Denied!

Being denied sucks. When you are denied something it is hard to not take it personal, right? When I was in High School I felt denied a lot. Asking girls to prom, denied. Trying to make the varsity team, denied. Hoping to get the lead in a High School play, denied.

Written all together it can make someone feel as if they are a failure and that denial becomes who we are, it becomes a part of us. We start to see ourselves as the denial. 

Sarah and I have been waiting for over 2 years for what we have been calling, “The Call”. Letting us know that we have been matched with our next baby. Each and every day we do not get a call feels like we are being denied. It feels like the last 2 years are all stamped with DENIED!, in red letters. Like a pass or fail from your teacher.

This last week, those in the Christian faith celebrated Holy week. As I read through the passages I cannot help but see denied stamped throughout the story. That those in the circle of Jesus especially after his death. They felt denied the Messiah they had hoped for, felt denied the leader they hoped him to be was now gone, denied the teacher they had followed. Their Rabboni.

Denied.

Then in John 20 verse 15, Mary is at the tomb, it is empty. She sees who she thinks is the gardener and asks for the body. She has come to honor Jesus by preparing his body, and now she has been denied. In her mind this is the latest in the moments of denial. She has been denied walking with her messiah and now this? Mary asks, maybe begging the gardener do not deny me this last moment. Let me honor him by preparing his body for burial. 

When we live denied, our eyes shift from the promise to something else. Something not worthy of our eyes. Mary lost track of where her eyes were at. And I understand it, she has suffered a massive lost in her life. The One who she has followed and given to has been crucified. Then Jesus calls her name. 

Mary. 

In that moment Jesus is not just calling out her name, he is calling to her heart. He is calling her out of the moment of being denied. It was not about being denied, it is about the delay. Delay to when it was time. Delay to when God was ready to be honored. Delayed to the timing of God. It is hard to understand why God allows us to be delayed into things he has for us. 

Often, sometimes daily, I ask God why he is denying us the chance to get the call for our next baby. Why do our boys have to keep praying the same prayer every meal, “Jesus help us to get a call for a brother and sister.” Why does he keep denying us this answer to prayer?

Maybe for you it is different. Maybe for you it is, God heal me. Nothing. God please heal my marriage. Nothing. God bring my kids back to you. Denied. God help me to forgive those who have hurt me deeply. Still trying to forgive. 

God has had to call my name, Ryan. To help me lift my eyes. Help me see that I have been living in the thought that I am being denied something, that my family is being denied a brother or sister to love. Or in my sons’ case both a brother and sister. 

God is delaying his promise, not denying it. What are you hoping for today? Maybe healing from a broken marriage? Maybe you have been waiting for something, calling out to God and yet nothing. If you feel denied, wait. Keep calling out to Him, keep searching for the heart of God. 

We feel denied because we called out for our mother or father to be healed and they were not.
We feel denied when our calls to help our marriage go unheard.

We feel denied when our child struggles with an illness when we call to God to heal them.

Delayed not denied.

Keep calling out to God, ask him to imprint his desires on your heart. God what do you have for me? At times we do not ask this. We look out for ourselves or we ask God to fit into our plans and our own desires. Reframe the ask.

If God calls your name, like he did for Mary, how will you respond? She responded with Rabboni. Samuel responded with, Here I am. How we respond in the delay is important. 

Ryan.

Here I am Rabonni. 

Delayed but not denied. 

Ride or Die...Heart and Soul

About 4 years ago I was driving around Madrid, IA. I was working in hospice at the time as a Chaplain. On most of my drives I would consume podcasts like they were half price after Easter jelly beans. On this day Dylan sent me a podcast and told me to listen. As I pulled it up on my phone and started to listen it spoke deeply to me. The pastors on the podcast shared about how the two of them started at a church together and how in those early years they decided that them and their families would covenant with each other at that church for life.

I sent Dylan a message after listening to it and asked him if he was in. Are our families going to covenant together here for life. Ride or Die.

He said he was in. Ride or Die. It felt like a natural progression. It was a fit for us.

We talked more in a face to face visit about this and that was it. I came home and told Sarah with tears in my eyes, Ride or Die we are in this for life with the Does.

It was odd, there was no fear in it at all. Joy. Lots of joy. This is something that I had no intentions to step into when we said yes to Marshalltown. But over the first few months that was it, we were in.

Flash forward to this last October, I had been coming to the end of the worst 2-3 month stretch ever in ministry. It was horrible. My relationship with Dylan had gone down hill and I was miserable in ministry. I was feeling isolated. Hurt. I was done. As I sat in my office on my lunch break I typed up my letter of resignation. It was a horrible moment, it was something I never thought I would do, I was was broken.

I sent Dylan a text message asking if he wanted to get together. He met and after a few awkward moments I shared with him my heart. I shared about my brokenness and hurt from the last 2-3 months. But here is the funny thing...as I shared I could see deep brokenness in his face. This was unlike anything I had witnessed before. He shared how he was feeling betrayed that I would not have shared this sooner. He was sorry and apologized for where I was hurting. After deeper conversation I shared with him that I had a letter of resignation ready.

Dylan shared with me that if I gave it to him he was going to refuse it. He told me that we had made a covenant with each other...Ride or Die. That we had to do what we needed to work this out.

Fast forward almost 6 months.

