echoes of redemption | steven dilla

I have trouble balancing routine and randomness in my life. I’m fairly convinced both are central to a healthy, creative life.

I need enough routine to spend time in Scripture every day. Enough routine to pray without ceasing. Enough routine to show my wife I love her. Enough routine to pour into the ministry God has entrusted with me. Enough routine to see dreams transform into realities.

Balance.

I also need enough randomness to experience God in fresh ways. Enough randomness to keep the conversation ardent. Enough randomness to pursue my wife fresh and vibrant ways. Enough randomness to serve other people and the ministry God has given them. Enough randomness to dream new dreams.

Balance.

It’s not as much about the destination as it is about how we travel.

Podcast: in the beginning: light

The central act of spiritual leadership is separating light from darkness.

Genesis 1:1-5, Revelation 21:22-26

I was reading in Genesis 1 yesterday and was hit with the question: Why did God separate light from darkness - why didn’t He destroy darkness? It could have all ended there - just light, no darkness.

Then I realized, as long as there is free will, there will be separation. Options. Choice.

In Genesis 1, God does a lot of separation. Just in the first three days, He separates light from darkness, waters in the sky from waters on the earth and seas from land. Later in Scripture He separates the Temple from the people, the Holy place from the rest of the Temple and the Most Holy place from the Holy place.

Most Christians today, when you ask them what Holiness is, will say, “separation.” God is Holy. He is separated. He is different.

Yet so many Christians make their lives about destruction. 

Is there destruction in Scripture? Absolutely. But notice, it does not come at the hands of a merciless God. It comes as the result of a people not choosing the path of light. It comes as a consequence of darkness. 

There tends to be little mercy in our Christian culture today. It’s easier to destroy another human’s heart than it is to help them heal from their separation. It’s easier to destroy organizations, causes and ideals than to separate our lives from them and still remain connected to the people as a source of light.

Maybe our lives should be modeled more after Genesis 1 - separation. Instead of trying to destroy things in the world that oppose God, we should separate ourselves from them. I’m not talking cultural disconnect, I’m talking Holiness. God remained sovereign over the darkness, we should remain connected to the people who are in darkness as we serve as ministers of reconciliation.

Each series at Elevate, there is one element we spend more time during production on than any other element - the Bible story. We want to communicate the message of the Bible in a clear, age-appropriate and applicational way.

During preproduction we work on our theology, narrative, flow and logic. We’ll spend hours hammering out a single story. When the story hits the art department our team works to come up with an engaging style for the characters, then the material heads to animation to bring it all to life. The audio department scores, adds the voice over and sound effects and passes it on to video post for final touch ups.

Take a look at one of our preschool Bible stories, the story of David and Mephibosheth:

And here is an elementary Bible story telling the story of Ruth and Naomi:

For more information on Elevate, visit elevatekids.com.

There is this moment in Luke where the angel Gabriel tells Zechariah that “God has heard your prayer.” This is a profound verse in the narrative for a few reasons - but it hits me huge because so many times it seems like God hasn’t heard my prayers.

To be childless in the ANE was to be scorned by society (see Elizabeth’s response in v. 25). Luke makes the note that Zechariah and Elizabeth “walked blamelessly in all the commandments and statutes of the Lord.” In other words, they were not a childless couple because they were living in sin. Surely Zechariah and Elizabeth had prayed for a child many times - yet received no answer. Here is a priest who it seems God has not listened to - and he and his wife remain childless.

The angel reminds Zechariah that God has heard. He is listening. In this case, He was waiting on His timing.

If John the Baptist would have been born too early he would not have fulfilled the purpose God had for his life - that had been prophesied hundreds of years before his birth!

What appeared as God’s denial of Zechariah’s multiple requests for a child, was really God’s preparation for the one man - in all of history - that would prepare the world for it’s salvation.

There is security in knowing God loves me enough to hear my cry, but loves the world enough to answer it in a way that brings salvation to others.

Last week I spent some time flipping through the first half of the Psalms. I was looking for major themes, similarities that jumped out, stuff I miss when I’m reading one at a time. Here are three major thoughts from Psalms 1-75:

• There is an inseparable link between God’s character and His blessing. God is totally authentic. Every interaction He has with us in an overflow of part of His character.
• David cried out a lot - but he wasn’t needy. In Psalm 73:26 David says, My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart; and my portion forever. I’ve always loved the power of the thought of God as our portion - all we need. Everything. No seconds, extras or fillers. God is it. For David, God was his portion and when he cried out to Him, every need was met
• Many Psalms begin in lament and rise to trust. David would cry out to God and through his time with God, David would be built up in trust for His Father and end His prayer with his life submitted faithfully before God.

One thing is for sure, David’s relationship with God was unlike anything else. It was a blessing David never knew to ask for, yet certainly did not take for granted. He was totally dependent on God, yet he wasn’t outside community on earth. His God was his portion and his community was support to that relationship, not substitute for it.

Podcast: the one who showed mercy

A look into the culture and context of the story of the Good Samaritan. Together we’ll dig through this story and discover what it could mean in our lives today.

I’ll be the first to admit this could be a non sequitur of a post… but I’ve got to throw it out there: blogospheric negativity is a disease that rots the internet. And for some reason, it is near pandemic levels on “Christian” blogs.

I read a decent amount of blogs, and try to check out a new 5-10 blogs a week. It is amazing to me how many Christians have blogs where they post negatively. Toward other Christians. Toward the world. Toward global warming. You name it, you can probably find a Christian’s blog that’s negative about it.

I try to stay overwhelmingly positive when I talk about things on my blog - but here it is, my most negative post yet - I’m going negative on negativity.

• There are few things that waste a Christian’s energy more than negativity. The energy we spend thinking of ways to destroy people verbally is robbed from our calling to bring restoration to the world.
• More often than not our negativity breeds other’s negativity. Instead of building the body of Christ, we tear it down.
  
• Negativity usually is trying to isolate a person or group of people - yet it almost always isolates the negative person. Don’t get me wrong, negative people tend to move in herds. But the downward spiral of negativity in their group has so cut them off from reality, they are clueless to what is really happening.
  

Instead of going negative:

• Use your passion for an issue to drive you into positive action to fix that issue. Turn what could be useless venting into forward motion for a solution.
• Spread positivity like it’s a plague. Find the solution to your problem - God put it on your heart for a reason - and passionately back it.
• Surround yourself with positive people who want to make a difference in the world, not just point out problems.

Here is a quick update on everything in my world (for the moment):

Update: Well, it’s the end of the day, I shot this video nearly 12 hours ago… first video blog was incredibly difficult to get on the web - but it’s up! Enjoy.