Soaring Free

During the three years I lived in Japan, God used various experiences to shape my life. The most poignant of them took place when I was in the sev­enth grade. This one would transform me forever.

We lived near Tokyo in a small complex called Camp Zama, an army town protected by guards and surround­ed by barbed wire. On the inside, it looked like any other military compound, complete with Quonset huts and sol­diers’ barracks. But the outside held all the mystique of Japan.

I was intrigued by the nation’s history, enchanted with the symmetry of its rice fields and the artistry of its thick thatched roofs. I came to love Japan, and I always looked forward to our weekend jaunts into the cool hill surrounding Tokyo.

One summers afternoon, we piled into our black Rambler station wagon and headed for the countryside. We wound our way up the side of the mountains, where the beauty of the vast countryside unfolded. Periodically, a break in the greenery that lined the winding road treat­ed us to a panoramic view of’ the magnificence for which Japan is so well known.

At the summit we stopped by a lookout point that afforded us a breathtaking view of neat patchwork rice paddies below. As soon as the car came to a halt, the door flew open and four young Cordeiros raced toward the edge of the cliff in order to get a front-row view. Trees blanketed the mountainside, brush­ing the soft breezes with a fresh cedar fragrance. We breathed in deeply, savor­ing each moment as if it were our last.

“Ahh! Isn’t this just the best,” my brother said, pointing to the checker­board rice paddies below. Stretching out as far as we could see lay lush green val­leys, each one reaching toward a sleepy village.

“You can almost see forever from here!” my sister sighed.

Unmoved by her sentimental poetry, I suggested, “Let’s eat!”

On one side of the viewpoint sat a Japanese woman selling bento, box lunches containing dried fish, rice and pickled vegetables. Opposite her stood a man dressed in a traditional yukatta (or hapi, a short kimono coat) wear­ing tabi and getta (“socks” and “wooden sandals”) that clicked and clacked with each step.

“Irrasbai-masse!” he said, tilting his voice and adding a shrill edge to the customary vendor’s call still heard around Japan today. ‘Welcome! May I have your attention’?”

While his voice intrigued me, it was his merchandise that caught my attention. A large box hung suspended from a strap around his neck. Above the box he had dis­played several bamboo cages, each one containing a tiny finch.

“Irrasbai-masse!” he repeated. “Irrasbai-masse!”

“How much for one of those birds?” I asked, strain­ing to understand his broken English.

“One hundred yen,” he replied. “You like?”

In my junior high days, 100 yen amounted to about 36 cents. I figured that for such a deal I would oblige this peddler.

“I’ll take one!” I said, handing him a 100 yen coin. In exchange, he handed me a bamboo cage containing the tiny bird. To conclude our purchase, he bowed in formal Japanese fashion. Distracted by my new acquisi­tion, I returned a token bow and hastily headed toward my brothers.

Just then, the vendor called back to me.

“Sumimasen! Excuse me!” he called. “Don’t forget: bring cage back when finished!”

“Bring back the cage?” I asked, confused. “I’m not planning to eat it. It’s going to be my new pet. Without a cage, how do you expect me to get it home?”

“Oh,” he replied, “you no understand. Bird not to take home. You take bird to edge and release, so can fly free!”

Without a doubt, 1 thought his suggestion had to be just about the dumbest thing I had ever heard. I had just paid good money for this bird—and he wanted me to let the creature go? I had no intention of complying. But his eyes remained fixed on me, silently urging my obedience. I stood there, hoping for a reprieve.

On the one hand, I thought I could make a run for it. I knew my sneaker-clad feet could outrun his gettas. But then again, there could be some hid­den samurai moves under his yukatta. Or worse, he could throw one of’ those ninja stars at me. So at last, I figured I’d better comply.

I politely nodded and made my way toward the edge of’ the cliff. Before me, the ground dropped dra­matically about 100 feet into the lush valley. I glanced at the vendor-turned-sentry who still kept me under his surveillance.

I slowly opened the door that separated the bird from its freedom. I tapped on the opposite side of the cage and the tiny finch hopped its way suspiciously toward the opening. Then, prodded by a final tap on the bamboo prison, it suddenly launched into flight with a jubilant fanfare of tweets and whistles. I watched as It darted over the treetops. it paused and then—almost as an afterthought—circled back toward me as if to say thank you. I watched until it disappeared into the clouds and I could see it no more.

I stood suspended in a moment of fresh discovery.

I walked slowly back toward the vendor (who no longer resembled a wary sentinel). I returned the empty cage and he bowed in the traditional form. I returned his bow but not so hastily as before. This time, I took the reverent posture of a young disciple before his sensei

I didn’t return home that day with a newfound pet. I brought back something much more profound.

I experienced the joy of being a Dream Releaser.

This incident has traveled with me throughout the years, forever altering my perspective about serving people. If I had even a hint back then of how much this single experience would transform my life, I would have paid 100 times as much for that little finch.


Inward-Pointing Arrows

Years later, at age 19, I turned my life over to Christ. I felt starved for attention and hungry for a better life. Yet I didn’t realize that all my arrows pointed inward.

I began attending church, only to find myself rating the services as to how they affected me. I evaluated prayer meetings and even worship services by what kind of experience they gave me.

If they didn’t “move” me, then obviously they weren’t of God.

I read all the books of self-discovery detailing how I could achieve my goals and how to get my prayers took answered. I heard all the speakers; and while each one provided some help, I still felt something missing. I had prayed all the ‘bless me” prayers ever printed and chant­ed all the affirmations taught in the seminars, but, something seemed lacking. The messages didn’t ring quite true. As time went on, I began to see myself becoming a per­son I didn’t particularly like. It dawned on me that I had been using God as a vending machine. He became a means to an end—mine! I needed Him to get more blessings, more money, more position, more favors. He existed more for my purposes than I did for His. The epiphany came when I realized that I existed for His purposes, not my own.

Years later I remembered afresh the lesson God taught me on that mountaintop in Japan. But this time, it wouldn’t come with a bright light or through a beard­ed prophet with reverb. This time it would be delivered through the simple life of’ a Dream Releaser.


An Early Investor

I guess that God knew His assignment for me would get kind of taken to the cemetery if I didn’t get help, so he sent Noel Campbell, a pharmacist-turned-preacher who invested in me early on.

Noel’s wife had died of cancer, forcing him to rear five young children as a single father. I remember him graciously moving his living-room furniture to one side and removing all the breakables, so we could hold week­ly youth meetings in his home. Every Saturday evening we would commandeer his house and cram more than 100 students into his front room. The scene resembled a hostile takeover more than it did a Bible study, but you’d never know it from Noel’s smile.

In 1984, I left the youth ministry and moved home to Hilo, Hawaii, to pastor the small beginnings of a church. Noel felt a nudge from the Lord to move with me—with no promise of salary and no guarantee of a position. He simply resigned his position as an assistant pastor Eugene, Oregon, and moved to the quiet town at the base of Mauna Kea. His main assignment?

To be a Dream Releaser.

As a 31-year-old rookie, my dreams lay frozen under glaciers of’ fear. My immaturity, mixed with my fears, made for a volatile recipe. But Noel, in his mid- to late-50s at the time, came to Hilo to encourage and, at times, prod me until I found the confidence to fly. He made a com­mitment to help me stay in step with what God had planned. He remained with me for six years to ensure that I didn’t forfeit the “scholarship” God had placed inside of me.

Noel saw in me things that I couldn’t see for myself’. Without him, I may very well have missed the miracle God put in motion. I was both insecure and impatient-­but Dream Releasers have a way of helping their charges to navigate through such obstacles.

When Noel finally saw me in full flight, he returned to the Pacific Northwest to be a grandfather to his daugh­ter’s children. When he boarded the plane, I remember feeling as if Elijah had departed! But like the mantle that the venerable prophet left behind for his young disciple, Noel left me something even greater.

He gave me an empty cage.

Through Noel’s selfless love, I discovered what I needed most—not another seminar, but someone to tap on my cage. His example beckoned me to do the same for others. The same lesson I had learned a few years earlier from a bird merchant turned sensei, God was now ask­ing me to teach.

Imagine how many restless souls are waiting for someone to take the time to bind a broken wing, to breathe in new courage, to nudge them into flight! Not until I accepted this invitation did I begin to notice the true heart of Jesus. I had unwittingly made Him into a vendor—but now I was about to make Him Lord.

The Pain Principle

Hurting people hurt people and are easily hurt by them





Early in my career, I accepted an invitation to lead a church. It was a wonderful opportunity, and it was in a nice town. It was an exciting time for Margaret and me.



MY NEW PEN PAL



I had been at the church only ten days when I received a piece of mail from Tom, a member of the congregation. I opened it up, began reading, and soon discovered that it was a typed transcript of the sermon I had delivered on my first Sunday. I was amazed—and flattered—that someone had taken the time to capture every word I had said. And then I looked more carefully. The pages were covered with comments. Tom had red-penned every grammatical mistake, corrected every misspoken word, and pointed out anything he thought was a factual error.

I thought it was odd, but I didn’t worry too much about it. I know I’m not perfect, and I’m aware that I sometimes make mistakes when I speak. But I have a healthy self-image, so I didn’t let it bother me. But then the next week, another envelope arrived in the mail from Tom. Once again, the message I had preached the previous Sunday had been transcribed. And once again, every tiny mistake was marked in red ink. That’s when I figured I’d better meet Tom and find out what was bothering him.

