The world offers us a lot of mirrors, and we spend a whole lot of time standing in front of a whole lot of them. And regardless of which one of these many mirrors we choose, it will never be large enough to take in ‘all that we are’ in order to reflect ‘all that we are’ back to us. For God made you far too marvelous for the mirrors of men. Therefore, you might want to quit standing in front of them.

If the alternative to believing in God is believing in men, then the answer as to why I should believe in God is not only simple, it’s blatantly obvious.

The battle didn’t just happen to happen. Rather, God invited us to the battle so that we could be left utterly breathless at the miraculous way that He won it. And once we witness that kind of victory, our need to fight anything is replaced by His ability to win everything.

It’s not that I don’t believe in God. Rather, it’s that I don’t believe in not believing in God.

It’s not what God asks of us. Rather, it’s what He wants to give to us. And in a society that has focused on the former at the exclusion of the latter, we have fundamentally ‘asked’ that God give us ‘nothing.’ And if you’re at all curious about what ‘nothing’ looks like, watch the news.

We’ve come to believe in what people say about God for the singular reason that it grants us the excuse not to believe in who He actually is so that we can continue to be who we actually are not.

I have found that unless I surrender every part of my life to God every part of my day, I will end up missing most every part of my life every day of my life.

As a kid we would step out on those thick summer nights and collect lightening bugs. And with a mason jar chock full of them, their combined brilliance would light up my hands as I held them. But, if I released them from the jar, their brilliance would light up the world, which now included the hands of everyone around me. And as I think about the light of the Gospel and the utter brilliance of its message, as Christians maybe we should get rid of our jars.

I am begging you to let nothing shackle you that God has sent you to unshackle.