'Drive the Dark of Doubt Away'...

“If I tried to recite all Your wonderful deeds, I would never come to the end of them.”—Psalm 40:5, NLT

H ad to do a double-take when I saw this bumper sticker in a downtown parking lot, but the more I thought about it, the more I loved this glass half-full quip. Not that I’m always feeling it, or because it tells you to look at the stresses of life through rose-colored glasses, but because it shouts in its own way an essential Christ-one reminder:

When you get dressed in the morning, be sure to put on gratitude.

For a photographer, perhaps the most sickening sound imaginable is that of metal and hard plastic colliding with pavement when the camera strap evades your grasp and slips off your shoulder. It is like being in the midst of typing out an important the-clock-is-ticking document, business proposal, or idea and having the “blue screen of death” appear out of nowhere on your laptop screen.

It was a really beautiful, upbeat Monday morning until both of those things happened while working remotely. And in no time, there was no shortage of nausea, anxiety, sweaty palms, and panic. Life happens, and no matter how long you’ve walked with the Savior of the world, you don’t always respond well...

"When the disciples saw Jesus walking on the water, they thought he was a ghost, and they started screaming."

—Mark 6:49, Contemporary English Version

How quickly a beautiful new day can all unravel on the interior, expecting the worst and not even  daring to think about “hey, look at the bright side” because none seems to be in sight. The problem with camping out in the land of negativity, though, is that it tends to magnify the problem—especially the problem that, so far, only exists in your “what if?” mind. I mean, it looks really bad, so it must be, right?…

…“So, the jailer placed them in the innermost cell of the prison and had their feet bound and chained. Paul and Silas, undaunted, prayed in the middle of the night and sang songs of praise to God, while all the other prisoners listened to their worship. Suddenly a great earthquake shook the foundation of the prison. All at once, every prison door flung open and the chains of all the prisoners came loose.”—Acts 16: 24-26, Passion Translation

…Driving back to the office more than an hour away, with all of that negativity still swimming mightily on the inside, I purposed to follow Paul’s and Silas’ lead. Like them, not in a “don’t worry, be happy” sort of way, but with the time-proven reality that verbally expressing gratitude and thanks to God who has got the whole world in His hands—including your own little world crisis of a dinged camera and blue-screen-of-death computer—magnifies His goodness, majesty and power on my insides. Gratitude expressed in the midst of whatever our innermost cell happens to be—situation, decision, conversation—can cause an internal earthquake that sends the swimming negativity elsewhere and replaces it with renewed faith and hope in what and Who really matters after all.

And it was so.

It was a reminder that purposefully recalibrating your thinking and emotions to Who’s got this and Who holds you in the palm of His hand helps put meaningful music to that bumper sticker—and not just on Sunday morning in church. Perhaps, even shouting a little "Joyful, Joyful" Beethoven/van Dyke …”Melt the clouds of sin and sadness, drive the dark of doubt away…ever singing, march we onward, victors in the midst of strife.” (Or,  perhaps something with more of a groove.) 

And even though no one else was in the car that morning, it's good to know that as with Paul and Silas, quite often and though we may not realize it or try to make it happen, that kind of singing in the midst of the hard realities of life can be powerfully contagious. We may never know who’s listening, or their response. Ours is simply to get dressed, put on gratitude, to celebrate God being God even in the midst of strife, and to begin reciting all His wonderful deeds...blissfully knowing that we can never come to the end of the sentence.

Even, and especially when, you drop your camera and die on the inside right along with your laptop.

(Postscript….The diagnosis of the camera: not fatal after all. The diagnosis of the laptop: “seems to be fine—just a computer behaving badly.”)

“Worship is about magnifying the right things. It can be so easy to let the struggles of this life become all-consuming, and we must not ignore them. But, when we worship, instead of magnifying and focusing on those things, we magnify and focus on the Name, the strength, the power, the grace of Jesus. When we do that, it puts everything into perspective.”

—Matt Redman

The Fruit of Becoming

"...while every branch that does bear fruit, He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful."—John 15:2, NIV

All I remember is that it was a beautiful day, too beautiful for a man to stay cooped up indoors, so I walked briskly into it. Breathing deeply, clearing my head of fog, taking in all the sights, sounds, and aromas around me like a sponge. Preferred walks are long, solitary, and with varied terrain, but on this day, it was good to head to the “downtown route” that winds some three to five miles (depending on your ambition) along storefronts, waterfalls and rivers, steep neighborhood streets, and long stretches of back roads punctuated with homes and bicyclists and dog-walkers and guys running chain saws as part of the New England ritual of always getting ready for winter...

