Another New Beginning

About three and a half years ago, I started this blog as part of my journey into what I called "the real world." Little did I know how long it would take me to get there.

As I look back on the early posts here, I can't help feeling like it was a different person who wrote them.  I guess really it was.  I can hardly believe all that God has led me through in this past season, and the changes in my life have been both internal and external.  My soul and my situation are both so different now.

Not to say there weren't some really good things going on at the time I started all this, but as I look back I see a kid with some big talk and not much substance to back it up with.  In this season, God is calling me into manhood.  Into hard work.  Into courage.  (Things about which college graduate me had so very much to learn!)

God has also been providing me with new opportunities to share my thoughts.  It's become apparent to me that if I don't have any place to express what God is teaching me, I don't know what to do with myself.  That's part of why I started this, really.  I had all these ideas and no forum in which to teach them, and I was pretty much boiling over.  Now I lead a small group and a worship team, and God has finally given me chances to teach in church again after a long break.  I couldn't ask for more opportunity!

Another thing about the time when I started writing on here was just that: the time.  I had all kinds of it.  Much more than I knew what to do with, in fact, and I wasn't really using it well to be honest.  Sadly, those blog posts are one of the only truly productive things I was doing in a large part of that season.  Now I have a full-time job in addition to all the teaching opportunities I was just talking about.  I certainly don't need to try to find ways to pass the time!

Of course, much more could be written about how I'm in a different place now than I was then.  However, another thing God has been teaching me to leave behind is my compulsive desire to say everything I think needs to be said all at once.  With that in mind, here are just two of many things I think are important moving forward from here.

First, God owns everything.  There's already an appalling number of I's in this post and this blog, and there will be a few more before I get done here.  But he owns everything, and the more I realize that, the more I enjoy life.  He just isn't that concerned about my agenda.  I hold on to my freedom and time in self-employment, and he tells me to get a job.  I pray about a girl, and he tells me... to get a job.  Seriously, he knows what to do, and my time and effort belong to him, not me.  If I'll let him use those things as he sees fit, I believe with everything I am that I'll experience the blessing I've tried (and failed) so long to produce on my own.  Not that it's some magic formula-- it's just that where the Spirit of the Lord is there's freedom.  That's the ultimate blessing.

That brings me to my other point.  I've noticed that my life goes better when it's lived with a healthy dose of just not caring so much.  Now, I don't mean to say that life and doing the right thing aren't important.  What I mean is that a great deal of what I've cared about has been misplaced.  I've cared so much about my own safety and what other people think of me, and that has never produced anything but death.  I just don't have the energy to keep caring about that stuff, and I become the person I really am more and more as I let it go.  I end up accidentally walking into the freedom I thought I could find myself but couldn't!  I have life less figured out than I ever thought, and I can only hope that blessing continues.  Figuring everything else out is someone else's job anyway, and guess what? He's already finished it.

These days, I care more than ever what God thinks about me and less about what everyone else does.  The nice thing about that is that what he thinks doesn't change like people's opinions do.  I don't have to manage it.  Nor can I: no matter what I do, God is only looking at me with love and planning me a future filled with hope.  100% love, all the time-- Even when that means he has to discipline me to get something stupid to stop.  It never changes his opinion on me: beloved son, covered by the blood of the beloved Son.

So, that real world thing I was talking about?  I didn't mean getting a grown-up job (although I did do that).  I mean seeing that this is my Father's world, and no matter what happens I have him.  His question to me in this season is the same as to the disciples in the sinking boat in the storm: why are you so afraid?  And as I realize that he will always be there, I start to fear less.  With him there, it will always be ok... and even if it isn't, I still get to go be with him in heaven at the end.

Still, eternal life starts now.  That life is the light of the world, the streetlights' call.  What is eternal life?  That I may know the only true God and Jesus who he sent. I can do that now.  I can let his light shine through me more and more-- another new beginning, every day, every moment, every prayer.

Want to try it?  Want to see what happens?  Well, you won't read about it here.

Come live it with me.

Sports and Worship

Today I'm going to address two subjects. One has been a big part of my life for a long time, but interestingly not a very big part of this blog.  The other has been an even bigger part of my life but not for quite as long, and therefore has been a huge part of this blog since its beginning.  Now, had I come up with a more creative title for this post I could make a dramatic revelation of what these two mystery topics are at this point... but instead I'll just refer you to the top of the post.  They're even in the right order!  How convenient.

To begin with, I want to subdivide the sports category into two parts: being a sports fan (i.e. watching/following sports), and being an athlete (i.e. playing sports).  I'll take on the subject of fandom first.  I got thinking about this because I had the opportunity to go see an Indians game with a collection of very cool people yesterday.  It was a wonderful time (and the home team actually won, a rarity for games I've been to recently) and I feel very thankful to God to have been part of it.

I'm a worship leader at my church (don't worry, this is relevant to the previous paragraph, just hang on), and God has been challenging me to lead a life of worship, not just when I'm on stage or playing my guitar but all the time.  I was struck again at the baseball game how much seeing a live sporting event is like going to a worship service.  I mean, there's singing, clapping, listening, watching... even prayer sometimes.  All the elements are there-- the question in my mind is just: what is being worshiped?

I'm still not sure what I think about this.  I do know I used to be one of the biggest sports fans of anyone I know. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that I followed all the major sports religiously, and I'd go so far as to say that sports were an idol for me.  Even as God has been helping me put things back in the right order, though, I've been wondering what the proper place of sports is.  I think it's easy to use sports as an escape from the real struggles of the real world-- that's what I was doing before.  Part of me wants to say I should just throw it all the way out of my life if it could cause me to sin, but I don't think that kind of legalism is what relationship with God is all about.  Plus, even after God has broken my idol, I still really enjoy watching sports! So what do I make of that?

My current take on it is that I just need to stay in the real world.  I'm not sure I can explain what that means, but I know when I've left reality to live in a false world, whether of sports, video games, or whatever.  I also know that I didn't feel like that after the game yesterday.  I felt like the game was secondary to the fact that we were able to build community, at least for me.  I think it's a good sign that I had at least two conversations that were more interesting to me than the game.  In fact, the game can even help keep things from getting awkward or uncomfortable by removing the pressure to talk about something all the time.  If you pay attention, though, you can have meaningful and important conversations in and around the action in a totally natural way.  Baseball works especially well for this since there are significant stretches where literally nothing happens, but it applies to all sports I think.

See, even for people like me who are pretty serious and intense, it's impossible to have "important" conversation all the time.  I don't think human beings can support it... and I'm coming to realize it wouldn't even be healthy to do so!  We have to prove ourselves to our friends by being present and real in the little things before we have any credibility on the big things.  And sports, it turns out, are just about the easiest and most enjoyable common ground point I can think for making an initial connection with someone.  So if I can stay in the real world (that God rules) and not lose track of what's really important (living a life that honors Him and recognizes his presence), I can not only enjoy a fun game but also honor God by building relational equity and new friendships (and then by thanking him for all of it!).  If I lose track of reality, sports can swallow my life.  Simple as that.

I think the same thing applies to playing sports as well.  I've always loved running around like a crazy person chasing a ball or frisbee or really anything else sports-related-- never met a sport I didn't like.  It's hard to explain to someone who doesn't have it, but there's this innocent joy in just testing what I can do and enjoying what I'm physically capable of.  I never really understood how that related to worship until recently.  I just read, though, about how all of creation worships God its maker.  Let me quote Psalm 19: 1-5--

"The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.
There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens he has pitched a tent for the sun,
which is like a bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion, like a champion rejoicing to run his course."

