It was "men's church" at the jail last night; about 18 guys showed, and over half were there at the last meeting, and one fella that looked vaguely familiar, and he told me he was in jail 12 years ago, and remembered me too. 

The one thing I know now, more than ever is, you can't read a person by their looks. Time and again, the meanest looking turn out to be the most gentle and the most open. 

The first fella to arrive, introduced himself as a street preacher, and I sensed the Holy Spirit in him but his mission seemed to be the unraveling of end times prophecy and he had a graph he's been working on and was itching to show it to me. I was rescued by the arriving men, and I prayed in the meeting. 

I preached on Matt. 6:22-23 "The eye is the lamp of the body." 

The presence of God hovered in and over the meeting, and every man's eye was on me: they were engaged! This is His power and His love that pours out, calling them to Himself: and I can tell you there is no place I'd rather be than in that rushing, surging tide of grace!  

Christ's words plumbed the depth of sin and His grace beamed with an almost irresistible glory. Believe me, you can feel it when the hearts relates, is convicted and is looking for mercy. 

Before I closed I made an appeal for prayer for any special needs, no one spoke up, so I began praying for every child the men have, every waiting spouse, every weeping parent and grandparent, and every lamenting sibling and loved one. This was the Holy Spirit's grandest entrance, almost like a "mighty wind." 

When I finished, one fella, that struck me as one of the most innocent, asked if I would pray for his wife, he then revealed that after he was incarcerated she fell into depression, and then, on top of all the upheaval, her beloved dog died, and ultimately she relapsed, and is now out selling herself on the streets to feed her Fentanyl habit. I was stunned. He wasn't angry, no jealousy or shame, no nothing, his only thought was for her safety, he just wanted God to protect her. 

The world of darkness can reduce us in ways we never imagined; and it's depth of evil is beyond calculation; only satisfied when we forfeit our souls. 

 

 

At times, when sorrow weighs us down or a hard duty rises before us, we still find enough light within to pray with a lifted heart. In that quiet surrender, God seems near—gathering us into a vast deliverance. The soul turns inward and sees His light; it reaches outward and feels His strength.

Then we step over fear and labor with a new resolve. Even sorrow is transfigured—its clouds glowing with a solemn beauty, like a sky lit from within. They hang above us not as threats, but as a sheltering fire, or as the high mountains of another world—terrible, yet strangely a place we could remain, even beneath the rumble of what we cannot escape.

What once loomed so large to our anxious sight shrinks into smallness before a wider vision. Troubles that felt like floods become as dew upon the grass. The world itself, with all its noise and striving, seems a quiet sphere, drifting in the depths of heaven.

Such moments come to every tested and faithful soul. They hold more true life than years spent in routine and striving. They become our inner landmarks—steady lights that remain long after, reminding us how deeply our spirit shapes what we see above us.

We romanticize the past because fear has been stripped away from it.

We spoil the present because fear still clouds it.

The tragedy is that life keeps proving we can survive the worst—

yet we cannot stop fearing the next thing.

Understanding why fear is part of our story might be the key to wisdom itself.

That's the point of the following quote by Arthur C. Benson ---

"After living a full life—seeing much, enjoying much, and enduring much—a person often looks back and feels a quiet dissatisfaction.

Their days weren’t ruined, but they were always slightly shadowed by the sense that happiness was never quite as pure as they had hope.

So they turn their thoughts to the old scenes of love and companionship.

They call up memories from the darkness, like flipping through an old photo album, and gently retouch them.

They remove the worries, the disappointments, and especially the fears—transforming the past not into what it actually was,

but into what it might have been: warmer, softer, more golden.

Thomas Carlyle nailed it when he said the reason memories of the past always look so beautiful is because the fear has been taken out of them.

It is fear of what may happen and what must eventually happen that overshadows our present happiness.

Remove fear, and we would be truly happy.

Yet here’s the strange paradox: even though we’ve survived our darkest and saddest experiences completely unscathed,

we never seem to learn not to be afraid.

If we could only understand why fear is woven so deeply into human life,

we would have solved a great part of the riddle of the world."

It's no mystery why the Bible says "Fear not" near 365 times.

“He took her by the hand and lifted her up, and immediately the fever left her; and she ministered unto them.” — Mark I: 31.

