Wayne Jacobsen

I met with a man last week who wants to turn So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore into a movie. I’ve long thought that done right the John and Jake conversations could be a compelling movie, but I wouldn’t want to trust anyone to get the story right. And since I didn’t know him we arranged to spend some time together during my recent trip to Washington. We had a great conversation and I think he really gets it and wants to embellish the same things in that book that I do and make an independent picture of that story and share it with an entirely new audience.

What’s more, he was at the Sundance Film Festival a couple of weeks ago and happened to sit next to a screenwriter he didn’t know who happened to be reading that book. What are the odds of that? So, we are discussing having her take first pass at the screen play and she wants to work collaboratively with me in making sure we get the story right. Pretty cool. We are moving slowly here, so don’t expect a constant stream of updates. He’s already involved in a movie now and is thinking this might be “what’s next” for him.

As part of our dialog, however, he shared an illustration with me that I loved. He shared that one of the greatest challenges that people face on this journey is that they gt caught up in trying to sort out college level and beyond concepts and ideas, when we haven’t even begun to focus on or even master 3rd and 4th grade material:

“For instance”, he said, “one of the biggest lessons that Christ gave, I believe, is to ‘First take the plank (or log) out of your (own) eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from you brother’s eye.” If we were all to focus on just this one lesson, I believe the world would be a much different place. A lot of our fights seem to occur at the college level material and beyond. While it’s fun and even worth while to question whether Heaven is ‘this’ or ‘that’ or whether the afterlife is like ‘this’ or like ‘that,’ it’s like trying to fully understand calculus without any knowledge of algebra. Once you learn algebra your relationship and understanding of the words that describe calculus change, evolve and take on different meaning. So trying to understand the spiritual with only the religious or the heart with only the intellect or the experiential with only the concrete can be provide quite the difficulties.”

I’ve thought about it a lot sense. I used to have a profound curiosity about the great theological questions of eternity, eschatology, and God’s sovereignty. I have found over the last few years that my growing engagement with Father has lessened my hunger to sort out those things, or even to engage in the ongoing debates about them. Spiritually I’m still in the third grade trying to understand how to love the people around me each day in the same way I am loved by Father. And I am loving that. There’s a reason Jesus passed over the disciples’ incessant questioning on such matters. “No one knows the date but the Father himself.”

If that’s spiritual calculus, and I’m still years away from spiritual algebra, then I don’t have to waste my time figuring out those things that are best left to him. That’s why in The Jesus Lens, I talked about being certain where Scripture is certain, and being ambiguous where Scripture is ambiguous. I know that isn’t easy, especially when someone in spiritual first grade is expounding on their theological convictions and you find it a turn-off. You might feel embarrassed that they seem to know something you don’t know until you realize that they don’t know it either. And their need to convince you how right they are is all the proof you need to know they aren’t really sure themselves.

Let’s learn to live loved-—by him, and then out of that love with others. If we learn to do that well, who knows we might someday get into a bit of algebra!

It is with great joy that I share these pictures with you that I just received from Kenya. These are of the children at the Living Loved Care Center that many of you helped us build over the last few years to help 72 orphans living in a slum find a safe and healthy environment in which to live and learn. I think you can see in the pictures below the joy and celebration that they are experiencing in their new location.

Two years ago Kent and I stood in the pathetic conditions these kids lived in. Standing ankle deep in mud, with open sewage flowing just a few feet away. Due to your generosity we completed this orphanage about a year ago and have paid for the expenses and staff of that school through it’s first year. Thank you so much for being a conduit for God to bless these children and give them an opportunity to have a new chance at life. Just over a year ago they were living in horrid conditions, begging on the street to find enough to live, and not being educated. Now all that has changed.

