Articles & Posts
River of Life
I’m sitting in a hotel room waiting to visit some extended family. Stasi and I flew here for a memorial service. Gosh, I hate these occasions. So awkward. So painful. Death was never meant to be part of the human experience, and we reel when it strikes. You learn so quickly who has hope, and who doesn’t. Hard as it is, it is also a tender opportunity to bring Jesus, but a delicate one as all of you know who have walked others through loss. I was already thinking about this letter before we got the call, before the hard news. This seems like a confirmation of what I wanted to share with you. So here goes… I think most of you understand we are living in a very late hour; that these could very fairly be called the last days. If Paul thought his hour was getting late, then think how much later ours is!! This is a hard time for the saints on this earth, because such dark forces have been set loose. One of those rampaging is Death. Not just physical death (though have you noticed how many out-of-the-blue deaths have been taking place in your world?!). But “the end” of things, like relationships, fellowships, dreams, projects, etc. If you want to thrive at this moment, you can—but you’ve got to lean into and draw upon the greater resources of the Kingdom of God. He always has provision for us. And that’s what I want to talk about: The Life of God made available to us. One of the most compelling images in the Old Testament is the picture Ezekiel gave us of the river that flows from the throne of God: I saw water coming out from under the threshold of the temple toward the east (for the temple faced east). The water was coming down from under the south side of the temple, south of the altar. He then brought me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the outer gate facing east, and the water was trickling from the south side. As the man went eastward with a measuring line in his hand, he measured off a thousand cubits and then led me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist. He measured off another thousand, but now it was a river that I could not cross, because the water had risen and was deep enough to swim in—a river that no one could cross. (Ezekiel 47:1-5) The imagery speaks of the abundance of God, his unending, unceasing, inextinguishable LIFE, pouring forth from his Presence. The image is repeated in Revelation, where it makes clear this river is the River of Life: Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. (Revelation 22:1-2) The Life of God, for his people, flowing as a river, but also as a tree and its fruit. I can’t wait to drink from that water, taste that glorious fruit! God doesn’t keep his life to himself; he pours it forth for all creation, and especially his sons and daughters. We know Jesus wants us to draw upon this life, for he said he came that we might have his Life, and have it abundantly (John 10:10). Scripture says we are meant to “reign in life” through Jesus Christ (Romans 5:17). O how we need more of the Life of God in us, particularly in these days. So I've been compelled recently to pray that the River of Life would flow through our lives, renewing us, bringing us the Life of God in greater measure. That the River would also flow through the work of Wild at Heart. I think you will find this very, very helpful—to be calling upon the River of Life into your lives, your households, your “kingdoms.” I offer this prayer as a help, or model, for you to adapt to your situation, and to pray right along with us... "Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit—we love you God! We worship you! We give our hearts and lives to you in every way. You are our Life, Father, and there is no other. Jesus, you came that we might have Life. Romans says we reign in life through your Life, Lord. And so we present our lives to you in a fresh way, to be filled with your magnificent Life! We pray that the River of Life, the very Life of God, would flow through our lives in abundance. We pray the River of Life would flow through our homes and families; our work; our kingdoms. We pray that the River of Life would flow through the team and the work of Wild at Heart in the world. Fill us, fill this mission, with your inextinguishable Life, God! May your abundant Life sweep away all death, and destruction, and everything set against us. We call forth Life—more life in us; more life in Wild at Heart; more of the River of Life flowing through this work in the world. In the mighty Name of Life Himself, Jesus Christ, the risen Lord! All praise and glory to him! Amen." Offered in love, John Download the Wild at Heart March 2019 newsletter here.
John Eldredge
Reminders of the God We Love
Dear Friends, I received a text the other day from a friend of mine. It began as a surprising intrusion of joy, which grew into a rescue of my soul. First came simply a photo, taken from the window of a bush plane somewhere in the Alaskan wilderness. At first glance, I couldn’t quite make out what I was looking at. All I could see was a massive mountain slope, angling down towards a river. The impression was something far North and exotic. There are no trees in the photo, only tundra in autumn colors. The picture was taken from probably 17,000 feet and something is dappling the surface of the tundra on both sides of the river. As my eyes adjusted, I realized I was looking at a massive assembly of living creatures, something out of Eden. While my mind tried to take in and sort out what I was beholding, the second text followed: “90,000 caribou stacked up for a river crossing.” It filled my heart with joy—not only because I love wildness, and massive animal migrations, but because it reminded me of the God I love. And O, how good it is to be reminded of the God we love—what he’s really like, how generous his heart. I had a similar experience a few evenings later when Stasi and I were watching a BBC nature series on the oceans of our planet. Richly filmed in high definition, intimate and epic, the vast, colorful beauty of the seas, coasts and coral lagoons saturating this planet was enough to evoke worship every time. This particular episode was shot in the open ocean (utterly breathtaking) when a massive pod of dolphins began to fill the screen. Fifty...one hundred...a thousand dolphins all racing along in the open sea, twisting, leaping, diving in a sort of organized, whimsical chaos, racing along in pure dolphin happiness. The narrator explained we were watching a “super pod” of Atlantic dolphins five thousand strong. I was speechless; such things exist?! That encounter, that revelation was so holy it removed in the moment every doubt I had in the goodness of God. Right. This is the God I love, I thought to myself. And my heart came back to him in tender hopefulness and affection. We need more of God. I assure you nothing, absolutely nothing, will bring you more of him than loving him. Turning our hearts toward God in love opens our being to receive him like no other practice. And it is a practice, something we consciously and actively engage in, in the moments of our day-to-day. Life has a way of eroding our confidence in the goodness of God. What a ridiculous understatement; let me try again. Life is a savage assault, striking at random, poisoning our heart’s assurance that God is good, or at least, good towards us. It’s this that makes it so hard to find more of God, receive him in fresh and wonderful ways into our being. So it’s here we must seek healing, and now is a good time to do so. Start with something you love. The laughter of your child. Sunlight on the ocean. Your beloved dog. A favorite song; music itself. Perhaps a photo, like my caribou. A favorite spot—your garden, the cliffs at the sea, the family cabin. Someone dear to you. We begin with the things we love; this is the way back, the path home. For we don’t always draw the connection—God made these specifically for you, and gave you the heart to love them. You’ll be out for a bike ride in the very early morning, cool breeze in your face, all the sweet, fresh aromas it brings, the exhilaration of speed, and your heart spontaneously sings, I love this! The next step is to say, So does God. He made this moment; he made these things. He is the creator of everything I love. Your heart will naturally respond by opening towards him. It’s like throwing your faith a life-line: Every wonderful thing in your life is a gift from God, an expression of his heart towards you. All your precious memories, each and every one—your eighth birthday when you got that little red bike that awakened your love of riding, which carried right on into your adult life. That perfect powder day, when you and your fiance skied run after run, then warmed up by the fire in the