How do the heavens have a voice?  How can the sun praise God?  These are inanimate objects we're talking about, remember.  I think they worship God because they do exactly what he designed them to do.  That's why all of creation worships God; we're the only part of it that sometimes chooses not to.  But God's design for us is multifaceted for sure.  Yes, we're designed to worship and praise and love, but God also gave me athletic ability and joy in using it.  Can't I worship him by using that gift with a joyful and thankful heart, following in his design?  If you thinking I'm reaching in making that analogy... well, David made the same one in verse five above!  No, not the bridegroom... that's a whole different kind of worship! I'm talking about the champion. Now, I'm not always a champion by any stretch of the imagination, but I know that feeling of rejoicing to run the course.  I praise God for it.

And that's how sports have become part of my relationship with God.  As we keep the focus on him, all his blessings come into proper focus for us.  The question isn't about making a rule of what's right or how much sports is ok, but about learning to walk with the Lord and submitting to his design, staying present in the reality where he reigns and where he deserves more praise than any sports team.  He loves us and has given us so much, but we can only appreciate the gifts fully when they point to the great giver.  Just like at the end of that same Psalm, what matters is this:

"May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer."

Trying

I'd like to begin today with an extremely random quote: "Do or do not; there is no try"  --Yoda.  Our favorite green jedi munchkin utters this line while trying to get Luke Skywalker to use the force strongly enough to lift his X-wing out of the swamp that inexplicably exists on (in?) the asteroid where Yoda lives.  At least I think that's how it goes; I haven't seen the old Star Wars movies in quite a while.

Anyway, that particular line has always been one I've loved to quote, partially because Yoda is one of the only voice impressions I can do with any level of proficiency whatsoever and partly because it just seems applicable in many situations.  You have to watch out for Yoda, though.  As the main philosopher of the Star Wars series (along with Obi-wan, I guess), he's always saying things that are obviously meant to be profound costumed in a mystifying array of vague spirituality, ambiguity, and reversed syntax.  When you look closer, though, his statements usually fall somewhere on the spectrum between pure nonsense and outright falsehood.

This one is a prime example.  Now, I think it's true that people tend to use the phrase, "I'll try" to indicate that no one should expect them to succeed, either because they aren't up to the task or because they don't actually plan to expend that much effort on it.  So in that sense, Yoda's instruction could be legitimate.  A jedi saying they'd try would be a cop-out of that order, since the force should enable them to do basically whatever they want (an interesting issue never really addressed in the films, by the way-- why can't they fly? why can't they all shoot lightning out of their hands? If Vader can choke people with his mind, why does he even bother with a lightsaber? But I digress.)  Here in the real world, though, there is no force.  Here, we have God.

The most powerful force in the universe is not a formless power that can be used to good or evil ends.  Far from it, He's a person (three of them, actually) with a very specific will for how things are going to go in his world.  His sovereign will puts us in the position where we clearly do not have control over our own success or failure.

I'm not trying to get into the whole free will vs. sovereignty argument here.  I think it's self evident, though, that our best-laid plans tend to "gang aft a-gley" as Robert Burns said (rough translation: they go straight to crap a lot of the time).  A much more intelligible quote from another poet sums it up quite nicely, I think: "For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business."  --T.S. Eliot.  Now, Mr. Eliot wrote some really depressing poetry (and some very snobbish literary criticism) early in his career, but then an amazing thing happened: he met Jesus.  The quote above is from after that happened, in the midst of his crowning accomplishment, a very long poetic meditation on the value of life (and other things) called The Four Quartets, which I highly recommend.

I think T.S. Eliot was wiser than Yoda.  I also think that the preceding is a sentence that has never before been written in the history of literature.  I'm ok with that.  All I know is that the Bible is filled with verses backing up the idea that we have very little control of the "do or do not" part of life.  For us, there is only try!

"Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it?  Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?"  Lamentations 3:37-38

"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain."  Psalm 127:1

"Lord, you establish peace for us; all that we have accomplished, you have done for us" Isaiah 26:12

Far from being depressing, this is freedom.  If our success or failure as men or women-- as Christians, as people-- depends on our own efforts, we are screwed.  But God takes the pressure off!  He is already doing things; the things that we have accomplished are all things that he did.  Instead of worrying about whether we succeed or fail, we get the privilege of discovering and participating in the plans of God.

"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them"  Ephesians 2:10 (ESV).

I quoted from the ESV here because the NIV makes the verse sound unnecessarily Yoda-ish by inexplicably translating the Greek word for walk as "do" in this verse (and in no other place for whatever reason) and adding another "do" before good works, where there isn't even a verb in the original!  Their carelessness caused me to misunderstand this verse for years, thinking that I had to somehow make God's plans happen.

What if instead, God is already at work in His world?  What if his plans are already in motion, and we can just walk right into them as we pursue relationship with Him?  What if all we have to do is try, and He handles the success and gives us failure when we need it?  What if we can trust that He is strong and He loves us, and the rest is not our business?

Can we really be led by the hand of God, hear his voice, and work alongside Him in his perfect plan?

It's something I'd like to try.

Integrity in Community

I've had a couple conversations recently that really got me thinking again about the issue of how we relate to each other within the body of Christ (i.e. the church). Long story short, I ended up expressing a lot of my thoughts about it in a poem, so I'll start with that:


Euphemistic Eucharist

Howya doin’? What’s up?
Pretty good, not too much,
life goes on, praise the Lord,
the usual and such--

By pretty good I mean
my family’s a mess--
we fight, except not here:
in this house we just bless.

I’m saying in not much
my schedule is insane:
it’s filled with noise and stress
it hardly can contain--

Life just keeps on going,
and so I don’t have time
to let you see beneath
charade and pantomime.

To praise the Lord I smile
and just sing happy songs;
pain stays behind the mask
where it, of course, belongs--

The usual just means
I’d tell you I’m depressed
were I allowed to break
facades so nicely dressed

And such and such and on--
a thousand pointless things
I’d rather say than tell
you anything that stings.

Safe. But are we happy?
We smile; are we alive?
The one place where it seems
reality should thrive,

instead we hide away;
we put our pride above
our pain--how can we throw
our masks aside and love?

Because we need help and we need
to be saved and all of us are
pretty much the same kinds
of messed up so why not just be real?

Can you see here what I’m driving toward?
Maybe then we could really praise the Lord.


So, I realize that my poem is a bit caustic.  I'm just trying to honestly address a real issue, though, and the fact that it keeps on coming up among people I talk to lets me know I'm not the only one who feels it.  The issue, as you can probably guess from the poem, is that church (not just mine, or anyone else's specifically, but church in general-- the conversations I mentioned at the beginning were with people from three different ones) has a tendency to become a place of fakeness where people don't feel like they can come with their real problems, instead of what it should be: the place where they could safely be honest and receive healing.

3 questions come to my mind:  why does this happen, why is it so bad, and what can we do about it?

Let's break my OCD tendencies toward order and symmetry and start right in the middle with the second question.  I don't want to belabor the point that the phenomenon I'm talking about is bad news, but I want to start with what I see as the basic reasons why it is so harmful.

The first is that everyone has problems, and problems don't just go away.  Of course, drawing near to God is helpful in dealing with them.  God can supernaturally solve them whenever he wants to.  The problem comes when churches start teaching (or just believing, consciously or subconsciously), that this supernatural encounter with the healing Lord is only a one-on-one deal.  Now, I know that God has healed me at times without any help from anyone else--he's just that good.  However, the general model that he has laid out for us is something totally different.

