into the new

Sitting one day beneath a light blue sky, dimmed with desert sand looking more like faded old denim jeans, I found myself reading a book by Italo Calvino. In that book he writes:

“A person's life consists of a collection of events, the last of which could also change the meaning of the whole, not because it counts more than the previous ones but because once they are included in a life, events are arranged in an order that is not chronological but, rather, corresponds to an inner architecture.”

I sat the book down on my chest and breathed in the air, the sand, the thought. For eleven years, since the plane set down on the East end of the continent in 2010, we’ve been breathing the same Saharan sand. What beachside castles could be built in our lungs, an inner architecture of events. The waters of the Nile and Senegal rivers flow in our veins. The Indian and Atlantic comprise our horizon. The men, women and children across Africa people our dreams.

His words struck home in my heart. The collection of events in our lives are not chronological. That may be how we experience them, one after another, but the weight of each, the shape of each, determines its place. We all have memories we put on display. We build archways in our inner architecture, inviting others to celebrate them with us. Others, we try to hide in the basement behind old boxes and unfulfilled aspirations, callings for which we could never time. The irony is that those life events we try hardest to bury become fused with our inner foundations, cracking the image of God in our lives, while God’s callings for us float waiting to be invited back up to the living room.

For Elise and I, the events of these days will appear to “change the meaning of the whole,” not as Calvino says, “because it counts more…but because they are included in a life.” We have made the difficult but obedient decision to leave Africa.

Leaving Africa

Leaving Africa has been one of the hardest things in our lives. This great and beautiful continent that mothered me, raised me in her rain forest heart, trained me high above her rift valley, tried me in the desert sands, tested me on her coasts. More than all that, she has peopled our lives with the most incredible men, women and children. She has been the Lord’s house for us, placing us in family.

The Lord has been generous to us, not rushing us through this decision, but drawing us toward a new season over the past three years. Even as we were preparing to return to Dakar after a year of itinerate speaking in the United States He knew I wasn’t ready to make the move. The Spirit of God was kind, gentle and loving, moving step by step and day by day toward His purpose.

What a privilege it has been to have the support of men and women in our organization like John and Cheryl Easter, Mike and Linda McLaflin, Bryan and Laura Davis who saw their leadership as a mantle to steward others well. What an honor to stand with brothers and sisters like Jeremy and Jenilee Goodwin, Owen and Alison Pinckney, Chris and Heidi Ness, and countless others left unnamed for their protection.

What a humbling gift to serve along the national churches of East, Central and West Africa that have created space for us; to love the people of the underground church; to place our shoulders alongside Pastors Jean Noel and Khady, Benoit and Sophie, Jeremie and Elisabeth; to walk with future generations of servant leaders at the Bible schools in Senegal, Equatorial Guinea and the Gambia. All too immense a gift for one family!

A Door with a Beat

At our home in Dakar we built an small office a couple years ago, an intentional space to serve. As a symbol I had the door made of the wood from which djembe drums are made. That door had a beat, the knocks had a rhythm, a purpose. Every person who walked through was stepped into a song, a hymn of praise, a place of peace. I stood in that doorway a few weeks ago for the last time, blessed by the years that the door made by Sudanese teak invited people in to meet with Jesus, to grow in relationship with His people, to be loved in His kingdom.

Now, our life, our calling, lay on the other side of that door.

A Consecrated Time of Change

I have always been inspired by the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian who left comfort for purpose. While he was in Harlem, loving the men and women of the growing black church, his heart ached with the destruction taking place in Germany. He left the thing he loved for the purpose God was calling him toward.

For Elise and I we have watched the United States from the other side of the world, faithfully asking, “Lord, is now our Bonhoeffer moment?” Is it time for us to put our shoulders against the weight pressing against the American church. Over the years he has continued to keep us rooted in Africa, but 3 years ago we felt the air beginning to shift. We returned to Senegal for our third term of service unsure what was taking place.

In November of 2020 we sat down with our West Africa leadership and shared what we felt the Lord was saying and before the meeting was over Elise and I knew the time was now. In February, we spoke with them again and shared our final decision. From that point until a few weeks ago we walked the difficult path of saying goodbye. As of August 2021 we have brought the past 11.5 years of service with Assemblies of God World Missions to a close, as we step into this new season.

We are currently in the process of moving toward Richmond, Virginia to serve a multiethnic, multigenerational congregation with the challenging words of Bart Rendel and Doug Parks “to reimagine, reboot and reignite a movement of disciple making in our corner of God’s kingdom.”

Our vision is still to be a personal link from the local church to the unreached; to see the marginalized and disenfranchised who get easily lost in our fragmented society. Our mission is still to create a space to grow a movement; to steward the gifts and abilities the Lord has blessed us with for the good of others and His glory.

The Inner Architecture of Kingdom

Elise and I want to thank you for your faithful support over these past years, allowing us to be your personal link from your local church to the unreached of Africa. Together we have amassed a treasure trove of life events, ones that we sit prominently displayed in the inner architecture we share.

And even more so, the great and glorious things that God has done in and through our united obedience will be celebrated before the Lord in the inner architecture of His Kingdom. Every lost person found. Every new believer baptized. Every Christ-centered marriage consecrated. Every leader given a servants towel. All of those things mark our united service in Africa. And they will be the same defining events in our American days to come.

life in the bubble

Have you ever felt slapped in the face by a building? You were moving along through life at a nice brisk pace and then, wham, a solid construction that stops you in your tracks, like a gateway Arch welcoming you to cross the Mississippi, or the grand statue of Christ the Redeemer embracing Rio de Janeiro?

It’s amazing to think that a single building can define a city, even a nation. The form and design can define a culture. People in the remotest parts of the planet know America by her White House. The world grieved with the French when fire destroyed centuries of history held in the roof of the Notre Dame.

Our buildings become monuments of permanence, solidity; or, as if chisel into stone, a legacy of our history. Perhaps that is why we struggle to tear even the most temporary structures down.

Life in the Bubble

After the global destruction of World War I, a young aspiring architect wanted to make his mark on the world. Wallace Neff wanted to create buildings that radiated innovation and durability. For years he studied shells along the West Coast and marveled at how they endured the relentless pressure and immense forces of nature working against them.