The next Sunday after delivering the sermon message, I asked someone to point out Tom to me. I walked over to him, stuck out my hand, and said, “Hi, I’m John Maxwell.”

At first Tom just stared at me. Finally he said, “Hello, Pastor.” And that’s when I realized he wasn’t going to shake my hand. Then he turned on his heel and walked away.

Sure enough, a couple of days later, guess what I received in the mail? Another envelope from Tom. I started calling them his “love letters.” I got one every week with his in-depth critique. Would you care to guess how long I received Tom’s love letters? Seven years! During that time, he never voluntarily shook my hand. I tried to connect with him, but he wanted little to do with me. In only one subject could I get him to engage in conversation with me. Our kids were adopted, and so were his, so he’d talk to me about them. But he wouldn’t warm up.



WHAT LIES BENEATH



Then one day I had lunch with a veteran pastor. I told him about Tom, the weekly love letters I received, and my inability to win Tom over. My pastor friend looked at me and said, “You know, John, hurting people hurt people.” That statement really connected for me. ‘Whenever someone says or does something hurtful,” he continued, “you need to go beneath the surface.”

I looked at Tom in a new way after that. I began searching for the cause of his pain, and I tried again to connect with him. Finally one day when I was trying to get him to engage, he made a statement that more than hinted at the problem. He said, “Never trust a pastor.” I later came to find out that Tom had once served as a board member at a church and had been mistreated by the pastor. He decided from then on that pastors were bad news and couldn’t be trusted.

After I understood the problem, I was able to work on winning Tom’s trust. It took a lot of effort, but by the time I left Lancaster to accept another leadership position, Tom had gotten over his mistrust of me. We became friends. And not only was he willing to shake my hand, but he’d give me a great big bear hug. By then, he had long since given up sending me love letters.



SOME PAIN, NO GAIN



To really understand the Pain Principle and have it help you in dealing with others, you need to keep in mind four truths:



1. There Are Many Hurting People



It doesn’t take a psychiatrist to see that many people are hurting today. Columnist Ann Landers asserted that one in four Americans is imbalanced. (She added that we should look at our three closest friends, and if they seem okay, it means we’re the one!)

Of course, the fact that many people are hurting is not a new phenomenon. In the nineteenth century, philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer compared the human race to porcupines huddled together on a bitter cold winter night:



The colder it gets outside, the more we huddle together for warmth; but the closer we get to one another, the more we hurt one another with our sharp quills. And in the lonely night of earth’s winter eventually we begin to drift apart and wander out on our own and freeze to death in our loneliness.



Schopenhauer was quite a pessimist. Unlike him, I believe there is hope for everyone. But at the same time we can’t be naive about people. A tremendous number of individuals are nursing deep hurts.



2. Those Hurting People Often Hurt People



German poet Herman Hesse wrote, ‘If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn’t part of ourselves doesn’t disturb us.” I agree with his viewpoint. When hurting people lash out, it is in response to what’s happening inside them more than what’s happening around them. They feel or believe something negative within themselves. The problem is that people who don’t believe in themselves will never succeed, and they will also keep those around them from succeeding.

Early in my pastoral career, I did a lot of counseling, a responsibility I eventually gave to staff members because I didn’t have the temperament for it. But over the years I counseled enough hurting couples to observe that their interaction usually followed a pattern. Emotionally one spouse would “throw up,” and then the other one would clean up. I saw it happen again and again. And always the individual in the most pain did the most damage to the other person.



3. Those Hurting People Are Often Hurt by People



Not only do hurting people hurt others, but they are also easily hurt by others. My friend Kevin Myers illustrates it this way. If someone has a splinter in his finger and he allows it to remain there, his finger becomes swollen and infected. Then if another person barely brushes against it, the individual howls with pain and says, ‘You hurt me!” But the reality is that the problem isn’t with the person who innocently bumped the finger. It’s with the person who has the splinter but has neglected to address the injury.

Emotional pain works in a similar way. Hurting people overreact, over exaggerate, and overprotect. They also over influence. By that I mean they control the relationship. That was the case with Tom. The old wound was his unresolved conflict with a previous pastor. He had never removed the “splinter” so that it could heal. And because he was hurting, he prevented our relationship from growing for seven years. That’s always the way: relationships are held back by the less healthy person.

As you interact with others, remember this: anytime a person’s response is larger than the issue at hand, the response is almost always about something else.



4. Those Hurting People Often Hurt Themselves



In an old comedy routine, a know-it-all is fond of lecturing his friend at the station where they wait to take the commuter train each morning. And every time the know-it-all talks, he pokes his friend in the chest with his finger. That, of course, doesn’t sit well with the other man. So he finally determines that he’s going to put a stop to it.

The next day on the way to the station, he meets a third friend and says, ‘I’m so tired of that know-it-all lecturing me and poking me in the chest. Today I’m going to get ‘im.”

“How are you going to do that?” his buddy asks.

The first man opens his coat to re­veal three sticks of dynamite strapped to his chest. “Today when he pokes me, he says with a smile, “he’s going to blow his hand off.”

Hurting people are often like that. They may hurt others, but the ones they hurt deepest and most often are themselves. Poet George Herbert declared, “He who cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself.”



DEALING WITH HURTING PEOPLE



Author Glenn Clark advises, “If you wish to travel far and fast, travel light. Take off all your envies, jealousies, unforgiveness, selfishness, and tears.” People who have not gotten past their hurt have a hard time doing that. As a result, they act and react differently from healthy people.



Healthy people are... Hurting people are...



more willing to change. less willing to change.

more willing to admit failure. less willing to admit failure.

more willing to discuss issues. less willing to discuss issues.

more willing to learn from others. less willing to learn from others.

more willing to do something about the problem. less willing to do something about the problem.

able to travel light. carrying a lot of baggage.



If you find yourself dealing with a hurting person, which we all must do from time to time, then I advise that you do the following:



Don’t Take It Personally



Hurting people are going to find offense when none is given. When you know that you’ve done nothing wrong, remember that it’s not what others say about you; it’s what you believe about yourself. You can apologize for their pain and feel compassion for their state, but you should try not to take it personally. That can be difficult—even for a person with a healthy self-image—but it’s worth the effort.



Look Beyond the Person for the Problem



Just as I did with Tom, you would do well to try to look past the person and his hurtful actions and try to see what’s causing him pain. Even if you can’t discover the source of the problem, this plan will help you to approach the person with greater compassion.



Look Beyond the Situation



Have you ever had to make a bad-news phone call and dreaded it, not so much because of the news you had to deliver but because you were dreading the response from the person on the other end of the line? Just last week, my wife and I had to make such a call. The weekend had been planned, but at the last minute things changed. We had to call a friend who would be negatively affected by the change. We hated to make the call, not because the news was that bad, but because the person is not always emotionally strong and would react badly.

In such cases, try not to focus on the situation. Just remember that it’s not what happens to you; it’s what happens in you that matters. Try to rise above the emotional turmoil that the other person may create.



Do Not Add to Their Hurt



The natural inclination for many people is to meet fire with fire, pain with pain. But striking back at a hurting person is like kicking a man while he’s down. Statesman Sir Francis Bacon said, “This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge keeps his wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well.” If someone lashes out at you, the best thing to do is to forgive him and move on.



Help Them Find Help



The kindest thing you can do for hurting people is to try to get them help. Some people don’t want to deal with their issues, and you certainly can’t force them to receive help. But you can always choose to extend your hand. It may take a long time, as it did with Tom, but even very bitter people have been known to come around.



WHAT IF YOU’RE THE ONE WHO’S HURTING?



At the beginning of this chapter, the question was asked: Do I hurt people, or am I too easily hurt by them? If you answered yes, then you need to answer a second question: Am I prepared to work through my issues and get beyond my pain? Here’s the key. Most people just want a quick fix, something to give them some relief in the moment. That’s why some choose to lash out; it makes them feel better temporarily. Others use alcohol, food, sex, or something else to lessen the pain. But as my friend Kevin Myers says, “If you want to become well, you need more than a fix. You need to become fit.”

People who seek emotional fitness don’t look for momentary relief. They search for what’s right. How can you tell what kind of person you are? People searching for a fix stop working at resolving a problem as soon as the pain or pressure is relieved. People seeking fitness continue doing what’s right and improving themselves even when the discomfort goes away.

Delving into your old hurts and emotional issues often takes the help of a professional counselor and can he a messy proposition, but it’s worth it. I recently read a story that provides a good analogy for what it’s like. In March 1995, the New England Pipe Cleaning Company of Watertown, Connecticut, was working under the streets of Revere, Massachusetts, to clean out a ten-inch sewer line. The workers found many of the usual items that clog those kinds of pipes. However, they also discovered many other things: sixty-one rings, vintage coins, and silverware. The bad news is that the workers had to do an unpleasant job. The good news is that they were allowed to keep the valuable things they discovered in the process.

If your relational capacity is all clogged up,” you, too, may have to do some digging to make things right. And you may have to deal with some pretty nasty stuff. But the reward is that you may discover some treasures that you didn’t know existed. And at the end of your hard work, you can develop a healthy capacity for relationships.

The Friendship Principle

If you were suddenly faced with a huge project that had a tough deadline and you needed to pull together a group of people to help you accomplish it, who would you ask for help? Would you enlist the aid of the people in your office who give you the most trouble? Would you go out of your way to partner with people who rub you the wrong way? Of course not!

