I glanced down at the screen and immediately let out a long sigh.

Give me a call when you get a moment.

The message was from someone I always found particularly stressful to talk with. Every conversation seemed to leave me emotionally drained. We rarely saw eye to eye, and I often walked away feeling as though I had been talked down to rather than listened to.

For a brief moment I considered pretending I hadn't seen the text. Maybe if I waited long enough, the need for the phone call would simply disappear.

Unfortunately, according to my driver's license, I'm a responsible adult. Responsible adults return phone calls, even the ones they'd rather avoid.

I rested my forehead against my hand and stared at my computer screen. Maybe I could put it off for an hour. Then I shook my head. What good would that accomplish? I would simply spend the next hour dreading the conversation instead of getting it behind me.

I reached for my phone, took a deep breath, and prepared to make the call.

Before I could dial, my phone rang.

An unfamiliar number flashed across the screen.  Normally, I probably would have ignored it. But in that moment it almost felt like a welcome interruption from the conversation I was trying to avoid, so I answered.

"Hello?"

A warm, gentle voice greeted me on the other end.

"Hi. I'm with the women's ministry at church. I was just calling to see how you're doing today and to ask if there's anything I could be praying about for."

For a second, I wasn't quite sure what to say.

"I...I'm actually doing really well," I finally replied. "I really can't think of anything I need prayer for."

Looking back, that's almost amusing.  Only moments earlier I had been anxious enough to delay making a simple phone call, yet it never even occurred to me to mention it.  Part of me dismissed it because it seemed too small. It wasn't a health crisis. No one was dying. It hardly seemed worthy of asking someone else to pray about. Besides, explaining the situation would have taken too long.

But if I'm being honest, I think there was something deeper going on.  I've always found it much easier to be the person praying for someone else than the one admitting I need prayer myself. There's something vulnerable about allowing another person to carry one of your burdens before the Lord.

The sweet woman didn't seem bothered by my answer.

"Well," she said, "then let's thank God for how well He's taking care of you. Would you like to pray together now, or would you rather I pray for you after we hang up?"

I chose to pray with her.  Her prayer wasn't long or elaborate. She simply thanked God for His faithfulness, praised Him for His goodness, and asked Him to continue watching over my life.

When we finished, we said goodbye.  I sat quietly for a moment before walking over to the window. Looking up toward the sky, I sighed.

"I know that was You," I whispered.

Behind The Scenes

So I took a deep breath and dialed the number.

Ironically, the conversation turned out to be about almost nothing. The issue that had consumed so much of my attention was resolved within just a few minutes. There was no argument. There was no conflict. It wasn't nearly as stressful as I had imagined it would be. Before long, I was hanging up the phone and returning to work as though nothing had happened.

But something had happened.

As the afternoon wore on, I found myself thinking less about the phone call I had been so anxious to make and more about the unexpected call I had received just beforehand. The timing was simply too perfect to dismiss as coincidence. That woman from church had no way of knowing what was weighing on my mind. She couldn't have known how emotionally exhausted I already felt that day or that one more difficult conversation, however small it may have been, felt like more than I wanted to carry. Yet somehow, at precisely the right moment, God had placed me on her heart.

The more I reflected on it, the more I realized that the size of my problem was never really the point. From an outsider's perspective, it wasn't much of a problem at all. It certainly wasn't a life-altering crisis. In fact, within a matter of minutes it had already been resolved. But God wasn't responding to the size of the situation. He was responding to the condition of my heart.

I was tired.

I was already carrying more than I realized.

What seemed like a molehill to everyone else felt like one more weight on shoulders that were already weary, and my heavenly Father saw that long before I did.

Jesus once said, "Your Father knows what you need before you ask Him." I have read those words many times, but that afternoon I experienced them in a way I never had before. I hadn't prayed about the phone call. I hadn't asked anyone else to pray about it either. In fact, when that sweet woman asked if there was anything she could pray for, I told her there wasn't.

Looking back now, I wish I had been honest. I wish I had told her that I was anxious over something that probably seemed insignificant. I wish I had explained how perfectly timed her phone call was. But I was so focused on what was directly in front of me that I almost missed what God was doing behind the scenes.

Before I ever realized I needed encouragement, He had already sent it.

That realization has stayed with me ever since. How many times do we assume we're facing life's challenges alone, all the while God is already at work in ways we cannot yet see? How often is He quietly moving through the obedience of another believer, arranging circumstances we could never orchestrate ourselves, gently reminding us of His presence before we've even thought to ask for it?

Perhaps that's one of the most beautiful aspects of God's love. He doesn't simply respond when we cry out to Him. So often, He is already moving toward us before the prayer ever leaves our lips.