"And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.  Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective." (James 5:15-16).  This is God's model for healing.  We get other believers involved, and they pray for us so that we will be healed.  Catch that?  James is letting us know that if we won't share our brokenness, both spiritual and physical, we won't access all the healing that we could because it comes through receiving prayer from each other!  So that's one reason why it's a crisis that we don't feel like we can be real in church-- where else will we find the righteous men who can pray powerful and effective prayers for our healing?


Another reason is that everyone has problems, and everyone knows this is true.  Even (or especially?) people who aren't Christians yet.  We might feel like being real with the stuff of our lives will scare unbelievers away, but I propose that the fakeness we choose instead is infinitely more frightening.  Everyone knows that people have problems.  Everyone knows that they themselves have problems!  So if you walk into a group of people where no one seems to have any, what do you think?  You think, I'll never fit in with these people.  So another reason this fear of dealing with real issues in church is a problem is because it is actually driving away the broken people who desperately need to receive healing by being prayed for (and who God wants to make into the powerful and effective prayers who will then help restore others!).

Finally, and potentially most seriously, being fake in church will hinder our worship.  We might think we can sneak in and deal with our problems alone with God and have ourselves fixed by the time we have to talk to anyone.  The problem there is that God is looking for worshipers who worship him in spirit and in truth (John 4:23).  If we won't be real with God and with our family, we can't worship him in the way he desires.  This is serious stuff, and if you don't think so just read in Exodus and Leviticus about people who tried to worship God in unauthorized ways.  If we want his healing presence to be with us, we have to be willing to worship in the spiritual integrity God is seeking.  Otherwise, our thanksgiving (Greek: Eucharist) will amount to little more than empty words we use to avoid saying what we really mean.

So, why does it happen that we feel like all we can be at church is just fine and peachy-keen, etc.?

I think it probably comes down to fear, mostly.  Just because we all have problems and we know it doesn't mean we necessarily feel comfortable sharing them with people!  If our fear of being judged for the things that are still messed up about us trumps our desire to be healed from those things, we won't share, plain and simple.  If we have a history of being judged, that makes things worse of course, as does seeing other people be judged in places (like church) where they should be welcomed instead.  Put all those things together, and fear wins out a lot of times.

Also, I think there's a misunderstanding in the church of what the Bible really teaches about joy.  When it says to be joyful in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16), is that the same as being happy all the time?  If the joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10), and a fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), are we weak Christians who don't have the Holy Spirit if we go through struggles and trials?

All of the answers are no, in case you're wondering.  No one is "too blessed to be stressed" either (although some might be in too much denial not to smile).  Joy is not the same thing as happiness, and godly joy is just as compatible with sorrow as with happiness.  Jesus himself wept (John 11:35), but he was given the oil of joy more than all his companions (Psalm 45:7).  He also got so stressed that he sweated blood (Luke 22:44).  So godly joy must be something different than unceasing happiness.  What if, instead, it's the ongoing security of knowing that eventually everything will work out for your good because it's all in the control of the all-powerful God who loves you?  Then you can feel the pain of loss and brokenness without losing hope, and when you are happy you can be happy for the right reasons.  That's the joy that will bring you strength.

One further note on why the problem of disingenuousness happens at church:  it kind of gets to be a vicious cycle.  No one wants to be the first person to do anything, so if no one is talking about any real stuff, it's that much harder for anyone to break the trend.

Which segues nicely into the last question: what can we do about this thing?

First, let me say that I'm no expert on this.  I'm actually more of an expert on being fake, to be quite honest.  All I know is that I deeply desire to be real, and I'm starting to learn what that means.  So how can we be the ones to step out and start being real in the one place in all the world where the truth should win out?  How can streetlights shine into darkness that has clouded the home of light?

The main thing I can see is that we have to start wanting more of God so desperately that we don't care about our own images.  We have to care more about what he thinks of us than what anyone else does.  This is what it means for him to be our Lord.  His opinion is the final word, and what he says goes, no matter what it makes us look like.  If we start believing that, maybe we can be the ones to step out and take the first risk.  We can't make anyone else be real, but we can show them they won't die if they try it!

Also, we have to confess and repent of our judgmental spirits.  This will allow us to bless other people who are real enough to be honest about their problems instead of comparing our own struggles to theirs to see how we stack up.  All judgment is comparison, and all comparison is irrelevant because God's love is infinite.  What if ours started looking more like his?

We also have to stop getting the truth backwards.  It's not that God is so good that his followers shouldn't have any problems; He's so good because welcomes us in spite of them!  He fixes them too, but for whatever reason he hasn't chosen to do it instantaneously in most cases.  We have to let him be who he is in this instead of making him into a false image of what we want him to be.

I'm sure there is much more to be said on this topic-- does anyone else have any ideas to share on how we can help?  I'll end with one I just thought of, which is actually the most important one: prayer.  I want to start asking God to change the problems I see instead of just worrying about them.  I want to talk less and pray more.

So-- God, change what you want to change.  Make us more like you.  Make your body whole.  Let us walk in integrity, bravery, and community.  Give us real relationships with real people, and let us worship you in Spirit and in truth.  Amen.

'Twas the Night after Christmas...

...and I finally felt like writing a blog again. It turns out that trying to be a writer for a living has left me somewhat less than eager to sit down and type out big entries on my blog. I think there's only so much structured thought (and staring at a screen) that my mind can handle.  With that in mind, this entry (and perhaps more and more of those to come) will be very unstructured and random.  The nice thing about having a blog with very few readers is that you can do things like that with no real ramifications. This blog has certainly gone through several different phases of more/less structure, and it will continue to be whatever I want and need it to be going forward.  Right now that means making it more personal and less conceptual, although I have no idea how that correlates to how beneficial it is for anyone else.  It might make me more likely to write more often, but I don't know if quantity is even as important as quality.  All I know is, if you want to read it, I'd love to have you do so! I do continue (even late at night) to hold myself to some standards of writing, so I will at least promise that-- I won't get completely lazy :)

It's funny to me how even the best things in life can become so formulaic that we do them without thinking.  I know I've talked about this before, but I seriously tend to do this with just about everything. Blogging is a prime example.  I like to share my poetry and thoughts, but sometimes I have such a rigid idea of what a blog post of mine can be that I don't write anything for a long time just because what that formula prescribes doesn't sound good to me!  That, in a word, is silly.  I want to do it less.  Random posts help me break out of it.

An interesting issue that brings up in my mind is that randomness can also become a formula.  This is a huge deal in the discussion of modern poetry, which I've been reading a lot of and a lot about recently.  Basically, poets around the turn of the 20th century got so tired of all the poetry "rules" about rhyme, meter, etc. that they just discarded them and tried to start all over without rules.  The thing is, they rejected the rules so rigidly that modern poetry quickly became just as stereotypical as what it tried to rebel against, only with fewer readers.

Now, I don't think poetry has to have rhyme or meter to be poetry.  Free verse can be wonderful if the words are chosen with the same diligence innately required by adherence to rhyme and meter.  It turns out, though, that it's also easy to use the whole "I don't follow the formula" thing as a cop-out for producing work with less effort and attention to quality.  As I look back at some of my poetry, I see that I too have done this.  I have traveled to the Wasteland and seen that many Waldo's have gone that way before, and continued on my journey.

Speaking of poetry, I have a B.A. in English with a concentration in poetry... and somehow I'm still woefully ignorant of good poetry throughout history.  I realized this with an unpleasant shock the other day, and I have a desire to fix it.  I own the Longman anthology of English poetry, so I just started at the beginning.  It's been a lot of fun, and I'm in the 18th century now.  I wonder why I didn't care about my education while I was actually doing it?

