Reflections of a Ragamuffin

I wrote a devotional last week for LIFE Outreach International entitled “Courage and Cowardice” and got a number of emails in response.  So many of us grew up so indoctrinated by the “gentle Jesus, meek and mild” view of Jesus, that it becomes the default lens through which we read the Gospels. When the underlying assumption is that Jesus never rocked the boat, it is amazing how we can miss what was really going on in the text.

I wanted to share one email I received that expresses the view that Jesus was always reactionary in response to the Pharisees and never proactive in dealing with sin and injustice.

“I have to disagree on Jesus cause conflict. It was the Pharisees who were always starting the trouble. Jesus is the truth and truth and untruth will always be in conflict. The way I read your words sounded like Jesus was looking for a fight. This would contradict the fruit of the spirit love joy patience kindness etc. get my point.”

My response…

“I wanted to comment on your response (above) to my recent devotional that I wrote  on Courage and Cowardice. You state in your response that Jesus is truth and the truth and untruth will always be in conflict, yet you then state that for Jesus to cause conflict would be a contradiction to the fruit of the Spirit.

You also state “it was the Pharisees who were always starting the trouble.” In Matthew 21:9-12, Matthew records these words:

‘9 And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” 10 And when he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up, saying, “Who is this?” 11 And the crowds said, “This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee. 12 And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. 13 He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.’

Notice that there is no mention of the Pharisees in this passage. Jesus has just made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem and the entire city was buzzing about him. From a PR perspective, this was the absolute worst thing Jesus could do. Right at the moment the crowds were beginning to ask questions about Him, he grabs a whip and causes quite a ruckus in the Temple. This conflict in the temple could have been avoided, yet Jesus created the conflict because it needed to happen.

As followers of Christ, we are called to resolve conflict, not avoid it. Sometimes the conflict we are working to resolve is conflict that we created…but conflict that needed to happen.

I spent 30 years thinking that righteous living was avoiding conflict and following the “peace at all costs” Jesus. That line of thinking made it easy for me to sanctify my cowardice and fear when I should have been standing against injustices all around me.

For example, human trafficking is a huge issue right now in our world. Today there are more people living in slavery than at any time in human history. For the most part, the Church has not been involved in this fight. Right now, women and children are being sold into the sex industry. We need godly courage to rage in our hearts to stand up against this injustice…to fight for the poor and oppressed…as Jesus commanded. There is simply no way to do this without causing conflict.”

Righteous conflict. What does that look like in our lives? In what ways is our conflict avoidance not righteousness, but cowardice?

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It is official.

We are launching Route1520, a ministry to help individuals and families who are dealing with the reality of pornography and sexual addiction. Melody and I will join Tal and Teresa Prince and Dr. Dana Stoddard in this exciting endeavor.

“He got right up and went home to his father.”
Luke 15:20, The Message

I remember when I came to my senses, like the Prodigal. I had drifted to a far country, but because I was checked out along the way, I honestly didn’t know where I was as my mind began to clear. I desperately wanted to go home, but didn’t know which direction home was. Getting back home wasn’t as simple as turning over a new leaf or vowing to never act out again. I had done that hundreds of  times before and if it was that simple I never would have drifted as far as I did.

I needed someone to introduce me to a new path…a new route. Someone who had already traveled that road before and understood the fog I was in. Someone who had experienced the Father’s relentless love and knew personally that His heart was good. Someone who could help me deal with my suffocating shame.

Plain and simple? Route1520 provides those “someones”.

If you would like to know more about Route1520 or get involved personally, here are a few links that provide an opportunity to do so:

Subscribe to RSS feed of Route1520’s blog.
Tal Prince, Dr. Dana Stoddard, and I contribute to this blog. We will be sharing reflections from our stories and hope and encouragement for those who need to find a way home. Dr. Stoddard, with his years of counseling experience, will share from the stories of others as well.

Join Route1520 on Facebook.
Until we launch our official web site, our Facebook page and our blog will serve as our main methods of communication. Join us and check back often to be encouraged and to connect with others who are involved with our ministry. Once you join, please share our message with family and friends and invite them to join in the effort.

Follow Route1520 on Twitter.
Route1520 will be a great source for information and education on our culture’s saturation with pornography and sex and will provide practical insights into how to effectively minister in this area. Even if pornography or sexual addiction hasn’t affected you personally, it will. Someone close to you is currently struggling in this area and we want to help you offer love, grace, and hope when the secret surfaces. We will use our Twitter account as a means to quickly and efficiently share information and connect like-minded individuals.