What if you became aware of a business opportunity that you knew was the chance of a lifetime? How would you pursue it? Would you use the Yellow Pages to find people to help you? Would you put an ad in the newspaper looking for a business partner? Certainly not! You would mentally review the friends and associates qualified to help, and you would choose the people with whom you have the best relationships. And if two people had the same level of skill, you'd pick the person you most like to work with.

All that may seem painfully obvious to you as you read it. However, I believe that most people underestimate the power and importance of relationships in regard to business and career. They try to learn the most recent management fad. They focus on product quality. They create programs and systems to improve productivity or increase repeat business. They collect e-mail addresses. These things may be helpful, but the real key is relationships. Never underestimate the power of friendship and likability when it comes to doing business.

To see an excellent example of the Friendship Principle, look at the life of Bill Porter. If ever there was a person with obstacles to succeeding in business, he was it. Porter was born with cerebral palsy. As a child, he was always physically behind his peers. From birth his right hand has been nearly useless, and verbal communication has always been difficult. The so-called experts thought he was retarded and advised his parents to institutionalize him. They refused. Instead they made major adjustments to their lifestyle, worked with him, and helped him to cultivate independence. Porter worked hard and completed high school, receiving his diploma.

DETERMINED TO MAKE IT

After high school, he looked for work with the aid of the Oregon Department of Employment. He took a job as a stock clerk and was fired after only one day. He worked as a cashier for Goodwill and lasted only three days. He took jobs at the Salvation Army working on the loading dock and at the Veterans Administration answering phones. After more firings, the Department of Employment deemed him “unemployable.”

But Porter wouldn't give up. He didn't want to live his life accepting a government disability check. When he got an opportunity to sell household items to raise money for United Cerebral Palsy, he loved it. He decided to make sales his career. He had a hard time finding a company that would give him a try, though. Finally he persuaded the director of Watkins Incorporated to give him a chance. He was reluctantly offered a territory that no other salesman would accept-- working for straight commission. Porter would be selling household products door to door.

That was in the 1950s. Today, Porter is in his seventies, and he still works for Watkins. For decades he got up in the morning at 5:45, took two hours to laboriously get ready and dressed, caught buses across town to his territory, and haltingly walked seven to ten miles every day, going door to door selling products such as vanilla, spices, and detergents. He won his first sales award more than forty years ago and long ago became Watkins' number one salesman in the Northwest. In an era when door-to-door salesmen faded away, he continued to thrive.

How did he do it? His first asset has always been persistence. His second has been friendship. How else could you explain the continued success of a salesman whom people find difficult to understand, selling products that can he bought cheaper at discount stores, being sold in a method that went out of style decades ago, from a man who asks his customers to complete their own order forms because he has trouble writing? As Shelly Brady, who has assisted Porter since she was seventeen, says, “He snuck into people's hearts.”

THE FOUR LEVELS OF BUSINESS RELATIONSHIPS

As soon as you understand the way that relationships affect business, you begin to realize that all business relationships are not created equal. As I have studied the subject, I've found that there are four levels:

1. People Knowledge--Your Understanding of People Helps Build Your Business

In the introduction of this book, I discussed the importance of people skills in business relationships. They are absolutely essential to success. All the product knowledge in the world won't help someone without people skills. Nor will technical expertise. Nor will the ability to build a brilliantly efficient organization. If individuals don't possess people skills, they very quickly hit a ceiling in their effectiveness.

An interesting way that some people overcome a lack of expertise in people knowledge is to partner with someone who possesses it in abundance. For example, people like Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs brought together technical skill and people knowledge in a way that has made Apple computers a household name.

I believe there are thousands and thousands of technically talented people whose businesses would turn around overnight if only they mastered--or partnered with someone who possessed--people knowledge.

2. Service Skills--Your Treatment of People Helps Build Your Business

Barry J. Gibbons, author of This Indecision Is Final, maintains, “Between 70 percent and 90 percent of decisions not to repeat a purchase of anything are not about product or price. They are about some dimension of the service relationship.” Many businesses today recognize this fact, and as a result, they place greater emphasis on service to their customers. How you treat the people you do business with really matters, especially in a competitive marketplace. The more competitive the industry, the more important the service.

3. Business Reputation--Your Reputation for Relationships Helps Build Your Business

Writer Howard Hodgson said, “Whatever business you are in, you are in a business of relationships. That's why your reputation is your greatest asset.” Because of Bill Porter's physical disabilities, many people under-estimated his people skills--until they got to know him. Porter knew how to connect with people and understand their needs. For that reason, he was a good salesman. He also conducted his business in such a way that his customers always got what they were promised, when it was promised. Over time, his reputation grew. And as a result, he has sold products to three and sometimes four generations of some families!

4. Personal Friendship--Your Friendship with Others Builds Your Business

The highest level of business relationships is reached when people like your business, but more important, they like you! When there is a heartfelt personal connection to another person, it becomes stronger than any other kind of business bond. That's why I say all things being equal, people will work with people they like; all things not being equal, they still will. Friendship is the difference maker! Even when the odds are stacked against you, friendship many times will still give you the edge with the customer. Why? People like being and working with their friends.

I read a story about when General William Westmoreland was in Vietnam, and he was reviewing a platoon of paratroopers. As he walked down the line, he asked each of them a question: “How do you like jumping, son?”

“Love it. sir” was the first answer.

“The greatest experience in my life, sir!” exclaimed the next paratrooper.

But when he came to the third one, the soldier's response surprised him. “1 hate it, sir,” the young man replied.

“Then why do you do it?” asked Westmoreland.

“Because I want to be around the guys who love to jump.”

THE VALUE OF FRIENDSHIP

Although I've been examining the Friendship Principle solely in the context of business, it applies much more broadly. People want to engage in activities with people they like. Once again, this probably seems obvious, but I mention it because I want to emphasize the value--and power--of true friendship in every context and situation.

One person who had incredible insight about relationships was King Solomon of ancient Israel. It's said that he was the wisest person who ever lived. During the course of his lifetime, he wrote many wise things about friendships, and we can learn from them today. Here are a few of those truths about real friends:

Real Friends Are Scarce

Solomon wrote, “Friends come and friends go, but a true friend sticks by you like family.” When you develop a deep friendship with someone, value it, because real friends are rare. A true friend ...

is someone who sees you at your worst but never forgets your best.

is someone who thinks you're a little bit more wonderful than you really are.

is someone you can talk with for hours or be with in complete silence.

is as happy for your success as you are.

trusts you enough to say what he really means when talking to you.

doesn't try to know more, act smarter, or be your constant teacher.

In short, a real friend is a friend all the time. Value the real friends you have. They are precious. More important, try to become a real friend to others. There are few gifts greater than being a friend.

Real Friends Are Refreshing

Solomon observed, “Just as lotions and fragrance give sensual delight, a sweet friendship refreshes the soul.” Every situation in life improves when a friend is involved. When you want to share a fun experience, there's nothing like having a friend with you. When you're facing a crisis, a friend shares its weight. C. S. Lewis said, “Friendship is born at the moment one person says to another, 'What, you too? I thought I was the only one.'” That kind of connection is refreshing, no matter what's happening in your life.

How do others respond to you? When people see you coming, do they expect to be refreshed and energized? Or do they have to expend energy to sustain their interaction with you? Everyone should be a breath of fresh air to someone in his life.

Real Friends Make Us Better

In the best kinds of friendships, the people improve one another simply by being together. As Solomon said, “You use steel to sharpen steel, and one friend sharpens another.”

Automaker Henry Ford was having lunch with a person and asked him, “Who is your best friend?” As

Ford waited for his response, the man hesitated. He wasn't sure.

“I will tell you who your best friend is,” Ford jumped in. “Your best friend is the one who brings out the best that is within you.”

That's what real friends do. They bring out each other's best.

Real Friends Remain Faithful

Have you heard this one? What do you get if you cross Lassie with a pit bull? You get a dog that bites your face off and then goes for help. Real friends aren't like that. In this world there are plenty of people who don't care about others. Solomon remarked, “Calloused climbers betray their very own friends; they'd stab their own grandmothers in the back.” But real friends remain faithful no matter what.

Author and pastor Richard Exley said, “A true friend is one who hears and understands when you share your deepest feelings. He supports you when you are struggling; he corrects you, gently and with love, when you err; and he forgives you when you fail. A true friend prods you to personal growth, stretches you to your full potential. And most amazing of all, he celebrates your successes as if they were his own.

You cannot sustain a deep friendship with everyone, nor should you try. But you should cultivate genuine, deep friendships with a few people. And you can be a friendly, kind, supportive person to everyone you meet. You can treat every person as an individual, not simply a business “contact.” If you put others first as people and then worry about business second, you're on your way to practicing the Friendship Principle.

No matter what kind of business or industry you're in, the Friendship Principle can help you. It doesn't matter if you're the salesman or the customer, a boss or an employee, an executive or a stay-at-home mom. Whatever work you do, people will be more inclined to do it with you when you treat them like a friend.

Be Happy with Who You Are

You can dare to he happy with who you are right now and accept yourself, faults and all. A lot of us don't realize it, but the root cause of many social, physical, and emotional problems is simply the fact that people don't like themselves. They are uncomfortable with how they look, how they talk, or how they act. They don't like their personality. They are always comparing themselves with other people, wishing they were something different. “If I just had his personality ... .” “ If I looked like she looks… .” “If my thighs just weren't so big … .” If I had less here and more somewhere else, then I'd be happy.”