...Look the other way. Change direction. Pretend they’re not there. These are knee-jerk reactions when walking and being approached by missionaries of a belief system that I know is contrary to my own. This time, though, I was surprised that the tables were turned: Didn’t look down, didn’t turn down a side street. When they stopped to ask if they could sit down and talk, I found myself—hardly the bold conversationalist—asking them if I could first talk with them about what and Who I believed, and why.

And at first, they were the ones who started walking away. “Hey wait!” And what came out of my mouth next, I remember not, only that it wasn’t some deep, theological sentence-diagramming conversation designed to back someone into a corner with a finger-pointing "so there!" I wouldn’t know how to do that, anyway. What came out seemed mostly about this: "Believing and following Jesus…changes…everything in a man’s life."

“Jesus does not come to scare us into submission, but to woo us in friendship.”

—Brian Simmons, “Song of Songs—Journey of the Bride”

One seemed genuinely interested, as if eager to know the real deal. Another was decidedly skeptical but seemed curious to hear more. The third guy seemed interested as well, but started doing skateboard tricks either to try to distract me…or distract himself. The entire atmosphere was charged not with tension but with rather mysterious but tangible rest and heaven-sent Love…

…and then, as is often the case with a cool dream, you wake up before you get to the really good part. “What was that all about?”  The answer came the next morning, and I didn’t realize it until after I read back what my mind had downloaded randomly into my journal after just-so-happening to read Gospel stories of Jesus’ interaction with all kinds of curious people:

“This day, purpose to become more like, walk more like Jesus. Become is the word. This will take awhile, like your whole life, but keep becoming more and more. Put Him on each day as clothing. Keep abiding in what He did, who He is, and His words—as one of my pastors puts it, ‘pitch your tent there.’ Then be surprised and amazed at what He does. Remember the pruning of the tree out front? Those rogue branches that want to go off on their own strength but bear no fruit and so have to be pruned back. Not just one and done, but season after season. That is your life. Become is like that. And without even realizing it, the fruit gets more abundant and sweeter with each mile along the long journey. Become is for everyone of God’s kids, not just the bold and well-spoken. Remember what the religious leaders said about Peter and John, that they could tell they weren’t all that educated but had clearly been with Jesus. Become like that. Become can be done, not by my own strength like that rogue branch but simply because He is powerfully at work in me…if I will simply yield, even this day, to stay plugged into the Vine, and then keep on walking…”

“Therefore, become imitators of God. Copy Him and follow His example, as well-beloved children imitate their father. And walk continually in love; that is, value one another—practice empathy and compassion, unselfishly seeking the best for others—just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and sacrifice to God, slain for you, so that it became a sweet fragrance.”

—Ephesians 5:1-2, Amplified

Finding Big Things in Simplicity

"It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago he planned that we should spend these lives in helping others."—Ephesians 2:10, Living

There has got to be more. Something big. Something as huge as God. Something as bold and spicy as William Carey’s declaration of “Expect great things for God; attempt great things for God.” Even the more common translations of this Ephesians verse imply that it’s go big or go home: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (ESV). And besides, this is America. Come on!

Then there’s the day after day of the routine of life. It can all be very good, and often quite busy, but it can make that living large for God thing seem, well, maybe only for super saints or super heroes from church history, or for some other day. Not me. Not here. Not this week. “I’ll check in with you later, God, when I’m feeling more inspired, OK? Besides, I need coffee.”…

….I stop there just about every workday morning for good coffee at a good price. And over time, you recognize the same faces that show up at the same time every day, and get to know something about the folks who run the place—surface stuff like their names, and a bit about their families, and what’s happening in the world and with the weather. Quick in, quick out. 

Except on this particular morning, when I wasn’t feeling the “go big for God” at all, as I was paying and having my coffee card stamped as usual, one of the folks who runs the place suddenly leaned in and said: “I hear you are religious. Would you please pray for my husband and my daughter…” and she went on in detail about their names, their needs for prayer, and that it had all come down like a ton of bricks on her world on the same day.

