Breathing

Travis Meadows has long been a beloved singer and songwriter in our family. If you’re not familiar with his music I would highly recommend it.

We were fortunate enough to get him to do a house concert a couple of years back.

He put on an incredible performance – but the most memorable part of the evening for me was talking with Travis in my parents’ kitchen later that night.

Travis has been through a lot of heartache. He’s open about mistakes he’s made and the consequences he’s experienced.

I don’t know if I’ve met a more humble or grateful person. He counts every single day as a grace.

"A good day for me is waking up breathing,” he told me. “There's a lot of people that didn't wake up today."

I don’t remember the last time I thanked God that I woke up breathing. I don’t remember the last time I thought about all of the people that didn’t wake up today.

I should, though. I should thank God for every breath I get to breathe.

I can’t keep my lungs pumping. I can’t keep my heart beating. I can’t number my own days.

I could give you a list of complaints and grievances. I could tell you all the ways that things are hard or unfair. I could offer up all of my problems.

But I woke up breathing today. I woke up with a heart that’s still beating.

So did you.

I don’t know what you’re going through.

You might be in a really sweet season. You might be going through the darkest time you’ve ever known.

But you woke up breathing.

It might be a hard day – but it’s a good day.

Stuck

I have a niece named Kennedy.

Kennedy is pure joy and constant motion. She loves to run and jump and dance – all the while pumping her little arms with all her might.

She also hates to be contained. When she was little, we’d have to strap her into her booster seat at dinnertime or she’d throw herself out of her chair.

When she was tired of being strapped in, she’d shout, “Stuck!”

My brother and sister-in-law would smile, shake their heads, and say, “You’re not stuck. We put you there.”

I’ve felt stuck before.

I’ve felt like I couldn’t get out of a difficult situation. I’ve felt trapped in discouragement or disappointment. I’ve felt contained and confined.

I’ve shouted, “Stuck!” to God more than once.

And more than once God has smiled and said, “You’re not stuck. I put you there.”

The times I’ve felt stuck have often turned out to be the times I’ve learned the most about trusting and depending upon Him.

If you feel stuck, look around. The way out might simply be better or different choices.

But it may be that God put you there on purpose. It may be that He wants you to learn to trust and depend upon Him.

I promise you this. God is working in and through you – wherever you are.

Grow On

Ingeborg Syllm-Rapoport was born to Protestant parents in 1912 and grew up in Hamburg, Germany.

Her upbringing was relatively typical of the time and place – except that she broke gender norms by attending college and then medical school at the University of Hamburg.

She focused her studies on diphtheria and was in pursuit of a Ph.D.

Then Nazi Germany happened.

Though her parents were both devout Christians, her maternal grandparents were Jewish and that, according to the Nazi regime, made Syllm-Rapoport of mixed race and not truly Aryan.

Professor Rudolf Degkwitz of the University of Hamburg conceded, in 1938, that Syllm-Rapoport’s doctoral thesis would have been accepted and approved had it not been for the Nazis’ race laws which prohibited anyone of Jewish decent to receive a doctoral degree.

Syllm-Rapoport fled to America where she married. She received an M.D. and practiced medicine until she and her husband returned in Germany in 1952.

Nearly seventy-five years after she first submitted her research, the dean of the University of Hamburg, Dr. Uwe Koch-Gromus, gave Syllm-Rapoport a chance to defend her thesis.

In 2015, at the age of 102, she did. 

Her mind was still sharp, and she had not wavered in passion for her subject. She passed with flying colors and became the world’s oldest recipient of a Ph.D.

There is so much I want to do. There is so much I want to accomplish. I have dreams – lots of them.

But – more importantly – I think I have God-given dreams. I believe He has a purpose for me.

I believe He has a purpose for you, too.

I don’t know how long it will take to do all that God created you to do. But if you still have a beating heart you’re not quite done.

Keep going. Keep learning. Keep discovering more of what God created you to be and do.

Grow on.

Average

I’m pretty average.

I mean it. That’s not false humility or anything. I’m legitimately very average.

Most people like to think of themselves as “above average” (according to a number of surveys).

Not me. I’m as average as they come.

I barely broke a 3.0 GPA (in high school or college). I was on the varsity basketball team – but I didn’t start. I was second or third off the bench. I was a student council representative, but I never ran for office – and I for sure wouldn’t have won if I had. I wasn’t popular or unpopular. I lived in the middle.

My middle brother was the smart, hard-working one and my younger brother was the artistic, creative one.

I was, well, nothing in particular.

That used to bother me.

But I felt a lot better when I read about the disciples Jesus chose.

