Queen Esther & Human Trafficking

At the church where I serve as Youth and families pastor we have a contemporary service each Sunday at 9am. My wife and I lead worship almost every Sunday and once in a while I get the opportunity to speak. We are using “The Story Series” as our base for that service which is designed to walk us through the entire Bible in 31 weeks. This week was about the book of Esther, a woman of beauty and courage. I wanted to share my notes from yesterday’s message because I think this story needs to be shared over and over again.

Esther one of the few women in the Bible that gets her own book. Esther holds a very important place in Israelis history, a history that could have ended if it were not for this brave girl. But the story isn’t an easy one, there are some pretty messy things that happen in the story of Esther. Like many old testament stories we might be tempted to think simply of the kid version of the story where the king hand picks Esther the most beautiful woman in all the land, she saves her people from an evil man named Hamen and they live happily ever after.

If the story of Esther was not in the bible I’m sure it would be a Disney princess movie. From rags to riches, from being a foreigner to being the queen of all the land. But it might not meet the PG standards.

But lets look at the story, deep into the story and find what God’s plan in all this was.

Our story begins today with another woman on the throne, well not exactly on the throne because the king, king Xerxes was on the throne but his wife Vashti was queen.

King Xerxes loved to be extravagant and to party, who wouldn’t be when you are the ruler of 127 providences. To show off his wealth and extravagance Xerxes had a 180 day fair, like a worlds fair of sorts to display his kingdom to his VIP guests and to top it off he gave a grand banquet to all his guests that lasted 7 days. At this banquet was an open bar and all the wine anyone wished to drink.

So in other words it was a drunken mess, like a tailgate party that has gone on for way to long.

At the climax of drunken party Xerxes has this bright idea of inviting his wife to come parading her beauty before him and his All male guests.

But Vashti would not have any part of it. She would not come to the king’s request and entertain the watching lustful eyes of the drunken men. She would not do it. She would not disgrace herself.

That choice that Vashti made was a courageous one. To refuse the king could equal death. But she would not allow her self to simply be an item, a possession for the king to do with as he pleased.

She stood strong and because of her stand she was banished.

So with Vashti banished the King was in need of a new queen, and this for Xerxes was not something to be taken lightly. He sent men through out his 127 providences to bring to him young girls that might be suitable to be queen.

These girls had no choice in the matter they would be taken from their homes and brought to the palace to be placed under the care of a eunuch. They would be given spa treatments for months.

When I read this in Esther this past week it struck me that these girls in away were trafficked away from their families, their homes and forced and trained in the ways of pleasing the king.

In the past few years I have been made aware and learned a lot about human trafficking. Human trafficking, is modern day slavery. Repackaged and reformed to be as much out of the publics eye as possible, people are entrapped, enslaved, forced to do unspeakable things with little to no freedom or hope.

In third world countries the poor become indebted to the rich and can never repay, families are forced to sell their children as workers in factories or sending them to other countries because they are promised a new life and wealth but when they arrive they are tricked and coerced into sex slavery, prostitution and drug smuggling. They are stripped of their human rights, dignity and told they mean nothing to anyone.

This is a sad truth. Slavery didn’t end in 1865, it might have slowed down when the Civil War ended but it didn’t stop. And it’s not just in other countries across the sea it’s happening here in our own back yard. When I lived in Kansas I learned that Dodge City, which was 45 min away from my school, was a hot bed for Human trafficking, the stock yards were a prime spot for prostitution and drugs. The highway to dodge went right by my college… those people passed right by us and we didn’t even see them.

Even here in North Carolina human trafficking happens, my wife and I attended an event last Saturday to raise awareness for human trafficking and a girl at the event shared a little of her story, she grew up right here in Greensboro, NC, she wound up a victim of trafficking.

Human trafficking is as real and it happens, it even happened here in the story of Esther.

