November 2025 – Jerry Lout ⚬ Writer ⚬ Speaker ⚬ Mobilizer

November 27, 2025November 26, 2025

Partnering Up

When a rightly-fitted yoke is slipped about the burden bearers’ neck, there’s no cause for angst if the team partner formed and sustains the cosmos.

God speaks of his beloved apprentices as those who help lift the load of their fellow travelers*. Yet, even when the added “baggage” may seem far more than one can handle, the burden is lessened to near feather-weight once a pair of useful elements are brought into play.

Partnering and Practicing.

When Jesus stated in his near matter-of-fact way, “Without me you can do nothing”, he actually meant it.

The moment a disciple of Christ comes to terms with their sheer inability to push forward beneath the strain of a load, this is the kind of moment the Lord relishes. Why? Because he knows it is at just those times when we’ve run out of gas or we’ve run dry or we’re about to run for the hills, that we are most ready for his partnering to kick in. God never has meant for us to labor and toil for him from our feeble strength nor out of a straining fortitude.

Jesus calls us friends.

What are friends about? A friend shows up. A friend partners with us amidst our most desperate, most crushing seasons. Their quiet presence alone is often enough.

A friend is also one who knows how to laugh with us, long and hard. Tears flow. They spring this time not from sorrowings – but from sheer, unimpeded, pull-out-the-stops delight over some surprise happening or experience. Possibly through a side-splitting joke, or from one of those shared memories that suddenly blindsides the funny bone.

On the recent birthday-Monday, along an Okmulgee street I was in the midst of a small company of friends sharing a sweet moment of laughter. Not of the knee-slapping kind but one of the kind that leaves the heart strangely warmed. Our little band had just taken part in a short prayer-walk in the “bubbling brook” city of my youth, when somebody caught word it was my birthday. A melodic voice struck a chord. The springy melody was underway, “Happy birthday to you. . . !”

Friends praying – and singing – and laughing. Flowing from the Spirit of the dearest Friend ever.

November 20, 2025November 20, 2025

Fun Petitioning

Milestones. When they come around, a great many are met with celebrations. My birthday some weeks back was no exception. An unexpected bonus got slipped in. The entry here, published in the TIMES paper where I’m privileged to offer up weekly articles, gives rise to much gratitude.

* * *

This coming Monday, September 29, 2025, is to mark for me another completed circuit around the sun! This time, a noteworthy milestone – since my birth year is 1945. And, it happens that, to my great pleasure, I will be in Okmulgee, the city of my childhood. How cool will it be – strolling her streets on my eightieth, accompanying an assembly of fellow Jesus-followers. Praying with them over this very special community. (If you’re so inclined, come join the fun!)

But wait. Prayer? Fun?

Just to be clear, interceding (verbally appealing to the Lord in the heartfelt care of others) is not to be summed up solely by the word fun. However. If praying, when examined across the pages of the Bible and through the centuries of its practice demonstrates anything, it is this.

Christ means for joy to mark the lives of his apprentices.

“Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, ‘I praise you, Father. . .'”; “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.*

When petitioning God about things on our hearts we may indeed groan at times. Over the state of our world, over our homelife, over the lives of others in their crushing needs. This is part of authentic praying and is often modeled for us in Scripture. The Spirit of our Lord calls us to it. Bob Pearce, founder of World Vision Intl., captures the sentiment as well as anyone, “Let my heart be broken by the things that break the heart of God”.

Still, where praying can, and often does, include the groan of lament (passionate expression of grief or sorrow), such heaviness of expression does not fully reflect the disposition of prayer. Not at all.

Scripture is generously peppered with the sounds of God’s children, his apprenticing followers, freely voicing their joyous, celebratory (fun-filled) declarations to him. We are urged to jump into the fray. “Rejoice in the Lord always”, Paul exhorts, then adds, as if to ensure that we catch the Father’s happy longing, “. . again I will say, ‘rejoice!”**

A helpful posture of heart is called for at our meetings-up with Christ. Whether in praying or in serving, whether through lament or celebration, the believer is not called upon to “make something happen”.

Teeth-gritting, fist-clinching attempts at praying are foreign to the way of journeying with the Lord Jesus – Inventor of the easy yoke.

November 13, 2025

Mentored

“Follow me, as I follow”. It is interesting isn’t it, that the best of leaders tend to be the best of followers?

Paul’s invitation language makes something clear. His offer to model the faith for the “Christ-disciple wannabe” is a statement flowing from humility, not arrogance. After all, this man Paul is the Jesus-hating ‘Saul of Tarsus’ of yesteryear. His resume reads in part, “Paul – the worst of sinners”.*

The Difference Jesus Makes.

Saul of Tarsus had met the Master of masters. His life-altering collision with God in Christ on the Damascus Road initiated a hundred-eighty-degree turn. The former homicidal Pharisee plunged into the deep end of Christ-centered discipleship. With Paul, as with others (Matthew, Peter, James. . .) he took up an apprenticing posture under the direct tutelage of his savior, the Lord Jesus. So that a while later, Paul’s transformation still ongoing, he wrote younger believers in the faith, offering his invitation: “Follow me as I follow Christ”**. Walking purposefully – one day after the next after the next – in the company of his welcoming mentor, the trainee had grown suited to train others. Paul the apprentice (never ceasing to be follower) led.

Continuing to follow after – striving himself toward Christlikeness (“that I may know him”***) – the humble disciple-maker could speak from his established identity in the Lord.

His life one of mentoring, instructing, of modeling Christ.

Electrician apprentices (when intentional in their cause) get transformed into electricians. French language understudies who, over the long haul, devote themselves to the cause, advance in time to become easy conversationalists. . .even in Paris!

Whether a person is Italian tenor Adrea Bocelli, Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes, or Okmulgee’s dustbowl-escapee-turned-Journeyman Plumber Clyde Lout. Each of them is marked by a feature that keeps propelling them forward.

Intention.

November 6, 2025November 5, 2025

For Good Measure

Apprenticing through Practice.

“Measure twice, cut once.”

Carpenter-trainees know the phrase well. When setting out to cut a piece of lumber, the worker employs his time wisely, even when extra seconds of time are called for. By taking care to measure and mark the piece – not once but twice – the craftsman guards against mistakes (some can be costly!) and avoids senseless waste.

The “measure-twice” phrase loops in the head repeatedly during an apprentice’s early tutoring under the guidance of their craftsman-teacher. The mantra, being revisited again and again over time – in both mind and bodily action – transforms an important quality inside the carpenter-wannabe. They are never the same, and happy for the change.

The carpenter apprentice might at first regard the “measure-twice” action as a pointless waste of time. But not for long.

Any successful tradesman in any field has applied himself to (firstly) pay attention to instruction and (secondly) to practice – practice – practice.

We don’t have to look far within Scripture to spot a seasoned follower aligning himself to the way of Jesus Christ.

What does Paul coach the believer in, once they are challenged to reframe their thought life toward things of “excellence”? As a spiritual journeyman, so to speak, Paul invites the following:

“What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”