When I Get Invited to Oprah's...

The elliptical machine is my therapy lately. It can become a place of deep reflection and insight. Especially if you are watching Oprah.

Don't get me wrong - I don't usually watch Oprah or any daytime TV. But I happened to be at the gym and Oprah happened to be on one of the big screens. I still probably wouldn't have paid much attention, but her guest was going to be Ted Haggard.

Ted Haggard is known mostly for his sex and drug scandal thing that happened two years ago, but before that he had grown to be one of the top evangelical leaders of our nation. His mega-church topped 15,000 people in attendance. So he went on Oprah to clear the whole thing up.

As you can imagine, the conversation had heated moments. I was waiting with bated breath to see if this once world-renown evangelical pastor would take his once in a lifetime opportunity to proclaim the truth - and not as an observer and scholar of the truth now, but as a participant in the truth. Of all the words you would stand before God for saying, it seems that these would be them.

Oprah would ask "How can you deny who you are?" in reference to his struggle with homosexuality. After agreeing with her intermittently, he said "I'm not that man, because I believe that Jesus Christ has made me a new man." Haggard, 1. Oprah... on the rebound.

"Are you saying that Jesus Christ doesn't accept homosexuals?"

Hesitation. "I believe Jesus accepts all people."

Now, that's simply not true if you believe that the Bible is God's inerrant and infallible word. He created all people, He loves all people, but He cannot and does not accept any of us just how we are. The churched kid that pathologically lies, the high-school FCA leader that gossips, and the homosexual pastor are all literally unacceptable to God. The only thing that can make them acceptable is placing their faith in Jesus to forgive them of their sins and trusting and allowing the Holy Spirit to regenerate them from the inside out - changing desires, attitudes, and ideas. So as someone who apparently spent most of his life studying these things, I have to admit I was expecting the smack-down of the Gospel.

I can't say that I blame the man, but you could tell he was pushed into a corner by insecurities. Something in me wondered... What if he had grabbed ahold of that question as his moment to proclaim the absolute truth in love? The gospel will offend people no matter how humbly it is preached, but if you never preach the whole gospel you offend God himself. "I believe Jesus accepts all people... who repent and allow themselves to be changed by the Holy Spirit according to the Bible? Who turn away from sin and towards faith in Christ alone for salvation? Who...? I don't know exactly what I would have said if it was me. But that's okay. When and if my "moment" comes, no matter the journey I've been on, I wish for the true and regenerating gospel of Jesus Christ to be spoken simply and sweetly from my mouth.

"And I tell you, everyone who acknowledges me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God, but the one who denies me before men will be denied before the angels of God. And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say." - Luke 12:8-12.

Steady Now

This is a song I wrote recently... listen and let me know what you think!

• Steady Now by Abigail Bradshaw

More Abigail Bradshaw music on iLike

Steady now


Everything that can be shaken 


Will be shaken
Steady now

The rock I stand on is firm


And of this I am sure


Steady now, steady now


Holding fast

Strap myself to the mast of this ship


While the storm is raging


Holding fast

Promise lasting beyond evidence

Of sight and hearing

Holding fast, holding fast

You’ve promised to keep me


And never to leave me

Even when my foot slips


It’s still in your grip


And trusting is freeing


I’ve no rights but I’m seeing

That You know the way

So stay steady now

The Worst in Me

I hate it when people aren't up-front with me.

In a meeting recently with one of my friends, we were having a discussion about unspoken expectations and assumptions. I learned that for a few months, some of my other friends had gone to her asking if something was wrong with me.

I can't help but ask: why didn't they come straight to me? It can be disappointing when you grow up with someone for more than half of your life and they can't come to you directly to ask how you've really been.

Jesus said, "So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift (Matthew 5:23-24 ESV)."

After reading that verse, I decided that a few people in particular might have something against me, so I needed to reconcile before I set foot into church this Sunday morning. Not to make this like a soap opera, but I was a little annoyed with one said friend for reasons other than the ones I already mentioned. In my opinion, she had drop-kicked me to hang out with a guy from our group of friends, and it was just a big flirt-fest to watch... for several days. And I wasn't the only one that was irritated. So here goes my apology.

"I'm sorry for not being a good friend to you lately - honestly, I have been kind of annoyed with you and ______."

"I know, I just was having fun with him. I didn't mean to make anybody mad."

"Yeah, I know. I'm over it now, and I shouldn't have gotten so annoyed. Will you forgive me?"

"Yes! I just don't know why someone didn't come talk to me about it directly at the time..."

Shoot. It was at that moment that I began to see all the things I hated about a terrible friend surface in me. How could I expect people to come straight to me with their concerns when I'm not willing to face up to them about the things that divide us? How could I expect sincere friendship when I so often am insincere in my intentions and words? And the overly-critical friend - what am I when I begin to criticize them?

I'm at a place of new found need: for mercy to forgive my hypocrisy, and grace to be a better friend.

Dream

I don't want to do a lot of posts about songs and how they relate to my life, but you don't often come across a song that seems like it was written after someone read the story of your life.

Click to listen, if you'd like to.

The first verse is almost an exact description of my childhood. I really 'played pretend between the trees' and 'fed my house guests bark and leaves' with my cousins all the time when we were growing up. One cousin in particular became my best friend. We were both home-schooled and in the same grade, so for the first ten years of my life we had everything in common - and we were inseparable when we were together. She died of leukemia during my seventh grade year.

So it's been almost seven years... I was told that it would eventually just feel like she moved away. But you tend to miss people less and less if you know that only distance separates you. It's not the same with death - you miss them in a greater way with each passing milestone of life.

I'm in the second verse of the song now, asking God who I'm supposed to be, like everyone should when they're my age. I'm dreaming big... what could God do with my life? I can't help feeling it will be grand. And at the end of my life, I'll be able to say I lived it full and well.

This song is written from a trusting perspective, trusting that what happens in your life and the dreams that you have are connected in a deep and divine way. In my life, it's trusting that Jesus Christ builds the church the way He wants it, trusting that no person can keep me out of God's will, and trusting gladly that God knows better than I do what I need.

Mexico

Total hours of travel logged: 61
Total number of people saved: >25
Discovering there are differences in the comfort level of concrete floors: priceless.

This trip to Mexico was probably the best first international missions trip I could have asked for. We visited remote mountain villages where there is no running water, survived bus rides that make Space Mountain look like the play toy at Burger King, and discovered things about each other that you only discover on a mission trip where you share a single toilet with 29 other individuals.

It's strange and sobering knowing that all of the people I met are still living their lives in the world I just visited. Seeing the Kingdom of God advance in such tangible, visible ways in those villages gave me a respect for God's ability to move despite any lingual or cultural barrier.

How much more could God move in and through me in my own culture if I'd only make myself available? That's really the thing about missions trips: you wait around all day just to be used by God (especially in Mexico). Availability is really the key to being used in the media world, the sports world, the music scene, the church world, the high school dropout world, and any other subculture God would call a person to.

So "here am I" - I'm going to try to bring a little of Mexico back by doing more waiting around for God to use me, wherever I am. No amount of busy activity, no matter how productive it seems, fulfills like being used as an instrument in the hands of God.