New Blog Address

Check out my new blog at BryanDavidson.org. I'm experimenting with new hosts like Wordpress and Typepad but either way I've decided to stick with this url for good.

Binoculars, Please!

How far away is your God? (one of my recent articles)

I think a relationship with God is a lot like a romance or a love story. If only more people caught on to that kind of thinking. It’s sad when people see God like themselves – self-centered, self-sufficient, in-charge kind of God. Just because we see ourselves that way has no effect on who God is. A.W. Tozer has a lot to say about knowing God. He said the most important thing about you is what you think about when you think about God. What do you think about when you think about God? Is your God far away or close by? Is your God someone who keeps score – who watches you like a hawk and comes down and strikes you when you do the wrong thing? Do you see God like your parent or grandparent – a quiet, proper, old, traditional, forever kind of God? Is your God someone whose so busy running the world he doesn’t have time for you – he’s far away from you has no relevance to your life? There are some who have chosen to be the “I don’t believe in God” people. There are others who are mad about the God thing because of their parents or those who go to college and enjoy buying in to a professor’s views. All of us have constructed a view of God. We carry this view with us through life.

The reality is how you see God is the litmus test that’s going to affect everything single aspect of how you will pursue him. If you haven’t nailed down a God whose love for you as his son or daughter, is more affectionate than you could ever truly understand. If your view of God is wrong then you are going to have difficulty with everything. We read in Daniel that people who know their God will be much stronger.

But you can know how to view God. Did you know God made you for himself – to enjoy, to love, to cherish, hold? When you capture that kind of reality sharing him with others will become your affection too.

This is something that’s dear to my heart because I too never developed a real sense of who God is until Amber and I married and we moved to Atlanta. I started spending time with some people who clearly saw God and life in a different viewpoint than I did. I was captivated by that; confused at first, but intrigued. So I went on this little journey of rediscovering God. It took longer than I anticipated it would because I had to shatter my old view of God. At the Christian university I attended I developed a view of God that was dutiful, rigid, political, rude if needed, always do the right thing over anything else even if it meant to run over people. I don’t want to point fingers at my school. I would never blame them for a view I had of God, but it was there that I developed it and I needed some clarification in my life of who He was. In Atlanta I found it. Two men who really affected me were Louie Giglio and my pastor Andy Stanley. Louie taught a gathering on Tuesday nights and preached at my church some. They were close friends from grade school and grew up in the kind of environment I was used to and where I developed my view of God. And I’m grateful to sit under their preaching especially when I needed to see God in a different light. They know how to speak the language of the culture.

God made you for his pleasure. You were made for God. “All things have been created by God and for God.” You were not only created in God’s image but for his pleasure as well. Inside our hearts are these evidences – these homing devices that intensely crave after God. More is never enough when were after God because we were created to live in deep, passionate communion with Him all the time. When were not, something’s wrong – a gap is created and we thirst for him. We go our searching and while there are these offbeat cultural textures that are after our minds as well, we will stay thirsty until we find God. Some people stay thirsty for a long time. Every human being craves intimacy – a kind that only God can give. Yet some of us aren’t aware of this. This is what happens – we respond to all of this by the way we see Him. If we see him like a God who keeps score then we will try to do things that might make him happy. If we see him as far away then we’ll respond to him like he is far away. If you think he is old or out of touch with us then you will just do what you want because being cool is important to some of us. Some of us think God doesn’t understand us at all.

What’s amazing about God is that right now as you try to understand more about God, God is saying, “I understand what you’re going through. I get the deal.” That means a lot when you enter a stage of confusion and clarification like that. One of his characteristics is patience and He’s committed to patiently wait on you as you go through this process. That’s encouraging! God knows what’s going on, on TV. He knows whose going to win the Amazing Race. God isn’t out to judge us He’s out to capture us with attention, love, and understanding. Who wouldn’t want that?

Here’s an important catch: God has told us about Himself so we could know about who He is. God is not what we choose to think of Him, what our parents or family thinks of Him. God is who He is…period. We have to get in our heads that we can’t decide that, He does. He’s God.

