Jesus – Page 5 – Jerry Lout ⚬ Writer ⚬ Speaker ⚬ Mobilizer

June 1, 2018June 2, 2018

Learning Curve

It’s unnerving getting interrupted when giving a public talk – more-so when demons are involved.

Through our Kenya and Tanzania years I grew thankful for the wisdom and courage of African servants of Jesus. Many challenged me in positive ways – not so much by direct words, but by life-example – in things like discernment and spiritual authority.

Scenario: How do you counsel the second wife of an unbelieving polygamous husband who has come to faith in Christ?

Such tricky problems, I discovered, don’t get easily fixed through pat answers by well-meaning outsiders. Put another way, simple solutions do not fare well in the world of the complex. Cultural divides compound things. Reconciling family traditions to the Way of Jesus demands patience, grace and wisdom. What a relief discovering I served among church leaders who – though some lacked greatly in overall Bible knowledge – understood how to rightly address baffling questions that I and my fellow expats were, frankly, clueless about.

***

“There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them.” (as usual, few people can distill a truth better than C.S. Lewis)

What’s with all the screaming?

The lake region was a magnet to demons, or so it appeared. Generations of witchcraft practice seemed to fling regional doors open to dark displays of the invisible underworld.

Taking my place behind a simple wooden pulpit I rested my Bible there and surveyed the gathering. A light lake breeze made its way inland now and then to blunt the oppressive mid-day heat. It was District Convention time and congregations from the area had set up makeshift shelters of straw to shield from the sun’s brutal rays. Three days of teaching, of celebrating, of praying and of feasting were getting underway.

I had barely begun my message when a clearly troubled woman rose in the audience. Her first cries were soft but quickly became louder. A rhythmic chant followed, growing more shrill, more distressing by the moment. Soon she seemed out of control. . . or under the control of some alien influence.

Without my uttering a word or signaling for any help, two tribal gentlemen moved quickly to the woman’s side. Addressing her in moderate but deliberate tones, the men succeeded in relocating her to a space a short distance from our gathering. I learned later on that these intervening men had experience in exorcising bad spirits from the demonically-troubled.

My audience seemed unrattled by the interruption and I resumed preaching. Several minutes of my early remarks from scripture were only slightly muffled by shouts from the deliverance quarters, “Come out of her. Out in Jesus’ Name!” All the while the poor woman’s unnatural voice ebbed and flowed with irregular volume. At last all went silent. Soon the freed lady re-entered the meeting and conducted herself in a perfectly civil manner.

Again I thanked God it was they – the wise and Spirit-equipped Africans – who answered the call to such crises, and to puzzlements “beyond our pay grade”. Gaining appreciation that useful missionaries. . . if they are anything. . . are observers. Learners.

Thank you, Lord. And help us.

August 17, 2018

Aidini

“I go to the Coast to mock him. And to beat him when he shows the lie.”

The big man was strong, menacing. Anyone having experience with Alexander Aidini knew his threat was not small talk.

“He is no man of God, this foreigner!” the angry African went on. “He comes to our land a trickster. Come, we shall beat him together, all of us. We go to Mombasa!”

The object of Aidini’s contempt was an American preacher. T. L. Osborn had come with his evangelistic team from Oklahoma to Kenya’s coastal city on the Indian Ocean, “to preach the gospel, to proclaim Jesus Christ in power. . . to heal and deliver and bring salvation.” He labeled the open-air meetings “crusades”.

Osborn’s preaching campaigns had been many and were known to draw thousands, with large numbers of sick and suffering among them. Aidini was sure all was a hoax to exploit the masses. He would show it up for what it was.

Among the half dozen toughs accompanying Aidini was a man whose mother was blind.

“Bring your mother with us, bring Mama Zaila. When the white man makes prayer for healing in the meeting, we will put her there. When her eyes remain dark and she is not well this will show the lie. And there we will move, we will break the mzungu just there!” Three days travel brought them to their destination.

Leaving their Land Rover beneath a gnarled tree next to a kiosk, the group entered the stream of tribal people making their way by foot toward the blaring loudspeaker. Mombasa’s port-city-atmosphere with its salty aroma was heavy, humid.

“Take care, Mama Zaila, do not rush. Hold tight to my arm.” The woman clung to her son’s forearm, her useless eyes staring into blackness.

