"I must not fear. Fear is the mindkiller. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration." That's from the book Dune, but Frank Herbert. I've used this quote before, but its pretty powerful. And I think it fits when we're talking about lack. Because really, what is lack but a fear of not having what we need? Or a fear of not being who we need to be. Now, add this to that: "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love" (1 John 4:18). People always want to talk about love and hate as two sides of the same coin. But I'm convinced that love and fear are the opposite. I think hate is just "love" taken to a dangerous level. And I put it in quotes because when you hate someone its usually because you want something from them that they won't give. And love is never about getting. But fear is different animal. Fear has torment. We torment OURSELVES. What's that quote (and yes, I know I'm being quote-y today), "We buy things we don't need, with money we don't have, to impress people we don't like." I think that one's from Fight Club. But it rings true. We try so hard to be someone we're not because we're afraid people won't like who we are. We try so hard to get what we (think we) haven't got because we're afraid that we don't have enough. We live our lives from a place of lack. Always chasing the carrot, and always ending up with the stick. Banging our heads against the wall and only coming out of the deal with a headache. Well, I'm here to tell you that you don't have to live that way. I have no lack because my God has no lack. And the same is true for you. God doesn't need anything from anybody. But He has something that He wants FOR us. In fact, He wants us to have it so bad that He gave it to us. He gave His only begotten Son. He gave His Holy Spirit (the love receptor, the Spirit of Truth that leads and guides us into all truth). He gave us... Himself. And He is love. And there is no fear in love. We don't have to be afraid. Because we know that we are loved. And because we ARE loved... we CAN love. Because our God--who IS love--has no lack... WE have no lack. And the best part is: The more love you give, the more love you have. The more love you experience. Because love is giving. Only by giving it away, by sharing it, can we "have" it. Rather than trying to hold on tight, afraid that we might lose what we've got (and tumble back down into that place of lack), we can give everything we have. Everything we are. We can lay our lives down for our friends, and therein, thereby, LIVE our lives. Life is for living. And to live is to love. To love is to live. God gave His only begotten Son so that we might not perish, but have everlasting life. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. Love or fear. Abundance or lack. Everything we need--the desire of our heart... love--is available to us. All we need to do is reach out and grab it. Receive it and release it. Take hold of it by giving it away. Experience it by letting the love inside come out. Receive it and release it. Receive it by releasing it. Release it by receiving it. Fill ourselves to overflowing with what we've already been filled with and love others by letting God love us!

The thing about lack--about having a mindset where we think we lack something--is that feeling like you're less than will always make you chase that thing that you think you lack. You'll always try to do in order to be. You'll get stuck in man-centered, performance based religion. Running around the hampster wheel. Wearing yourself out, but not getting anywhere. Banging your head against the wall and getting nothing but a headache. That's the trick that the serpent used when he hissed his lie into Eve's ear way back in the garden of Eden. "If you want to be like God you have to..." And it doesn't really matter what comes after that dot dot dot. What he was saying was, "You're not good enough. But if you do this, this, and this you can make yourself good enough." But aside from the fact--the truth!--that we were created in God's image in the beginning, I've always had a problem with the idea of us not being good enough, but somehow, magically, out of our own "not good enough" strength... making oureslves good enough. And, listen, I'm not talking about practicing and getting better at things. Obviously that exists. I'm talking about how, at the end of the day, we are who we are. And if who I am isn't good enough for you... that's YOUR problem. I can't do anything about that. I can't change that. But that's why its so damaging to think of ourselves that way--in relation to each other and certainly in relation to God. If we see ourselves as not good enough, as lacking, then we'll try to be better. But how are we supposed to rise above our own selves? So we screw up. And then we get frustrated and give up. I've seen it so many times. "I'm already going to hell, so what's the point of even trying?" That's what religion has to offer. Religion has us running FROM God instead of running TO Him. I'm telling you, His arms are open wide. He's our safe place. God doesn't love us because of what we do. He loves us because of who we are. And who HE is. God IS love. It isn't just what He does, its who He is. I have no lack because my God has no lack. Look at Colossians 2:10, "And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power." We are complete in Him. Because He is complete in us. We have everything we need. God has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness. He has blessed us with all Spiritual blessings in the heavenly Christ. Everything we need (LOVE) is found in God. And God is found in us. He lives in us. We live in Him. Love lives in us. We live in love. Here it is as simply as I can put it: No love, no life. KNOW love, KNOW life! We try so hard to be someone we're not. To get something we think we haven't got. When what we ought to be doing is embracing who we are. Celebrating who we are. And embracing each other. Celebrating each other. To live is to love and to love is to live. Life is about connection, and relationship. If you feel like you're lacking something, you'll always be trying to get something. And that's not love. Love is giving. Knowing that you are who you're supposed to be, knowing that you have what you need to have, and giving it away. Sharing it. Giving YOURSELF away. Laying your life down for your friends. Loving the hell out of people because you know God loves the hell out of you!

