Disappointment: What Will You Do With the Pain?

Hearing God, choosing His presence, and exchanging our pain for His perspective

There are moments when disappointment is more than an inconvenience.

Sometimes it frightens us. Sometimes it challenges what we thought we knew. Sometimes circumstances unfold in a way that makes us wonder, God, where are You in this?

We have been discovering that one of the most important questions in disappointment isn't simply:

“How do I get out of this?”

It is:

“Where will I turn while I am in it?”

That question has become very personal for us.

When God Spoke Before We Knew What Was Coming

Several years ago, Sharon began sensing strongly that something wasn't right with my health.

We had been working with someone we trusted for years, but Sharon increasingly felt that the Holy Spirit was telling her that we needed another perspective. She didn't know why. She just had an unusual hesitation—an internal sense that we weren't supposed to continue doing what we had always done.

Eventually, we found someone who used different methods of evaluating health, and we made an appointment.

But before that appointment, something happened that deeply affected Sharon.

On Saturday evening, while sitting beside me, she experienced something she had encountered on a few previous occasions: she believed the Holy Spirit was alerting her to cancer.

Her immediate reaction was essentially, No. That can't be it.

Then it happened again.

Early Monday morning, before our appointment, she woke from sleep with the word “cancer” strongly impressed upon her mind.

Three times.

She still didn't know what we were going to discover. Neither of us did.

Later that morning, the practitioner raised serious concerns about what he was observing and told us that he believed we were seeing a precancerous process that needed to be addressed.

It was frightening.

But something else was happening at the same time.

God had prepared Sharon before we ever walked into the room.

That didn't make the news pleasant.

It didn't eliminate our emotions.

It didn't answer every question.

But it changed how we experienced the disappointment.

We weren't encountering something that had surprised God.

And somehow, in the middle of something we absolutely did not want, there was comfort in realizing:

He was already there.

A note about our story: This is our personal experience and spiritual interpretation of what happened, not medical advice or a recommendation to substitute spiritual impressions or alternative testing for appropriate medical evaluation.

Disappointment Gives Us a Choice

As we continued walking through our health journey, we began recognizing something.

Disappointment continually presents us with choices.

We can become consumed with fear.

We can become angry.

We can desperately try to control circumstances.

We can search everywhere for something that will make the uncomfortable feelings disappear.

Or we can bring the entire mess to God.

That doesn't mean pretending we're okay.

It means being willing to say:

“God, I don't like this. I'm afraid. I'm disappointed. I don't understand. But I'm bringing it to You.”

And that brought us to two people in Scripture who experienced enormous pressure and disappointment very differently.

Saul: When Fear Makes Us Take Control

In 1 Samuel 13, Saul was facing a deteriorating situation.

Samuel had told him to wait. But Samuel hadn't arrived when Saul expected him to, and Saul could see his people beginning to scatter.

The pressure was increasing.

So Saul acted.

Instead of continuing to wait, he offered the sacrifice himself.

Saul's response to uncertainty was essentially:

“I have to do something.”

That impulse is incredibly familiar.

When circumstances seem to be unraveling, waiting for God can feel irresponsible. Everything inside us wants to regain control.

Fix it.
Make something happen.
Stop the pain.

But sometimes our attempts to control disappointment take us farther away from the very One we need.

Later, when Saul was tormented, David's music brought him relief (1 Samuel 16).

But eventually Saul turned against David—the very person who had once brought him comfort.

Something was happening inside Saul that temporary relief couldn't heal.

Unresolved fear, insecurity and jealousy were producing something increasingly destructive.

David: “In My Distress, I Called Upon the Lord”

David experienced distress too.

A lot of it.

But listen to the direction David ran:

“In my distress I called upon the LORD, and cried unto my God.”
— Psalm 18:6

David didn't say he wasn't distressed.

He didn't pretend he wasn't afraid.

He brought his distress to God.

Psalm 34 gives us another beautiful picture:

“I sought the LORD, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.”
— Psalm 34:4

David experienced fear.

But fear wasn't where the conversation ended.

Fear became an invitation to seek God.

And David certainly wasn't perfect.

