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BodyLife has now become “Living Loved.” Our latest Living Loved Newsletter has just been posted at the Lifestream website. We will still deal with church life issues and concerns from time to time, but the newsletter has always been about so much more. The latest issue has just been posted at:

https://www.lifestream.org/current-issue.php

(If this URLs does not show up in your email as a link to our site, just copy and paste it into the window of your browser and hit ‘return’.)

The title of this issue is, Quiet Lives of Profound Consequences, and talks about the crying need in our world for men and women who have learning to live loved by the Father in their own lives and are now ready and willing to help others learn to live in that reality as well. These are true elders in Christ’s body and there is a crying need throughout the world for people who can help others embrace this journey with grace and wonder.

Also you’ll find information on three new resources by Wayne that Lifestream will be releasing this Fall. The Jesus Lens is an 8 hour DVD series designed to help people read Scripture with greater joy and wisdom. A Man Like No Other: The Illustrated Life of Jesus, a book co-written with Brad and framed by paintings from the Gospels by Murry Whiteman. And finally, In Season, Embracing the Father’s Process of Fruitfulness, which is a re-packaging of Wayne’s look at the parable of the vine through his formative years growing up on a vineyard. You’ll also find letters that will encourage fellow-travelers, a book recommendation for parents of prodigals, and other Lifestream News.

You can read it online, or print your own downloadable version. We hope it inspires your own journey in drawing closer to Jesus and reveling in his life.

We have just received the first order of The Jesus Lens DVDs. And hopefully we’ll soon have the sit active that will post those videos as well. We’ll announce when that is read.

Right now we’re going to fill the orders for so many of you who ordered in advance. You should be receiving your DVDs over the next week or so. If you haven’t ordered it yet you may do so from our website.

You can also hear the audio and read more about this project here.

Here’s what some people are already saying about The Jesus Lens:

THE JESUS LENS material is excellent. Fresh, relevant and anointed.
David, retired teacher from Ireland

I love everything about it, especially what you said about the Bible
being a love letter. This has breathed new life into my Bible reading!
Julie, mother of three in California

These sessions opened up a fresh way of looking at the Scriptures as
God’s unfolding love story through the lens of His Son, Jesus.
Barry, retired military in Virginia

I feel like I’ve been handed a missing piece of my heart. (The Bible
has often been just another source of shame. Now I can see how God is
restoring it to its proper and useful place in my life.)
Susan, former slave of shame

THE JESUS LENS is an incredible look at the Scriptures. Having read
the Bible all of my life, this teaching has endeared me in a whole new
way to the amazing story of my loving.
Dawn, a member of the studio audience

I am so excited! Just this morning I received my advance copy of A Man Like No Other: The Illustrated Life of Jesus. Brad Cummings and I co-authored this book about the life of Jesus to put words to the incredible paintings of a friend of ours, Murry Whiteman, an award-winning commercial artist in the entertainment industry. The result is a full-color book that is a visual feast as well as a powerful tool for personal reflection or reading together with your spouse and family. On your coffee table it will become a focus of conversation with visitors. Our hope is that it will make people hungry to know the Jesus of Scripture and see him as the most engaging person that has ever lived.

The other copies are on a boat headed for California. We are hopeful to get these in hand to distribute by early November, but that will depend on border security and a lot of other circumstances we don’t control. But it will be here in time for the Christmas holidays and I can’t imagine a better gift to share with family and friends.

A Man Like No Other
The Illustrated Life of Jesus
By Wayne Jacobsen, Brad Cummings, and Murry Whiteman
128 pages, Windblown Media, $24.99 • 128 pages • 8.5 x 11.5 • Hardback

Available around November 7, 2011. You may now pre-order it from Lifestream for $24.99 Please do not include other books or audio in your order unless you want us to ship those when A Man Like No Other arrives. Our shipping prices are only configured for one shipment.

Here are the first two spreads:

Text:

Before the beginning they were always together celebrating life in a community of love and light far grander than anything mere mortals could ever conceive. One day their joy erupted into the darkened void of chaos with a proclamation of profound consequence, “Let there be light!”

And there was!

