In a sentence…I have allowed my burden to become an idol.

For my readers who don’t know me, four years ago my spouse chose to walk away from our marriage. I didn’t want that. My daughters didn’t want that. We were (and continue to be) left bouncing in the wake of the consequences created by her decisions.

The burdens I’ve been carrying since; burdens of abandonment, betrayal, loneliness, starting life over from scratch without a network in a new state is but a short list of what has dominated my thoughts. Not to mention the constant fear she would again someday pick up and relocate our children again. I have allowed these burdens, by the amount of time spent fretting and obsessing over them, to become an idol. By definition, an idol is something to which time and devotion are paid. I have paid too much time and far too much attention to my burdens of the past four years. They have become idols at the expense of time and attention focusing on God’s sovereignty over my life.

Are my burdens real? Absolutely. I can’t begin to describe the profound loneliness of beginning life over in a place you never wanted to live where you know no one, leaving behind 14 years of deeply invested friendships, ministry, network, jobs and every good thing that feeds your soul. Add to that the burden of single parenting, a job God never intended in His original design of family, cover it all with a daily feeling of being “on the outside looking in” and it’s a small start in communicating what a head-banging process this has been.

My burdens are real. They are heavy. And they may not go away anytime soon. Yet in focusing on them, both knowingly and unknowingly, I have allowed these burdens to become an idol. Like a man examining a stain on his necktie, my vision has become myopic. I’ve become oblivious to the larger environment around me, the environment over which God is fully sovereign. Focusing on my burdens has created in me a spirit of fear. I’ve been waiting and worrying over the next bad thing that could happen instead of acknowledging God and His perfect love that casts out fear. To, even in one’s mind, relegate God in any way as subject to one’s circumstances is sin.

One would think a seminary graduate would have this figured out. But there is a big difference between head knowledge and heart assurance. At some point all of us will experience a life event that forces us to decide whether or not we will “own” our theology. When life is full of everything happy and circumstances are favorable, it’s easy to pay lip service to the goodness of God. When life kicks you in the head and takes away most or all of what you value, the question is unavoidable. Is God still good when life is not?

In the wake of my spouse walking away, my friend Jerry Sittser told me, “In God’s big-picture drama, people who walk out of your life are small players. As painful and horrible as this situation is, there is nothing anyone can do to thwart God’s purposes for your life. Or for the lives of your children.” This is a true statement. Yet in my pain I lost sight of this. God, in my mind, became subject to the decisions of my ex-spouse. Instead of rightly seeing God as in control of His universe (and mine) in the middle of my awful situation I viewed Him as subject to my rotten circumstances instead of sovereign over the details of my life.

Psalm 34 calls us to “magnify the Lord and exalt His name” and that in doing so God will “deliver us from all our fears.” In allowing my burdens to become an idol, I’ve done the opposite. In magnifying my fears I have minimized God. That in itself is grievous. Yet the arrogance of this sin is magnified by the irony that my spirit of fear has been cultivated while surrounded by God’s blessings. I’ve lamented to God the burden of moving to and surviving in a place where I knew no one, while across the room sits a cabinet full of customer files, every one of them a stranger until God brought them into my life. I’ve lamented to God the burden of leaving behind the bonds of an established church family, while the members and friends at Turning Point Church, many of whom don’t even know me that well, have consistently prayed for me and cared for my daughters as if they were their own. I’ve lamented to God my burden of loneliness, and in doing so treated God as if He hasn’t been here for every tear and every sleepless night.

While I’ve been guilty of treating God as though He is subject to my circumstances, true to form God has been incredibly patient and kind with me. He has, in ways big and small, used these same circumstances to remind and encourage me that He transcends everything I can see and imagine. He really does “cause all things to work together for good to those who love Him and are called according to His purpose”. After disappointments in my job, He surprises me with unexpected sales. Or sitting in church, missing all my friends and ministry in Arizona, a hand on my shoulder and a voice saying, “You’ve been on my heart a lot. Let me pray for you.” Or in moments of deeply felt insignificance someone saying, “Thanks for what you said in your sermon. God really used it in my life.” And even in ways far outside the box like a guy named Bob at Sam’s Club in Roswell, New Mexico who offers to pray for me while filling my car at the gas pump.

If I’d spent as much time looking for God in the details as I’ve spent focusing on my fears, how different would my life look?

So there you have it. My confession. And my resolution to stop living from a spirit of fear. God’s arm is not too short to save. There’s nothing that will happen in my life that He’s not already aware of. The fact that I am still here is proof of His provision. He promises to give me a hope and a future. He promises not to quit working on me. And He promises to “restore all the years that the locusts have eaten”. I have no idea how He will do that, but I look forward to seeing it.

In the meantime, my burdens may not get lighter. My situation may not change. It may get worse. But it doesn’t matter because God is on His throne. He loves me. I don’t know why. But He does. And His promises are bigger than my fearful circumstances.

Or as He says, “If I (God) am for you, who can be against you?”

Todd A. Thompson – ASliceOfLifeToGo.com

For this Minnesota Vikings fan, the two pictures I saw recently were worth at least that many. And no small number of them were cuss words.