Mark had a very active mind, perhaps the most active of the four evangelists. He delights to record not words, but deeds. I do not think that any of the others, after telling of this woman’s cure, would have immediately added, “and she ministered unto them.” The sequel is not what we should expect. When an invalid rises from fever, we expect others to minister to her and help repair the ravages of disease. Matthew, after describing the healing of Jairus’s daughter, records Jesus’ command that “something should be given her to eat.” No doubt the time came when she, too, ministered to the household; but Matthew does not go on to say so. He leaves the scene at the bedside.

Is Mark, then, less sympathetic? Is it a lack of sentiment that makes him hasten to tell us how soon this woman was back at her work? No; I think it is the opposite. Mark sees that the great use of a temporary burden is the power it gives for human service. This is a side of suffering we seldom consider. We rarely think of sickness as preparation for deeper usefulness. But Mark does; to him, that is its glory. The woman raised from the bed of fever is not merely restored; she is enlarged. She is in a better state than if she had never been ill. The illness has become an enrichment. And her new spirit of service must have been to her friends as great a surprise, and as great a miracle, as her healing.

“Faith which works by love” Gal. 5:6

 “The amount of faith we place in others is quite out of proportion to our actual knowledge of them. 

You will see two girls, in the course of just a few hours, becoming mutual confidantes. 

Why is this? 

It is because they have taken a liking to one another. 

Their faith in each other has had nothing to build upon but love. 

There has not been time for experience. 

Love is the anticipator of experience. 

Love pays in advance; it gives the money before it receives the thing. 

Divine love is no exception. 

God pays humanity in advance for services not yet rendered; 

I suppose that is what the prophet means when he cries, 

“Behold! His reward is with Him and His work before Him!” 

Love gives its confidence in advance. It does not wait for proof. 

It does not linger for corroboration. It does not suspend its trust until its object is weighed in the balance. 

It surrenders its faith unpaid for.

My friend, let this be your faith in your fellow human! 

Do not wait until you have proven them! 

You look out upon the lapsed masses; you see no beauty to be desired in them. 

Will you then let them go? 

Is your faith to be dependent on sight? 

Not if you love. 

If you love your lapsed brother, you will hope all things for him. 

Love gives the benefit of the doubt to those who seem unpromising. 

Love imputes its own righteousness to those who are still in shadow. 

Love believes in tomorrow for those in a dark today. 

My friend, if you love, you will believe that all things are possible for humanity. 

Though as yet you see no rainbow, though as yet you hear no bells across the snow, though as yet there has come from the waters not even an olive branch of peace, still you will believe. 

Love itself shall be your rainbow; love itself shall be your bell of hope; love itself shall be your message from the flood. 

Humanity is still climbing the Dolorous Way—fainting beneath her crosses, groaning amid her thorns. 

Do not wait till she has conquered, do not wait till she is crowned! 

Go out to meet her in her climbing! Go out to greet her in her night! Go out to own her in her rags! 

Take up her bitter cross and call it yours! 

And if people say to you, “Why do you dare to hope for these withered leaves?” 

lay your hand upon your heart and say, “Love believes all things!”

George Matheson. 

Inner Peace: Why God Sometimes Takes It Away

  

This deep inward peace and quietness of soul is such a priceless gift that God sometimes raises its value by temporarily removing it. 

Ordinary blessings are often taken for granted—

until they’re lost and then restored, at which point they feel extraordinary.

It’s completely normal to sit at your desk or go about your daily work without a second thought. 

But if you get seriously ill and can’t even step into your workplace for five or six weeks, then when you finally manage to return for just one day, you think, “What an amazing blessing this is!”

 The same is true with health. When you’re strong and can travel three, four or five miles a day, and barely notice it. 

But after you’ve been at death’s door and start to recover, even the simple ability to move your hand or stir your leg in bed fills you with gratitude: “I can actually move! What an extraordinary mercy!”

Inner peace works exactly the same way. As long as it flows without interruption, we treat it as ordinary. 

But when that peace is shaken—when our souls are buffeted by Satan or deep discouragement—and then it is wonderfully restored, 

we suddenly see it for the extraordinary blessing it really is.

This is why God sometimes allows even His dearest children to become discouraged and their peace to be interrupted: 

He is deliberately raising the value of this spiritual treasure in our eyes.

God is a tender Father who wants all of our love directed toward Him. Our joy, peace, and comfort are merely the “nurse” that helps sustain our spiritual life. 

When He sees us loving the nurse (the gifts) more than we love the Father Himself, He gently removes the nurse for a season. 

He will not allow anything—even good things like peace—to steal first place in our hearts." 

William Bridge, A Lifting up for the Downcast. 