Speaking of that, I also unpleasantly realized that I haven't really cared about much of anything for a lot of my life.  I've been afraid, I guess.  I just want to stop living life like that.  I want to do things I really care about, and I want to really care about the things I'm doing.  Those are two subtly different things, in my mind, but I don't feel like explaining why.  Maybe you feel the same way and you'll just get it.

The more I begin to fear the Lord, the less I fear everything else.  This is what I think it means to be wholehearted.  Fear divides you, unless you fear the One whose great desire is to put you back together.  I don't want to live life in fragments, and I think God can make that happen.

I'm ready to care.

You know, I think you can only relax when you really care.  If you won't work hard on anything, you can't relax because there's nothing to relax from!  I know that when I've gone through times of just coasting, I couldn't even enjoy my downtime because it was all downtime.  I constantly had the feeling that I should be doing something else (which was true).  Entertainment, relaxation, procrastination-- they just won't get you where you're going.  Take it from someone who knows.  (By the way, that reminds me of a cool song called "Let the Drummer Kick" by Citizen Cope.  Someone on Youtube made a really cool animation that goes with it.)  To belatedly finish the thought I was just working on: if you work when you need to, all the fun things you get to do become amazing blessings rather than desperate attempts to escape your gnawing conscience.  It's wonderful.

Speaking of music and wonderful, music is wonderful.  Almost everything I was given for Christmas has to do with music (or else food, but that's a different topic).  I think that should tell me something about music.  I care about it!  It's part of what God's called me to, and I want to be better at it and appreciate it more.

Speaking of absolutely nothing in particular, I had one of the greatest text message conversations of my life the other day.  I had been at my parents before going to a party, and afterwards my mom texted me asking how it was.  I told her it was pretty good and pretty much what I was expecting, and I asked her how her day was.  She told me four things she did that day and said that I wasn't being very descriptive.  That's when it hit me: men and women don't understand each other.

If you ask a guy how his day was, you will get an evaluation.  It will probably be short. If you ask a woman how her day was, you will get a description.  It may be quite long.

Obviously, neither side understands the question they're asking, so both end up vaguely dissatisfied with the answers they get.  I think I can solve the problem, though-- we just need to stop asking questions.  Next, I'll be tackling world hunger.  Believe it or not, I also do some of my best and most organized thinking late at night like this.  But tonight is a holiday.

Two last things, and then off to try to live for the rest of the year like Jesus really did come to live with us and die for us... and also to try not to forget the giver for the gifts.

1. Today at church we played O Holy Night, and it was a powerful moment of worship.  Less than 3 minutes later, we were playing Jingle Bell Rock... and there was nothing weird about that.  We praised God with all we had, and then we laughed and danced like crazy people.  Or put another way, we cared about something deeply and invested our hearts in it, and then we were able to have joy in the ridiculous and simple.  Before today, I wouldn't have thought that Jingle Bell Rock could be a worship song.  I think it was this morning.  I can't even believe I'm saying that.  But what if we honored God in that moment just as much as in the rest of the service?

2. Penguins are pretty much the most comical creatures alive.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Stepping In

Disclaimer: this post is not meant to be read while eating. Consider yourself warned.

The more I try to follow Jesus, the more I realize that he is always speaking to us, whether we are listening or not.  He can use any means, any situation, and nothing is too plain or ordinary for him.  He doesn't have to part the heavens; he'll do whatever it takes to get to us.

I know that because this week he spoke to me through a piece of poop.

No, not like an audible voice or anything.  I'll explain.  First of all, though, just a brief sidebar: I will be using the G-rated or PG-rated terms for fecal matter throughout this post (poop and crap, respectively), but I wish it to be known that I find neither of them as satisfying as the PG-13/R-rated term for which they are both euphemisms (although there's no denying that poop is an intrinsically funny word).  I think it has to do with the idea of onomatopoeia-- when you step in some of said substance, it doesn't sound anything like "poop" or "crap"... but it does sound an awful lot like "Sh....."   (at least I think so).  Also, the occasional use of real swear words instead of their socially acceptable equivalents can be more helpful (and probably no more or less offensive to God, who sees our hearts) in relieving real frustration such as what I'm about to describe, I've found.  But, I really don't want to get into the moral discussion of the proper uses (if any) of profanity.  Although, having said all that, it probably can't be helped at this point. ANYway...

To restate my earlier premise, God used some crap to get my attention.  I was moving a bunch of stuff into my new apartment, and I had to park my car on the street (I guess 3rd-floor tenants don't get driveway spots).  So, I was carrying a big box of random stuff through the treelawn.  As you may know, when carrying a big box it is pretty hard to see the ground near your feet.

So yeah, I stepped all up in that stuff (a prime example of a situation where using the real word would be more satisfying).  Not one of those glancing blows where you just wipe it off real quick, but one of those where you look down and the whole pile is smashed flat and a large portion is still adhering to and squishing around the side of your shoe.  Very frustrating, and not at all what you want to be tracking into your new apartment, especially when to get there you have to walk up a common staircase past two other people's doors whom you'd like to have a cordial relationship with.

Something had to be done, so I left my shoes at the door, took the box up to my place in my socks, and got some paper towels. Unfortunately, I was wearing basketball shoes.  As a former shoe salesman, I know that the benefits of this shoe style include superior impact absorption (for jumping), great ankle support, and good traction.  Well, the traction part turns into a big disadvantage if you step in some crap, because all those little rubber zigzags make for some pretty impossible crevices to clean with paper towels.  So there I was, sitting on my new doorstep, very intently scraping poop out of the treads of my shoe with a tiny stick.

And then God said, "What if you were this diligent about getting rid of the crap that's in your heart?"

At least, that's the best wording I can put to the conviction I felt in my spirit.  How often am I content to just leave my sin sticking to me and track it all around my own life and the lives of those around me?  It's not big... just like poop isn't real big.  It isn't the size that's the problem... it's the content, the dirt, and... the smell.

We're supposed to be the fragrance of Christ in the world, both to believers and those who are still searching, and ultimately as an offering to God himself (see 2 Corinthians 2:14-16).  But if we walk without really caring too much or taking time to address the sin stuck in the treads of our lives, even the little/private/thought-life/insert excuse here stuff, I guarantee our aroma will be a much different one. 

Even if most of the rest of us is clean, it doesn't take much to change a fragrance.  I can pray and worship God and witness all I want, but if I'm self-centered the rest of the time then what do I smell like?  I'll leave you to fill in that blank.  By the way, another sidebar I don't want to get into now: this same principle may well be why the church is often not respected by our culture.  We can do all kinds of good things, but it doesn't take many people like those idiots who protest at funerals and such to change the aroma of all of us...just a thought.

Back to my other idea, though.  The verse that God initially brought to my mind through all of this was a different one from 2 Corinthians-- the part where it talks about their reaction to the correction Paul had brought them in his other letter (7:8-11):

"Even if I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it. Though I did regret it--I see that my letter hurt you, but only for a little while--yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance.  For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us.  Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.  See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done. At every point you have proved yourselves to be innocent in this matter."

See, we don't need to dwell painfully on our sin forever, but to bring it to God.  God's conviction brings earnestness, eagerness to clear ourselves, indignation, alarm, longing, concern, and readiness for justice-- all of which are exactly what I felt when I stepped in that crap, by the way.  I was diligent, eager to clean it off, angry, alarmed, concerned, and ready to see justice done to the perpetrator!  (I believe I prayed something to the effect that the owner of that dog would have to watch it get run over, actually.  I'm not saying this was part of the godly sorrow, just that it seemed like justice at the time. It probably isn't.)