lodge. The vacation you still think about, how fun it was, how carefree you felt. Your wedding reception; the dancing; the inextinguishable joy of it all. Every moment you have ever been happy, thrilled, comforted, hopeful...that was God loving you. Such gifts come from no other source. “You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing,” “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father” (Psalm 145:16; James 1:17). No other act will bring you a greater measure of God than loving him, actively engaging your heart and soul in loving him. Because as we do, the flower of our being opens up to the sunshine of his presence, and all the goodness he longs to breathe into us. The best way to get there is to think upon the things we love, and remind ourselves, “This is from God; this is his true heart.” Reminding yourself that God is the one who brought into existence the very things you love is a wonderful reminder to your soul of the intimacy between God's heart and yours. You love the same things! Did you know that? Close friends love the same things; lovers love the same things. Go on and think of something else that delights your heart—laughter, beauty, your favorite things in nature, a childhood fairytale. Beginning with the things we love is the way back towards God. In loving him, we are able to receive him. As we receive him, we realize again how wonderful he truly is. Our heart enlarges for him, our union is strengthened, and we can receive more of him. Love, John Download the Wild at Heart February 2019 Newsletter here.
John Eldredge
A Little Girl’s Heart
I am the grandmother to two little girls who, at four months apart, are parentheses around the age of two. One is blonde. One is brunette. One has straight hair, the other curls. They both have eyes and smiles that light up the sky and set off fireworks in my heart. They are smart and curious and delightful and beautiful and the missing pieces in my life that I didn’t know I needed. Every grandchild that has come has unlocked something in me that feels like a homecoming. I am in love with them. And I am learning how to be a grandmother. On this learning curve, I really blew it last month. I am so careful and attentive to what I give them. If I spend a certain amount on one, then I spend the same amount on the other. Not perhaps at the same time nor on the same thing, but the running tally is in my head. My innate sense of justice, vigilant against favoritism. So when one little one needed a new pair of quality shoes which was out of reach for her parents, I knew that I had spent the same on a couple of dresses for my other granddaughter, and I happily sprung for the shimmering pair of pink Mary Janes. My mistake is coming. Okay, here it is. The new shoes were at my house the same time as both granddaughters were there, and I gave them to the one without giving anything to the other. Right, right, I know they will have to learn that sometimes that happens, but may I remind you that they are TWO. Their little hearts and minds do not/cannot fathom that yet. It is as foreign a concept to them as “sharing.” So my older granddaughter (by four months, remember) opened her shoes, loved them, and put them on. Hooray! My younger granddaughter saw them and wanted to put them on as well. Telling her they belonged to her cousin set off her grief. When she finally understood, she walked to the corner of the room, disappeared behind a chair, and in hiding tried to comfort herself by repeating her name. Cue sword piercing my heart. The next day, I ran to Target as soon as I could and found an inexpensive pair of gold shimmery shoes in her size. Later that afternoon, my husband brought them to her house and had her open them. At first, she thought these shoes too belonged to her cousin. When she was made to understand that they were HER shoes, she immediately begged to put them “On! On! On!” She has barely taken them off since. After putting on her new shimmery, “sparky” shoes, my husband got down on his knees and spoke to her in love, “Your heart matters. YOUR heart.” My husband and I get to join my granddaughters' parents in conveying the truth they so constantly do. These little girls are going to grow up knowing that they are seen. They are delighted in. And that their hearts matter. Let this story have its way with you. Let it prick your heart in the remembrance of times when your heart was overlooked. When you didn’t get the new shoes, the new dress, the new notebook, the loving glance, the TIME. When the message you received was not “your heart matters.” And now, let me remind you of your Father. The One who is fierce on your behalf. Who is not keeping a tally of any kind, because His love for you is immeasurable and His gifts of love and provision to you are boundless. He sees you. He delights in you. He wants you to know it so badly that He came in person to deliver the message, and He is coming still in this moment. Hear His voice. He holds your face in His hands. He speaks. “Your heart matters.” “The same way a loving father feels toward his children – that’s but a sample of your tender feelings toward us.“ Psalm 103:13 (The Passion Translation)
Stasi Eldredge
The Illusion of the Perfect
Scrooge was haunted by the spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Future and it led to his redemption. I am haunted by the illusion of the Perfect Christmas. May it lead to mine. How many cookies must I bake for my home to feel as sweet as a Bavarian Bakery? How many rooms must I decorate with sprigs of evergreen and boughs of holly before a chorus of Fa La La La La’s lighten every heart? How do I think of, select, and wrap the perfect gift that conveys, “I see you. You matter. I’ve been paying attention”? How many twinkle lights will fill my home with the Light I am after? And how do I ward off the feeling that I am failing miserably to do any of this? I don’t know. You would think that after all these years I would have given up but I haven’t. My longing to convey love is not diminished though the number of cookies I bake is. The number of rooms I decorate has lessened dramatically but my desire to recapture something of the holiness of Christmas this side of Paradise and make room for the tangible Presence of God has only increased. How about you? Here’s an idea. Let’s take the pressure off. Pressure kills. It kills relationships. It kills joy. It kills our ability to enjoy the partial that we are given to relish. It’ll kill our Christmas celebrations. Pressure even numbs our awareness of the glory of Emmanuel – Christ with us. Pressure takes us out. And we want to be present – to offer the gift of our presence to those around us is actually the greatest gift we can give them. The loved ones in our lives don’t want a marvelous gift from a harried and pressured giver. They want us. They want our love given with a free hand that is an alluring fragrance of our Jesus. Holidays – Holy Days - are not given to us to rise to the mandate of perfection but to rest and remember – to enjoy the gifts our holy God has given to us by his free hand and to receive his gifts with humbled awe and gratefulness. We can’t wrap enough presents to respond in this way, we can only ask for the grace to wrap our hearts around this truth. God wants our hearts open and ready. He invites us to live from a place of trust and rest, not a place of pressure and demand. We can demand so much of ourselves, can’t we? So let’s just get it out in the open. No one’s Christmas is going to be perfect. But perfection IS COMING. On that day our longings and desires will be met with a filling that is currently incomprehensible. Our Christmas on this side will not be perfect but it can be holy. It can be glorious. It can be good. I’m being invited to lay down the illusion that I can pull this thing off. Instead of that pressure, I’m being invited to rest in the love of God and remember that he alone is perfect and he loves perfectly. This babe in a manger, this Lamb of God, this Lion of Judah, this God of angel armies, this Savior of the World has come. He is coming today. And when he comes in all his glory, every dream will come true for the richest among us and the poorest. For the most healthy and the most infirm. For the most seemingly blessed and the most horrifically oppressed. Jesus is coming again. Justice is coming. Love has already won and on that final and first day of Ultimate Triumph no illusion will shadow our hearts. And so we wait eagerly as we hope earnestly. We welcome you, Jesus. Into the depths of who we are. Into our celebrations. Into our Christmas day and into all our days. Into our hearts, our homes and our world. Oh come, oh come Emmanuel. (This was originally posted in 2015 but is still true for today!)