First, we need to unveil his character, what makes God to be God. He’s displayed his amazing traits. God is revealed in his son, Jesus. God established a relationship with us through his son, Jesus. Jesus taught that God is the: Perfect Father. Creator. Savior. Redeemer. Majesty. Ruler. He is: Love. Joy. Patience. Kindness. Faithfulness. Jesus taught you are the: Son. Daughter. He is the Father. This is a love relationship. The greatest romantic story ever told. He sent Jesus for you, his blood filled the gap sin built, the crave we endure. The enemy is out to derail your relationship with God.

He is a knowable and relatable God. He is the tender mercy to a crying heart. He desires to be intimate with me. That’s one that I continue to wallow in.

So now what? We have to say, “I get it and I trust you.” We have to decide that he knows best and put our entire trust in his ways. Tell God, “I trust you.” He loves me more than I love myself. That’s the first step to knowing God and beginning spiritual conversations. He’s in control of every conversation you will have. He’s the one that holds everything together. When we get that – our lives become fluid, something God can fill up and overflow on to others. Conversations are nothing more than an overflow of what God is doing inside of us. The intimacy spreads through others and we get the privilege of enjoying community like it was meant to be. Then there’s connectiveness in our lives.

Once we understand how God sees us, it should free us up to pursue him.

Converse with him.

We don’t have all the answers, but Jesus surely does. He encourages us to experience him, to bring him into the conversation we so desire to have. We are limited in what we offer, but Jesus is limitless. No boundaries with him.

So, go for it!

Talk to him. Love on him. Then go love on others. And leave the rest of the story to the storyteller. You’re immersed in something that’s far more beautiful that you’re most amazing mindscapes can comprehend. Something compelling.

You’ll never tire of hearing about God when it’s truly representing who he is. That makes life so exciting and liberating doesn’t it? The story never ends.

When you spend time with him it’s not like going online, it’s more like sitting down on the couch and together having an intimate talk. The difference is that God sends his spirit to interact through the conversation. The spirit makes it a lot more intimate. In the spirit you feel his love and his pride in you. Your outlook of the world all of sudden turns small. You realize that the world is so minute compared to the Creator of the Universe. The only downsize, if there is one to those who experience this amazing connection, is that it takes more time with him, to really grasp the reality that he won’t be able to fill your spirit like that all the time unless you keep seeking him. You crave for it. You search for it. You try all kinds of ways to fill that vacuum that you’ve had before. You learn over time that he can’t do it for you unless you allow him to. It’s called freedom of choice. Through time, if we’re willing to endure and keep searching, we’ll learn how to discipline ourselves to hear his voice and obey. We’ll learn how to talk to him and get results. It is a discipline and a language. People don’t master it they just trust him and go with it. A person who is godly isn’t someone who knows a lot about God; it’s someone who knows God and maintains a vibrant relationship with him.

Conversations with God / Conversoulogy

I’ve heard some people say that life is one big conversation. The life you live is a conversation with God.

In the Spring of 1997—it was in the middle of February, as I recall.

I heard someone say one time a lot of us are sure as hell about things, but do you want to be as sure as heaven?

It was a timely moment for me. I cried out for a connection with God. I was stung. My pain had to go away—I knew I needed to be healed. I was almost completely certain that only God could heal me. I believed it for a moment—just a moment—a divine moment it was. Immediately everything changed.

So what healed me? God did. How did he heal me? -Through my heart’s cry for him. He wants to be sought. Now I wanted to play my role as the seeker. He’s God. I’m man. He’s to be sought while I’m to seek Him. It truly makes sense.

That day I began to have conversations with God. It’s called prayer. A guy named Charles Spurgeon said it best: “prayer is the slender nerve that touches the omnipotence of God.” Ever since that day I’ve been in this magnificent dialogue with the Creator…aka CEO himself.

Before then I couldn’t talk to him, nor thought I really wanted to. The reason I didn’t want to was because God cannot hear us until we thoroughly introduce ourselves. I had introduces myself the way people told me to, but I didn’t really want it that badly. It wasn’t until that day that I really wanted it and when I did, he came and I’ve spent every day since wishing the world could experience what I’ve experienced.