The bigger question, though, is why my stepping into sin doesn't have this same effect on me.  Why do I seem so unconcerned about the uncleanness and the aroma?  Why don't I have that same earnestness to be clean? I have one idea-- come back with me to my story for a moment.

The reason I was at the apartment in the first place on this day before moving in was to meet the gas man and let him in so he could turn the gas on.  He was (not surprisingly) late, but it turned out to be good because I had just finished my lengthy cleaning process and gotten all the stuff up into my place.  He arrived just as I was coming down to my car with a couple bags I was going to fill with more stuff to move on a future trip.  "Go on in," I said, "it's open... I just have to drop these in my car real quick."  So I was hurrying back to my car, only thinking about getting back into the house to show him where to go.  You see where this is heading?

Yup.  I stepped in it again.  The exact same place.  It wasn't quite as bad this time, but only because it was already completely flat from the first time.  What I said at this point I will not even paraphrase.  My point is, though, that I felt a lot less desire to clean it off right away, having just gone through that whole process.

I think it gets harder to deal with our sin seriously because we keep coming back to it.  We step in it again, sometimes within hours or minutes of getting clean, and we'd just rather hide it than go through the painstaking process of actually cleaning it out and the additional shame of not being able to avoid the exact same mistake we already made.  The ancient philosopher Heraclitus famously said "You could not step twice into the same river," the idea being that the water flows on and is different when you come back.  But you can step into the same crap as many times as you choose to, or as many times as you forget where it is or don't pay attention.

That's why it's so important to have godly sorrow, the kind that brings earnestness and repentance and leaves no regret.  Each time we come before God with our sin is no different than the first time.  His love for us is the same, no matter how many times we fall, and only He can clean us to the point where we convey the aroma of Christ and give us awareness of how to stay out of the crap next time.

So anyway, I did clean off my shoes again, and it was while doing so that I felt like God told me that second part.  The instrument He used to reveal all this to me was perhaps the most unglamorous one possible, and then just in case I forgot he used that same piece of s**t (couldn't resist any longer) again.  He is always speaking.  Will I listen?  He has much better things for me to step into. :)

Saying no...

I suppose I probably should have seen this coming.

What, you may ask? Well, of course ever since I posted about saying yes to God, I've been much more conscious of all the ways I say no to him.  I'm actually realizing, much to my chagrin, that between outright saying no and just not listening at all, I don't really say yes to God nearly as much as my previous post might have made it seem like.  I mean, I even boiled the whole process of life down to a few simple steps in that post... and then I found out I'm bad at doing them.

I guess this is just my personal disclaimer then.  I didn't ever mean to suggest that I have life under control, but it turns out that's kind of what I was actually thinking after all.  If that sounds prideful... it is.  Nice thing is, if you just get something like that out in the open, then God can do something with it.  What he likes to do is humbling and often painful, but that's really what progress looks like, I think.

So, I was thinking that I should amend my five-step plan to include a part where we confess and ask for repentance for all the ways we say no.  Then I was thinking, not many of us are actually bold enough to say no outright to God (although I have done that, and I don't recommend it).  Mostly we just don't ask/listen/pay attention to him.  For those of us who know that he actually speaks, this is a little bit like a kid plugging his ears and yelling lalalalala to not hear what his parents are saying.  He can try the excuse that he didn't hear, but that doesn't usually get far (note that this is a purely hypothetical kid of course, not based on personal experience at all).

The only difference between us and that kid is we've developed more sophisticated ways of plugging our ears and yelling, so to speak.  Last time I mentioned YouTube and its noise-making, distracting brethren on the web and tv.  Sometimes it can even be healthy things, like working hard, or even personal relationships.  Mostly, however we do it, we say no to God by trying to avoid the silence (physical and spiritual) in which we know he speaks.

What I'm finding is that no matter how well I think I'm doing with this stuff, I'm still much more of a mixed bag of good and bad than I wish I was.  I suspect the same is true for you, if you're honest.  Even in this, though, we have hope:

Our hope is that God pursues us.

Even when we are running away (or toward any other thing, which is the same), he comes after us.  He doesn't mind the whole mixed bag thing so much; it's really his only option for people to work with.  Check out the story of Elijah in 1 Kings 19, for example!  Elijah just had pretty much the most amazing mountaintop experience (literally) possible in the chapter before, and in chapter 19 he freaks out and runs away.  He also asks God to kill him rather than making him keep working!  Keep in mind this is the same guy that was eventually found worthy to skip the whole death thing and get carried into heaven on a chariot made of fire as well.  Was he perfect? No. But God pursued him... and he spoke to him in the silence (1 Kings 19:12).  I know the NIV says gentle whisper, but the literal translation is "thin silence."  That phrase inspired a poem for me that reflects my desire to listen and respond to the Lord, and I'll finish with that:

Elijah's Prayer


let me be found
in the thin silence

listening

let my voice
surrender and stay

quietly

for you

let my heart
be wholly at home

to whisper

resting on you
let me be lost

Amen

Saying Yes

Have you ever had something you've said or written come back to get in your way when you want to do or say something else? That happened to me this week, but it was actually a really good thing.  I'll explain.

You see, over the years, I have located a lot of amusing, random and even positively worthwhile (although representatives of this last category are much fewer and further between) content on the monstrous website we all know as Youtube.  Every now and again, I'll go to make a joke or a reference to one of these videos I like, but then no one has ever seen it and my joke just falls flat.  Or even worse, I'm laughing and no one else is--they're just standing there awkwardly, perhaps offering a slight polite chuckle, trying to affirm that my sense of humor is valid while knowing that they never plan to watch the video in question (or if they do plan to, that they'll never remember what it is when they go to look for it).

My solution to this problem?  If you're thinking "stop making jokes based on obscure time-wasting internet videos?" I have to commend your logic, but perhaps you don't know me very well.  No, I had a much more comprehensive solution in mind: Compile a list of every crazy Youtube video that I might possibly want to reference or joke about, then post it on my blog so that all my friends at least everyone who reads that will understand and be able to laugh when I want to talk/post about these things.  Because all of you would instantly devote your next several hours to watching all of them as soon as I did that, right?

Yeah, it sounds kind of dumb when I write it all out like that--which brings me to my point, really.  One of the benefits of writing things down is that it helps you clarify what's important and worthwhile.  Another benefit is that if you write down the good things you learn, they can help convict you and get you back on track later when you're about to do or say or post something stupid.

In my case, I had just written at length about how we're going to die and we don't know when, so we might as well use our time for things that actually matter.  I was seriously about to directly follow that post (see below) with a giant list of Youtube videos.  Just think about that for a second.  To use the internet term, *facepalm*.

As some of you may know, I have just a bit of an addictive personality.  It's a strange combination of being very easy to amuse, difficult to distract, and able to tune the whole world out and focus on one thing.  I tell people I can't have ADD-- no way I have a deficit of attention, I have a surplus.  It may be a disorder though... anyway, suffice it to say that almost anything can get my attention and hold it for longer than most people would imagine, sometimes even at the expense of eating, sleeping, conversing or other necessary life functions.

So imagine what Youtube does to me.
I can't even begin to tell you how much of my life has been flushed down that drain.  I'm really not sure why I would want anyone else to experience that.  Certainly me seeming funnier is not a good enough reason.

And really, mindless waste of time is one of the best sides of Youtube.  There's a whole underworld of darkness and inappropriate content on it as well that they don't advertise, but they know it drives a huge portion of their traffic.  You just have to look at what kinds of videos have the most views.