I give great thanks to God for letting me be involved in this project and for putting it on many of your hearts to help. Kent and I stood there and it touched our hearts. I’m so blessed that did not have the same experience but still felt a tug on theirs to help out. Enjoy these pictures:

The students at play

Learning in the classroom

The younger students outside their schoolroom

We continue to pay staff fees and cover expenses, which total about $2500.00 per month while we hope to find a way this year to invest in an income-generating opportunity that will provide for the Center in coming years. If you feel called to help us support these children either with a one-time contribution, or a monthly donation, that would really be a help. If you want to know more about this project or the AIDs recovery home we also support in South Africa, you can see our Sharing With the World page at Lifestream. You can either donate with a credit card there, or you can mail a check to Lifestream Ministries • 1560-1 Newbury Rd #313 • Newbury Park, CA 91320. Or if you prefer, we can take your donation over the phone at (805) 498-7774.

For those wanting to purchase some of our new resources, we now have a distributor in Australia that can ship to that part of the world. Hopefully this will save on shipping costs from the U.S. Just point your browser to Living Loved in Australia. Unfortunately that only includes Wayne’s new book In Season, and the DVD series, The Jesus Lens. The others are currently tied up with Windblown Media and their distribution channels. Hopefully we’ll be able to add other resources in the future.

Yesterday I was invited to join Cliff Ravenscraft on his Encouraging Others In Christ Podcast, asking the question, “Is God Bigger Than Your Bank Account?” He wanted to respond to a paragraph in an email I sent about learning to live inside Father’s provision instead of the mistaken notion that we provide for ourselves. In this podcast I share a lot of my own journey to come to rest in the Father’s provision and thought it might be a blessing to many of you as well. He also gave me permission to include it on my Lifestream blog as well. I hope it is helpful to many of you wrestling with learning to live in the Father’s generosity.

You can also subscribe to any new audio postings at Lifestream via iTunes.

One of the things I enjoy about having a new book out there is that it shifts the conversation a bit. I love talking about living loved and why there might be better ways to do church than to fit it into one of the models so prevalent today. But now I’m finding through A MAN LIKE NO OTHER I’m getting to talk more about the life and person of Jesus—the most compelling person to ever traverse this planet. And because of IN SEASON, I’m seeing people think a bit differently about their spiritual journey. Finally many are beginning to understand that you can’t find life in him by applying a set of guidelines, no matter how good the guidelines.

He invited us to follow him, not follow a set of rules or rituals. We can only do that where a growing relationship with him is helping us begin to sense his whispers in our hearts and his nudges toward the people or things he wants us to engage, and those we can pass by without obligation. The longer I walk this journey the more clearly I see that daily following him defies any set of guidelines we try to force on any particular situation.

I know some will take that too far and toss out any principles of righteous behavior that will help us see and test what he is saying to us. I wouldn’t go that far. Principles of love, kindness, justice, and grace give us a moral compass in which we can recognize his impulses in our lives. Having a righteous heart will mean we won’t cheat on someone we love, we won’t gossip to tear down another person, we won’t lie just to get something we want, and we won’t betray close friends in our own self-interest. We are willing to do the difficult thing, rather than the easy thing. We’d rather give up our lives that manipulate someone away from there. Morality matters. Those who live without a moral compass easily justify the most obscene behaviors for their own personal gain and leave in their wake a host of broken hearts. What’s more, they won’t even care about those people so sold are they on their own personal happiness or survival.

But those principles alone will not tell us what to do today. The problem with trying to live a life by Godly principles alone is that you arbitrarily try to implement something that is true into a situation where it does not fit.

Many does not live by bread alone, but by every word that God breathes. Don’t look for another program to tell you how to live. Stop trying to find the principle to apply in your situation today that will turn the tide on your relationship with your spouse or kids, or bring you the life you hope to have. Instead, find those things that stir your heart to know him and in knowing him to recognize the smallest breath of a whisper he puts in your heart. Follow him today, as best you sense him and that will be enough.

Over the past year, due to the generosity of many of you, we were able to send $85,100.00 to Kenya to help complete the orphanage, pay school fees for orphaned children, and assist with famine relief in Kenya. We have bee blessed at every turn to see the generosity of saints here, and the loving appreciation of saints there.

Last week I received this email from Michael, the brother God has given us to work with there. His gratefulness and blessings go to all of you who have been part of this amazing relationship with us:

Dear brother Wayne and the entire team of the saints around the world,

I would like to take this opportunity to send my gratitude to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who has joined us together to build up the body of Christ and also to be a vessel to touch the lives of brothers and sisters in order for them to know who is really Christ, the people would not see Christ until they would see the image of Christ in us.