Subscribe to Route1520’s Email List.
Route1520 is actively building our email lists, but we need your help. When you sign up, there are a few lists that you can be a part of. The most important list at this time is the Prayer Team. If you feel led to pray for Route1520, especially during this launch phase, please subscribe and indicate your interest in our Prayer Team by checking the appropriate box on the sign-up form. We will also provide ministry updates via email and will eventually publish an email newsletter. Please take a moment and sign up and share the sign-up link with others.

Donate to Route1520.
If you would like to contribute financially to Route1520, you can send your tax-deductible donation to:

Route1520
5184 Caldwell Mill Road
Suite 204-246
Hoover, AL 35244

If there are individuals or ministries that you are aware of that you think we should connect with, please let us know in the comments section. We covet your prayers as we launch. We realize that rescuing those who are trapped in sexual brokenness is front-lines stuff and that our enemy will be relentless. We need your prayers and your help.

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Bob shared this powerful video this morning during worship at Oak Mountain Church. What an amazing picture of the Gospel.

Our Bridegroom also stood waiting and watching patiently and rescued us at the appropriate time. 

In her excitement after being set free, she breaks out into song.

Watch and remember that there are people trapped and dying all around us. May we be looking for lives and not looking for loot.

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Yesterday I was moved to tears as I scrolled through the horrific images that were beginning to come out of Haiti in the aftermath of Tuesday’s earthquake.

Total devastation.

Please take a moment and step into their story. Take a moment and scroll through the pictures and pray for those who are still looking for loved ones. For those who desperately need medical attention. For those who need hope.

And then consider doing something more. Prayerfully consider clicking the graphic below and giving generously to Compassion International to help with the Haitian relief effort. Or you can simply text the word “disaster” to 90999.

Simple. Easy.

Let’s be His hands and His feet.

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Today used to be my anniversary.

If Melody and I had not divorced, we would be celebrating 18 years of marriage tonight. As it is, we are not sure what to do with January 11th.

Should we celebrate? That feels kindof odd. That marriage is now dead.

Should we grieve? That seems a bit off as well, because our sorrow has truly been turned into gladness.

We have decided to simply remember.

To remember both the good and the bad…the joy and the pain. To remember that we would not be enjoying the intimacy we share today had we not gone through the gut-wrenching process of facing our brokenness.

We were young and in love and thought we had everything figured out. We loved God and wanted to spend the rest of our lives serving Him together. We were so convinced that we were going to the mission field to reach an unreached people group that we took back almost all of our wedding gifts, including our fine china! (My mom still hasn’t forgiven us for that one!)

I was too much of a coward to talk to Melody about my struggle with pornography before we married. I sincerely believed that once we got married that my problem would go away forever and she would never have to know.

I was wrong.

Our story took turns that we never dreamed it would take. When we said “I Do” at Samford University in 1992 it never crossed my mind that I would be divorced 10 years and 11 months later…leaving a gorgeous wife and four beautiful kids to figure out what happened to Daddy.

So tonight, as Melody sleeps beside me, I remember.

I remember all that has taken place in 18 years.

Planting a church. Starting a business. Four kids. Financial struggle. Infidelity. Separation. Reconciliation. Infidelity. Divorce. Court appearances. Church discipline. Melody’s remarriage. Another man tucking my kids in at night. Melody’s divorce. Learning to co-parent well. Pursuing Melody. Dating. Remarriage.

It’s been quite the journey, and, as much as we want to slip away into our “happily ever after”, we understand there will be more pain and conflict. But we have come to know that there is a pain that heals.

Happy Old Anniversary, honey.

Oh…and you can click here to see what we looked like on January 11, 1992. Be nice!

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I’m in Winston-Salem, North Carolina tonight. I drove up today to visit my best friend Jim who had an amazing 19.5 hour surgery a week and a half ago. The surgery was to aggressively remove the cancer he was diagnosed with just over a year ago.

At our wedding last October, Jim had complained about feeling bloated, but I didn’t think much of it. Always the picture of health, I was floored when Jim called a week later and first said the word cancer.

Cancer.

I thought about that word as I drove from Birmingham to North Carolina today. I thought a lot about Jim.