Stasi Eldredge
A very Happy Advent Season to you!
Last month I reached out to you to ask your help meeting our budget by the end of the year, and I wanted to thank all of you who are able to send in a financial gift! We are so grateful for your generosity! And now all of us are, one way or another, navigating the coming holidays. I don't like the pace that I'm running at this morning. I didn't sleep well last night, and so when I finally did conk out, I overslept, woke up late, and ever since I’ve felt behind on everything. I rushed through breakfast, dashed out the door to get to some meetings, and now I'm rattled. I don't like the feeling of being rattled. And I don't like the consequences of it. When I'm rattled I'm too easily irritated and frustrated with people. I don't have the patience to listen to what my wife was trying to say this morning. I find it hard to hear from God when I’m rattled, and I don’t like feeling untethered from him either. I notice now in my rattled state that I want to eat something fatty and sugary; I want something that is going to make me feel better. And it’s the holidays, so there is fatty, sugary stuff everywhere. (Nobody sends out boxes of carrots or alfalfa sprouts as Christmas gifts.) When we are rattled, it’s human nature to seek some sense of equilibrium, a sense of stability, and I wonder—how many addictions begin here, just wanting to feel a little bit better? Soothe ourselves. The fruits of being rattled are not good, but honestly—I think most people live in a state from “slightly rattled” to “fried” as their operating norm. And so we who would want to find a better life in God would want to make it a practice to avoid living rattled. Which is especially difficult around the holiday season. Late morning, I finally do what I should have done from the beginning—I pause. I get quiet, settle down. I give myself some breathing room to come back to myself and to God. My breathing returns to normal. A little bit of space begins to clear around me, and in that space I know I can find God. Suddenly, somewhere outside, someone has just fired up a leaf blower— one of the great pariahs of the human race, the enemy of all domestic tranquility. My body tenses, the stress is returning, and because I am paying attention I can see that the constant stimulation causes us to live in a state of hypervigilance. And thus we look to all our “comforters” to calm down. But I know my salvation is not in the eggnog frappuccino, nor the peppermint fudge. So I close the window against the screams of the leaf blower, and return to a practice that has become an absolute lifesaver for me: The One Minute Pause. (I mentioned this briefly back in March, but maybe you’ve forgotten it since then.) I simply take sixty seconds to let everything go, and be still. As I enter the pause, I begin with release. I let it all go—the meetings, what I know is coming next, the fact I’m totally behind on Christmas shopping, all ot it. I simply let it go. I practice “benevolent detachment” as I pray, Jesus,I give everyone and everything to you. You’ll know in the moment what to give to God—a person, a conversation, a project, the world. I give everyone and everything to you. I keep repeating it until I feel like I am actually releasing and detaching. And then I ask for more of God: Jesus, I need more of you; fill me with more of you, God. Restore our union; fill me with your life. We all need more of God. Whatever our circumstance may be, if we had more of God in our life right now, I guarantee you things would turn out better. It follows that if we can receive the grace God is providing us for the restoring and renewing of our souls, we will both enjoy the fruits of happy souls (which are many and wonderful) and also be in a place to receive more of God (which is even more wonderful). We would find the vibrancy and resiliency we crave as human beings. So I practice the pause a few times each day. I begin with release. Jesus, I give everyone and everything to you. I keep repeating it until I feel like I really am releasing. Then I ask for more of God: Jesus, I need more of you; fill me with more of you, God. Restore our union; fill me with your life. Honestly, you can do this in a fairly simple pause—in your car, on the train, before and after you get on your phone. Especially after Christmas shopping. And the fruit of it will be wonderful! I could have written about Christmastide, or the Incarnation, the faith of Mary and Joseph, the joy of the shepherds. But I know that what will prove far more helpful to you this month is to set before you again The One Minute pause. Because it will rescue you, and bring you back to your own soul and to God. From there, you’ll be much better situated to navigate the holidays. May I also suggest making time this December to listen to our Advent podcast series? It’s one of my favorites from years past—with Craig McConnell and I sharing the disruptive, holy invitation of God in this season. On behalf of the entire team, a very Merry Christmas to you, friends. We love being partners with you in this great hour! Love, John Download the Wild at Heart December Newsletter here.
