joy & affliction

Joy & Affliction

~ notes and meditations from a sermon by Douglas Wilson ~

An unrepentant heart and unconfessed sin can disrupt joy. 

Another disruptor of joy can be affliction. 

In 2 Corinthians 6.3-10, St. Paul offers his resume, showcasing the reality of affliction in his own life and saying, in the same breath, that he is sorrowful yet rejoicing. Life with Christ is no walk in the park, and God isn’t a genie in a bottle whose biggest priority is to give us our hopes and dreams on a silver platter. Those who teach that membership in God’s family results in a rose garden experience of life turn a blind eye to the fact that the strongest and most devoted saints have undergone trials and tribulations that often make ours pale in comparison. 

Having God on your side doesn’t give you a Free Ride out of life’s inevitable tragedies and afflictions. Joy, however, isn’t dependent on life’s circumstances. We must be careful to define joy. Douglas Wilson is adamant that genuine biblical contentment isn’t a trivial, bubblegum type of joy; it isn’t “Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy” all the time. Rather, biblical joy is bedrock that goes a thousand feet down and is grounded in a deep satisfaction in the will of the sovereign God who orders all things according to His purpose and for our good. 

This kind of joy isn’t affected by life’s events. A fickle, superficial joy doesn’t fare too well in the face of what life has on offer. This world is a messed up place. Trials are trials. Cancer is cancer. Death is death. Some Christians try to say that these things—disease, death, and destruction—aren’t really that bad after all. No, they ARE that bad. They are REAL storms. But if you have a strong house, you can stand against the storms. 

True biblical joy is built on a cliff facing the sea. The storms will come, but the house will stand. Joy in the midst of affliction isn’t stoicism; joy doesn’t pretend that things aren’t so bad after all, or that there’s no storm buffeting the house. We see in 2 Corinthians 6.3-10 that Paul gets over his afflictions by getting under the One who is in control. We must affirm the biblical testimony: God sends both rain and drought, health and sickness, life and death. In the words of Job, “Are we to accept only the good things out of God’s hand and not the bad?” God, in His providence and control, either dictates all that happens or permits it to happen. Either way, we can rest in His sovereignty: He is in control, and nothing comes to pass that He doesn’t decree or permit; everything He decrees or permits is for His glory and for our good. We find joy by resting in this truth and trusting that the God who sends the rain knows what He is doing. 

Paraphrasing Thomas Watson, Wilson says, “Sometimes we lose perspective on our trials when we focus on the one who brought the trials rather than on the One who sent them.” The idea that God can send affliction into our lives doesn’t rest well with us. Affliction from the hand of God may make us doubt His disposition towards us, but it only shows that God’s concerns are different than our concerns. God’s chief concern is His glory; our chief concern is our glory. God cares about who we are as people; we care about our life going according to plan. God’s at work in our lives for our good, but that doesn’t mean He has the same agenda we have. God sends trials into our lives, using them to further conform us to Christ and to mold us into the sort of people He wants us to be. God has a plan for all of us, and that plan is summed up like this: “that we may be like Christ.” THAT is His plan for our lives, and He uses all of life’s good and bad to chisel us into the people He desires us to be.

God is our fortress, and He sends the tempest, often so that we will simply seek refuge in Him. When we run to Him, the affliction is still affliction. Pain is still pain. Disease is still disease. The challenges are still challenges. The situation is what it is; joy enables us to come at the situation differently, but it doesn’t in and of itself change the circumstances. Afflictions can tear at our joy when we focus on the afflictions rather than on the One who sent them; by resting in God’s providence and sovereignty and trusting that He knows what He’s doing (even if it’s not what we expect or want Him to do), we can experience the joy and peace of God that surpasses all understanding.

#mars

NASA has unveiled some new photos of Mars, and they are "off the hook" (as the kids say, or used to say; I'm not up to date with all the kuul kid lingo). Here are a few for your enjoyment and for the sake of posterity:

on fatherhood and failure

(all quotes from Tim Bayly's "Daddy Tried")

"Fatherhood is worth doing, even when we fail. Christian fathers should approach fatherhood expecting to fail--and often. Sadly, sometimes we will fail very badly. We live in a fallen world and we ourselves are fallen, and sanctification is a lifelong and painful process. We still have within us the law of sin and death (Rom 7:22-23), and this means our best work of fatherhood will remain blighted by sin... As fathers, the best we can hope for is that, in the midst of our sin, God will add His blessing and grace and mercy to our feeble efforts and our sons and daughters will grow up to be godly. Our hope is not in ourselves, but in the Lord who is the Maker of heaven and earth. God is our refuge, an ever-present help in time of trouble. When we are weak, He is strong and He is glorified by working through our weakness." 