No, you can be happy with who God made you to be, and quit wishing you were something different. If God had wanted you to look like a fashion model, a movie star, a famous athlete, or anyone else, He would have made you look like them. If God had wanted you to have a different personality, He would have given you that personality. Don't compare yourself to other people; learn to be happy with who God made you to be.

Many people are insecure about who they are, so they constantly try to gain the approval of everybody around them so they can feel better about themselves. They end up living to please other people, trying to fit into their molds so they can be accepted. They act one way for their boss, another way for their spouse, and another way for their friends. They live a life of pretense, wearing various masks, and hoping to please everybody. In essence, they are not being true to anyone, especially themselves.

But if you are going to enjoy life to the full, you must learn to be confident as the individual God made you to be. Understand this: You were not created to mimic somebody else. You were created to be you. When you go around copying and trying to be like somebody else, not only does it demean you, it steals your diversity your creativity, and your uniqueness.

God doesn't want a bunch of clones. He likes variety and you should not let people pressure you or make you feel badly about yourself because you don't fit their image of who you should be. Some people spend three-fourths of their time trying to be somebody else. How foolish!

Be an original, not a copycat. Dare to be different; be secure in who God made you to be and then go out and be the best you that you can be. You don't have to look or act like anyone else. God has given us all different gifts, talents, and personalities on purpose. You don't really need anybody else's approval to do what you know God wants you to do.

Certainly, you should always be open to wise counsel. I'm not suggesting that you be foolish or rebellious. Nor am I suggesting that you move from liberty to license in your spiritual life. We never have permission to live an ungodly life. But we do have God's blessing to be confident, not letting outside pressures mold us into something or someone we're not. If you want to wear your hair a certain way that's your prerogative. You don't have to check with all your friends to make sure it's okay. Be secure in who you are. If you want to join the choir at church or start a new business or buy a new car or home, you don't need anyone's approval before you can do what you know God wants you to do. Your attitude should be: I am confident in who I am. I'm not going to go around pretending, wishing I was something else, trying to fit into everybody's mold. 1 am free to run my own race.

It's okay to be you! God made you the way you are on purpose. He went to great lengths to make sure that each of us is an original. We should not feel badly because our personality tastes, hobbies, or even spiritual tendencies are not the same as another person's. Some people are outgoing and energetic. Other people are more timid and laid back. Some people like to wear suits and ties. Other people are more comfortable wearing blue jeans. Some people close their eyes and lift their hands when they worship God in a more subdued manner. And guess what? God likes it all! God loves variety.

Don't think that you have to fit into somebody else's mold and, similarly don't be upset when other people don't fit into your molds. Just be the person God made you to be.

Interestingly Victoria and I are totally opposite in many respects. I'm a very routine person, extremely structured and organized. I get up at the same time every day. I do the same things, maintain the same schedule from week to week. I go to the same restaurants and eat the same food. In most cases, I don't even have to look at the menu, because I know I'm going to order the same things I always order. Victoria, on the other hand, does not like routine. She likes variety. She's outgoing, energetic, fun, adventurous, and daring. There's no telling what she's going to do next! My prayer is always, “Please, God, just don't let her get arrested!”

And here is the wonderful part: God made her that way! One of the reasons why we have a good relationship is because I don't spend my time trying to change her, and she doesn't make me feel badly about being myself, or nag me because I'm not just like her. We've learned to appreciate our differences. We've learned to enjoy the person God made each of us to be.

In the process, we balance each other. I'm structured and routine; she's fun and adventurous. Without her, my life would be boring; without me, she would be in prison! (Just kidding.)

Learn to Appreciate the Differences

The truth is, we all must learn to appreciate our differences. Don't try to squeeze everybody into your little box. And don't allow anyone else to cramp your style. Certainly, we can always learn from other people, and sometimes we need to he open to change. But you need not feel insecure because you don't have the same physical, emotional, or intellectual traits that someone else has. Be happy with who God made you to be.

The reason many people are discontented today is because they compare themselves with other people. You know how it goes. You start out in a perfectly good mood, happy as can be, but then you see one of your coworkers drive up in a brand-new car. You start thinking, I wish I had a new car. Here 1 am, driving this old clunker. Before long, your good mood is gone, and you are discouraged and discontented. Or maybe you see a friend walk into the room and she is being escorted by her handsome husband who looks as though he just stepped out of GQ magazine. Then you look over at your husband . . . and well, you get my point.

But it's as silly to compare your spouse to somebody else's spouse as it is to compare your talent, abilities, or education to somebody else's. Such comparisons are almost always counterproductive, causing you to lose your joy just run your race. Don't worry about anyone else.

Not long ago, I heard a minister on television tell how he got out of bed every day at four o'clock in the morning and prayed for two hours. My first thought was, Oh, my, I don't pray for two hours a day, and I surely don't get up that early. The more I thought about it, the worse I felt!

Finally; I had to get a hold of myself, and say, “That's great for him, but thank God, it's not great for me! I'm going to run my race, and I'm not going to feel guilty or badly about myself just because I'm not doing what he's doing.

God has an individual plan for each of our lives. Just because something works for somebody else doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work for you. God gives each of us special grace to do what He's called us to do. If we make the mistake of trying to copy other people, we're going to be frequently frustrated, and we're going to waste a lot of time and energy. Worse yet, we may miss the good things God has for us to do!

I've seen mothers who are always running their children here and there, investing a lot of time in their kids. Their children are involved in every club and sport, and usually that's great. But some moms simply try to copy another person, or they enroll their children in all sorts of activities out of a sense of guilt and condemnation. Some frantic, frazzled parents are so desperately trying to keep up with their peers (their peers, not their children's!), they are missing the entire point of the horizon-expanding programs in the first place. Not only that, but all that running around is wearing out Mom and Dad!

Here's some good news: You don't have to keep up with anyone else. You can run your own race and be an individual. God has given you the grace to do what He's called you to do. He has not given you the grace to do what everybody else is doing. You don't have to be the best mother in the world. Just be the best mother that you can be.

I may not ever be the world's greatest pastor. I may not be the best husband or the best father, but I'm determined to be the best I can be. And I'm not going to feel bad about myself. If somebody can do what I do better, fine. I'm not in a contest; I'm not comparing myself with anyone else. As far as I'm concerned, I'm number one! I know I'm doing the best I can do.

That is what the Scripture teaches. It say's, “Let each one examine his own work.”' In other words, quit looking at what everybody else is doing and run your own race. You can take pride in yourself without comparing yourself to anybody else. If you run your race and be the best that you can be, then you can feel good about yourself.

Granted, you will face enormous pressure to do what everybody else is doing, to try to please everybody and meet all their expectations. If you're not careful, though, your life can become a blur, a pale imitation rather than an original. But you don't have to please everyone else; you need to please only God. The truth is, if you're going to run your own race, you may not be able to meet other people's expectations. You can't be everything to everybody. You'll have to accept the fact that some people may not like you. Everybody's not going to agree with every decision you make. You probably will not be able to keep every person in your life happy. But you can't let the demands, pressures, and expectations from others stop you from doing what you know God wants you to do.

Melanie is a bright young woman who does a marvelous job of balancing her responsibilities as wife and mother with her desires for a career outside the home. But she felt pressured to keep moving up the ladder in her company. When a new position opened, her boss urged her to accept a promotion. Her husband approved, and Melanie knew it was a great opportunity. But something inside caused her to take pause. She didn't feel good about accepting the new position. She didn't want to work in that stressful an environment, and besides, she was fulfilled and contented in her current position. She was highly competent at her job, enjoyed her career, and was able to work flexible hours, which allowed her to spend plenty of time with her family.

“I'm honored that my employer wants to promote me,” Melanie said, “but I'm happy with the way things are. I'm afraid, though, that I will let everybody down if I don't take the new job. I feel that I won't be living up to their expectations if I turn down the new opportunity. What do you think I should do?”

“Melanie, you can't live to please everybody' else,” I told her. “And although those people may mean well and may want the best for you, only you know deep down inside what is right for you. You have to learn to follow your heart. You can't let other people pressure you into being something that you're not. If you want God's favor in your life, you must be the person He made you to be, not the person your boss wants you to be, not the person your friends want you to be, not even the person your parents or your husband wants you to be. You can't let outside expectations keep you from following your own heart.”

Melanie declined the offer for the new position, and she and her family are thriving. In her case, a promotion would have been a step backward.

Seek Good Counsel

When you face difficult decisions or uncertain choices, it helps to seek counsel from someone you respect. Certainly, as the Bible says, “there's safety in a multitude of counselors,” and we should never be hardheaded and stubborn. We should always stay open and be willing to take advice. But after you've prayed about something and looked at all the options, if you still don't feel good about it, be bold enough to make a decision that is right for you. If you're trying to please everybody else by doing things you don't really want to do, so you won't hurt somebody's feelings, or you are trying to keep everybody happy, you will be cheating yourself. You can run yourself in circles trying to be something that you're not, and you'll run the risk of missing out on God's best for your own life.

Sometimes you can even get too much advice. If you're not careful, conflicting opinions will simply cause confusion. Sometimes the friends who are giving you advice can't in. in run their own lives. But they sure are good at telling you how to run yours! Be careful about whom you allow to influence your decision-making process. Make sure the people who are giving you advice know what they're talking about and are people who have earned no your respect as a source of wisdom. Besides, secure people rely on their inner direction 75 percent of the time and on their outer direction only 25 percent of the time. That means for most of the decisions you make, you should not have to seek everybody else's opinions and approval. You need to follow your own heart in light of God's Word and do what you feel is right and good for you.