You want to protest that you're not really "religious" but rather pursuing something better than that. Instead, you wisely cut to the chase of what really matters right now: “Well, of course!” And she drives the urgency of her request home by writing down their names on a piece of paper and tucking it in my hand.

Out the door and settling back in my car, a sense that Jesus’ reply to “I’ll check in with you later when I’m feeling more inspired…I need coffee,” had been, “Wait up, I’m coming with you.”

And then, an overwhelming sense that this particular prayer request could use many more people coming around to lift Up this family, and so a quick text SOS. And then, “ping”…an incoming text with another and different kind of urgent prayer request. “Please believe with us!”

I want to say that Jesus was chuckling to Himself as I buckled up and drove off. Is it OK to say that? Because I think He was, because that shockingly humble moment that immediately followed wondering aloud where all the “great things for God” were in my life made me laugh, especially in amazement at the wonder of Him and how He works in His larger than my-little-world life.

Another box broken by the uncontainable God of creation. And it was good. And it will, undoubtedly, have to be busted open again many times more in the days and years ahead. Because even if William Carey is right, and even if this is America where everything is supersized, the God I purpose to walk with is so huge that He often works in and through us most powerfully not when we do something really, really big—the kind of “big” I have in mind, anyway—but in the small, everyday things, and when we go back one more time to a simple Gospel of staying faithful and trusting, and being available…"that we should spend these lives in helping others," even when the routine tries to get you to say, “I’ll check in with you later when I’m feeling more inspired.”

“Go back to those Gospels over and over again. God’s word is inexhaustible and can always deepen your understanding and belief. We don’t limit ourselves in conversation with our loved ones because we 'talked to them already' and neither should we limit ourselves in the reading of the Bible because we 'read it already.' It is as dynamic and deep, in fact even deeper, than any person we seek to know. Ask questions of Jesus in Scripture. Ask about His character. Ask about His values. Ask about His life. Ask about His priorities. Ask about His weaknesses. And let Scripture respond to you. The answers you find will lead you to want to know more, to be closer, to be with Jesus. And the more we are with Him, the more we will find ourselves wanting to and learning to be like Him.”—Barnabas Piper, from “Help My Unbelief”

The Harvest Within

“The harvest is so great, and the workers are so few,” He told His disciples. “So pray to the one in charge of the harvesting, and ask Him to recruit more workers for His harvest fields.”—Matthew 9:37-38

Everyone wants their life to make a difference. Not everyone is an evangelist. So, what do you do with this verse? You begin by taking it personally…

…It was not on the original Saturday “to do” list, but with a week of rain in the forecast and the morning breaking sunny and mild, there was no better time than now for tackling spring yard work. The task ahead loomed large, but with the invigoration of mild air in my lungs, no winter coat, and thermal gloves replaced by the blister-preventative type, progress was swift and joyful:

Raking the lawn of its winter debris, digging deep to loosen up the tough and stubborn areas, persistently going over areas besieged by sand from what the snowblower kicked up, admiring the fruit of your labor, and then adding nutrients to prevent moss and dandelions and other persistent invaders, and finally a healthy spreading of turf food….all before the rains came.

“Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will reap a crop of My love; plow the hard ground of your hearts, for now is the time to seek the LORD, that He may come and shower salvation upon you.”—Hosea 10:12, Living

You don’t have to be an evangelist to be a harvester of things that truly matter. But you do have to team with the Master Gardener to prepare the soil of your own heart first, and rake up debris of complacency and the dirt that simply comes from walking through this world, so that God might plant a harvest of righteousness—one who is “right with God”—within you.

And it all starts with the ministry of the interior so that you can begin to see and sense and feel like Jesus in His "harvest" declaration as you go about your day. It always starts on the inside so that, like Him, your heart will become more tender, compassionate, quick to listen and slower to speak, and become acutely aware of the “sheep without a shepherd” who walk through your life. To be ready and in season (not just early spring) for His invitation to step into a particular situation, a life, someone’s prayer request, and then carry the Light of the world who is within you—His healing touch-handshake-hug-knowing look, His words of comfort and encouragement that go beyond feel-good sentences, and the testimony of hope from the Father’s works that have been alive and real and that are still pulsating within your own veins….