God The Father

I sat on the little barstool at my kitchen counter, eating my oatmeal and reading through the Bible app on my phone. I'm making my way into Deuteronomy now, which means I'm reading through many of the moments when Moses reminded the Israelites of where they had been and all God had brought them through. 

When we were at Mount Sinai, the Lord our God said to us, ‘You have stayed at this mountain long enough. It is time to break camp and move on.’ --Deuteronomy 1:6–7 NLT

I read those words again. Maybe it was because I'm heading toward my fiftieth year on this earth, but I sat there thinking about some of the things I've struggled with for what feels like most of my life. I find forgiveness difficult. I've detailed that struggle plenty of times here. I have a temper. I can hold on to hurt far longer than I should. And there is an entire list of other things I really don't feel the need to rehash this morning.

But as I sat there staring at those words, I had one overwhelming thought. Aren't you tired of it?

Isn't there a point when we finally become exhausted from fighting the same battles? Isn't there a moment when we look around at the familiar landscape of our struggles and realize we've been circling the same mountain for far too long? Maybe sometimes God looks at us with all the love of a Father and simply says, You've been here long enough. It's time to break camp and move on.

I sat on my barstool thinking about what breaking camp would actually mean for me. Because breaking camp isn't simply standing up and walking away. If you've been somewhere for a while, you've accumulated some things. You have to pack before you can leave. And packing means you have to go through your stuff.

I know a little something about that after moving this year. There comes a point when you're standing in the middle of a room surrounded by boxes and you have to decide what is actually coming with you. What do I still need? What still serves a purpose? And what have I been dragging around simply because I've had it for so long that I've forgotten I have the option to let it go?

I've walked through some really deep mourning since my divorce. God has done an incredible amount of healing in me, and I don't want to minimize that. I am not standing in the same place I was years ago. But if I'm honest, there is still some debris lying around the campsite. There is some unforgiveness, some bitterness, some anger, and some frustration. There are things that may have made sense in the middle of the pain. Things I picked up because I was hurt and confused and trying to make sense of a life I never expected to be living.

But I'm beginning to wonder if I've reached the point where God is asking me a different question: Are you really planning to pack all of that and take it with you?

Because breaking camp means going through some things. Anyone who has ever moved knows what it feels like to open a closet or pull a box from the back of a cabinet and wonder why on earth you've been carrying something around for the last ten years. Maybe it served a purpose once. Maybe you loved it once. Maybe there was even a season when you genuinely needed it. But you don't anymore.

And if you're moving forward, especially if you're moving into a place with less room, you quickly realize that everything cannot come with you. Some things have to be left behind. Some things have to be thrown away. Some things no longer serve the person God is calling you to become.

Maybe its time to go through some boxes.

Going Through the Boxes

Going through the boxes means we have to identify the things we don't want anymore. We've all heard about decluttering our homes, but have you ever thought about decluttering your mind? What are the things you don't want to move with you when you finally break camp and leave the mountain where you've been sitting for far too long?

I can tell you that I've got all kinds of things I don't want anymore. In fact, I've probably got a truckload of stuff that can go straight to the dump. I've got some bitterness I don't need. I've got anger, unforgiveness, and old wounds I've been carrying around for years. Who wants to keep hauling all of that from place to place? It's a bunch of old junk, and most of it isn't even relevant anymore.

When I was moving out of my old house earlier this year, I spent a lot of time going through things I had accumulated over the years. At some point, I came across an entire box of VCR tapes. There had been a time when those tapes were a major source of entertainment for my kids. They held movies we had watched over and over again, and at one point they certainly served a purpose in our home.

The problem was that I hadn't owned a VCR player in years.

Why on earth was I still carrying around an entire box of tapes when I didn't even own a machine capable of playing them? Yet there they were, taking up space. I had apparently moved them before, probably more than once, never stopping long enough to ask myself why I was still carrying them.

So I threw them away.

Of course, those old VCR tapes weren't actually hurting me. They were simply taking up space. Bitterness, anger, and unforgiveness are a whole different story. They take up space too, but they are also toxic. It's like packing a box of poison, loading it onto the moving truck, carrying it into the next house, and then wondering why we don't feel very good.

Not only are those things useless, they hurt us. We cannot be healthy while continually carrying around the very things that are poisoning us. Yet isn't it interesting to stop and think about how much we carry from place to place? We carry it into new seasons. We carry it into new relationships. We carry it into our homes, our churches, and our workplaces. Everywhere we go, we bring the same boxes with us and then wonder why the new place eventually starts to feel so much like the old one.