Esther was taken by Xerxes men to the palace to be beautifully prepared to meet the king. Their one job now was to please the king…

When I read this story I find this to be the lowest point in Esther’s life. She had been through a lot, from the lose of both her parents, to be raised by her uncle, to now being take from the only family she has and forced to compete to be queen.

Before Esther was taken her uncle Mordecai advised her to tell no one that she was a jew.

In a fairy tale sorta way Esther is chosen by the king to be his next wife, we don’t know really if Esther really wanted to be queen, but we do know she didn’t have a choice. The king thought she was beautiful so she became is queen.

Fortunately for her, her uncle Mordecai lived in the same city and so she didn’t lose all connection with him. In the story Mordecai find out about a plot to kill the king and saves the king. In response to Mordecai’s saving his life the king has his second in command Haman honor Mordecai. Haman happens however to hate Mordecai and so plots to kill Mordecai but thats not enough Haman wants to kill all the jews so he tricks the king into making a decree to have all the jews killed on a certain day.

But the king nor Haman knows that the new Queen is a jew.

In Esther 4 Mordecai makes Esther aware of whats going to happen to the jews and pleads with her to help them.

Esther 4

When Mordecai learned of all that had been done, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the city, wailing loudly and bitterly. But he went only as far as the king’s gate, because no one clothed in sackcloth was allowed to enter it. In every province to which the edict and order of the king came, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, weeping and wailing. Many lay in sackcloth and ashes.
When Esther’s eunuchs and female attendants came and told her about Mordecai, she was in great distress. She sent clothes for him to put on instead of his sackcloth, but he would not accept them. Then Esther summoned Hathak, one of the king’s eunuchs assigned to attend her, and ordered him to find out what was troubling Mordecai and why.
So Hathak went out to Mordecai in the open square of the city in front of the king’s gate. Mordecai told him everything that had happened to him, including the exact amount of money Haman had promised to pay into the royal treasury for the destruction of the Jews. He also gave him a copy of the text of the edict for their annihilation, which had been published in Susa, to show to Esther and explain it to her, and he told him to instruct her to go into the king’s presence to beg for mercy and plead with him for her people.
Hathak went back and reported to Esther what Mordecai had said. Then she instructed him to say to Mordecai, “All the king’s officials and the people of the royal provinces know that for any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned the king has but one law: that they be put to death unless the king extends the gold scepter to them and spares their lives. But thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king.”
When Esther’s words were reported to Mordecai, he sent back this answer: “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”
Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: “Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.”
So Mordecai went away and carried out all of Esther’s instructions.

I love Mordecai’s reply to Esther, “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”

For such a time as this. In the book of Esther God is not mentioned once but the evidence of God’s plan is blatantly present. Here in these first moments of Esther’s queenship she is faced with a great challenge, Haman has doomed all jews, but Mordecai sees something different, he sees hope, he sees the position that Esther is in was meant to help save the jews.

Esther new that there was a chance the king would not want to see her, that he could just as easily banish her as he had Vashti but she was willing to take the risk, she was willing to have courage and stand for her people who couldn’t stand for themselves.
we know from the rest of the story that the king does grant her life and he attends her little banquet twice, we learn that Esther has the courage and guts to tell the king what is troubling her and how Haman has set out to bring an end to her people. She has the courage to speak for those who could not.

Sadly the king couldn’t reverse the decree but he does allow the jews to defend themselves and on the day set out to be the destruction of the jews turns into a victory against their enemies.

What do we take away from this story?

How does this story of Esther effect our lives today?
When I read this story I see a young girl who stands up with courage and turns the worst possible thing into the best possible thing. Who doesn’t lose heart even though she went through one of the worst possibly life experiences ever, I see a girl that stands up and fights for those who cannot fight for themselves, literally.

So us?

What are we going to do?

I told you earlier about Human trafficking. I’ve told you about people that cannot speak for themselves, that are not free, that each day are fighting for their lives. But does that break your heart, because it does mine, it hurts to hear about children how are forced to work, kidnaped, sold and mistreated.