I have no lack because my God has no lack. John 1:3 says, "All things were made by him; and without him was not anything thing made that was made." Jesus, the Creator of all, gave His all to us. He wanted us to have His abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life... so He gave it to us. He didn't make us jump through hoops to earn it. He just wanted us to have it, so He gave it to us. I don't make my son jump through hoops before I give him his dinner. He needs it, I want him to have it, so I give it to him. And, listen, the fact that he's grateful for it is icing on the cake. But the fact remains--if he has a good day, I feed him. If he has a bad day, I feed him. The provision passed down from father to son (or Father to Son) isn't something that can be earned. That's what I think I'm trying to say. Fathers care for their Son(s) because they love them. Period. And think about this for a moment: If God is love (and He is), and everything that was made was made by Him--and through Him, because you can't make something out of nothing, it is all an extension of the Creator--then everything was made by love, and through love, and for love. Love is the thing we truly think we lack. And living from that supposed (albeit false) place of lack is what gets us into so much trouble so much of the time. I believe very strongly in 2 Corinthians 5:14 (NLT), "Either way, Christ's love controls us. Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have all died to our old life." I believe that Christ's love controls us either one of two ways: 1. We believe Christ loves us and we do everything we can to experience that love by sharing it, by giving it away. Or 2. We don't believe that Christ loves us and we do everything we can in order to get that love that we think we are lacking. We live that "old life," the rat race, trying to get, get, get... or we believe that we have died to our old life and we walk in newness of life. We either try to build our own Kingdom, or we rest in the loving arms of our heavenly Father and experience and enjoy the Kingdom HE built. The Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of heaven. The Kingdom of love! He gave us the keys to the Kingdom. He gave us His love! What else could unlock the Kingdom of love but love! When you have love, you have all you will ever need. And, listen, I'm not saying you don't need to take care of business. Paul said, "You don't work, you don't eat," or words to that effect. But I'm saying, as the Beatles said, "Love is all you need." Love is what makes life worth living. Love is what makes it possible to live. Because, as we know, to live is to love and to love is to live. You can't have one without the other because they are not just connected, they are the same thing! We were made BY love, and filled WITH love. Love is our true identity, our innermost being. Love is not just what we do, love is who we are. And love is giving. Having no lack is less about what you "have" and more about what you DO with what you have. If you hoard things up then you waste them. But if you give what you've got... you experience what you've got in such a real and powerful way. Love is giving. Having no lack means living out of your abundance! Giving what you've got!