Later in his life, David made devastating choices of his own. But when confronted with his sin, he eventually acknowledged it rather than defending his right to do whatever he wanted.

That is part of what distinguished David's journey.

He kept returning.

The Goal Isn't to Suppress the Emotion

This distinction matters.

Turning to God does not mean denying disappointment.

It doesn't mean:

“Christians shouldn't be afraid.”

Or:

“If I really trusted God, this wouldn't hurt.”

That's not what we're talking about.

We have experienced fear.

We've experienced anger.

We've experienced grief.

We've asked questions.

We've had moments when our emotions weren't pretty at all.

The invitation isn't to suppress those things.

The invitation is:

Bring them with you when you come to Jesus.

Beauty for ashes — bringing Jesus what we are carrying and allowing Him to show us what He wants to give us in return.

Beauty for Ashes

Toward the end of our podcast, Sharon shared one of the most personal examples of this.

Her mother has been facing terminal cancer, and Sharon has been walking through anticipatory grief—the strange pain of grieving someone you love while they are still with you.

One day she decided to bring that pain to Jesus.

In her imagination, she pictured herself handing her mother to Him.

And she saw Jesus receive her mother tenderly into His arms.

But Sharon sensed there was still more.

Several days later, she returned to that conversation with God.

This time, she pictured Jesus taking her mother toward heaven. As He did, her mother became a little girl—about six years old—with braided pigtails and a beautiful dress, running freely and joyfully.

That image was especially meaningful because Sharon knew how difficult her mother's childhood had been.

Later, when Sharon told her mother what she had pictured, her mother remembered having a photograph of herself at about that age—with braided pigtails and a dress.

For Sharon, that experience became a beautiful picture of entrusting someone she loves to Jesus.

It didn't change the reality she was facing.

It changed what she was carrying inside of it.

An Invitation to Bring Jesus Your Pain

This is something we practice ourselves, and perhaps it can help you begin a conversation with God as well.

Find somewhere quiet. Bring a journal if that helps you listen.

Then begin simply:

“Holy Spirit, is there something underneath the pain I'm feeling that You want to talk with me about?”

Don't try to manufacture an answer.

Tell Him what hurts.

Name the emotions honestly—even the ugly ones.

I'm angry.
I'm frightened.
I'm disappointed.
I feel abandoned.
I don't understand.

Then picture yourself placing those things into Jesus' hands.

You aren't pretending they never happened.

You're acknowledging:

“Jesus, I don't want to carry this without You.”

And then wait.

Ask:

“Jesus, what do You want to give me in exchange?”

Maybe a Scripture comes to mind.

Maybe you remember something about God's character.

Maybe you sense peace.

Maybe an image comes to mind that helps you understand what you're carrying.

Or perhaps nothing happens immediately.

That's okay too.

We aren't trying to manufacture an experience.

We're cultivating relationship.

Walk Through the Exchanging Pain Exercise

One of the tools that has been meaningful to us is the Exchanging Pain process from You Are Worthy Ministries.

It provides a simple framework for bringing our pain and emotions honestly before Jesus, releasing what we are carrying to Him, and listening for what He wants to give us in exchange.

We have made the process available here so you can walk through it during your own quiet time with the Lord:

Exchanging Pain Tool — You Are Worthy Ministries (PDF)

Exchanging Pain tool attributed to You Are Worthy Ministries.

This isn't about forcing an answer or manufacturing an experience. It's an invitation to slow down, acknowledge honestly what you're carrying, give it to Jesus, and make room to hear His heart and receive what He wants to give you.

Wait for Him

Lamentations says:

“The LORD is my portion… therefore will I hope in him. The LORD is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him.”
— Lamentations 3:24–25

And one of Sharon's favorite promises is Jeremiah 33:3:

“Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not.”
— Jeremiah 33:3

Maybe that's where we leave this conversation.

Disappointment will come.

Sometimes circumstances will change quickly. Sometimes the journey will take much longer than we hoped.

But disappointment gives us an invitation.

Where will I take this pain?

Saul shows us what can happen when fear increasingly drives us toward control.

David shows us another possibility:

“In my distress, I called upon the Lord.”

And perhaps that's where joy begins—not when every disappointing circumstance has finally disappeared, but when we discover that Jesus is with us right here in the middle of it.