Thanks to the revival of Spanish colonial architecture in Southern California he rose to prominence, becoming the architect for Hollywood stars. That wealth and affluence gave him space to pursue his passion: bubbles. He developed and patented, according to Jeffrey Head, “a new type of construction in which a rubber-coated fabric balloon [was] blown up and then sprayed with concrete or plastic.”

Neff dreamed that his Bubble Houses would take the world by storm. In the early 1940s each bubble only cost $200 and 18 hours to build (still only $2000 today)! He saw those durable pod shells as his life’s legacy. In 1942 the first twelve bubble houses were built in Falls Church, Virginia, and before long Neff and his team were expanding all over America and the world.

So imagine my surprise when I discovered that between 1948 and 1953 there were 1200 bubble houses built on the plateau of Dakar! How was it that I’d lived in Senegal for 6 years and never seen one of Neff’s innovative domed marvels?! Where were these space age defining constructions? Searching old city plans and modern aerial views of the city I finally found what looked like domes. I jumped in the car and drove over to find them. Today only a handful remain, and most of them have been deformed over time with adaptive construction.

The innovations of the past couldn’t stand up to the impact of urban sprawl. Neff’s bubble houses sadly proved inefficient for Dakar’s ever increasing dense population.

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Domes of Impact

Looking at these aged innovations, these ineffective concrete dreams, began a new prayer conversation in my heart. Neff wanted to leave a legacy. Who doesn’t? We use terms like ‘impact’ and ‘influence’ to encapsulate our dreams. We want to take an active role in our ministries and how God’s kingdom comes and His will is done. This is well intentioned but should give us pause.

“Evangelical Christians love using the word ‘impact,’ writes Timothy Gombis. “While this is understandable, it is actually a pretty forceful… understanding of ministry. The term impact has to do with forcefully coming into contact with something, which is a pretty violent understanding of how pastors relate to their churches and how churches relate to the world.”

Gombis goes on to explore the missionary ministry of the Apostle Paul who, although we often imagine him as the poster child of activity, instead took a more passive role in deference to what God was doing in the Church. “Paul does not seek to impact his churches, nor even to influence them… In Paul’s view, God is the active agent who builds, grows, and shapes the church. Paul is deferential to God’s intentions and plans so that he sees himself as being at God’s disposal to do with him as God sees fit.”

Forward in a Fog

All of this reminds me how in 2009, as Elise and I were preparing to follow Jesus into the deserts of Northeastern Africa, God led my heart to Exodus 13 and 14. Moses and the people of Israel were on the banks of the Red Sea. They were moving toward God’s vision for their future while their past was dangerously close behind. Over our blessed years in Africa it has often felt that we have been journeying through the desert, blindly trusting the Lord is going before us, like He did at the Red Sea.

Only recently have I begun to see how immense that image really is. The people of God, newly freed from slavery, are following God in fog and fire! Passing through the Red Sea they were surrounded by a fog. Walls of water and a pillar of cloud towered over them while the crashing of Egyptian wheels echoed behind them, pushing them forward.

For forty years the manifest presence of God’s Spirit always went before them, leading them toward the future (Exodus 40.38). How many times did the people tire of the journey, the frustrations of their never-ending pilgrimage? How often were they tempted to breakaway from the pack when the fog began to move?

Surely, they must have thought, “God just made this water sweet. We should stay here!”

“God just provided manna in this valley. Will it be there tomorrow if we move?”

“We finally have water again, bursting forth from this rock. The Lord is at work here. We should stay here.”

Sadly, the people often did resist the movement of the Spirit. They started to set down roots or longed for the rose-colored experiences of the past. They could have chosen to stay at Sinai or be satisfied in Succoth. They could have settled for the innovations of yesterday while God led them again into fog of the unknown that required trust but promised His presence.

If the Spirit moves, should we stay? If the cloud of God’s presence is moving shouldn’t we move with it? Answering these questions may come quickly, but when we become comfortable in our rhythms and content with our patterns, our actions may belie our ready responses. We love that style of worship. We prefer that communication method. (What was wrong with 8-tracks anyway!?) Too often we stay when the Spirit is already on the move.

Bursting the Bubble

There was a time for God’s people to be in Egypt. There was an era for Neff’s bubble houses. There was even a blessed season for them to stay at the foot of Sinai. But the day came when they had to leave Egypt. The day came when Neff’s bubble burst. There even came a day when the Spirit of God left Mount Sinai (Numbers 10.11-12).

We all want legacy and longevity, but what if God is calling us to follow Him into the unknown? Give up trying to define the landscape of your city in your strength. Redefine your life in Christ. Obedience is better than permanence. Follow the Spirit.

We all want to impact the world and influence others, but what if Jesus is calling us to surrender “our” control over “our” ministry, reevaluate yesterday’s innovations and trust in His path and plan. Let the Bubble House burst. Make space for new. Follow the Spirit.

It can be scary to follow the fog of His presence away from Mount Sinai, believing He is doing a new thing (Isaiah 32.19). Follow the Spirit. He made a way through the Red Sea. Now look, He will make a way through the desert. There we will wrestle with your fears in the darkness. We will be like Jacob wrestling with angels and discovering the greater things God has for us down the road, further ahead, beyond our sight (Genesis 32.22-32).

Let us tear down our temporary structures as we fix our eyes on Christ the Redeemer. No architect can rival what He is building, a city radiant with the glory of God (Revelation 21). Jesus has prepared a place for us and His Spirit is leading us there (John 14.3). Follow the Spirit.

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Additional B&W Photographs by Steve Roden and Wallace Neff in 1953.

from Cyprus with love

I’ve always been a fan of the new name. Maybe it’s because Brett doesn’t translate well into other languages or accents. I’ve been called it all. Breck, Bright, even Breakdance a few times. Maybe it’s because I grew up in an African culture where names are very meaningful: Divine, Faithful, Standstill. Their purpose was right there in front of them in bold letters as they learned to write.