We have a choice, just like Esther had a choice, you are placed her in this time and in this place just for this. To stand up for others, to fight for freedom, it’s going to take courage, it may cost us much, maybe everything but is human life not worth that, is not each human being in need of love, worth giving love to simply because they are created by God.

My Heart breaks for humanity, for the broken and the captive.

If we are going to call ourselves followers of Jesus we have to carry on what he started… at the beginning of Jesus earthly ministry he read from Isaiah and it’s our challenge today.

Luke 4:18-19
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

If we don’t know what to do find someone who does? If anything we need to speak for those who can’t.

“Lombada”

Last night in youth group we talked about how Jesus has authority over everything and how his authority compels us to go. The question was raised how does Jesus’ authority impact you and me as we follow him on a daily basis?

Does it?

When we came across that question it really made me stop and think, how does this effect me? Am I living like Jesus truly has all authority over my life?

Megan and I are nearing our first full year of marriage and I can honestly say this year wasn’t without some bumpy spots in the road. When I lived in Brazil I quickly learned the word for speed bump in portuguese, “Lombada”. They seemed to be everywhere, even in the middle of the highway. Every time we were about to go over one the driver of the car would yell “Lombada” to warn us it was coming, unfortunately sometimes the warning came late and I hit my head on the roof of the car a few times.

Sometimes we need those lombadas to slow us down or have someone yell out a warning for the bumps coming up. Through all the bumps of this first year of marriage Megan and i had to slow down, refocus, and rub the bumps we got on our heads from hitting the roof. Recently, I would say in the last three months Megan and I have been working on reestablishing the fact that Jesus has authority in our marriage. But even that has not been easy, we discovered our need to spend quality time together each morning and inviting Jesus into that time.

In a way our reestablishing the fact that Jesus has that authority in our lives helps us warn each other about the “Lombadas” up ahead, communication has improved and joy has started to unfold it’s peddles in full flowering blooms.

Sometimes we need to ask hard questions like “Does jesus really have all authority over my life and if so how is that effecting my daily life?” We need those questions to slow us down, to help us think and grow. Because once we see that Jesus has all authority in heaven and earth we should be compelled to go. As followers of jesus we should be relentless to love.

I have been reading a book about David Livingstone, who was a missionary and explorer in Africa back when much of Africa was unknown and dangerous. One of the things that really stood out to me from the book is how relentless Livingstone was, he often didn’t wait for others to give him the approval to go and seek out other tribes and peoples. He went when others would not. God gave him the courage to face lions and dangers unknown.

When we come to grasp the knowledge of God’s authority we will began to live fearlessly because if God is for us who can be against us. We as spirit-filled followers of Jesus need to be more like Livingstone and the early Christians who were relentless to love.

Let our lives be relentless acts of worship to our God. I believe the words in Psalms 150 verse 6, “Let everything that has breath  praise the Lord. Praise the Lord.”

 

-Caleb Hunter

Where Are You?

If you were to ask me if I would consider myself a morning person I would have to say no but I use to be. Somewhere along the way to twenty-four I lost my appreciation of the morning, and to be honest I am not sure why? Perhaps it might have been from the fact that in college I had to get up early for class some mornings and so those mornings that I did not have to wake up for class I rebelled by staying in bed as long as I could. I guess I need to force a revolution of my thinking. “Viva la révolution de ma pensée”, I know very little french but long live the revolution of my thinking is something I do, sorta. Sometimes I just need to rethink how I’m thinking, to stop making excuses and redefine why I do what I do.

This morning I started my day with coffee, a doughnut and some more coffee in my warm office sitting back in my much to large chair reading a book by Henri J.M. Nouwen. Henri was a former catholic priest and theology professor who spent his final years working with the mentally and physically disabled. I have read a few of this books and find his insites to be thought provoking and challenging to my spiritual growth.