That is what we're learning as we continue Journeying In Joy.

---

A Question to Sit With

What disappointment are you carrying today that Jesus may be inviting you to place into His hands?

When Disappointment Becomes an Invitation

Even in the middle of the storm, His presence remains—and sometimes the darkness becomes an invitation to draw closer.

Sometimes God has a sense of timing that makes you smile.

We sat down to record the second episode of Journeying In Joy knowing that we wanted to talk about disappointment.

And then the power went out.

There we were, sitting by candlelight, talking about disappointment while experiencing a small disappointment of our own. We had gone 74 days without rain, so we were genuinely grateful for the storm—but suddenly we were recording a podcast in the dark.

It seemed strangely appropriate.

A Year We Never Expected

This past year has contained things we once looked at in other people's lives and thought, I don't know how I would ever handle that.

And then some of those things happened to us.

There have been broken relationships. Serious illness. Hospice. Hospitals. Fear. Grief. Unexpected expenses. Questions without easy answers.

At one point during our conversation, Sharon described it as perhaps the worst year of her life—and yet, at the same time, one of the years in which we have grown the most.

That's the tension we're beginning to understand.

Walking with Jesus doesn't mean pretending something isn't painful.

It doesn't mean calling something good when it isn't good.

And it doesn't mean that grief somehow demonstrates a lack of faith.

We can grieve.

We can be disappointed.

We can admit, This hurts.

But we don't have to grieve without hope.

The Question in the Middle of the Storm

As we walked through hospitals, family difficulties, and decisions we didn't know how to make, another question seemed to keep appearing:

Will you lean into Me? Will you trust Me?

There were circumstances we couldn't fix.

There were people we couldn't manage.

There were outcomes we couldn't control.

And perhaps one of the hardest lessons has been realizing that we were never supposed to control all of those things in the first place.

What we could do was remain connected to Jesus.

Jesus describes Himself as the vine and us as the branches. A branch doesn't produce life by trying harder. It receives life by remaining connected to the vine.

That's becoming much more than a theological idea for us.

It's becoming a way of living.

We Have Seen Him Prepare the Way

One of the remarkable things we've experienced is discovering that sometimes God was preparing us before we even knew what we needed preparation for.

There were financial provisions that came before we understood the expenses ahead.

There were quiet impressions that later made sense.

There were moments when the Holy Spirit seemed to prepare our hearts for the next difficult step.

And there were times when what He asked us to do wasn't comfortable.

One of those moments came during an early 80th birthday gathering for Sharon's mom.

Because of her illness, we knew this gathering carried a significance that ordinary birthday parties don't. Family had traveled from several states, and we wanted her to know how deeply she was loved.

Sharon felt the Holy Spirit nudging her to become vulnerable—to tell her mom what she meant to her, to honor her, and to play a song of blessing over her.

She didn't really want to do it.

It meant crying in front of everyone. It meant allowing people to see the grief she was carrying.

But she did it.

And something changed in the room.

Other family members began crying together. People opened their hearts. Conversations happened that hadn't happened before.

The vulnerability Sharon would have preferred to avoid became an opening through which love could be expressed.

We don't overcome disappointment by avoiding the pain. We walk through the pain with Jesus.

Not Numbing the Pain—Bringing It to Him

There are many ways we can respond when disappointment hurts.

We can become bitter.

We can become afraid.

We can become anxious.

We can lash out.

We can withdraw.

We can numb ourselves so we don't have to feel what we're feeling.

But there is another invitation:

Bring it to Jesus.

That doesn't mean ignoring our emotions. In fact, we've been learning almost the opposite.

Name the grief.

Acknowledge the disappointment.

Tell Jesus what hurts.

And then invite the Holy Spirit into that place.

We aren't presenting this as people who have figured it all out. We're still living it. We're still learning. We still get things wrong.

But we're discovering that Jesus meets us there.

Learning to Recognize His Voice

One of the practical things we shared in this episode is something that helped us when we first began learning to recognize God's voice.

Take a journal and find somewhere quiet.

Then ask a simple question:

“Holy Spirit, what do You want to talk about?”

And wait.

Perhaps a Scripture comes to mind.