Maybe it’s because, according to my parents, I narrowly avoided being named Brick. Yes, Brick. As in,“We should build this house with…” or “The third little pig was smarter than the others. He didn’t build with straw or sticks. He built his house out of….”

Several times in Scripture God gives people new names. God changed Abram to Abraham, Sarai to Sarah. After an epic wrestling match Jacob became Israel. After a Spirit inspired revelation that would rock the foundations of future faith Simon became Peter. At other times God didn’t wait until a midlife crisis or dark night of the soul to change a name. Sometimes God gave chosen names to parents for their unborn children. The aged Zechariah was graced with the name John for his way-making son. The young Mary was surprised with the saving name of God who draws near to us, Jesus.

Not Your Average Joseph

It appears, influenced by God action in the days of old and the playful attention of Jesus, the early church got in on the name changing fun too. In the book of Acts the apostles gave a new name to a man named Joseph.

Joseph was a Levite, a descendant of Jacob’s son that brought forth Moses, Miriam and Aaron. For generations his ancestors stewarded the holy space where humanity met with God. His people carried the Tabernacle through the wilderness and cared for the Temple in Jerusalem.

But this young Levite was not your average Joseph, born and raised in Israel. He was a third culture kid, a child of immigration, a Hellenistic Jew. He was born on the mediterranean island of Cyrus off the elbowed coasts of Turkey and Syria. He was raised amidst the swirl of diverse nationalities and people groups that ferried back and forth from his golden green home.

Then one day while in Jerusalem he heard the good news of Jesus, the crucified King of the Jews. He joined the growing band of pentecostal disciples who believed with one heart and soul in Jesus the resurrected King and His everlasting Kingdom. He listened to the powerful testimony of the apostles and He saw the social imbalance of society. Looking around him, he saw hunger and injustice. He saw pain and persecution, desperation and need. Joseph accepted the radical message of King Jesus and began to dismantle the life he’d built for himself.

He sold a field he owned and gave the money to the apostles to distribute it to the disenfranchised; the widows, the orphans and the foreigners in need.

The apostles began to call Joseph by a new name: Barnabas (Acts 4.36). In this new name, Barnabas, they folded in rich purpose and meaning to which Luke stopped to give special attention. Luke didn’t let this new name slip by without translation. Bar Nabas in Hebrew literally means son of prophecy, but through interpretation and translation it becomes ‘uios paraklaseos,’ son of encouragement.

Encouragement Led by the Spirit

Often Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as the Paraclete, the helper, the comforter, the encourager. The apostles listened to Jesus teaching them about the promise of the Father, the empowering of their lives and ministry in the baptism of His encouraging Holy Spirit.

As the apostles watched Joseph from Cyprus they saw a man led by the Spirit. They saw a life yielded to the movement of Jesus’ love for the broken and oppressed. They witnessed in his words and actions an advocate for the discouraged, a comfort to the hurting. Joseph from Cyprus gave freely of himself and his resources. He gave generously of his impact and influence to advocate for others. The apostles were right to call him a son of encouragement, the Paraclete, a son of the Spirit.

Reading the book of Acts afresh we see Joseph of Cyprus’ influence everywhere. From the early church in Jerusalem to the planting of churches among the Gentiles. Led by the Spirit he put his reputation on the line for Paul the former Pharisee who was now preaching the gospel. When testimonies came to the apostles that God was establishing a multiethnic church in Antioch they sent Barnabas as their reliable scout. And when a young missionary ‘failed’ the son of encouragement was there to comfort him, to create space for the young John Mark back into ministry (with that in mind, reading the Gospel according to Mark takes on a whole new level of richness).

From Azusa to Dakar

A few weeks ago, while guiding the Bible school students through a biblical model of leadership, we looked at the Asuza Street revival as a case study. In 1906, it really looked like the Church in America was stepping into a new name. Men and women led the congregation together. Black, white, asian and hispanic lifted up the name of Jesus in unison holy and set apart from a segregated nation. But after a few years, the American church looked more like the aftermath of Babel than it did the day of Pentecost.

As we talked about the racial divisions still alive in America I could not hold back tears, or keep my voice from trembling. America, that “great unfinished symphony” desperately needs of a Church led by the Holy Spirit, ready to advocate for the voiceless and stand up for the downtrodden. In that raw and tender moment I invited the class into our pain and asked them to pray with us for the United States, for the Potomac, for Richmond.

Stepping into a New Name

World systems are collapsing. Whole nations are lost in political upheaval or surrendered to the corrupt and powerful. Refugees from every continent are fighting their ways across deserts, through war zones and pitching waves on the mere whispers of a promise, a better life. People with names are being lost on the margins of society and along the borders of nations.

How will we respond to the world in need? How will we respond to the call of the Spirit?

Looking across the Global Church many want to be like Paul, the pioneer of church planting. Others may long to be like Peter, stumbling their way through ministry to the papacy. But what the struggling world sorely needs now is a generation of men and women like Barnabas in the Church. We don’t need more Bricks or Bretts, Josephs or Jacobs. We need sons and daughters of the Spirit. Men, women and children who will follow the Spirit of Jesus into the lives of the hurting and lost.

have art, will travel

Kneeling at the altar I saw a vision of a hammered blue gate, bolted and locked to solid brown walls that would not budge. I shook the handle, but the gate held. Locked.

Seeing the metal frame before us as a blockade I asked the Lord to unlock the gate so that we might reach the people beyond. I looked up and watched as a dove descended and landed, not on the lock, but on the top hinge of the gate. As the dove landed the gate hinge gave way and it swung noiselessly against the lock revealing a dark-faced man clothed in flowing white clothes.

My immediate response, still moving through the emotions of the last broken down gate in Northeastern Africa, was to scan the man’s body for weapons, but the dove flew between us revealing he was unarmed. He was seeking the Savior. As we stood together, next to the unhinged gate, I watched as the man upturned his head and arms and began to worship Jesus the Messiah! What joy burst through my heart! I watched as a fire descended into his chest and as He opened his mouth in praise a tongue of fire came out that became so large it rose over the nation of Senegal! Amazed I watched as several smaller tongues of fire began to kindle over the city of Dakar.