No worries. I didn’t say anything. Not out loud, anyway.

I was hanging out with my daughters at The Main Event. After the bowling and arcade games I was in the redemption store where one cashes in their tickets and points earned. In the corner of the store, within one matted frame were two 8×10 black and white photographs. The inscribed pewter plate read, “The Hail Mary Pass” – December 28, 1975″

The first picture: Dallas Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach unleashing a desperation pass in the face of the fierce rush of the Minnesota Vikings Purple People Eaters defense.

The second picture: Cowboys receiver Drew Pearson with arms outstretched. Waiting for the pass? Yes. But those arms were outstretched because he just finished pushing off on Viking defensive back Nate Wright, also in the picture, on his way to a face plant into the frozen turf.

The most offensive of offensive pass interference in the history of football.

For Vikings fans, there’s no need for a third picture. The nightmare image is laser burned into our memory. Drew Pearson, carrying the ball on his hip into the end zone like a kid caught with both hands in the cookie jar. He was looking over his shoulder for the flag that he and everyone at Metropolitan Stadium and everyone in the national television audience knew was coming.

The penalty flag he deserved.

The penalty flag that never came.

The biggest no-call in the history of Vikings football.

I’ve seen plenty of pictures of that game. But these two poured ink in my wound. They were autographed. Roger Staubach with a Sharpie attesting to his dumb luck and Drew Pearson signing a photographic confession of his guilt.

That Pearson later admitted he shoved his opponent down is of no comfort. Instead of going home to cry in their Texas-sized pillows like they should have, the Cowboys advanced in the playoffs while my worthy Viking heroes were deprived of their victory.

In talking with my friend Ed about my feelings on this travesty I said, “I think my tombstone is going to read, “Drew Pearson pushed”.

Though you don’t want to say it around longsuffering Minnesota Vikings fans, football is just a game. What happens when the penalty flags don’t get thrown in real life?

What happens when the money that is owed to you in a business transaction never comes because someone schemed and connived to steal it from you?

What happens when the promotion you have earned by hard work, education, achievement and proven track record is given to someone else…because they have the “right” last name?

What do you do when the person whose criminal actions do harm to your loved ones, yet they walk on a legal technicality?

What happens when someone purposely and falsely damages your reputation in order to prop up their own image?

It’s natural to be infuriated by the injustice. Where’s the flag? Somebody throw the flag!

But the flag never comes.

Worse, there appears to be no attitude of contrition on the part of the offender. It’s as if they have no conscience. God’s Word talks about this. Psalm 10:4 says, “The wicked man is so arrogant he always thinks, “God won’t hold me accountable; He doesn’t care.” It’s that lack of accountability that makes us crazy for justice. We want the price to be paid and we want to see everything made right. And we want to see it made right …right now.

The difficult truth is that God doesn’t settle His accounts immediately. How we wish that He would. But He doesn’t. Will He eventually? Absolutely. God is a God of perfect justice. His character will not allow Him to ignore wrongs done. The day will come when every wrong done, big or small, will be made right. We can rely on God’s perfection for that.

The difference between us and God in matters of payback is that while we would punish the offender out of anger, God will judge fairly from His perfect justice. It’s impossible for you and I to equally possess opposite character qualities without compromising one or the other. As fallen human beings, We can’t be perfectly loving and perfectly angry at the same time. Something’s gotta give. In His time, however, God will judge our offender with
perfect justice without compromising the perfect love He has for that person.

So what to do while we wait for that day?

Resist the urge to play mental games of retribution. While there are momentary pleasures in contemplating the many possibilities of the word “smite” with regard to our enemy (e.g. Steinway pianos falling from the sky onto their head, etc) it’s best we leave that to God. In fact, it’s best for us to just plain “make room for God”. Among the most difficult acts of our will is to trust God with the judgement of those who have greatly damaged us. Yet God honors our yielding to Him with a peace that passes understanding. Someone bigger and infinitely more qualified will settle the account. We can forgive and go forward, knowing that God will someday make everything right.

Understand, “making room for God” is an ongoing process. Drew Pearson pushed off 34 years ago. It still makes me nuts to think about. And that was only a football game. Imagine our conversations with God regarding the deep wounds inflicted on us by another. We never get used to injustice in our lives. Yet making room for God makes it possible for us to live the abundant and abiding life He desires for us.

Stop looking for the flag.

Make room for God.

Then live in the space you made.

God will take care of your enemies.

“Do not avenge yourselves, dear friends, but give place to God’s wrath, for it is written,  “Vengeance is mine, I will repay,” says the Lord.” – Romans 12:19

Todd A. Thompson – www.ASliceOfLifeToGo.com

Have you ever been deeply wounded by another person who, with deliberate action and malice aforethought, hurt you on purpose?

Have you waited for justice to be served?

And waited some more?

Are you still waiting?

(Maddening, isn’t it?)

In our broken world, wounds come in three ways. Sometimes people wound us unintentionally. It is to be expected in the rough and tumble of imperfect people living on Planet Earth. These wounds are easier to forgive because there was no malicious intent.