Jim was a literal answer to prayer for me. Soon after my divorce, my counselor suggested that I practice being open, honest, and intimate with guys…that I needed to let people close and to practice being known “warts and all”. I wasn’t all that excited about the idea and quickly realized that I really didn’t have any good friends…especially following the divorce. I started praying for a godly friend. I even prayed that he would be single.

The next Sunday at Oak Mountain I noticed a guy who I had met five years earlier at the gym playing basketball. I re-introduced myself and we set up lunch later in the week. We discovered that we had tons in common…basketball, both divorced, our girls were a year apart, and our boys were 8 days apart. The following year we coached our sons’ baseball team together and had a blast. We wanted to provide structure for our boys as they grew into men and this later developed into our Epic Fathering group.

In February of 2005, since I wasn’t dating anyone and Jim wasn’t dating anyone, I joined him in gorgeous St. Kitts, West Indies for PLATO Learning’s President’s Club as his guest. (Yes we were teased mercilessly the entire 10 days.) The trip was an absolute blast. When Jim left PLATO to go with another company, I applied for and got his position.

Over this past year, I have watched Jim fight this disease with a focused strength and faith that has been an inspiration to me and hundreds of others. He has fought well through 10 rounds of chemo (and kept his great hair…jealous!), two surgeries on his lungs, and tonight we were even doing laps in the hallway a week and a half after undergoing his 19.5 hour ordeal here in North Carolina. The man is amazing and I can only hope I possess half the courage that he does when life throws me a curve ball.

One of Jim’s friends put together a video that contains quotes from Jim’s CaringBridge blog over the past year. The video is set to Matt Redman’s You Never Let Go, which has a powerful message…especially in light of Jim’s circumstances.

Please visit Jim’s CaringBridge site. Drop him a note and encourage him. But don’t be shocked if you are the one who leaves encouraged.

I know I have been.

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A got an email this morning that contained a link to Dockers’ new ad campaign “Wear the Pants.” In case you can’t read the graphic above, here’s the copy…

“Once upon a time, men wore the pants, and wore them well.  Women rarely had to open doors and little old ladies never crossed the street alone.  Men took charge because that’s what they did.  But somewhere along the way, the world decided it no longer needed men.  Disco by disco, latte by foamy non-fat latte, men were stripped of their khaki’s and left stranded on the road between boyhood and androgyny.  But today, there are questions our genderless society has no answers for.  The world sits idly by and cities crumble, children misbehave and those little old ladies remain on one side of the street.  For the first time since bad guys, we need heroes.  We need grown-ups.  We need men to put down the plastic fork, step away from the salad bar and untie the world from the tracks of complacency.  It’s time to get your hands dirty.  It’s time to answer the call of manhood.  It’s time to wear the pants.”

Answering the call of manhood.

I don’t know a man who, if asked, doesn’t diligently and desperately want to answer the call of manhood and to make his life count. The problem in our culture is that we have allowed manhood and masculinity to be watered down and tempered to the point that many men…especially Christian men…feel ashamed that they are men. The “gentle Jesus, meek and mild” refrain of the last two decades has left men not knowing what to do with courage, strength, and righteous anger. C.S. Lewis spoke to a similar situation in his day. In The Abolition of Man, he says:

“We make men without chests [hearts] and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.”

Because by and large our spirituality is defined by what we don’t do (especially here in the Bible belt), men are often unsure about what true masculinity looks like. So afraid of stepping out of bounds with their behavior, many Christian men have checked their hearts at the door and are left as empty shells lacking passion and fervor to do anything. We paste on feeble smiles and sit mildly on the sidelines, vowing not to cause any trouble.

Dockers obviously wants more men to buy their slacks and is obviously playing off of the age old question of who is wearing the pants in the home. But what an indictment! Could you imagine this ad campaign being used during World War I and World War II?

But today, there are questions our genderless society has no answers for.

We have the answers to our culture’s questions, but trying to answer them from the genderless paradigm simply won’t work. The Church must courageously redefine this paradigm and champion the glorious differences in how we were created…male and female. Different doesn’t imply one is better than the other.

Men, we need a new manifesto!

So what is the call to manhood? What injustices in our society need to be fought against with a strength and courage that is anything but mild? In what ways is today’s message to men a form of castration?

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Donald Miller’s latest book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, is rocking my world. Really. He shouldn’t be allowed to read my mail like he has obviously been doing.

The book is all about the elements of story and how conflict is necessary for every good story. It has really helped me with perspective as I look over the events of my life. I wrote a post a few months back called Misinterpreting My Story after watching a 20-minute video of Don giving a talk on these concepts. Trust me, if you have not seen this video, take the time to watch it now.