(Journal Entry from January 19, 2014)

Seven years ago, I began to sketch on canvases for the first time. As part of our recovery process from our painful exit from Northeastern Africa I was trying to explore creative outlets, new ways of worshiping and healing.

After seeing a vision while worshiping at the altar of a church I quickly began to sketch what I’d seen and, with the trepidation and excitement of an amateur, set out to interpret it through brush and paint. I wanted to see beyond the gate, beyond the block, beyond the trauma. Each brushstroke was an intercession, a cry for the unreached peoples of Senegal. I prayed I would see that man in my vision face to face. I dreamed I would walk the sand streets of Dakar and see the gospel passed through his life into souls of men, women and children across Senegal.

As I painted and prayed I could hear Simeon’s prophetic words as he held the baby Jesus, “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you may now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all nations: a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel,” (Luke 2.29-32).

For seven years, from the home in Manassas provided by Chapel Springs Church where I painted it to Dakar, that small canvas prayer has gone with us. From the guesthouse in Colobane where we first arrived and bought a dog to our first home in Guediawaye where we set a new rhythm for family life. From our kids school in Hann

Mariste to my little office in Pattes D’oie, that painting has served as a constant reminder of why we came to Senegal. Its intercession echoed along the bustlings roads of Parcelles Assainies and busy markets of Waxane Nimzatt, reverberating through the deep population in Pikine and Thiaroye; everywhere we turned a gentle call set against a blue sky to believe men, women and children will meet with Jesus.

As is so often the case, life rushes ahead of us. We get lost in the jumble of people wrestling their way through life. You busy yourself with being present in the most important relationships, set up boundaries to safeguard your family, and allow time to speed past in a blur. Dreams and visions become engrained like muscle memory and questions we once thought were so important fade in the rearview mirror of time. When I looked at that painting I stopped asking who that man was and kept interceding for the lost around him.

A Life Inspired

A few weeks ago, my dear friend Benoit came to Dakar. I got to guide him into ministry, first as a teacher at the Bible school and then as a mentor as we planted a new church with a small group of believers left stranded in the wake of a pastor’s moral and spiritual failure. After a year and a half the fellowship of believers had walked through healing and Benoit was ready to be their pastor.

Now, he is the pastor and director of a school in the middle of Senegal. The distance has been heart breaking but I’ve been so proud to see how he and Sophie along with their growing family have sought to take the gospel to the men, women and children around them.

During his visit I shared with him what I felt God was speaking to my heart, that the vision which brought us here to Senegal, was of him. I took that painting off my wall, the painting of him that I’d painted two years before I met him, and gave it to him.

As we sat together, praying and encouraging one another his stories inspired me. I asked his permission to share a few of them with you.

When the nation was hit by coronavirus it was impossible to reach out in their new city. People couldn’t come to church and he couldn’t go to homes to share the gospel. He prayed and one day, while resting and listening to the radio, he thought to call them and see if they would let him have time on the air. They not only gave him time, but gave it to him for free. Multiple times a week his Bible studies are broadcast across the region.

When he started other Christians and even missionaries told him not to share about Jesus. Speak about the stories of the Old Testament, don’t anger people with stories of Jesus. In his gentle way, Benoit responded, “I was not sent here by Abraham or Joseph. I was sent here by Jesus. I will share his story.” That’s when people started to respond.

A Peul nomad brought his demon possessed wife the religious leaders and witchdoctors couldn’t heal. She’d came into their home in a comatose state, rigid and in a trance. Freed in the name of Jesus she walked out in her own strength. The man now calls from his wanderings with his herd and is on his journey toward Christ.

A local imam began rebuking Benoit on his radio show. That was until he began to listen to it. He started to say, this religion of the Christians is truly from God. He started calling Benoit. Now they are talking about Jesus together.

As Benoit sat in our living room he shared how the imam wants to read the Bible but he can only read arabic script. In my office, there were only two books left in Arabic remaining from our time in the Sahara, Glad News! God Loves You My Muslim Friend and my Arabic Bible. I brought them down from the top shelf and gave them to him to lead his searching friend home.

A Life on Purpose

Through the seasons of our lives it is easy to become battle-hardened, to dig down into a trench and claim a space for our calling. But this isn’t the way of Jesus. He calls us to Himself. As we draw near to Jesus, he empowers us and sends out among the orphan, the widow and the stranger. We are not commissioned to build missile silos of apologetic faith ready to decimate and conquer. We are blessed to a blessing, to serve the wounded and the searching as wounded healers who know the way home.

I pray that you would open your eyes to see and your ears to hear what Jesus is saying over your life today. What new vision or new dream does He want to set before you? A new path that brings him glory rather than an old way that has become comfortable and worn. Would you invite the Spirit of Jesus to speak to your soul anew? You may be surprised by what He says.

“May the Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6.24-26)

face toward the sun

Beauty has a strange way of crashing in on us.

Every morning I get up in the predawn dark, greeted by the songbirds that populate our trees. But before I can stop to drink it in we leave that idyllic setting to brave the automotive chaos of urban traffic. These roads are less like blacktop pathways and more like storm-struck beaches beneath the collision and clash of metallic waves advancing against each other. Gone are the sweet songs of firefinches and mourning doves, now only the warbled horns blaring and chirping expletives.

And then, over the crunch and the crowd, the shadowed sky begins to break. Far on the horizon light begins to transform the city. The dark is peeled back like an orange rind and the dawn proclaims life and light for a new day.

A Girl from the Dunes

A few weeks ago, Jérémie invited me to come and preach. When he was in Bible school we began a children’s club together. Under the setting sky we would converge on a roofless discotheque, trailed by children from across the maze of homes rising out of sandy alleys. Then, after sunset, the adults would gather for a prayer meeting and short worship service.

Jérémie is now the pastor of a small fellowship an hour and a half from Dakar. It was wonderful to see him and his wife again, to rejoice at his oldest daughter’s good school marks and see how much his son has grown. It was a beautiful time together. We lifted our voices in worship, like songbirds greeting the day as they set out to search for food. I shared from the book of Mark and together we chewed on what the Spirit was saying to us.