As I was reading I came to this quote, “To live a disciplined life is to live in such a way that you want only to be where God is with you” (The Inner Voice of Love, pg 23). Sometimes in the morning when I wake up I ask myself “Where am I?” as I come to in the reality of the day. But perhaps there is a deeper question of “Do I find that where I am, God is there also?”. Thats a hard question that doesn’t come with a quick answer. Do I find myself in a place where God is?

Henri began this page in the book by writing, “When we experience a great need for human affection, you have to ask yourself whether the circumstances surrounding you and the people you are with are truly where God wants you to be” (pg 23). We all long for love, it’s a part of what makes us human but where we find that love is critical to how our lives are shaped and lived. We long for deep human affection and I believe God uses people to show us his love but are we really where God wants us to be?

I know from some of my experiences that I have been in places of great emptiness and there I just find a void of what my heart really needed. It’s hard to be in those places but we don’t have to stay there, there are times we fear change and fear being challenged to think differently. However, if we don’t ask the hard question of is this really where God wants me we may never move on.

This reminds me of Peter and how jesus called him to follow him. Peter had the choice to stay where he was and keep fishing all his life. He probably had a well established market for his fish, he had friends, family, and all the comforts

he could afford in the first century A.D. , but he had to stop and ask the question “Is this where God wants me to be, is this the place, are these the people, is this what I am suppose to do? I am sure Jesus saying come follow me threw him off his routine but Peter’s response was without hesitation, he moved to where God was and lived in a such a way that he wanted to be with Jesus.

Later when Jesus is walking on the water Peter ask’s jesus to call him out on the water, he wants to Go with jesus even if it’s scary and challenging. Peter was willing to Question whether being in the boat was where God wanted him to be or not? He was willing to trust that God was going to provide a way to walk on water. Each day we wake up and ask God is this where I am suppose to be today, if you want me out on the water call me there and I trust you will provide a way. We long deeply for love, we long even deeper to be where God is. Ask the hard questions, challenge your thinking and find out where God wants you to be. He is already there going before us we just have to get out of the boat.

 

-Caleb Ross Hunter

 

 

Love Helps… Just a thought.

“Love helps is when we instill hope in others by pursuing their significance, not our own”

A thought. A singular thought. Not more than two words: Love Helps. This thought started in 2011 when I had the opportunity to spend six months in Brazil, South America. I went down to Brazil to teach English at an international school in Carpina. I had traveled to Carpina before on short-term mission trips with my church’s youth group, and I had also known the missionaries since the early 1990’s. But I soon realized that I was unprepared for what God had to teach me while I was there. I was so completely unprepared to be a teacher, but now I have come to realize that not only had God brought me to Brazil to teach, but for him to also teach me.

The first couple of months were anything but easy. I had difficulty in adjusting to the culture, I struggled with living with the missionary family, and felt more homesick than I ever have in my entire life. There, I found myself vulnerable, broken, and hurt. I had nowhere to run, and there was no escape. I couldn’t just leave and not teach. I had to face the pain.

There was one day that I remember particularly well.. It was after I had taught my morning classes and I came back to an empty room where I usually took breaks between my classes. That morning I had felt so defeated and I thought my students were not learning anything. I was really questioning why I had come 2,000 miles away from home and put myself through this. Even as I think about it now I still feel the pain of that day.. I literally cried for an hour or more, asking God “why”.

My plane ticket said I wasn’t leaving until July and this was March, so I had no choice but to stay. In that moment, in the midst of my defeat, is when God showed up. Through my tears, I realized where I was hurt, broken, and vulnerable in that place. God started asking me to be honest. He asked me to try to answer why I had come. As I thought about it, I did not want to answer, because I knew my reason was wrong and foolish. When it came down to it, I had come to Brazil for me. I came because being a missionary teacher seemed like an awesome experience. I thought most people would not have dared to to get up and move to Brazil, so it would make me better than them.

Honestly, I had been pursuing my own significance. Selfishly, I wanted my students to all learn English really well because it would mean I did something good. That is when God broke my heart. I felt God tell me to stop trying to teach these student and start loving them. Like most of the time whenever God asks us to do something, we start making excuses.