Unfortunately, anger and bitterness aren't quite as easy to throw away as a box of VCR tapes. Once I decided I didn't want the tapes anymore, getting rid of them was simple. I picked up the box and threw it away. Emotional wounds don't leave quite so easily. But I think the first step is still the same.

You have to decide you don't want them anymore.

You have to make the decision that you are ready to get rid of them.

For a long time, there was probably a small part of me that kept those VCR tapes because I thought maybe someday I would buy another player. Maybe the kids would want to watch those movies again. Maybe I would need them. Of course, I was never going to buy another VCR player, but apparently I still wasn't quite ready to completely let go.

I wonder if we do the same thing with bitterness and anger.

Perhaps somewhere deep inside, we believe we might need them later. Maybe we think our anger protects us. Maybe bitterness helps us remember what someone did so we never allow ourselves to be hurt that way again. Maybe unforgiveness feels like a wall we've built around ourselves, and we are afraid that if we tear it down, we will somehow become vulnerable to the same pain all over again.

But that's not actually what happens.

Instead, we end up carrying our pain with us. We pack it carefully into boxes, load it onto the truck, and move it from one season of our lives into the next. God says, Break camp and leave this mountain, and we respond by asking Him to wait while we finish packing all the pain we collected while we were there.

But what if we don't need it anymore?

Sometimes we hold on to pain for so long that it begins to feel like part of our identity. The wound becomes part of our story, and eventually we have a hard time separating what happened to us from who we actually are. We become the person who was betrayed. The person who was abandoned. The person who was hurt. The person who wasn't chosen. The person who didn't get the life they thought they were going to have.

But that's not who we are.

Christ calls us to something different.

It reminds me of the question Jesus asked the man who had been lying beside the pool of Bethesda for thirty-eight years. The man had been in that condition for so long that Jesus asked him a surprisingly simple question: “Do you want to get well?”

Of course he wanted to get well. Who wouldn't?  But maybe the question is deeper than it first appears.

Getting well means something has to change. Getting well means leaving behind the place where you've been lying. It means stepping into a life that may feel unfamiliar. It means no longer defining yourself by the wound you've carried for so long.

Maybe deciding to leave behind bitterness, anger, and unforgiveness begins with answering that same question.

Do you want to get well?

I do.

I don't need this stuff anymore. It doesn't serve me. It doesn't protect me. And the crazy thing is, it never did.  I've been at this mountain long enough.  It's time to break camp and move on.

What Lies Ahead

As I thought about all the things I would gladly take to the dump instead of packing onto another moving truck, I continued reading through Deuteronomy. The very next verse caught my attention.

"See, I have given you this land. Go in and take possession of the land..." (Deuteronomy 1:8)

What do You mean You've given us a land?  I'm already here. I'm comfortable at my campsite. I've got all my pain and past trauma surrounding me. I've unpacked everything. I've settled in. This is familiar.

But that's not God's purpose.  He has a new land waiting for His people.  The problem is, they can't get there until they break camp and leave the mountain where they've been sitting for far too long.

I think sometimes we assume God asks us to leave things behind simply because He wants us to forgive, be obedient, or move on. Those things certainly matter, but I don't think they're the whole story. God wasn't asking the Israelites to leave because He enjoyed making them uncomfortable. He was asking them to leave because He was taking them somewhere.

He had an inheritance waiting for them.

And He didn't simply tell them to walk into that land. He told them to take possession of it.  Taking possession means more than simply passing through. It means putting down roots. It means living there. It means enjoying what God has given you. It means embracing the life He intended for you all along.

But none of that could happen if they refused to leave the mountain.

The same is true for us.

God isn't asking us to get rid of something without replacing it with something better. Getting rid of all these boxes isn't just about throwing away junk. It's about creating room for the life God wants to give us.

Our lives have limited space. Every moving box we insist on carrying has to live somewhere. Every box of bitterness, anger, resentment, disappointment, or unforgiveness takes up room in our hearts. The more unnecessary things we keep carrying, the less room there is for the things that actually belong there.

If we're already filled with bitterness, where does peace fit?  If we're filled with anger, where does joy go?  If we're consumed with replaying yesterday's hurts and disappointments, how do we fully embrace what God wants to do today?

God didn't simply want the Israelites to leave the mountain. He wanted them to walk into the inheritance that had been waiting for them all along, an inheritance they could never experience as long as they remained camped where they were.

I don't know about you, but I'm not interested in carrying boxes that are decades old if they're keeping me from stepping into what God has for me today.

