Durable424. What’s that Mean?

Some readers have asked me, “What do you mean by durable424?”

By durable I mean resilient, strong, enduring, true, able, remain, unrelenting, courageous, determined and faithful.

Let me be clear. There is a huge difference from being durable in spirit and being hardened in heart. (But that is another conversation.)

Whether you are an athlete slogging through long, torturous hours of training and sacrifice; or you are a parent suffering through long nights of anxiety over a wayward child, durability is one of your defining qualities.

A durable spirit is the key. Physical endurance and emotional toughness are secondary to a durable spirit. As a person of faith it is my experience that durability is possible, not by determination or will, but by faith. Determination requires grit and effort. This exhausts me. It wears me out leaving me feel like I can’t.

The human heart can suffer many things and continue to survive out of pure will. My goal is to walk with you through the pits and falls, hardships and fellowships that life brings. That you walk life out of an abundantly durable spirit, not as a survivor; rather as an overcomer! You have likely encountered more difficulty already than you had planned for. I would suggest by the shear fact you are still here reading deeper, that you are more durable than you have imagined.

What about 424? Every day, in 24 hour cycles, life calls us to new challenges. The truth is you are durable. In this moment. Not you in yourself, but you in Jesus Christ. He has made a way through faith for indestructible life to build new reality within you. Through the exchange personal identity is no longer based on parentage or ancestry, but on the nature of Christ in you. Every moment let the reality of that truth be present. Let that reality birth new responses to old challenges. Let the reality of Christ in you be your hope of glory and a better future.

The writer of the book of Hebrews (7:14-15) referring to Jesus’ power to overcome and endure states it to this affect- that a priest has appeared..

“…one who has become a priest not on the basis of a regulation as to his ancestry but on the basis of the power of an indestructible life.” From the Greek the original means indestructible, indissoluble. The Message Bible refers to “the sheer force of resurrection life.”

This is Spirit and Life. The new nature is durable for every point of test or trial. For now. For 24. For 7. For 365.

Durable424 is a state of being.

• It is worshiping when others worry.
• It is praying when you’d rather pout.
• It is staying connected when it’s inviting to leave.
• It is trusting God for breakthrough when blaming, accusing and complaining is more popular.

Durable people trust and wait for God to speak or God to move first.

With Him, you can be durable.

Reality. Check.

Reality.

I will be honest, I have been slacking in my exercise and fitness plans. Recently, I made some adjustments and have chosen to focus with renewed commitment and energy on returning to a “more fit me”. It didn’t take long to reveal the test results of just how unfit I really was. Shortness of breath. Very low endurance for the distance. Carrying a few saddle bags of weight. It left me feeling worn out, out of sorts and out of shape! That reality check about my physical condition caused a spin off question. Just how fit is my faith? My spiritual condition? I mean, it seems things are speeding up and pressing toward critical mass.

I am just a little past half time in my life. Like you, I have suffered my share of challenges, losses and difficulties. Like you, I have failed sometimes but, overcome most of the time. I will be quick to admit there were times when the heartache and pain were a more than I expected and sometimes unexpected. There were times when I wanted to give up. Stop. Quit. What’s the use? Let me just live my life in peace. Reality, now is the time to dial up faith, courage, desire and passion!

God’s answer to Jeremiah’s complaint comes to mind,
“If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?” Jeremiah 12:5 NIV

The same words translated through The Message Bible are even more poignant, “So, Jeremiah, if you’re worn out in this footrace with men, what makes you think you can race against horses? And if you can’t keep your wits during times of calm, what’s going to happen when troubles break loose like the Jordan in flood?”

The writer of Hebrews sites a time of shaking will come that will shake all that can be shaken… [for what purpose?] to reveal the Kingdom that cannot be shaken (12:26-28).

Check.

The Scripture suggests that there will be a time when the race will be accelerated, as when the horses are released. There are times when a safe, orderly society will be less orderly and downright dangerous. Times when trouble breaks out and the enemy breaks in like a flood. What will be our response? Are we fit for the challenge? Will I be among the faithful who can endure?

If you are loving and believing God today I am so thankful and encouraged. I am encouraged because I know you have been made fit for this time. Jesus exerted great effort in order to save my soul. It is that effort that I rest in and labor from. He saved us from ourselves; from our tendencies toward failure, disobedience and weakness. We have been granted a new status before the King of the Universe. We are now partakers of His divine Nature for His Glory! On my own from my old nature I could not perform nor achieve. As a new creation in Christ, now I can! We were born for more than an ordinary life. We were born to go beyond, to live in that reality as an Over-comer!

Christ in you, the hope of Glory. Under any conditions. Reality. Check.

The Perpetually New Question: Why Me, God?

How does this family’s experience call you to be courageous? Enjoy.

Why Me, God? – Full-Length Message from John Tiller on Vimeo.

Home, Sweet Homelessness

I’ve had the opportunity work in team to benefit homeless men in our region providing temporary housing, food and counsel. I am familiar with the frustration and hopelessness they face.  I have also been able to spend brief times in the mission field. One time not too long ago I was in a foreign land and gone from home for three weeks. During those three weeks my passions and enthusiasm were on a curve. Early on the excitement was about the mission and the needs of the locals. Later into the three weeks I found myself bent in another direction-toward home. I recall the last couple days feeling an overwhelming urge and expectancy for going home.

There’s no place like home. Like Dorothy’s stay in Oz, home has a will always call our name. After being gone from home for varying lengths of time the cathartic effect of new faces and new places begins to wear thin and we begin to pine for home.