….in the middle of blissful yard work, an ambulance arrives at the neighbor’s home down the street. A loved one who had been ill is no more. Soon, family members arrive in various stages of shock and sorrow. It would be easy to do nothing—this is a private family moment, after all. Besides, definitely out of my comfort zone to step in. But what would Jesus do? There they are right in front of me: “sheep without a shepherd.” So probably, as in many examples in the Gospels, He would give Himself away to the moment.

I desperately wanted to avoid it all, and yet I desperately wanted to reach out in some meaningful way without being a pushy neighbor. Blessedly, the same Jesus who the Gospels say over and over again knew the hearts of those around him without them speaking a single word, provided a similar open door: As I was driving by, I noticed the oldest son, who I had known many years, out at his truck. The conversation began with surface neighborly type stuff and then quickly to the situation at hand. We were able to shake hands, and celebrate the life that had passed, and share funny stories, and then end with “know that I’m praying for you all.” (Most of the family probably hadn't grasped the fact that the one who had just passed had given His life to the Lord, thanks to another harvest worker in his life, and was now safely in the peace and joy of Eternity.)

And who knows what will come of all of that, other than that two seeds had been planted that day: the one in my neighbor’s heart, and more importantly, the one in my own.

The harvest of righteousness that comes from tilling the soil of your own heart may or not include finding a moment to include the “Four Spiritual Laws” but if the tilling has been good and frequent, the fruit should be abundant, fertilized by the good Word and watered by the power that comes from spending time in His presence. And fruit that grows in the form of generosity—not just in stuff but in attitude and especially with your own time and comfort zone.

It could be as simple as picking up a rake on a Saturday morning...

“For God who gives seed to the farmer to plant, and later on good crops to harvest and eat, will give you more seed to plant and will make it grow so that you can give away more and more fruit from your harvest.”—2 Corinthians 9:10

Along the River

“Something on the other side is worth pushing through… Leave the comfort zone and ‘control’ of just standing on the shore.”—Andy Guyette

When you desire to walk each day with the King of the universe, there are no coincidences, only intersections of Divine purpose that keep showing up in the middle of wherever you happen to be. I thought I was just walking through a town park early yesterday morning and decided it would be a good time to listen to a sermon I'd been meaning to get to during the busy week. I thought I was just standing on the river’s shore, gazing at the peacefulness of the open water, and peering over to the shore on the other side where sunlight seemed to be hosting a private party of golden goodness.

But it just so happened that Andy's sermon was about Jesus urging His disciples to get into the boat together and “let us go over to the other side.” And it just so happened that while I was standing along the river’s edge, beginning to feel those familiar cravings of not just pausing to catch my breath but actually settling into a comfort zone of living, that Andy’s (he’s a member of my great team of pastors) words under the photo zapped my heart with a Heaven-sent defibrillator.

And on this Palm Sunday, when I can once more picture myself either watching the triumphant procession from the sidewalk or choosing instead to keep moving forward "to the other side" with Jesus, even without knowing what exactly is ahead, Andy’s message, combined with words previously written for a similar season, are reviving much-needed shouts of “Hosanna!”

And to all who come this way today while on the Journey, Selah….

Some passages of Scripture, no matter how many times you read them, seem to have a trumpet fanfare accompaniment. One is: 

"Wake up, O sleeper!..", to which the apostle Paul adds: "Be careful [mindful, aware] of how you live...making the most of every opportunity because [indeed] the days are evil.”—Ephesians 5:14, NIV

And in these days, for every person who has said "Yes!" to the One who has loved them and called them by name, and who has embarked on the fantastic journey to eternity, the blaring wake-up call may have little to do with falling asleep at the switch and a whole lot more to do with wanting to cave in to the relentless temptation to go on cruise control, to settle for what is safe and comfortable.

On our best days, we swear we could never go there, but truth is, with all of life's daily stresses and pressures, it is only natural to want to go into survival mode at times. (Sometimes, it's a great day when you can just tread water.) But when the storm passes, it can become way too easy to unknowingly agree with the suggestion of the Adversary and camp out in the land of comfortable, routine living. And while it is true that there is God-glorifying ministry in even the simplest things and during the most routine of times, it is also true that like that first ragtag, entirely imperfect band of brothers, we were created and destined for something much greater, and feel the tug for something mysteriously exciting, perhaps even world-changing in our own little corner of the world or in places we've never heard about.

