Disappointed With God

(click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

“I’ve spent a good portion of my life disappointed with God.”

That’s what he said, and it got me thinking.

Am I disappointed with God?  Have I been disappointed with God?  Was I ever disappointed with God?

I can’t think of a time when I was ever disappointed with God.

Oh sure, there have been a thousand times when things didn’t go the way I wanted them to go, but that didn’t make me disappointed with God.

Why not?

I guess it is because I always just figured that if things didn’t go the way I expected, it’s because I didn’t really know how things are supposed to work.

For example, there was the time as a baby Christian when I concluded that I didn’t have to lock up my bicycle anymore because God was going to protect me from theft.  Then I came home one day and found that my bicycle was gone!  Of course, I was disappointed, but I wasn’t disappointed with God.  I was just disappointed with the situation.  I thought things worked in a way that they actually don’t work.  I just recalibrated my thinking and moved forward in my walk with God.

A more serious example is when I was a Christian radio DJ, on the air daily, playing Christian music and ministry live on the radio, taking requests, talking to people, encouraging people in the faith, etc.  I also had a wife at home, and an increasing number of mouths to feed.  And being a little Christian radio DJ is not a great way to provide for a big family.

There’s an old joke in the radio industry:  what do a DJ and a large pizza have in common?  They can aaaaaaalmost feed a family of four.

I was praying things like, “God, I believe You have called me to this radio station, and yet I’m not making enough money.  I thought You were going to provide for my needs as I do Your will.”  Meanwhile, the owner of the station wanted me to get into advertising sales to help support both the station and myself.  But I didn’t want to.  I wanted to focus on the on-air ministry as a live DJ.  

Yes, that led to some frustrating days where I was expecting God to provide more money, meanwhile I was turning down my boss’s encouragement to get into sales.  Then I finally realized, “Well, I guess this isn’t how this is going to work.  God isn’t going to suddenly drop in money from heaven.  But meanwhile, I do have this opportunity.” So in the summer of 1992, with our fourth child on the way, I went off the air as a live DJ and began working in sales.  And that turned out to be a positive change in every way, for that whole ministry as well as for my family.

Disappointment with God never took root in me.  I just figured, hey, that’s not how this works.  Let’s move on.  And I would say, yes, God provided.  I saw it over and over.  But He provided through open doors and opportunities that came our way over and over and over again, thank You, God!

Have you ever been learning something new, and it was frustrating, and at times you wanted to quit?

I remember when I was first learning graphic design, using a computer program called CorelDraw.  I didn’t go to school for this.  I was already raising my own family, but the opportunity came.  I suddenly found myself editing a small newspaper, and I didn’t know what I was doing!

I was sitting at Kinko’s in Carbondale, Illinois late one night, because they had a computer with CorelDraw on it, and I had to get this newspaper edited before the deadline.  There was a certain ad that I needed to change, but I couldn’t change it.  Every time I clicked it, the whole thing highlighted and moved, but I couldn’t click just the text to change it.

I was going out of my mind!  It was late at night.  There was no Google to ask.  The Kinko’s worker didn’t know anything about it.  Back then you couldn’t even right click for a context menu.  Plus I was so tired by then.

Finally.  FINALLY I realized that the text inside the ad had been GROUPED TOGETHER.  I had never heard of things being grouped together.  I didn’t know you could group things together.  

Did I become disappointed with the CorelDraw corporation?  No.  I was just frustrated because I didn’t know how it was supposed to work.

And I think that is how people end up feeling disappointed with God.  It’s not that God is disappointing.  It’s that we don’t know how it’s supposed to work, so we burden our relationship with God with all these expectations, and then when our expectations aren’t met, we feel disappointed with God.  Some people walk away from God altogether for this.

What if I would have walked away from graphic design just because I didn’t know about grouping?  That would have been dumb, right?  

When things don’t work the way we expect, we don’t quit.  We figure out how they are supposed to work!

The same is true in our walk with God.  Of course it’s hard to figure out.

Isaiah 55:8-9 says, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts.”

Romans 11:33 says, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!”

In Job 11 it says, “Can you search out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limits of the Almighty? They are higher than heaven…their measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea.”

Psalm 147 says God’s understanding is infinite!

If we don’t even know how everything works in our favorite computer app, what makes us think we understand the workings of the infinite God?