"Claim the promises of God over your own household. Give yourself to the obedience of faith (Rom 1:5) and get to work. Don't allow your sins to silence your commands to your children and your household. God has made you the father of your household and it is your responsibility to lead and discipline and teach and love them as your heavenly Father has led and disciplined and taught and loved you. Of course you will do your work imperfectly. Of course you will see your failures. Of course you will grieve as you recognize ways you have passed your particular sins down to your sons and daughters... What else is new? We have our orders and must carry them out because doing so is life to our children and to our children's children. So buck up. Don't be a perfectionist. God has been pleased to reserve perfectionism for Heaven."

"Over the years I've been a pastor, I've noticed one of the vulnerabilities of those who have grown up in a broken home is that, when they get married and have their first fight with their wife, they despair. They're convinced cross words indicate their marriage is bad and they're headed for divorce. When they tell me their fears, I assure them that my wife and I both grew up in good Christian homes and our parents exchanged cross words and had fights. Also that we have cross words and fight, ourselves. But cross words aren't an indication of a bad marriage. They're an indication that the marriage is between two sinners. Also that there are times when we have to work things through in such a way that we get messy. Truth be told, [my wife and I] are usually more concerned about couples who brag about never fighting than we are about couples who find marriage difficult and argue and snip and snap, getting angry at each other."

"God calls sinful men to be husbands, and thus it is His will that your wife be loved and led by a sinner. God calls sinful men to be fathers, and thus it is His will that your sons and daughters be disciplined and taught and loved by a sinner. All of this is clear. The life of faith is a life of obedience in the face of our own failures and sin. There's no other way. Don't let the guys with smiley wives and clean pickup trucks and perfect hair fool you. They put their pants on one sinner's leg at a time, just like you... Get rid of any expectation of perfection here on earth. Thorns and thistles grow in homes as well as corn fields. This is life after the Fall, so roll up your pants and shirtsleeves and live by faith."

on reading

Last year I read somewhere in the vicinity of 185 books (I could check the accuracy of that statement, but I'm too lazy; if you care about specifics, don't be lazy and scroll down to the first of the year and check for your own satisfaction. This year's ambitions are less modest, if only because I'm trying to dedicate more time to writing. Each year I choose a period of history to hone in on; 2017 saw a 50-book reading queue detailing the history of England from prehistoric times to the era of the British Empire, and this year I'm focusing on early modern Europe (around 1500 to 1790). I'm further subdividing my reading list to sharpen the focus on three particular events: the Seven Years' War (known commonly in the U.S. as the French & Indian War, though that war was just one particular theater of the wider Seven Years' War), the American Revolution (with emphases placed on books written from the British point-of-view), and the French Revolution (whose currents would shape and give opportunity to Napoleon Bonaparte). Next year I'm going to dedicate a significant portion of my reading queue to the Napoleonic Wars, which mark the end of the early modern world and the beginning of our current modern era. 

Whew. After writing that I need to take a breath. 

(And I'm sure you do, too).

But we're not finished yet.

During my Claypole House days, I discovered the joy of reading nonfiction and fiction in tandem. It brings both to a more vibrant life. To experience this for yourself, pick up an historical book on the Battle of Gettysburg and read Michael Shaara's Killer Angels in pace with the events. Do it and tell me if you're not hooked. Fiction and nonfiction pair like French cheese and vintage wine, and this year's early modern nonfiction is being read alongside two excellent historical fiction series: The Aubrey-Maturin Series by Patrick O'Brian and The Richard Sharpe Series by Bernard Cornwell. Both authors are fantastic, though O'Brian is more well-known (he received a boost when Russell Crowe played Captain Jack Aubrey in the loosely-based Master and Commander movie). In a stroke of good fortune, both authors bring different aspects of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars together: O'Brian writes about the war at sea, and Cornwell focuses on the land war. Because both series together march upwards of forty-something books, I'm splitting it between this year and next (which is still a good solid twenty-odd books each year). Thus far this year I've finished six of Cornwell and O'Brian's novels (along with a spattering of fiction bringing these events to further life).