I told a guy the other day “you’ll meet God when you figure out that he works. Am I right?” His reply was, “I think you’re right.” I said, well hang with me a little while and you find out that he works. He said, “Great.” Well, this young intellectual had told me just weeks before that conversation that he didn’t believe in one God. Yet, he’s admitting openly and honestly now that if there is one God and he discovers a piece of him, he’ll believe it. That’s the way a lot of people are. They don’t believe it because they haven’t met Him. Until you meet him you won’t understand.

Generalization is the death of art. It’s in the details where God resides.
ARTHUR MILLER

What Does the Malcom Gladwell Phenomenon Reveal About Our Culture?

How did Gladwell become the Dale Carnegie of the iPod Generation?

Last night I was wondering why the author Malcom Gladwell could become such a cultural prodigy. Better yet, I began asking myself the much more incisive question: What does the Gladwell effect say about our culture?

It says times have changed. The way we learn is different. The way we see and receive information is different. We’re searching for understanding, for something else, yet with reasons. What most people care about is fulfilling experiences, fulfilling relationships and reasonable understanding. Gladwell helps in the latter. We know we’re becoming more and more complex but we’re more than willing to allow it as long we enjoy life and relationships. This reveals a lot more than most of us take the time to consider, or have allow ourselves such time.

As most of us know, Malcom Gladwell is the acclaimed author of the hugely bestsellers "Blink" and "The Tipping Point”—so big it created an unexpected wave of non-fiction books to seize the market, the kind that none of us could be have predicted to become such a bestseller in the mainstream pop culture. But it’s not the sales that perplex me – it’s the impact it’s having on the entire culture. I've wondered what this could mean. What could this say about us? At first, his popularity and influence on our culture seemed strange to me, that is until I began a two-year journey seeking understanding of the culture and why the gospel stopped sticking.

This week I read a well-written article on Gladwell by the New York Times book review editor Rachel Donadio. Danadio made these elucidating observations, comparing Gladwell’s impact to Dale Carnegie ("How to Win Friends and Influence People" - 1936) and Norman Vincet Peale ("Power of Positive Thinking" - 1952), who's books helped shaped society in a peculiar way.

In our "iPod generation" we've chosen Malcom Gladwell. While Carnegie and Peale produced books about understanding, relating and liking people, Gladwell helps us understand how things work in a way that helps us have control over them. What Danadio calls optimism through demystification. While optimism will always be a foremost way to win in society, certainly – a vital asset to all - but, it's demystication that we most desire today.

What does this say to the person who is trying to add value to culture? It’s clear that people think differently – way differently than they did 30, 20, 10, even 5 years ago.

The biggest thing that I have to keep driving home to people and organizations is how vitally important it is for you to "think deeply" about what you do and why you do it. Not only in a linear approach but in non-linear, right-brained one. And then to work hard at communicating that to the everyday world, and make sure it’s transferable and memorable (Gladwell’s Stickiness Factor). This world intensely desires to have an "under the surface" understanding of life, and especially faith.

Gladwell is doing the work most people wish they could do. To think, write, converse and read all day in coffee shop’s. I don't argue with that life because that's the gist of my days - fortunately. So we have joined this guy’s journey of questions and desire for understanding through his writings, as he thinks deeply about the issues affecting our lives and culture. So he's become our friend. He’s become one of our life tour guide’s. And all of us should be aware that this is the way many of the leaders in the 21st century will look.

He’ll have a message, but he’ll carry it with deep-seated "reasons." He’s open. He thinks. He wonders. He sees new horizons. And the world becomes his audience.

He isn’t afraid of the complex, the unpredictable, the unknown. Rather he enjoys the process of finding answers while embracing the mystical. He is used to speed, to change and to options so he just goes with it, until he find what fits. He’d rather have mobility than stability any day. There will be a tension between opportunity and loyalty in his life. Leaders who follow Jesus will respond to that by being careful what they commit to, trusting the spirit to synch their heart with Jesus' in every situation. There will be tension between short-term and long-term because many leaders see long-term commitment has a threat to their freedom and personalization. Again, leaders who follow Jesus will have to hack that one out with the Heavenly Father. The leader of the future loves challenges and will have a hard time with commitment. They don't want to be loyalist just for the sake of loyalty - like their parents were taught and lived. Tomorrow’s leaders don’t necessarily want to change the world; they’d rather enjoy the world while changing it. He loves to rethink everything – another reason to welcome the Malcom Gladwell’s of the world, if only there were more. There are, just wait and see. In fact, the self-proclaimed liberal Gladwell is called a Spiritual leader of the American culture, which is scary.

