Category Archives: Suffering

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Looking Back: Wholeness and Holiness


In May 2009, I posted some reflections from Philippians 3:17 that were part of my preparations for an upcoming Streams of Grace retreat:

Philippians 3:17, “Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do.”

I suggested, “We need to notice those among us who have walked a little further or a little longer than we have. Maturing is the fruit of long training in grace. We need to see what faithfulness in the face of great hardship actually looks like in the life of a more seasoned follower of Jesus. This is what the Philippians had in Paul.”

Click to read more “Wholeness and Holiness”

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Wholeness and Holiness: Thoughts for a Retreat


I spent most of today working on materials for this weekend’s Streams of Grace retreat in Malibu at the Serra Retreat. The theme is “Wholeness and Holiness: A Vision of Spiritual Maturing.” I’ve really been enjoying Philippians 3:7-17—our core passage for the weekend.

Let me share one insight and one quotation that especially stirred me today:

Philippians 3:17, “Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do.”

We grow more whole and holy in Christ as we remember that no one becomes whole and holy alone. Everything in Philippians 3, a familiar passage for many of us, is written to a community, not just to an individual Christ-follower. Though each of us can gain a great deal of personal benefit from what Paul says, he’s ultimately talking about our shared journey.

And we need to notice those among us who have walked a little further or a little longer than we have. Maturing is the fruit of long training in grace. We need to see what faithfulness in the face of great hardship actually looks like in the life of a more seasoned follower of Jesus. This is what the Philippians had in Paul.

As for the quotation, I came across this from Esther de Waal in The Celtic Way of Prayer:

“Unless we learn to live with ourselves, how can we live with others? Unless we know ourselves, accept ourselves with honesty and forgiveness, how can we possibly know or accept other people? I know that maturity comes only from staying still, from facing what has to be faced, perhaps from engaging in a battle with the forces that threaten me from within and without. Yet in all my years of growing up, no one, neither my own family, my school, or college, helped me to think about what was involved in living with myself. In my more adult years I have not found a church that has taught me this, and it is only in recent years that I have begun to find books and retreats that have given me some practical help and experience and wisdom.” (De Waal, Esther. The Celtic Way of Prayer. New York: Doubleday, 1997, p. 95.)

During our Saturday block of solitude and silence (from about 10:30am to later afternoon), I’m going to suggest this reflection question:

De Waal makes a connection between stillness and maturing. How does that connection strike you, especially in the midst of today’s solitude time with God? What comes into your awareness as you are still today? Whether those thoughts and feelings feel positive or negative, how might God’s Spirit be seeking to bring deeper freedom, healing and confidence in His love through what He brings to your attention?

If you aren’t planning to join us, I hope you’ll consider joining us in October for the next one.

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A Cross-Centered Faith Part Two


How do you respond when what you expected from God never happens? How do you feel when God seems to disregard your comfortable assumptions about Him? Let me continue sharing a couple of quotations from Alistair McGrath on the cross.

“God becomes an iconoclast, shattering our neat conceptual pictures of what he must be like by revealing himself in a way which both contradicts and mocks our attempts to pin him down. The cross reveals the fundamental uncontrollability of God, who breaks the mould of our thinking.” (Alister McGrath. The Mystery of the Cross. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1988, p. 104.)

Father, You have a way of shattering my own nice, neat images of You. You are the God of Divine Surprises. You have shattered my image of You as the One Who does things the way I expect You to do them. You are not the God Who fits cooperatively into my comfortable theological box. The places of desolation, discomfort and dryness that I’ve walked have begun to break me of the expectation that You give nice, satisfying rewards for my admirable spiritual efforts. You offer no guarantee that coming to You will always bring goodies for my mind, emotions or will.

Thank You, Father, for enabling me to see just how much I’ve sought created things over the Creator. You are bigger than any of my concepts or images of You. Please continue to expand my awareness and conception of You—and may I not be limited by them. When I try again to pin You down and control You, gently remind me again of the foolishness of my misguided attempt.

“The cross exposes us, stripped naked of our self-assurance, bringing home to us our sinfulness and inadequacies. It is the decisive contradiction of the self-sufficiency of the believer and the church alike, forcing both to recognise that their greatest security and greatest strength lie not in themselves and their imagined abilities, but in the God who was hidden in the sufferings of the cross.” (McGrath, p. 169.)

My desolate places have been the cross at work in my life. I am being stripped of self-confidence, as “spiritual” as I thought it was. I have become far more aware of the depths of my sinful attitudes and behavior. I have seen that “apart from You I can do nothing.” May I continue to learn that my greatest security and my greatest strength lie beyond myself in You…yet You are not beyond me but in me. May I come to find You as the God Who is hidden in the sufferings of the Cross…of my cross.