2018 Resolutions

“A new year and a new me!”

Except not really.

Not a lot of people do New Year’s Resolutions, but I’m fond of them. I like having yearly goals, a certain set of things to strive after. Each year thus becomes more defined, and more memorable, and different than the years before or after it. I’m a categorical kind of guy and like to view my life in compartmentalized, bullet-pointed phases. I think it might be part of my aspergers. Despite my fondness of Resolutions, I hardly ever achieve all of them. I’m ahead of the game if I even accomplish two. This past year I was not ahead of the game. My 2017 Resolutions were:

[A] Make Progress with School

[B] Read an Hour a Day

[C] Write Two Novels

I didn’t start school back up (it’s slated for spring/summer this year, for financial reasons), I didn’t write two novels, but I did read an hour a day (and clocked in at 185 books read, a new record). Many of this year's goals are along the same lines:

[A] Read or Write an Hour a Day*

[B] Continue Living Healthier

And… (commence drumroll...)

[C] Buy a House**

*Though I hit a whopping 185 books read last year, I didn't get much done in the way of writing. I'm hoping to remedy that this year by allowing myself to use "reading time" for "writing time." My aim this year is to write two novels and finish my Brief History of England (much of which is posted in 2017's chronicles).

**By the goodness of God we have saved up enough money for a good-sized down-payment on our own home and brought our credit and debt to where it needs to be to get a good loan. There are lots of reasons to look forward to 2018, but having our own home, rather than renting, tops the list.

books read: 2017

This past year I read (or reread) 185 books. That's a new record!
(Reading an Hour a Day can get you far in life!)

~ Religion & Spirituality ~

Knowing God (J.I. Packer)
The Heidelberg Catechism: A Study Guide (G.I. Williamson, 1993)
The Godly Man's Picture (Thomas Watson, 1660)
Is God Anti-Gay? (Sam Allberry, 2013)
Empires of Dirt: Secularism, Radical Islam, and the Mere Christendom Alternative
  (Douglas Wilson, 2016)
Act Like Men: 40 Days to Biblical Manhood (James MacDonald, 2014)
Man Up! Becoming a Godly Man in an Ungodly World (Jody Burkeen, 2011)
The Grace of Shame (Tim Bayly, 2017)
Daddy Tried: Overcoming the Failures of Fatherhood (Bayly, 2016)
Real Marriage (Mark Driscoll, 2013)
Recovering Redemption (Matt Chandler, 2014)
Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters (Meg Meeker, 2007)
Amusing Ourselves to Death (Neil Postman, 2005)
The Dawkins Delusion (Alister McGrath, 2010)
The Devil's Delusion: Atheism & Its Scientific Pretensions (David Berlinski, 2009)
Darwin's Doubt (Stephen C. Meyer, 2014)
Evolution 2.0 (Perry Marshall, 2015)
Deliver Us From Evolution? (Aaron R. Yilmaz, 2016)
The End of Reason (Ravi Zacharias, 2008)
The Real Face of Atheism (Zacharias, 2004)
The Grand Weaver (Zacharias, 2010)
Has Christianity Failed You? (Zacharias, 2010)
Why Suffering? (Vince Vitale & Zacharias, 2015)