The church of God in Africa, has walked only with the doctrine and the judgmental message for long time and it was my long time cry to see the transformation from the hearts changing the way of focused in the church of God in Africa. These are the brothers and sisters for whom Jesus died and they must see the light with supernatural power to touch and to change the lives of every individual. This truth has been hidden for so long but our Lord Jesus Christ had a plan to work on His way to help the church of God in Africa to come out from human understanding to spiritual enlightenment.

So I thank God that my spiritual eyes have been opened to know the mind of Christ towards his people and I would like to thank God through you brother. I am not thanking you because of the resources that you have been sending alone. That is part of it, but spiritual enlightenment as well that I can realize the purpose of Christ to choose to sacrifice His life that we may be redeemed once more and have the fellowship time after time in daily life. This must become lifestyle—walking with Jesus. This is beyond the Sunday service, or certain fellowship or human structure/schedule.The transformation is taking place, it is my great joy people to come out from traditional religion which have bound brothers and sisters for so many generations that it has become routine and practice for many generations.

I can remember in the book of Acts Paul was sharing with the brethren that as he had read an inscription on one of their idols, “to unknown God”. Paul was emphasizing that he had come to share with them to the same God which they had been worshiping as the unknown God. So I thank God for the wisdom which God has given you. The time you first step in Kenya with brother Kent, you could see a lot of errors in Africans church, these inclusive hierarchy, title, positions, structures, institution which people called the churches. You didn’t judge us or point fingers but you shared the message of love and through that, that word had became a medicine to heal the entire continent just with the small group you began with.

You practice faith with action, along with your brethren over there to feed the hungry, to cloth the narked, to put the shelter to the homeless, to help the widows, to the rescue the orphans, to educate the needy and to help those who were oppresses, those are the key which has opened the gospel of Christ to get breakthrough and to change the lives of people from the small group to the Nation and even to Nations.

So it is our prayer that God gives you wisdom and understanding revelation that we may reach the entire world with the Gospel of love. We don’t have anything that we can give you, but I can just only pray for you and give you the below encouraging words and verses along with your family and sends these message scriptures to the entire brethren who have prayed and give out the gifts whether in financial or any other help:

Matthew 10:42 – And whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple, truly, I say to you, he will by no means lose his reward.”

2 Corinthians 9:13 – By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission flowing from your confession of the gospel of Christ, and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others.

Proverbs 19:17 – Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the LORD, and he will repay him for his deed.

1 Chronicles 29:11-12 – David praised the Lord before the entire assembly: “O Lord God of our father Israel, you deserve praise forevermore! O Lord, you are great, mighty, majestic, magnificent, glorious, and sovereign over all the sky and earth! You have dominion and exalt yourself as the ruler of all. You are the source of wealth and honor; you rule over all. You possess strength and might to magnify and give strength to all. Now, our God, we give thanks to you and praise your majestic name. “But who am I and who are my people, that we should be in a position to contribute this much? Indeed, everything comes from you, and we have simply given back to you what is yours.

2 Corinthians 9:8 – And God is able to make all grace overflow to you so that because you have enough of everything in every way at all times, you will overflow in every good work.

Galatians 6:9-10
So we must not grow weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not give up. 6:10 So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who belong to the family of faith.

2 Corinthians 9:10-15 – Now God who provides seed for the sower and bread for food will provide and multiply your supply of seed and will cause the harvest of your righteousness to grow. You will be enriched in every way so that you may be generous on every occasion, which is producing through us thanksgiving to God, because the service of this ministry is not only providing for the needs of the saints but is also overflowing with many thanks to God. Through the evidence of this service they will glorify God because of your obedience to your confession in the gospel of Christ and the generosity of your sharing with them and with everyone. And in their prayers on your behalf they long for you because of the extraordinary grace God has shown to you. Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift.

ROM. 12:11-13 – Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12 Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.

