It begins as a low, steady hum before twisting to urgent whispers, growing louder, tugging for more attention: Go ahead, buy just one more item; slip into one more coffee shop; numb yourself on social media. You deserve to be happy.

So you go for it: tossing a few more pretty pillows into your Target cart, purchasing yet another latte, indulging in a greedy gaze of that glamorous Instagram account. Or you pack for a beach vacation, hoping it will revive your spirits and usher in the winds of peace — only to find yourself tired, beaten down, and spiritually parched. A stale barrenness remains lodged in the crevices of your soul.

Especially in seasons of sadness, loneliness, and stress, it’s tempting to turn to fleeting pleasures for comfort, isn’t it? I remember a time when life seemed crushing, and I was desperate for something to comfort me.

God, in his kindness, gave me the solution: a Bible-saturated life.

Lost at Home

Our family had moved 1,100 miles across the country, with four young children, and I was lost, treading in deep, swirling waters. Everything important to me as a woman felt unfamiliar: our neighborhood, our home, the grocery store, the pediatrician’s office, the church. Even after the boxes were unpacked, I remained unsettled.

Our 4-month-old daughter stopped sleeping with any measure of consistency, our 2-year-old son continually asked when we were going “home,” and our 6- and 8-year-old boys tiptoed into our bed during the pitch of night, craving security in the midst of upheaval.

While my husband went to work each day, I remained at home: comforting my children, filling sippy cups, homeschooling, and completing circular, unending chores.

I appeared calm and ordered, but inside I was crumbling. Exhaustion, loneliness, and hidden waves of sadness engulfed me. I pushed it down, prayed haphazardly, opened my Bible randomly, and told myself that God understood. A verse here or there would have to suffice in shoring up my soul.

It was a horribly broken system. And it was failing.

Surprising Comfort

Then, one ordinary Friday, I packed up our children and journeyed to the library. My fingers traveled the book spines, desperately seeking something, and then paused on a book called The Pleasures of God.

I brought the book home, and during the children’s rest time began reading. Later, in the hush of night, after the dishwasher was emptied and the crumbs swept, I curled up on the sofa and read more. It did not take long: my brittle soul was watered as I was pulled back to the Bible — reading, rereading, and cross-referencing, awakened to truths that had always rested within arm’s reach. How could I have missed this?

Simple. I had not spent consistent time before the Lord (1 Samuel 12:24), with a quiet heart (Psalm 37:7), an open Bible (Psalm 119:18), and prayer (Isaiah 59:2).

As I began to unearth what makes God happy, reading verse by verse, chapter by chapter, Old Testament to New Testament, it was as if I had new eyes, seeing the magnificence of God through a kaleidoscope of unspeakable beauty. A new passion ignited within me: feast on Scripture every day, for all of life.

Reviving the Tired Soul

I can hear someone respond, “Just read more of the Bible and life will improve?” Perhaps you are doubtful.

Remember this: the Bible is not merely a book. As Hebrews 4:12 tells us, “The word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

Bible reading has become my treasure hunt as I grab hold of Hebrews 4:12, expecting that God will speak to me through every passage: convicting, teaching, and encouraging. Day by day, he awakens me to who he is and what he desires. Day by day, he brings his comfort to parts of my soul out of reach from every other.

“When we open God’s word, he speaks, moving and shifting our souls. To treasure the Bible is to fully live.”

When we open God’s word, he speaks, moving and shifting our souls. To treasure the Bible is to fully live. How tragic, then, to shelve your Bible until Sunday morning rolls around — or to settle for only a verse here or there.

Just this morning I delighted in the reminder of Psalm 19:7–11:

The law of the Lord is perfect,     reviving the soul;the testimony of the Lord is sure,     making wise the simple;the precepts of the Lord are right,     rejoicing the heart;the commandment of the Lord is pure,     enlightening the eyes;the fear of the Lord is clean,     enduring forever;the rules of the Lord are true,     and righteous altogether.More to be desired are they than gold,     even much fine gold;sweeter also than honey     and drippings of the honeycomb.Moreover by them is your servant warned;     in keeping them there is great reward.

Do our tired souls need reviving? Do our sad hearts need rejoicing? Do our dim eyes need enlightening? We will find it all in God’s word. No wonder David describes Scripture as more precious than gold and sweeter than honey. More precious, too, than any pillow we could buy — and sweeter than any latte.

Gifts, Not Substitutes

As women, we naturally crave beauty, relationships, and rest. These desires are not wrong: we are made in the image of God — a God who authored beauty in his creation, made us for relationships, and ordained us for Sabbath rest. God himself designed the physical, the touchable, the earthly. Beautifying our homes, longing for deep friendships, and retreating to relax with family are good gifts from a good God.