~ The History of England ~

from prehistoric times through the height of the British Empire

PREHISTORIC BRITAIN
  Prehistoric Europe (ed. Barry Cunliffe, 1994)
  Warfare in Prehistoric Britain (Julian Heath, 2013)
  Britain Begins (Cunliffe, 2014)
  Britain BC: Life in Britain and Ireland Before the Romans (Francis Pryor, 2004)
  History of the Britons (Nennius, 6th century AD)
THE RISE & FALL OF ROMAN BRITAIN
  Roman Britain (Henry Freeman, 2016)
  Early & Roman Britain (Edward Conybeare, 1903)
  Roman Britain (Peter Salway, 1984)
  Roman Britain: A New History (Guy de la Bedoyere, 2014)
  On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain (Gildas, 6th century AD)
ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND
  Early Britain (Alfred Church, 1889)
  Britain After Rome: The Rise and Fall, 400-1070 AD (Robin Fleming, 2011)
  Britain AD: A Quest for Arthur, England, and the Anglo-Saxons (Pryor, 2005)
  The Anglo-Saxon Age (John Blair, 1984)
  The Anglo-Saxons (James Campbell, et. al., 1991)
  Alfred the Great and the Viking Invasions of Europe (Beatrice Lees, 1919)
  The Conquest of England (John Green, 1883)
  The Vikings (Don Nardo, 2010)
  England During the Dark Ages: 449-1071 AD (Green, 1895)
  Ecclesiastical History of the English People (Venerable Bede, AD 731)
MEDIEVAL BRITAIN
  The Norman Conquest: The Battle of Hastings and the Fall of  Anglo-Saxon
          England (Marc Morris, 2014)
  The Norman Conquest (George Garnett, 2010)
  Medieval Britain (John Gillingham, 2002)
  England and the Crusades: 1095-1588 (Christopher Tyerman, 1988)
  Magna Carta: The Birth of Liberty (Dan Jones, 2016)
  The Plantagenets (Jones, 2014)
  William Wallace and Robert the Bruce (Charles River, 2015)
  The Hundred Years War: England vs. France
    The Hundred Years War (William M. Lace, 1994)
    The Hundred Years War: Essential Histories (Anne Curry, 2002)
    The Hundred Years War: The English in France, 1337-1453
          (Desmund Seward, 1999)
    The Hundred Years War: England and France at War
          (Christopher Allmand, 1988)
    England Expects: The Battle of Sluys (Corrigan, 2016)
    The Armies of Crecy and Poitiers (Christopher Rothero, 1981)
    French Armies of the Hundred Years War (Nicolle & McBride, 2000)
    Henry V and the Conquest of France (Knight & Turner, 1998)
    The Armies of Agincourt (Rothero, 1981)
  The Wars of the Roses: Lancaster vs. Yorkshire
    A Brief History of the Wars of the Roses (David Hume, 1905)
    The Wars of the Roses (Terence Wise & G.A. Embleton, 1983)
    The Wars of the Roses (Lace, 1995)
    The Wars of the Roses: 1377-1471 (Robert Mowat, 2014)
    The Wars of the Roses (River, 2017)
MODERN BRITAIN
  The Tudors (John Guy, 2013)
  Queen Elizabeth & the Spanish Armada (Francis Winwar, 1954)
  Stuart Britain (John Morrill, 2000)
  The English Civil War (Robert Freeman, 2014)
  The Glorious Revolution (River, 2017)
  The American Revolution (Henry Freeman, 2016)
  Trafalgar & Waterloo (River, 2014)
  The War of 1812 (Freeman, 2016)
  The British Empire (River, 2017)

~ Historical Miscellany ~

THE ANCIENT WORLD
  The Story of the World: The Ancient World (Susan Wise Bauer, 2006)
  Empires of Mesopotamia (Nardo, 2000)
  The Assyrian Empire (Nardo, 1998)
  The Persian Empire (Nardo, 1997)
  Ancient Egypt (Nardo, 2002)
  Ancient Egypt (Judith Crosher, 1993)
  The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egypt (Toby Wilkinson, 2013)
  Weapons and Warfare of Ancient Egypt (Nardo, 2002)
  Ancient Greece (Peter Ackroyd, 2005)
  The Roman Republic (Nardo, 1994)
  The Punic Wars (Nardo, 1996)
  The Collapse of the Roman Republic (Nardo, 1998)
  The Roman Empire (Nardo, 1994)
  Stephen Beisty's Rome (Stephen Beisty, 2003)
MEDIEVAL MISCELLANIA
  The Story of the World: The Middle Ages (Bauer, 2007)
  The Roman Empire and the Dark Ages (Giovanni Caselli, 1981)
  A Brief Political and Geographic History of Europe (Frances Davey, 2008)
  The Early Middle Ages (Nardo, 1995)
  The Invaders: Romans, Barbarians, Vikings, Normans, Gothic Tribes,
    & Moslems (Martin Windrow, 1979)
  Barbarians (Stephen Knoll, 2009)
  Medieval Warfare (Nardo, 2015)
  Weapons & Warfare of the Middle Ages (Nardo, 2003)
  Stephen Beisty's Castle (Beisty, 2013)
  Castles (Meredith Hooper, 2006)
  A Cultural Atlas of the Middle Ages (Mike Corbishley, 2007)
THE MODERN WORLD
  The Story of the World: The Early Modern World (Bauer, 2004)
  The Story of the World: The Modern World (Bauer, 2005)
  World War One (Rupert Colley, 2012)
  World War Two (Colley, 2011)

