James is one of my favorite books in the Bible. I have a difficult time concisely summarizing what is impacting me from the book because every line is so powerful. I’ve been learning some hard lessons about what James writes in chapter three.

Our nature is that “no human being can tame the tongue” and “we all stumble in many ways.” The tongue is capable of setting “the whole course of one’s life on fire.” I have seen this in my life. How much damage that a wrong word out of my mouth can cause. “Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.”

Yet I still pray without ceasing. It’s a confusing dichotomy that we all have to grapple with. Our own nature conflicts with what God wants. We can never really trust ourselves, we have to increase our faith and desire to please God and let the evidence of our changed hearts show in our deeds. “Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?”

In Exodus, it’s notable how often Moses doubts himself when God calls on him. He tells God multiple times to “send someone else”, believing that no one will believe him or that he’s not well spoken enough for the task. In Exodus 4:11-12, God tells him:

“Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

Imagine if Moses had believed his own doubt and not gone. He would’ve missed all the great things God had planned for him. It’s why it says in Proverbs 3:5 to “lean not on your own understanding.” We don’t know what’s in store for us. Moses was just like us, having doubts about the call. It’s ok to doubt, but we must act in the face of them.

Your faith is displayed in how you find and follow the will of God. The goal is to reach the end of the road and have God’s approval. For God to look at us and say “well done, my good and faithful servant.”

Search for answers according to God’s word. Believe God is faithful to his word. Stand on the solid rock He is. Plead with God to reveal His will. Ask, seek, knock. You have not because you ask not. Observe how God answers your prayer. Watch what happens in your life and act in the way He’s calling you to.

When God answers your prayer - yes, no or wait - worship God for his will. When you discover God’s will, submit and obey the call.

Both fear and faith will make you believe in something that’s not there. When the waves and wind crashed around the boat in Mark 4, Jesus was sleeping. When the disciples woke Him, “He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, ‘Quiet! Be still!’ Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?’ (‭‭‭Mark‬ ‭4‬‬:‭39‬-‭40‬‬‬).

This is the type of faith I aspire to. It’s like the famous Solzhenitsyn quote, “the line between good and evil cuts right through the heart of every human.” Or the physics of every action has an equal and opposite reaction. For every time I have fear, I am capable of an equal and opposite reaction of faith.

Permissionless means the efforts of all lift up the rest of us. A playground for the ambitious. Something the dreamers wish they could never wake from. Iron sharpening iron. Doing good acts at scale. Loving your neighbor in the network, not just in your neighborhood. Give your time and energy with no expectations in return. Your contributions have rippling effects you cannot measure the effects of. Just do it. Inspire; lift up; go higher.

“If you have raced with men on foot, and they have wearied you, how will you compete with horses?” Jeremiah 12:5 (ESV)

Three weeks ago I took a screenshot of an Apple note and had a random thought to put it in figma and put higher branding on it. Then I was thinking maybe I should just build this, how hard can building a notes app be? (It’s hard).

Luckily I had nothing to do the next day and I hacked together a simple higher themed notes app and shipped it to TestFlight. Within a week it was approved by the App Store. It now has a Farcaster integration to post directly to higher and a Zora integration to pull higher art into a feed. There is also a mini creator studio to generate a higher branded screenshot essay and post it to Zora. Connect your wallet and click the Zora zorb from any note.

I’m only three weeks in to building this and am having a blast. It’s only a side quest and I’m the only dev so there will be bugs, but I hope people will enjoy it.