Sometimes we wound ourselves by our own poor choices. We make bad and/or foolish decisions. That pain is at the self-serve pump. No one to blame but ourselves.

Then there are the wounds inflicted by others who hurt us on purpose. They knew exactly what they were doing and they did it anyway. Perhaps it was a quick measured decision. Perhaps it was a long process of planning to do evil to us. And when we are blindsided by their harmful actions we stagger back, wondering how anyone could do so much intentional damage with no regard or conscience?

In the middle of our pain we console ourselves with the thought that certainly justice will be coming. The account will be set straight. They will have an attack of conscience and come to us with apology and we will have our satisfaction. Then we will be vindicated.

At first we hope for that.

Then we wait for that.

Then we wait some more.

Then we seethe over the delay and think, “It will happen. It must happen.”

(Not you, of course. But people I know. They think this way.)

Then one day we wake up and realize that the apology we’re waiting for will never come. Their conscience has cobwebs on it. More infuriating, the one who did evil to us is cruising through life without hitting so much as a speed bump.

What to do?

Here’s what my friend Jennifer has to say on the topic. I don’t think anyone could say it better. If you see yourself at all in the above paragraphs, this will hit you like a train. Read this carefully, let it sink in. Apply it to your life if you need to, then pass it along to anyone who could benefit.

“Picture yourself walking through your life at this moment. But turn yourself around in your picture….you’re walking backwards. Not traveling to the past, but moving forward into your future, while facing backwards.

Instead of seeing your future and all the new people in it, you are constantly staring at your awful past. Especially at those who did evil to you.

As long as you continue to want to be vindicated and wish for an apology while looking back at how wrongly you were treated, reflecting constantly on how you were gipped, you will walk your life moving in a forward motion, only facing backwards.

Walking forward, facing backwards you will miss all the beauty of the things and people in your life right now. Because in your soul you are not facing them, you are looking backwards. And because of that you will see your future through past events. It will cause you to guard your heart and miss out on all the joy because of your “facing backwards” perspective.

It will happen in your thoughts. It will happen during what should be happy moments. All are tainted by facing backwards.

When you decide to grab your healing by the horns and shout it out that you refuse to allow one more day to be stolen, you will find yourself turning around and walking forwards, facing forwards.  Then you will see the new things, the new people and the good things that are happening in your life.” - Jennifer Hildebrandt 

 ”This one thing I do: Forgetting what lies behind and straining toward what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 3:13b-14

Todd A. Thompson – www.ASliceOfLifeToGo.com

I’m running late.

I hate to be late. I’d rather be everywhere early. Except for maybe a dentist appointment. But other than that, just get me there early so I can stand in line and wait and relax knowing that at least I’m not late.

But this day I’m late. I left the driveway in a hurry. You know the kind of hurry I’m talking about. The throw your briefcase in the back seat, stick your coffee mug on the dash, put on your sunglasses, look both ways and fly down the road kind of hurry. I remember taking a deep breath on the 39th Street/Superstition overpass. “After I pick up Jeremy, I’ll be going opposite all the bad traffic”, I said out loud to myself.

One block later, I’m not alone anymore.

I hate red and blue lights. Especially when they flash. They make me tense every time I see them. Even when I haven’t done anything wrong.

A glance at the speedometer tells me this isn’t one of those times.

Anyone who claims they can’t think on their feet, or on their seat as it were, has never been pulled over by a cop. In the 20 seconds it took him to prop up his motorcycle and walk up to my door I had developed, processed and discarded 33 possible explanations for my excessive rate of travel. As I pushed the button to lower the electric window, only one explanation remained.

I was speeding. And I was busted.

“May I see your license and registration please?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Going a little fast for this area, don’t you think?”

“Yes, sir.”

“It’s 35 miles per hour here. Are you aware of the signs?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You were doing 49 in a 35. Are you aware there are kids in this neighborhood?”

“Yes, sir.”

Normally, I like knowing the answers to questions. But in this moment, my knowledge is killing me. I’m getting an A+ at being 100% guilty.

Painful as this is, I thought, I can handle these questions as long as he doesn’t ask me where I was going. Because then I’d have to tell him that I was on my way to a seminary class on the Old Testament. In fact, on the seat beside me is an observation paper from 2nd Samuel chapter 7. It’s the chapter where God says to David, “…when he commits iniquity, I will correct him with the rod of men.”

Thankfully, he doesn’t ask me where I was going. He picked another question instead.

“Were you wearing your seat belt?”

When you’re in the middle of deep conviction, it really hurts to be reminded that you’ve been double dumb.

After he completed the paperwork and signed me off, he rode away. I wanted to be mad at him. I wanted to blame it all on the cop. Like didn’t he have anything better to do than sit behind a blind corner on a secondary street when there were real criminals running around who deserved to be caught. But I couldn’t be mad at anyone but myself. I was speeding. I was wrong. I broke the law.

I got caught. I was busted.

I hate to be late.

So I paid my $100 fine a few days early.

“Everyone wants to see justice done…to somebody else.”- Bruce Cockburn

Todd A. Thompson – www.ASliceOfLifeToGo.com