I can be pretty slow on the uptake at times.
At certain moments, things seem very cloudy and I am not always good at discerning God’s voice from mine. (Maxie Burch says that’s because I talk too much and never shut up. He’s probably right).
However, there are moments where this is not the case. Not sure if it is because I run out of words or God decides that I really need to hear something. Normally, these moments of clarity become clear over time and involve a multi-prong attack, where I am getting it from God on all fronts. For instance, I will read something in the Scriptures and then have someone speak about that passage in a public setting. Or I will have a friend ask me about something that I was secretly considering. Or I will look back over the last few months and see a pattern that I had somehow overlooked.
You might say, “Scott, are you blurring the line between coincidence and God speaking?” No, I don’t think so. I agree with Dr. Blackaby, when he said in his book, Experiencing God, that God speaks in four ways: through prayer, the Scriptures, other people (the Church), and our circumstances. Sadly, I realize that I talk too much and God has to come at me from multiple sources repeatedly to break through my noise.
Recently, I looked back over my personal reading and time in the Scriptures this fall using B90X and I saw a pattern emerging. I began to chew on this pattern and started connecting some dots and some experiences that I was having in my personal life. I had been encountering a similar theme from the writers of the Scriptures to modern-day authors. I had been living in a fairly consistent reality for several months.
So, I put it down on paper and started fleshing it out. And in a funny and surprising way, it intersected the general Lenten theme that the Think team set for our conversation at Crash beginning on Sunday, February 14th and continuing through Palm Sunday, March 28th. I will be sharing a lot of what God has been teaching me (“okay, God, I get the point” moments) during these seven weeks.
This will be a personal series in many ways and I am excited for the teaching that will take place from passages across the Scriptures. Teaching that will relevantly speak into our present context and direct our focus to the experience of Jesus on the way to the Cross.
I hope like me, you will have an experience with God where you can say, “okay, God, I get the point!” and then do something as a result of your newfound understanding. We know that, in a spiritual context at least, knowledge without action leads to pride. We won’t be looking for simply more knowledge but a new direction for living and action. I pray that we can engage the places in our lives where we face suffering (and conflict, resistance, or our “lizard brains”) and allow God to inspire our perspective towards redemption and hope. We really do serve a God who wastes nothing.
What a Waste: A Series on Suffering
Feb 14-Mar 28
“None get to God but through trouble.” -Catherine of Aragon
What a nice quote…but who wants to live that? Who accepts that trouble, suffering, difficulty, resistance, conflict, or pain are a part of God’s work in us?
As we move through this season of Lent, in preparation for Holy Week, we will consider the role of suffering in our lives. We believe that we worship a God who wastes nothing. A God who joins us in our suffering. A God who suffers. Whose suffering and death and resurrection produced our reconciliation with God and began the renewal of all things.
We are going to suffer, too, and it will shape us. This series is about this suffering and our response to it.