John Eldredge
Coming Soon
The whole creation waits breathless with anticipation for the revelation of God's sons and daughters. Romans 8:19 My friend is pregnant. She is beyond ripe with child – her due date was a week ago, and the little one inside is snug as a bug in a rug and seems to be in no hurry to leave his or her cozy home. My friend’s tiny frame is unbalanced, to say the least. She is w a i t i n g. She can do nothing but wait. (Okay, yes, there are a few things she can try in order to encourage her little one to make his/her entrance, but really, she has no control.) All of creation is waiting too. It is as if it is pregnant with longing – desiring to be freed from the bonds chaining it to a broken world. And we are waiting. In this Season of Advent, we honor and remember that we are waiting for our Jesus to come again and set all things right. We remember that He promised to come into our world and that He did come. He is faithful. He has promised that He will come again. And so we wait eagerly with hope for His ultimate return when we too will be freed from the effect of living in a fallen world – our natures still somewhat bound to a groaning earth. Our hearts are made new in Christ, and one day our bodies will be as well. We will see our Jesus glorified and His splendor face to face, and while we wait, there are some days where waiting for His return feels as painful as the first pangs of childbirth. We are expanded in our waiting even as my pregnant friend expands. We are in the waiting room of the world, eyes alight and alert for the signs of the culmination of all creation. Or at least we are meant to be. We get distracted from this hope that is meant to be the anchor of our souls. These days I am distracted by my Christmas to-do list. This season, meant to highlight the celebration of our King who came and is coming again, can swallow me in the day-to-day “requirements.” The tree in our living room stands naked, and I feel a wee bit accused by its empty branches. Someone asked me yesterday if I was “all ready for Christmas,” and I almost laughed at the absurd question. Ready? Say what? I love Christmas lights and Christmas music. I love the world all dressed up with ribbons and bows and wreaths and candy canes. I even love my now plain home even more when it is all dressed up as well. But ready? Ummmm, no. I look forward to having checked off all my boxes of things to get done. I want to enjoy them as I go through the list. But what I want to be most ready for is Christ’s return. What I want to be expectant of is the sound of a trumpet heralding His second arrival. He said to be ready. To be expectant. He really is going to come again. It’s true. We forget. I forget. But this season, let us remember that He who has promised is faithful. The Babe in a manger is returning as the King. He who slipped into the world quietly is coming again with the blast of a trumpet that will rip wide the sky. The One who entered into a broken world to seek and save all that was lost is coming back to complete His task and make all things new. Breathless. Expectant. May every twinkle light remind us of the twinkle in God’s eye, as He knows what we must remember. The day is near.
Stasi Eldredge
Our Mission Statement
On the wall of our Outpost is our mission statement. The first three sentences read: Recover the Lost Treasure of the Gospel Transform the Lives of Men and Women as Men and Women Teach them to Live in the Kingdom of God So much in such simple sentences. Allow me to unpack it a bit… The Gospel is the most exquisite treasure chest in any story or fairytale, ever. The dignity and power of femininity and masculinity; the essential place of the human heart; hearing God’s voice for yourself; the war all around us; the power of Jesus to actually heal hearts, souls, memories; the hope we have in the Renewal of All Things. Treasures that get lost, and stolen. And we are treasure hunters. Transforming lives is so different than merely inspiring, or motivating. Transformation is deep and lasting; transformation means the recovery of the original glory God intended for men and women, the glory he meant for each unique son and daughter. Restoration would be an appropriate synonym. The treasures of the Gospel transform, restore, release. Jesus is all about transformation! Third, the Kingdom of God is something we learn to live in; but there are so few teachers to show the way. How prayer actually works; how to practice stillness, the role of beauty; how to use the victory of Christ to break soul ties, curses, dark strongholds; the difference between wounds and brokenness, and how to re-integrate shattered places in our personality; how each member of the Trinity has a unique role in our lives; on and on we could go. Oh, I wish you could read the mail we get, hear the stories of restoration taking place all around the world. Let me share a few with you now… “I was reluctant to engage in a men’s retreat but once I arrived the invitation turned into a four day flood. Agreements and lies being named and broken. God spoke and I filled a journal. On the last night, my soul was restored and I was given an intimate name from God. I’d never known the longing in my heart to hear that… Since that weekend the message and resources of Wild at Heart have been at the forefront of my relationship with God, my wife, my daughters, and my ministry to others.” “Absolutely blown away by the impact it had and is having on me. For the first time in 20 years, you gave me permission to be the man I am designed to be. What enormous freedom!” “I will be forever grateful for Beautiful Outlaw. As a Christian counselor I recommend this book over and over and it continues to transform everything about how my clients see Jesus! I mean...AMAZING freedom and breaking of bondage for so many people!” “Last Fall my husband of 18 years left me for no clear reason and I’ve been dealing with all kinds of difficult emotions. The Holy Spirit has been using your book Captivating to propel me into a new and beautiful place with Jesus. I couldn’t read it fast enough. :-) And, when I got to the very end I cried.” “Prior to Wild at Heart, I was controlling, striving, driven, selfish, living for the world, critical of others. I was a hard man to be around. I had so many wounds pressed down, and buried under years of striving, posing, and controlling. God has healed so many areas of my heart, has literally changed me as a leader in my company, it has saved my marriage and it has set me on a wonderful path to raise a son who loves Jesus." “I came to the retreat a profoundly wounded woman. Molested as a child. Abusive husband. Drug addiction. I did not think there was anything good about being a woman; I did not think there was anything good about men. My life and my relationship with God have changed forever because of the retreat! Praise God he never stops restoring lives!” Oh friends—it is working. IT IS WORKING!! With such glory and power, in such far-reaching ways we can hardly take in the beauty. And we need your help. None of this takes place without your love, your prayers, and your financial support. We are a non-profit; part of our budget is met by our income through conferences and resources. Part of it comes through the generosity of our friends. And you have been so generous! So faithful! We need to raise over a million dollars by the end of the year. I’m not worried; God is faithful. I simply want to ask if you would consider a gift to us in the next few weeks. I know if we all do what we can do, Jesus will take care of our needs and the mission will carry on! Thank you. Thank you for all your love, and prayers, and generosity. Together we are recovering the lost treasure of the Gospel, transforming the lives of men and women, and teaching them how to live in the Kingdom of God. What better thing could we partner in than that???! With love, and thanksgiving for you, John Download the November 2018 Newsletter here.