Africa is a vast place with pockets of equally dense populations swarming across sprawling cities. Still, the crowd flooding Mombasa’s big outdoor field, was bigger than any the Congolese visitors had known. It was clear the name Osborn evoked interest.

The band of half-dozen strangers from a thousand miles westward pushed their way deeper into the crowd, their goal the big wooden stage where the mzungu preacher and his wife, Daisy sat. At either side of the American couple were invited local dignitaries along with a number of Africa church and mission heads.

Poised at last before the stage, the Congolese gang – their sightless companion in tow – awaited their moment. For Aidini it could not come soon enough.

August 23, 2018

Undone

Preacher Osborn’s voice rang strong, echoing across the mass of gathered humanity. On the deceitfulness of sin, its destructive fruit in a life. Then of the power of forgiveness, of the cross of Jesus, of hope in him.

The evangelist paused, then turned to a different emphasis.

“Do we have anyone troubled in their body tonight?”

As the air hung quiet above the throng, heads began nodding. Calls of “Ndiyo” sounded from the Mombasa crowd.

“If you are lame, cannot move about well or cannot see through your eyes. . . if your body has stopped working in some way. And if you believe Jesus came to free you, to heal you both soul and body, this is your time to believe him. Do we believe Jesus?”

A ringing chorus rose, “Yes!”

“Well, now we’re going to pray. Remember it is Jesus who heals. I cannot heal anyone. Jesus. He is the deliverer. As the book of Hebrews tells us, ‘Jesus is the same yesterday and today and forever!’ Tell me now, is he the same for your life? Can you trust his love, trust his power? (pause) Believe him! He wants you well.”

The evangelistic with the soft Oklahoma drawl held firmly to his mic. His voice was passionate, marked with sincerity. “Now, let me pray with you. The resurrected Jesus is here. And he will heal. . . will deliver in these moments just now.”

L. Osborn prayed and the words came simple, clear, strong, with evident conviction. Not a lengthy prayer.

“Now friends, if anyone brought a deaf friend here today, you check with that friend. Look them in the face. Ask them, can you hear?”

As the minister went on with prayer, brief words of guidance and of referencing the Bible, a shout erupted a few feet from where he stood, “Ayeee! Ayeee!”

The shouting voice was Zaila’s. She had willed her eyes open the moment the preacher had called out a phrase, “In Jesus’ name, be healed!” A momentary lull had followed, then. . .

“Ayeee, Ayeee, Ayeee!!”

Wide-eyed with vision, Zaila’s shout of triumph startled Alexander Aidini who stood inches away facing her. Her outburst continued. “I see! I see! . . . I see your face, Mzee Aidini! I see you, I see!!”

The hardened Aidini had tasted little personal fear over the years. If fear was found near him, it was usually him bringing it to others. Fear had not come his way. But now.

Alexander’s inner self trembled. The big man quaked, coming undone in the presence of a force unlike anything he had known.

A shouting, crying Zaila went on, caught up in astonished delight. “Mzee! Mzee Aidini! Nakuona (I am seeing you)! Mzee, hii ni Yesu! – It is Jesus. Jesus!”

At last, Aidini, overcome by conviction, drew himself together. He found his voice.

“I want to get saved. Tell me. How do I get saved?”

October 19, 2018

Gain

“I hustled”.

The strong declaration sprang from my father’s lips. Clyde Baxter Lout was near seventy and I near forty as we chatted. Morning coffee had brewed and I was offering up questions about his early years as a working man.

“Hustle” is an old word. It comes with several different meanings. My father used it for just one.

He applied the term the way Collins English Dictionary does – “If someone hustles, they try hard to earn money or to gain an advantage from a situation.”

Counted among my closer friends are several engineers who came to America’s shores as students from far away places. . . Asia, the Middle East, elsewhere. They hustled.

Getting schooled in Oklahoma, most had arrived at Tulsa University after finishing undergraduate work in their own homelands. Making their way to my state from places few Oklahomans ever see – Bangalore, Beijing, Chenai, Tehran, these friends had grown up in cultures separated by long miles and diverse languages. But they carried this thing in common.

In their daily hustle, the bright young men labored energetically, sacrificing sleep, going after carefully-defined goals.

They apprenticed.