You guys know how I feel about this, so I'll just put it out there right from the jump: We have no lack because our God has not lack. God, the Creator of everything, doesn't need anything. He says so pretty specifically in Psalm 50:12, "If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof." God doesn't need anything. How could He? And He certainly doesn't need anything from us. When Cain and Able were getting their sacrifices ready, God didn't want what man could produce with his effort. He wanted a Lamb. He wanted Jesus. Jesus made the sacrifice that was required. And, by the way, the judgment of God wasn't God killing His Son instead of killing us. That's kind of absurd. The judgment of God was bringing Jesus back to life after religion killed Jesus. After WE killed Him. God didn't put His Son on the cross. Man did that. But I digress. The point is, God isn't looking for us to provide anything for Him. He is OUR provider. Our provision. When Abraham was willing to sacrifice HIS son, God stepped in and provided Himself as a ram. What true Father wouldn't lay down His own life to protect His children? So this idea that we owe God something, or that God wants something from us... I don't buy it. I believe God wants things FOR us. Things that are in our best interests. Knowing the end from the beginning, He wants us to experience every good and perfect gift that is available to us. But so often we run around like chickens with our heads cut off, ignoring what we DO have because we're too worried about what we think we DON'T have. We come at life from a place of lack, as if we start with nothing and have to fight and scratch and claw for everything we're ever going to get. The rat race, right? But if you win the rat race... what? You're king rat? Is that really a goal worth focusing on or working towards? Whoever dies with the most toys wins? Really? I don't think so. I think there's more to it than that. Look at Hosea 4:6, my key memory verse for this Rant series, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children." Sounds pretty harsh. Being rejected and forgotten. But I think its more of--like I say a lot--US robbing OURSELVES from what's available to us. If we reject knowledge, if we are told the glorious truth of the Gospel (that God is love and He loves you), and we disregard that in order to continue to try to build our own kingdom, then we ARE going to miss out on the gift we've been given. Its not that we HAVE lack. Its that we're almost choosing to disregard all of the blessings we've been blessed with. We miss out on what we have--on what's available to us--by focusing on what we think we don't have. Even if what we think we don't have really doesn't matter. Sometimes we don't have something... because we don't need it. Because its not good for us. Sometimes we "lack" something because God would rather us have something us. Something better. Knowing what we HAVE is so much more important than worrying about what we "lack."

To end this Rant series I want to flip the script a little bit. We've been talking about what WE need to focus on--our goals, the path we want to walk... love--but look at Ephesians 1:4 in the Message Bible. It tells us what GOD is focused on: "Long before he laid down earth's foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love." WE are God's focus. I always say there's really only two important things in this universe--God and people. Loving God and loving people. Loving God BY loving people. Psalm 8:4 asks, "What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?" God is mindful of man. God's mind is full... of us. We are always on His mind. When He talks about knowing the thoughts that He thinks toward us, thoughts of peace and not evil to bring us an expected end, that's not by accident. That's because He is focused on us. Focused on love. His love for us. Psalm 17:8 says, "Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the shadow of thy wings." And Deuteronomy 32:10 tells us that, "He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, and kept him as the apple of his eye." Which is to say that we are God's special creation. We were created so that the God who is love could express Himself to us. And in us. And through us. And as us. God's mind is full of man. We are the apple of His eye. We are the point of the whole thing. And I don't say all this to puff us up or give us a big head. I don't say all this so we'll get full of ourselves. I say all this so that we can understand. If God's focus is on us... our focus can be one to each other. Not being self-centered, but being Christ-centered. Which means being people-centered. I'm not saying I should focus on me. And, listen, sometimes we do need to exercise a bit of self-care. That's important. But at the same time, if I take care of you and you take care of me, then neither one of us has to worry about ourselves. My point is: Its all about people. Relationship. Connection. God and people. Loving God and loving people. Loving God BY loving people. That HAS to be our focus if we want to experience this abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life that we've been given. If you're focused on yourself you're going to miss out on so much of what's available. Because love isn't about getting. Its not about what you can do for you. Love is giving. Giving what you've got--who you are--to the people that you come into contact with. Giving everything you have and everything you are without worrying about how it will be received. Without worrying about what you'll get back. Just giving because you have something to give. Something worth giving. Giving because your focus is the same as your heavenly Father's focus. Giving because people are special to you. Important to you. So walk in love, but never forget what that means. Love can't exist in a vaccuum. There has to be someone loving, and someone being loved. It takes two to tango. Keep your focus right and things will always turn out the way they're supposed to!