After the service a young girl came and greeted me. Jérémie introduced her. After our club days in Wakané Nimzatt, he had taken that same model to another neighborhood. This little girl heard the love of Jesus Christ and it transformed her world. She is Pulaar, a child of an unreached and often resistant people group. As she grew in faith, her family brought her to Jérémie with these parting words: “She loves Jesus more than us. You take her.”

The sting of Jesus’ words to his disciples have never found so real an illustration for me. This little girl from an unreached people has set the weight and wonder of the cross on her shoulder and found life (Matthew 10.34-39). In her face reflects Christ’s radiance of God’s glory because even in the face of rejection, she has been grafted into the family of God and been woven into the home of Jérémie and Elisabeth (Hebrew 1.3).

What a beautiful path of discipleship. What a great reminder of the kingdom to come!

A Boy in the Kenyan Hills

At her age, I was in the Kenyan highlands, playing with friends at boarding school, building forts and chopping wood. There are few places on earth as beautiful as the Great Rift Valley, but those glorious views belie a cold that my thin island blood couldn’t adjust to.

As a dorm, we chopped wood for hot water so we didn’t freeze in the shower. We chopped wood to keep a fire going to stay warm at night. We even chopped wood because it was fun. It was incredible to see large, solid trees give way into firewood and kindling as the swing of our young arms hammered down.

Emmett Cooper and Steve Wamberg once wrote, “When splitting wood, aiming at the top of the log only produces useless slivers of wood. Aiming for the block—past the target—gets the job done.”

So often we set our eyes on what is nearest to us, the top of the log, instead of the insurmountable task ahead. We set ourselves against the task and come away with meager advance and slivers of success. We aim at what is right in front of us, forgetting what is to come. We measure ourselves against the disheveled patterns of this world and find ourselves wanting.

That little girl, however, challenges us to look past the “target,” past the plots and plans of mice and men and back toward the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3.12-14). How could we live the possible in the plans of people when the impossible is set before us in the profound glory of Jesus Christ our Lord? Should we abandon the Father’s promise for fear of the unseen and unknown?

A Chosen People

New Testament theologian Scot McKnight reminds us “choosing a church is choosing a culture, and the culture we choose will form us into the people we become.” Today, we must ask ourselves if the culture we’re in is willing to create space for dreaming new dreams, impossible dreams, God’s dreams?

As sons and daughters of God we must lift our arms once again, aiming for the block—not distracted or dissuaded by the systems and best practices of this world—trusting the Holy Spirit who speaks dreams and visions into our hearts will bring them into existence. Though we do not know the future, we know the One who does.

It’s in obedience, not success, that divine beauty crashes in on us. It’s in righteous pursuit, straining toward the goal surrounded by the foment and fury of this world, that we see the sunrise.

the way is made by walking

2020… what a year!

I think historians will be wrestling out ways to express the overall shape of these past twelve months. Sometimes it feels more like we’ve collectively lived a decade in this single spin around the sun.

Think about it for a second. If you could use one single word to describe this ‘brick through a window’ of a year, what would it be? How would you sum up all the brushfires, murder hornets, swarming locusts, political intrigues and global revisions?

I’m beginning to think this year has really just been an extended Charlie Brown cartoon. We seem perpetually stuck in the frame where Lucy invites Charlie to kick the football. Invariably, despite all her promises and cajoling, Lucy always pulls the football away at the last second sending him reeling across the scene. Like Charlie, it’s as if the world is screaming one collective “AAUGH!” as we hurdle back to the hard, unyielding earth.

2020… what a year!

A Rosary of Themes

Ironically, I started this year with a word in mind. Every year we pray for God to set a theme for our family. We take the first few months of the new year, seeking the voice of God for a word, a prism through which to pray and read and walk.

Over the years its been amazing to look back and see how God was preparing us for the life-shaping and life-shaking events to come. In 2007, I started writing down each years theme, watching them develop and form into seasons. That year of growth was followed by a much needed year of restoration (2008). They flowed like winter slowly melting into spring. 2010 was the year we made contact. Our feet touched African soil and a summer season burst into brilliant life and color.

When we set faithfulness as our theme for 2015 could we have ever expected to walk through the most difficult days and darkest nights we’d ever experienced. Days when I struggled to find clarity and energy. And yet, undergirding it all was that year’s theme God had spoken to us: faithfulness.

In my journal now rests a rosary of themes, beads of experience. Looking back, we really should have seen it coming when we felt the Lord saying “Transformation” as we prayed for 2020.

This year has upturned plans and strategies. It’s trampled underfoot goals and intentions. And throughout these days and months we’ve felt the transforming power of the Holy Spirit at work, revealing Christ’s glory in our weakness and creating space for us to celebrate His beauty!

Praise God for this year is throwing away the cookie-cutters of ministry, the ways of doing ministry that have become ingrained and inflexible (Psalm 104.24). Thank God this year is disconnecting us from the plug-and-play systems that undermine the Holy Spirit’s call to innovate and pray (Romans 12.2). Today, let’s extol His name as we commend His ways, and not our own, to a new generation (Psalm 145.1). Let’s rejoice that He is replacing our tired attempts to repeat what He’s done in other places and times with new things we could never have imagined (Isaiah 43.19)!

2020… what a year!

A Way Made by Walking

Closing the book on this year and cautiously stepping into 2021 I’m reminded of the words of the Spanish poet Antonio Machado, “The way is made by walking.”

Friend, its time to stop looking for the ‘tried-and-true-paths’ that promise success and simply follow Jesus into the unknown. It’s time to step into the new thing He is preparing for us. But make no mistake this will require trust. Perhaps that should be this next years theme: Trust. Trust that in the dark His command is a lamp showing us the way (Proverbs 6:23). Trust that in the unknown and unforeseeable His word is a light that reveals our path (Psalm 119.105).

This path may lead us deeper into the wilderness. If it does, praise the One that led us there. This new year’s journey may cut against the current of those around us ready for life ‘to go back to normal.’ If it does, trust Him all the more (Proverbs 3.5). Each step is building up our most holy faith. Every day on this pilgrimage is a new opportunity to stoke the fire of our love for God and one another.