I have asked myself constantly these sorts of questions the past couple years:
Questions of Purpose and Perspective : :
• Am I on this earth to fit my heart, passion and gifts into a system that seemed to work in the past? Am I on this earth to be a missionary to the real world or the church world?
Questions of Willingness and Aloneness : :
• Am I willing to do what God has called me to do even if I have to do it alone? Am I willing to pay the price for their souls? Am I willing to listen to the Spirit and explore the unknown or just do what people tell me to do?

I am becoming clearly convinced that most of us (if 40 yrs & below) are not meant to continue serving in the methods of the past. What we are meant to do is whatever it takes to lead this generation into the discovery of Jesus. And if the leaders older than us do not understand how to release us to reach our generations, then we have to be strong and courageous to make a new path without them. This isn’t about our parents or about us; it’s about destiny and people souls.

Hurdles

"You have to find something that you love enough to be able to take risks, jump over the hurdles and break through the brick walls that are always going to be placed in front of you. If you don't have that kind of feeling for what it is you are doing, you'll stop at the first giant hurdle." - George Lucas

This year is the first year of my life that I've been 100% certain I am doing what I was made to do. Before now, the hurdles we're always temptations to find something else to do. Now, hurdles are expected, even embraced because I know they just make me stronger.

"Before you can be creative, you must be courageous. Creativity is the destination, but courage is the journey." - Joey Reiman, CEO, Brighthouse

The Need to Conquer...the Harder to Fall

The longings of my heart is to pour the gospel message into people’s lives. I am not so much of a brain surgeon—I am into doing the heart-surgery thing on people’s lives. But the intertwining thought that continually tangles my mind is how can I be the person God made me to be. It wasn't long ago that my role seemed so complicated compared to everyone else.

I would assess and evaluate and seek counsel and look everywhere for that fit. All of this has led me back to the same mind-boggling questions and the same desperation I’ve always had. And I wonder if there’s no other way than to aggressively and intentionally go.

That’s the way my journey with Christ began. I went…hard! I found wavering souls and fed them the food of God. Lives began to change. My life was like a sailboat…and I glided with the wind of God. I didn’t have time to think…only time to proactively pour my life into the word, prayer and the powerhouses of teachings in all kinds of books, tapes and the men of God to spend time with. The overflow of all of that was to step out in faith and point people upward to Jesus and then to help guide them into a similar walk I had. The power was eminent!

Then things started to unravel as I found something to conquer.

Beforehand, I had nothing to conquer, only everything to lose. My life revolved around losing in order to gain; giving in order to receive; staying weak as the only way to be strong. But in college I found something to have and enjoy and settle on.

Of all the things in the world, it was a relationship with my future wife. We had something that was truly incredible, a story only God could weave. But the moment we acknowledged to each other that we were going to be soul mates for the rest of our lives, in my mind I felt like a conquering hero.

At the top of my game I began to let the very thing that brought so much joy to my life take me down. I really had no idea this was going on. I was in love and at the point where I had it all—a walk with God, a very fruitful life, and a wife very few people get to have.

This was a woman who is special and everyone who knows her can see it. She’s as true of a Proverbs 31 woman of God as you’ll ever find, even at a young age. So I had my trophy now and everything else seemed less spectacular. The high of my game became the unraveling.

Success is such a danger isn’t it? The more you obtain, the more you have to lose. Even the good things in a life can become the idol that brings you down.

There’s something to be said about the man who maintains a perspective that he has nothing to lose and everything to gain. The more we learn and the more we become can eventually become our biggest threat.

The constant fight – to be more consumed with God than anything else – the world, the becoming, the having, the wanting, the expectations, and even the pursuit. It’s God’s deal or nothing at all. We are meant to be slaves of the Master in word and deed.