They were pretty ordinary. A handful of them caught fish for a living. One exploited his own people by collecting exorbitant taxes for Rome. Another was a militant knucklehead that wanted to overthrow Rome by force.

(Honestly, Jesus choosing those two to be His disciples and then calling them to love one another is a lesson in its own right.)

Here’s the point.

They weren’t the best and the brightest.  In fact, they were quite average.

If Jesus could use guys like that to change the world, then maybe He could use me too.

Think about it this way.

A paintbrush is quite an ordinary thing.

But in the hands of a capable artist, it can be used to create a masterpiece.

Most of us are pretty ordinary.

But an ordinary person in the hands of an extraordinary God can change the world.

If you feel ordinary, join the club. If you feel insignificant or insecure, get in line.

But – in the hands of a master Artist – what might God do in and through you? How might He turn your life into a masterpiece if only you’d submit to the guidance of His brush?

Shine

When Thomas Edison invented the light bulb in 1879, he had a particular purpose in mind. Namely, the light bulb was created to emit light. It was wired to work a certain way and perform a certain task. To use it for purposes other than that for which it was created would result in disaster.

Baseball, for instance.

Have you ever tried to play baseball with a light bulb? Me neither. That’s because we know it would end badly. The light bulb would break and no longer be able to provide light as it was intended.

Imagine that you decided to go ahead and try it anyway. Chances are, it would take about one pitch for the light bulb to shatter to pieces.

Now imagine someone came along, got down on his hands and knees in the dirt, and began putting the light bulb back together. Imagine that when he was finished, after hours of diligent labor, the light bulb not only worked again, but shone even brighter than before. Would you ever play baseball with a light bulb again? Of course not. Lesson learned.

The truth, though, is that we play baseball with light bulbs every day.

God wired us to work a certain way. He created us for a particular purpose – namely, to represent and reflect His heart and character every moment of our lives.

Sin willfully and purposefully goes against what God originally intended for our lives.

It’s like playing baseball with a lightbulb.

Our sin shatters us.

But on the cross, Jesus put the pieces back together.

He restored us to our original condition, able to once again represent and reflect the God who made us, to once again shine as we were meant to shine.

Let’s stop working against our design and begin working with and for our Creator.

He knows far better than we what He intended when He made us.

Purpose in the Desert

Moses was nothing more than a lowly shepherd when God showed up and gave Moses his marching orders.

Moses grew up among Egyptian royalty but, years earlier, had fled to the desert after he’d killed an Egyptian for beating one of the Israelite slaves.

He ended up in the land of Midian. He married, had children, and settled down.

He took a job tending his father-in-law’s sheep in the desert for the next forty years.

Moses assumed he would live out his days as a shepherd. He had grown accustomed to the quiet rhythm of the desert. He wasn’t expecting anything to change.

Yet, it was there, in the desert, that God showed up.

God gave Moses the seemingly impossible mission of leading the people of Israel out of their slavery in Egypt to the land that God had, long ago, promised to give the descendants of Abraham.

And the only way to get from Egypt to the promised land was through the desert.

The same desert Moses spent forty years walking.

He knew the land inside and out

All this time Moses thought he was just tending sheep but God was actually preparing him to lead His people.

Maybe God has a purpose for your desert. Maybe He’s using it to prepare you for something.

Let’s not squander this time. We’ll never get it back.

Maybe it’s time to turn off the TV, close out of social media, and put the phone down.

Pick up a book. Learn or refine a skill. Invest time in something God can use.

Let’s give Him as much as to work with as we can so we’ll be prepared when He shows up with our marching orders.

A Land Called Nothing

Just off Route 93, situated in the Arizona desert that separates Phoenix and Las Vegas, is a six-acre land called Nothing. Nothing is, appropriately, a ghost town.

Established in 1977, Nothing for years struggled to gain traction. Alas, with no running water, much less a sewer system, and no electricity, Nothing seemed to prophesy its own demise.

In the decades that have passed since the citizens of Nothing finally abandoned their fated town, many have come and tried to make something out of Nothing. But attempts to bring the dead town to life have inevitably failed. A sign that once greeted visitors still stands. It reads, "The staunch citizens of Nothing are full of hope, faith and believe in the work ethic. Thru the years, these dedicated people had faith in Nothing, hoped for Nothing, worked at Nothing, for Nothing."

You've got to admire the honesty.

If you were being honest, what would you say is the object of your faith, the essence of your hope, the reason for your work? If the answer is anything other than Jesus, it is as good as Nothing.

You see, it was Jesus that spoke everything into being out of a vast nothing. Imagine what He could do with your life. Imagine what He could do with mine. Let us leave behind this land called Nothing. There is a great adventure awaiting in a land called Promise.