Our prayer also goes to the girl (Jesus knows her name) who made the dolls to help raise money towards Living Loved Christ Hope Education Center. The children are praying for her. I shared the message with the kids and they want her picture. Our prayer also goes to the donation of the students who are orphans in different schools whom you have been helping for the education in past years, our prayers also goes to those who stood in the side of relief, medication, microfinance, in widows program, single mother both in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania,

Thank once more for having the trust for me,and trusting my hand to guard the gift as on behalf the church. In Africa we have thousands of believers who could do better and are more well- educated. Why God has chosen me to carry the gift of the saints, I count as his gift and I promise to remain a good stewardship for his Body.

May the lord bless you and bless you much to stand with African church in this time of drought and famine that has swept up so many.

The needs in this part of Kenya are overwhelming, and the need continues. We feel like God has asked us to help out in this corner of the world and will continue to pay for the staff at the orphanage, assist students in their school fees, and be part of a continuing effort to salt that part of the world with the invitation to live loved by the Father. If you have some extra to share with these projects, or if you want to know more about this project or the AIDs recovery home we also support in South Africa, you can see our Sharing With the World page at Lifestream. You can either donate with a credit card there, or you can mail a check to Lifestream Ministries • 1560-1 Newbury Rd #313 • Newbury Park, CA 91320. Or if you prefer, we can take your donation over the phone at (805) 498-7774.

I should have known better. In order to preview this book, Hometown Prophet by Jeff Fulmer, I had to promise to write a review on my blog within 30 days. I have never made that commitment before. I usually tell people I’ll read 25 pages or so and see if it captures me as a reader. If so, and I can recommend it, I’ll do so on my blog. But I was intrigued with the storyline, so I told them to send me a copy. For the first half of the book, I was glad I did. I found myself casually recommending it to other people, with the caveat that I was only a third of the way into it, or when I was half way through.

The premise was brilliant. An unemployed young man, living at home with his mom begins to have dreams that appear to be from God. When the dreams come true, the Christians rally around him as a prophet. Then, the foretelling dreams begin to hit closer to home and the celebrated prophet becomes a pariah in the Christian community. There was so much about this set-up that I enjoyed, not the least was having God visit someone who wasn’t living a stellar “Christian life.” I liked the beginning conflict with those who had more vested interest in the status quo than in what God might actually be doing. The author is an engaging storyteller, making me believe the story and endearing me to its characters. I was hooked, until I got about 60% into the story. That’s when it all went wrong.

AT that point the characters surrounding our hero became horribly stereotyped, as did the liberal agenda that began to bleed from the pages. The dreams turned out to be less about God inviting people into a transformation with him and more about Christians become more politically liberal. Here’s where the author’s agenda really turned me off. I do think God would have us to be more loving especially to the poor and downtrodden, and I wish believers were more committed to good stewardship of the planet, but to have the story end there really cheapened what was going on in Peter, the protagonist in the story.

I have rarely been this unsatisfied with the ending of a story that started out with such promise. As I read the early portions I was intellectually salivating with the possibilities of how this story could turn out. In the end it didn’t satisfy any of them. Now, I don’t know Jeff, and his whole purpose in writing this story may have been fulfilled by its ending. I don’t begrudge him that. But in the end, it is not a book I’d recommend to others here. So, I guess I won’t be making that commitment again any time soon.

The other day this photo arrived in my inbox. Photographer Kent Lindsay, a frequent listener to The God Journey, said that this photo came to mind as he was listening to one of our recent podcasts, Conversations That Matter. He wrote that he found such peace in this photo because it reminded him that the kingdom of God is an unforced reality that is spilling out in the world and we are merely children letting it fall on us. With his permission, I get to share his photo with you. (You can find out more about his work here.)

I love what he wrote and as I looked at the picture I, too was captured by it and reminded that God’s purposes in the world are so much bigger than any of us. Who of us can cap the great force of his love or direct its flow. We certainly don’t control it and dare not presume to claim ownership of anything God does in or through our lives. All that’s good in the world is simply God’s life and love spilling over onto kids, in whom he delights. Is it not enough that we simply revel with him in the moment, and not be tempted into thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought to think?

This may be what Jesus meant when he said, “Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 18:3) Participating with God in our world has less to do with personal achievement, but simply being willing to watch for the flow of his love, and play in that reality as circumstances unfold around us. There’s great hope and peace in that.