John Eldredge
Growing Your Capacity for Joy
God drops things in our laps at just the right time. He puts barriers in our paths that look like roadblocks, but are really gifts in disguise, beckoning us to take a closer look at what’s going on inside. We can either step over them, or choose to pick them up and examine them for the potential they may hold. Failure is actually ripe with goodness. The longing to run away or escape our lives for some greener grass may be the opportunity to seek God in the midst of it, to learn something deeper about both us, and Him. Exhaustion and sadness often hold the door to a more restful and joyful life. If we will let it, these doors open to remind us of the person we wanted to be, but have left behind in the chaos and disappointments of life. When the sadness refuses to be silenced and the feelings arise that this is not the life I signed up for, we can either go to shame, or go to God. Is it a sin to want to be happy? Is it wrong to want an inner peace that is not subject to the whims and torrents of the world? I don’t think so. God doesn’t think so either. We are made for bliss. We are made for inner peace. If it were not so, why would all humanity throughout history seek it with such a driven and frenetic passion? I need a refuge; I need rest. Sometimes, not knowing what to do with the overwhelming need that rises in me to simply be left alone by the clamoring within and without, I run away to a movie. Sitting in the dark and eating popcorn provides a little respite. I have a momentary flash of happiness when the opening credits and trademark soundtrack begin to roll. There’s the woman holding a torch! There’s the world turning with an engulfing light! Yay! But then, after a couple hours, I come out of the movie, and all that I left in the car still awaits me. Too often this temporary escape thing doesn’t work out the way I’d hoped. Not that I’m opposed to temporary escapes. Look at my life, and you’ll know that. It’s just that sometimes the motive behind them isn’t a search for joy or laughter or a shared experience. Rather, it is born out of a refusal—I run away from my own heart out of a refusal to engage it. It takes energy and space to become present to the truth of my inner world, and when I’m overwhelmed, the thought is, well, overwhelming. Until it can no longer be ignored, because God places a roadblock in my path that forces me to face the fact that I need a Savior. When I reach the place where I’m pressed to accept my own weakness, it causes me to hold my life and heart open before the merciful eyes of a loving Father. In short, it draws me up short—to see where I fall short in my own strivings. So that I may once again discover the source of my identity, which is found smack dab in the middle of God’s loving gaze. God calls us to run away to Him, not from Him. He invites us to not fix our gaze on other people’s lives (and compare them to our own), but to look to Him for the source of our worthy life. He asks us to find our rest in Him. He is our resting place. When I’m exhausted, the temptation is to turn from God, thinking He requires more from me than I have to give. I believe I need to muster some passion from a dry well and focus on improving my performance. I think I need to pull myself up from my bootstraps when I’m too tired to put my shoes on. Not so. We are called to be honest, and to bring to God our authentic selves. He asks us to come before him in the state we find ourselves in. Look at David—the Psalms are filled with his passion. He comes before God when he is desperate, and when he is rejoicing, when he is overcome and distraught, and when he is exultant and victorious. We are invited to do the same. In every moment, God does not ask us to share life with Him as anyone other than the person we are. We are not meant to be anyone else. We are invited to come to Him with childlike trust that He will not turn His face away. He invites us to tend our hearts in His loving gaze. His arms are open wide. He is the greener grass in which we will find solace, soothing, refuge, and joy. And as we choose to draw near to Him, to rest in the safety of his gaze, the redemptive work of God gains ground. Joy begins to bubble up, and the Kingdom of God advances in our lives, spilling over into others as well. Open your heart to Him—to life, to vitality, to the power of God moving within and through you. Ask God to grow your capacity for joy. He can do it! If you want more on how to find a rich, “defiant joy” in your life today, I hope you’ll order a copy of my new book, Defiant Joy—Taking Hold of Hope, Beauty and Life in a Hurting World. I also invite you to listen to four new Wild at Heart podcasts this month, where I share how to maintain a posture of holy defiance that neither denies nor diminishes our pain but dares to live with expectant, unwavering hope. Offered in love, Stasi Download the Wild at Heart October newsletter here.
Stasi Eldredge
Waiting
The soft sound of a light morning rain dancing on the roof above me is so lovely. The earth is parched and we have been praying for rain. Now comes the roll of thunder. An early morning thunderstorm is a rare thing but it is a welcome one. I can practically hear the earth sighing in relief. It has been waiting long for this refreshment. It’s been more than thirty days since the last rain and the nearest forest fire is a mere ten miles away…hungrily bearing down. But this rain will change things. It is not a passing thing and in its steady presence, the beautiful grey wet morning is a declining answer to the flames. The prolonged waiting for rain has had an affect. Not only has the grass on the surrounding hills become crunchy, brown and vulnerable but the wildflowers that were exploding in Van Goghesque colors have vanished. We had been exulting over their beauty and then a moment later, they were gone; their splashes of color receding back into the monochromatic earth. And we searched the sky with worried eyes praying for the rain to come. It became the goodbye phrase in town. “Goodbye. Pray for rain!” Perhaps that at least was a good thing. Because many, so many were praying for rain and not just here but all over the States. It has been a dry year. A dangerous year. Fires breaking records and engulfing homes and land and heartbreakingly even some lives. So we pray. And now it is raining. The danger for the present is passed. What are you praying for? Where are you parched? Do you remember a prior season when your soul or your life was crunchy and vulnerable and you asked for intervention and you waited for relief and finally, unexpectedly even, it came? It will come again. But I don’t know when. And I don’t know how deeply all of the waiting will affect the landscape of your life, your very soul or mine. But I do know that in the waiting and the praying and the dryness, God has not taken his eyes off of you. The One who is the Living Water refuses to leave us parched though He does allow us to thirst. May the thirsting hone us to come to more clarity of what we actually are thirsting for. Friends, do not give up. Though waiting is h a r d and it is sometimes painful work; there is fruit in the labor. Because the answer will come and it will come completely in Jesus. He is the Answer. He is the One we need. In downpours and droughts. In dry seasons and deluges. Hear it? There now. Thunder is rumbling in the distance.