Why on earth would I keep hauling around a box of old VCR tapes when God has something infinitely better waiting for me? Those tapes don't work anymore. They serve no purpose. They simply take up space.

So maybe the better question isn't just, What do I need to leave behind?  Maybe it's, What do I want to carry instead?

I want boxes labeled peace, joy, forgiveness, wisdom, humility, trust, and gratitude.  The boxes labeled bitterness, fear, anger, resentment, and old wounds?  Those are going straight to the dump.

I believe God is still whispering the same words He spoke to Israel thousands of years ago.

You've been at this mountain long enough.

It's time to break camp.  It's time to move on.  It's time to leave something behind so you can move toward something better.

The Israelites weren't wandering aimlessly after they broke camp. God already knew exactly where He was leading them. He had prepared the destination long before He told them it was time to leave.

The same is true for us.

God already knows where He's leading us.

Our job is simply to stop unpacking yesterday's boxes... and start following Him.

The request seemed simple enough.

A friend asked if I wanted to go to a baseball game. It was a Major League game, complete with stadium lights, cheering fans, overpriced hot dogs, and everything that makes a summer evening at the ballpark so enjoyable. Under different circumstances, I would have been excited to go.

The problem wasn't the baseball game itself.

The problem was that I already knew what I was supposed to do.

After an incredibly busy week at work, I had promised the Lord that I would do a better job of listening to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. In my last post, I wrote about learning to embrace God's rhythm instead of constantly pushing myself beyond my limits. As much as I wanted to spend time with my friend, I also knew I needed rest. Deep down, I sensed the Holy Spirit gently nudging me to decline the invitation. It wasn't an audible voice or some dramatic experience. It was simply that quiet conviction that I have come to recognize over the years when God is trying to redirect me.

But I didn't want to disappoint my friend.

So I said yes.

At first glance, it seems like such a small decision. It's only a baseball game. Surely that couldn't matter very much. But by the time we arrived, I was already feeling the weight of an exhausting week. I tried to enjoy myself, but it was a struggle.  I could barely stay awake. Yes, it would have been fun to spend time together and watch the game. But, I was simply too tired to enjoy it.

Then the game went into extra innings.

What was already going to be a late evening became even later, and by the time I finally pulled into my driveway, it was nearly one o'clock in the morning. I remember crawling into bed knowing I had another full day waiting for me in just a few hours.

As the week went on, I found myself dragging through each day, trying to recover from one late night that never should have happened. More than once, I caught myself thinking, I wish I had listened.

It wasn't that God didn't want me to enjoy a baseball game.  It was that He knew what I needed better than I did.  The more I reflected on it, the more I realized this wasn't really about baseball at all. It was about obedience. 

Why is it that we sometimes work so hard to avoid disappointing other people while thinking so little about disappointing God? Why does someone else's approval sometimes carry more weight than the prompting of the Holy Spirit?

Paul addressed this very issue when he wrote:

For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ. — Galatians 1:10

That verse has been echoing in my mind ever since.

The boundaries God gives us aren't meant to keep us from enjoying life. They are acts of love. They protect our hearts, our minds, our bodies, and our relationship with Him. His "no" is rarely about keeping something good from us. More often, it is about lovingly leading us toward something better.

The more I grow in my faith, the more I realize that obedience isn't just about avoiding obvious sin. Sometimes it is simply trusting that God knows what is best for me, even in something as ordinary as whether I should spend an evening at a baseball game. 

Why Does God Tell Us No?

It's not because He wants to keep us from enjoying life or because He expects us to become little robots who do the same thing every day. Quite the opposite. The boundaries God gives us are ultimately about our joy, our protection, and our flourishing.  Not our punishment.

There have been countless times in my life when God has gently placed a boundary in front of me that I didn't fully understand. Sometimes I ignored it, convinced that my way would be fine. Without fail, those decisions eventually led to exhaustion, unnecessary stress, temptation, or simply becoming someone I didn't want to become.

On the other hand, every time I have trusted God enough to respect a boundary that didn't make sense to me at the time, I have watched Him bless that obedience in ways I never expected. In fact, it almost seems as though the sweetest blessings come when we choose to obey before we fully understand why.

Think about Noah.

Many theologians believe it is possible that rain had never fallen on the earth before the flood. Whether that understanding is correct or not, one thing is certain: when God told Noah to build an ark, it sounded completely unreasonable to everyone around him. Day after day, Noah continued building while people  questioned his sanity. Yet God didn't simply tell him to build a boat. He gave him exact instructions, right down to its dimensions and construction.

Noah could have decided he knew a better way. He could have shortened it, widened it, or skipped parts that didn't make sense to him. Instead, Scripture simply tells us that he obeyed.