If you don't know where you're going--or where you want to go--its going to be hard to get there. If you're not focused on your goals, you're probably not going to achieve them. That's kind of what my memory verse for tonight says. "Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established" (Proverbs 4:26). Or, in the Message Bible, "Watch your step, and the road will stretch out smooth before you." It kind of goes along with the underlying theme I've been grabbing at, about the Word (which is Jesus, which is love) being a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path. Its all about love. Looking at the love in any (and every) situation. Seeing that silver lining in even the darkest cloud. I don't think things happen randomly. I think things happen for a reason. Even the things that look "bad" are working together for good. They can teach us things. Help us to learn and grow. But I also think we can avoid a lot of pain and suffering by listening to that still, small voice deep inside. If we let love guide the way we WILL get to where we're supposed to go. And, real quick, I want to say that where we want to go isn't always necessarily where we're supposed to go. I've done things in my life that I thought were serving my goals, and then found out that what I thought I wanted paled in comparision to what I ended up getting. The journey is such a big part. And the destination is important, don't get me wrong, but sometimes we aren't even ready for what we want until we go through that journey. So we might as well enjoy the ride, while we're on the ride. Don't get so caught up in trying to move forward at warp speed that you forget to stop and smell the flowers. Don't get so caught up in trying to get something you think you haven't got that you miss out on experiencing and enjoying what you have got. I think when Jesus spoke about the thief and the robber who tries to enter the sheepfold any other way but through the door (which is Jesus, which is love) He was talking about US robbing ourselves. We have already been given everything we need. The journey is discovering what we've been given. We are already who we need to be. The journey is discovering who we really are. What's that old phrase? People are like teabags, you don't really know what they're made of until you put them in hot water. Its easy to say things that make you sound good. But when the rubber meets the road, that's when things get real. That's when what's inside (what you believe is inside) comes right out. We live from the inside out, whether we know it or not. Whether we realize it or not. What's inside (again, what you believe is inside) WILL come out. It's too big not to, whatever it is. So its important to focus. That's my point for today. Focus on what's really inside. Focus on the path that love sets out for you. Ponder the feet of your path. Watch your step. "Is this where I want to go? Is this serving my goals?" Don't get distracted by things that, in the grand scheme of things, really don't matter. Enjoy the journey, but make sure you're headed in the right direction. Make sure love is leading the way. Make sure you're following your heart. Focused on your goals. Focused... on love!

If you're anything like me, you have a lot going on. Whether you want to or not. Because that's life. That's what happens on a day to day basis. I always say, "The hardest part of life... is living." But, to be fair, the most beautiful part of life is living. Because to live is to love, and to love is to live. And there is nothing more beautiful than love. There is nothing more holy than love. There is nothing more important than love. Its all about love! So let me drop my memory verse and then we'll dig into it. Matthew 6:6 in the Message Bible, "Here's what I want you to do: Find a quiet, secluded place so you won't be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace." So many times in the Bible Jesus did that very thing. He went away. Got away. Found a secluded place. Got to a position and a place where He could just focus on what really mattered. Commun with His Father. Talk to God... and (equally as important) listen to God. I think we even get prayer twisted around a lot of the time. We think God is like a genie where we get to just tell Him what we want and He'll snap His fingers and make it happen for us. When, really, its important for US to find out what HE wants. And I always say it like this, "What you THINK doesn't really compare to what God KNOWS." He knows the end from the beginning. He knows what's best for us. He always has our best interests at heart. And He not only knows what's best for us, He knows the best way for us to get (or experience) what's best for us. He can keep us from falling. He can hold us up. He can lead us, guide us, direct us, and protect us. If we let Him. If we focus on God (on love) instead of focusing on all the other... stuff... that we get so caught up in. Its like the story of the snakes biting the Israelites. There was a bronze serpent on a pole (Jesus on the cross, in type and shadow) that the people were told to look at and live. But sometimes we are too concerned with the snakes at our ankles. Nipping at our heels. Sometimes we miss out on the fact--the truth--that we can just rise above those things. We can SET our affection on things above, and we don't always have to worry about things on the earth. We don't have to let people get the best of us. We don't have to let things get into us. We have to go through things, that's life. But we don't have to let things go through us. And when we DO get overwhelmed... we know what to do. We can get away from it, find that quiet, secluded place. I think even in church settings sometimes we try to put on a big front. "Role-playing before God." But God doesn't want all that. He doesn't want fluffed and buffed. He wants real and raw. I always tell my kid, "You gotta talk to me. I can't fix the problem if I don't know what the problem is." And I've heard it said, "Don't tell God how big the storm is, tell the storm how big God is." I get that. But we can, in times of need, cast our cares on Him. Because He cares for us. And the best way to do that is in a one-on-one, focused, real, secluded prayer place with God. Just you and Him. No distractions. No messing around trying to impress people--or God. Just speaking from the heart and listening with the heart!

