In dimly-lit darkness, surrounded by no one but the enemy, watching everything crumble around you in slow-motion, it’s tempting to lie just to save your own skin.

Peter did it. Probably without thinking. I imagine it as one of those moments when it feels like words are throwing themselves out of your mouth rather than you speaking them. Like an out-of-body experience when you see yourself saying something stupid—again, in slow-motion—but you’re unable to shout loud enough or fast enough to stop your dumb-ass self.

And so are you. So is everyone ever.

Light and dark. Good and bad. Faithfulness and flakiness. Holiness and sinfulness. Trust and skepticism. Hope and cynicism.

In the Gospels, the disciples are our example par excellence of this. Perhaps Peter more than any other. The question that comes to my mind is, why do I seem to highlight his faults more than his strengths?

Yes, he sank into the water when Jesus called him, but he was the only one who even stepped out of the boat to set his feet upon the surface of the water. Yes, there was that time Jesus himself referred to him as Satan, but on another occasion he also called him Rock because he intended to build his church on him as the foundation. Yes, he denied Christ three times after his arrest, but he was also one of only two disciples who followed him to court.

Mob mentality is demonic. Fueled by the fires of hell itself. There has never been a mob bent on blessing, only destroying.

Flock mentality is Christ-like. Empowered by the light of heaven. A true flock of Jesus can never be characterized by violence.

This, as Paul and others would later point out, is indeed the great battle going on behind the curtain. The reality beneath our reality.

Or draw your sword. But you can’t do both.

You can learn to accept life as it comes to you—as your Father allows it to come to you—or you can fight your life when it’s not to your liking.

If you face your life like a soldier, ready for battle, there will be casualties. Someone’s gonna get hurt. And it may not be you. When we come out swinging, we’re bound to hit something or someone.

Sometimes God will repeat a question to you, whether you ask him to or not.

Quite often, when he does so, it is an invitation to reflect on your initial response. “Are you sure about that?” Maybe it’s worth reconsidering. “Is that your final answer?” Maybe there is a deeper, truer answer.

In prayer, one of the most difficult habits to untrain one’s self from is the compulsion to ask questions. To ask for anything, whether a blessing, some help, or an answer. Most of our early training in prayer, (mostly by example), is to make requests. But you must untrain yourself to ask in order to leave space for God to do some asking.

Is not the main goal of faith. Sometimes it is indeed the smartest thing to simply walk away. On the other hand, the situation may call for walking straight up to evil, look it in the eyes and say, “Here I am. Do your worst.”

Admittedly, this makes zero sense. If you can turn and run, why stand still? If you can fight back, why not come out swinging? If you can call for backup, why stay silent?

Not really. Nowhere is 100% protected from pain, hurt, loss, meanness, betrayal, disappointment, or whatever.

There are, however, safer spaces. The more power we have to foster such environments for others, and the more wisely we can choose such places for ourselves, the better.

But in the end, everywhere is risky. Every space, every environment, every relationship. Even the safest spaces are not invulnerable. So the sooner we can stop being surprised at the inherent danger of being humans who live among other humans, the better.

Is essential to love. Without a sharing of one’s self, and without the acceptance of that self by another, there is no real love. At best there is only acquaintance. There might be cordiality and cooperation, and perhaps a degree of superficial familiarity, but nothing so intimate that it could be labeled “love.”

Love is a meandering journey of self-disclosure. It’s not a one-stop shop full of get-to-know-me trinkets. It’s not a questionnaire to be filled out and referred back to as needed. It’s not a speed train engineered to make the fastest trip between Point A and Point B. In fact, there is no Point B. No point of arrival.

Is whatever is anti-unity. Because Christ is pro-unity: “that they may be one as we are one.”

God’s self is a unit. If the doctrine of the Trinity bears any real importance on how we humans live, it is this: God demonstrates how the multiple are to be one. And this unified nature is what he desires his family to reflect out into the entire world—a world that is desperately divided. I hesitate to say “a world more divided than ever,” because that really may not be true. But I at least feel like it’s accurate to say “a world on a downward spiral of division.”

Can be hard to reckon with. If I’m being completely honest, even after 30 years of following Jesus pretty darn seriously, and after quite a number of prayers significantly answered, I’m sometimes still a little sore about the ones that were not.

Some of them I know never will be. The opportunity has passed. Some of them still could be, I suppose, but it’s been so long that I’ve pretty much stopped asking. And I suppose some of them may be answered in an unexpected way, but if the answer looks so different from the request that it doesn’t help me connect the dots—well, I don’t know what to do with that.