Stasi Eldredge
Moths
Our house has been overtaken by moths. A hatch of them has erupted, giving space to more hatches, and now they are beyond count. They are tiny things. Bothersome things. Things that want to land in my coffee and have a sip before my lips even touch the cup. Something must be done. Something will be done. In the meantime, I have begun to think of them as miniature birds. Little birds are wheeling around my living room, and calling them that in my mind has elevated their existence from being irritating creatures to little wonders that fly. Re-naming them, thinking of them differently, changing my perspective about them has changed how I feel about them. And my feelings changing about them has changed how I experience them. One has just landed on my computer – delicate little thing. Being an intelligent reader, I bet you can see where I’m going before I even make the leap. Our thoughts matter. They play out in our lives. What we name situations, people, our lives, even ourselves has a dramatic effect on how we experience them. Am I blowing it as a woman who has let her house fall to the captivity of a multitude of moths, or am I a wise woman who is living with the effects of a fallen world and not allowing the current situation to rattle her? Perhaps I have a foot in both descriptions – it depends on when you ask, but I know which one I want to lean in to. On any given day, who are we? What are our lives? Good or bad? Blessed or cursed? There is much power in what we name them. And who gets to decide what we do? Magazine covers? Wall Street? The person who honked at us yesterday when we made a small, thoughtless error? The teacher handing out the grades? The boss handing out the promotions? Or the God of the Universe? The tricky part is that we haven’t arrived yet to inhabit all that is most deeply true about ourselves. We live in the in-between, the already and the not yet. The scriptures tell us we are now seated in the heavenlies with Christ Jesus, and it is true. But we still walk and navigate this world with clay feet. We are. And we are becoming. And in this tightrope experience, what balancing rod do we hold on to? Our failures or our future glory? What the bullies named us or what our Father names us now? Are we a disappointment or the very crown of creation? Dear one, beloved of God, our Father has named us good. Our Jesus has declared the work finished. Our God who sees the end from the beginning is not disappointed, nor is He surprised. He doesn’t regret His choice to rescue us, nor resent the cost He paid to do it. Our work now is to believe Him, to marinate our hearts and minds in the truth of the Gospel, to agree with God and to let it change the way we feel – to let our experiences be based on the deepest reality of the Universe. We are children of the Living God. Holy and cherished in His sight. We are not an irritation to be dealt with. We are a beautiful creation being carved with loving intention. And we can be defiantly joyful because of that.
Stasi Eldredge
Joy Is Meant to Be Ours
In this world we find ourselves living in, having joy often feels both crazy and out of reach. That’s why I included the word “defiant.” Defiant means to stand against the tide. It means to go against the flow, even when the flow is comprised of a strong current of despair and difficulty. To have joy in the midst of sorrow—or the never-ending news feed—can seem impossible. But joy is meant to be ours, a joy that is defiant in the face of this broken world. Our hearts are to echo the heartbeat of our joyous God. Happiness is circumstantial. I’m happy when I wake up and realize it’s not Monday, but Saturday—I have a day off! I’m happy when someone brings me a cup of coffee. I’m happy when I get a birthday card. I’m sad when a vacation is over. I’m sad when I mishandle the heart of a friend. I’m sad when no one remembers my birthday. I love being happy. But happiness is unpredictable; it feels vulnerable because it is tied to my circumstances. And don’t we all know it? One day you’re up; next day you’re down. Joy is something else altogether. It feels firmer, richer, less vulnerable somehow. I’m happy when my family goes out for ice cream, but it would seem a little overblown to say I was filled with joy because of it. I was joyful at all three of my sons’ weddings. I was filled with joy over the birth of our granddaughters. Joy flooded my heart when a dear friend was cleared of cancer. I don’t think it was merely happiness; the joy felt rooted in the presence of God. His hand was so evident. Joy is not happiness on steroids. It is something entirely different, made up of its own unique substance. Joy is connected to God and reserved for those who are tapping into His reservoir, who are connected to His life. Joy is rooted in God and His kingdom, in the surety of His goodness, His love for us. It is immovable. Unshakeable. It is available at all times, day and night, because God and His kingdom are always available to us. I’m ready to get off the roller coaster of happiness; I want my heart grounded in the higher place of joy. I bet you do, too. Who among us does not want more joy in our lives? In our work? In our marriages? In our relationships? With our children? In our quiet moments alone? If joy is a fruit of the Spirit, (and it is), then we are meant to experience it and enjoy it, regardless of our circumstances. Whatever may be swirling around us, the eye of the storm is joy. But how do we get there? The simple answer is, we need to come to know God more deeply. When we do, we can believe and rest in His faithful, immovable, immeasurable love for us in every moment we are in. Joy is the heartbeat of heaven, the very light that emanates from Jesus’ heart, so as we grow closer in relationship with God, we’ll also grow in joy. We’ll see that He is not spending His moments wringing His hands, as we are sometimes prone to do. He is not braced against the future or overcome by serious hardship. His joy is never up for grabs. Rather, His joy is immovable, just as He is. It is an essential part of His very person. Meister Eckhart wrote: “Do you want to know what goes on in the heart of the Trinity? I will tell you. In the heart of the Trinity the Father laughs and gives birth to the Son. The Son laughs back at the Father and gives birth to the Spirit. The whole Trinity laughs and gives birth to us.” We are born from the laughter of the Trinity. What an amazing thought. As image bearers of the Living God, surely joy is written deep in our very hearts. So it should come naturally, right? But I am not a naturally joyful person. My battle has not been one of needing to be pulled back into reality because of my Pollyanna worldview. My battle has been with depression. I know what it feels like to spend your days walking through sludge up to your knees with a heavy cloak upon your back. But I also know the incredible feeling of having it replaced with a sense of hope and promise leading to a deep, untouchable joy. I’m learning. I do want to get off the emotional rollercoaster of circumstantial happiness. I do want to be rooted and grounded in joy. That’s what I’m after. That’s what I believe God is calling us to. That is what I am calling us to as well. I hope you read this new book, because I really do believe it’s going to open up wonderful new experiences of joy for you! Offered in love, Stasi Download the Wild at Heart September 2018 newsletter here.