In time job fairs came along. Industries took notice. Meanwhile, for several of the internationals, another kind of shift had come. Discovering the Christian faith through friends in Tulsa, a number trusted their lives to Jesus. So life in another dimension began. A bigger life, one in Jesus’ kingdom.

On the other hand Clyde Baxter had started off as an orphan.

Though lacking formal schooling beyond tenth grade (cotton fields calling him to scratch out a living in the great depression years), he hustled. Fleeing Oklahoma poverty on rumbling freight trains, he moved westward, and landed his first California job as a ditch digger. When a “plumber’s helper” ad caught his attention, the young Okie went for an interview.

“Young man, if you will give energy and attention to it, we will make you an apprentice.”

“What is an apprentice?”

November 17, 2018

A Hungering

Jesus of Nazareth invited two apprentices to walk and work with him. Then came a third. . . then another and another. Since those early days, the increase of his trainees-in-Christlikeness has carried forward until their number now spans the globe.

Jesus knew well the need of passing along insights and wisdom. But also, of modelling his rare kind of power – the power of love – brought here to earth by him from another world. He did this kind of thing at every step, this modelling and training.

As for insights and wisdom, what this master-trainer brought into view went deeper. It went past the understanding and good sense already found among people through centuries of human experience. Further, the compassion he showed left other forms of human caring shallow by comparison.

Many historians measure this Middle-eastern figure, whose name is more commonly spoken than any other in history, as the most gifted, the most brilliant human ever to live. Yet he didn’t hold his understanding to himself, wasn’t stingy with his gems. Rather, Jesus offered up to any who would take him seriously, his own qualities – wisdom and truth – which any sensible person might eagerly receive.

So, this carpenter-turned-rabbi – as a feature of his mission – recruited to himself a company of students, of learners who might grow to live as he lived. Might even, to a surprising measure, become as he was. Many of Jesus’ apprentices arrived on the scene from ordinary backgrounds. Some were well-educated, others not, some well to do, others not so much.

They would travel with him in climates both calm or stormy. They tasted samplings of popularity and favor and weathered seasons of scorn and rejection.

These disciple-apprentices dined in community. They wrapped up countless action-filled days reflecting together before an open flame at a makeshift fire pit, often at places a good way from their homes. Their minds and hearts took in what they were able of their coach’s actions and sayings. Time in each another’s presence stretched them. They quibbled. They fussed. They were in training.

When one or two of the group asked him for advice on how to pray, Jesus answered in sensible language, “Pray this way. . .”

He also modeled praying. His apprenticing meant that he would (in a manner unlike others of his day) shift readily into a conversation with the invisible God whom he knew to be among them. This would occur easily, naturally when a time or circumstance called for it, which tended to be often.

When their food supply got small, Jesus talked to them about carefree living, then, on occasion would completely surprise them, bringing forth a meal. Such actions would leave them in wonder and deeply curious as to this man’s other-worldly nature.

Never one who seemed rushed or fidgety, he chuckled easily with his apprentice-friends. And, like any skillful mentor, he corrected them without timidity, apology or fanfare.

On a given day Jesus’ corrective counsel might be directed to one or two of the apprentices or he may address a thing meant for the wider community. Regardless, corrective action was each time offered in the interest of serving both his highest good and theirs. The trainees grew to own this.

The longer they walked with him, the less they wished for the former life, their old ways of being. It began to feel as though the rabbi was growing them, little by little, to become very much like himself. This seemed a good thing. They hungered for more.

December 4, 2018

A New Coach

The apprentices did not tire of their hardships in the company of the carpenter-turned-rabbi. Roughing it with Jesus deepened them somehow. And, while his parables and assignments at times perplexed them, they were never at risk of getting bored.

As he labored at offering up truth and clarifying it where needed, Jesus remained always-present to them. His favorite moments seemed to be found engaging these clearly flawed but hungering men. The rabbi taught with warmth and wit and they would catch the occasional upturned smile in the flicker of a crackling night fire. At other times his voice was marked by a distressful tone. This would not often pass unnoticed, their searching eyes exploring his troubled features. Clearly he knew things – deep, disturbing, wonderful things – not yet ripe for sharing.

While they at times tracked his sayings with clear-eyed understanding, the recruited apprentices weren’t always the keenest of trainees.