Similarly, parents, you should not put pressure on your children to fulfill your dreams. You should allow them to fulfill the dreams God has placed in their own hearts. Of course it's good to give our children direction and guidance, but don't be a controller or a manipulator. Don't put unrealistic expectations on your children.

One of the things I appreciated about my mom and dad's parenting style was that they never planned my siblings' lives or my life. Certainly; they pointed us in the right direction, offering advice and wise counsel. They helped us see where our gifts and talents were, even those that were buried. But they always let us fulfill our own dreams. From the time I was a little boy; I knew my dad wanted me to preach, but I never had that desire. Despite his disappointment, Daddy never once tried to cram preaching down my throat. He never tried to make me feel guilty or that I was less of a person because I wasn't doing exactly what he wanted me to do. In fact, he often told me, “Joel, I want you to fulfill your dreams for your life, not my dreams for your life.” Today, I can preach with the freedom of knowing I'm not doing just what pleases my dad or other family members; I'm doing what pleases God.

Are you being the person God made you to be? Or are you just going around pretending, trying to be what everybody else wants you to be, living up to their expectations and following their dreams for your life? When my dad went to be with the Lord and I first started pastoring at Lakewood Church, one of my biggest concerns was “How is everybody going to accept me?” After all, Daddy' had been there for forty years, and everybody was accustomed to him. His style and personality were much different from mine. My dad was a fireball of a preacher, always energetic and exciting. I'm a bit more laid back.

One night I was praying, asking God what I should do. “Should I try to be more like my dad? Should I copy his style? Should I preach his messages?” On and on I went. I was just so concerned about it. But the Lord spoke to me, not out loud, but deep down in my heart, saying, Joel, don't copy anybody. Just be yourself. Be who I created you to be. I don't want a duplicate of your dad. I want an original.

That truth set me free!

I love the reminder in the book of Joshua. Moses had just died, and God wanted Joshua to take over as leader of His people. God said to Joshua, “As I was with Moses, I will be with you.” Notice He didn't say; “Joshua, you need to try to be just like Moses, then you'll be okay” No, God said to Joshua, “Be an original. Be who I made you to be, and then you'll be successful.”

One of the secrets of any success I've had at Lakewood and I know it all comes from God--would be that I have walked in my own shoes. I haven't tried to fill Daddy's shoes or anyone else's. I have not tried to be something that I'm not or tried to copy somebody else. I don't step up on the platform and act one way, then go home and act another way. No, with me, what you see is who I am. That's all God requires me to be.

And that's all He expects of you, as well. If you will learn to be the original God made you to be, God will take you places you've never even dreamed of. You may have some faults, some areas you and God are refining. But remember, God is in the process of changing you. And if you'll just be happy with who God made you to be and make a decision that you're going to be the best you can be. God will pour out His favor in your life, and you'll live that life of victory He has in store for you.

The Purpose of Trials

No matter how successful we are, we all face challenges, struggles, and times when things don't go our way. When calamities occur, some people immediately think they have done something wrong, that God must surely be punishing them. They don't understand that God has a divine purpose for every challenge that comes into our lives. He doesn't send the problems, but sometimes He allows us to go through them.

Why is that? The Bible says temptations, trials, and difficulties must come, because if we are to strengthen our spiritual muscles and grow stronger, we must have adversities to overcome and attacks to resist. Moreover, it's in the tough times of life that we find out what we're really made of. The pressure exposes things that we need to deal with things such as wrong attitudes, wrong motives, areas where we're compromising. As odd as this may seem, the trials can be beneficial.

The Scripture says, “Don't be amazed at the fiery ordeal that's taking place to test your quality as though something strange was happening.”' Notice, the trial is intended to test your quality, to test your character, to test your faith. In other words, “Don't think it's a big deal when you go through these tough times.” All through life, you will face various tests, and even though you may not enjoy them, God will use those trials to refine you, to cleanse and purify you. He's trying to shape you into the person He wants you to be. If you will learn to Cooperate with God and be quick to change and correct the areas that He brings to light, then you'll pass that test and you will be promoted to a new level.

Tests of Faith

I've discovered in the struggles of life that God is more interested in changing me than He is in changing my circumstances. I'm not saying that God won't change the circumstances. Certainly, He can and often does. But most of the time, I'm tested in the areas where I am the weakest.

You've probably found something similar to be true. If you have a problem with jealousy; it seems as though everybody you meet has more or better material possessions than you do. You notice that your best friend wears a brand-new outfit every time you turn around. The person you work next to, who makes half as much money as you do, comes driving up in a brand-new car. Your long-lost relative calls to tell you that she just won the lottery!

Are you going to pass the test? Are you going to keep a good attitude and rejoice with those who rejoice and be sincerely happy for them? Or are you going to get all negative and bitter and say, “God, I work harder than they do. Nothing good ever happens to me. I go to church every Sunday. Why can't I get a new car?”

That's a test of your faith. That's God bringing to light impurities in your character. That's God trying to refine you. If you'll learn to work with God, and let go of that jealousy, you'll be amazed at the blessings and favor and victory that will come into your life.

I'm a very focused and goal-oriented person. When I have a project to do, I like to get it done right then and there. I've been that way my whole life. In elementary school, when the teacher would give us a homework assignment on a Monday that wasn't due until Friday, I'd go home on Monday night and do the whole thing! I didn't want anything hanging over my head.

When I go to a restaurant, I order before they even give me a menu. I'm trying to tell you in a roundabout way that sometimes I'm impatient. I don't like to wait; I don't like to be inconvenienced. But I've discovered that the more impatient I am, the more I find myself in situations where I have to wait around. If I'm in a hurry to get out of the grocery store, inevitably I'll get in the line with a brand-new cashier who is plodding through his or her first day on the job, and the person in front of me will have twenty-three items that don't have a price tag on them!

At home, I've noticed that the more impatient I am, the longer it takes Victoria to get dressed for an occasion. Ironically, when I'm not in a hurry or being impatient, Victoria will beat me getting dressed. She'll be out in the car waiting with the kids. But every time I'm impatient, one thing after another will delay us. Little Alexandra will have taken Victoria's makeup. The iron won't work right. My wife can't find our daughter's shoes. Interesting, isn't it? Victoria doesn't realize it, but God is using her to refine me while she's getting dressed!

God deliberately uses situations such as these so I can recognize the problem in myself and learn to deal with it. He's working something out of me so I can rise to a new level and be the person He really wants me to be.

In a similar way, God will use people in your life. Your own husband or wife, your in-laws, or your own children may be the unwitting mirrors that God uses to reveal areas where you need to change.

“Joel, I can't stand my boss. He irritates me to no end. I don't know why I have to work with him day in and day out. When is God ever going to change that man?”

Have you considered that God may want to change you? God may have purposely arranged for you to be in close proximity to that person who grates against you. He may be trying to teach you how to love your enemies. Or, He may be trying to toughen you up a little and teach you to have some endurance, to not run from everything that is hard, uncomfortable, or inconvenient.

A husband moans, “God, why did You put me with this woman? She can't do anything right. She can't even cook. She burns the toast. She can't make a meat loaf. God, when are You going to change her?”

She's probably going to continue to cook just like that until you learn how to get over it, have a better attitude, and start appreciating the fact that at least she's trying to do something for you. You could be eating a TV dinner!

A parent complains, “God, these kids are driving me bananas. If You would just make them behave, then I'll be happy”

God is not going to change anyone you are dealing with until He first changes you. But if you'll quit complaining about everybody around you and, instead, start taking a good look inside and working with God to change you, God will change those other people. Examine your own heart and see if there are attitudes and motives that you need to change.

One day I was driving to church, and I was running a bit late for an important meeting. I knew that if could avoid any traffic jams, I'd get there just in time. But I caught every single stoplight going out of the neighborhood. I even got stopped by a light that I had never before seen turn red, not in my entire lifetime!

I started praying as 1 drove, but the more I prayed, the longer it took me to get through the traffic lights. I finally steered onto the highway and took off toward the church as fast as I could drive, praying the whole time that God would give me the discernment to know which hill the policemen were waiting behind. I had just enough time to make it to my meeting.

But as I kept going, much to my chagrin, the traffic started moving slower and slower. I thought, Oh, no! What is going on? Eventually, the traffic came to a complete stop. I thought, God, I've got to get to this meeting. You've got to help me. In a couple of minutes, the lane next to me started moving. I tried everything I possibly could to get into that lane, but it was just one of those days. Nobody was willing to let me squeeze in. I had my blinker on, I was smiling and waving, I was holding up money, I was blowing kisses, I was doing everything, yet nobody would let me in!

Finally, a sweet little old lady was kind enough to let me pull into the lane in front of her. I thought, All right! At last, I can get going! But just as I tramped down on the gas pedal, the flow of traffic in that lane came to a complete stop, and I had to slam on the brakes. Meanwhile, my previous lane starting moving! I was so frustrated that I didn't even want to think about trying to get back in that other lane.

I didn't realize that God was testing me in the area of my patience. I sat stewing in that traffic for about ten minutes, and when it started inching forward, I noticed the problem. A car had stalled and had been pulled off to the right side of the road by a wrecker.