There’s no room for disappointment.  We don’t get disappointed.  We just realize, “Hey, I guess that’s not how this thing works.  God, please teach me and show me and lead me.  Your ways are higher than my ways, so I put my faith and hope and trust in You.  Please help me to hear and to follow You every step of the way for the rest of my days…in Jesus’ name…”

Amen.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

I Will Walk at Liberty for I Seek Thy Precepts

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

How can you have more freedom by living with more restrictions?

It sounds counterintuitive.  It sounds like nonsense.

We want to be free to do whatever we want, whenever we want.  The more limits, the less freedom, right?  It’s a one-to-one ratio.

Yet we find a different concept in the Bible.

Psalm 119:45 says, “I will walk at liberty; for I seek Thy precepts.”

The precepts are God’s commands, His laws, His principles, His boundaries, His guidelines.  It’s God’s blueprint for how to live.

It says we can have liberty and freedom as we seek to live within His boundaries.

But there is something inside of us that doesn’t want boundaries.  Tell a man not to cross a line and some part of him is itching to do it.

And God lets us cross the line.  We have the free will to crisscross His boundaries all day long.

But there are consequences for crossing God’s boundaries, and one of the big ones is:  less freedom.

“No, Doug.  That sounds like MORE freedom.”

I know that’s what it looks like.  I’m trying to live within God’s boundaries, and let’s say someone else isn’t.  They can do things I won’t do.  They can say things I won’t say.  They can ingest things I won’t ingest, watch things I won’t watch, listen to things I won’t listen to, do things with their body I won’t do.  They sound way more free than I do, right?

And that’s what makes this Bible verse sound absurd, “I will walk at liberty for I seek Thy precepts.”

Now let’s look at what Jesus said in John chapter eight.  In verse 34 He said that whoever sins is a slave of sin.

Sin is anything outside God’s boundaries.  We are all free to exercise our freedom INSIDE God’s boundaries, but as soon as we step OUTSIDE of His boundaries we are now in a territory called sin.

And Jesus said that whoever steps into that territory of sin becomes a slave of sin.

And being a slave is the opposite of being free.

That’s why Psalm 119:45 says, “I will walk at liberty for I seek Thy precepts.”

When we seek His precepts, we are seeking to know God’s boundaries.  Where are the lines?  I want to know where the lines are so I can stay in freedom and out of sin so I don’t become a slave of sin.

Now when we think of slavery, we think of being forced to do things we don’t want to do.  Sin, on the other hand, is often what we DO want to do, so how is that slavery?

It’s slavery because listen:  sin always traps you in circumstances you don’t want to be in.

I’ll say it again.  Sin always traps you in circumstances you don’t want to be in.  That’s the slavery.

So yeah, you might think of a sin and how much you want to do it.  That’s called temptation.  It’s the treat inside the trap.  It’s the bait hiding the hook.  God said don’t do it, but you WANT to do it, and you want to be free to do it, and God seems like a killjoy when He says, “Don’t.”

You can go ahead and do it, but if you sin, you’re going to find that there’s always WAY more to it than the thrill on the surface.  Sin ALWAYS traps you in circumstances you don’t want to be in.

That’s why God gives us boundaries.  He wants us to be free, and His words help us to live free.  Psalm 119:103 says, “How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!”

Verse 44 says, “So shall I keep Thy law continually for ever and ever.”

And verse 45 says, “And I will walk at liberty; for I seek Thy precepts.”

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

Be the Big Stroller Wheel

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

Yay, it’s time to go to the festival!

Thankfully you have an umbrella stroller for the baby.  Just unfold it, strap him in, and off you go.

Watch out for rocks, though.  And uneven sidewalks.  And sticks.  

In fact, just watch out for everything, because the wheels on an umbrella stroller are so janky that even a pebble can potentially block the wheel.

On the other end of the stroller spectrum is the jogging stroller.  You can actually run with a jogging stroller and its big wheels will easily roll over all the little obstacles, giving baby a smooth ride.

This is a good illustration for life, because as you know, life is full of little obstacles that can stop you in your tracks.  But listen:  they don’t have to.

You can approach life as a little janky hard plastic stroller wheel, or you can approach life as a big shock absorbing jogging stroller wheel.