But when these longings become disordered, sneaking in and claiming preeminence, our lives begin to implode. Our desperate reaching is a sign that our soul isn’t well, a cue that our footsteps are on dead-end paths. Only God can satisfy our souls. When he is first, other pleasures fall into their fitting places. Do we enjoy them? Yes. But they no longer govern us. Our unchanging God does, through our yielding to his word.

“When troubles and uncertainties erupt, and they will, remember that there is no substitute for the Bible.”

Tend to your own soul by quieting your heart, opening your Bible, and listening. There are no shortcuts. Do whatever necessary: rising early, canceling subscriptions, saying no to the temporal. And when troubles and uncertainties erupt, and they will, remember that there is no substitute for the Bible. Seek comfort and instruction in God’s word, and listen to him speak.

Open Bible, Quiet Heart

Elisabeth Elliot famously said, “The secret is Christ in me, not me in a different set of circumstances” (Keep a Quiet Heart, 20).

My circumstances did not change for the better after our move all of those years ago: I was still in the same unsettled situation, and life was lonely. For four years, I remained rootless, at least from a worldly perspective. My husband’s ministry kept us traveling on Sunday mornings, so I did not have a singular church home and flourishing friendships. The busyness of raising and homeschooling four young children was a work I loved, yet it was a heavy burden to carry without a support group of mothers nearby. My closest friends and family were a thousand miles away. Although I became acquainted with a few neighbors on a surface level, deep and godly friendships during that time were absent.

Yet there was a holy purpose hidden in that season, one that I see clearly now, as God lovingly pried earthly comforts from my grasp, turning my lonely heart directly back to himself through immersion in his word. I learned to abide in the Bible and trust him.

My children are grown now, and life looks different. But one thing has not changed: my soul’s need for Bible-saturated living. This is a lifelong pursuit, not a one-and-done conquering.

Recently, that old familiar feeling crept back, tugging as fresh trials unfolded. I began to neglect communion with God, choosing to curl inward. Feeling spiritually parched and a little sad, I thought, What do I need? More time for me? More time to serve myself? A vacation? More understanding? A friend who “gets it?”

Nope. Just an open Bible, the life-giving Spirit, a quiet heart, and prayer.

My grandfather is no longer here for Christmas.

I scarcely remember one without him, and yet now his absence is becoming the new normal. We no longer gather in his living room to read Luke’s account of Jesus’s birth, sing “Joy to the World,” open presents together, or eat the Christmas dinner he prepared. His chair, once so full of fondness, infectious laughter, and gentlemanly repose, now sits silent, full of memories.

A new sensation now dines with me during my favorite time of year. As the dining table crowds with new faces, new grins, and new babies, nostalgias of past Christmases unfold in the background. Here, more than at any other place or time, days past and days present meet. Here I behold fresh holiday scenes with old eyes. So much is the same, and so much is different.

Loss has made me older.

I look around the table at the bright eyes of the children, and see a joy unburdened. The Christmas they have known is the same today. They can’t see what their parents see. They cannot detect the soft-glowing faces or hear the unspeaking voices. To them, chairs aren’t empty, they’re yet to be filled. They don’t know the ache in our celebration, the wounds that never fully heal.

I now know Christmas as my grandfather had for years — as a mixture of gladness and grief, gratitude and regret, Christmas now and Christmas then. I could not discern the others who dined with us around the table from another life ago — parents, friends, his beloved wife. I never realized his Christmases filled with more than just that single Christmas. I now see the unspoken dimension. I better understand that weathered smile, brimming fuller, yet sadder than once before.

Suffice it to say, Christmases these days aren’t quite the same.

Out with the Old?

With this new experience of Christmas with an empty chair, comes certain threats and temptations.

Jesus once warned about sewing a piece of new cloth onto an old garment; or putting new wine into old wineskins. The wineskins might burst, he taught; the cloth might tear. But here we are. In the mind of the man or woman who has lost, the new is patched with the old; new wine pours into old family wineskins.

Perhaps you can relate. The pressure of sitting and eating and singing where he or she once sat and ate and sang can tear at the heart. You may have lost more than a grandfather. The strain of grief you feel around the holidays nearly concusses. The spouse whose name inscribed upon the ornament is no longer here. One stocking is missing. The beloved child you watched run down the stairs Christmas morning has not made it down for some years now. Christmas, this side of heaven, will never be the same.

I do not pretend to know such depths of despair. But I do know twin temptations that greet those of us who have lost someone. I hope that naming them might help you this Christmas.