As I drew nearer to the flashing lights, compassion for a stranded motorist was the farthest thing from my mind. Instead, I was thinking, I wish you'd keep that old piece of junk off the road; here you are holding everybody up, and you're making me miss my meeting! My attitude was terribly sour. About that time, my heart sank. I looked over at the disabled vehicle and I saw what looked to be a Lakewood Church bumper sticker on it. Sure enough, when I drove by, I slowed down and looked over, and saw a man smiling and waving at me. I smiled back and waved at him like I was his best friend. I thought, If he only knew the truth!

That's when it dawned on me that perhaps God was trying to teach me something. Maybe God was using the traffic jam to bring to light impurities in my character. This was God showing me areas in which I needed to improve.

God often allows you, too, to go through situations to draw out those impurities in your character. You can rebuke until your “rebuker” wears out. You can pray, you can resist, you can bind, you can loose, you can sing and shout, you can do it all, but it's not going to do you any good! God is more interested in changing you than He is in changing the circumstances. And the sooner you learn to cooperate with God, the sooner you'll get out of that mess. The quicker you learn your lesson and start dealing with those bad attitudes and start ruling over your emotions, the quicker you'll go to the next level in your spiritual journey. We must recognize the refining purpose of trials. We can't run from everything that's hard in our lives.

Perhaps you are in a trial, and you're doing what I did. You're praying for God to deliver you out of that negative situation. That is a legitimate prayer, but maybe you're missing the point of why you were allowed to go through that trying time.

Recognize that God wants to do a work in you. He's molding you and refining you. But you're so busy trying to evade the difficulty, the work is not being done. You're so focused on all the circumstances and all the people around you that you haven't taken time to look deep inside and deal with the issues God is bringing to light.

Perhaps you get worried and full of fear when important things don't go your way. Have you ever thought that God may be allowing those events to teach you to trust Him and to see if you will stay peaceful and calm in the midst of the storm? Have you considered that God may be allowing some of that to teach you how to rule over your emotions? He may be trying to toughen you up, to help you develop some backbone and stability in your life.

We often pray, “God, if You will change my circumstances, then I'll change.” No, it works the other way around. We have to he willing to change our attitudes and deal with the issues God brings up; then God will change those circumstances.

God loves you far too much to allow you to go through life in mediocrity. He will often permit pressure to be applied to your life, to test you, and only as you pass those tests will you advance. He will put people and circumstances in your path that grate on you like sandpaper, but He will use them to rub off your rough edges. You may not always like it; you may want to run from it, you may even resist it, but God is going to keep bringing up the issue, again and again, until you pass the test.

Work in Progress

Remember, the Bible says, “We are {God's] workmanship.” That means we are a work in progress, not a finished product. One way or the other, God is going to get His way. Either you can learn the hard way, as I did in that traffic, and say, “Okay, God, I'll do it Your way. I understand. I'll be calm; I'll be patient.” Or, you can do it the easier way: When struggles come your way, look deep inside and be quick to change. Be willing to deal with any issues that God brings up. Work with God in the refining process rather than fighting against Him.

Scripture says that God is the potter and we are the clay. Clay works best when it is pliable, malleable, and moldable. But if you are hard, crusty, and set in your ways, God will have to pound away on that old, hard clay to get out the lumps.

Certainly, none of us enjoy going through struggles, but you have to understand that your struggle may be an opportunity for advancement and promotion. The very thing that you are fighting against so tenaciously may be the springboard that catapults you to a new level of excellence. Your challenges may become your greatest assets.

Many years ago, fishing for codfish tip in the Northeast had become a lucrative commercial business. The fishing industry recognized that a great market for codfish existed all over America, but they had a major problem in the distribution. At first, they simply froze the fish, as they did all their other products, and shipped it out all across the country. But for some reason, after the codfish was frozen, it lost its taste. So the owners decided to ship the fish in huge tanks filled with fresh seawater. They thought for sure that would solve the problem and keep the fish fresh. But to their dismay, this process only made matters worse. Because the fish were inactive in the tank, they became soft and mushy, and once again they lost their taste.

One day somebody decided to put some catfish in the tank with the codfish. Catfish are a natural enemy of codfish, so as the tank traveled across the country, the codfish had to stay alert and active and be on the lookout for the catfish. Amazingly, when the tank arrived at its destination, the codfish were as fresh and tasty as they were in the Northeast.

Like that catfish, perhaps your adversity was dropped in your path for a purpose. Perhaps it was put there to challenge you, to strengthen you, to sharpen you, to keep you fresh, to keep you alive and active and growing. Granted, at times, it feels as though you have a great white shark in the tank rather than a catfish, but the adversity you are facing could very well be something that God is using to push you and challenge you to be your best. The trial is a test of your faith, character, and endurance. Don't give up. Don't quit. Don't whine and complain, saying, “God, why is all this happening to me?”

Instead, stand strong and fight the good fight of faith. God is giving you an opportunity for promotion. It is the struggle that gives us the strength. Without opposition or resistance, there is no potential for progress. Without the resistance of air, an eagle can't soar. Without the resistance of water, a ship can't float. Without the resistance of gravity, you and I can't even walk.

Yet our human tendency is to want everything easily. “God, can't You teach me patience without having to go through the traffic jam? God, can't You teach me how to love and trust You without ever having a problem?”

Unfortunately, there are no shortcuts; there's no easy way to mature physically, emotionally, or spiritually. You must remain determined and work with God. The Bible says, “Work out your own salvation. Salvation is more than a onetime prayer. It is constantly working with God, dealing with the issues He brings up and keeping a good attitude, fighting through until you win the victory.

Some bumblebees were taken along on a space mission for a study on the effects of weightlessness. Similar to humans in space, the bees floated around with such great ease, they didn't even have to use their wings. It looked as though they were thriving in the weightless environment without work, struggle, or adversity. But after three days, all the bees died. The experiment was summed tip with these words: “They enjoyed the ride, but they didn't survive.” Bees were never meant to go through life without using their wings, not having any resistance. In the same way, you and I were never made to float through life on flowery beds of ease.

God never promised that we wouldn't have challenges. In fact, He said just the opposite. His Word says, “Be truly glad' These trials are only to test your faith, to see whether or not it is strong and pure . . . So if your faith remains strong after being tried in the test tube of fiery trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day of his return.”

When you go through difficult times, make sure you pass the test. Don't be stubborn and hardheaded. Recognize that God is refining you, knocking off some of your rough edges. Stand strong arid fight the good fight of faith. God has called each of us to be champions; you are destined to win. If you will work with God and keep a good attitude, then no matter what comes against you, the Bible says that all things--not just the good things in life, but all things--will work together for your good.

Our Two Biggest Problems

MY OFFICE was silent for what seemed like an eternity. Only a few seconds had passed, however, since Sally, an attractive woman in her mid-thirties, had opened up her session with three words: “Dan's leaving me.

Sally's husband of seven years had called her from work, less than an hour before her appointment. He'd told her that he didn't want to stay married. There was no other woman. It just wasn't working out. He was apartment hunting, and would leave a phone number with her.

Dan's leaving was quite painful, but no real surprise to Sally. She had felt him slipping away since the first few years of the marriage. “There's always been a distance in Dan that I could never get past, she said sadly. “It's as if there's a wall around him. I don't even think he's really aware of it.”

Sensing Dan's isolation, Sally had made many attempts to become closer to him through the years. She had discussed the problem with him, read books, gone to marriage seminars.

Dan, however, had shown little interest in the various methods Sally used. The only problem he could see was Sally's constant dissatisfaction with their relationship. Obviously, her unhappiness had become a big problem for him.

Dan did leave Sally. He also left a question in her mind for a long time afterward: Why did Dan hide? What would possess him to conceal his heart from Sally, who would have cherished it? Why avoid the very closeness that he needed from a wife?

PEOPLE IN HIDING

Answering this question of why we hide from the very relationships and truths we need is one of the purposes of this book. For a variety of reasons, all of us to some extent live two lives: an external life, in which we learn the feelings, attitudes, and behaviors that are “safe” to express; and an internal life, in which we closet away our “unsafe” traits, which exist isolated and undeveloped.

Our tendency is to keep the “unloved” parts of ourselves forever under wraps, with the hope that in time, they will go away and not cause us more pain.

This pattern is like the frightened man who goes to see his doctor for an annual physical. He's been having sharp back pains for some time, and he's terrified of the prospect of back surgery. So, as the doctor probes and prods, he bites his lip on the pain, murmuring to the doctor, “Nope--no pain there, either,” in hopes that nothing will be discovered. He tries to distract his doctor by listing off his great energy level, good diet, and general fitness. All the while he desperately wishes that he'll get off without a diagnosis.

Jesus referred to our reticence to reveal our pain in one of His many confrontations with the Pharisees. He spent a great deal of time with hurting people. Once He had dinner with a tax-gatherer named Matthew--in our day, the equivalent of eating with an unpopular government official. Criticized for His choice of relationships, Jesus said,

“It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means, 'I desire compassion, and not sacrifice,' for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Matthew 9:1243)

Jesus point was that we all have problems and needs to be looked at, understood, loved, and helped by Him and His resources. But revealing these problems is often the larger problem.

We can call our efforts to conceal these problems defenses, which are anything we use to protect ourselves from danger. We put them up as spiritual and emotional “shields” to keep from being exposed or hurt.

This isn't to say that we have only one shield. Most of us use a variety of hiding patterns in different situations. We tend to select certain shields depending on two factors:

(1) what injured part of ourselves we're protecting;

(2) who or what we're protecting ourselves from.