When little hard wheels hit an obstacle there is a noticeable lurch.  It can even stop you in your tracks.  And that’s how some people are with little offenses.  They take the hit.  It stops them in their tracks.  It gets them off course.  They get upset.  They get angry.  How dare you!

But some people have learned how to be the big stroller wheel.  When little offenses come their way, they roll right over them, hardly even noticing.  There is no lurch.  They aren’t stopped in their tracks.  They don’t get knocked off course.  They don’t get upset.  They don’t angry.  They don’t scream, “How dare you!”  They just keep going because, like a big stroller wheel, they had the ability to glide right over all the little offenses.

You can tell the little stroller wheels because they are prickly about everything.  All the little offenses stop them.  And they have to stop and talk about them, over and over.  “I’ll never forget what so and so did to me.”

It’s so much better to be the big stroller wheel and just roll past offenses.  You have things to do, places to go, missions to accomplish.  You can’t be stopped by every little offense, so like a big stroller wheel, just smoothly roll right over them.

Proverbs 19:11 says a wise man is slow to anger and overlooks offenses.  That’s the big stroller wheel!  It just rolls over offenses and keeps going.

If you want to make your life so much better, get rid of the umbrella stroller attitude.  Stop getting hung up on every little offense.  It’s not worth it, and babies get dumped in the process.

Instead, be the big stroller wheel.  Be the wise person from Proverbs 19:11 who knows when to overlook an offense and just keep rolling.

You’ll get farther.  You’ll go faster.  And no babies will be harmed in the process.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

 

The Construction Principles of the Carpenter

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

“The bathtub has arrived!”

A huge man waddles in carrying a heavy bathtub.

It’s a new house.  The walls are up.  The smell of sawdust is in the air.  And it’s time to install the bathtub.

The man sets it down in the only place it can go, touching the walls on three sides.  Then he looks down the drain and says, “Uh oh.”

Uh oh.  That is something you never want to hear.  You don’t want to hear it from your dentist.  You don’t want to hear it from your potty-training toddler.  And you sure don’t want to hear it from your plumber.

What happened was, he set the bathtub down, looked down the drain hole, and what did he see?  He should have seen nothing but a black hole, but instead he saw the floor.  No hole.  No drain.

What he didn’t know was that a few weeks earlier, when his assistant was installing the tub drain pipe, he didn’t follow the blueprint.  He installed the drain where he THOUGHT it should go.  He followed his gut, not the blueprint.

That’s a disaster, right?

But we do that daily with the blueprint of life.

What is the blueprint of life?

Jesus talks about the blueprint of life at the end of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter seven.  He actually gives us a construction analogy.

He said, “Whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who builds his house…”

There’s your construction analogy.  He compares building our life to building a house.  And he compares His teachings to the house’s blueprint.  A blueprint tells you how to build a house, and God’s word tells you how to build your life.

A blueprint is drawn up by an architect.  The architect is the designer.  

In life we have an architect with a capital A.  It’s the Lord God Almighty, creator of heaven and earth.  And we have a blueprint with a capital B.  It’s the Word of God, the Scriptures, the Bible.

But we often don’t treat the Bible like a blueprint.  We treat it like an optional book of wisdom that we don’t really have to pay all that much attention to.

And we pay a price for it.

To the degree that we follow God’s blueprint is the degree to which we build our life well.  And to the degree that we don’t follow God’s blueprint is the degree to which we build our life poorly.

A good architect thinks of all the details ahead of time.  He fits everything together perfectly, but the builder has to follow the blueprint or things WON’T fit together perfectly.  In fact, if the builder messes up just a few things, that building project will become a royal disaster very quickly.

The same is true for our life.  If we follow God’s Word fairly well, but we decide that we know better in just a few things, it’s not going to work.  

Some people say, “Oh, I don’t want to be all LEGALISTIC.”  But imagine this.  You’re spending a half a million dollars to build your new dream home, and your architect has cooked up a beautiful blueprint.  Do you want the builder to be legalistic about following your blueprint?  Of course you do!  This is your home and you want it done right.

And when it comes to our life, don’t we want to build well?  Don’t we want a good life that is solid and holds up under the pressure of the elements?

Jesus told us how to do that.  “Whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.”

We can build our life well if we build according to the Blueprint with a capital B, drawn up by the Architect with a capital A.