Anyway, I didn't really write this to bash a website.  I know Youtube can be used for good things too, like learning how to do things.  My church's worship team uses it to help teach people new songs because pretty much every song in the world is posted on it somewhere (most illegally of course, but that's a topic for a different blog).  As with almost all our greatest human inventions, though, our greatest blessings become our greatest curses too.  After all, pretty much any problem or benefit you can point out with Youtube also applies to the Internet at large.  Clearly, the issue here is not Youtube.

The issue is me.

More specifically, will I say yes to God's will even when it means laying down my plans or frivolous enjoyments?  (both of which are perfectly illustrated by my Youtube list/plan)  Underneath that, one level further down, will I trust that God's plan for my life will be the best, most fulfilling one in the end?

By not posting my list, I'm saying I will.

It's interesting too that as I am willing to submit myself in this way, God is giving me new ways to deny my own will and live for his, some little and some larger.  For example on this blog, I took down my poem of the day gadget even though I love poems because some of its content was questionable/depressing. I also took down my movie list because... it reminded me way too much of the Youtube list.  I'm not going to lie, some of this can get a little frustrating!  Sometimes I can get all like, "really? you're not letting me have this?  Now my blog sidebar won't be nearly long enough to line up with my posts!" or some other such ridiculous thing.  My order and my plans get challenged by his order and his plans (by the way, when I say not letting me, I refer not to a physical prohibition but to the way my peace of mind and spirit start to evaporate when I consider doing said thing).  Even if it's a bigger thing (like fasting, for example, which seems huge to me at least) the peace that comes from listening to that still small voice is worth whatever I have to give up.

One step further: I believe it's the only way for me to grow into the things I need to become in this season of my life (and live in the way I suggested in my last blog).  I don't have to figure myself or my life out!  I'm thankful for that-- I don't know which one of the two would be harder to decipher.  What I do have to do is trust enough to slow down, listen to a God who desires to speak, and then say yes.

Not maybe, not later, not yesbut, just yes.  After saying yes, then I just have to do the yes.  It's no good to be the son who pays lip service but doesn't do anything!  Better to be one who says no but then does the yes, actually (see Matthew 21:28-31).  I can plan my course, but I want to let God determine my steps (see Proverbs 16:9).  It's very simple, but that doesn't mean it's easy.  It actually takes God's strength to say yes to God, which is a whole other level of confusing that I don't have time to go into right now because I've been focused on writing this blog at the expense of eating, as I mentioned that I tend to do.  I only bring it up to say that it requires we depend on him, not on ourselves.

Trust. Listen. Say Yes. Do Yes. Repeat.

The rest is up to him.

Memento Mori

The title of this post is a Latin phrase.  It may not at first seem like a very uplifting one-- it means "Remember you will die."

This phrase has been a motto of the Christian faith throughout its history.  Does it sound morbid to you?  It did to me at first... but as I've been thinking about it more I think it's one of the most important thoughts that has ever been expressed.

And believe it or not, it's in the Bible.  Ecclesiastes 7:2 says "It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of every man; the living should take this to heart."

Yeah, houses of mourning are pretty much our favorite places to be, right?  I was trying to think about what these places would be today, and what came to mind was funeral homes.  How do you feel when you go to a funeral?  I know I just want to get out of there as soon as possible most times.  If there's a choice between a funeral and a feast, I know which one I'd normally choose.

But Solomon is challenging us with something here, challenging us to deal with the real issues of this messed up world we find ourselves in.  When we're partying, we often don't have to deal with any of this-- it's like the food and drink and entertainment are specifically designed to keep us from having to think.  Actually it's not like that, it IS that in many cases.  As Solomon points out elsewhere in his book, this isn't always a bad thing-- too much thinking can be just as bad as not enough.  The lesson of the funeral, however, is said to have more lasting value.

What's the lesson?  Essentially, it's that we are all going to die.  And we don't know when-- could be tomorrow, could be fifty years from now.  As Francis Chan said in his (excellent and highly challenging) book, Crazy Love, "You might not finish this chapter."  Or this blog.  Comforting, right?

Actually, I think it is.  Here's why: something happens when we die.  You might be thinking, "we go to Heaven!" and yeah, that's obviously what we're shooting for.  (Remembering to live in the light of our future hope in heaven is really important too, but that's really a whole different post. I'm just talking about death here. Let's keep it focused on death.)

See, while our spirits are going to meet Jesus and face the last judgment, something is happening here on earth too.  The best way I can describe it is that things are ceasing to matter.  Think about it-- when you die, do you think anyone will care at all what clothes you wore, what job you had, how much money you made at it, or where you lived?  I doubt it-- they'll care about who you were, not what you did.  So all those other things will entirely cease to matter because the only person who ever really cared about them will have just left the premises.

Remembering that we will die just puts in perspective the things that are really important.  Did we live life striving to become more like Jesus and to bless those around us, both our Christian family and the lost around us?  Or were we too selfish?  As I've been thinking about this for myself, I've realized that a lot of the things I'm focused on are so dramatically self-centered that they completely lack importance.

Remembering that we might die soon provides the impetus we need to do something about this self-centeredness.  There really isn't time to deal with our own priorities and then move on to what God cares about and what will bless others.  We have to do the important things NOW.  I know I don't want to scrape my way into Heaven like someone escaping through the flames (see 1 Corinthians 3:11-16).  I want to devote my time to things that will last.

Now, obviously this mindset could lead us into frenzied panic: we have to know right now what God wants and do all of it right away with no breaks because we could die any minute!  But that isn't really the point.  I'm convinced that almost anything can have eternal value... if it's offered to the Lord.  We become more like him in our everyday work if we do it for him, in our resting if we rest in him, in our worship if our hearts are really inviting him.  We also bless our community by working, our friends and family by resting and recharging, and our God and church family by worshipping with all our hearts and inspiring others.

"So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God" --1 Corinthians 10:31

The coolest thing that's been happening in my life recently is that I've started seeing how God desires to meet me and grow me up in all these different situations.  I feel a lot of times like my thoughts and feelings are all over the map, but God pursues me in all of them.  All of these things then become windows into his love and ways to become more like him.  As I offer them to him, some he takes away, some he gives back, and some are multiplied several times over!  But all of it matters-- yet only to the extent that it stops being about me and starts being about God's plan being worked out in my life and in the lives of those he has placed around me.

So, I'm not planning on going anywhere anytime soon, but I have to remember that I will die.  I just don't want to waste my time alive on cares that will perish with me.  My life will have impact on the future only as I care about the things the eternal God has always cared about: the rescue and restoration, salvation and sanctification, of broken souls in a fallen world.  As I learn to live like this, I can be free from the stress of all my own plans and worries (which, incidentally, I don't have power to do anything about because God isn't terribly concerned about them) and begin to walk in the freedom that comes when you're working for the plans of the One who has the power.

And all that just from remembering that one unspecified day, I'll die.  Not so bad, is it?

Memento mori.

Humanism vs. Glory

I recently heard an excellent message from a preacher to whom I would love to give credit for it, except I don't know his name.  Anyway, I wanted to share the general gist of it in the hopes that it can spur others on to have some of the same thoughts and questions it sparked in me.  (By way of at least some credit being given, I heard this message as part of a video compilation called the revival hymn which you can google and I encourage you to watch if you're feeling ready to be pummeled with convicting truth and challenging ideas for about 40 minutes.  This thing rocked my world.)

Basically, this preacher started by describing how humanism has become the predominant worldview of our time.  A quick and dirty definition of humanism: a philosophy that states that the ultimate goal of life/existence is the happiness of humankind.  A lot of people (including Christians... we'll get to that in a moment) live like this is the case.  Even if they don't think their position out philosophically all the way to full-on humanism, many at least arrive at its cousin, hedonism (or simple pleasure-seeking) as the driving principle of their lives.