This way is made by walking. 2021… what a year!

“Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.” (Jude 24-25)

of fathers and sons

Eight hundred young men crowded the street. That’s how the story goes. The space outside the Hotel Montana was so flooded with young men from across Madrid that the police had to be called to try and disperse them.

In the days before this strange mass in the city street, a man had come to town in search of his estranged son. As Hemingway tells it in The Capital of the World, this father had placed an advertisement in the newspaper saying “Paco meet me at the Hotel Montana Noon Tuesday. All is forgiven. Papa.” One by one, tens, then hundreds of sons converged and swallowed up the gray in search of restoration.

There is something uniquely beautiful about the relationship between fathers and sons. Most sons grow up wanting to be like their dads. They navigate the years being saturated with their fathers’ worldviews, mannerisms and behaviors until they reflect their fathers as much inside as out. Time is pivotal for fathers and sons.

The Tears of a Prophet

Lately, our family Bible studies have been getting more interesting. It’s like watching a flower emerge, a time-lapse of an emerging bud encased in green, slowly unfolding with brilliant life and vibrant color. As we retrace the steps of Scripture again and again, engaging the well known stories and forgotten details, I never cease to marvel at the ever deepening questions and reflections our children bring.

In one short year, I’ve watched as my son’s mind has expanded like an exploding universe, filled with wonder and mystery, studying God’s word. The world of the Bible is coming alive to him and he’s increasingly finding his story in it.

The other night, as we sat and talked together about the role of God’s people to be a kingdom of priests for the nations (Exodus 19.6), his face clouded over. He, in his very Henry way, meekly entered the family discussion. In his clear and precise voice, he put forward a question his eyes revealed he knew the answer to: “Does this mean that [the people around us] don’t go to heaven?”

It was a heartbreaking moment as Elise and I gently said that yes, without Christ they face a Christ-less future. His eyes burst with tears and he buried his face in the arm of the couch. His mind fired like rockets with the faces and names of friends who don’t know Jesus. For the first time I watched as my eight year old son wept for the lost. In that moment, our entire family was broken anew for the unreached around us. The rest of the evening was filled with tears and intercession. And it challenged me to ask myself when was the last time I wept for the lostness of the unreached? Time is pivotal for sons and fathers.

A Life of Collected Memories

When I told my father about this particular family devotion he said, “you’ll remember that time for the rest of your life.” He’s right. That moment will become a memorial stone in our family story. When we gaze back against the horizon of time it will stand out with many others, across a promised land marked by altars, where we’ve met with God.

So much of life is spent in collecting. We arrange our closets with the collections of clothes that best describe us. We fill our libraries with books that reveal the inner workings of our minds. We saturate our walls with art and decor that create externally what we long for within. Our collections tell the world who we are because most collections are visible.

And this is what we find in the Gospels: the story of a Son and His Father. They are the collected memories of disciples who watched the love of Father and Son embrace the world. The author of Hebrews puts it this way: “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power,” (Hebrews 1.1-3a).

As Christmas draws near, this time of year we celebrate the birth of Jesus “who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men,” (Philippians 2.6-7). Time and time again in the Gospels we see a Father smiling on His Son. We hear a Dad cheering from the stands, each victory a new milestone, each challenge producing another memorial stone.

Time is pivotal for fathers and sons because, through time, God the Father and Christ the Son are restoring the lost. Through time, the triune King of Kings is recreating and redeeming all who respond to His call. And we, His kingdom of priests, are equipped by His Spirit to serve the widow and care for the orphan, to care for the stranger and walk humbly with our God (Micah 6:8). We are called to weep with others in their brokenness and invite them to the Lord’s Table (Romans 12.15; 2 Samuel 9.13).

In this life journey we can collect memories, beautiful milestones of restored relationship and sacred memorials of salvation. Our lives are the media through which the Father proclaims to the world, “Meet with me here at this time. In Christ, All is forgiven. Papa.”

the rock and sophocles

Life’s too short.

This last month has been a rollercoaster of emotions. Early one morning I received a phone call from my father. He told me that my mother’s recent routine surgical procedure had gone wrong. She was back in the hospital, waiting for a second surgery, more invasive, more corrective, and surely (although he didn’t say it) more dangerous.

It’s amazing how we as father’s intuitively downplay our own concerns for our children. Its a strength we don’t always recognize as children. I watched my father as he told me Mom was going to be fine and the doctors felt confident they would be able to repair the damage. I in turn gave the same brave face to my children when I told them about their grandmother’s surgery. I saw in their faces the same concern and worry and fear.

Five days later Mom was out of the hospital, back home and resting. My prayers breathed a sigh of relief, but the air was pregnant with an electricity I didn’t want to miss as life went back to normal. All the mundane tasks were calling me back for full attention, instead of the half-heart focus I’d given them the past few weeks; all those things that once seemed so important until something truly meaningful called for my attention.

Life is too short. The months, weeks and days from cradle to grave are summed up in a small dash between dates. How many stone markers and wooden crosses are there that sum up the highs and lows, triumphs and tragedies and everything in between with a short line. Life stories swallowed up in a linear void. And how many of those dashes are too short for cause of human striving?

Each person will have a different response to these life moments, these times that bring definition in the blur. Some will be crushed by the weight of painful possibilities. Others will bury themselves more deeply in distraction, work or play, to keep their minds occupied. Ultimately, like Jacob, they will all come to the same place where they must wrestle out the meaning of life and purpose (Genesis 32).

Wrestling Out Purpose
Jacob had worked hard. He’d carved out a wealth of his own, a life made up of success in the face of corruption, a nuclear family of his own filled with children. Finally, Jacob was able to shake free from his father-in-law, and set out to define his own life apart from Laban’s tricks.

But the farther from Laban he went the closer to Esau he got. Unresolved fear began to mount as he remembered how things were left with his brother. Jacob was distressed. Every dune they crossed and every wadi they passed brought them closer to Canaan and possible disaster. The days slowed to hours under the hot traveler’s sun.

Everything that Jacob had put his life into, all his hard work could go up in smoke. Not only that, but the people he loved the most were in danger. There on the banks of the Jabbok, God met with Jacob.