As the new year begins let me share with you a chapter from my latest book, In Season: Embracing the Father’s Process of Fruitfulness. If you haven’t read them earlier, you can read earlier parts of the book here: Introduction and Chapter 1.

Chapter 2

I am the vine; you are the branches.
If a man remains in me and I in him,
he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
JOHN 15:5

I was born into a family of farmers. My father owned and lived on a vineyard, as did his father before him. I grew up among rows of grapevines that stretched toward the horizon. I have worked in the vineyard during the heat of summer and the frigid cold of winter. It was in the vineyard that I began my spiritual journey.

This is why John 15 is one of my favorite passages in Scripture. In it Jesus uses the metaphor of a vineyard to teach his disciples how they could follow him into a relationship with his Father that would make them fruitful and fill them with his own special brand of joy. As a farmer in a vineyard, a student of Scripture, and someone who has been on a life-long adventure of growing to know the Father, I want to invite you into the vineyard with me to learn what so many have missed. Jesus really did offer each one of us a relationship with his Father that is more real than the breath we take and more natural than we dare believe. My favorite time in the vineyard is the waning days of winter.

It is still only mid-February, but in the short winters of California’s San Joaquin Valley, spring is just around the corner. The ever lengthening days are already clawing at winter’s grip. In the late afternoon the long yellow rays of the setting sun have surrendered to violet-tinted shades of pink. Though it was a warm afternoon, the evening chill comes quickly. I zip up my coat against the light breeze, pulling the collar up around my neck and thrusting my hands into the pockets. Lights from distant farmhouses have already begun to twinkle against the fading landscape, and out of the diaphanous shroud of evening ground fog that obscures the horizon, rows of grapevines curl over the hills and completely surround me.

The vines are all neatly trimmed, their branches gently twisting around the wire strung from the posts that stand as sentinels beside each vine. The hard work of winter brings surrealistic order to the vineyard. Should anything in God’s creation be so tightly clipped and neatly arranged?

The vineyard is at rest, waiting patiently for the glory of springtime and another season of fruitfulness. I guess that’s why I like this time of year so much. In the moments just before darkness settles in, the wispy fog and the neatly trimmed rows combine to grant me that marvelous gift of secluded peace. Except for the softened whine of a few cars far away, the only sound I hear is the crunching of dirt clods underfoot.

Only a few months ago the air was filled with dust, voices, and churning of tractor engines that mark the frenzied drive of harvest to get the raisins in before the first rain. A few weeks from now those same noises will fill the air as the process of fruitfulness starts all over again. But now it is quiet. And though a glance from a distant farmhouse might lead someone to believe that I am alone, it is not so. I have come here at this time to walk and talk with the Father.

This has been my cherished prayer closet since I was a young boy. It is a sanctuary of greater reverence than I’ve known in any cathedral built by human hands. No place on earth more quickly draws me to him, because it is here that we first met, and here we have met so often. This is where I began my spiritual journey.

This is my father’s vineyard—a thirty-five-acre ranch in the heart of California’s Central Valley. For almost all of his first sixty-five years he lived and worked within a mile of this very spot. The farthest he ever traveled, interestingly enough, put him in another vineyard, this one in northeastern France, where he was wounded in battle just before New Year’s Day 1945.

After the war he purchased the farm next to the one on that he was reared. This vineyard provided for his family, but more importantly, also provided the opportunity to teach his four sons about God and his ways. I’ve learned more about God in this vineyard than in all my years of Bible training and study. I learned from the lessons Dad taught us and that he backed up in the integrity of his own life and experience. I learned about the cycles of the seasons, of God’s faithfulness, of overcoming adversity, and of surrendering to his will. Most of Dad’s lessons came from Scripture, but many others came from his lifetime of growing grapes.

And I grew to know God in my long walks through the vines, usually at dawn or dusk. I read Scriptures and learned to voice my concerns to him, telling him my deepest secrets. Eventually I began to hear him respond—simple stirrings, gentle insights, and eventually deep convictions; the voice of God superimposed over my own thoughts. I could know what was on his heart in the same way I was letting him know what was on mine.