And this is what I call The Construction Principles of the Carpenter.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

Take Heed How You Hear

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

Jesus said something that sounds almost cruel.

He said, “Whoever has, to him more will be given, and whoever does not have, even what he seems to have will be taken from him.”

That sounds like the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

So let’s look at this verse more closely.  It’s Luke 8:18 and it says, “Therefore take heed how you hear. For whoever has, to him more will be given; and whoever does not have, even what he seems to have will be taken from him.”

This can be a hard verse to understand, but the key is in the beginning when Jesus said, “Take heed how you hear.”

The words “take heed” are a warning.  It’s saying watch out, be careful how you listen.

Are you being careful how you listen?  

You can’t just open up your brain and dump everything in!  You have to listen with an ear toward wisdom.

Proverbs 2:2 says, “incline your ear to wisdom.”

The NIV says:  tune your ear to wisdom.

On your radio you “tune in” to a radio station.  When listening we need to tune in for wisdom and truth.

Be careful how you listen.

Take heed how you hear.

So what did Jesus mean when He said, “For whoever has, to him more will be given, and whoever does not have, even what he seems to have will be taken from him”?

It all starts with this tiny bit of wisdom to listen carefully.  You have to be smart enough to know that not everything is true.  Not everything is wise.  Not everything is godly.  Not everything is helpful.

You have to be smart enough to know that some things you shouldn’t listen to at all.  There is poison.  There are lies.  There is foolishness.  There is evil.  You have to be careful how you hear.

If you start there, then when you listen you will be tuning in for wisdom and truth.  And when you tune in to hear wisdom and truth specifically, you will hear it!  

This is what Jesus meant when He said, “To him who has, more will be given.”  

When you listen for wisdom and truth, you will hear it, and you will learn, and you will grow.  More will be given to you.  And the wiser you grow, the more wise you will be in discerning what you hear.  It has an exponential effect.

But what about the poor guy who apparently doesn’t have anything, and even what he seems to have is taken away from him?

That’s the guy who DOESN’T take heed how he hears.  He isn’t careful about what he listens to.  He listens to any old thing and lets it take root in his brain.  

It can SEEM like he has wisdom and truth because he has a lot of DATA.  But if he isn’t careful about it, he is letting in a host of foolishness and ignorance and even lies.  Steve Taylor wrote a song that said, “He’s so open minded that his brains leaked out.”  If he keeps letting all this in, eventually even what wisdom he SEEMED to have will be gone.  Any wisdom he seemed to have will be washed away in a flood of information.

Proverbs 1:5 says a wise man will hear and increase learning.  The only way that happens is if you listen with a discerning ear.

If you are careful about what you listen to.

If you take heed how you hear.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

Food Glorious Food

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

I was talking to an evolutionist, the kind that believes that everything evolved from nothing after a big bang.

I said, “Just look at food, for example.  You think it just evolved on this big rock hurtling through space after a big bang?”

“Well, it took billions of years,” he said.

“Always with the billions of years,” I said.  “Incredible complexity rising from simplicity after starting with nothing, just given enough zeros on the calendar.”

I said, “Look at this banana.”

“I’m looking,” he said.

“Look at this astounding bright yellow color.  It’s magnificent!  It’s beautiful to the eyes!  I’m so glad it evolved into something beautiful.”

But wait. There’s more!

When you pick up a banana, it’s smooth to the touch.

When you peel a banana, it’s ready to eat!  No special preparations needed.

And when you eat a banana, it tastes good!  You’re saying that by some miracle of evolution a banana evolved so that when we eat it, it tastes good?

Okay, not everyone likes bananas, but get this.  Bananas are the biggest selling item at Walmart.  Let that sink in.  

So they taste good, but here’s where it really gets deep.  Bananas are good for you!  I’ve read that bananas have actually helped keep much of the world alive.

To say something is “good for you” sounds trite, but look at what it takes for something to be good for you.  It takes a miracle!

You can eat this thing, your body receives it gladly, it goes into your stomach, your stomach perfectly knows how to handle it, and your body turns it into all the vital things that bananas provide for us.

So you would have to say that the human body evolved perfectly to have eyes to see an attractive banana, have hands to get that banana, have taste buds to enjoy that banana, a stomach to digest that banana, and then at the micro level all the things the body does after that at an increasingly smaller level to keep us alive and well.