Past Swallows Present

The first temptation is to the variety of grief that kidnaps us from life today. This bottomless ache comes when we begin to stare and stare at the empty chair. The grief overwhelms all gladness; the past swallows the present. The good that arrives is not the good that once was, so all current cause for happiness becomes spoiled or forgotten.

This is to step beyond the healthy grief and remembrance of our losses. It poisons the heart by entertaining the question the wise man bids us not to: “Say not,” he warns, “‘Why were the former days better than these?” For, he continues, “it is not from wisdom that you ask this” (Ecclesiastes 7:10). This grief poisons the what is with the what used to be. It hinders the ability to go on.

Grief threatens to lock us in dark cellars of the past, keeping us from enjoying the child playing on the floor or the new faces around the table.

Over-the-Shoulder Guilt

Second is the temptation to bow to the over-the-shoulder guilt bearing down on us. Lewis captures this in A Grief Observed:

There’s no denying that in some sense I “feel better,” and with that comes at once a sort of shame, and a feeling that one is under a sort of obligation to cherish and foment and prolong one’s unhappiness. (53)

“The empty chair can threaten to overwhelm all joy in this Christmas or shame us for feeling any joy this Christmas.”

This temptation sees the empty chair frowning at us. “Why aren’t you sadder? How can Christmas still be merry? Didn’t you love him?” The memory, not remaining in its proper place, looms over our shoulder, patrolling our happiness in the present. This shame is a sickness that tempts us to hate wellness.

So, the empty chair can threaten to overwhelm all joy in this Christmas or shame us for feeling any joy this Christmas — both must be resisted.

Melt the Clouds of Sadness

So what do we do? There the empty chair sits.

Fighting both temptations, I need to remind myself: Christmas is not about family around a dinner table, but about Jesus. And Jesus has promised that for his people — for my grandfather — to be absent from the Christmas table is to be present with him.

I ask myself, Should I wish my grandfather back? Would I, if it stood within my power, recall him from that feast, reunite his soul with his ailing body — reclaim him to sickness, loneliness, sin — summon him from the heaven of Christ himself to a shadowy celebration of Christ on earth?

Somedays I half-consider it.

But I know that if I could speak to him now, he wishes me there. The empty chair heaven longs to see filled is not around our Christmas dinner, but the empty chairs still surrounding Christ. Our places are set already. Better life, real life, true life, lasting life lies in that world. That empty chair of our loved ones departed is not merely a reminder of loss, but a pointer to coming gain.

“That empty chair of our loved ones departed is not merely a reminder of loss, but a pointer to coming gain.”

This place of shadows and darkness, sin and Satan, grief and death, is no place yet for that Happy Reunion. The dull Christmas stab reminds me that life is not what it should be, but it can also remind me life is not what it will soon be for all who believe.

Jesus will come in a Second Advent. He will make all things new. Christmases with empty chairs are numbered; these too shall soon pass. And the greatest chair that shall be occupied, the one that shall restore all things, and bring real joy to the world, is Jesus Christ, the baby once born in Bethlehem, now King that rules the universe. He shall sit and eat with us at his eternal supper of the Lamb.

And until then, while we travel through Christmases present and future, I pray for myself and for you,

Melt the clouds of sin and sadness;Drive the dark of doubt away;Giver of immortal gladness,Fill us with the light of day!

Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in . . . love. (1 Timothy 4:12)

Setting an example is a powerful and essential part of pastoral leadership. A strong line of reasoning in preaching, even a soundly biblical argument, might fail to persuade. But a personal example of Christlikeness, especially what Francis Schaeffer called “the beauty of human relationships,” is unanswerable (Two Contents, Two Realities, 141). Beauty can be martyred, but it cannot be denied, and it will rise again.

A young pastor can and must deeply resolve to love everyone in his church and outside his church with Christlike love. He can and must set the believers an example by his gracious, patient, gentle, forgiving, pain-tolerant love. But without the beauty of love, any pastor, however orthodox, becomes a living denial of Christ. To quote Schaeffer again, “There is nothing more ugly than an orthodoxy without understanding or without compassion” (The God Who Is There, 34). Schaeffer was even more blunt: “I’ll tell you something else, orthodoxy without compassion stinks to God” (Death in the City, 1968, 123).

Pastoral ministry is not a career track, not a job, not a gig. It is a sacred calling from above. And the pastoral calling is basically twofold: to preach Christ and to embody Christ. The former is a matter of declaring the truth, the latter of demonstrating the truth. And how can we truly declare the truth without also demonstrating it? If we pastors do not set an example in love, we unsay by our lives what we say by our doctrine. Such an anti-example betrays the gospel. And that horrible betrayal is not a remotely hypothetical possibility. That betrayal of the gospel is common.