How often we sugar coat our encounters with God. We look for the transfigurations, the visions of God’s divine glory, while God is ready to meet us in our pain, in the darkest places in our soul. We’re so busy looking for rainbows we don’t see the body slam he’s bringing. We’re so hungry for our own success we can’t even smell what the Rock is cooking. All we want is a blessing but God wants to transform us.

All his life Jacob has been wrestling with everybody (Esau, Isaac, and Laban), trying to squeeze out meaning and purpose, against others. Jacob was living out the meaning of his name, grabbing at God’s heels, demanding a blessing for his benefit, a prize for his purpose. What more could we ask for?

The Tyranny of Self
Like Jacob we strive and struggle against one another, elevating our needs above all others. And this seems only right as we are uniquely aware of our needs. As altruistic as Jacob was in fearing for his family, giving his best efforts to protect them against Esau, he was still allowing a dangerous humanistic mindset to determine his behavior and rewrite his purpose.

In this current climate it seems appropriate to remember the Greek classics Sophocles deftly translated by Seamus Heaney: wrote “all of us would like to have been born infallible, but since we know we weren’t, it’s better to attend to those who speak in honesty and good faith, and learn from them.”

As wise as these words are they lift our eyes no higher than to other fallible people. It is a dangerous time when we put our hopes and dreams of a world renewed and a life transformed in the small hands of men and women. Whether we call it tribalism, xenophobia or a host of other names, the elevation of ‘me' and ‘mine’ will never produce the lasting purpose we want to define our lives. At best we can hope to become little dictators of our own individual democracies where our word is law and our rule irrefutable.

A Life of Pregnant Time
But life’s too short for that. Our lives have been built for too much meaning and beauty to be squandered on our vanities. Our lives are pregnant with purpose if we can only stop wrestling with one another and start wrestling with God.

When we stop fighting other image bearers and turn our eyes toward Jesus we find ourselves with a new name in a renewed purpose. No setbacks or struggles can overcome us. In Jesus, we shift from a life of clock-watching and score-keeping to a life of intentional worship.

Consider the life of Paul. Paul’s purpose and meaning were all bound up in a pregnant approach to life. Repeatedly Paul called for God’s people to shift their thinking, to change their focus, to rewrite their mindsets. Paul encouraged the Galatians to re-orient their lives toward Christ, watching for the rich opportunities to serve and bless others (Galatians 6.10). He challenged the Ephesians to redeem the time in the face of evil (Ephesians 5:16).

Our lives as Jesus’ people should be marked by a belief that any time we are wrestling out the purpose of God for our lives are moments pregnant with possibility. Paul calls us from our common complacency to walk in wisdom. As we walk before a corrupt world, redeeming the time as we graciously share the good news of Jesus Christ (Colossians 4.5-6).

In the end, life’s too short to spend it fighting the wrong battles and skirmishing on the wrong shores. In the coming days, let’s climb out of the trenches, season our language with salt, and love others as we fix our eyes on Jesus. Life’s too short to wrestle with anyone but God.

shadowboxing and the future

It only took a year! Buried in the heart of all our furniture, books and belongings, Elise and I had packed a boxing heavy bag on our 20 foot container. Because of my knees, running is not a great exercise option but I’m painfully aware I need all the help I can get to stay in shape (or is it get in shape…).

Maybe it’s the fact that I see the top of this middle-age hill from here, or that somehow I’m closer to 50 than 20 now, but it’s clear that Father Time has been in cahoots with my vanishing metabolism for some time now. Over the past decade I was busy like every one else in the rat race of life, searching for meaning, hungry for success and busy laboring for significance.

It’s been wonderful passing on to our kids more and more of the wisdom my father taught me as a child. Somehow, however, it took me nearly four decades to realize the old adage, “It’s all fun and games until somebody gets hurt,” wasn’t so much directed at the rambunctious roughhousing kids but the dad who gets down on the floor to box and wrestle with them. (I’m still not sure how that boxing lesson turned into a mauy thai free-for-all with me buried under four kids!)

So, finally after all the construction and unpacking, moving and removing, we’ve got the punching bag up and boxing gloves out. Time to get back in the fight. But as hungry for health and energy we may be, hurry and quick results aren’t the answer we need. It’s not quick fixes or yo-yoing scale readings. We can’t rush new habits.

But what a hurry we’re in today! Hardly out of a global lockdown and we’ve come bursting out like a prize fighter at the ding of the bell, with a bust lip and swollen eye. We’ve hardly given ourselves time to come to grips with the punches dealt in the last round to register the sheer amount of damage we’ve taken before we’re jumping back out of the corner in a mad rush for our opponent.

It’s important to realize, like that prizefighter, our motivations maybe right and righteous, our pursuit for victory and success laudable; but in our unfettered hurry we only invite carnage to our intentions and misdirection to our purpose.

A Misdirected Unity
Between the days of Joshua and the reign of David, the people of Israel stumbled across the generations, adrift in the river of time, floating from one defeat to another. Turning away from God, the people found themselves bruised and bloody from their sin at the oppression of the surrounding nations. Suffering and disenfranchised they would turn their faces toward God and He would faithfully raise up a judge among them to set things right. Reading the book of Judges is like leafing through a Sears-Roebuck catalogue of failures; it’s like watching the carnage of a merciless boxing matches go round after round.

Reflecting on the final round of Judges, Tokunboh Adeyemo wrote, “Though the period of Judges was marked by religious apostasy, moral atrocity and general political anarchy, there was still a pervading national sense of justice and unity.” Unlike the others’ rounds the final battle recorded in Judges was not against a foreign power or outside opposition. It was an internal struggle that led to civil war. These chapters show a sinful and shattered group roused by injustice.

Eleven of the twelve tribes swiftly set out in righteous indignation to right the wrongs of Benjamin. But rather than start in a slow, careful and concerted search for God’s plan, they hurried into battle only asking God who should go first rather than if or how they should proceed. Although their motivations were right, they suffered severe causalities as brother fought brother. They hurried their coalition of fury into war and got burned in the conflict. Only when they slowed down, humbled themselves and expressed their angst before the Lord did they find a clear answer and the path to a bittersweet victory.

