This originally appeared as the weekly devo on whillschurch.org.

I wish I could say that Whitney Houston’s death came as a surprise. When the news broke, I thought to myself – this is going to play out with typical Hollywood shallowness. Sure enough, the Grammys became part love-fest for Whitney. I wonder how many of those people really liked her. Just the night before, Whitney was escorted away from a party due to her own abrasiveness.

The real tragedy in Whitney Houston is we have seen this before, we will see this again. An artist or star who blows us away with their craft and their talents, all the while on the inside they are slowly decaying. They have this sense of longing or inadequacy that needs to be fulfilled. They are not limited in their resources in searching for this something to fulfill this void in their life. No matter how many movies they make, hit songs they sing, or famous they get, that empty void still haunts them. Since they are not limited by resources, they will try anything to fill this void – sex, drugs, cars, houses, charity, business. And for some of them, the search will kill them.

Whitney Houston’s voice was unmatched. Her rendition of the national anthem for Super Bowl XXV in 1991 will leave you speechless. In fact, I think they should just play this version from now on, I doubt any artist will ever come close to matching that performance.

As pure as her voice was, what was going on inside her wasn’t. She shocked the world with her marriage to bad boy Bobby Brown. She shocked us again by telling us she wasn’t all that different from him. Then their reality tv show removed all doubt that the Whitney image of the 80s was just that – an image. Her rocky marriage, the drug and alcohol abuse, and the violence just made most of us extremely sad for her.

And Jesus loved her.

Houston always said that was her favorite song – Jesus loves me. Despite the profane lifestyle, the failures and the escapades – she consistently said that “Jesus Loves Me” was her favorite song.

Why couldn’t she grasp that in a deeper way that translated into a different lifestyle? The same reason so many of us can’t. It is difficult to see Jesus among the deadly distractions this life has to offer. My distractions may not be prescription pain killers or alcohol, but I’ve got them. And so do you if you are honest with yourself.

One conversation my kids and I constantly have when an artist comes on tv and mentions God is – “So you think he’s a Christian? You think she’s a Christian?”

It breaks a parent’s heart to tell their kid that their hero or favorite artist is just a broken, messed up person trying to figure out life. The only difference is they have the money to make some really, really bad mistakes that last forever. But if the music and entertainment industry has taught us anything – that is it. Fallen, messed up people are fallen, messed up people no matter what their income is.

And one of Houston’s songs seems to sum it up fairly well – Didn’t We Almost Have It All? Almost is still NOT having it all. Houston’s distractions cost her life. For whatever reasons, it never seemed she allowed Jesus to have the last word in her life. It’s easy to see this in her life, harder to see it in our own. But are our distractions of kids or marriage or success or titles or houses or money any less deadly? Is our obsession with our own happiness any different than Houston’s?

Scale – maybe. The question is still valid for us all – What does it profit a person to gain the whole world but lose his soul?

Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. (John 6:35 NIV)

This originally appeared as a weekly devo for whillschurch.org.

This has been one heck of week for our family. My ongoing battle with the pinched nerve in my neck has sort hit a stand still. I got better but I still have sporadic shots of pain down my arm depending on what position I get my neck in. I haven’t been able to play basketball in over a month and my exercise plan has sort been non-existant.

So the doctor ordered an MRI. Easy peasy, right?

I’m not claustrophobic. So the idea of laying down in huge magnetic coffin isn’t all that terrifying to me. The problem is they lie me flat on my back, strap my head down on the board exactly in the position where that nerve is pinched and it sends this flaming stream of pain down my right arm.

The pain was intense. Couldn’t finish it. Tried it again yesterday with some hydrocodone — lasted all of 5 minutes when the tech said – “This isn’t going to work.”

So today, we upped it to Valium. The last time I took Valium…well the nurse said I was extremely funny and ought to think about a career in public speaking. And that was how I got started in ministry…

In fact, I’m starting to feel the effects right now as I type this. jfkla;sdifq9′j’m3ic Just kidding…sort of.