  The Korean War 

    The Korean War (Andrew Mulholland, 2013)
    The Korean War (Andrew Santella, 2007)

    The Korean War: A History (Bruce Cumings, 2011)
    The Korean War (Hourly History, 2017)
    The Korean War: A Captivating Guide (Captivating History, 2017)
    Valleys of Death: A Memoir of the Korean War (Bill Richardson, 2010)

    The Battle for Pusan: A Memoir (Addison Terry, 2007)
    From the Cockpit: Coming of Age in the Korean War (Tex Atkinson, 2004)
    Jet Pioneer: A Fighter Pilot's Memoir (Carl Schneider, 2017)
    Blood on the Snow: A Korean War Memoir (William Melton, 2017)
    A Rage Within: A Korean War Memoir (James Campbell, 2017)
  The Vietnam War

    The Vietnam War (Mark Black, 2012)

    The Vietnam War in 50 Events (James Weber, 2015)

    The Vietnam War: The Definitive Illustrated History (DK Publishing, 2017)

    The Tet Offensive & the Invasion of Cambodia (Rivers, 2016)

    Aircraft of the Vietnam War (Bill Gunston, 1988)

    Hue 1968 (Mark Bowden, 2017)

    We Were Soldiers Once... And Young (Harold G. Moore, 2004)

    American Warrior: a Combat Memoir of Vietnam (John C. Bahnsen, 2008)

    'Nam Raw: Excerpts from 24 Vietnam Combat Memoirs (McFarland, 2016)

    Dispatches (Michael Herr, 1991)

    The Vietnam War (Neil Smith, 2012)

  Black Hawk Down (Bowden, 2010)
  Iraq & Afghanistan
    And Then All Hell Broke Loose: Two Decades in the
      Middle East (Richard Engel, 2016)
    The Forever War (Dexter Filkins, 2008)
    The War in Afghanistan (Stuart A. Kallen, 2014)
    The Iraq War (Rodney P. Carlisle, 2007)
    War Journal: My Five Years in Iraq (Engel, 2008)
    The Second Battle of Fallujah (Rivers, 2016)
    Rise of ISIS: A Threat We Can't Ignore (Jay Sekulow, et. al., 2014)
    Because They Hate (Brigitte Gabriel, 2006)
    A History of Sharia Law (Rivers, 2016)
    The Syrian Civil War (Rivers, 2017)