All this is simply a natural part of humanity's ongoing attempt to flee from God as the source of meaning or reason in life.  However, the problem as it relates to the church, to those of us who try to shine a light into the darkness, comes when this humanist influence starts seeping into Christianity.  Biblical Christianity teaches that the purpose for our existence is to bring glory to God.  The process by which we abandon God's glory and start living for happiness (either for all: humanism, or just for us: hedonism) is certainly a subtle one, and I don't really feel qualified to explain how it happens.  I see in my own life that it does, though.  Let me just share some questions that have been kicking around in my heart to hopefully shed light on what I mean.

Do I ask God for forgiveness because I want to feel better about myself or because I am really sorry for attempting to steal his glory through whatever prideful sin I indulge in?

Do I want God's guidance in my life because I want to feel safe, or because it will result in me taking part in his perfect plan to maximize his own praise?

Do we "do evangelism" as a means to fix the problems of the world and its broken inhabitants or because the Lamb of God shed his holy blood for these people and deserves to see them claimed by his love?

Do I even believe that God is justified in caring much more about his glory than our temporal well-being?

How would my life be different if I lived for God's glory instead of my own happiness?


See where I'm going with all this? The problem of humanism seems to be everywhere I look... all these ways that I've subjugated true Christianity to my own quest for ________ (fill in the blank: completion, happiness, fulfillment, simplicity etc.).  The problem is not that God doesn't want to give me those things!  It's just that pursuing them instead of God himself is like taking a medication because you want the side-effects, not the cure.  We can get so distracted that we completely lose sight of the fact that we've been set free from the sin and bondage that was killing us.

And what is freedom, anyway?  Not the ability to do whatever we want... but the ability to walk in the healing light of God's glory. The light we shine into the dark can't be our own, and it can't even be the elusive glow of happiness, whatever that is. 

The only light that can really illuminate the dark streets of our city and our world is the light of the glory of God revealed in Christ.

We need to be preaching God as the all-consuming righteous lover of our souls, the glorious Lord of all things who rightfully deserves their obedience, NOT the means to happiness, not something to add to the lives we already have to make them better.

But first, before we start preaching it... we need to start living like it's true.

I've often heard it said that people are looking for something bigger than themselves to belong to that will give them meaning.  Personal happiness is too self-centered-- I think many would willingly lay down most of life's comforts to really feel that they had meaning.  No wonder people don't buy what the church is selling: if it's all about happiness it just isn't that different from all the other scams they've already gotten burned on.  Only the overwhelming glory of God is enough bigger than us to be worthwhile.

How do we live for THAT?  And how do we share it with others in such a way that they want it too?  Although I have so far to go to really live this way, I long to pursue these things and see the church reflect them.  How can we start living for God's glory in fuller measure?

Maybe if we loved unselfishly... not for what we could get out of it.

Maybe if we worshipped God... not music or a song or the show.

Maybe if we truly gave up our lives to God... instead of trying to fit him into our plans.

Maybe if we prayed God would save us from the ways we don't honor him... instead of the ways we aren't happy.

Maybe if we stopped chasing happiness long enough to truly be still in the presence of God.

"Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth." (Psalm 46:10)

God's glory WILL win in the end.  I'd just like to be part of making that happen instead of getting myself in the way.

Mushrooms, but No Shortcuts

I recently took some time off from all my responsibilities and went on a road trip by myself, something I highly recommend doing if you can find the means to do so. (A hint: it's a lot easier if you quit your job.)  It's just good to get out and remember that this is a huge world that God is holding together, and it's also great to catch up with old friends (and relatives)!  More than all that, though, I went looking for some direction and set aside some serious time to seek God for that purpose on the trip.  I didn't keep this a secret, so since I got back a lot of people have been asking what God showed me.

It sure wasn't what I was expecting.

In fact, it wasn't direction in the sense I was asking for at all.  The best way I can actually think of to explain it is just with this story that happened on day 2 of the trip.

I was at my grandparents' house for this early stage of the voyage.  They live on like 120 acres of wonderful land in the middle of not much (central Illinois).  Part of my trip's mission was to take long walks in their woods and talk to God out in his creation.  As I told them that, and almost before the words had finished leaving my mouth, my grandma said "maybe you'll find some mushrooms!"

See, I didn't know this, but my trip directly coincided with the beginning of wild mushroom season in Illinois.  Something else I didn't know was that this is a *big deal* around these parts (perhaps due to the lack of too much else going on).  I mean, I've never seen people get so excited about fungus before!  More on that later.  Anyway, it was clear that on any walk I took in my time there, I was going to be equipped with a "sack" (which is what people in Illinois call plastic bags) for the purpose of retrieving any mushrooms I happened to find.

I wasn't really thinking too much about the mushrooms at first.  I stuffed the sack into the pocket of my jacket and started off down the hill toward the creek behind my grandparents' house with my eyes only occasionally straying downward to check for the ugly, wrinkly morel mushrooms that were supposed to be there for the picking.  They don't really look like anything you'd want to eat, actually.  Anyhow, I walked for a long time, stopping occasionally to rest and pray and bring the things on my heart before God.

I kind of thought, I guess, that there would be a lot of these mushrooms around.  I was looking forward to making my grandma's day since she was clearly pretty excited about my search.  After two and a half hours or so of my walk, though, I still hadn't found a single one of the elusive fungi.  My prayers actually started to shift from my requests for general life direction into requests to be directed toward mushrooms.  I hadn't really felt like I was hearing God answer my other prayers anyway, so I was starting to get a little bit frustrated.

I don't know why he was waiting for this, but almost as soon as I started praying about the mushrooms, God started to speak.  What I felt him say, though, was not what I was expecting or even wanting: "why don't you forget about the mushrooms and just walk with me in my woods?"

So I did.  It's funny: I always ask God for answers when he really likes to give me questions.  And the really amazing thing is that they always end up being the answers too.  Anyway, my walk suddenly got much better.  The sun came smiling through the trees after hours of overcast, and either a great variety of birds started suddenly singing... or I just started to notice them.  I felt God just show me his love.  Finally, I got pretty tired and hungry and sat down to rest beside the creek a little before turning back toward the house.

I turned around, put my hand down to get up... and there it was.  Yup, a mushroom.  A big, ugly wrinkled one.  I picked it and thought I would at least have something to show for my time... but that wasn't it.  I looked around a little more, and I kept finding more and more!  In one little area about the size of my apartment, I found so many that I almost filled the sack.  I was unreasonably happy for someone carrying a bag of fungus.  I started to understand maybe why the locals were so into this... maybe.

After the initial euphoria wore off, though, I realized that the mushrooms were just the next part of what God was trying to tell me.  I was so concerned about my own life and my own stuff, when God just wanted me to spend time with him.  What a crazy shortcut to attempt, getting God's direction without taking time to invest in relationship with him.  But I do that all the time.  The mushrooms were just a symbol of that, and really--he had been leading me towards them the whole time.  The blessing was only revealed in fellowship with him, though.

Now, I don't think it's wrong to ask God for specific direction, just that it wasn't God's plan for my trip.  David asked for very specific guidance, as did many others, and God answered them.  You don't really read about Jesus asking the Father for directions, though.  The model he gave is in John 5:19: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does."  Jesus just lived life as close to his father as possible, and then he could easily see what the Father was doing and join him in it.  He didn't ask, he just walked in fellowship with his eyes open... and he saw.

That's what I think God wants me to do for the direction I need for my future: draw close to him and keep my eyes open.  It just takes the trust that he really is leading me all the while to things I can't currently see.  Otherwise, the request for direction is just about me, not about him... and he doesn't do shortcuts like that.