I told God I’m not any good at loving people… His response was, “it’s not up to you”.

Out of those next few months, God started to lay upon my heart a dream of Love Helps. Simply put: I want to help others live love. But what has been incredibly challenging about this is the fact that to help others, I have to first accept and trust that God loves me. It sounds easy, but it’s not, because it forces me to be honest about the state of my heart, my love, and my life. On May 13^th, 2011 I wrote,

“When I looked at myself I didn’t like who I saw, anger and hate had enslaved me to my lies, farther from the light, from the light… but LOVE HELPS, it set me free, made me who I am, Unashamedly Me”

When I was able to accept the fact that God loved me even though I was selfish and unconcerned about the world around me, I started to realize that life wasn’t about me. The last three months in Brazil were full of great experiences. I began to learn how to love my students and appreciate them for who God created them to be. I started to forgive myself and allow God to free me up be the man he created me to be. This is a process and journey that I am still on.

Fast-forward to the now.. Recently, my wife and I were having a conversation about love and how this society and culture both try to get us to buy into the lie that life is all about us. That it’s about our significance. It’s a lie that started in the garden of Eden when the serpent told Eve that if she ate from the tree, she would be like God. What Eve forgot was that she was already significant. Her significance came from God.

See, God already loves us. Our true significance, if we are honest, can only be found in him, but so often we chase after everything else to fill that void. We try to pursue our own significance. We buy all the replacement Jesus’ that the world offers, but refuse to open our hearts to let God in. Out of that conversation with my wife came the line, “Love helps is when we instill hope in others by pursuing their significants…Not our own.”

But what does that really mean? How do we live that out? At the end of the “love chapter” in 1^st Corinthians (ch. 13), Paul writes, “These three remain faith, hope, and love but the greatest of these is love”. I have always thought this whole chapter was rather poetic, especially this last line, but as I have studied it I have come to notice a connection between all of these things.

First, we have faith. Faith in it’s most basic terms is full or total trust. In this case, it is full and total trust in God. When we have full and total trust in God, we are honest with him. We understand he loves us, died for us, and forgave us of our sins. It is tragic to think that many times we have faith that heaven exists but we lack the ability to fully trust that God loves us and wants to be in relationship with us. Faith is not about heaven, faith is about God. Ask yourself these questions:

Am I pursuing God, or am I just pursing Heaven?

Do I honestly love God with everything? And I mean everything…

The second thing we have is hope. Well, what is hope? When you look up the word hope in the Dictionary, you will find the words “to believe or trust that something is going to happen”. I think a good way to put hope is to “be encouraged or to encourage”. When we trust God and believe in him we give hope to the rest of the world. God’s love for us gives us hope. It encourages us to live life. Faith and hope are tied tightly together. We, as people of the earth, need to be encouraged but we also need to learn to encourage. This is what it means to instill hope, to encourage. Ask yourself?

Am I so busy pursuing others significance, or my own?

Am I being a voice of hope to those around me?

The most important of these is love. Why? Because faith plus hope, in action, equals love. Not that it’s a simple math equation that should be so easy to figure out, but when we understand that God is the variable that makes all this work, it starts to make sense. When we put our total trust in God and fully accept his love and forgiveness ,we receive hope from that; a hope that is well worth sharing with the rest of the world. When we put that faith and hope into action there we find our ability to love. We find that we can pursue others significance over our own.

I had to ask myself “why do I lack the ability to truly love others”? I found the answer was because I was pursuing my own significance outside of God’s love for me. God is still working on my heart and shaping my life. Now I can say that I have a deep love for humanity. A fire within my bones to see the world alive, awake, and moving toward loving God with everything we are by using our abilities, strengths, gifts, talents, and passions to help our neighbors in any way that we can, with open hands of love.