It's a tug-of-war that will rage within until we get Home, but God is cheering us on: "No matter what it looks or feels like, don't let go of the rope!" And it doesn't stop there. God also manifests His cheering through the encouragement from a fellow runner or two or three: that rare person or small posse that bursts into our circle of acquaintances with the usual bantering about the weather, food, family and sports, but then takes it to the next level with words and example that stir us onward and Upward. These God-sent sons and daughters of encouragement regularly purpose to help fill our heart and mind with thoughts and Truths that are much, much higher than what our flesh wants to settle for.

And in these days, especially these turbulent days, there could be few more important questions to ask yourself than: "Who are you running with?" And then, an equally important prayer: that one or more Kingdom-living encouragers would burst into our circle, and that we could be that one for someone else; someone who carries the kind of encouragement that can help silence "Wake up, O sleeper!" with a resolute in-this-together declaration:

"The religious motivation of the pending wrath of God, and the ideals of a small life, are no longer options for us.We are sons and daughters of the Most High.We are in training for reigning as never before…living an abundant life in Christ until the kingdoms of this earth become the Kingdom of our God."  — Danny Silk

[ADAPTED FROM JANUARY 10, 2016]

Hearing Footsteps

"We often miss hearing God's voice simply because we aren't paying attention."—Rick Warren

It would have been easier to complain about the snow after being teased with a bit of an open winter. Instead, resolve kicked in, snowshoes were kicked on, and it was on to Mission Possible: If You Can’t Beat It, Enjoy It. The decision, as is almost always the case, did not disappoint. Hiking through the woods, no matter what the season, has a way of arousing and awakening nearly ever sense within you:

Seeing beauty in the details of a beautiful big picture.

Feeling leg muscles begin to burn with a beautiful kind of hurt.

Tasting gallons of fresh air rush into your lungs with beautiful cleansing.

Smelling evergreens warmed by the sun and beautiful stubborn earth emerging by brooks.

And on this particular day, acutely aware of the sound of every creaking pine, every distant bird call, every twig breaking under foot, every beautiful note being sung by a stream that refuses to let winter win.

"Ears to hear and eyes to see—

    both are gifts from the Lord."—Proverbs 20:12, NLT

It wasn’t that way earlier in the week when I awoke “on the wrong side of the bed” to an ear that was plugged up…and wouldn’t unplug, no matter how I tried. Hoping it would just take care of itself and go away, a few hours became the next 24 hours, and though I could hear perfectly well out of the other ear, everything was half out of order. What I wanted to hear, muffled. What I thought I was hearing, wrong. Impossible to hear a whisper. Suddenly, a sense of feeling adrift without a compass while everyone around me seemed to know exactly what to say and where to go next.

In the walk-in clinic, after what seemed like a half-hour power wash of my ear canal, out came what the nurse said was impacted blockage about the size of an almond. (I may never eat almonds again.) How was that possible?

“Pretty evident that it built up over time until there was no place for it to go. Happens to a lot of people.”

“But what can I do so that it doesn’t happen again?”

“It’s something you’ll probably have to fight off the rest of your life. The important thing is to clean it out at the first sign of trouble. Don’t let it go and hope for the best.”

When we wake up "on the wrong side of the bed," our natural I-can-handle-this tendency can be to let it go and hope for the best. That works sometimes. But mostly, we walk every day through a world filled with dirt and dust and junk that is determined to distract us from the straight and narrow Good Path. And neglect becomes deafening.

That visit to the clinic, and that hike in the beautiful woods, were reminders to purpose to make every day count, to take no day and nothing for granted. 

To live in such a way, as the psalmist put it:  “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12, NIV).

To live in such a way, even in March, that hearing—especially hearing God’s footsteps along each leg of the journey—may become the greatest, most precious sense awareness of them all….

“Resolve to be aware of what God is doing…tune our ear heavenward, and determine that this season will not slip away, that we might have our eyes wide open to see that the LORD is present and active.”—From “40 Days of Revival,” Hillsong

With Reckless Abandon

"There's a wideness in God's mercy

I cannot find in my own

And He keeps His fire burning

To melt this heart of stone

Keeps me aching with a yearning

Keeps me glad to have been caught

In the reckless raging fury

That they call the love of God.”