For example, some people find that they have one defense at work and another at home. At work, an executive might hide feelings of rage and frustration behind a mask of compliance and high performance, especially when there is an authoritarian or critical boss. The compliance defense keeps the executive from speaking the truth about how he really feels toward his boss's critical nature.

Then when this executive walks in the door of his home, a shift often occurs. He may continue hiding his anger but may also be feeling ashamed of his encounter with the boss. This can easily lead to his withdrawing to the television or newspaper: a withdrawal defense. Worse, he may blame his rotten day on someone in his family: a displacement defense,

Notice the difference between home and work. At home, the overworked executive no longer protects himself from his rage at the boss; instead, he shields feelings of shame and worthlessness from the family.

What is it that sends us into hiding? To understand this pattern of building defenses we must go back to foundational issues. I think life is basically about solving problems. We need to do some problem-solving at the roots in order to understand what's going on above ground.

I believe that the reason why we tend to hide our problems and struggles can be traced to two basic problems in life:

(1) we're unfinished people;

(2) we fear the very things we need to restore us.

Let's take a closer look at these problems that cause us to become people in hiding.

PROBLEM #1: WE'RE UNFINISHED

Our fundamental problem is that we are an unfinished people. As Christians, all of us are somewhat like a beautiful but damaged home under restoration.

Have you ever walked past a house under renovation near your neighborhood--one that was close enough to your usual pathways that you could see it in its various stages of development? I can remember such a home when I was growing up. Though I wasn't aware of it at the time, it had been a grand mansion. Years of weather and neglect had sent it into disrepair.

Then new owners bought the house with the idea of restoring it to its former glory. These “house lovers” poured large amounts of time and money into rebuilding the mansion with materials as similar to the originals as possible.

Several times a week, I'd pass the large lot where the building activity went on. I always made sure I looked at the house from the same spot on the sidewalk (a little to the right of the front door) and at the same time of day (late afternoon). The process of gradual change and growth were a mystery to me. I was fascinated to watch the step-by-step changes in the home as it “grew” over the months. It was like having little sequenced snapshots of the building in my mind.

What struck me were the tremendous variations in the house's appearance over time. Some days it looked like a burned-out bomb site, with piles of lumber and sacks of concrete surrounding truckfuls of dirt; yet on others I could glimpse the heartbeat of its architect in its lines, its grace, its columns, and its large bay windows. And then there were days when both the breathtaking beauty as well as the fragile incompleteness of the site would stand out.

That unfinished home had a wonderful past, and a hopeful future upon completion. Its past was rooted in the dreams anti desires of the family who had bought it, as well as the vision and skill of the architect who designed its renovation. Its future--which is now its present--has been a good one. It has stood tall and beautiful for a long time now, a host to several families over the years.

This process is similar to how God sees us. Like the mansion, we have a past of wonder. Chosen and designed by God “before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:4), we have been created to take on certain aspects of His character, such as being loved and loving, and being productive. This is what it means to be created in His image. We all have an Architect's blueprint inside our hearts. This blueprint is in the process of being developed.

Like the mansion, we also have a future of hope. Our destiny is to one day be like God in our character: “We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is” (I John 3:2). The Bible calls this maturity: “until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature of which belongs to the fulness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13).

But what about the present? Like the mansion under construction, we are all in various stages of spiritual and emotional immaturity and disrepair. At times, we may feel like a burned-out bomb site; sometimes we can see a glimmer of the image of God in us. And sometimes both are apparent.

We have both a heritage established and a future planned by One who loves us as a parent. And our present is the link between the two. Our present is the time period in which the development and restoration of essential parts of our soul is to occur. It's that season in which blueprint (past) is supposed to become a completed project (future).

For most of us, the present can be a painful time of struggle. It's a period of being “under construction,” and sometimes the process hurts. The Bible compares this pain to what a woman experiences in childbirth:

For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. (Romans 8:22-23)

People who have suffered great loss in their lives understand this passage. Being “under construction” means having to endure much.

Our basic problem in life is that we are an unfinished and damaged creation, somewhere in between the blueprint and the final whisk of the cleaning cloth. Just as a contractor provides labor and materials to build the structure, we are to be active participants in our own growth. The solution to our problem is to find our areas of spiritual and emotional unmaturity, and to enter into the process of restoring those parts to their renovated condition.

THE UNFINISHED BUSINESS OF RELATIONSHIPS

The fundamental problem of being unfinished has many kinds of effects in our lives. One area of growth that many of us struggle with is a need for genuine, deep, warm personal relationships. Sometimes this need is manifested in a deep sense of not “belonging.” of not “fitting in.” It seems there is a void inside our hearts that just will not be filled.

The Bible proclaims our need for connection. At the deepest spiritual and emotional level, we are beings who need safety and a sense of belonging in our three primary relationships: God, self. and others. We begin life in a terrified and disconnected state. Disconnectedness is the most destructive result of sin's entrance into the universe. It is the deepest and most fundamental problem we can experience.

This disconnectedness is a violation of the very nature of God, of what He holds primary. God created us for a life of closeness and attachment. Jesus declared that the entire Hebrew Scriptures rested on loving God and people. Perhaps the number one root of emotional disorders is that some part of the self is isolated from relationship.

Jesus referred to our need to be close to Him in His picture of the vine that nourishes the branches:

Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches: he who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit: for apart from Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:4-5)

The Bible teaches that we are to form attachments with people, not only with God. We are to learn how to feel loved and experience a sense of belonging by being in relationship with others. That's why John emphasizes our people-to-people relationships:

If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar: for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. (1 John 4:20)

John is declaring that our closeness to people is a measuring stick, to some extent, of our closeness to God. It is the rare person who can be deeply intimate with God and yet isolated and disconnected from His incarnate Body.

We are left with what may appear to be a simple formula:

Problem--our need for attachment.

Solution-- find intimate relationships.

To the casual observer, this might seem uncomplicated. “Just find a good church with supportive people and begin to get involved: it can't be that difficult,” one might conclude.

It's a different picture, however, for those who have had painful experiences or little experience of close involvement with others.

In many cases, believers suffering from isolation may even attend growing, healthy, biblically oriented churches that put a premium on caring relationships. They may be quite active in their fellowships, spending a great deal of time, effort, and money to be involved in a community of believers. Yet these same folks also report feeling disconnected, detached or “dead” inside, often while engaged in “fellowship activities.”

“I tried changing churches,” one person told me. “I thought if I got around different groups. I'd develop closeness. But the problem was the same at all the churches. I never really felt a part of things. So I decided to get in a good church and settle in --you know, make a commitment. I was at that church for five years. And now, half a decade later, I still feel on the outside. I thought at first it was people. Now I'm beginning to think it might be me.

Meeting our emotional and spiritual needs is not as simple as it looks. This “added complication” in God's growth process is the essence of Problem #2: In many ways, we hide from what we need to be whole.

PROBLEM #2: WE FEAR WHAT WE NEED

One night, a policeman walking his beat encountered a man on his knees underneath a bright street lamp, desperately scouring the sidewalk.

“What's the matter?” the policeman queried.

Without looking up, the man cried, “I lost my wallet!”

“I'll be glad to help, sir,” replied the patrolman. “Give me an idea of the area where you lost it.”

“Oh, that's easy,” said the distraught searcher. “It dropped out of my pocket about halfway down the block.” The man pointed to another part of the street.

Puzzled, the policeman asked, “I'm confused--then why are we looking over here?”

The man answered without hesitation, “The light's better.”

This story sums up the essence of the problem of hiding. The poor man who found himself walletless was frantically looking in the wrong place for the right thing. We have a similar malady. For a variety of reasons, many of us are afraid of exposing and repairing the broken parts of our souls.

That's Problem #2: Though we are an unfinished people, we tear and avoid the very things we need to restore us. We hide parts of our soul from love.

Notice I said “parts.” not “part.” Just as our bodies have many different muscles and bones that can be hurt, God has created us with different aspects -- parts -- of our souls. These various aspects can be loved and developed. They can also be isolated and immature. Each of us is a complex arrangement of such “parts” that together create a unique whole.

We will be dealing with our varied spiritual and emotional developmental needs later in this book, but it's important for each of us to realize that we're not the product of some cosmic cookie-cutter. We're individuals. David affirms this when he thanks God for supervising his own creation:

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. [Psalm 139:13-15, NIV)

Because of the effects of Adam and Eve's fall from innocence into sin, those “inward parts” made by God have been damaged in their ability to function in some way. Let's face it, sin injures us! And untangling the combination of “what's broken and why” is a major task we must undertake if we're to see those injured parts healed.

WHAT ABOUT ME?

Someone might ask at this point, “How does this describe me? I really try to be open and honest. My problem has more to do with relationships in which the other person is hiding.”

I have a couple of answers to this. First, hiding isn't always a conscious process. Sometimes, our deep hurts and immaturities have been isolated from relationship for so long that we no longer have access to certain thoughts, feelings, or memories. In this case, hiding is a device used to protect us from overwhelming pain when we aren't ready for it.

A few verses after his prayer of thanks, David now asks God for more access to his “hidden parts”:

Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me and know my anxious thoughts; and see if there be any hurtful way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way. (Psalm 139:23-24)

David prayed for awareness of the truth about himself that he needed to look at. He didn't want to walk off a cliff blindfolded.