Free me today to rest in Your peace and love in the midst of felt inadequacy, weakness, anxiety and failure. May Your grace secure me and strengthen me throughout this day. Thank You for ways that You are causing the cross to move from true idea to living reality in me. This is all from You.
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A Cross-Centered Faith Part One


As we live in the light of the cross and resurrection here on the other side of Easter, I wanted to share some words from Alister McGrath about Martin Luther’s powerful idea of a cross-centered understanding of God. How does it feel and what does it look like to experience God as more absent than present, His back more than His face?

“God tells Moses that he shall never see his face, only his back: and that is his only certainty. Luther interprets ‘the back parts of God’ to mean the despair and the anguish of the absence of God, of being forsaken by God, of the contradictions of life: in short, the cross. But it is of decisive importance to see what Luther taught was not that God is somehow there, in spite of defeat, sorrow, pain, humiliation, anguish, failure, sin and death. Not at all! He taught that God himself confronts us in person and makes his presence near in and through defeat, sorrow, pain, humiliation, anguish, failure, sin and death. The ‘contrary things’ of failure, sin and death constitute the raw material which God transforms into his own self in the human heart. God reveals himself through a contrary form. It is the back of God which is revealed—but it is God, and not another. To learn this is to learn Christ.” (Alister McGrath. The Mystery of the Cross. Grand Rapids, MI: Academie Books/Zondervan Publishing House, 1988, p. 8.)

Luther believed that a cross-centered faith understands experiences of defeat, sorrow, pain and the like as encounters with God rather than evidences of His absence. I’m tempted to see God only where I feel good. What I’m tempted to judge as God’s absence is more of a disguise, I suppose. You don’t appear in my life according to my demands.

My assumptions about how You are supposed to reward my seeking with felt consolation and clear insights have to die. You won’t let me get trapped seeking experiences of You rather than You Yourself. My expectations and assumptions begin to take on a life of their own, and it is not the life of Christ they’ve taken on.

Father, teach me to discern when it is “your back parts” that You are revealing to me. Grant me simple faith to receive and acknowledge Your presence in ways that I haven’t expected it. Wayne Anderson called these ways “back door grace.”

For many reasons, life seems to have taught me that I am to avoid failure at any cost. And if I cannot avoid it, I must hide it. But experiencing the backside of God will involve many experiences of apparent failure in relation to Him. This is just one spiritual implication of taking up my cross.

Please open the eyes of my heart to notice how You are revealing “your back side” to me in the places of defeat, sorrow, pain, humiliation, anguish, failure, sin and death that I’ve walked through recently. I have assumed that these experiences were evidence of Your absence, Your disfavor. Change my mind and heart. Free me and transform me so that I reflect Your kingdom and Your righteousness. Help me to learn Christ.

“If God is to be found in the cross of Christ, then he is hidden in its mystery; if human experience is illumined by that cross, then the experiences which are illuminated are those of suffering, abandonment, powerlessness and hopelessness, culminating in death. Either God is not present at all in this situation, or else he is present in a remarkable and paradoxical way.” (McGrath. p. 102.)

As I listen to these words it dawns on me that the cross moves from being merely a symbol to being a central reality of my life. The cross is not just an ornament or a church decoration. It is the brand of my life. My experiences of suffering, of abandonment, of powerlessness and of hopelessness are a kind of sharing in the cross of Christ. My pain and hardship and suffering are not meaningless. Christ knows and understands. He is with me in this.

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Book: Thank My Lucky Scars


Over the last few months, I have been getting back in touch with old friends and acquaintances from my high school graduating class. This summer, we’ll gather for our thirty-year class reunion. I’m still stunned every time I look at that number!

One classmate, Ward Foley, recently wrote his memoirs, Thank My Lucky Scars. He called me up to catch up a little, and was kind enough to send along a copy. In it, he tells the story of having been born with Arthrogryposis Multiplex Congenita (AMC), a severe condition defined in one location as “is a rare congenital disorder that is characterized by multiple joint and can include muscle weakness and fibrosis.“ Over the years, he had dozens of surgeries to seek to improve the strength and function of his body.

On top of that, he shares the stories of many extreme hardships he faced along the way as an adult. I found the story to be very inspiring. He talks a lot about how he found God’s presence in the midst of the suffering he faced along the way. I read the book in two days–it’s that compelling. I would encourage you to consider picking up a copy from his website. It’s well worth the read. You may or may not agree with everything he shares (and who of us agrees with anybody on everything anyway!), but you’ll find some real encouragement in hearing about his journey.

You can also watch a video clip about Ward on his website as well.