—the late Rich Mullins, “The Love of God”

I make my living with words, and when they don’t seem to fit, my first instinct is to reach for my red editing pen. It's not just business writing. Sometimes, a song that describes some aspect of God will come along that contains a shocking word. One that doesn't seem to fit at all. And my oh-so-sensible flesh desperately wants to red-pen it into something, well, safer and more comfortable...for me. 

But inevitably, war breaks out within. My heart-after-God self surprises by rising up with a louder voice, and with no red pen in hand, is drawn to these songs in wonder if not like a magnet. Because, like countless poets and artists have done throughout history, the writers of these songs are in First Love mode as they tell their story and pour out their hearts. They are trying to help me see beyond a Captain Obvious kind of faith by describing something about God’s nature and character that is so incredible, so Eternal, that only seemingly outrageous words come close to describing the indescribable—the feeling and knowing that comes with experiencing God at work in your life.

About such things, the late Brennan Manning wrote:

“Employing adjectives such as furious, passionate, vehement and aching to describe the longing of God are my mumbling and fumbling way to express the Inexpressible. Yet, I plod on. Both theology, which is faith seeking understanding, and spirituality, which is the faith-experience of what we understand intellectually, offer a glimpse into the mystery. Now we see only reflections in a mirror, mere riddles (1 Corinthians 13:12). But someday, the adjectives will give way to the reality.”—from “The Furious Longing of God”

That 1989 Rich Mullins song, though. And one more recently that bursts: 

“Oh, the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God

Oh, it chases me down, fights 'til I'm found, leaves the ninety-nine

I couldn't earn it, and I don't deserve it, still, You give Yourself away

Oh, the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God.”

It can be hard to get around what the dictionary says about "reckless": “without caring about the consequences of an action.” That just seems so, well, un-God-like.

But wait…

Jesus did risk everything—ministry, reputation, influence, friends—by ignoring social and religious standards by publicly talking to, loving, and touching lepers and other to-be-ignored outcasts of the day. He knew it could all unravel, but He knew that before the beginning of time. But He still came from Heaven to earth. Jesus never flinched, never hesitated, never cared about the possible negative response to His actions, because He knew his Father’s mission—and that recklessly, outrageously trumped all common sense and other people's opinions, even if they rejected him.

The leper speaks: "I am alone and no one loves me." I have been that leper at one time. But Jesus!

Jesus risked being stoned to death or at the very least being kicked out of the Temple, and the good chance that many of the very people He came to live and die for would walk the other way because, without caring about the consequences, He recklessly (to our sensibilities, anyway) chose to dine with tax collectors and sinners, and to hang out with and show compassion on those of ill repute, and liars, and cheaters. These were ones everyone was taught to stay away from: "They made their mess, let them live in it."

Throughout history, these all speak: “I’m too sinful to be saved and Loved.” And I was once one of them. But Jesus!

Even the most oft-quoted verse of them all is, in its own way, furiously reckless: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”…For God so loved, knowing full well that many of those whosoevers would reject the greatest Love gift of them all, or wander back in to messes or solitude like that 99th of the 100 sheep in the flock.

And I was surely one of them at one time or another on this journey. But Jesus!

This morning, I will seek to sing “Reckless Love” beyond the chord notations and scrolling lyrics, and perhaps pray in agreement with the composer that the shocking choice of poetry trying to describe the Indescribable goodness of my God will jolt me once more out of a safe, cozy, almost sentimental slumber of merely admiring the old, old story from a distance. It's too easy to drift there during the week, to become complacent, to go through the motions without realizing it. It's where that red pen is really needed—to keep editing out "lukewarm" so that I can once more...

“...see what an incredible quality of love the Father has shown to us, that we would be permitted to be named and called and counted the children of God! And so we are! For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, we are even here and now children of God, and it is not yet made clear what we will be after His coming. We know that when He comes and is revealed, we will as His children be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is in all His glory. And everyone who has this hope confidently placed in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure—holy, undefiled, guiltless.”—1 John 3:1-3, Amplified

And in seeing and doing so, to purpose somehow to return the favor to Him and my neighbor in reckless abandon:

“Nothing on earth matters more than this single thing: That we might see Jesus as He truly is, hear His call to follow, come what may, and love Him back dangerously, obsessively, and undeniably.”

—Pete Greig, "The Vision and the Vow"