He could leave them feeling uneasy by his prescriptions for living life. Sometimes they were utterly baffled over a point he seemed bent on making. In these times, to his credit, he never demeaned them. Rather, the rabbi gently drew them in. . . to reflecting, to pondering, in ways the best educators through history have commonly done.

Jesus’s first team of trainees numbered just twelve. The wildly-diverse company of personalities with their contrasted backgrounds walked with Jesus, under his tutelage a good three years and more.

Partly because of his awful and glorious final acts – yielding up himself as a young man in his prime to a voluntary death, then shockingly emerging fully alive three days later from his garden tomb – the rabbi’s handful of followers came to embrace him fully. And, considering their remarkable Holy Spirit-empowering afterward, how could his company of trainee-disciples possibly remain few!

Being fully divine, Jesus remained entirely man. Human, subject to weariness, to pain, pleasure, hope. Yet he stayed blameless, flawless-of-character, good.

While Jesus was surely qualified to mentor craftsmen in the skills of carpentry and construction, he knew well that his mission lay elsewhere. It was a mission spanning eternity and with all tribes of the human family in view. It was a call of cosmic dimension, an assignment in transforming communities out of all earth’s cultures and languages, into persons remarkably like himself.

While the word apprentice hasn’t always sprung readily to mind when reaching for a label to tag a “Jesus-follower”, it may come as close as any to best portray this mentor-mentee relationship.

Jesus was a master teacher. Beyond this, Jesus supplies not only knowledge for learning but the power needed to effectively apply life-altering truths to raw, in-the-trenches daily living. Bringing his disciples forward into a life as his own, he leads as friend.

A few years back I happened onto the writings of a gentleman in whom the term “apprentice to Jesus” had found a welcome home. He referenced it often. The apprentice word fits Dallas Willard like a favorite pair of gym shoes fits an athlete.

We can likely learn some things from a seasoned Christ-follower apprentice – who, on entering the process, found an entirely new life emerge.

“Follow me as I follow Christ” – Paul, the apostle

July 23, 2015August 28, 2017

Shepherd Find

George’s old sedan churned dust as it entered the meadow. Dad’s hay-baling equipment broke down occasionally and he called on the hired fix-it man to lend aid. These and many other details converged in the haying enterprise – centering on one aim. Feeding our small herd of cattle through the winter months.

To my knowledge, nothing of the sheep family ever grazed on our property. Perhaps the nearest to that happening was my purchase of a goat years later. I fattened it up on the old property in advance of my son and his bride’s wedding. Their rehearsal dinner featured nyama choma (Swahili for ‘roasted meat’).

The terms sheep and shepherd found their way into our thoughts, however. And often. Even into our prayers. My family’s church culture introduced intriguing words and images like this. Stories to do with sheep and their shepherds drew our family to fondly consider attributes of God. We learned of his nature and of his disposition to us his children. In view of these things, our dad reflected on the blessings that came his way, his good fortune.

A principled man, Clyde Baxter labored for the well-being of his family. The dream of securing employment drove him to ride the freight cars westward. Clyde married Thelma only after establishing himself as a steady wage earner with a stable future. Life carried uncertainties as in every generation. He understood this and stayed focused.

Linking his work ethic to his modest ten grades of schooling, Clyde excelled in the plumbing craft. In the late 50’s he launched a business in Okmulgee. City Plumbing.

His love for rural life stirred. What if? So dad moved his shop to our eighty acre place a mile from town.

Get up, boys. Time for Sunday School and Church. Throughout the busy years Dad did the best he knew to do in affording us a moral and spiritual footing.

Doing so he sensed that his abilities to labor, to plan and to provide rose out of a greater influence. He knew he was not a self-made man. He entered into and drew from a source far greater than his human ingenuity could supply.

The grown-up orphan was humbled. He knew he was fathered. And shepherded.

Dad was reserved. His prayers were private. In my growing-up years it was sounds of my mother’s intercessions that drifted from their room. Mother petitioned the shepherd. When we gathered at mealtime, it was always mother praying our food.

My child imagination resonated with images of a good shepherd. I saw Jesus as shepherd. But more. Jesus was good shepherd – giving his life for the sheep. From my earliest years exploits of a giant-slaying, lion-crippling shepherd boy grabbed me. Then each October Sister Opaline selected Christmas Play characters. I thrilled at arriving for practice one or two seasons cast as a shepherd. A long crook staff in hand I saw myself as a kind but commanding presence. Protector of the defenseless.