I remember the first time I touched a presence bigger than myself. I wasn’t more than eleven or twelve years old and had gone for a long walk. I was standing in a row of vines some distance from the farmhouse and made a simple request. “God, if you’re real, would you show yourself to me?”

Honestly, I didn’t mean at that exact instant, but in the next moment a soft breeze wafted through the vines. My skin began to vibrate as I sensed something or someone was coming close. I looked about anxiously to see if any of my brothers had followed me out into the vineyard, but they had not. The air became rich and clear and my mind filled with thoughts about the God I’d always wanted to know.

He seemed to surround me and flow right through me. My heart pounded, the hair on my neck stood straight out. At first it was pure delight, but the more I questioned what was happening, the more fearful I became that a voice would speak or a vine would suddenly burst into flames. I wasn’t ready for that. Eventually the fear overwhelmed me and I ran back to the farmhouse as fast as I could.

What had I touched? It was a presence undeniably distinct from my own. It felt wonderful and scary all at the same time.

And though I promised myself I’d never do that again, I would soon find that my desire for him would overrun my fears and I’d find myself again praying that prayer. He didn’t ever show up like that again, but he continued to make himself known to me in ways that endeared my heart to him as I continued to grow.

That’s why the vineyard has always been my special place, and it is no wonder to me that when Jesus wanted to reveal the reality of living in his kingdom he made rich use of farming and, in particular, vineyard illustrations. No other metaphor offers such a rich source of instruction, encouragement, and challenge. The passages of Scripture that deal with vines and grapes are among my favorite. I have not only studied them but also lived them, and they have changed my life. The vineyard of my childhood is not so different from those that Jesus would have walked through with his disciples and spoke of in stories.

On that last night before his impending trial and excruciating execution, he wanted to prepare his disciples for life with him beyond his death and resurrection. Where did he take them? He brought them to a vineyard to teach them their last lesson. Among those vines he spoke of a greater vineyard beyond space and time—his Father’s vineyard. He told them that he alone could make them fruitful and in doing so would put his joy in us so that our joy might be full.

Fruitfulness and fulfillment are the themes of the vineyard. Who doesn’t want joy and peace deep enough to hold us through the worst circumstances, and a sense of purpose that comes from knowing our lives make a difference in the world? For many, however, these promises remain only an elusive mirage. Though many things in this world promise fulfillment, they only bring moments of happiness that quickly fade to emptiness. None of them offer the enduring joy and peace we were told they would give us. So people are not surprised when religion’s joy seems fleeting as well, when the joy of salvation quickly gives way to the rigors of discipline.

Sadly, most think they are the only ones who feel that way. They look around not knowing that others are pretending as well. Even those Christians who try to convince others that they have found the secrets of fulfillment and fruitfulness often prove by their own personal stress, immorality, or spiritual emptiness that they have not. Religious activity will never lead to the fruitfulness and fulfillment Jesus promised his followers. When Jesus led them to a vineyard he wanted them to know that the way to the fullness of life lies through the reality of a relationship—not the dictates of a religion.

I have long since left the ranch and moved to more urban settings. My days are no longer filled with vineyards but with computers, automobiles, and other machinery of our technological age. It is easy to be seduced into the mistaken notion that spiritual growth lies in carefully observed principles and rituals, rather than the more organic realities of a growing relationship.

We are organisms, not machines. Our spiritual growth patterns have more in common with the four grapevines growing today in my backyard than they do with the computer on which I am typing. That is why when it comes to spiritual growth, Scripture makes such vivid use of the images of a vine growing in a vineyard and the ever-shifting seasons that influence its growth.

Let’s go to the vineyard together, you and I. Let’s walk the rows with the Father of the vineyard and watch his vines grow and bear fruit. We’ll even get to stop, pull back the leaves, and behold the marvelous process of bringing a vine to fruitfulness. Let him teach you the lessons of the vineyard and show you the secret of finding the fullness of joy and fruitfulness that he promised to every believer—including you!

___________________

This is Chapter 2 of my new book, In Season: Embracing the Father’s Process for Fruitfulness. Copyright 2011 by Wayne Jacobsen and used by permission. Available from Lifestream.org