Stasi Eldredge
Holding On While Letting Go
“She grabs life with both hands.” Isn’t that a good thing? Doesn’t it mean she lives with passion? She is fully IN. She wants to be fully present and drink deeply from the draught of life. She dives in to experiences and people with abandon. She does not hold herself back. Wow. That’s sounds really appealing—so why am I exhausted just writing it? Thing is, though I want to live with passion, I can’t be fully present 100 percent of the time. It’s too much for this soul to take. I need to retreat. Pull in. Tune out. Life is loud, and my heart needs quiet. I’ve dived in with abandon in the past and slammed into the unseen, rocky bottom. I am aware that I am more cautious now. It is my toe that dips in the water first. I want to know how deep, exactly, is the water before I go. Some of my discretion is wisdom born of suffering. Some of my holding back is fear born of suffering. Come, Jesus. “But we are those who do not shrink back.” I don’t want to be a woman who shrinks back from anything or anyone God calls me to. If He says “Dive,” I don’t want to hesitate. But sometimes, like cliff jumping into the water 30 feet below, it takes a bit of encouragement to my soul to buoy my faith and resolve. If Jesus calls me to do something, then He will equip me to do it. Leap! He doesn’t promise that I won’t get hurt in the jump. He promises that He won’t abandon me in the free fall or in the landing. He calls me to LIVE. To live in Him. To live fully. To press in. To pursue Him and to pursue people. He cautions, “Don’t shrink back. Don’t sit on the sidelines. Don’t let your soul take up residence in a cul-de-sac.” He promises that He is my Life. He is my safe place. He says, “Take hold of Me with both hands.” That I can do. That I will do. Because I trust His good heart. And if I get bruises in the process of following, I can know that He will use even those for the honing of my heart to become more like His. His heart holds on to His Father’s in a Union He prays for us to know. I desire to know it. To live it. To love from it. He invites me to love. He fuels my passion for life by the fire in my heart that He lights Himself. He asks me to let go of my fear. He calls me to let go of holding back. He tells me to release my demand for a pain-free life for myself and all those He loves. Turns out, pain is not the enemy I thought it was. A cold heart is. Hands that cling to this false idea that a good life requires a vigilance of self-protection rather than a vigilance of nourishing my resolve of faith. God knows what my soul needs. Yes, I need quiet sometimes. I can more easily find Him there. But He is also to be found in the hustle and bustle that our lives sometime require. In all of it, He will not be held back. He has leaped from the highest of Homes to dive after you and me. He has committed to grabbing on to us with both nail-scarred hands. And He is holding on. He will not let go. https://youtu.be/okmxFDMYuEQ
Stasi Eldredge
St. Patrick's Breastplate
I want to share something that God is reminding me of this morning with the hope that it brings encouragement to you. Are you familiar with St. Patrick’s Breastplate? It’s a powerful prayer that begins in this way: I arise today Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity, Through belief in the Threeness, Through confession of the Oneness of the Creator of creation. “I arise today through a mighty strength.” Oh, wouldn’t that be nice to say every morning? I want that to be true, but the thoughts that frequently take our hearts captive upon arising include: It’s going to be a bad day. I don’t want to get up. You are a failure as a mother, father, friend. You do not love well. You are alone. You are selfish. This is all too hard. And repeat. Do you know what yours are? This morning, the accuser was battering my heart with “Failure. Failure. Failure.” The crushing weight of shame was reinforced by memories (cruelly twisted but seemingly real interpretations) of my failing, evidence parading across my mind that I was not being a good friend, wife, or mother. But the prayer continues: I arise today Through the strength of Christ's birth with His baptism, Through the strength of His crucifixion with His burial, Through the strength of His resurrection with His ascension, Through the strength of His descent for the judgment of doom. Wow. Well, okay then. We don’t arise through our strength to figure it out or to change or to become an amazing person who loves everyone at all times perfectly. We arise today and every day by turning our gaze onto Jesus and what He has accomplished for us—because we needed Him to accomplish it. While still feeling the weight of failure, I began to ask Jesus for the truth and to tell it to myself: I am not a perfect friend, but I am a good one. I fail as a wife and mother, but I am not a failure. I took my gaze off of my performance and turned it onto the King and His character: His faithfulness. His goodness. His mercy. His strength. I arise today, through God's strength to pilot me, God's might to uphold me, God's wisdom to guide me, God's eye to look before me, God's ear to hear me, God's word to speak for me, God's hand to guard me, God's shield to protect me, God's host to save me From snares of devils, From temptation of vices, From everyone who shall wish me ill, afar and near. Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise, Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me. (Find the complete prayer at https://wildatheart.org/prayer/st-patrick’s-breastplate) This morning, like so many days in my clay-footed life, I need mercy. My Father offers it to me. Jesus has won it for me. The Holy Spirit beckons me to receive it. I have blown it. But the blowing now has become the wind of the Holy Spirit. His breath shepherds my heart into my Father’s, and there mercy triumphs over judgment. I may stay in bed a bit longer, but now it is not out of despair. Now I cozily snuggle into His forgiveness, His love, His heartbeat of hope. We can have hope no matter if we wake to accusation or to celebration, because our God is with us. And for that I am defiantly joyful. With much hope and joy, Stasi Download the Wild at Heart August 2018 Newsletter here.
Stasi Eldredge
My Girl
They named her after me. Her middle name is in my honor. But I won’t get to hold my precious granddaughter until I meet her in the Life that is coming. And the tears begin to flow again as I write. My daughter in law was four and a half months pregnant when we got the call that she had begun to bleed heavily. John and I were out of town. Breathless, waiting for the result of the ultrasound, the only news we received was a text from our son asking, “Would you come home for us?” So, of course we knew. We knew and we wept for them and we wept for ourselves and we wept for the little girl we were going to have to wait to know. It is a holy and sacred place, the place of grief, the land of loss, the ache that seems to penetrate to the core of the earth let alone the deepest realms of the heart. Most people are not alive for long before knowing this pain. I felt it first when I was 23 at the death of my father. The older I get, the more goodbyes I have had to say. But this one, this one I never got to say “hello” to. And in this place of sorrow, I am met with the knowledge that the “hello” is coming. I will get to know my girl very, very well. I can imagine her now in the Kingdom, alive and well with long flowing blond hair like her mother’s, her smile as wide as her dad’s. She is tall and she is happy and she is one more reason that I am able to look forward to the day that IS COMING. “We grieve. But we do not grieve as those who have no hope.” So many of you have known this loss. Mercy to you, dear ones. Miscarriage is not an uncommon thing but being uncommon does not diminish the pain. It is real. It is worth our tears. Tears are the balm of the Holy Spirit – sacred to our Father – cleansing the deepest recesses and allowing the Comforter to come. Healing is available. Some children are conceived and handed directly into the hands of our Jesus – carried in this world for such a little time. But a real time. A time that matters. A time that reaches its fulfillment in eternity. We will lay in the ground our little one. But one day soon, one day so very soon, we will rise. We will rise and we will embrace.