Text:

Father, Son, and Spirit gave birth to a new reality,what we know as our universe. Father proclaimed and the Son brought his words to life—creating light, stars,planets, oceans, land, and animals. Everything that was created, the Son created. This was his world teeming with life and beauty and it reflected His magnificent glory. And as the crowning glory of creation, they made a man and a woman in their own image and gave them the earth to live in and care for. And God made Himself known to them by coming each day and walking with them in the cool of the day.

For a time all was well and the earth was at peace. But it did not last.

One day a deceiver appeared in the garden and seduced the first two humans into thinking they knew better than the God who made them, and they chose a course that seemed more pleasing to them. Wanting to know good and evil outside of their relationship with God, they rejected his counsel and by doing so plunged themselves and their world into another chaos. Selfishness, shame, disease, and war began to rule the world, marring them and the creation.

Yet God continued to come to them seeking to rescue what sin had destroyed. Darkened in their understanding the people retreated in fear whenever God approached them and misunderstood his attempts to rescue them as the brutal punishment of an offended deity. They could no longer see who He was, nor how passionate He was to redeem them out of their brokenness and restore them to his glory. But He persisted, continuing to prepare His people for a day of greater revelation and the inauguration of a new creation.

In the fullness of time, God spoke again into the chaos of darkness. This, too, was a word of creation and light, but this time it was not in a voice, but a baby—-the Word made flesh now inside the creation. God sought to prove he was not distant and uncaring, by becoming one of us, embracing all that it meant to be human. Here he lived, he loved, he taught, he healed. He came to set us free, to invite us into the life-giving relationship that he himself enjoys with the Father.

He willingly gave up his life so that we and this world could be redeemed back to God. He came as a Son that he might reveal to us the Father. His life–who he was, what he did, and how he related to others—exactly reflected of God’s nature. If you want to know what God is like, we have only to look to him. This is the story of that man, Jesus – a man like no other!

Genesis 1-3, John 1:1-12, Galatians 4:1-4, Hebrews 1-5:3, 2:14-18

I don’t put YouTube videos on my blog very often. If memory serves me well, I think I’ve only done it twice. And I’m probably very late to this one since it has been viewed over three and half milliont times But this one touched me very deeply. Yes, you have to sit through a cheesy ad and it is from a pop TV show, but watch the story unfold. Incredible!

I know many don’t like the words to the song, but the sum total of this story and song struck a deep chord in my heart as I listened to it this weekend. No, I don’t agree with all the words of the song, but I do agree with the theme of it. God does want a world without war and will one day make it so. And there is perhaps no one better to proclaim that truth than someone who has been so impacted by it. I don’t know if I can tell you to enjoy this one, because if you’re like me you might need a box of Kleenex nearby. But its end your heart will feel triumphant as the purpose of God unfolds in our world. This is as close to God’s heart as anything I know. Only the selfish, greedy heart of broken humanity keep this from being a reality. Lord Jesus, come judge the world and set right what sin has so twisted!

For many people, the early stages of seeing through the illusion of religious performance, makes them feel as if they got lost. Suddenly they look around and it appears the whole landscape has changed. Places that used to help them now seem to hinder them. The old wells they used to drink from now taste dry and dusty. It’s easy to feel as if you’ve done something wrong, or got lost somehow. But as this recent email exchange will show, this isn’t the sign something is wrong, but just the effects of starting out on a different trail. Yes, that can be disorienting for a period of time. I’ve said this often, no one I’ve ever met who went down this trail didn’t find it well worth whatever price they paid to find it.

I feel as lost as lost can be. Not in the sense of “saved” but in the sense of where do I go from here, what does forward look like? That sort of lost. Nobody calls anymore…they’ve “given up on me.” You see I refuse their “fellowship.” But all they offer me is the same stuff…get in a group and serve the “body.” But the body they are referring to is the machine that ate up my soul, the machine that refuses to question anything it sets out to do. The machine that consumes it’s own like some crazed animal that devours its young.

Is this machine, the one Jesus created when He spoke of His “church”? Nobody in the machine gives the one thing that is precious, time. If I’m truly wrong ,my actions (or lack thereof) then why can’t they spend a couple of days (if necessary) to explain my error?