Its easy to get distracted. To focus on the wrong things. To let our expectations sabotage us. But just because its easy doesn't mean its right. Sometimes the hard thing to do is the right thing to do. Or sometimes the right thing to do is... nothing at all. And I know that's hard for some people. Its hard to just let things go. To trust that things will work out in the end without us trying to jam a square peg into a round hole. Did you ever think about that? If you want that square peg to fit, you need to cut the edges off. And sometimes those edges are what make us special. Those edges are what make us... us. We weren't all created to fit in the same round hole. We need to stop trying to fit into the same religious box. We need to learn to live and let live. To let people be who they are and to love them for WHO they are. You don't have to "fix" everything and everybody. If the Holy Spirit can't convict people to walk the straight and narrow path (that leads to life), do you really think YOU'LL be able to? I don't. And I don't think its our job to control each other. To change each other. To make people fit into our box, or our idea of what--or who--they should be. We see differences as obstacles to overcome. But really we should be embracing each other's differences. Celebrating each other's differences. Our differences are what make us special. If everybody was exactly the same... that would be pretty boring. God doesn't want robots. He doesn't want drones. He doesn't want us just going through the motions in order to try to earn something from Him. He gave us a gift, and He wants us to enjoy it. He wants us to experience His abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life. That's why He gave it to us. And we experience that life by letting HIM live it in us, and through us, and as us. We live Jesus' life of love by letting Him love the hell out of us and then loving Him back by loving the hell out of each other. Receiving and releasing the love of God. That should be our focus. Not getting things from people. If you're saying "I love you" to someone in order to get them to say it back to you... that's not love. Because love is never about getting. Because love IS giving. Our focus can't be on getting. That's called being selfish. And that's not ok. That's certainly not love. But if we focus on what we have, instead of what we wish we had, we'll be able to cultivate an attitude of gratitude. We'll be able to enjoy what we have instead of just always trying to get something else. I bring this up a lot but one of my favorite things we said at my old church was, "I have no lack because my God has no lack." That stuck with me. So let's focus on what we have. Let's focus on sharing what we have. Giving what we have. Freely you have been given... freely you can give. One more time: Receive it and release it. Give what you've got. That should be your focus. That's the way to live a life worth living. A life of love. A life of purpose and focus. Making sure to major on the major and minor on the minors. To let people be who they are (instead of who we wish they were) and love them for who they are!