Ravi Zacharias noted in This We Believe:
“A modern-day writer, jack Higgins, was asked at the pinnacle of his success what he now knows that he wished he had known as a younger man. ‘I wished I had known that when you get to the top, there is nothing there.’”

Three pertinent questions that can take you towards God or separate you far away from him:

What am I after? What do I want? What do I want to live for?

It's a Heart Issue

Tozer has me thinking this morning.

You and I are a part of the legion of seekers who’ll only find what we’re looking for in the quietness of the soul. The ones who find God discover this.

Tozer reminds me that I won’t find the soul connection with God in something. There is no particular method for finding what everyone’s looking for. People flee the norm world for a getaway condominium of rest and quietness, but only discover their thirst unquenched. Rest is found where God is – and God for you might be a closet or a parking lot. Rest assured, he is found when he is sought and rest flows from without.

Life and world issues that are thrust upon us are heart issues. We are so entrenched in what happens to us, or protecting what we have (especially, if it’s good), when the root of our happiness is in knowing how to react and pro-act to life. We jump into life waiting for the world to take us where it wants, but it’s a never-ending cycle isn’t it?
All of life’s issues are heart issues.

A generation is crumbling not because of it’s misuse of sexuality, but because they haven’t uncovered the power of the heart. You find the heart of life in the quietness of the soul – where God resides. It’s the place where you find the intimacy you’ve been looking for you’re whole life. When you taste it, you’ll do whatever you can to get it back.

Yet we want to focus on what to take way. “I’m struggling with this sin so I need to stop watching TV.” That maybe a great idea but I can guarantee you it’s not your problem. Your problem is in the heart. Go find your heart – the heart of God – the intimacy you long for. Satan wants to point you toward a TV, but it’s all part of his confusing scheme. The issues is we're selfish. We live for ourselves. That's the root of our struggle and sin.

When you taste God for who he is, you’ll never forget it. Nothing – not an experience or a preacher or a book or a overseas trip or anything can compare with tasting God like he truly is. There’s freedom and rest and understanding and single-mindedness and willingness that pours in here.

You can have all the money and possessions in the world, but if you lack this you’ll stay restless. God doesn’t want us to live in poverty, but it might take that (like the young rich ruler) to get your heart. It might not take giving much of it up at all. All that God wants is your heart – the motives, desires, tastes, all of it. You’re just be managing what he already owns anyway. Why would he care about taking away your things? Everything with God has to do with the heart. If he asks you to give up something, it’s because he’s after your heart. You just have to trust him and obey him with a fierce single-mindedness.

A close friend sought God and found him. Then God led him to give up his very influential and lucrative career to pursue his God-given aspiration. He did. But months later after God knew he had his heart, he led him back to his old career with an even more affluent position, only this time he was working with churches. God wanted his heart and my friend gave it to him.

I have this thing about giving up on God. What I mean is: I give up on God a lot. I've often thought up my own ways too much. My wife has told me in the past that my mind is my greatest strength and greatest weakness. I can think up stuff with my mind that is good, but that same ability can be used negatively. There have been moment when I'd have this thing for scheming up reasons why I need to do things a certain way rather than uncovering his heart. I'd convince myself I found his heart when I’m really still searching. The more I go through this motion the better, but it’s a tiring and turbulent way to live.

We go to God for an answer. We go to God out of duty. Why not go to God to stay synched. When you need to make a decision, the answer is right there, in the spirit that has you completely full and content. It’s common sense to keep oneself synched up through the word of God and conversation with God.

Why are we afraid to teach people about the heart? They get it...at least, they can pick up if we know the heart or not. And they will look at you like, "Why haven't you shared this before? This explains everything!"

Six Viewpoints

I just did an article on evangelism for a magazine. I thought I'd post some of the viewpoints I propose (a modern magazine needs points).

1) Transformation is a life-long process, not just a one-time event.

2) Unless we put more emphasis on authentic, connective relationships we will lose this generation.

3) The most effective evangelism strategy is to cultivate genuine friendships with people who are non-believers and engage them in thoughtful, respectful conversation about what’s important to them.

4) Those with the foresight and strength to speak the truth in love will have the most impact.

5) Genuine humility and love will win over anyone anytime!

6) Centralize everything with Jesus. They like Jesus but they don’t like the church.