We pastors need not be perfect. All of us have many shortcomings. But still, following God’s call, we pastors must accept, deeply accept, that we have signed up for sacrifice. It’s how we set an example of love.

Our Sacred Calling

The apostle John says, “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him” (1 John 4:9). Jesus died that we would live. That is how love thinks, how love behaves — paying a price, that others might enter into the life that is truly life. So, Bonhoeffer was right: “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die” (The Cost of Discipleship, 89).

Recently I was in conversation with a friend who serves in a church-planting network. He told me that one of the questions he hears, as men consider that call, is whether they might have to exceed a forty-hour workweek. I was astounded, as was my friend. Limit ourselves to a forty-hour week? Love doesn’t think that way. Love does whatever it takes for others to live. Should a pastor attend to his family at home too? Of course. But a self-protective minimalism is not love.

“Pastoral ministry is not a career track, not a job, not a gig. It is a sacred calling from above.”

When the apostle Paul was describing the great heart of God for us, he had to strain at the leash of language to say it. He speaks, for example, of “the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us” (Ephesians 1:7–8). If God loves us richly and lavishly, then his pastors cannot love with a guarded heart that holds back. We pastors have the privilege of hurling ourselves, by faith in God, into the depths of his love for people. Then we find out along the way what it will cost us. And we’re fine with that, because we will also see how wonderfully people will come alive — even through us, flawed as we are.

Beauty Through Sacrifice

I remember my final Sunday as pastor at Immanuel Church Nashville in 2019. Jani and I were sitting in the front row, waiting for the service to begin. The band was playing a pre-service number. I forget what it was, but it was a bluesy, rocky something, to the glory of Christ, and utterly delightful. Then my peripheral vision noticed movement off to my left. I looked. And there, about fifty feet away, was a young mom in the church, no longer sitting but standing and moving and even dancing. She wasn’t making a spectacle of herself. There was no hint of self-display. She was just too happy to sit still. And Jani and I knew that dear lady. We knew she didn’t live a charmed life. But there she was, her heart moved by the music and lifted up to the Lord, dancing.

The sight of her joy was so beautiful, I choked up. And in that moment, I knew and felt that all the pain and heartache and sheer hard work we went through to establish Immanuel Church as a gift to our city — it was all worth it. Why? Because it funneled down to one final moment in 2019 when a young mom was enjoying the felt presence of the living Christ so wonderfully she had to get up and dance. In that sacred moment, our sacrifices no longer felt sacrificial. We were too happy to care about all that.

Love and Its Opposite

I wish I could say I always feel that way. But I don’t. Many times, I have to grab myself by the scruff of the neck and say, “Ray Ortlund, you’re going to go do the right thing, and you’re going to like it!” I expect you understand. And here is a line of thought I use as a diagnostic, a way of helping myself realign with Jesus, even in the moment. It’s these two opposites: what a loving pastor is not, and what a loving pastor is.

What a loving pastor is not: He is not out for himself. He does not perceive other people through a lens of cost-benefit calculation. He does not treat others as props on the stage of his grandiose drama. He does not make people into stepping stones on his upward path to ministerial stardom, a big platform, epic book sales, and invitations to speak at big-deal events. He does not curve reality back in on himself, his own advantage, his own importance. He is not self-referential in how he navigates reality. In fact, a selfish mentality is repugnant to a loving pastor.

“If we pastors do not set an example in love, we unsay by our lives what we say by our doctrine.”

What a loving pastor is: He is a man for others. He sets a cheerful “for you” tone as the culture of his church. He feels a gentle fierceness that people will not walk out of church on a Sunday without feeling seen, understood, valued. He is willing to lose, but he is determined to protect others. He will explain himself, but he will not fight for himself. He gives his all, and he enjoys doing so, because the people he serves matter that much to him. If he feels successful, it’s because more and more people are coming alive to Jesus. And he marvels that the Lord has given him such a glorious privilege.

Love Has a Future

As you set the believers an example in love, sadly, some might not see the beauty of it. They might even dislike you for it. Your selfless love might stand as a living reproach to their own selfishness and worldliness. In their eyes, your love might be made into your crime. They might even throw you out. But it is better to fail by doing what is right than to succeed by doing what is wrong, better to fail in the Spirit than to succeed in the flesh. Such a failure still contributes to the great battle being fought in the heavenlies in your generation.

But most people who claim Christ are reasonable. They will rejoice to receive your ministry, and they will join you in your spirit of Christlike love. Even if it does end badly, “they will know that a prophet has been among them” (Ezekiel 33:33). And the resurrection of Jesus proves this promise: “There is a future for the man of peace” (Psalm 37:37).