I saw Don Miller and Susan Isaacs a few weeks ago when their tour came through Birmingham. I still find myself going over my notes from that night. Donald made a statement that really challenged me.

“When you remove conflict from your life, you remove beauty.”

Now doesn’t that just fly in the face of most of our Western ideals? You can’t turn on the TV and watch more than 5 minutes without a commercial pitching something that is guaranteed to strip all of the conflict right out of our lives and leave us all cozy and comfortable.

And yet our culture is obsessed with beauty.

As Miller goes on to say, “Conflict is the only way a character can change.” If this is true, (and I think it is), and we know that God is at work changing us, why does it surprise us when we experience conflict and pain in our lives?

Conflict is inevitable and as believers, we are to work to resolve conflict and not try to avoid it at all costs.

What does it look like to embrace conflict instead of working so hard to avoid it? How can we do a better job of resolving conflict instead of avoiding conflict? What beauty in your life came as a result of pain and conflict?

I have an autographed copy of A Million Miles in a Thousand Years and will send it to an individual who leaves a comment with an example of beauty that resulted from pain and conflict. Only one comment per person please. Comment away!

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I woke up this morning around 4 AM and tried unsuccessfully to get back to sleep. Since I was going to be getting up early to meet with the guys at 6:30, I decided to stop fighting it and got up.

After quietly making some coffee, I settled into the kitchen table and pulled out my journal. It was still dark outside, but heard the sound of a slow, steady rain. A number of things were on my mind (thus the reason I couldn’t get back to sleep) and I began to fill page after page of my journal.

A theme kept popping up as I journaled, and, as I reflected, I realized that that theme would make a powerful book. I made a few quick notes about the book idea and without warning my brutal inner critic started hammering away at me. This was not unusual at all. I have been blessed with a very healthy inner critic for most of my life. What was unique about this morning is that I took the time to write down what it was saying. This is what I heard:

“A second book? Are you serious? You sure are the arrogant one…already talking about a second book and the first one isn’t even started. You’ll never be a writer and the only reason you want to write is so everyone will think Tray is a good guy. Why don’t you drop the fantasy, you poser.”

The barrage lasted about 15 seconds.

As I wrote down what I had heard, I was amazed how how mean-spirited and absolutely hateful the words were. I would NEVER speak that harshly to another human being, yet for some reason I was allowing my inner critic to talk to me that way.

I was sensitive to the voice of my inner critic this morning largely because I have been trying to help the guys in my Band of Brothers group to pay attention to their own inner critics over the past month. I discovered mine about five years ago and have grown accustomed to its accusing, shaming tone.

I believe it is vital for us to be able to discern the voice of our inner critic…to bring what is being said into our conscious mind. If we don’t challenge the accusations that are based on lies, we ultimately live our lives as if the lies are true and the critic is right.

 But thank God for Romans 8:1!

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

 Zip. Nada. None!

And that includes self-condemnation as well.

A question I ask the guys often in our group is “What does it look like to give yourself grace?” Frankly, most evangelicals are not too good at it. I know I wasn’t. But I’m getting much better at allowing myself to be human.

Growing up with my legalistic, black and white mind, even entertaining the idea of giving myself grace felt like I was trying to go easy on sin. And when I did screw up, oh the fury! I could spend weeks allowing my inner critic to beat me to a pulp with shame, guilt, and condemnation. In a sense I felt like I needed to show God just how sorry I was for sinning and the best way I could do that was through self-loathing and self-condemnation.

This was yet another example of how I was not believing the wonderfully scandalous Gospel. I had not accepted the fact that God loved me as I was and that my sin had not caught Him off guard. I felt I needed to beat myself up a bit as part of the process of finding God’s favor again.

So what about you…what does your inner critic sound like? Are you resting in the fact that He loves you as you are or are you playing the self-loathing game in order to convince God how sorry you are for your sin? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

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A few months ago, Melody and I discovered a blog that contained one of the most honest and painful stories that we had read in quite some time. The more we read, however, it became abundantly clear that the author, tho broken, had drunk deeply from the well of God’s grace. We were hooked and have been reading Serena Woods‘ blog ever since.

Yesterday I recounted the fateful Saturday in the Fall of 1997 when I crossed the line and had an affair. Go to Serena’s blog, www.graceisforsinners.com, and read my painful story. Please leave your comments. I’d love to hear from you.

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