And that’s just the banana.  We could talk about apples and oranges (by the way, Americans eat more bananas than apples and oranges combined, just sayin’).  We could talk about potatoes and peanuts and on and on and on.  We live in a world exploding with food glorious food!  If you don’t like this or that, there’s plenty more!

All this bounty and no one to thank…except the processes of evolution times billions of years.

I don’t think so.  I want to give credit where credit is due.  I thank our Creator God for His abundant creation, so astounding in every little detail: food that looks good and tastes good and is good for us.  And our bodies that know what to do with it.

So yes, I bow my head to pray before a meal.  I do it at home, and I do it in public.  I’m just so thankful, and so impressed and amazed at how it all works together, and God did it!  Isn’t He wonderful?

He gave us food glorious food!

Thank You, Heavenly Father, for Your wonderful work in creating food for us to enjoy.

Amen.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.

The Highway of Holiness

(Click to listen)

I’m Doug Apple...and my heart is on fire.  (Luke 24:32)

A highway is a road built up to make travel easier.

That’s what the footnote in my Bible says under Isaiah chapter 35 verse 8.

That verse is talking about a highway, so the footnote tells us what a highway is.  It’s a road built up to make travel easier.

You aren’t going through the mud on a highway.

You aren’t going through the briars and the thorns.  My grandma called it “the thicket.”

A highway makes travel easy.  It’s a piece of cake traveling on a highway, so smooth and level and wide.  It’s a pleasure.  It’s a joy!

On the other hand, traveling OFF the highway is NOT smooth.  It IS muddy.  There ARE thorns and thickets.  You have to slow down and stop and keep getting your bearings.  “Where am I now?”  You ask that question a lot when you get off the “hard road” as Grandma called it.  “Where am I?”

So a highway is a road built up to make travel easier, and Isaiah 35:8 is talking about a highway.  This highway has a name.  It’s called The Way of Holiness.

Sometimes we get weird with this word “holy” and “holiness,” but it’s not weird at all.  It’s a road built up to make travel easier.

What???  That doesn’t sound very doctrinal and theological.

Well what is holiness?  It’s a purity, a moral purity in the presence of God.

We get weird about the word purity, too, but put it in the highway context.

Do you want your highway to be pure, to be as free as possible from bumps and cracks and potholes?  We want the highway department to make the highway as smooth as possible.

Well on the highway of life, it is holiness, it is purity that makes the road as smooth as possible.  If you want to travel fast and light, the Highway of Holiness is the way to go.

Isaiah 35:8 says that the unclean, the evil-minded will not travel on the way of holiness.  Of course they won’t, and they suffer for it.

To the degree that you are not living a holy life, that is the degree to which you are driving off the road.  No wonder it’s bumpy and scratchy and leaves you wondering, “Where am I?”  You’re off the road.

Traveling on the Highway of Holiness means living within God’s parameters.  Highways have boundaries.  When you drive within the boundaries, it’s a smooth ride.  When you think, “I’ll be free!  I’ll drive wherever I please!” you’re asking for a really bad ride.

And if you’re paying attention, you see that it’s true.  Sin brings bumps in the road.  Big sins bring big bumps in the road.  Living a life of sin is just full of obstacles.  It’s not a highway at all, or even a road.  It’s like driving into a thicket and thinking you’re going somewhere.  You aren’t.  My grandma is looking at your car in the thicket and asking, “What are you doing?”

The highway is a road built up to make travel easier.  Isaiah 35:8 talks about the Highway of Holiness, and when we steer our life within God’s holy boundaries, wonderful things happen.  

Isaiah says there are no lions or ravenous beasts on that highway.  It’s a smooth and clear path for the redeemed.

On the Highway of Holiness there is singing and everlasting joy!  Sorrow and mourning will flee away, and the people will be filled with joy and gladness.

How can that be?  Because the Creator, God the Father Himself, is ever present on the Highway of Holiness!  He is there, full of life and love and joy and peace.  His mercy is forever.  He loves us and has created a highway for us to live on, a highway that’s built up to make travel easier.

It’s the Highway of Holiness, and when we live within its boundaries, we will find that traveling through this life has never been better.

Amen.

May God bless you today.

I’m Doug Apple.