42 years, 255 pages, and dozens of attempts later, it’s done. I’m finally a published author!
Though He Fall: My Journey Through Surrender, Loss, And A Thousand Healings is my testimony of God’s sustaining grace through disability, grief, and a parent’s worst nightmare. Above all, it’s the story of the overwhelming goodness and sustaining grace of God.
Early in the summer, I was pressed, rather than prompted, by the Lord to “finish the book.” It seemed urgent back then, so I laid aside almost all of my other activities and sank myself into the discipline of writing in order to get my story “out there.”
With the generous help and keen eye of some friends, I’m happy to report it’s done. I couldn’t have finished this assignment without Kelli and Tim and Mark and Kim and, of course, Sandy. The book is a whole lot better because of them.
I’m honored to share this project with you and pray you will be given a wider lens through which to see the amazing mercies of God. Indeed, He doeth all things well.
Is anyone among you suffering? Is anyone cheerful? Is anyone among you sick?
James 4
Hey James, how about, Is anyone just plain sick and tired?
Have any of you felt like it doesn’t matter, you don’t matter, nobody cares, so what’s the point? Have you ever thought about walking away because your faith journey is just too hard? Running the race is just too…whatever?
I have a word for you. Literally, a word.
“ἀνάγκη”
Paul uses the word to describe how he could never walk away from the life he’d been called to. To quit was unthinkable. You’ll find this word in the following verse:
For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!
1 Corinthians 9:16
“Necessity.” Anágkē means a driving force, an inner compulsion. This word unburdens one of having a choice in the matter. It’s not a thing you volunteer for (“on my own initiative”, v17), but a calling (“sacred trust”, v17). You don’t ‘sign up’ for it.
One fine day, Saul/Paul was horsebacking with warrants in hand to arrest Jesus followers. Next thing he knows, he’s flat on his back, blinded by an explosion of light. Jesus showed up. “You’re not going that way anymore, Saul. I have something else in mind for you.”
You won’t find Jesus asking him if he wants to preach and suffer and die for the cause. It’s a foregone conclusion, “You’re going to do this.”
Paul’s necessity was to preach the good news. He wasn’t called to make tents or build synagogues. He was called to preach the gospel to the Gentiles. And “WOE TO ME if I don’t…”
Paul was so captured with his calling all of his life was measured in terms of the gospel. The good news of Jesus Christ defined his joy and shaped his thinking and liberated his soul. He was fueled by it. All his hopes were bound up with the prospect of living out and advancing the gospel.
His ‘necessity’ to carry the gospel forward was a vital organ inside the man; if it ceased, he’d be done for. Others might try to ignore theirs or “flee to Tarshish” but Paul’s compass pointed to Nineveh. To abandon his calling was a woe he didn’t want to imagine!
What’s your “necessity”? What compels you? What burden has Jesus placed on you?
I have a necessity to show people that God can use my disability to share the love and hope of Jesus to others. Yours might be to lead your family with integrity. Your calling might be to teach. I had lunch with a retired brother yesterday who told me he’s motivated to help people who are powerless to help themselves. You might be compelled to write. Or you ‘heart’ the homeless. Maybe you are an entrepreneur or a philanthropist.
You might know what it is but you find yourself in a dry season and are tempted to walk away. Face it, we all get discouraged. We all get weary in well-doing.
With all the compassion and understanding I can muster, please allow me to encourage you not to call it quits. Whatever *it* is in your life, it’s worth it. Trust me, I get it.
I’ve got recent entries in my prayer journal that would curl your toenails. In Job-like manner, I’ve railed at God about my struggles. I’ve pity-partied about how I seem to be the only one getting sanctified (not the good kind!). Why do others seem to thrive but I’m over here getting the thorn? Huh, God?
In spite of it all, God is faithful. If I didn’t have that, I’d just roll over and die. His loyal love (‘hesed’) to me is what gets me up in the morning. On those days I’d rather pull the covers over my head, I’m compelled by a calling I cannot deny. It’s my necessity. People fail me, I fail myself, but God never fails.
So then, where is my reward? It is found in continually depositing the good news into people’s hearts…
1 Corinthians 9:18, Passion Translation
My “reward“ for ministry used to be a regular platform, an enthusiastic congregation, name recognition, and a monthly paycheck. Nowadays, I watch birds. I have a fulfilling quiet time with Jesus. I study and read. Sometimes I write. Most everything I do is hidden.
So what is my reward? It’s not a recognition of my preaching gifts. It’s not people waiting in line to speak to me after a service. And I certainly don’t get paychecks for doing gospel ministry anymore.
Now I do all this because of the gospel, so I may become a partner in its benefits.
1 Corinthians 9:23, CEB
What is my reward, you ask?
Paul would say, your reward is to live and share the gospel and enjoy its blessings. It doesn’t matter to who or how many or whether it’s even seen.
Stay in the race, weary sibling in the faith. Keep running. Let’s finish well.