-Caleb Ross Hunter

King in the Temple of our Hearts

Over the past year I’ve been on a journey with our youth group through the life of Jesus, this past sunday night was another step in that journey.  We looked at two different encounters with Jesus and tried to figure out how they might apply to our lives today. In the first encounter we found Jesus riding a donkey into Jerusalem, up through the desert road from Jericho, a climatic 3,000 ft climb up the mountain to where men, women, and children celebrated his coming, celebrating as if he were king, they threw down their cloaks, waved palm branches and sang Hosannah. We learned that throwing down your cloak wasn’t something you did unless you were showing loyalty to them like a king. Even then very few would have considered throwing their cloak down on a dusty dirt road but in that moment those people saw Jesus as their king. They sang Hosannah which means “God will save us, right now!” They were soon to find out that Jesus wasn’t going to be the earthly king that they had planned on, he wasn’t going to overthrow the Romans, he was going to be a greater king than that. He came to be King in man’s hearts, King in our hearts.

From there we find Jesus comes to the Temple the next day. The Temple would have been an exciting place, crowded with people, a buzz of business as people prepared for the passover sacrifices. People packing in to buy their unblemished lamb or dove. Jews from all over came. The priest would have been busy from sun up to sundown offering sacrifices for the people. There would have been a constant line of those waiting their turn for their sins to be forgiven by the blood of a lamb or calf or dove. But that was all interrupted when Jesus came in and started flipping over the tables and driving out the sheep and cattle. He let the birds from their cages and disrupted the flow of exchange and sacrifices. He was angry at what he saw and burned with a jealous passion for his fathers house. 

Jesus had a right to be angry in that moment, the venders had taken up nearly all of the court of the Gentiles and the court of Women which were places meant for prayer not for selling of animals. They had turned that area of the temple court into a den of robbers and not into a place of worship. Somewhere over the years the religious leaders had stopped carrying about the court of the Gentiles and Women. They thought it was more important that people have easy access to animals for sacrifices then it was for people to be allowed to worship God in those places. We know Jesus cared for all people, and he cared about everyone’s relationship with the Father. He would die so that we might be in relationship with him so it’s no wonder that we would fight for the Gentiles and Women to have a place to worship. Jesus had to clear that space and stop everything for that to happen. 

That brings it back to us. There are times in our lives where we need Jesus to be jealously angry for us, for our time, and we need him to flips some tables over in the temple of our hearts. We need him to remind us it’s not about going to church or doing the right things or sacrifices its about a relationship with Him and his Father. Sometimes we need him to clear room so that HE can be King of our hearts again. When he is King of our hearts and our lives it’s much easier for us to throw down our cloaks and worship him with everything we got.

 

-Caleb Ross Hunter

Where is Our Joy?

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… but honestly, it doesn’t feel like it. The air is turning cold, the presents are under the tree, the refrigerator is full of Christmas cookies, the parties are planned but my heart is heavy. Usually around Christmas, spirits are high and I feel like a snow flake falling joyfully from the sky. But right now I am not sure where my joy is?

 I know it’s there some where deep inside my heart. I know happiness is fleeting but joy lasts forever. So is that joy just misplaced or hidden deep in the worries of my heart. As I was reading the Christmas story this morning trying to find joy in the beginning of it all, I realized a lot of times we do misplace our Christmas joy in things that really have nothing to do with Christmas at all. We have the tree, the cookies, the presents and the Children’s Christmas program, but thats not Christmas. In Matthew chapter 1 verses 22-23 it reads “All this took place to fufill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with Child and give birth to a son and they will call him Immanuel”, which means, “God with us.”

God with us. Immanuel, Immanuel, Immanuel. That is it, that is where my Joy is hidden. It’s been with God the whole time for He is my joy. When Jesus came into the world many of the jews had given up hope. They were in a place where God seemed distant and they thought they could not have joy under the Roman rule. Recently, I have had my moments where I felt just like those jews, God has felt distant and I’ve honestly been disconnected. Living here in the South a lot of times I feel like an alien, an outcast, or completely unwelcome, at times even in the church I serve at. Like those jews living under Roman rule they had freedom, they had rights, jobs, and some place in society, but they were not Roman citizens, they had no voice and had to do what was expected of them without question.

