of the Father's green pastures.

The gate of Jesus leads to the impossible. That ruined relationship can be restored through Jesus. Barriers caused by who we've been and what we've done in the past no longer set the limits on us and how God can use us as the old is transformed into something new, a feat truly impossible for anyone other than He who created all in the first place. Bonds of addictions of all kinds that keep us miserable and trapped in selfishness slip away as we walk through the gate God made.

And we who have been locked away behind the fence until we're skinny from starvation and disease, worthless on the world's market, can feed on the living richness of relationship with God, which is greener and more plentiful on His side of the fence after all. Suddenly, in Jesus, the impossible is accomplished. But the trail through the gate starts the impossible journey of freedom and restoration, it doesn't end there. It gets bigger, more fantastic, more impossible. As we are restored, grow healthier and realize our freedom through Christ, we become someone God can use to help others learn about The Gate, and we can help God build The Gate in the fences around the hearts, souls and lives of others.

Whatever mountains stand in the way of God setting the captives free and healing the wounded can be leveled, razed and thrown into the sea by a word of faith. Nothing remains impossible. Our oceans between where we are and what God wants to accomplish split and move out of the way leaving a path of dry land through the barrier. Even death loses its sting as we find resurrection and life in The Gate. When we accept that God the Father provided The Gate for us, as we are, trapped, starving and sick, it opens for us. We can freely walk from held back and fenced in to freedom and power that makes the impossible possible.

Daddy, thank You for The Gate of Jesus, made from love covered in precious blood. Help me to never take it for granted or be apathetic about the miracle of freedom and possibilities that has and continues to be provided in my life. Thank You for the restoration and freedom and ability to serve I've already experienced, and thank You for that which is yet to come, which seems even more impossible than the miracles of yesterday. When the impossible of my life is overcome in the sight of others, may it bring You all glory and praise. In Jesus' name, amen.

Unshackled Moments ~ March 1

A couple of days ago, I finished the book Before Amen by Max Lucado, and when I added it to my Goodreads read shelf, I decided to glance at a few of the reviews. The first review I read rated the book three stars, and the preacher's wife who wrote it explained that her main issue with the book came from the admonition to go to Our Heavenly Father and refer to Our Mighty God as Daddy. She and all the folks who replied to her review agreed that it felt wrong to do that, and that it didn't show God nearly enough reverence. I saw that word "reverence" repeatedly. So I thought about it for most of the rest of the day, and I came to the sad conclusion that these folks have missed it.

The idea seems to be that one can’t use the word Daddy for a father with reverence. Is it disrespectful to address a father as anything but father? Obviously, that depends on the family and the father. In some formal households that would be the case, but I don’t think any of my friends have respectfully addressed their make parent as father that I have heard. Respect isn’t always about the word. Father is formal. Dad is informal. Daddy is informal and juvenile or even childish. But they can all be respectful or disrespectful depending on tone and usage. When a friend upset with being told he had to do something and his father threatened punishment if it wasn’t done then and right and he answered, “Yes Father,” with sarcasm and disdain in his voice and an eye roll for me to see, that was disrespect. If he’d said, “Sure Dad,” with the right attitude it would have been respectful.

It’s our attitude that determines our respect more than the words we choose. There is nothing disrespectful about being close and familiar with a father. The Bible clearly shows an intimate relationship between Jesus and the Father, despite the fact that contrary to popular opinion, Abba did not mean Papa or Daddy. Abba was the only word available for Father in the Aramaic of the time and region, so it probably ran the range from sounding formal and distant to informal and childish and respectful to disrespectful all depending on usage and tone. We are God’s children, told to come as little children. In today’s language and common understanding, a father is the one who sired but is distant, while a dad is someone that is there for his children. A dad watches and actively participates in their lives. A dad helps them grow up, raises them, and nurtures them. That may not be your understanding, but that is how most Americans see it today. In that situation it is hard to show closeness while using the address of Father, and Daddy is simply the more child-like expression of Dad.

What about reverence? There are many examples of reverence, but the one we seem stuck on is that due a mighty king. So, imagine with me a mighty but loving king on a glorious throne. His subjects enter His court, along with some visitors from foreign lands. They stop talking. No one speaks without being spoken to. They all bow the knee to this man and revere Him. They are there to seek help, because the enemies of the kingdom have gathered at the gates and threaten to destroy the kingdom and its inhabitants.

The queen, the king's bride, enters with a four-year old little boy in her arms. He squirms out of her arms and begins running across the court yelling, "Daddy! There's horses and men out the gates! They look mean!" The king scoops the young prince into his arms and whispers, "Shh. It's OK. Now be quiet. Daddy's busy."

The boy sits in his father's lap and listens as dignitaries and ambassadors come before the throne, bow and in eloquent and carefully chosen words both request the aid of the king and express their doubt that even all mighty king's men and horses will be able to handle this foe. The prince is obedient in his silence as long as he can be, but finally he's had enough. After one more person says, "Oh mighty King, defender of the helpless, ruler over us all, you surely must realize that the opposing ruler is as dangerous as he is vicious and evil, and we are in dire trouble!" the boy can stand it no longer.

"No, we're not in trouble! My Daddy can do anything! He can win this battle without even getting tired!" The king smiles and chuckles at the boy's confident faith. The onlookers gasp. As do we as we think of the scenario.

But that's what we're supposed to do. Remember that we are the little princes and princesses, not barely tolerated subjects of visitors. Run to Him. Throw ourselves into His arms. Yes, He is mighty. Yes, He is King. But He's also our Daddy. My Daddy can fix anything! My Daddy can do anything! My Daddy's got this. Who in the above scene truly showed reverence, complete awe, worship and respect for the king? The boy. I'm not scared, my Daddy can beat this enemy, quiet this storm, supply.......