I have been in counseling this past year, working through a lot of stuff. Learning to die to myself and letting God heal in my hurts. The last few weeks have been tough, I preached on 1 Sam 14, and in this passage Jonathan and his armor bearer are going up the side of a mountain for a really tough battle. Jonathan asks his armor bearer are you with me?

The response stopped me in my tracks (mentally), Do all that you have in mind...I am with you heart and soul.

This has been now part of my mantra with him...Ride or Die...heart and soul.

I told a friend of mine from seminary about the covenant, and he shared that he had not heard of something like that before. And that is because it is not for everyone. Honestly it is not for most people. I just know that for our families, that is it. Here and now. Ride or Die.

I do believe that you need someone like this in your life. It might not mean you live in the same town or that you covenant to pastor together forever. Most cannot do that. We are weird.

I have found out that for this covenant to work there can be nothing between us. There has been more tears shed and more hurt over the last 6 months than I can ever remember having in ministry. But each time...when either of us feels down. We have called each other, at some point in the conversation it comes up. Ride or die. We made a covenant with each other, with our families. There have been things I have shared with Dylan about being a dad that I have not shared with anyone other than my wife. Because I know...ride or die, heart and soul.

Ride or Die. Heart and Soul.

Identity

Prove I am not a mistake

I love a good story line in a movie. You give me a good story line and I am hooked and in. Of course one movie that has always had me hooked is the Rocky series. Recently they rebooted the series with the son of Apollo Creed, Adonis. What a cool name right? I have tried to talk Sarah into using this as a name if our next baby is a boy but I digress she is not as on board as I am.

Both of the movies are fraught with amazing storylines. In the first movie we are introduced to Adonis who was adopted as a young kid by Apollo's wife.He has been fighting his whole life to create a name for himself. He fought in juvie when people would mock who his mother was. He fought growing up to make a name for himself, refusing to use the name Creed. At the end of the movie he has been given the chance to have a fight with a title holder looking to make a name for himself before he goes off to prison.

Adonis is looking for his identity. He is looking for who he is. In the final fight he is going toe to toe with the champ (of course he is, right). In a “lump in your throat” moment, in the penultimate round, Adonis gets hit and goes down and is knocked out cold. His mother is at home and she stands up screaming. His girlfriend in the crowd starts to scream at him to get up. Rocky is in his corner and is yelling out to him. I get emotional just writing about this.

As he hits the canvas his whole life is flashing before his eyes. He flashes back to the first moment when he met his mom in juvie, his mind brings back Rocky struggling through chemo treatment, his girlfriend locking him out of her life, and a moment of his father fighting of which he has watched probably hundreds of times. All fades away as he comes roaring to reality and back to life. He gets back up, the ref checks his gloves and he finishes the round getting hit time after time.

As he gets to his corner, one of his eyes is now completely closed and the other is nearly closed. Rocky tosses water in his face trying to wake him up. Rocky tells him that he is going to stop this fight, if you have followed the franchise Rocky did not throw in the towel when Apollo fought the Russian and it cost Apollo his life. Rocky is not going to let this happen again.

This has now hit home for Rocky, it is not just another fight.

Adonis pleads with him, “please don’t let me finish, I gotta prove it.”

Rocky, “prove what?”

Adonis, “That I am not a mistake.”

WOW. Heart rip out for moment Rocky and Adonis...and us.

Adonis has been chasing his identity his whole life. He has been running from the idea that he is a mistake.

This is me.

Rob Reimer shares that the power of the lie is in our agreement with it.

Adonis for so long wanted to believe that he was not just some mistake that happened. Now I know that I am not a mistake, but I believe the lie of where my identity is located. In Ephesians 4 Paul urges us to live a life “worthy” of our calling. He calls us to live a life worthy of our identity, worthy of who we have been created to be. He has called me, he has called you. 

Paul calls us to live a life “where your identity shapes your destiny, where who you are permeates how you live. If you only believe what God believes about you, it would revolutionize the way you live.” - Rob Reimer

That is the power of a Creed right hook. That is the power of the endurance of going toe to toe with a prize fighter.

God has called me to live in his identity for me. How he sees me. Stop dropping my head, eyes up. I have to tell myself often, stop dropping your head, lift it up. God created you for something greater.

‘

Rocky says you are going to do this because of your identity, “because you are a CREED!”

We often hear these words, “you are not good enough for God’s love. Do you think that He will actually forgive you again? He does not want to hear from you.”

Separate. Isolate. Destroy. ALL LIES!

You have nothing to prove to God. You do not have to prove your a not a mistake. You do not have to prove that the last few years of your life are a mistake. 

You MUST hold on to the truth, precisely at the moment that the lie is vying for a position in your heart and in your soul and in your behaviors. - Rob Reimer, Soul Care

I think that my identity is in flux. It is never in flux. Not to God.

In the final 15 seconds of the fight, the fight commentator says this, “Creed spins and puts the champ in the corner, throwing body shots like he is Rocky Balboa, going upstairs like he is Apollo Creed.” And Creed knocks the champ to the canvas for the first time in his career.

What would be said of us if we lived out our identity like this? If we went to the body of our enemy like Jesus did in the wilderness? If we went up top like God has done for us against the enemy when we are attacked?

Rocky says you are going to get up and fight. Fight with your identity, because you are a CREED!

Hold onto your identity Ryan, because you are MY SON! You are a CHILD OF GOD! Can you feel that? Can you live in that identity? Live worthy of the identity you have been called to.