Don’t you know that all the runners in the stadium run, but only one gets the prize? So run to win.
1 Corinthians 9:24, CEB
I’ve heard this text preached with a variety of applications. Now I read “So run” in light of verses 18 and 23.
Run, beloved. Keep running. Run for the sake of the gospel. Not for pay, not for adulation, not for personal success, but for Jesus. Run so others might share in the blessings of following Jesus.
“So run.” It’s worth it. It’s worth all the bends, twists, detours, and it’s worth it even when everyone else is passing you by. God has made you to run, he’s given you a lane, so run for Jesus’s sake.
When we run with this as our motivation along with the fuel of “necessity,” we win. It doesn’t matter if you get your name put up in lights or your testimony included in the chapter of a book. Jesus sees it. He sees you. He sees you getting back in the race…and running.
So run.
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I understand every day is sacred, but this one has an extra blast from the ram’s horn for yours truly. Not coincidentally, on days like this, I am prone to go off by myself (this time a coffee shop in Carrollton, Georgia) and peck out some thoughts on a keyboard, of which such exercise is probably more for me than it is for you. Sorry, no offense.
This is how I process: I write.
Today is year thirty-eight of disability and I couldn’t be happier. Weird, huh? I guess if you knew me it’d make better sense, especially the many of you who have walked with me these nigh-unto four decades. By the way, thank you for that. Some of you have been my ‘inner circle friends’ and I can’t possibly know how I ever deserved you but I’m eternally grateful. The dude who was the rehab psychologist at Shepherd in Atlanta was worried about me back in ’81 because I smiled all the time. He assumed I was in denial about my condition until he saw the steady stream of friends who visited my room every week. It dawned on him, bless his heart, that my faith family were medicine for my soul. Still are.
So…thirty-eight. Crazy, huh?
Each year that passes causes me to ask what it might mean and where the next year takes me. I like to look at the numbers themselves and find their (possible) spiritual significance. I don’t go all harebrained, mind you, but some numbers just work in powerful ways in God’s economy. In the natural, many lay down their bets on ‘Lucky 7’ and avoid the number ’13’ like the plague. It might surprise you to learn (not you-you, but the other ‘you’ reading this) God has given us numbers to identify the working out of his redemptive plan in the cosmos. I embrace the number ‘5’ often in my walk with Christ as it represents ‘grace’ and we all need as much of that as we can get.
I started looking at the number ’38’ and had to laugh because after some degree of mulling, the most obvious reference to it sneaked its way past my mental firewall. Ah yes, of course. How could I miss it?
John 5:1-6
After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades.
In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed.
One man was there who had been an invalid for THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS.
When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”
One more time for the people in the back:
[How long?] “THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS.”
“It me.” 😊
Pretty sure the Father was like, ‘Helloooo…”
The story picks up at the “Sheep Gate” in Jerusalem; this fact alone should call to mind the Shepherd whose voice the sheep hear, not to mention John the gospeler has already called Jesus “the Lamb” (John 1:29) and the “Good Shepherd” in chapter ten. One gets the idea this is a pretty important theme for the beloved disciple.
Here’s a downcast sheep lying among a great crowd of cast-down sheep and he can’t do a thing to help himself into the healing spa-like waters of Bethesda (Beth=house, hesed=mercy). Suddenly, One who is called the Lamb of God kneels down where he is and asks if he’d like to be healed.Can you just picture every head in the vicinity popping up and spinning in their direction?
The area was lousy with sick folk and here comes Mercy Incarnate winding and wending His way through the nooks and crannies at the direction of His Father’s Voice (John 5:19; 8:28-29; 10:14). He pulls up suddenly, looks down, and parks right next to this particular man on this particular day at this particular moment.
A word, if you will. If you are waiting on your healing, do not lose heart. Mercy will find its way to you. Nothing will hold it at bay or block its path so long as God directs it through in your hour of trouble. Keep going to the “pool” in the backyard of the House of Mercy and don’t stop going. I’ve been going to the same Living Water for thirty-eight years, waiting expectantly for the Day, but each one that passes and I don’t hear my “Get up, son” I still hear His “I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. Let’s sit together and watch what unfolds together.”
I can’t tell you just how comforting His Presence has been to me these years. Thirty-eight of them, occupying this same patch of ground every day, day after day. My own corner of Bethesda. It’s often a grind but I’m daily sunning in His Mercy. ‘Hesed’ has been my trusty beach umbrella. Hope is always playing in my earbuds.
As it closes in on sundown here in this coffee shop I know weeping is likely to have its say, but I know the sun’ll come out tomorrow and My Shepherd will still be here, beside me, at this pool. And we’ll do it together until I hear my “Today’s your day, Scott; time to get up.”
Maybe this is my year.
Maybe next year.
That’s up to the Good Shepherd, and, believe you me, I’m listening for His Voice; you’ll forgive me if I run out on you if this turns out to be my year.