Perhaps it's a picture.

Perhaps a song.

Perhaps a thought or impression.

Write it down.

Then compare what you've heard with Scripture and with the character of God. Does it reflect who He has revealed Himself to be?

Then continue the conversation.

Ask another question.

This was an important change in our understanding of prayer. Prayer began becoming not only talking to God, but making room to listen.

Relationships grow through conversation.

Our relationship with God does too.

Joy Is in the Journey

Maybe this is why the name Journeying In Joy continues to mean more to us.

The goal isn't to reach some spiritual place where difficult things no longer hurt.

And God isn't standing at the finish line saying, You should be joyful by now.

He's with us in the journey.

As Sharon said during our conversation:

“Joy is in the midst of it.”

That's what we're discovering.

This has been an extraordinarily difficult season.

And somehow, in the middle of it, we're also recognizing His voice more clearly, experiencing His provision more personally, and learning to depend upon Him more deeply.

Maybe disappointment isn't always something we have to hurry past.

Maybe sometimes it becomes an invitation.

An invitation to stop trying to figure everything out ourselves.

An invitation to bring Jesus the places that hurt.

An invitation to listen.

An invitation to trust.

An invitation to know Him more deeply than we did before.

And perhaps that is part of what it means to journey in joy.

---

A Question for the Journey

Think about a disappointment you're carrying right now.

Instead of beginning with, “Lord, how do I fix this?”, try sitting quietly with Him and asking:

“Holy Spirit, what do You want to show me in the middle of this?”

Then wait.

Listen.

And write down what comes.

— Mark & Sharon
Journeying In Joy

Disappointment — Where Are You, God? What Are You Doing?

Disappointment is something all of us experience.

We hope for something. We pray for something. We believe something is going to happen. Perhaps a door appears to be opening, a relationship seems promising, a ministry opportunity develops, or circumstances seem to be moving in the direction we have hoped.

And then something changes.

The door closes.

We aren't chosen.

Someone lets us down.

A prayer doesn't seem to be answered the way we expected.

The future we imagined doesn't happen.

Recently, as Sharon and I have been preparing for the next episode of Journeying In Joy, we have been studying disappointment. We don't believe we have reached the end of this study yet. In fact, this post is really a collection of some of the things we are learning along the way.

One thing is becoming increasingly clear:

Disappointment isn't simply something that happens around us. It can become something that happens within us.

Disappointment begins with expectation

There is usually something underneath disappointment: an expectation.

We expected a particular outcome.

We expected someone to respond differently.

We expected God to answer a prayer in a certain way.

We expected the door to open.

And when reality doesn't match what we expected, disappointment enters the space between what we hoped would happen and what actually happened.

That doesn't necessarily mean the expectation was wrong.

Sometimes the thing we wanted was very good.

That is important because sometimes Christians can feel guilty for being disappointed, as though disappointment itself demonstrates a lack of faith.

But Scripture gives us many examples of people honestly expressing sorrow, confusion, grief and unmet expectation before God.

The question isn't simply whether we experience disappointment.

The deeper question is:

What happens inside us when we do?

The road to Emmaus: “We had hoped…”

One of the passages that has stood out to us is the story of the two disciples walking to Emmaus in Luke 24.

Jesus had been crucified.

Their expectations had collapsed.

And they said something incredibly revealing:

“But we had hoped…”
— Luke 24:21

Those words could almost be the definition of disappointment.

We had hoped.

They had believed Jesus was the One who would redeem Israel. Now, from their perspective, everything had gone terribly wrong.

But there was something they didn't realize.

Jesus was walking with them.

Their disappointment had affected how they interpreted their circumstances, but their disappointment had not changed the reality of His presence.

That connects deeply with something we discussed in our first Journeying In Joy episode.

When we look back over our day—or even over painful seasons of our lives—we can ask:

“Jesus, where were You?”

And perhaps that question becomes especially important in disappointment.

Jesus, where were You when the door closed?

Where were You when I wasn't chosen?

Where were You when that person disappointed me?

Where were You when what I prayed for didn't happen?

The Emmaus story reminds us that sometimes Jesus may be much closer than we recognize.