Stasi Eldredge
It's Raining
A friend of mine wrote yesterday of the various trials that she is currently under. Her list was long and weighty. They say that when it rains, it pours and this dear woman is in a deluge. I bet you’ve been in them yourself with no umbrella in sight. What saddened me was at the end of her email she wrote sarcastically, “And you say God loves me? Right.” I wrote her back that it’s raining over here too. My list is long. My heart is tender. Does God love us? Does He love us who lets such things plague us or come against our well being, our very lives? Does He love us who allows much more horrible things happen to us, to those we love, to those around our broken and hurting world? Yes. Yes, He does. His love is not up for grabs nor subject to scrutiny with every wrong that occurs. If it is then we are tossed back and forth on the waves, our hearts sea sick and vulnerable. God proved His love once and for all. He paid the ultimate price to win us back to His heart by spending His own life to save ours. Remember. He has chosen us. We are His children. We are loved beyond telling. He is for us. God never promised a life without pain. In fact, Jesus told us it would come. “In this life, you will have suffering.” (John 17:33) It seems that the One who is the Light of the world is prone to understatement. When suffering does come, as it will, we can either blame Him for it or invite Him into it that we might bear it together. Our Father is mercy. He is strength. He is grace. He is the Comforter. We may not understand – ever – beyond a theological explanation of the effect of the freedom to choose bestowed upon us at creation. We may not understand what befalls us save for the fact that we live in a fallen world and God calls us to love and trust Him in the midst of it. We may not understand except for the truth that God hurts when we hurt, He weeps when we weep, catching our tears in His sacred bottle and in it all He yearns for us to trust His goodness even in the midst of sorrows. And we can. Oh dear friends, call out to Him in the sunshine and in the rain. Press into His heart in the clear weather that you might know Him as the anchor of your souls when the wind howls. Ask Him, our Divine Helper, to help you. He has saved us once. He is saving us still. Save us now, Lord Jesus, Savior of the world. We need You.
Stasi Eldredge
My Weakness
We went on a family vacation last month and I sat and watched as my family walked around a lake. I’d been there a few years before and had run around it, not satisfied by mere walking, my energy exploded out of my feet. Now it was my victory to make it to the bench. I woke this morning to hearing this in my heart, “My strength is perfected in weakness.” 1 Cor 12:9 I’m familiar with the verse. I know it. I’m not sure I know all that it means. What was Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” I wonder? And it wasgiven to him so that he would not become conceited?! So his life would not be about how amazing he is but how glorious God is. It kept him humble, dependent and honest. I thought being strong was the greater good. And not merely physically strong, but more importantly, spiritually strong – “Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of HIS might.” Oh, there it is again. His might. We are to be strong in the Lord but not in our own capacity. We depend on His strength. We yield to Him. We ask for and surrender to and enjoy His strength, His very Life flowing through us. Yes, we are to stand firm. Hold fast. Be strong and unwavering. We need to be. We are called to be. And to look to Him to do it in us and through us because when we think we can do it by ourselves or are doingit by ourselves – we get lost and prideful and the hero of our story is now written in the lower case. But we are not the heroes of our own story. Jesus is the Hero. And boy do I needa Hero. I have One. So do you. I’ve seen weakness displayed in others in a variety of ways that led my heart not to feel sorry for their weakness but to exalt in the God we both love. My family has spent time in the dwelling place of a family who live on a dump in Guatemala. We have spent time with another family who live on a gorgeous ranch in the West. Both families love Jesus. Guess whose testimony about the glory, the goodness, the faithfulness and the beauty of Jesus held more power shaking me to my core? I close my eyes now and I can still see their dark Guatemalan eyes shining with a Spirit filled light. My strength is perfected in weakness. I have spent time by the bedside of loved ones struggling for breath as their life was ebbing out of them, death just days away. I have spent time previously sitting with those same loved ones on front porches when they were strong and breathing deeply. In each of those times we talked about the Presence and provision and hope of Jesus. We shared stories of His character and kindness and power. The early conversations prepared us for the latter but it was those latter conversations that were the stuff of legends. It was the fixed gaze of the Beloved on the Presence of God in the pain that was gold. Rubies. Priceless treasure. Angels were as breathless as I. My strength is perfected in weakness. I stopped using a cane a while back and it’s time for me to pick it up again. Pride coupled with some warped embarrassment has kept me from using one for too long. Why do we despise our weakness? Why is it so unnatural to treat ourselves with kindness and mercy when our loving Father treats us with nothing else? Because there is a story there, of course. Our lives are an unfolding story and the prologue for each of us is wrought with hidden moments that damaged our hearts. We must let the Light in. Needing Jesus, needing His healing, needing His strength, His mercy, His help, His comfort, His wisdom, His perspective, His LIFE is not weakness. It is a gift. It is an honor. I walk with a limp now and many days I walk with a deeper limp that others cannot see though it is just as real. I need my Jesus. I am leaning on my beloved. I am not embarrassed to do so. The truth is, He loves it as much as I do. I am not the strong woman I wanted to be. But I am becoming the strong woman He wants me to be. A woman who is weak on her own but who is not on her own. She is tapped into the very heart of the God of all creation who is strong on her behalf. He is love. Love stronger than the grave. Love fiercer than death. Love that triumphs over evil. Love that prevails. Love that is kind and full of both mercy and power. He is my strength. So let me be weak. And please God, let His strength be perfected in my weakness.
Stasi Eldredge