I love to win. Ask anyone who knows me. Family game night at Top Golf, bargain shopping, chasing down a good deal — I want the W. And if I'm honest, I carry that same wiring into church leadership. I want things to go up and to the right.
But here's the deal: life doesn't go up and to the right. Not for very long.
Some of you know exactly what I mean. The unexpected loss. The investment that went the wrong way. The health news you didn't see coming. The plan you were sure about that just... didn't work. One week you're on a mountaintop, and the next you're wondering what happened. And if you're following Jesus, I've got news that's both good and hard: that wild ride isn't a sign something's broken. It's the terrain.
In Luke, Jesus is honest about it. A man says, "I'll follow you anywhere," and Jesus basically says, you sure? Foxes have dens, birds have nests, but following me won't be the comfortable option. Your plans will get interrupted. Life won't run on your timeline. There are going to be seasons of cost, and they're going to feel like cost.
And then — same chapter — He sends seventy-two ordinary people out, and they come back stunned because it worked. God actually used them. There's nothing more addicting than watching God work through you. High highs. Low lows. A beautiful, wild ride.
So if the highs are that high and the lows are that low, what holds you steady in the middle of all of it?
Jesus tells us. When the seventy-two come back celebrating everything that went right, He gently redirects them: "Do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven." Don't build your joy on the win, He says. Because if you live for the success, you'll die from the failure. There's something steadier than any high and deeper than any low: your name is written in heaven.
That's the miracle I just can't get over.
And it gets more personal the longer I sit with it. Because at some point, I was the harvest. I was the person somebody else's wild ride was leading to. Think about your own story for a second. The grandmother who prayed for you. The parents who dragged you to church before you understood any of it. The coworker who said something about Jesus at the exact wrong-right moment. The friend who refused to give up on you. Every one of them was on their own ride of highs and lows — and it ended with you. Here. Reading this.
That wrecks me. Somebody went on a hard, holy, up-and-down journey with Jesus, and the fruit of it was a person. You. Me. I think about the people God used to get to me, and I just shake my head — You kidding me? Me?
Here's what the gospel actually says, underneath all of it: Jesus went to a cross so that you could be forgiven. Not improved. Not impressed into shape. Forgiven. Justified. Set apart and called by name. Your name — written down, in heaven, in permanent ink, by the only One whose record never changes. You didn't earn it on your best week, and you can't lose it on your worst one. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound.
That's why it steadies me. In a season of success, I hold onto it, because no win will ever be bigger than my name being written in heaven. And in a season of cost, I hold onto it too — it might be hard right now, but I'm good. I'm His. That doesn't move.
So here's the one thing I'd ask you to do with this. Not ten things. One. Sometime this week, write down the name of the person God used to get the gospel to you — and then go thank them. Call them. Text them. If they're gone, thank God for them out loud. Let yourself feel the weight of being somebody's harvest. Because it just might wake you up to the people around you right now who are one wild ride away from being written down too.
The ups and downs are coming. For all of us. But the miracle underneath them doesn't flinch.
And if you've never had that — if your name isn't something you're sure about — that miracle can be yours today. That's the whole reason we never get tired of talking about the gospel. It's the thing we keep at the center.
We'd love to have you join us on Sunday.
