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What happened between these two photos? 

Life!   Forty years of it, that transformed two naïve lovers into a couple that really gets each other and who are still celebrating an ever-deepening love and appreciation of each other.

It’s amazing what forty years and tons of grace will do.  Through those years we’ve celebrated together with overwhelming joys and cried together though mind-numbing sorrow; we’ve known the drudgery of mundane days and the simple pleasures of long walks, deep conversation and hilarious laughter that would have made sense to no one but us; we’ve fought with each other and our own frailties enduring seasons of frustration that seemed so dark; and at every turn and we’ve discovered things about each other that only made them more endearing. 

The one constant has been that we’ve always found our way to each other as our affection has grown. The idealism of our youth has been forged by time, circumstance, and no small measure of grace into an ever more precious treasure that we savor today with the contentedness only long-term love can know. We are far different people than we were when we started out, but what we have become wouldn’t be possible with out the other—their patience, their perseverance, and their love.

I have great memories of that college sweetheart I married 40 years ago, but I wouldn’t trade her for the woman she has become.  She is so much more a complete human being and an absolute delight to share life with.

Sara, on our 40th anniversary, I want you to know how much I adore you for all the beauty and joy you’ve added to my world; how much I admire you for your wisdom and all that you have faced and overcome, and I appreciate you being faithful to every promise we made so long ago.  I could not imagine having lived my life without you. You are the most important ingredient in everything I’ve done.  None of it would have happened without your support, friendship, and love.

You are the greatest gift God has put in my life and I will love you more each day we have together.

What a crazy week this has been.  After a worldwind trip around Florida I returned on Monday. What an amazing trip.  I started in Daytona Beach, spent a few days in the Orlando area, then a week teaching The Jesus Lens at a YWAM base in Sarasota through a German translator.  After which I finished up in West Palm Beach reconnecting with some old friends and enjoying time with some new ones.  This was a wonderful trip and I met so many people who are learning to live in the reality of Father’s affection and break free fo the trappings of religious obligation and performance.  I am always amazed by what God lets me do in the world and who he gives me to know.  And I admire the courage of so many who are willing to take the road less traveled even when suffering the judgment and abuse of friends and family who regard them now with suspicion simply for rejecting the idea that Jesus came to start a religion.  He didn’t.  He came to invite us alongside his Father, to freely embrace his love and to freely share it in the world.  

I only had a couple of days to re-orient from the trip, try to catch-up on my email backlog and make the few appointments I had previous scheduled before the lead producer, Kevin, and the screen writer, Angela, for the movie adaptation of So You Don’t Want To Go To Church Anymore arrive for a weekend of trying to finalize the script.  Tomorrow someone else, Eugene, will join us who might be the director of this picture.  I am still amazed that this book is making progress through the machinery that tries to cough out a movie.  

But I’ve had a lot of fun living inside the story again. Tentatively called, “Out of the Game,” it takes the major parts of that story and reshapes them in a way that will help it communicate with a different audience on the big screen.   I’ve enjoyed working with all the people on this project and the passion they have shown for this story. We’re still not agreed on every detail, but having just finished my most recent read of the manuscript, I’m convinced we’re getting very close.  So the next three days we will be refining the screenplay as well as making some critical decisions about moving the process forward.  And on Saturday we wil be sitting with a group of actors who will read through it so we can see how the dialog sounds in their mouths.  It’s an adventure to be sure and I love at this stage of my life revisiting that story and my own life being a bit re-shaped by it.   I don’t usually get touched reading my own words, but some of this I worked on fifteen years ago and have enjoyed the re-focus and the gracious invitation of a Father into a life better lived in the security of his affection rather than the rabid fears religion often uses to make people conform.  Only about 15% of the projects that get this far actually get made.  There are so many parts that have t come together for this to work.  So, we’ll see.  One step at a time.

