A Life of Growing Trust
Can we trust God to watch over us even if you’re not doing all we think you need to do, or even if things don’t turn out the way we hoped? Because Wayne and Brad couldn’t get their schedules together, Wayne invites Renee Lockey, an OB-GYN from Austin, TX and a previous guest on The God Journey, to be the guest co-host for a conversation that began in Wayne’s living room about growing to trust God in the real issues of and opportunities of life. The conversation explores the joy of finding community with other brothers and sisters in less managed environments, how busyness an distract us from what’s most important in our lives, and dealing with the nagging accusation about whether or not we are “doing enough” to be part of what God is doing in the world.
Podcast Links:
Renee’s previous appearance on The God Journey
Renee’s Blog Lead Me On
Resources that helped Renee deal with sexual brokenness.
Contributions are still needed to help establish an orphanage in Kenya.
You can order In Season: Embracing the Father’s Process of Fruitfulness from Lifestream
What do you do when your dad is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease? Will his healing hinge on your faith or prayers? In a romp through their recent emails, Brad and Wayne bite into these questions and a few more. Why do we have a difficult time living in uncertainty and going on a daily adventure with God and instead seek false security in some pat answer, ritualized technique or immutable principle? The truth is we are more secure in him than any of those things can offer, and learning to live there allows us to be part of an unfolding adventure in our lives rather than grasping at illusions of security that only disappoint in the realities of this broken world. During this conversation they talk about physical healing, inner healing, and the prayer of faith that we can engage with God as his work unfolds in our lives. 
Steve Jobs’ last words before his death and a recent clip from “Through the Wormhole” has Brad and Wayne talking about the joy of living in wonder at the reality of God that easily transcends all of our powers of reason. If our scientists can’t see, measure, or understand 95% of what makes up our universe, then maybe God is more intimately involved in his creation each day than we know. Embracing his mystery beyond our own ability to understand, is a far more freeing way to live than getting stuck in our frustrations when God doesn’t do what we want or expect. They also talk more about prayer and how Jesus said we can connect with this transcendent God in the simplest expressions of our love and desire for him. 
The podcast we did on 
What do you do when you realize you’ve climbed the ladder leaning on the wrong wall? A comment Mike made in our last podcast about his “feeling lied to” by those he knew who helped him learn how to run the religious treadmill, opens a discussion with Brad and Wayne about how we think of the people and places that were part of our lives while we trying to serve God religiously. To many it does feel like they were duped or lied to. For others it felt like they had too much invested in the old ways to even consider another alternative. In time, however, grace does its work in us and we find ourselves thinking very differently about those who are still caught in the system of religious obligation. 
Sometimes the best way to find what you’re looking for is to let go of what you already have. Mike Steele, a former computer entrepreneur and then a major facilitator for the house church movement in North America joins in a conversation with Brad and Wayne about the transformations in his life. In the busyness of his high-profile “ministry”, Mike was able to recognize the emptiness on the inside and instead of grasping for what he thought he wanted, he let God unravel his life in a most amazing way. Now, no longer fitting anyone’s expectations for his life, Mike has gone on an amazing journey to discover what a real relationship with God looks like. He and his wife, Chris, live in Colorado Springs. 
Wayne and Brad continue their conversation with Murry Whiteman, the artist of their newest release: A Man Like No Other: The Illustrated Life of Jesus. Their words were added to the artistic brush of Murry Whiteman to conclude a project that has been in his heart for twenty years. The result is a 128-page, full-color art book containing panoramic images drawn from the gospels with stories to help you think through the life of Jesus with all the religious garb we usually add to the story. In this podcast, you’ll hear the passion for Jesus that each of these three brought to the project and how they wanted others to stop and see the reality of Jesus in a way that they may not have done so before. The book will be available in early November. 
Wayne and Brad have just finished their most recent book, A Man Like No Other: The Illustrated Life of Jesus. Their words were added to the artistic brush of Murry Whiteman to conclude a project that has been in his heart for twenty years. The result is a 128-page, full-color art book containing panoramic images drawn from the gospels with stories to help you think through the life of Jesus without all the religious garb we usually add to the story. In this podcast, they wanted to introduce you to Murry and let him share a bit of his story in coming to know Jesus himself and what inspired the paintings in this new book. Murry talks freely about his story learning to live in the love of Jesus and some of the trouble he encountered with some of the naysayers in his life. And, no, Murry is not the man like no other, Jesus is! Though Murry is a pretty unique character. 
Brad returns from a quick trip to Jerusalem and then he and Wayne dip into the mail bag to catch up on some of the things our listeners are thinking and asking about recent podcasts. That does get them into a wide-ranging discussion about Jesus’ Second Coming, the performance of religion, and the rejection someone suffers for being honest with their pastor. But the longer topic extends the “Living Out of Our Spirit” Podcast by looking further at what it may mean to be born again and waking up to that world of the Spirit where we commune with God and live inside a relationship instead of following a set of principles. Finding a continuing place of surrender to Father and the ways he works, has helped both of them grow in this reality. 