Shepherds watching their sheep by night. Wow.

Through vivid Bible scenes I saw Jesus walking away from a gathering of safely-kept lambs and ewes. In the dark it was me the good shepherd went looking for. I was the strayed sheep. I saw myself lying helpless in a distant ravine, wolves prowling nearby.

One Sunday morning in a Bible story time I was invited to welcome the good shepherd into my life. He laid down his life for me, a helpless sheep. Guided into a simple prayer by my teacher I eagerly opened my heart’s door.

Jesus came. His Spirit entered me in his mysterious way. Through simple faith. God was my shepherd. The good shepherd.

Today I know him in a wider range of wonderful titles – Savior. Friend. Teacher. Brother. Comforter. King. Father. Naming a few.

As a limping, sometimes straying sheep, I cherish him still as I first came to know him.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want Psalm 23

June 25, 2015August 28, 2017

Opaline. Interior Design

The visiting minister opened his Bible. Taking it up he preached on believing faith. And on healing. He then invited any person desiring God’s healing touch to come forward for prayer.

Several people with varied ailments entered the center aisle. They started toward the front. It was like a mini-pilgrimage for the hopeful. The regulars of the church turned to see their friend Opaline – the elegant woman inelegantly rising and joining with others. Her friends were moved for her. Her Christ-like example constantly inspired. Most uplifting was her simple and her certain love for Jesus. Her shoulders elevated slightly from the rigid crutches supporting them, Opaline inched forward in the line.

She had lingered at other times, trusting that a miracle of healing might one day come. She could linger again now. She held strongly to a certain knowing. A healing grace from her Lord would come. Still, she conceded that the when was not hers to dictate. She rested in the trustworthiness of a now-and-not-yet principle often at play in God’s mysterious but all-wise workings. His ways are perfect, Opaline reminded herself.

For Opaline there was no question whether Jesus healed, nor whether she or her circumstances mattered to him. She knew that she mattered. He confirmed his love and presence often. In many ways. She felt it, knew it inside. And she responded by loving in return. Loving him. Loving people. Now here in the healing line, as in other settings, she was just ready; open for whatever he may have for her. It was Opaline’s way.

The Church Family looked on, and prayed. They were hopeful, almost straining to believe. Indeed if a miracle could be willed into being (faith aside) her friends would have already seen to it.

With a kind smile the minister greeted her. He spoke words of Scripture and then prayed.

Nothing. Some moments of hopeful waiting followed. Nothing. A gradual swivel and Opaline retraced the pathway to her seat. She drew her Bible to its familiar resting place on her lap. Clasping her hands on it she lifted her heart in petition – for those up front receiving prayer.

Years lumbered by. Indeed the years themselves seemed to even limp at times. Variations of the healing-line scene replayed occasionally. A preaching message. The invitation for healing. Opaline at times joining the others. With crutches, braces and her distinct angular limp navigating the center aisle. And again, returning to her seat – her hardware companions carrying forward their duties into another day, and week, and year.

If Opaline was disheartened, evidence escaped notice. No sorrowing looks of disappointment; no clues of sadness.

Maybe her mindset became, Perhaps next time. No one likely knew. Regardless. If her spirit did need rallying – it surely rallied.

Opaline was a deep well. Interior graces like contentment and peace and endurance – in the middle of whatever suffering – deepened her, flavored her. Prayer and solitude and worship. These cultivated the graces. She chose – aware of her frailties both inner and outer – a kind of lifestyle she felt most natural to Jesus. Her inner deepening was traced to her frequent times with him; Worship of Jesus was central to Opaline. No time for wearying whys or for self-pity snivelings. ‘Life’s an adventure. Bring it on.

Decembers came and went. The Christmas Plays didn’t flounder. Summer Vacation Bible School was Clock-work On.

Opaline’s Sunday School children bounced and giggled when she entered their brightly decorated room. They showed off coloring work and clay figures; it didn’t matter the quality. It was meaning that mattered. What message from God was each child here to catch today? The view separated the treasured from the trite. Her high school students moaned on a rare day she might be absent. They loved the engaging, gifted instructor. And her smile. Always the smile.

