I met a girl named Julie. It was 28 years ago that my friendship with Julie turned into a whirlwind romance of pursuing love. I ran after her until she said yes in March and we were married June 26th. This is the story of God: He pursues after us with His love and maybe we haven't said yes yet. Pursuing after someone requires no substitutes - when pursuing Julie I didn't send a friend or a better looking guy to woo her. In God's case He decided to come Himself as Jesus to pursue me with his love. In our relationship I have been distracted and focused on doing things to please Him. In my mind if I could do religion really well He would love me even more. Our relationship has winded down the path of dysfunction many days leaving me anxious and restless. Meanwhile He still is relentlessly pursuing me with His love - a pursuit that is unconditional and totally accepting of me for who I am. Today He is with me, chasing me and wooing me. He is here in person with no substitutes waiting for me to say yes.
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Now with God's help, I shall become myself - Soren Kierkegaard
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Think on These
- Settle yourself in solitude and you will come upon Him in yourself. -Teresa of Avila
- Be who you are and say what you feel; Because those that mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~ Dr. Suess
- Be yourself; everyone else is already taken. ~ Oscar Wilde
- To have naked interface with the Ultimate Other is to know one's self in one's truest and deepest being. ~ Richard Rohr
- Faith allows God to lead you through the darkness when God knows and I don't. - Gerald May
- What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. - A.W. Tozer
- The Poser shrinks only when he is acknowledged and accepted as an embarrassing but very real part of me. - Brennan Manning
- The Pharisee within is the religious face of The Poser, who always feels uneasy about his relationship with God. - Brennan Manning
- Rediscovering the inner child is not an end in itself but a doorway into the depths of our union with the God who makes himself at home in us. - Brennan Manning
- We already have everything, but we don't know it and we don't experience it. Everything has been given to us in Christ. All we need is to experience what we already possess. - Thomas Merton
- If we wait for the time in which to wait for God we will never wait for him. We will never discover in prayer our true self in God. - James Finley
- For God to be is to give being, and for man to be is to receive being. - Meister Eckhart
- The true self is our whole self before God. It is the self the Father created us to become. It is the self in Christ. - James Finley
- Leadership is cultivating the Biblical imagination of God's people. - Alan J. Roxburgh
- Leaders can do great things when they align their expectations with God's. - Alan J. Roxburgh
- Keep company with God and learn a life of love. - Dr. Jeff Zakrzewski
- God is nearer to us than we are to ourselves. - St. Augustine
- The church matrix is centered in detachment leading to a dysfunctional community of false selves. - Dr. Jeff Zakrzewski
- The temptation to take over God's role in our life is the essence of the false self. - M. Robert Mulholland, Jr.
- Faith is the opening of an inward eye, the eye of the heart, to be filled with the presence of Divine light. - Thomas Merton
- To be a saint means to be myself. - Thomas Merton
- Genuine self-knowledge begins by looking at God and noticing how God is looking at us. -David Benner
- There is only one problem on which all my existence, my peace, and my happiness depend: to discover myself in discovering God. If I find Him I will find myself and if I find my true self I will find Him. - Thomas Merton
- Living a God-arranged life is always exploring the unknown. -Jules Glanzer
- The life of contemplation implies two levels of awareness: first, awareness of the question, and second, awareness of the answer. - Thomas Merton
- God created human beings after God's own image, and we've returned the compliment, so to speak, creating God after our image. - Richard Rohr
- Waiting is the hardest work of hope. - Lewis Smedes
- When you take on a challenge, it builds the core of who you are, even if you don't perform flawlessly. - John Ortborg
- A calling is the place where your deep gladness meets the world's deep need. - Frederich Buechner
- Everything is determined by how we set our sails. - Charles Swindoll
- Failure does not shape you; the way you respond to failure shapes you. - John Ortborg
- God has an inextinguishable habit of asking people to do things that are scary to them. - John Ortborg
- He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how. - Nietzsche
- Hope is essential for life. - Erwin McManus
- I connect best with others when I am connected to the core of my true self. - Brennan Manning
- I did not wish to live what was not life...I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life. - Henry David Thoreau
- If you want to walk on water, you've got to get out of the boat. - John Ortborg
- It is the worst of situations that we are able to discover the best in us. - Erwin McManus
- Live like a child or saint in the immediacy of the here and now. - Anne Morrow Lindbergh
- Nothing is so much to be feared as fear. - Henry David Thoreau
- Now I become myself. It's taken time, many years and places. I have been dissolved and shaken, worn other people's faces... - May Sarton
- The punishment imposed on us for claiming true self can never be worse than the punishment we impose on ourselves by failing to make that claim. - Parker Palmer
- There are signs that will guide your journey. They are waiting to be discovered, but you must search for them. - Erwin McManus
- To become is to change and bring change. - Erwin McManus
- Traveler, there is no path. Paths are made by walking. - Antonio Machado
- We are created to know God and to know love. It is love that moves God toward us and love that pulls us toward him. Follow love and it will guide you to God. - Erwin McManus
- We're more self-absorbed but less self-aware. We don't know who we are. - Erwin McManus
- Wherever you find yourself- do not easily leave. - Abba Anthony
Being Jeff
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- Dr. Jeff Zakrzewski
- Sumner, Washington, United States
- I have often wondered that my life has not always gone in the direction I had anticipated. Yet in retrospect if I went on to heaven today I have already lived a full life. After 26 years of full time ministry pastoring at a number of churches God has given me wonderful opportunities to be involved in His work in people's lives. I have been married to Julie for 30 years and have two children, Janelle and Jeff with two grandchildren, Bella and Sophie. Currently I am in God's workshop in Puyallup, Washington.
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Must Reads
- Naming the Elephant, James Sire
- Hidden Worldviews, Steve Wilkens and Mark Sanford
- Things Hidden, Richard Rohr
- The Universe Next Door, James W. Sire
- Merton's Palace of Nowhere, James Finley
- The Missional Leader, Alan Roxburgh, Fred Romanuk
- The Deeper Journey - The Spirituality of Discovering Your True Self, M. Robert Mulholland, Jr.
- The Gift of Being Yourself, David Benner
- New Seeds of Contemplation, Thomas Merton
- Simplicity, Richard Rohr
- The Shack, Wm. Paul Young
- The Inner Voice of Love, Henri Nouwen
- Soul Cravings, Erwin McManus
- Searching for God Knows What, Donald Miller
- Posers, Fakers & Wannabes, Brennan Manning
- Let Your Life Speak, Parker J. Palmer
- Laugh Again, Charles Swindoll
- If You Want to Walk on Water, You've Got to Get Out of the Boat, John Ortborg
- Everything Belongs, Richard Rohr
- Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller
- Awareness, Anthony DeMello
- Abba's Child , Brennan Manning
"Being Me" the Book
Click here to go to the website to receive your free e-book copy of Dr. Jeff's story
Being Me is a Journey
The struggle of being me is designed by God to be humankind's primary spiritual journey. It can only be discovered through two converging life roads: God-centering and people-communing.