Closed doors can reveal where our security rests

Steve Backlund of Igniting Hope Ministries said something that has become important in our study:

“Often a closed door is an opportunity for us to get deeper soul prosperity, to reaffirm our source is the Lord, not particular opportunities, not particular people within our lives.”

That is a challenging thought.

A closed door can reveal something.

Where was my sense of value coming from?

Was it from being chosen?

Was it from receiving someone's approval?

Was it from getting the ministry opportunity?

Was it from seeing the outcome I wanted?

Backlund goes on to describe those moments when we want to be chosen and aren't chosen as opportunities to deepen our “soul prosperity.”

That doesn't mean pretending the closed door doesn't hurt.

It means discovering that even when the door closes, Jesus hasn't left.

Disappointment can affect the body

Another part of this study that has fascinated us is discovering just how physical an emotional experience can become.

When the brain perceives loss, rejection, uncertainty or threat, the body's stress systems can respond.

Our breathing may change.

Our heart may beat faster.

Our shoulders or jaw may tighten.

We may experience headaches, stomach discomfort, fatigue or difficulty sleeping.

Sometimes disappointment produces agitation.

Other times it seems to do almost the opposite. We feel deflated. Exhausted. Withdrawn. Perhaps we simply want to shut down.

There is wisdom in learning to notice these things.

Instead of immediately trying to make the emotion disappear, we can become curious:

What am I feeling right now?

Where am I feeling it in my body?

What happened just before I began feeling this?

And perhaps most importantly:

What did I begin believing because of what happened?

The event and the meaning we give it

Imagine that someone doesn't choose us for something we deeply wanted.

The event might simply be:

I wasn't chosen.

But inside us, something else may happen.

I wasn't chosen.

becomes:

They don't value me.

which becomes:

Maybe I'm not valuable.

Now the disappointment has moved beyond an event.

It has begun touching our identity.

The same thing can happen when a door closes.

The door closed can quietly become God has forgotten me.

A delayed answer can become God isn't listening.

Someone's rejection can become I'm unlovable.

This is why simply telling ourselves to “get over it” may not bring healing.

There may be something deeper that Jesus wants to address.

Don't argue with the emotion—invite Jesus into it

One of the ideas that has become important to Journeying In Joy is learning not simply to argue with what we're feeling.

Instead, we can invite Jesus into it.

“Jesus, where were You?”

“What do You want me to know about this?”

We can ask the Holy Spirit to reveal what is happening inside us.

Sometimes there is grief.

Sometimes anger.

Sometimes rejection.

Sometimes fear.

Sometimes an old wound has been touched by a new disappointment.

And sometimes there is simply sadness because something we genuinely wanted didn't happen.

We don't have to pretend those emotions aren't there.

We can bring them into relationship with Jesus.

Releasing disappointment doesn't necessarily mean releasing the desire

This may be one of the most important distinctions we have discovered.

Surrender doesn't necessarily mean saying:

“I didn't really want it anyway.”

We may still want it.

The dream may still matter.

The relationship may still matter.

The prayer may still matter.

Instead, surrender might sound more like:

“Jesus, I really wanted this.”

“I'm disappointed that it didn't happen.”

“I'm giving You the hurt, rejection, anger and fear that have become attached to it.”

“Show me anything I have begun believing that isn't true.”

“And I choose again to find my security, identity and joy in You rather than in whether this particular door opens.”

That is very different from denial.

It is bringing disappointment into relationship.

Our bodies may need permission to come out of the stress response too

Because disappointment can have a physical component, processing it can involve our bodies as well as our thoughts.

Sometimes something as simple as slowing our breathing, relaxing our shoulders and jaw, taking a walk, crying, praying aloud, stretching, resting, journaling or talking with someone safe can help our bodies move out of a prolonged stress response.

The goal isn't to force an emotion away.

The goal is to acknowledge what is happening and create space for it to be processed rather than continually carried.

I picture disappointment almost like carrying a heavy backpack.

One disappointment goes into it.

Then another.

Then another.

Eventually we aren't simply responding to today's disappointment. We're carrying the accumulated weight of many disappointments.

Perhaps Jesus is inviting us to take the backpack off.

Not because those things didn't matter.