It’s no wonder by the time that Jesus showed up that many of the jews were simply looking for someone to over throw the Romans. They were tired, weary and had very little to be joyful about. I think thats why many of them missed the fact that Jesus was the Messiah. They missed that he was God with us. They thought their joy as a nation and a people would be restored when the Roman’s were gone, but Jesus was not here for that. He came to bring Joy to the world, to set the captives free, to bind up the broken hearted and to simply be God with us in the fullest of senses.

I think one of the things that has been stealing my joy is our Children’s Christmas program. Last year was my first year ever writing the Christmas program and it went really well. But this year, my heart has not been in it. When I read the script it lacks joy. There are these expectations that every year the children have to preform a Christmas program, and there is this feeling each year that this really isn’t for the kids at all, it’s for the parents and grandparents which is okay, however, at the same time it is one of the saddest things I have ever experienced.

Where is our joy? In a silly Christmas program (I can call it that cause I wrote it). Is it in our children half singing a song or two, in knowing that we are carrying on some tradition thats losing its meaning. I honestly want to scrap the whole play even though it’s happening this sunday and simply read the Christmas Story to the children, reminding them that God is with us. That Joy doesn’t come from presents, or trees, or cookies or santa. Our joy should be found in knowing God is with us. We should wake up each morning reminded that God is with us, that he is not distant, that we are not alone, that no matter what the world says or no matter how much someone doesn’t really like you, God loves you.

I think we have lost where our hope and joy should be. We have misplaced it…But we have to wake up, we can’t give up hope, we have to dig deep, look upon the face of God and ask him to restore our joy. A joy in him, a joy that flows over from a heart that knows love, a joy that understands God is with us, a joy that sings loud for all to hear because everyone should know and experience this joy.

May any who read this have a Merry Christmas full of God’s Joy!

God is with us

-Caleb Ross Hunter

Memories Framed in Our Minds Like Photographs

 In the past month life has been a crazy awesome adventure. Right before Christmas I flew out to New Mexico to see my best friends and was pleasantly surprised to be surprised by my girl friend being there. My friends had flown her out there so we could

have the whole break together. Surprises like that are wonderful memories made and really mean a lot to me, because it says myfriends really love and care about us! After a few days in New Mexico we flew up to Seattle, Washington to spend Christmas with her family. While we were there I asked Megan to Marry me and she said YES!

Those days leading up to asking her were nerve racking and exciting. After talking to her parents her Dad asked me what I would have done if he had said “No”, and my response was “Well… I guess it would make for a awkward couple of days”. But when her parents said “Yes”, I just felt this huge relief and for the first time in months I could really relax. I had bought the ring a few months ago and sometimes I have a hard time holding a secret, especially when it’s something really exciting. It’s even harder when the secret you are keeping is for someone you love and talk to everyday.

So on December 22, 2012 I could wait no longer, Megan and I went on a date night to Lights of Christmas, which is this christmas light display put on by a camp where Megan use to work. I had the ring in my pocket hoping there might be a place romantic enough, but as we walked around and saw the lights there were just to many people around. From

there we went out to dinner and headed back to her house. When we got there we went out to take pictures under the lights her family had put on in the front yard, after taking a few of our goofy pictures I bent down on a knee while she was looking at the pictures on the camera, as I went to pull out the ring she handed me the camera, I dropped the camera and han

ded her the ring.

The only thing I really remember saying was “Will you marry me Megan and go on this journey of life with me?”, She just smiled at me and said “yes!”