And for those who ask about the film adaptation of The Shack, that is still in process as well.  Lionsgate is the studio and they’ve already selected a director and are now workiing to cast the movie and schedule production.  There is no clear release date on this movie though it should be sometime late in 2015 or early in 2016.  There are lots of rumors floating around about who is involved.  Just remember, Hollywood types do a lot of negotiation and compete for media attention by using rumors and leaks.  Until you read, “Lionsgate announces…”, don’t believe everything you read.  

Everywhere I go people continue to ask me about our friends in Kenya and especially the need in West Pokot.  I appreciate that so many people are aware of this and continue to pray and give to help us rescue so many people who are in great need in that part of the world.  It is truly a human catastrophe with many people dying and a great need to help them build a new economy.  

I met last week with someone who is attached to a development agency that is already in that area of Kenya, in Turkana right next door.  They help tribes address the five basic needs to build a society:  water, food, wellness, education, and generating income.  The work with the tribe to help them identify their most pressing need and then begin to act as a tribe to help fulfill that need.  They they take on the next one. The plan is that in five years the tribe will address each of those needs and with outside training and resource be able to build a sustainable economy.  They have had great success throughout Asia and Africa and I’m set to speak with some of their people tomorrow.  I hope this will provide an approach that will let us wrap our hearts around part of the need and move it beyond relief to actually develop a future and hope.  They do it for a cost of $15,000 per year for five years and the people are left with their needs addressed and resources for their culture to progress. 

While I’m hopeful this might be an answer, I continue to hear of the great need in West Pokot.  This morning I heard from one of the people we work with there:  

“Last week I had a call from the doctor that elderly and the children have camped at the dispensary in large number since yesterday. The hunger has drived them from the village. If there is anyway to support them for the food it will be highly appreciated because it has affected the dispensary budget.  I went to the dispensary this week and brother Wayne, the situation here is extremely bad.  Many people have migrated from the village and camp to the hospital environment, because of the hunger, it has forced even the doctors and nurses to be overwhelmed due to this crucial situation and I met the doctors when they have started cooking the maize and beans to safe at least the situation for both the sick and those who had camped, many children women and Old were more totally affected, the old who are strong had tried to come in the hospital thinking that they will get meal and some who are not able to walk they have remain at their home helplessly. This situation has become worse and worse every day. The cry of doctors and Nurses is that if we can be able to get estimated 600 bags maize and beans it can help to save the situation for breast mothers, children and old aged, this can save a bit for about two to three months in this surrounding hospital village.  If not we may lose the lives of many.

So immediately we start distributing as you may see in the pictures, this has help a bit the congestion from the dispensary.  You have become, the father to the fatherless and the comfort to those who don’t even deserve, we urge you to support where necessary in this point. 

Pray for us….  

I have attached some of the other pictures below.  These are all huge challenges, and I’m always blessed by the Kenyan people we know in Kitale who are spending of their time and resource to help these impoverished people.  If any of these needs interest you and you’d like to underwrite it, please let me know. If you’d like to help with offerings that we can share, that would be great blessing as well. Our best guess now is that we’ll be putting about $40,000 into Kenya over the next few months as God provides.  If you have extra to pass along for the people of West Pokot you can direct it through Lifestream as contributions are tax-deductible in the US.  As always, every dollar you send goes to the need in Kenya.  We do not (nor do they) take out any administrative or money transfer fees.  If you would like to be part of this to support these brothers and sisters and see the gospel grow in this part of Africa, please 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 Newbury Rd Ste 1  •  Newbury Park, CA 91320. Or if you prefer, we can take your donation over the phone at (805) 498-7774.

Here are the young children gathering early in the morning at the dispensary hoping from some food, more people gather hoping for help, and distributing what little grain they had from the truck.  Not everyone in line got food this day.  There wasn’t enough.  

The last few weeks have been filled with family and friends during this end-of-the-year season and I was able to complete my latest book.  But more on that below.  This last week has been a refreshing and restful time.  I had a three-hour drive with my 89-year old dad just after Christmas getting him back to his home and we got to talking about his childhood, my childhood, any regrets about his journey, and how God has been faithful through the years.  It encompassed the span of both of our lives and was one of those conversations I will remember for the rest of my life.  I think many people would love to have that kind of time with their parents before they go, but never seem to find the time or the questions to let it open up.  Trust me, find the time!  Ask the simple questions of “What were your parents like?”  “What do you remember most from grade school years?”  “Any regrets?”  We fell into a very natural conversation when my dad was especially talkative.  I am blessed with a rich heritage of faith for sure, but I also Dad and I see things quite differently at times.  It was great to see God and the world through his eyes for those three hours and I learned an awful lot I didn’t know about my dad and his life.   

