My wife and millions of other people read Sarah Young’s Jesus Calling or Jesus Calling Devotional Bible every day. While doing so their faiths have been strengthened and their lives transformed.

Jesus Calling was written as if Jesus Christ was calling you for a chat. Today’s essay contains wise and thoughtful advice for each of us to consider this Father’s Day.

STAY ON THE HIGH ROAD WITH ME. 1

“Many voices clamor for your attention, trying to divert you to another path. But I have called you to walk ever so closely with Me, soaking in My Presence, living in My Peace. This is My unique design for you, planned before the world began.

Yesterday as Josh Groban walked toward me I smiled and thought to myself, I wonder if he’ll pause look around the room and ask, “Whose writing all those mysilentscream posts about my songs?”

If you missed those posts, here they are:
Hidden Away
Our Hiding
Secrets & Hiding
Secrets: As If.

Josh Groban and TreeHouse
False Alarms by Josh Groban
Brave by Josh Groban
War At Home by Josh Groban
If I Walk Away by Josh Groban

Human Trafficking and The Prayer by Josh Groban
Believe by Josh Groban
You Raise Me Up by Josh Groban
You Are Loved (Don’t Give Up) by Josh Groban

Reader JenniferMacLeod[~= @JenMacAtlGA82 recommended that Josh Groban’s “You Are Loved (Don’t Give Up)” be included in this series.

I had forgotten about the song, and when I watched the video I fought back tears.

Watch You Are Loved (Don’t Give Up) here. (Lyrics below)

I cannot begin to tell you how accurately this song describes what I have experienced at TreeHouse since 1989.
– Teens lost, lonely, and screaming-longingly to feel heard.
– Parents seeking, searching, and silently-longing to be encouraged.
– Friends hoping, hurting, and helping their friends limp along.
– Youth ministers, teachers, counselors, politicians and police officers looking for solutions.
Every week I see the looks on people’s faces when they feel heard and find hope.

I love Josh Groban’s song You Raise Me Up
Give it a listen:

When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary;
When troubles come and my heart burdened be;
Then, I am still and wait here in the silence,
Until you come and sit awhile with me.

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains;
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas;
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders;
You raise me up… To more than I can be.

While watching footage of the recent Boston Marathon, I, like you, felt shock and awe watching brave people run toward the scared and injured. I felt humbled by their bravery. Josh Groban wrote a wonderful song about being brave.

Josh Groban – Brave

Wake up, wake up, the sun cannot wait for long
Reach out, reach out before it fades away
You will find the warmth when you surrender
Smile into the fear and let it play

Josh Groban’s song False Alarms is about a dating relationship, but the feelings he’s feeling can also apply to other relationships where there have been hurt feelings.

False Alarms

Far across this red horizon
I am walking down the line
I am picking up the pieces
That this storm has left behind

After all the clouds are fallen
I would breach the battered ground
Turn your darkness into light love
Turn your silence into sound

But I can’t cage you in my arms
When my heart is jumping forward
To avoid your false alarms
And you can’t tell me not to stay
When I opened up your window
And I watched you fly away

More Unintended Consequences

Clearly the consequences of our actions is not always foreseeable:
– Sometimes harmless pranks go horribly wrong
– Oversights have lead to industrial accidents
– Forgotten oil plugs destroy car engines

On a more personal level, sometimes…
– Friendly banter is misunderstood as flirting
– Couples breakup when they want nothing but
– Partyers having fun get alcohol poisoning
– People try meth and become addicts
– Teens have sex and become unintended parents
– Parents try to build a relationship with their kids and it seems to backfire

Even More Unintended Consequences

Unintended Consequences

The German weekly Der Spiegel has a report about the unintended consequences of child labor laws in one Pakistani city known for producing soccer balls.

Apparently children were frequently employed in the factories, until child labor “advocates” in the West forced companies like Nike and Adidas to ensure that their suppliers weren’t employing children. But what happened to the kids? Surely after they were freed from their toiling in the factories they went to school and now have well-paying office jobs, right?

People do what they do because somehow, some way, their hopelessness craves for hope.

Someone bombed the Boston Marathon Monday. Someone, somehow found some level of hope in creating horror for someone else.

That grain of truth is what they grasp onto and that allows them to justify their choices.

“None of us,” wrote Christopher Wright, ” needs to be scratched very deep to uncover the darker depths of our worst desires and the evil action any of us is capable of, if pushed.” Moreover, while we are not the overt cause of others’ suffering we cannot escape it’s consequences. 1

As he hung on the cross Jesus Christ quoted Psalm 22: Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”

God asked God, “Where are you God?”

As we watch the news, view the video footage, listen to the radio hosts rant, discuss the events with others and ask our questions of God, it’s important to remember we are NOT alone. Pain and painful events make us ask the hard questions when life goes very, very wrong.