Yet for all the bravado and macho talk, I hate pain. I realize that most of us do…

More to come after the Valium wears off…

LATER: The valium didn’t work. Well…it sort of worked. It made me sick at my stomach and groggy but could not cut through that pain once I got on the table. So now they are going to schedule me for an IV sedation. I’m not confident this will work either but hey…

My point? My point is that we spend an inordinate amount of time avoiding pain. A friend of mine told me yesterday (he just got done with a knee surgery) that pain was God’s way of reminding us that we are still alive. As we talked, we joked that between the two of us there was one whole, healthy person. We enjoyed a good laugh but he reminded me of another famous person’s perspective on pain.

C.S. Lewis said “Pain is God’s megaphone.”

Pain is inevitable. It has been that way since Genesis 3. I don’t believe that all pain is God’s fault but I do believe that he USES all pain. That’s the subtle message of Romans 8:28 – ALL things work for good…, not all things ARE good.

So the real question for the Christ follower in the middle of their pain is this – what good is God going to work out in all of this? Hard question to deal with at times because not all pain is equal. But…all pain is painful.

In a few weeks (after the Go! series) we will start a series called Beyond Pain. We’ll get to explore these kinds of questions and more by studying how some of heroes in scripture dealt with pain. Some of the insights are going to be very, very surprising. We’re going to see that God Himself is not immune to pain.

In the meantime…hang in there. And find a friend to laugh with.

Image is of Stirling Castle in Stirling, Scotland. More info can be found here.

This originally appeared as a weekly evo for whillschurch.org

Last night we opened Christmas gifts from my Dad and Mary while they were on FaceTime. (By the way, this is just one more reason why I think the iPhone is best invention ever. But I digress.)

Mary is my stepmother who turned my son and daughters to the dark side. She discipled my own kids against me right under my nose to become Auburn fans. I was powerless against her. My dad has questioned my paternal leadership because of this. My only response has been – she’s your wife and you couldn’t stop her either.

As the wrong kind of orange and blue presents were being unwrapped, my dad asked me – “How many Christmases is this for y’all?”

“Too many. I’ve quit fighting it.”

We will have Christmas with my Mom and Dad (stepdad). Christmas with Dad and Mary. Christmas with Amy’s parents. And then our kids will get the gifts we got them as well. It’s ridiculous and I’ve fought this for so many years and lost every single time. It’s hard enough for parents to win against one set of grandparents. Try three.

But 35 years ago, I would have never seen this day as a possibility. That was when my world was put upside down by my parent’s divorce. It wasn’t common back in the 70′s particularly in the Deep South. I had never heard of it. Didn’t even know that was possible.

But it was happening to me and it wasn’t pretty. At age 7, I understood little of what was going on. I just knew that my world was completely shattered and changing in ways I had no control over.

A very dark thread.

Black threads on a tapestry add depth, perspective, and balance. In the hands of a master artist, they give a framework for the masterpiece. They are never the focal point. But without them, the focal point never takes center stage. Those that enjoy the art hardly ever notice the black threads. We are too overwhelmed by the rest of the picture. But they are there.

We all get black threads. The question is what to do with them. Do we stuff them away? Denying the shame, guilt, and hurt? Believing that there is no place for them in our lives? Or do we make them the centerpiece? Choosing to be a victim forever more. Focusing on the darkness, believing that there really is no color left in life?

Only a true, gifted master artist can take a mistake, a blotch, a dark thread and weave into the larger picture to make it look like that it belong there all along. Using the mistake as a strength. Taking the bad and make it reflect something good.

But this requires leaving the black threads in the master’s hands. Allowing him to use it when and where he sees fit. It might not be immediately seen what he is doing but we trust his handiwork. We’ve seen him do this before – over and over again. So we trust him, even though it looks unfixable, unredeemable.

35 years later, I’m living in the middle of a rich, deep, wonderful tapestry. All of the in-laws, out-laws, and step-laws love each other. They exchange gifts between themselves. They’ve spent holidays all with each other over the years, stayed in each other’s houses. Impossible? 35 years ago – yes.

But God does his best work in the 9th hour with the darkest threads…when He’s given the chance. His own birth is proof of that.

Merry Christmas. And know that He still uses the dark threads.