~ Fiction & Literature ~

HISTORICAL FICTION
  Black Ships Before Troy (Rosemary Sutcliff, 2005)
  Simon Scarrow's Eagle Series
    Under the Eagle (2000)
    The Eagle's Conquest (2001)
    When the Eagle Hunts (2002)
    The Eagle and the Wolves (2003)
    The Eagle's Prey (2004)
  Bernard Cornwell's Saxon Tales
    The Last Kingdom (2004)
    The Pale Horseman (2005)
    The Lords of the North (2006)
    Sword Song (2007)
    The Burning Land (2009)
    Death of Kings (2011)
    The Pagan Lord (2013)
    The Empty Throne (2014)
    Warriors of the Storm (2015)
    The Flame Bearer (2016)
A MELTING POT OF FICTION
  A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (George R.R. Martin, 2015)
  The Hammer of God (Arthur C. Clarke, 1994)
  Imperial Earth (Clarke, 1974)
  Childhood's End (Clarke, 1952)
  Pirate Latitudes (Michael Crichton, 2009)
  Dragon Teeth (Crichton, 2017)
  The Dead Zone (Stephen King, 1979)
  Salem's Lot (King, 1975)
  Gray Mountain (John Grisham, 2014)
  The Racketeer (Grisham, 2012)
  The Hunt for Red October (Tom Clancy, 1984)
  Red Storm Rising (Clancy, 1986)
  The Orchard Keeper (Cormac McCarthy, 1965)
  Outer Dark (McCarthy, 1968)
  Child of God (McCarthy, 1973)
  Blood Meridian (McCarthy, 1985)
  No Country for Old Men (McCarthy, 2005)
  The Road (McCarthy, 2006)
  Alas, Babylon (Pat Frank, 2005)
  On the Beach (Nevil Shute, 2010)
STAR WARS NOVELS
  Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader (James Luceno, 2005)
  Catalyst: A Rogue One Novel (Luceno, 2016)
  Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Alexander Freed, 2016)
  Episode IV: A New Hope (George Lucas, 1986)
  Battlefront: Twilight Company (Freed, 2015)
  Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (Donald F. Glut, 1985)
  Shadows of the Empire (Steve Perry, 1996)
  Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (James Kahn, 1983)
  Aftermath: Star Wars (Chuck Wendig, 2016)
  Aftermath: Life Debt (Wendig, 2017)
  Aftermath: Empire's End (Wendig, 2017)
  Bloodline (Claudia Gray, 2017)
  Episode VII: The Force Awakens (Foster, 2016)
  Star Wars: Complete Locations (D.K. Publishing, 2016)

et reditus

This June it’ll be three years since I shut down my long-running blog Darker Than Silence. The decision to ‘pull the plug’ was couched in terms of ‘cutting all cords’ in the wake of a bad breakup, but really it was to protect my sanity. That’s a reflection purely on me: I didn’t handle the breakup well, and my anger got the best of me. Anger soaked in grief is the worst kind of pain, and my inability to practice self-control is something for which I’m ashamed. Shame, I’ve found, is good, because it forces you to take a hard, knowing look at yourself; shame is what happens when we ‘know ourselves’, and it spurns you towards a brokenness that brings you to your knees and opens you up to the help you so desperately need. One of my greatest regrets is how I handled that breakup; I didn’t do well by her, and I know I wounded her heart with my farcical and grief-skewed words.  I’ve prayed deeply that any wounds she incurred on my behalf would be healed and that she sees herself as I always saw her, even if I pretended otherwise: as a wonderful daughter of the king.

I have no ill will towards her; I know that marrying her wasn’t God’s will for me. He had something else for me, something more fitting for me (not ‘something better’ but ‘something more suited towards me in particular’, an important distinction). She and I wouldn’t have been a good fit. We loved each other, to be sure, but we weren’t compatible. We were polar opposites in so many ways, and though they say opposites attract, they don’t say that opposites flourish. God was looking out not only for me but also for her; she would be happier with someone else, and that’s okay. As it stands, I’ve fully moved into what God has for me and am more happy and content than ever before. I’m in awe at the grace and favor God has shown me, excited for the life He’s planned for me—a life full of love and friendship and hard work.

The past two years have seen a lot of changes, not only on the outside but also in the inside. God has been busy, and at times I’ve felt like I’m just trying to keep up. God brought me the love of my life, and He began writing a story that’s definitely one for the annals. Ashley and I became friends at C.C.U. in 2005, and though I had a crush on her, I was too shy and quiet to do anything about it. Besides, she was a cheerleader and I was just this quirky, nerdy short guy with weird-looking hair. I spent my free time scurrying up the steps from the men’s dorm to the Hilltop Coffee Shop and scaring girls from the sewers, so what would a cute and spunky cheerleader want to do with me? She ended up dating and marrying my dorm room neighbor, and they had two girls together. Flash forward nearly a decade, and she and I reconnect at an Irish pub and it turns out her ex-husband was a dick and abandoned her and their two little girls. She and I continued hanging out, and I fell in love with her and her girls (Chloe and Zoey), and on 4 November 2016 we were married in a beautiful ceremony in my parents’ backyard:

Overnight we became Husband and Wife, and the next morning I was stepdad to Chloe and Zoey. But I wanted to be more than that, so we found a lawyer and started the adoption process. We knew it would be a fight: Ashley’s ex-in-laws and ex-husband were taking her to court again and again to get more privileges with the girls. Ashley had reasons for fighting them, and we knew that once the adoption went through, the girls would be entirely mine and all the exes would be legal strangers, and we also knew that this would be anathema to the in-laws. It would overthrow all they had achieved. We geared up for a brutal fight that we feared could turn violent, and we held our breaths and prayed hard. Lots of people who knew the situation prayed along with us; our church coated us in prayer, and we steeled ourselves as the adoption papers were served. Then something remarkable happened: the exes, who for years had dragged Ashley through the courts and who had fought tooth-and-nail for the girls, just turned their backs and walked away. They just gave up and washed their hands of us. There isn’t a doubt in anyone’s mind that this was a work of God: He answered our prayers by declaring that there would be no fight, and it was so. The judge sped up the adoption process (something which our lawyer said was unheard-of), the home inspector just had a nice conversation with us and declared me fit to be a father without even looking around the house (this, our lawyer said, was even more unheard of), and on 19 September 2017 I became the legal father of Chloe and Zoey (I delight to remember that I held Chloe as a newborn in the hospital, ignorant to all the threads God was weaving together for me to become her father). The girls’ birth certificates were changed, and they became Chloe and Zoey Barnhart. They became mine.

Sometimes I still lie awake in bed shocked at all that God has done for me. In the spring of 2006 God spoke to me in an audible yet silent voice (it’s hard to describe), and He told me, “I have given you these desires [to be a good husband and good father], and I have given you these desires for a reason. There is a girl, one of My children, who is hurting and aching. She desires true love and fears she will never find it in this world of twisted and abusive love. I have chosen you to be Me to her—to love her with a selfless, serving, and sacrificial love. I have a beautiful plan for you and for her.” For a decade I wondered how that would play out, and when God’s plan came together, all the pieces fell into place. Everything made sense. God was talking about Ashley when He spoke to me in 2006. His hand has been vibrantly evident in our lives, and He’s swept aside hurdle after hurdle to bring us to where He wants us to be. It hasn’t been easy (things are most often hard when God is at work), but it’s been life-giving, liberating, and something which I would never give up for anything this world has to offer. Many tears were spilled praying through the first verses of Psalm 40 in a desperate longing for God to answer my prayers for a heart made alive, and now I pray them in praise and wonder at the way God has been at work in my life:

I waited patiently for the Lord, and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me also out of the horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon the rock, and ordered my goings. And he hath put in my mouth a new song of praise unto our God; many shall see it and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.  (Psalm 40.1-3, 1599 Geneva Bible)

When I exclaim, ‘Look what God hath wrought,’ my meditations aren’t solely on the macro-movements; they’re in the micro ones, as well. When I look back on who I was four years ago, I’m stunned by the difference. It's truly Night and Day. Though my quirks remain the same (and I’m still a voracious reader and writer), I’m far more responsible and wise in my decisions. I’m more patient, more self-controlled, and more mature. God has led me into a life of Husbandry and Fatherhood, and it’s a life of sacrifice and self-expenditure. Time, money, energy, everything is directed towards the family God has put under your care. Husbandry and fatherhood is a pouring out of your deepest self. It’s exhausting, trying, and fulfilling. I’ve become more religiously conservative (having girls plays a part in this, no doubt), and I’ve shunned practices and habits that were ingrained into my life. This marriage and family thing is wonderful, and it’s a daily learning experience (I’m far from perfect, and I often fail). Being a husband and a father is damned hard, because if you’re doing it right then you’re committing your life to loving and leading your family, carrying the financial burden and providing for the family’s needs (and God has been faithful, always providing us what we need).

This blog will be different than Darker Than Silence. Though I’ve kept up my Weekly Updates, the day-by-day journal of my life, I’m keeping them on a private sister site. Making them public when I was single was one thing, but doing it when you’re the head of a family of four (and, God willing, soon to be more) is a different beast altogether. This blog will mainly consist of the trivial matters of my life (with big updates when necessary), and such ‘trivial matters’ include any leisurely studies (such as my study of medieval England last year), random posts of Star Wars or dinosaur pictures (what can I say? I’m a fan), or excerpts from my writing (when I find the time to hone my craft). Somewhere along the way, I hope, you may find yourself entertained.