But because we were never intended to carry their weight forever.

Healing is often a journey

Some disappointments are relatively small.

Others involve broken promises, rejection, relationships, fathers and mothers, churches, ministries, marriages, careers, unanswered prayers or dreams we carried for years.

Those things may involve grief.

They may involve forgiveness.

Sometimes they require healthy boundaries.

Sometimes they require surrender.

Sometimes they expose places where it has become difficult to trust or love again.

Healing from those disappointments may not happen in a single prayer.

It may be a journey.

And perhaps that is exactly where Journeying In Joy comes in.

Psalm 16:11 says:

“In Your presence is fullness of joy.”

Our journey toward joy isn't a journey in which we pretend disappointment doesn't exist.

It is learning to discover the presence of Jesus in the middle of it.

Maybe the closed door isn't the end of the story

Those two disciples on the Emmaus road thought they knew how their story had ended.

“We had hoped…”

But Jesus was walking beside them.

Their interpretation of the story wasn't the whole story.

And eventually their eyes were opened.

Perhaps some of our disappointments are like that.

We may not yet understand the closed door.

We may not understand why we weren't chosen.

We may not understand the unanswered prayer.

And we don't have to manufacture an explanation.

Instead, perhaps we can begin with a question:

Jesus, where were You in my disappointment?

And then another:

Jesus, what do You want me to know now?

Maybe joy doesn't begin when every disappointing circumstance is finally resolved.

Maybe joy begins when, even while walking our own Emmaus road, we discover:

Jesus has been walking with us all along.

---

This is a preliminary reflection from our ongoing study for an upcoming episode of Journeying In Joy. Sharon and I are continuing to explore what Scripture teaches about disappointment, what it does within us, and how Jesus meets us there. After we record the episode, we'll return to this subject and share more of what we're learning.

Scriptures for further reflection: Luke 24:13–35; Psalm 16:11; Psalm 34:18; Proverbs 13:12; Romans 5:3–5; Romans 8:15–16.

Journeying In Joy -- The Journey Begins

There are seasons in life when God begins stirring something new in our hearts.

Sometimes we understand where He is taking us. Other times, we simply know that He is inviting us to take the next step.

That is really where Journeying In Joy began.

Sharon and I recently recorded the first episode of our new podcast, Journeying In Joy. We recorded it while we were in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, but the journey behind it has been unfolding for much longer.

Why Journeying In Joy?

One of the Scriptures that has become important to us is Psalm 16:11:

“You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy.”

There is something significant about the word journeying.

Neither Sharon nor I believe that we have arrived. We are still learning. We are still growing. We are still discovering more about God, about ourselves, about each other, and about what it means to walk with Jesus every day.

That is why this isn't simply about joy.

It is about journeying in joy.

It is the ongoing walk with Jesus.

Our Journey Has Had Many Seasons

Like everyone else, our lives have contained many different seasons.

There have been seasons involving marriage and family, raising children and homeschooling, careers and changing responsibilities.

There have also been emotional and spiritual seasons.

We've had to learn about love.

We've had to learn about forgiveness.

We've experienced disappointment.

We've had to grow in our relationship with one another and, most importantly, in our relationship with God.

And we're still learning.

One of the things we talked about in our first episode is that discipleship isn't something that eventually becomes finished. Walking with Jesus is a continuing relationship.

He is continually teaching us.

Sometimes He teaches us through Scripture.

Sometimes through another person.

Sometimes through our marriage or our family.

And sometimes He teaches us through circumstances we never would have chosen for ourselves.

Saying Yes to the Holy Spirit

This podcast is also an act of obedience for us.

We believe the Holy Spirit has been encouraging us to begin sharing some of what God has taught—and continues to teach—us.

Sharon described this season of her life as one in which she has more capacity to pursue some of the things God has placed on her heart.

One of those things is encouraging people.

Another is sharing wisdom and resources that have helped us.

But ultimately, our desire is very simple:

We want to help people draw closer to God.

We don't intend for Journeying In Joy to be a polished presentation by two people who have everything figured out.

Quite the opposite.

We want it to be a conversation.

We want to talk about what God is teaching us right now.