I won’t forget looking back at the house and seeing her parents peaking through the window on the front door as

they oowed and aaahhed. Over the past year Megan and I have taken a lot of pictures and tried to capture the memories

of our time together. One of my favorite songs titled “All the memories” by the band The Classic Crime says

“Oh, all the memories we had
Framed in our minds like photographs
Take a second, take a second
And make this last
Here where the future meets the past
I can never fall in love again
I can never fall in love again”
All our memories are framed like photographs in our minds and hearts. That whole night I was looking for the right spot and the right time to ask. For months I had lost sleep over trying to figure out a plan or what it might look like, but now looking back at it a few weeks later, it was the perfect moment and I couldn’t have planned it. It wasn’t until we were our goofy selves, taking pictures and laughing about the faces we were making that the opportunity was right. I can say, I will never fall in love with anyone again because I found the one that I want to love. Our relationship has been anything but easy, the long distance and short bursts of time that we have been able to spend together over the past year have stretched us and challenged us. It has been emotionally draining at times and everyday we have had to believe and fight for the hope to carry on, but isn’t that what love is all about. About fighting for what we believe in, over everything else and forgiving when it just hurts.

Love isn’t some fluffy idea of an little naked angel on a cloud shooting lonely hearts with arrows. Love isn’t just a word that middle school students throw around to mean whoever they have a crush on that week. Love isn’t just attraction, or a spiritual fruit or 60’s

 rock n’ roll song lyric. Love is not something we will ever fully grasp or understand. Love is giving everything we got, sharing evenwhen it doesn’t seem fair, driving forty miles to find cold medicine when she’s sick, writing letters on what ever paper you can find including paint samples, moving half way across the country in faith that God will close the space between where you and her are because you believe God called you there, Love is calling back five minutes after they said something that made you mad and responding with I love you. Love is always, always, always a learning process that will take more time than we have and always have something new to teach us everyday. My assumptions of trying to understand love have been reshaped by my relationship and everyday is framing new memories to learn from and enjoy.

-Caleb Ross Hunter

Day 57 “A Year of Thoughts”: This is Something

This is something isn’t it?

Life that is, the breathe, the air

We breathe don’t we every second

Yet no human taught us or told us

We just did in the moment we had lungs

We found our breathe and learned

As if God were telling us in the womb

One moment explained, next in the experience

This is something isn’t it?

Life that is, who we are and become

We hope don’t we, move forth

Into each moment slowly turned to memories

The air shaped and bent by the wind as we hold together

By the elements mined deep within our soul

For where ever we are or where ever we go

This is something isn’t it?

Life that is, calling us to live it.

 

-Caleb Ross Hunter

Day 52 “A Year of Thoughts”: Our God is Greater

To often I forget that my God is greater than all my worries, fears and all that is overwhelming me. I fail to remember that God is greater than any feelings, situations, circumstances and that which is troubling my soul.

When I am able to place God as the ultimate authority in my life then he is able to use me, transform me and move me where I need to be. To daily remember that God is greater and that he is the one I need the most in my life must be my goal. He is writing a story where the main characters are you and I and Him but we must not remove him.

 

Live each day truly knowing and Believing God is Greater.

This is easier said then done.

It will be lived though we try to forget God

He doesn’t forget us.

Our God has given us life.

Be Joyous!

 

-Caleb Ross Hunter

Day 46 “A Year of Thoughts”: Learn Their Interest

Relationships must be intentional

Get to know not just what you like

But learn their interests.

Relationships should shape us and

Help us to Grow…

They should move us

Motivate us and

Enable us to

Take the focus off of us and

Learn about them

Enter their world

Through relationships we should

Learn a lot about us

How we communicate

What we value

How we invest

How we love

How our lives will be lived

Love Helps

Learning their interests

Opens doors

For learning to love them.

Who are you getting to know…

Do you care?

About them and

Their interests

I’m learning to care…

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ,

if any comfort from his love,

if any common sharing in the Spirit,

if any tenderness and compassion,

then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love,

being one in spirit and of one mind.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.

Rather, in humility value others above yourselves,

not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

Philippians 2:1-4

(NIV, my own emphasis)

-Caleb Ross Hunter