On New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day we connected with two couples that we’ve been close to for almost 40 years, meeting at a congregation where I had my first vocational “ministry” position.  They were also part of my time in Visalia.  We had almost 24 hours together to share our friendship and catching up on each other’s lives—both the struggles and joys of being on this journey.  There is a rich heritage, too, of relationships that we have cultivated over many years and through many twists in the road.  The fellowship was rich an the conversation filled with life.  What a graet mini-retreat!  

I’ve also had much more opportunity for personal encounters with people at propitious moments in their journey.  I find my heart leaning more away from “group” meetings and more toward pro-longed conversations with people engaged in a transformative journey with Jesus.  There are an increasing number of people that just want to stop by Newbuyr Park over lunch or a beverage to share this journey and I find when I’m on the road that the personal conversations have been so fruitful.  So I don’t know what the year holds there.  As I move into this stage of our my journey I much more appreciate the honesty, open conversation with a few rather than trying to facilitate it with a large group. I’m sure I will still do both, but excited that the shift seems to be moving more toward personal engagements where more transformative topics seem to come up and deep friendships often result.  This week while Sara and I were visiting in Central California two people heavily engaged with a congregation nearby wanted to meet with me. We spent a couple of hours together over coffee first and then some pizza.  Great conversation.  I love what one of them wrote about their conversation back home:

Thank you again Wayne for spending time with us today!  As we got into the car after lunch, I asked my friend, “So, what’d you think?”  He said that you are the same in person as you are in your books & emails—authentic & friendly!  I’d say it doesn’t get much better than that! Thanks again for all of your hard work, and all of your writings! The “Jake” book totally grabbed me & authenticated my Journey…  “He Loves Me” reiterated what I already knew, but even more.   “Finding Church” has really left me at peace.

No, it doesn’t get any better than that.  “Authentic and friendly,” is what I hope people see in my life however they engage me.  I’ve met many an author or speaker who seemed to be in private the exact opposite of the personna they cultivated for the public.  I’ve never wanted to be that guy and that brief note blew me away.  I am so grateful at Father’s love has shaped in my life.  So grateful.  Believe me, such things have not always been said of me.  

My Christmas project this year was to put together over 850 pictures that our photographers took on our trip to Israel last February.  What a daunting task to cull through the pictures and chose those that could capture the trip and the people who joines us there.  If you want to have a peak, you can view it here.  It has amazed me how much that group of 40 people has stayed connected in the months since. They have visited each other even across countries and continents, and stayed in contact through a private Facebook page as they continue to cheer each other on in the amazing journey of life.  We really did come to Israel as strangers and left having become a part of a larger family.  Many people have bugged me about going back at some point and I probably will when my daughter’s kids get old enough so that she can go.  That may be three to four years out, but nonetheless a possibility. And if some of you want to join us for that, I’ll go through all of this again!  

Finally, lots of incredible doors are opening up with Finding Church, that I’ll be more free to talk about in the weeks ahead as we try to sort out which way the Spirit is blowing us. The emails I get about the book have been much appreciated as are the thirty-one people have posted reviews on Amazon.com, even the guy who only thought it deserved two stars.  He seemed to have missed the point but he took a chance to read the book, which I think is awesome.  

As I look forward to 2015, I don’t start with a lot of personal goals, but I have an expectancy that God and I will continue this incredible journey and that he’ll allow me to help some others along it as well.  At this point I have little scheduled and even less planned, but I couldn’t be more excited about what might unfold.  I pray you too will have a fruitful year ahead and that we’ll all be a bit more free of our own hopes and dreamss to see his unfolding right in front of us!