Sometimes that may involve Scripture. Sometimes relationships. Sometimes family. Sometimes emotional healing.

And sometimes it will involve the difficult places of life.

In fact, one of the subjects the Holy Spirit has already put on our hearts to talk about next is disappointment.

Jesus Is Present in the Journey

Perhaps one of the most important things we wanted people to hear in our first conversation is this:

You are loved.

You are held.

And Jesus is present.

That doesn't mean every part of the journey is easy.

There may be moments when we don't understand what God is doing. There may be places where our expectations and our experiences seem very far apart.

There may even be moments when Jesus feels distant.

But what if He isn't?

What if part of our journey is learning to recognize His presence in places where we didn't recognize Him before?

That brings us to the question we left with at the end of Episode 1.

A Question for the Journey

When you think about your relationship with Jesus, do you think of Him as distant or close?

Don't answer that too quickly.

Instead, take some time with Jesus.

At the end of your day, look back over the moments you experienced—the good ones, the frustrating ones, the ordinary ones, and perhaps even the painful ones.

Then ask Him:

“Lord, where were You in every moment of my day?”

And listen.

Perhaps part of journeying in joy is discovering that Jesus has been walking with us much more closely than we realized.

That's the journey Sharon and I are on.

And we invite you to journey with us.

Mark & Sharon Koehn
Journeying In Joy

“You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy.” — Psalm 16:11

You Are Designed To Lead And Rule

I've been reading the book Rediscovering the Kingdom by Myles Munroe.  It is very good, and has been helping me understand what God had in mind when he created the heavens and the earth so long ago.

On page 88, Myles writes:

In truth, it does not matter what other people say or think, or even what we think of ourselves.  What matters is how God sees us, and He sees us as leaders and rulers in the earthly domain.  He created us with purpose and designed us with the necessary abilities to fulfill our destiny.

It is so easy to look to other people and their opinions to determine what we think about ourselves.  It starts very early as a child where we look to our parents on how to view ourselves.  Depending on your childhood circumstances, this may have been positive, or abusive, or something in between.  Even the best parents have difficulties, because as a fallen human race, who chose independence rather trusting in God's word, we tend to think highly of ourselves.  As we grow older, our friends become the source of understanding what my interests are, the labels that I take in, the declarations about my life and the direction it is taking.

But the quote above reminds us that none of that matters.  God is the one who designed us, and He is the one that determines who we are, and what we have been designed for.

What have you been designed for?  What does God say about you?  Are you discovering what God has declared over you in His Word?

Take time today to meditate on the scriptures - especially the I AM scriptures - which declare who the sons of God are.  Look at the dominion here on earth that God has given you to govern, and start asking the questions of how to lead and rule in these domains.

God bless you!

You Are Loved

In John 15:9 it says "I love each of you with the same love that the Father loves me.  You must continually let my love nourish your hearts." (The Passion Translation)

What kind of love did the Father and Jesus have for each other?

• Other person focused
• Honoring of the other person
• Lays down life for the other person
• Obeys because of Love
• Submission to one another

Love requires relationship

The fact that God is one, and is expressed as a trinity of persons, shows us that relationship is deeply involved in love.  Notice in our list above, it always involved another person.  While love can be expressed to another person, that does not mean that love will be returned, or that a relationship will be created.  It can be rejected, which is also rejecting the relationship.

God sent His son Jesus and proved His desire for a restored relationship with us, by having Jesus pay the heavy price for our choice for independence and sin.  This was love in action, and it has allowed us to have a love relationship with God that would otherwise never happen.

Love is a person

1 John 4:16b says "God is love!"  God is the definition of love.

This is hard to express, because most of us think that love is a feeling or an idea.  To actually understand that Love is a person, indicates that there is a source for Love that is beyond my definition, and that this love is not static, but rather is dynamic and involved in my moment by moment experience.

Indeed, because Love is a person, we have someone to look at and see how he demonstrates love, and we can experience His love, which changes us to love in the way He loves us.

How do I stay in Jesus’ love?

John 15:10 says: “If you keep my commands, you will live in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands, for I continually live nourished and empowered by his love.”

I see this verse and almost immediately go into a performance oriented point of view.  In order to be loved, I must obey.  It took me a long time to realize I was viewing it in the wrong direction.

