Jesus | Heartstone Journey

How To Navigate The Reality Of Life

What is wrong with us?

For some reason we choose to journey through life on our own, without the Lord, and bounce from one sin or train wreck to another looking for that escape from the turbulence of life. Maybe this turbulence involves a relationship, a divorce, an affair, loss of a child, pride, lust, nonforgiveness or even religion; maybe its alcoholism, a drug addiction, depression, an eating disorder, or a chronic illness where a cure seems hopeless. Whatever is at the center of your turbulence, be assured you are not alone. We must come to an understanding that no matter how desperate our circumstances are we can find our answers and our hope in Jesus. Jesus healed the paralytic despite his obvious doubt and despite the fact that he didn’t even know who Jesus was. I don’t know what you are going through or why. I don’t know the plans God has for you, but reach out to Him.

Jesus brings to us a peace that we all search for and yearn for. He brings a hope that we all long for and the wonder of His message that He speaks to us through His word is that He understands the realities of life, how it feels. The good and the bad.

What A Leper And Centurion Can Teach Us About Compassion

It’s hard to do good for people who don’t deserve it, isn’t it?

We all have those people we work with or people in our families that we would rather punch in the face than give a minute of our time to. I bet you can name a few people right now that would you rather work around or completely remove from your life. Words like compassion, friendly, joy don’t seem to fit into our narrative with these so called toxic people. Right?

Am I making sense here?

This is a tension that many of us live with day in and day out. I wrestle with this too, but check out one of the story that Jesus invites us into. Remember the story of the Sermon on the Mount? You know, love your enemy, turn the other check and yup…even go the extra mile. Or, blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Before we walk this out…I’m not talking about justified self defense or protecting your family here.

Sounds great doing a study on the sermon on the mount or reading it in your daily devotional, but living out in real life…well that’s a quite a different thing all together. Well it gets better because Jesus brings it all in by ending the sermon with this, “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”

OK, let’s hit the pause button here. In the last couple of months using the sermon on the mount as the litmus test, are you a wise man or a foolish one?

It’s Not About Religion…It’s About Relationship

Show of hands. How many times have you been in conversation with people and they want nothing to do with the story of the Gospel, because they connect it with religion?

Even though most of us don’t live out what we believe, how many Christ seekers struggle with questions like; What happens when I die? Is it ok for Christians to divorce? Do I literally have to give my local church 10% of my gross pay? Did David really sleep with another man’s wife? Is the Old Testament relevant? Does purity equal worth (woman caught in adultery)? I could go on and on!

Religion tries to answer life’s questions and more, but how does Jesus answer such questions? Growing up in the church I’ve learned that religion is more about answers, order, predictability — not about people. It’s more of a systematized theology.

If you’ve spent some time walking it out on the road of life, the experience is vividly clear that life is messy and it’s not really about any of those things. We could argue that religion has it’s place, but Jesus shows us through His time on Earth that the order of things might be off. What do I mean by that? When religion eclipses humanity, it overshadows grace and mercy with power.

When religion is in first place, leaders become self-righteous and followers become hypocrites.

—Andy Stanley

So what is religion?

You Won’t Find God’s Gift Under A Tree, In A Manger Or On A Cross

Ever wonder why God would become a man, to be born in such a lowly manner, and let us treat Him the way we did? Ever wonder why Jesus would, while existing “before all things” and holding “first place in everything” (Colossians 1:17,18); would agree to come to earth as a baby, suffer the abuse He suffered, and die such a painful death? If we continue reading in Colossians we read: “For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.”

How awesome is that?

This all happened to reconcile us to God. The tough reality is that God makes it very clear, in His word, that He is justifiably angry at humanity’s sin. All of us have sinned — and do so repeatedly. Yet He loves us sinners enough that He gave His own Son to live on earth, die on a cross, and bear sin in His own body, suffering the full weight of God’s wrath — wrath deserved by us all. Jesus paid the penalty to restore peace between God and sinners. It could not have been done any other way.

So Christmas is primarily a celebration of God’s love toward mankind. God never wanted religion (rituals, ceremony, tradition, self-righteousness, law), but an everlasting personal relationship in Truth — with us! Not emotional, time-bound, fashionable hypes, nor “visits” only in churches, but a genuine living commitment to Him. He is after our hearts!

I don’t want you to get lost in the wide scope of it all, so let me sum it up.

Why We Shouldn’t Interpret God’s Silence As His Absence

Have you ever been in a circumstance where there seems to be no solutions? Have you ever been in a circumstance where there are lots of options, but none of them are good?

All of us have a picture of what our lives are supposed to look like…and for many of us that vision is a distorted reality. We all step into a space like this at some point in our lives and we can’t see a way forward or a way out.

what’s even worse is the lives of everybody else around you magnify the tough reality of what you will never have and we slip into this “it is what it is” narrative.

Does this sound familiar?

From my own experience, in these seasons of life, we draw some really bad conclusions and we begin telling ourselves some deep lies. Like; “I will never find happiness again.” or “Nothing good can come from my circumstance.” or “I don’t see any point continuing on…I give up.”

Have you told yourself any of these things?

How To Navigate The Reality Of Life

What A Leper And Centurion Can Teach Us About Compassion

It’s Not About Religion…It’s About Relationship

You Won’t Find God’s Gift Under A Tree, In A Manger Or On A Cross

Why We Shouldn’t Interpret God’s Silence As His Absence

Favorite Quotes

Cool Scripture

Never Out Of The Fight!

Resources