This moving quote is explained at the bottom --

"O child of my Father, wounded, bleeding, and worn by inward woes,

turn not thy face away;

let me lift thee from thy bed of rock,

and stretch thee on the green sod of a pure affection;

for am I not thy brother, stricken in thy stripes, and healed in thy rest?"

This passage is written as a compassionate appeal from one suffering person to another. It’s rich in metaphor, but the meaning is fairly direct when unpacked:

“O child of my Father” — The speaker is addressing another person as a fellow child of God, emphasizing shared origin and spiritual kinship.

“wounded, bleeding, and worn by inward woes” —

The suffering described is not physical but emotional or spiritual—guilt, grief, inner conflict, or despair.

“turn not thy face away” —

Don’t withdraw, don’t isolate, don’t hide your pain.

“let me lift thee from thy bed of rock” —

The “bed of rock” suggests a hard, cold place of suffering—perhaps stubbornness, despair, or a life devoid of comfort.

The speaker is offering help out of that state.

“stretch thee on the green sod of a pure affection” —

In contrast, this is an image of rest, gentleness, and healing—

being cared for through sincere love and compassion.

“for am I not thy brother” —

The speaker grounds this appeal in shared humanity (and likely shared suffering).

“stricken in thy stripes, and healed in thy rest” —

This is the deepest idea:

“stricken in thy stripes” - I feel your pain as if it were my own.

“healed in thy rest” - Your healing brings me healing too.

In simple terms:

The speaker is saying: “You who are hurting deeply—don’t shut me out. Let me help you. I care for you as one who shares your pain, and your healing matters to me as much as my own.”

It’s a picture of redemptive compassion—the idea that true love enters into another person’s suffering and finds its own healing in helping them recover.

 

When I saw this picture I knew I would find words to explain how it struck me, today was that day. 

I went to the mission to visit one of the men (Fred, we both have the same name) and take him out for coffee; as we walked to the coffee shop we passed so many different faces. Christ has tuned my heart to the downcast, and the streets of Portland are filled with faces lost and bound. What an experience to simply walk there, what opportunities rise up to meet you! 

Along the way back, we met a brother that graduated from the program a few years ago and Fred introduced me to him and after we chatted with him for a few minutes, we left him, with a smile of encouragement on his face. 

Then a young woman, in her mid-twenties, and I'm sure she wasn't five feet tall, with ashen skin, and eyes with the unmistakeable look of loss and confusion. She wasn't thin, yet, and we stopped and told her about the women's program at the mission and gave her a pamphlet that lists all the free resources available to her. She seemed appreciative and as we left we noticed she didn't discard the pamphlet, many do. 

 We walked by a group of about six people sitting, backs against the wall, and we handed out some more pamphlets on the mission. 

At the end of the block, the walk was littered with items from a woman’s backpack—old cosmetics, a pen, a compact—as well as two pages torn from a notebook that lay on the walk. I picked them up and read what was written: it was one paragraph: a plea for help, and the hopeless question of whether all help is “fictitious.”

We looked up and another brother that graduated from the program was walking by on his way to a job interview; we chatted for a bit and then prayed his endeavor would be successful. 

All this as we walked by in just one block. 

The following piece is in response to his nephew recounting the horrors of war he saw. March 17th 2026 I posted my Grandson's piece. 

  "To speak in response to such a meaningful piece of personal experience is challenging. 

No wise persons wants to fill the space of suffering with words that might do harm to the sacred suffering in that silence. 

But, something your words brought to my mind and heart was how they reflect what Jesus did. 

He came to that ditch, he was dragged too, and the gospel goes into great detail telling the horror of it all, ending with him being hung up in the air as well. 

It recounts the brutality...the carnage, the blood. It doesn't protect us from the mother's wail, the tears, the soldiers laughing and joking, the indifference, the cowardliness of the disciples and the anger and wrath of it all from various angles. 

It's devastating, and it shaped the souls of those who witnessed it and countless souls of those who heard about it but were never there. Almost all of the apostles died for that witness and in solidarity with it. 

To be a with...is at the sacred heart of vulnerable love. To honor the suffering seen, is done by giving voice to the voiceless. In our humanness we want to raise our hand and give a middle finger to the hell and horror of it all. Jesus holds up his hand too, and it's got a scar from being nailed to the cross. 

We are wounded healers. You are, your sister is, your mother is, your father is...your dear comrades living and fallen are. Thank you for going, for enduring, for suffering, for your witness and for your anger. May its fire form you for greater light and not consume you into a soul full of darkness. 

But we are Moons, not Suns...so at least half the time...we are dark, until the light returns.