The answer to that last question is that I have come to believe that they cannot engage in the conversation because they know , they will also have to repent and they will be where I am, a VERY HARD PLACE. It’s just easier to to say, “look at him, he won’t GO to church he is in error…” The definition of “church” is a narrow one…only they fit in it. However I don’t think this is the “narrow way” Jesus spoke of…

Anyway here I am… lost

I actually love where you are. I don’t see you lost at all. You’ve awakened to a greater reality than they can see from where they are? You may feel lost but you’re not. You’re just living out of a different framework that finds the old guideposts to be unworkable. I think of it is people being disorientated. The reality I see doesn’t fit into the relationships I have. That’s a tough moment in this journey, no doubt, but if you truly are awakening to a different reality than they can see, that is the result. You’ve known “fellowship” with religious people. Having rejected the religious overlays that you now know kept you from a deepening relationship with God, you are a threat to people who find their comfort in their religious performance.

How could you not be? And be thankful they don’t have the resource of time to give you, because you probably wouldn’t find it of much help. The one thing I love about religious performance is that it keeps those trapped in it so busy and exhausted that they don’t have much time or energy to infect others with it.

You will find the grace to live in God’s revelation to you and NOT need the validation of those who serve in more religious ways. But it will take time. For now they seem only to make you question your own insights. What you discover going forward is a whole new set of relationships that live in God relationally and then you’ll discover a depth of fellowship you have to date only hungered for. I guess I’m saying don’t look for the old relationships to move with you on this journey as long as they find security in their religious activity. You’ll find a way to love them eventually, but look for the relationships God is bringing to your life now. Just love the next person God puts before you and see where that goes. And keep doing it every day. And soon you’ll find your life full of friends, maybe not all will be fellow-travelers, but they people God loves and with whom you can find friendship.

Weekly I’m asked by scores of people to recommend their blog, book, or podcast on my web page. I rarely do that because the shear number of them would make them all eventually meaningless. I trust God to alert me to those things I need to read and I share the ones I think God wants me to pass on.

One brother recently really touched my heart with his passion for a new website, but it seemed he could only see self-promotion as the way to gain an audience. I sensed he was a bit open for me to be really honest with him and to give him another option. I’ve heard back from him since I’ve written this and I have to see I was truly impressed with how graciously he grasped what I was saying and chose to let Jesus make his life available as he desires, rather than struggling in his own human passion to build an audience through self promotion.

Here’s what I wrote him. I thought others who are trying to find an online audience might find it helpful as well:

I’m glad you’re moving forward with some things that are on your heart. If I could, however, let me caution you about the process here. And I do this because I care about you and how you’re moving forward. And it isn’t so much wrong as it’s just the world’s way of doing things—-build an audience by getting people you know to do you a favor while also praying for great success. How do you measure that? By growing “audience share” or website hits?

I love your passion, but I think God would want it more directed at helping people live loved than them helping your website become known. What I love about the Internet is that people see through this pretty quickly and allows organic growth to happen effectively. When people are asked to “like” someone’s post, or pass it on to their friends, it has a strange feel to it. The truth is people will pass it on if they are touched by it. You don’t have to ask them. When people find you engaging, they will read and pass on the things God has put on your heart to share.

Kingdom growth is organic. It isn’t the result of people doing favors for someone they care about. Rather, it’s people trusting that God will take their voice as far as the want it to go. When I first began blogging and writing, it took me a long time to find my “voice.” Was I really communicating the things I wanted to say? Were people touched by it enough to read it or quote it to others? That’s along process and I know of no way to shortcut it. If too many people come to your blog or podcast too soon, they may form an opinion about it that would be totally different two years from now, but by then they are not coming back to read it.

I guess I’m suggesting another way to go here. Write or say what you think God gives you. See how people connect with it. Over the process you’ll find a “voice” that will resonate with people, because you are actually helping them find life in Jesus. When you find that voice people will pass along the website because of their passion for it, not because you asked them to do you a favor. Does that make sense? I know it is disappointing to those who think they have great stuff to say and no one to read it. I’ve been there. I understand that. But promotion shortcuts a better process of God working deeply in the heart as you find how his voice speaks through you.

