VERSED

Each of us has our own wilderness. A place where you struggle, wander, try to figure out life with no clear answers, you face issues. You could be wrestling with relationships with friends, loved ones or family. Maybe you desperately want children and it isn’t happening foryou. Maybe it's not related to the home at all; it may be connected to your employment. With others its finances; you live continually under the gun of insufficient funds. It could be an ongoing health issue. Maybe it's a problem related to academics and school issues. That's your wilderness. Where is God in the wilderness? Did He lead you there? Why don’t I hear Him? Will He save you?

This is a biblical principle and one that reverberates throughout the Bible. But it begins in today's reading from Exodus. Today’s episode is inspired by a message I listened to by John Piper.

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Yes, the Bible really says that. I was surprised, too. 

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

I learned recently that whenever the New Testament talks about leadership, it never emphasizes the authority of the leader. It emphasizes the danger of their own leadership. Interesting right? 

It was encouraging to me because I was doubting my own abilities even as a man and a leader professionally and personally. Culture is telling me to be essentially to be a leader is to serve myself by either being super assertive, authoritative, to railroad others out of the way to get what I want. 

Man, I’m so glad that God and His word and truth never changes with the culture. It has been the same yesterday, today and forever. The problem is not His Word, its US it’s our mangled misinterpretation.  It's us wanting to fit Him into our box. 

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Subscribe to The Pour Over

Have you ever found yourself intentionally not praying or reading the Bible or going to church because you feel guilty? Or you don’t want to feel convicted? 

We generally handle guilt by avoiding dealing with it. And that goes back to day one in humanity. It all began in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve disobeyed God, and we’ve been using their faulty methods in an attempt to silence guilt ever since.

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

The world you could say is marked by warfare. Conflict and fighting all around us. We feel and see the effects of it, we try to numb the effects of it while also becoming numb to its existence in the first place.

What is the root of it all? And what is the secret to a true happy life?

I recently returned from a sabbatical to rest, recover from a difficult season of my life and to renew my mind and refresh my spirit. During that time, I took a course on the book of James where we read from today. This episode is also inspired by a devotional from the late R.C. Sproul. 

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Subscribe to The Pour Over

It’s said in the Bible that David was a man after God’s own heart. Have you ever thought about what that looks like? We will certainly see one example today. David gives us the playbook on how we should respond when God says “no” to our plans.  

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Over 2000 years ago, every moment before and every second since, Jesus was  fighting back your depression, your fear, your pain, your worry. He was contending against hell…for you! I like the way Whitney Lowe from Scribble Devos puts it, "Jesus was grabbing evil by its throat, getting right up in its face and claiming YOU as His own."

Jesus chose to entire darkness so that we didn’t have to stay there. Do you believe that Jesus is that that that rages when we can’t see or feel it?

Is it possible for you to believe that the darkness in you is no match for him? Or better yet, that he’s already destroyed it?

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Subscribe to The Pour Over

When pain is crushing you, darkness feels like it is surrounding you, and you are overwhelmed by the things that need to be done that you simply don’t have the energy to accomplish… what should you do? 

Maybe you feel like, well God uses everything for good so I should be joyful knowing that truth. Do you feel like something is wrong with you because you can’t feel joyful? When your heart is breaking - don’t you just want to hide until you don’t feel this way anymore?

Enter lament. Something I had never experienced in my life until I discovered my wife’s affair and our subsequent divorce. It was standing in an empty home, the home that we were planning to raise our kids in, that I let out an authentic, God-honoring, non-stoic, expression of my grief. 

There are many examples and Bible passages on lament, there’s an entire book dedicated to it! Today, we are going to read and reflect on the power of lament in the book of Ruth. 

//

Everything you need is here

Included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Are you at the end of your strength? Is your life’s tank running on empty and everything you are trying to do to fill it up doesn’t seem to be working? Are you tired of trying? Do you want to quit? Are you frustrated, angry and overwhelmed, and sad all at the same time? I am. 

As I was looking for answers from God, exasperated with the weight and effort of simply standing still, He led me to Ephesians 3:20.

//

If you would like to dive deeper into this, or other verses in the Bible, if you have a verse you would like to submit to have included in a future episode if have questions about the Bible that you would like answered in a bonus episode, or simply want to connect with me click here

Also included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Subscribe to The Pour Over

If you’re in the middle of a trying time in your life all you want is some peace. 

My peace is this imagined place of sitting back in a comfortable chair with my feet up. The tension in my core muscles and neck is released as I trust the chair to support me. I picture that I’m on this beautiful wrap-around porch as the warm breeze of spring blows through the open windows and the aroma of new blooms fills the air. I'm at rest.

I’ve recently realized that what I’ve been describing is earthly peace. The dictionary defines peace as a state of tranquility or quiet - but peace in the Bible is different. It’s more than just the absence of conflict or a state of rest and I will be sharing with you today what I’ve been learning about biblical peace. 

//

If you would like to dive deeper into this, or other verses in the Bible, if you have a verse you would like to submit to have included in a future episode if have questions about the Bible that you would like answered in a bonus episode, or simply want to connect with me... text VERSED to 58228 or click here

Also included in that link is a list of resources and references I use in this podcast and can help you grow deeper in your faith as well. 

As always – ratings and reviews are massive! They really help others discover the podcast and ultimately help us improve VERSED. Thanks in advance for that 😊

Love you all – keep making hope louder!

John

FOLLOW ME ON IG! @johnlawhon

Check out what Lancaster Bible College | Capital – Washington, D.C. is all about!