Opaline lived. Limping toward her miracle.

Long ago at a wedding festival the host cheerily exclaimed to Jesus, You saved the best for last.

For Opaline he did the same.

April 28, 2015August 28, 2017

Family Addition(s)

It wasn’t an appealing dwelling place for a family but California’s Mojave Desert supplied one perk. Houses didn’t cost much. South African immigrants had assigned retired gold mining communities their names. A two mile drive west of Johannesburg led to Randsburg. Clyde, Thelma and seven-year-old Betty settled into their new home. He paid $150 for the house. His plumbing skills secured work for him at a nearby military base.

Clyde privately pledged that he and Thelma would have no more children. He vowed so during the agonized hours after Bobby’s drowning. For sure, his heart began a slow healing as he read through Bible stories. The life and words of Jesus especially drew him in, bringing more composure. And he sensed growth in his spiritual journey.

Still, something he dreamed after going to bed one night in their small Randsburg home left him astonished.
In his dream he pictured small children whom he couldn’t recall ever seeing before. They were lively, happy at play.

After some moments into the dream a crisp, convicting message – like a theme – overtook his mind. Bringing no further children into the world was not Clyde’s decision to make. Not really. His choosing this path closed the door to receiving precious little ones assigned to their family’s care.

Receiving? Assigned?

In the days following, Clyde could not shrug off images of laughing, playing children nor the dream’s assertion as he experienced it. The matter became a conviction. He yielded.

In due course Thelma delivered their third child. All nine pounds of Timothy Arthur Lout were clearly present. Exclamations erupted at Red Mountain’s hospital.

Now there’s a Big boy! He’s half grown already!

Timothy was still a baby when the family moved once again. Back to the Bay. To Berkeley. My mother (Thelma) later reviewed the setting and its seasons. When you were born, Jerry, Berkeley was just a quiet little college town.

I came into the world one year, one month and one day after my brother, Tim. I skinned up the tip of my nose from regularly rooting face-down into the bed sheets. For this the hospital nurses labeled me ‘little bull’.
How our small-framed mother actually delivered us bruisers, Tim and me, is a marvel. I trumped my brother Tim’s birth weight, tipping the scales at a disquieting ten pounds. A vital, robust life seemed clearly ahead.

During this period a word was finding its way into conversations all around. The word polio.

April 21, 2015August 28, 2017

A Sure Hope

The mourners dispersed. The flower-dotted cemetery reverted to its earlier stillness. Thelma almost whispered her words.

What is it, Dovie? This Presence. It’s inside me. . in gentle waves. What is this goodness and this . .safety I feel?

Thelma’s question hung in the air. The shadow of a Canary Island Palm stretched across the lawn before them.

She was hungry for answers. This utter absence of her earlier grief astonished her. She hoped that the extraordinary calm would somehow remain. Yet she feared it may take flight. Could she carry on?

Dovie, will this peace, or the source of it, be near again if I (she corrected herself) when I need it?

More questions. She had many and voiced most of them to Dovie over coming weeks.

Dovie was not a person of complicated notions or grand explanations. She waited. As she sensed a thought forming that brought clarity she pondered it, then offered a response. Otherwise she remained still. Prayerful.

The God that Dovie came to know and to love was real. And he was the giver of the Book. She knew that answers for questions that actually mattered were linked to the precious book. The pages of her own Bible showed uncommon signs of wear. It attested to truth. And to God’s presence.

“All I know, Thelma, is Jesus is real. It’s him. He’s the presence.” Her words were simple, uncomplicated. Dovie responded in this way it seemed every time. Always highlighting Jesus.

How do I get him. . have him in my life, Dovie? Can I? I don’t want to be without the hope. I need Jesus.

“Just say that to him, dear. Give him your heart. Surrender to him your whole life. Let him begin to take over. He’s listening. He doesn’t turn anybody away.”

Thelma yielded. As much as she knew how to. Shortly afterward Clyde kneeled, giving himself over to God’s care. Both of them were ready. They sensed it keenly. They needed God’s presence.

They were comforted too, that he understood the pain of releasing a son to the grave. Neither understood a lot of their salvation. They didn’t worry themselves over it. They just believed, and trusted.

Clyde and Thelma entered a new kind of life. Striding forward in faith, limping at times. In love. And hope.

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