I think a big part of our problem, collectively, as a society, is that we just want to distract ourselves from our lives. Phones, games, TV, on demand... We watch TV shows about people watching TV shows. My son watches videos of people playing video games. Which I guess isn't really different than watching people play games (sports) on TV. But my point is, we seem to want to focus on everything and anything other than what we really need to focus on. Let me drop my passage of Scripture. From the Message Bible, "Keep your eyes straight ahead; ignore all sideshow distractions. Watch your step, and the road will stretch out smooth before you" (Proverbs 4:25-26). The road that leads to life is straight and narrow. Sometimes it surely feels like a long and winding road, I grant you. But I'm telling you... we do it to ourselves a lot of the time. We get mixed up, twisted around. We get... distracted. We lose focus. I touch on this verse a lot, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path" (Psalm 119:105). But if you don't look at the path... its hard to follow the path. If you don't watch your step, its easy to get tripped up. If you don't check yourself, you'll let every little thing that happens wreck yourself. And that's no way to live. Now, as always, I'm not saying you should try to stop feeling things. My mantra is: Feel what you feel, but don't let it control you. Feelings are ok. God gave us the capacity to feel for a reason. But we need to stay focused at the same time. Weep with those who weep. Yes. Joy with those who joy. People need our support, be it good, bad, or ugly. But while its important to show empathy, and to give people what they need, we don't want to get so lost that we can't find our way back home. "I know you're sad. I'm right here with you. But I can't weep forever." I think helping people is pretty much why we're here. Connection. Relationship. Love. And I think there's a lot to be said about ministering out of our hurt. When you've been through something--or even when you're going through something--that's when you really understand it. That's when you have a unique insight about it. "I've been there, done that, got the t-shirt. I can help you through it." A map is nice, but a guide is priceless. A guide knows the short cuts. The things to avoid. The things to make sure NOT to avoid. So we go through things, I believe, for two reasons: 1. To learn and grow. 2. To be able to help others through what we've been through. So instead of focusing on disctractions... instead of focusing on what's wrong in our lives... we ought to focus on what's right in our lives. What we've gotten out of what we've been through. What we have, not what we don't. And--and this is where I think I'm going with this Rant series in the coming days--what we want. If what you're doing is not serving your goals... why are you doing it? Purpose driven. Focused on what matters. Taking steps to get to where we want to be, rather than just wandering around trying to avoid where we are. The Word--LOVE--is the light to our path. Love shows us where to go. What to do. But we have to then... go there. Do that!

Your heart is the most important part of you. It is the part of you that makes you... you. Because that true you comes from the heart. Who you really are flows from deep within. That's why its so important to keep your heart with all diligence. To make sure you're keeping your heart... by keeping it open. Not shutting it down because you've been burned before and you don't want to get burned again. I know its hard to reach out once you've been slapped down. But I'm telling you, its worth it. You have to go out on a limb sometimes, because that's where the fruit is. The fruit of the Spirit. Which is love. So let me say it like this: If you want love, you have to give love. Because love is giving. The best (perhaps the only) way to feel love is to love people. To share that connection. That relationship. That's why the Bible speaks of it being more blessed to give than to receive. I've said it many times: You can give without loving, but you can't love without giving. Love IS giving. And love comes from the heart. Love is who we really are. We are expressions of the God who is love. He expresses Himself TO us, and He expresses Himself THROUGH us! It all flows from the heart. That's what I'm trying to say to end this Rant series. Everything that is important, everything that matters, comes from the heart. The issues of life, right? "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life" (Proverbs 4:23). The Amplified Bible says it like this, "Keep and guard your heart with all vigilance and above all that you guard, for out of it flow the springs of life." The Message Bible says it like this, "Keep vigilant watch over your heart; that's where life starts." I like that. Watch your heart. Because your heart will lead you and guide you, if you let it. The Word of God (which is Jesus, which is love) will be a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your path... if you let it. Follow your heart. Trust your gut. Sometimes your heart will smite you, and that's ok too. That's when its time to reevaluate. That's when its time to get back on the straight and narrow path that leads to life. Your heart is where life starts. Jesus came that we might have life and that more abundantly. Its all about love. Which means its all about life. Because to live is to love and to love is to live. They aren't just connected. They are the same thing. A life well lived is a life in which you gave as much love as possible. That's the New Commandment, right? To love one another as Jesus has loved you. To receive and release His love. To let what's inside flow out by filling yourself to overflowing with it by knowing and believing that its in there. The heart is so important. So keep it and guard it. Make sure it stays open. Keep vigilant watch over it. Keep an eye on it, so you can know where to go. What to do. Do small things with great love. Do ALL things with great love. Do it heartily. To the best of your ability. Because its in your heart to do it. Don't try to be someone you're not. Listen to your heart and be who you are with every beat of GOD'S heart in your chest!