God is telling us that Jesus loves us first with the same love that Father God loves Jesus.  This is huge.  And because I am loved by God, and I am experiencing His love, I want to obey His commands.  I want to show Jesus my appreciation and this happens when I obey His commands.

Additionally, as I receive the Love of God, and will also express my love to Him through worship, adoration and praise.  I will worship through my every day experiences in life, both good and bad experiences.  These all become opportunities to walk in His love and to go deeper with Him by depending on His Love and depending on His point of view as to what is happening in life.

Experiencing God's Love

In 1 John 4:16 it says "We have come into an intimate experience with God's love, and we trust in the love he has for us..." (The Passion Translation)

Have you had an intimate experience with God's love?  Have you had this experience more than one time?  Are you able to describe the experience?  Is it purely emotional?  What does an intimate experience with God's love look like?

Who do you trust?  Is it because they love you and you know and have experienced their love?

We are told that God loves us, but hearing this doesn't translate into an intimate experience with His love.  I began experiencing God's love much later in life.  I received Jesus and His salvation when I was a child, and I was delighted to know that I was saved.  But the environment of training I received talked about God's love, but didn't help me to know and experience His love personally.  I was encouraged to pursue Him through reading God's word, by attending church and youth meetings.  I was encouraged to participate in various activities, but in my immaturity I took this as a means to perform and looked to gain approval and acceptance.  I didn't understand that I was loved first just because I was made in God's image.  I am apart of the family of God as a son, not something I earn, but rather I was given this position because of what Jesus had done for me.

My view of God and His love for me as Father changed when I attended one of the events at Shiloh Place Ministries.  At the event, there was teaching on exactly how much God loved me, and there was physical demonstrations of this to me.  I was given a long Fatherly hug by an older gentlemen.  He held me and then spoke of God to me in my ear, how He was proud of me, cared about me.  That God sees me and accepts me.  During ministry times and the breakout groups, the leadership would lay hands on me as they prayed which I greatly appreciated, because this was again a physical expression of God's love for me and to me.

I walked away a changed man and my view of how much God loved me.  I had experienced God's love in a real way, a way that was unique to me and my relationship with Jesus.  And because of this change one of my daughters testified that finally she had the dad that she always wanted.  Someone who listened to them, loved them unconditionally, and was depending on Holy Spirit during all conversations and interactions.

Because of God's love touching me so deeply, my trust level with Him deepened.  My communication with Him opened up more.  I now new that He loved me regardless of the circumstances and my behavior.  God loved me as I was - but He loved me too much to leave me where I was.  God pursued me and He has been walking with me my whole life, whether I recognized it or not.  As I was given revelation of His love and His desire for me to have a relationship with Him, it caused me to be drawn to Him.  I received Him as my Savior, I received Him as my Lord and I wanted an interactive relationship with Him.

Today, I still long for a deeper experience with God's love.  I love to worship Him and to be in His presence, but I want to continually know deeply that I am loved, and to live in the intimate place of friendship, sonship and companionship with Jesus.

God Loves You

You are loved, but the question is can you receive God's love?  Will you receive God's love?  Father God through Jesus and the Holy Spirit has done all that is necessary to allow for you to enter into a place of personal relationship with Him.  He wants a reconciled and restored relationship with you.  He wants to deepen His relationship with you.  Sometimes there are wounds and trauma in our lives that are skewing how we view what love is and who God is.  The first step to healing those wounds and resolving the trauma in our lives is to turn to Jesus and receive and accept His love for you.  Will you take that step?

To take that step, just start talking to Jesus out loud.  Tell Him what you are thinking.  Tell Him what you have done that is wrong.  Run to Him as someone who is safe to be with.  He is safe to talk to about anything.  He will meet you and hold you in His arms just where you are right now.

Garden of Your Heart

What does your garden look like?  The garden of your heart.

In the book The Shack by Wm Paul Young, the main character, Mac, actually walks through the garden of his heart, and he describes it as

• Wild
• Colorful
• Beautiful
• Messy

Holy Spirit described it as a fractal.

What does the garden of your heart look like?

How does the Holy Spirit describe the garden of your heart?