A second answer to the question of how this fear of exposure applies is that different people hide different parts of the self. Some struggle with being open about their needs to beloved. Others have difficulty bringing their more autonomous, sell-directed parts into the light.

Sally, whom we met at the beginning of the chapter, didn't consider herself to be a withdrawn person. She was outgoing and expressive. Yet as she began working on important personal issues in counseling, she began realizing that an aggressive, decision-making part to her personality had been lost years ago. For Sally, this independent part of her soul was hidden from love and truth.

I'm writing to those of you who are hiding parts of yourself from relationship, whether or not you're currently aware of it. I want to help you uncover and bring before the grace of God and His people the wounded aspects of yourself that have been in darkness. God Himself and the Body of Christ can heal your hurt places.

Think over the past few years of your life. Review the “regrets”: those relationships or opportunities that you wish had turned out positively. Many of us can date our problems in important relationships to a point at which we began to conceal parts of ourselves from God, self, or others.

HOW DO I KNOW WHAT I'M HIDING?

Many of us, like Sally, often don't truly know whether or not we're being defensive in some way. But we have a genuine desire to mature and develop the relationships we've been missing. Then how do we become aware of what's hidden?

A scriptural teaching can help us here. It's the principle of roots and fruits. God has designed the universe so that we can identify problems based on their effects on our lives.

For example, suppose you discover water dripping from the ceiling in your living room, mining the carpet. You'll probably respond to this problem in one of two ways. One way is to engage in damage control. You'll keep empty pots and pans wherever the water is leaking and scurry around to keep them emptied. If you live in a rainy climate, this could become a full-time job. Plus it's hard to cook without cookware.

The second method of response that you might choose is to hire someone to come in and fix the leaky roof. This may cost more, but it will truly solve the problem.

The soggy carpet is the evidence or “fruit.” It tells us that there's a serious problem in the structure of the house. The “root” is the leaky roof. If we don't pay attention to the root, we're likely to have much more bad fruit, such as thousands of dollars of damaged carpet and flooring.

Jesus talks about the principle of roots and fruits in Matthew 7: 17-18:

“Every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit.”

In other words, results always point to causes. Children are a good example. A family with loving, successful children is generally a sign of some good roots, such as parenting style, environment, and support. The family with troubled children is often a sign of some sort of struggle in the parents' lives.

The same is true in our lives. Our spiritual and emotional fruit points to our roots.

Lets look at another term to describe fruit: symptoms, a word used by physicians and therapists to mean the same thing: results or effects. Symptoms point to a root cause.

Hiding always has some fruit, or symptom. In other words, you and I can detect hiding in our lives by the problems it causes. When we hide, a part of our character is pushed away from relationship into a spiritual darkness called isolation. The isolation of some part of our soul from love will always produce a problem. This makes sense, because whatever is isolated from nourishment remains broken and undeveloped. In the physical world, we call this malnutrition. Spiritual and emotional malnutrition are just as destructive.

Symptoms can range from a failed marriage -- like Sally's -- to depression, anxiety, guilt feelings, shame, eating disorders, substance abuse, career conflicts, physical ailments, and many others. Remember, however, that symptoms can be our friends. They're doing the job that God intended for them, which is to tap us on the shoulder and say. “There's a problem--it's time to take a look at it.”

But suppose there are no detectable symptoms in our life? Should we take a look at our defenses anyway? Certainly, prevention is better than cure. Recall David's prayer in Psalm 139. He asks God for awareness without mentioning any symptoms. It's likely that he's taking a preventive look at himself. So even if we appear to be without symptoms (which really isn't possible in a fallen world), we're wise to stay awake, spiritually and emotionally.

Awareness is not all we need, however. We require an environment of safe relationships in order to come out from hiding, no matter how much insight and information we have about our spiritual and emotional makeup. This is how God designed it.

This point is often missed in our Christian circles, where it is often assumed that doctrinal exposure to the truths of the Bible is sufficient to ensure solutions to all problems. Yet Jesus Himself stressed the necessity of relationship in order to take in truth. His statement “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6) is one indication that knowing a person is necessary to knowing his truth. To know here means to understand personally, not just intellectually. This “knowing” applies to relationships with people as well as with God.

The heart of God places great value on our needs being met. Jesus' anguish over His people's turning from His provision is a poignant picture:

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling” (Matthew 23:3 7)

God wants to help His people in their struggles, dames tells us God is a gift-giver:

Every good thing bestowed and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation, or shifting shadow. (James 1:17)

The Bible presents God as a Father who is anxious to see His children taken care of. He delights in helping us, in providing for us.

Then why do we feel so bad so often?

That's the irony of the hiding problem. We all have needs: we're all unfinished. God has provided what we need to enter the healing and maturing process--becoming like Him. Yet in many areas of life, many of us feel spiritually and emotionally bankrupt, in pain, and unable to cope with life as we would like to. We're inherently unable to see what God has provided as good. It's as if He has laid out a banquet table for His children, inviting us to fill up, but something inside sees danger in the invitation and causes us to turn away.

This danger signal is the same one operating in our illustration at the beginning of the chapter: It caused Dan to turn from his need for caring, and Sally to avoid her need for autonomy.

Eating problems provide us a helpful example of the hiding dilemma. Several years ago, I was working in our hospital program with Rachel, a young woman with an eating disorder. Rachel had almost died from malnutrition several weeks before coming for help. She exercised obsessively, ate almost nothing, and worried that she was too heavy -- at only eighty-five percent of her normal body weight. All of her family's and friends' efforts to get her to eat had failed.

Rachel's obvious problem was malnutrition. The “simplicity formula” would say: Problem-- Rachel suffers from malnutrition. Solution--She needs a lot of good food. Yet she could not make herself take in the meals provided.

As I got to know Rachel. it became obvious there was much under the surface between her and her food. Let's go back to Problem #1: We are an unfinished people, in need of maturing. Rachel had come from a well-to-do, high-achieving Christian family. She was expected to follow her parents' lifestyle and career leanings. Her family had provided a safe structure of providing for her physical needs, but had placed little value on teaching Rachel the concept of thinking for herself. They had done too much for her and at the same time kept a tight rein on her behavior.

Over the years, Rachel had begun to symbolically equate relationship with food (love can also be symbolically confused with many things besides food, such as sex, performance, and admiration). She had begun believing that all people were as tight-reined as her parents were. In Rachel's words, “For me, to eat was to allow more of their control inside me. To refuse to eat was the only way to have any sense of control over my life. Food became the enemy.

Rachel came by this concealment of her own needs naturally. It's inbred in all of us. To understand the roots of our two biggest problems. we need to go back to the very first story in the Bible.

OUR DEEPEST ROOTS

Adam and Eve planted those first roots that keep sprouting into our hiding problems. When they ate from the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they became acquainted with evil. This experiential knowledge of evil was something we weren't meant to have. That's the essence of Problem #1: a break in relationship with God, self, and others.

The roots of Problem #2 were planted shortly thereafter:

Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked: so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man. “Where are you?”

He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” (Genesis 3:7-10, NIV; emphasis added)

Adam and Eve hid from God's restoring, forgiving, healing love. Notice the emphasized phrases. Adam and Eve had just moved out of a state of perfect attachment and obedience to God and into a state of separation and sinfulness. Yet the power of sin was already at work, shown in the solutions they conceived. First, they covered themselves. They put on the appearance that they did not have private parts. Second, they withdrew.

Why didn't they run to God, tell Him what they'd done, and ask Him to help them? They mistakenly saw God as someone who would hurt and not heal them. So they hid.

The story of the Fall presents a picture of the two main problems of living: the task of growing up, and the obstacles to growing up.

We can all relate to the conflict of our original parents in our sense of having a “secret,” which is either our own fault or our own shame, so frightening that it would be inconceivable to tell another about it.

The writer of Hebrews calls us out of our life in hiding:

Let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. (12:1)

Our subject is those encumbrances to our growth: where they come from, how they operate, what they tell us, and what we can do about them.

The process of spiritual and emotional maturing is difficult enough in itself, even without hindrances. Near the end of his life, Paul called himself “foremost” among sinners, an indication of how much work goes into anyone's growth.

But this difficult process is paralyzed when -- because of past experiences, fears, shame, and pride--we withdraw from the very relationships anti truths that would mature us. Our 'fig leaves keep us isolated from God, self, and others. They perpetuate not only our destructive patterns of living, but also our symptoms.

The safety of the walls we build as children can become a trap in our adult lives, as what was once a protection now becomes a prison. We build a safe place for ourselves when we hide, but those walls can prevent us from entering into the good things God has for us.

REMEMBER JENNY

Ideas are like prescription pills. They go down better with some sort of coating. Jesus explained many important spiritual issues in parables. His tales helped people understand concepts in terms of pictures.

The “coating” for our exploration of hiding from love is Jenny's story. Jenny represents all of us. She'll appear at the end of each chapter, fleshing out the truths we're learning. I hope that as you get to know Jenny, you'll recognize your own hiding process in her story.

We all have parts of our character that, like Jenny, have retreated deep inside the Deep Woods of our hearts. There those parts remain. For decades, perhaps, these hidden parts have been kept safe from abandonment, ridicule, or annihilation. Yet they have also remained frightened, disconnected, undeveloped, and unloved.

Jenny is a picture of the state of humanity since the Fall--desperately needing restoration, but terrified of exposure. We'll discover in the next chapter how these problems can open up opportunities for growth.