Where does that longing for home come from? Do we all long for home or is it just the few? I think most of humanity carries an amount of yearning, longing, craving to return to the familiar boundaries of home. There arises this deep sense of homelessness. From timid college freshmen to battle hardened soldiers. From runaways to the rich and famous on the walk-ways each has a void that refuses to be filled called Home.

It seems quite reasonable to conclude that this craving and longing for home has been passed down through our physical and spiritual DNA. It came from the very beginning of creation and the time of Adam and Eve in the garden. As migratory birds cross land and sea for thousands of miles in answer to the instinctive calling deep inside, I believe our Creator has given us a similar passion to arrive at Home.

Think of it like this. Our first parents were at home in The Garden of Eden. Lush, green, well watered, comfortable, environmentally controlled with sufficiency of all things including no sense of any fear nor need of any kind. Their luxurious accommodations included regular walks and conversation with the owner, developer of the estate—God himself.

Then, the day came when Adam and Eve lost it all. (Genesis 3:23,24) Because of disobedience, Creator God separated them from Himself and from the Garden. They were removed from the Garden on the spot. Their circumstance were immediately altered. Instantly, they were homeless.

Since then, in the processes of life generations have been born who have lived with a sense that Home is out there somewhere. The writer of Ecclesiastes said, He has put eternity in their hearts. Family and friends do us fine for awhile. Yet, deeply within there is a need for home; a need that cannot be satisfied with the natural or the ordinary. Throughout all humanity there has been an ongoing search for home.

There has been no satisfying remedy until Jesus Christ came to establish the dwelling place of God.  Now through Jesus Christ the longing for Home, the filling of the eternal can be satisfied.

Naturally we think that home is a place that I move into. However, this unanswerable and eternal empty place, this spiritual place is called Home wherever Christ moves in. Here in the human heart eternity meets the Eternal.

In this way we all have been homeless. Thank God for my homelessness! My need with its passion and pursuit brought Jesus home to me! Oh, Sweet Homelessness is now Sweet Home!

Do you want to live like that?

When the Wind Blows,Part 2: What do I do?

In part 1, the farmhand said he “could sleep when the wind blows”.

Is it time to sleep?

Windstorms bring destruction and chaos. Favorable winds blow carrying opportunity and blessing. Faith when coupled with responsibility allows us to sleep in the windstorm.  Surely windstorms will show up in life. Favorable winds will also blow. A fresh wind of favor is now blowing! This is not the time to be sleeping! A wind of new direction and a new season is upon us.

What will you do with the wind? Close the windows? Run for cover? Cancel your plans? Tie down everything around you? Steer into it to compensate to stay on your current course? Slow down, stop and wait? Face the wind and stand your ground? Resist the wind and increase your speed? Adjust your course? Hoist your sails and capture its power?

What will you do when the wind blows?

A major shift is going on in the world. Recent events in the nations within governments and economies are telling of change. The wind is changing and I think it requires us to think of change on a personal level.

Authority is closely tied to finances whether personal or governmental. You have probably heard an adaptation of the golden rule, “He who has the gold, rules.” If you were to look at my check book ledger it would tell a lot about me. What I spend and how I spend indicates what I submit to. It reveals where I have authority and how I rule in my own life.

We have been hearing the word ‘austerity’ a lot. Austerity is a good word, but I think self-control is better. Self-control in the heart translates into self-governing; in the home and on a broader level as a nation. By self-control I am saying Holy Spirit-control from a new birth. Unrestrained spending and indulgence has spread its weakening affect across relational and international lines. It cannot be sustained. How we spend our resources weakens or strengthens a nation, a family, an individual. The day of accounting now appears to have come, and many are being forced into changes that have taken them by surprise. There has been a windstorm, and they are not sleeping well.

Over the years we have been encouraged to live a fasted lifestyle, meaning to purposely turn your self away from privilege and comfort, to live on less. Often that kind of counsel had been cast off as pious, survivalist or old fashioned. It seems God has been giving advance instruction of what to do. When God sends a boat, take it! When the wind changes, make necessary adjustments and capture its opportunity, blessing and power.

Many will not initiate personal change until the inevitable appears and our backs are to the wall. We lose our job. Our health fails, or our comfortable world falls apart. The fear of change or the refusal to change will keep many in denial.

My wife and I have made some major changes in the past few years. I wish I could say that I saw them coming but I didn’t and a good number of the changes caught us unprepared. The result was a major shift in our lifestyle with significant loss. When the wind shifted, the change hit us hard. But we decided we would not let fear direct us. We are now on the other side of the change and continue to adapt, adjust and grow. The result has been astonishing. We have a gained understanding by keeping faith when the windstorm arrives and the landscape is changing. (See post of May 17, 2012, “The Profit of Loss”)

To many folks, change is paralyzing. They have no idea of what to do to prepare for, adjust to and lead in the change. It is said of the men of ancient Issachar (1 Chronicles 12:32) …they understood the times…, but more than understanding the times, they knew what to do! I would see the men of Issachar among those who live for and embrace change. They would be among the innovators, the first adaptors. They live on the edge. They initiate change and welcome change. They were EdgeHogs. (I will follow up with thoughts on the EdgeHog in another post.) Often the safest place to be is on the edge!

History is being made at this very moment. What we do in this season will have a long term effect on your life, family, career, ministry, finances, health.

Change is inescapable, whether or not we change is optional. I have a choice. I can adapt or resist. I can initiate change or I can be intimidated by change. I can break from the past or I can be broken (then break from the past, there is profit from loss). I think the choice is clear. But I won’t sleep through this opportunity!

What changes have you initiated or adapted to? Sorrow may linger for a season, but joy comes in the morning!