rebelling against low expectations
Can I be completely honest with you? I don’t have this thing called being a Christian all figured out. I struggle. I sin. I rebel. Yet somehow I’m still loved. I’ve felt captivated by the very presence of God, so close as if I could touch Him, and I’ve also cried as I asked, “God, where are You?” I’ve run—both toward Him and from Him, and ask myself again, “why do I do the things I hate to do?”...
Dear teenager, this is war. Can you feel it, sense it? It’s a battle unseen. A struggle not fought with weapons of metal and fire. It’s a war not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers, the rulers and forces of darkness. And you, teenager, are right in the middle of it. All around me, I see the evidence—individuals in battle, warring with themselves, their identity, their...
Surrender. It’s a beautiful thing. Beautiful, yet difficult. Like every Christian, I battle with this. Flesh warring against Spirit. I’ve sensed my human, sinful instinct to rebel rise up within me. I’ve felt the aching, grasping need to control, along with frustration when I realize I can’t. But above all that, I’ve felt peace, joy, and inexplicable beauty in letting go. The freedom of...
“As goes the will of the students, so goes the will of the nation.” On February 6th, 1943, the students of Amsterdam were forced to make a life-altering decision: sign a declaration of loyalty to the Nazi regime, or be subjected to forced labor for the glory and advancement of the Third Reich. Hans Poley—teenager, student, Rebelutionary—was one of the few to stand strong. He refused to sign...
Over the past few weeks, God has been teaching me a particular lesson. I can’t seem to escape it – I hear it on the radio, my pastor talked about it on Sunday, it’s in the books I’ve been reading, and it’s a continual resounding chorus inside my heart. “Don’t judge others. Show God’s love to all you meet, because you don’t know their story.” With this, came the realization of how often I do...
Every day, I’m in a battle. My enemy? The world. The prize? My time. My attention. My loyalties. And most valuable of all, my heart. My foe is cunning and crafty with many tried and true weapons at his disposal. His favorites— stress, conflict, busyness, social media, peer pressure. Each of these he knows well and wields skillfully. He also knows he doesn’t need to attack with all of them at once...
She’s just so perfect. The thought ran through my mind as I scrolled through my friend’s Facebook page. She’s so pretty. So smart. So godly and wise. On her way to such a great career. Can’t she ever just seem normal? But, in spite of all that perfection, this friend hurt me. She initiated our relationship, but then didn’t contact me for months, and wouldn’t respond to my efforts to reach out...
“Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this:…to keep oneself unspotted from the world.” — James 1:27 Have you ever wondered what it means to keep ourselves unspotted from the world? I do, all the time. How do we live in the world, yet not be of the world? Is it a list of rules? A kind of behavior? Certain “do’s or don’ts”? Some Christians seem to believe so. They have an...
The hardest thing I’ve ever done probably isn’t what you expect. In fact, it wasn’t doing anything. And it was not doing something that was so hard. The question I had to answer was: how do you respond when you can’t do the things you think God has called you to do? Stopped by Tendinitis Earlier this spring, I developed tendinitis in both my arms from doing two things I loved – playing the piano...
Have you ever felt cheated out of Christmas? Let me explain. We build this holiday up in our minds. Create an ideal—the way it’s “supposed to be.” There’s all the decorations, lights, cookies and carols, snow outside and steaming hot chocolate. The love, joy, peace and goodwill to all men. It’s so perfect and beautiful, and it’s what we all want. But real life falls short. Way, way short. Oh...
rebelling against low expectations