I actually get hundreds of requests a month to “like” things, or to help promote someone’s book or website. If I did all that was asked at me, no one would have any regard for what I actually want to recommend. When I read things that touch my life and I think valuable for those who frequent my blog, I put them in. But I can’t do it as a personal favor even to people I care about without diluting the value of doing so. I hope you can appreciate that and not read this as being unsupportive of God’s work in your life, but supporting a truer work that I pray will allow you to freely share what God has put on your heart.

There’s a huge difference between self-promotion in hopes of gaining an audience, and making yourself available to the Father to encourage others on their journey. One may make you a sensation for a moment, but only for a very small minority, the other will transform you over a lifetime and your focus will be on loving the next person in front of you, instead of using them to advance your ministry.

I just got word that Editora Sextant has just released my fourth Authentic Relationships: The Lost Art of One Anothering in Portuguese for people in Brazil. It is called, Amar o próximo. This book I wrote with my brother, Clay, for Baker Books. Since Sextant isn’t a Christian publisher, it is amazing that they have done four books now that I had a hand in: The Shack, He Loves Me: Learning to Live in the Father’s Affection, So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore, and now Authentic Relationships.

From the cover design it looks like people might mistake it for a book on dating or romance, but it is not. It is designed to help believers take their growing friendship with Jesus and apply it to building deep friendships with other people in his family. We don’t have copies here, so you will either need to buy them through the publisher. English versions of course are sold through Lifestream.

I’ve truly been blessed by all the email I’ve received about The Jesus Lens since we started posting it a few months ago. I don’t do a lot of direct lecturing these days and this was a unique series with a lot of content. My hope in doing it was that people would be able to see that the Scriptures give us one consistent view of God if it is read as a story of the reality of God coming clearer as the story unfolds.

I was really blessed by this email I got last week from Europe. They had just finished listening to the audio version of The Jesus Lens available from the Lifestream Podcast.

What a service you have done for God’s people!

I’ve listened to all of The Jesus Lens. How I thank God for the lady who asked the very last question, prompting you to answer that what’s important to God’s heart is the direction you’re heading, not necessarily how close you are at the moment. I just broke out weeping for joy. I literally bawled for awhile as I drove. Such a relief! I still was struggling with some “brokenness” as you call it, that made me feel estranged or at least distant.

My heart shouted, “Yes, that’s it!” I had no “proof-text” at the moment to back up your perspective, but now, I have remembered Scripture that clearly supports that way of seeing it. But I was relieved by what my heart told me before the scriptural foundation came.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Today is the third day straight that I’ve had some wonderful time in Luke. (i was reading the gospels when I started listening to the Super Disc and haven’t gotten very far, because Scripture just wasn’t that attractive to me.) You succeeded in whetting my appetite for God’s written words. All of those hours and hours of careful preparation on your part were worth it, Friend.

And this is just the beginning! I can’t imagine what an impact this is going to have on God’s people around the globe! You are working on the book, aren’t you?

Actually, we are working on a book as well, but that will take some time. We are on target to have the DVDs finished by October 10. The price for this 3 DVD collection is $34.95, but for those who would like to order early you may do so now from Lifestream a pre-publication price of $30.00. This is for a limited time and we will ship the DVDs to you just as soon as we get them in stock. If you want to add other books or audio to this order, please be advised that they will all ship together when the DVDs arrive. If you want them earlier, please place as a separate order.

Here is a larger picture of the cover for those interested:

Trailview Media • 3 DVD set • $34.95 • Available only at Lifestream

I got two emails this morning that were incredibly encouraging as to how God works in people as they continue to learn to live loved. The journey can be ragged at time, especially in the early days. But as Father teaches us to live loved, it’s amazing what he can put behind us and the fresh pastures of life he leads us into. Enjoy these stories and know that God wants to shape his life in you, too.

The first is from a former pastor and his wife that went through a very difficult season that is not as uncommon as some might think:

My husband and I experienced the proverbial “boot” from the church he pastored three years ago. The issue interestingly, was that he taught everything from a foundation of grace. A handful of “reformed types” who saw that as dangerous, found a way to accuse him of something …. etc, etc … you know the story. Overnight, our whole family’s reputation was destroyed, and we were excommunicated.

A week after our lives were suddenly turned upside down, a friend brought over your book, So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore and we also discovered your podcast and listen to it regularly.

