A powerhouse mentor recently expounded on the topic of disappointment in light of the beauty of God. Tearfully she testified that beholding the Lord’s beauty utterly obliterates disappointment. The recipient of majesty is left with only one response: God is worth it all. But what exactly is disappointment? An AI overview explains: “Disappointment is the feeling of dissatisfaction, sadness, or frustration that occurs when one’s hopes, expectations, or desires are not met. It is a psychological response to a gap between reality and what was anticipated.” A psychological response to a gap between reality and what was anticipated—disappointment is a gap! What I see in Scripture is that disappointment is a place almost all believers will eventually find themselves. Some may even live there for a season, because believers are in a constant state of trusting God’s goodness while living in a fallen world. Joseph is often preached as a prime example of overcoming disappointment. Yet when I read...
Babies born in the eighties got the best childhoods as nineties kids. The mixtapes of our adolescence tilted holy and a little grunge, with bands like Jars of Clay, Audio Adrenaline, Third Day, and DC Talk. Oh, and Church! Evangelical Church didn’t just preach sermons; we had full-scale productions of Heaven’s Gates and Hell’s Flames —designed to instill a healthy dose of holy fear. My grandma sealed my theological fate with a T-shirt that read “Heaven Yes” on the front and “Hell No” on the back. She meant for me to be a walking altar call at my public school, but I just thought it looked edgy. Many of us latchkey kids made up the gap generation in our families. Our grandparents had more than just one or two children, leaving wide spaces between siblings. By the time the first grandkids arrived, some aunts and uncles were still teens themselves—half babysitters, half playmates, all trying to grow up at once. As a gap kid, I learned by watching. Every choice around ...