A Redirected Approach
Today, we are surrounded by injustice, overwhelmed by the rabbit punches assailing us from every angle. All around the world men, women and children are suffering abuse and disenfranchisement. Newspapers and television channels are replete with all kinds of horrors. We have become busy with outrage and overcome with fury. In the next round we are poised for a great moment of victory, but only if we can clear our head enough to remember why we stepped into the ring in the first place.

As the days move faster and the world spins out of control we must, in the words of Dallas Willard, “ruthlessly eliminate hurry from our lives.” As the sons and daughters of God we must excise the busy-ness from our witness.

Looking across this world, our rushing to judgment is robbing us of clear vision as we shadowbox with our own opinions. Our hunger for quick results have come at too steep price as we’ve left the Church out of shape, overweight and bankrupt to serve people in pain. Our striving for success has left us bloody and bruised and alone. Friend, I fear our passion to draw battle lines is leaving a generation lost and cold in the trenches of our warfare.

In our fury we’ve lost the altar. Holding spears and shouting taunts back and forth we’ve lost our earnest prayer for revival and restoration. I look at our world and the nation of my birth and I weep because now more than ever I see people who need Jesus but have no access to Him. Can they see Christ in our harried lives, our sound-byte words, our unexplained actions? Even more, can they see His cross on our shoulders?

If my heart swells with hatred at the sight of broken men and women, hurting from a pain I don’t understand, I must urgently make space and time to see them as Christ sees them and find the Father’s love for them. If I don’t I’m only shadowboxing with false narratives of my own creation while the men and women created in the image of God await the good news of Jesus Christ! Beloved Friend, we have been made with a purpose. We have been made, not in the image of earthly ideologies or political slogans, but in the image of God.

The next generation is watching.

sand and a practical theology of watermelons

I’m not sure I can even begin to express how happy Elise, the kids and I are to be home. We’d barely been home an hour when the neighborhood kids came knocking at the door inviting our kids to play. It was like no time had passed at all. The only visual change was that they’re all now wearing face masks.

Being away from home during the harmattan season (when the desert sands are lifted out of the Sahara and send rain down across the rest of Africa) our days have been marked by three things: dusting, sweeping, and rearranging. Each room, from floor to ceiling. Each shelf, from right to left. In the renewing process, we also had a few new things like an Instant Pot for the kitchen, a new painting for the office, and maybe a few dozen books to be sprinkled throughout the house.

Each completed room left us with a sense of accomplishment; every space, freshly cleaned and arranged and ready, a physical reminder of purpose and potential.

Right now, I feel like I’m engaged in a similar grand-scale deep clean in my brain. What does church planting look like in the current global realities that make it difficult for the existing Church to gather let alone engage new works among unreached peoples in churchless neighborhoods? What dust has settled on our concepts of establishing new communities? Where has the sand of time piled up, obscuring our view of God’s Kingdom? How can we rearrange our practices and mindsets to grasp the movement of the Holy Spirit?

Remembering Faith, Love and Hope
The other day our family gathered with fellow workers and together we remembered a church planted under less than ideal circumstances. After less than a month the planting team was forced to abandon their new work due to persecution, and were unable to return. Eventually one of them was able to travel back to the city and meet with the new believers. The team was thrilled when he returned sharing with them of a vibrant, maturing and growing fellowship of believers!

The missionary team, Paul, Silas and Timothy sat down and penned a letter of rejoicing that has been passed down through time to us as 1 Thessalonians. For these church planters, the markers of health were the Thessalonians’ “work of faith, labor of love, and steadfastness of hope” (1 Thessalonians 1:3).

As we restart our church planting adventure here, connecting with our national church leadership, gathering with Bible school students and seeking to navigate our way into unreached neighborhoods, we dream of a day when, like Paul, we celebrate the faith, love and hope of Senegalese Christians. We wait expectantly for these new communities of men, women and children as we work to create space for them (Psalm 148.11‐14).

A Practical Theology of Watermelons
Early this year I was challenged afresh by an illustration from John Lo. He writes, “The interesting thing about seedless watermelons is that while they’re great for consumers, they’re terrible for farmers. The lack of seeds makes for great eating, but this requires farmers to buy fresh seed each time they’re planted. They’re bred for consumption but not for reproduction. Is the twenty-first-century church a seedless watermelon?”

How often in our streamlining processes—whether in life, business or ministry—do we end up excising the very thing we will need for the future. We celebrate what God is doing in the Church but we fail to carry those blessings out into the nations. We breed a Christ-lite culture that is easily digested but yields a blunted future that lacks transformation.

Home again, we are resetting our sights on planting three churches simultaneously. I am deeply aware that this is only possible as the Lord draws together millions of details. To watch people talking on social media, 2020 will be a year remembered in infamy for the myriad calamities discovered each month. But, could it not also be the year the soil of our lives was turned, the fields of our lives rearranged, and the seeds of revival planted?

Life Together
Dreaming outrageous dreams beyond my wildest imagination, I am always humbly driven back to what they mean for life together. This walk with Christ is not a solitary journey, but a true pilgrimage along the same road with others made in His image. Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “The person who loves their dream of community will destroy community, but the person who loves those around them will create community.”

Before we go too far, strike the rock and become frustrated that we are unable to force God’s visions into existence, let us be stirred by Paul’s example (Numbers 20.10-13). Let us rejoice, remembering what God has done, resting in the belief that He will do even greater things in the future. Let us go forward celebrating the splendor of our King, and let us do it together! Let us remember one another’s work of faith, labor of love and steadfast hope in Christ.

Let’s not be swept away in the sands of talents and special skills somehow believing that God can only use the strong and wise (1 Corinthians 1.27) Let us not allow ourselves to become consumed by striving for success or asking, “What can we offer each other?” Instead let us ask, like Henri Nouwen, “Who can we be for each other?”

Maybe it’s time to pick up a broom and dustpan, invite a friend, and begin to clean up our minds; dust off the important things, rearrange our motivations and be renewed (Romans 12.2). May we, the people of God, be known by our love (John 13.35).