I know you’ve heard these stories a thousand times. The point I want to make is that you and Brad have “accompanied” us on this amazing journey. You clearly articulate so many things that we believe and teach and live … yet haven’t always had a clear way to express. A few weeks back you spoke about your experience with your former church. You called it a dying. We looked at each other and smiled. That is exactly what we have called our experience. A painful but wonderful death to having a good reputation, a “fruitful” ministry, being liked by many, the ability to provide for our family, being understood and believed in, and so on. We have remained in our little town, where we are seen as unrepentant people who have done something horrible (but nobody really understands what it is), so we are to be excluded from “fellowship.”

Jesus has abundantly provided for us materially. But best of all, He is never satisfied with death. He has brought so much new life in the place of those things that have died… and that needed to die. These past three years have been one of the most significant gifts that Jesus has given us. As deeply painful as it has been, His nearness, tender care, and love have been deeper still. We are so very grateful.

The second is from someone who had been an active volunteer in a larger congregation and found God inviting them to a bit of a different journey:

e have been in a good place for a long time. We experience Father’s love and freedom and we are delightfully learning how to love the people he puts in front of us each day. That expands out to the neighbors we never knew because we were too busy running off to our big church where we were grossly overworked.

That freedom to love has also expanded out to the people we work with. People we used to see only as people that happen to work for the same company we see now as walking the same journey, just at different places in the journey. We enjoy meeting new people and discovering the treasure that is hidden of who they are and the unique way Father has gifted them, it is fun to dig in and get to know them and understand how they perceive their life’s journey so far and where they think it is going. We are just quietly living in freedom and loving it.

In the confines of religious obligation, freedom looks incredibly scary. But from those who walk away from its bondage and lies, I continue to hear of a full and free life ahead in spacious places. We were never meant to find our security in the structures or expectations of men, but in the gracious love of an incredible Father.

I’ve been trying to write an update from Australia for the last week, but just have not had time. Every day has been packed with people and the opportunity to explore their hunger and passions. And now I’m overwhelmed to even try. This has been an incredible adventure in all the conversations I’ve had with people who are hungering to live loved and share that life with others in relational ways.

There’s no way to sum that up today. I started in Toowoomba at the invitation of the pastors in the city, getting to talk with them one morning, and then with a room full of people over the weekend. It was a large conversation, but I think God was able to unveil himself through it. I even had time to share at Teen Challenge with some of the young men just sorting out their lives. Unveiling a loving Father was something so foreign to them but so freeing as well. Then in the Gold Coast and Adelaide we continued conversations with people who had read or heard things I’ve been part of. A recurring theme has been helping people who have been overwhelmed by depression by trying to live out the dictates of legalism and religion and how God sets people free from that. The personal conversations on this trip have been even more incredible than the group dialogs. I love that.

Now in Sydney that time has continued to unfold. Friday night and Saturday we had another large group conversation and watched God just invite people into his life and freedom. Relaxing into God’s reality, seemed to be a recurring theme. We try so hard to attain what God simply wants to give. Learning to respond to God’s giving instead of striving so hard to get him to give us what we want is the only way to live. But it takes some time to learn that.

Then last night I sat with a small group of people over dinner who have recently come out of a highly-structured and tightly wound mega-church in the area. As they shared about all the ways their need for approval had been manipulated by the leaders of this congregation, and how many “ministers” from America had come here with their pompous demands for their personal care and how the people here were trained to satisfy their every whim was at quite sickening. But as the stories unfolded it got increasingly hilarious. And instead of the conversations leading to greater pain, the laughter seemed to heal and affirm what God had revealed to them as the celebrated the freedom God brought them. We laughed late into the night and had to finally tear ourselves away so people could go home.

What a conversation! What joy I have in finding new found friends here in Sydney. It has not been easy to move on from any of the places I have stayed here, but I go to a different part of Sydney today to see what God is doing in a more traditional congregation and then I get to spend a day with a long-time friend from down under, before boarding the big bird for home.

This has truly been an amazing trip from the first people I’ve met, until now. I am simply overwhelmed with joy at the people I get to meet and share in the work Father is doing in their lives.

‘Roos in the wild near Adelaide

Bondi Beach in Sydney