The Bible doesn't record every conversation, every difficult day, or every obstacle Noah faced while building the ark. But I imagine God's faithful hand helping him through each challenge. After all, building something that enormous wasn't exactly an everyday project. I know from experience that I struggle to assemble a piece of furniture correctly even when I have the instructions sitting right in front of me.  Noah needed help, I'm sure.

Or consider the Sabbath.

When God gave Israel the Sabbath, He wasn't creating another burdensome rule for His people. As Jesus later explained:

Then he said to them, 'The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.' — Mark 2:27–28 

The gift of rest wasn't something God needed from His people. It was something His people desperately needed from Him.  I think we're living in a culture that needs to understand this more than we realize.

We are exhausted.

Physically.

Emotionally.

Spiritually.

We have become so accustomed to constant movement that true rest almost feels uncomfortable. Yet biblical rest is about far more than taking a nap or sleeping in on Saturday morning. True rest is making space to be with the One who created us. It is stepping away from the noise long enough to remember who God is and who we are in Him.

God lovingly leads us because He knows us better than we know ourselves. He sees what we cannot see. He knows where our choices will lead long before we ever arrive there.

Whether it's a life-changing decision about a career, a relationship, a ministry opportunity, or something as ordinary as deciding whether to attend a baseball game, His guidance matters.  Whether God was giving instruction in the scriptures to build an ark or recognize the sabbath, it was about protecting His people.  

Obedience isn't about surrendering freedom.  It's about entrusting our lives to the One who knows exactly what is best for us.

The Small Decisions Become the Big Ones

We often assume obedience in life is about about life's biggest decisions.

Who should I marry?

Should I take this job?

Is this where God wants me to live?

Those are certainly the kinds of decisions we should bring before the Lord. They have the potential to shape the course of our lives, and it only makes sense that we would seek His wisdom before taking such significant steps.

But, God is just as interested in the small decisions as He is in the big ones.  In fact, the small decisions are where He does some of His greatest work.

Most of our lives aren't made up of monumental crossroads. They're made up of ordinary Tuesday afternoons, quiet evenings at home, conversations with friends, interruptions we didn't expect, and countless choices that seem insignificant in the moment. Yet those ordinary moments become the place where God teaches us what it means to trust Him.

Sometimes obedience looks like saying no to one more commitment because you know your body and your spirit need rest. Sometimes it means turning off your phone instead of scrolling for another hour. Sometimes it means going to bed because you know the Lord has been reminding you that you're exhausted.

Other times, obedience looks completely different. It means showing up for a friend even when you're tired because that's exactly what love requires in that moment. It means speaking gently when frustration would come much more naturally. It means extending patience when someone has tested it over and over again.

None of those moments will ever make the evening news. No one is likely to applaud them. Most people won't even notice them.  But God notices every single one, and He uses them.  

My mom has told me a story almost every year on my birthday for as long as I can remember. While she was pregnant with me, she talked to me constantly. Whether she was standing in the kitchen making dinner, folding laundry, or simply going about the ordinary routines of her day, she would tell me what she was doing. Long before I ever saw her face, I was listening to the sound of her voice.

After I was born, she said I immediately knew her voice. When she spoke, I would turn toward her because I already knew who she was.

I've always loved that story.

Isn't that's exactly what God is doing with us in these ordinary moments?

Day after day, He speaks through His Word. He prompts us through the Holy Spirit. He reminds us of His truth during quiet moments of prayer. He comforts us when we're hurting. He redirects us when we're about to wander. Little by little, He's teaching us to recognize His voice, not because He's trying to control our lives, but because He wants to walk through life with us.

The more time we spend with Him, the more familiar His voice becomes. Eventually, we begin to recognize the difference between our own desires and His loving direction. We start to discover that His guidance is never random and His boundaries are never arbitrary. They always flow from His love for us.

He knows when we need rest before we realize how exhausted we've become. He knows when we need courage before we recognize our fear. He knows when we need to step forward in faith, and He knows when we need to be still.

Most of all, He knows us.

God's desire has never been simply to manage my behavior or make me follow a list of rules. His desire is relationship. Every boundary He gives, every gentle prompting He whispers, every invitation to trust Him is another opportunity to know Him more deeply.

That's why the baseball game was never the real lesson.  The lesson was discovering that the God who lovingly guides the biggest decisions of my life also cares enough to guide the smallest ones.

And maybe that's what faith looks like.

Learning to recognize the voice of our Shepherd so well that, whether the decision is life-changing or as ordinary as attending a baseball game, we trust that His way will always lead us to something better than our own.