By the way, everyone at my grandparents' church was very impressed with my mushroom find... apparently I passed some obscure Midwestern initiation rite without even knowing it!  I wasn't just a city kid anymore, now I was a mushroom hunter and better, a finder.  Only God could come up with something like that.  Oh, and my grandma was so excited as she fried up the mushrooms and made me eat most of them in honor of the find.  I guess mushrooms can be significant after all... and they were delicious :)

A Winter Poem in Spring

I'm looking out a window right now at that beautiful kind of wet snow that sticks to only the tops of tree branches and makes the whole world look like if you bit it, you'd taste ice cream.  Earlier, I took a walk in the beginnings of it, but it was still a pleasant surprise when I looked out later to see that it had covered everything.  I know it's almost April, and even my winter-loving self has to admit that it is now, by all official standards, spring.  I just think it's kind of funny that just because of that arbitrary division of months, some people act like this snow is an affront to the dignity of the world.

That got me thinking, too, about how we don't really get to decide when a lot of different things happen in life.  We can strive and try and even ask God for things, but they happen exactly when he wants them to happen, regardless of our plans or categories.  Just like it snows in April (and sometimes May too) in Cleveland. 

Then, I started thinking about the challenge of staying in the present.  I wrote last time about how the desire to have everything right now gets in our way.  However, that doesn't change the fact that right now is really the only moment we have to work with.  I think our problem comes when we spend now focusing on later or already.  When we do that, we effectively take ourselves out of the present.  What's more, we make it very difficult for people to connect to us because we are somewhere (or somewhen) else.

God is never like that, though.  As we try to become more like him, it's important to remember that he is definitionally the God who IS.  It's his name.  I AM.  Although he is not bound by time and experiences all the moments of it equally, he has dedicated his presence to being with us.  God with us, Immanuel, is really just a synonym for I AM in my mind.  If you look at how Jesus lived when he was here, he embodied this divine characteristic fully.  He was able to devote his full attention to wherever and whenever he was, and whoever he was with.  He knew so well how to be present.

Now, I don't think it's wrong for all you colder-blooded people to wish for warmer weather.  I just made the connection mentally that staying emotionally and spiritually present in our lives can be like trying to appreciate a snowstorm in spring.  If we can look past the potential inconvenience and the fact that the whole thing isn't what we were expecting (or hoping for in many cases), there is great beauty to be seen and enjoyed.  Although the seasons of our lives may not last as long or may last longer than we expect or want, God never fails to give us beauty out of our ashes (see Isaiah 61:3).  Instead of getting stuck on the beauty of the future (or past), why not stay in the present and enjoy what's there?

That's what I'm trying to do.  In fact, I've been trying to do it for awhile now, and this whole winter stream of consciousness reminded me of a poem I wrote a long time ago.  For some reason or other, snow has always been something that gets me thinking about these deeper things, I guess.  I'll end with this:

Comparison


faintly perceptible
falling in silence

uncounted stacking
of discrete moments

gentle brilliance
smiling, smoldering cold

overpowering flash
that marks restive roads

empty blanket plush
insulating clarity in the dark

silken momentum
across great distance

quiet everything covering
shining outer shells

restoring final stream
that gives growth future

indirect ocean
wave of frozen clean

and how could we be anywhere
but home?

What and When

I am in a season right now where I am more aware than ever of my need for God's guidance.  I have a lot of decisions to make and things to think about, more than it seems I ever have.  Maybe becoming a man just brings that stuff with it, and maybe I should have been feeling like this a year or two ago while I was determinedly avoiding decisions and (to be honest) real life.  Whatever the case, anything that reminds you of your dependence on God can't be too bad of a thing; it's just that the uncertainty can be unpleasant.

I don't feel afraid about it all, though... not really.  This past year has been a year of immense change and I know God has guided me through it all.  As I approach another birthday, I feel like the coming year is going to be much the same in that respect.  The hard thing about change, though, is that while you can sometimes see it coming, it's pretty much impossible to tell what it's going to be.

Really, I think that's where we get in trouble a lot in life: trying to decide what changes will come to our lives before they happen.  Even worse, sometimes we try to tell God what changes he should be making and when they should be happening.  I know I had a whole plan for my life when I was 18-- according to that plan, by this present time in my life I was supposed to be a full-time pastor happily married to the woman of my dreams and thinking about when and how many kids to have.  Thankfully, God knew I wasn't even close to ready for any of that.

Funny thing is, a lot of that horribly mistaken adolescent vision was based on things that I really do feel like God wants me to do.  My heart is to minister to people, to be married someday, and to be a good father.  I feel like these desires come from God and even honor him.  What God has been showing me recently, though, is that just because he has spoken something, doesn't mean it has to happen right NOW.

I've seen a lot of people bring themselves pain like this-- God gives them a vision for something, and then they get ahead of the plan and wear themselves out trying to make it happen, only to end up questioning God when the plan fails.  My question is, whose plan was it?  We (I include myself here) have an alarming tendency to grab the plans out of God's hands and make them our own.  God should fulfill this vision this way, and (usually) right NOW.

The Bible paints a very different picture of how God fulfills his plans, even once he has revealed them to us.  The lives of Joseph, Paul, Abraham, David, and many others reveal that God doesn't always do things right NOW.  After God revealed some of his plans to those honored individuals, they ended up being imprisoned for years, preaching on the backside of nowhere, wandering about in foreign lands, or being chased by the very king they had been anointed to replace, for example.  And Jesus, who clearly knew that God was his father at age 12 (see Luke 2:49), had eighteen more years to wait before he began his ministry!

But who would have followed a 12 year-old rabbi?

It just wouldn't work.  My point, I guess, is that any attempt at carrying out God's plans before their time is just as ludicrous.

As for those people I mentioned, all they kept on doing was the next right thing.  Joseph never lost faith in prison and served with distinction no matter where he found himself.  Paul just kept on preaching the truth. Abraham was even willing to sacrifice the son of the promise if it meant following God's commands.  Maybe part of David being a man after God's heart was the way he knew that God had anointed him king in Saul's place but continued to serve him and refused to kill him even when he had the chance (twice!).  He was waiting for God to do what he said he would, and he refused to take it into his own hands.

As for Jesus, he just continued to grow.  That's pretty incredible, considering he was God in the flesh.

Now, none of that is to say that we should just passively wait for things to happen.  All those men walked in great purpose and initiative when the time was right.  It's just to say that finding out what God wants to do is worthless if we won't wait on his timing to make it happen.  We also have to keep growing in the meantime.

So that's where I find myself.  I know God wants to do some things.  I'm just trying to find out what they are and, just as importantly, when they are.  The constant battle of life is to let God's plan be the one I follow.  This plan is not just destination, but timing and method as well.  God's revelation, no matter what it is, awaits its appointed time to be fulfilled (see Habakkuk 2:3), because God fulfills it--not us.  Jesus knew that it was his Father who was the one doing the moving.  I want to know what the Father is doing, and then (and only then) join in doing that thing myself.  That's how God's will is done. 

And if we'd all do that... that's how his kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven.

Christmas Traditions

A lot of my holiday traditions got disrupted this year.  The simple fact that I live in a different place now was responsible for a lot of it, but there were also some other changes for a variety of reasons.  For example, none of my Christmas ornaments got hung on any tree this year, probably for the first time since I was born.  Well, actually that isn't quite true; my parents were trying to steal a few of them by hanging them on their tree while I was separating mine out of their boxes.  I caught them :)

Anyhow, none of that is as important as what it all got me thinking about.  The holidays seem to me to be the time of the year most governed by tradition.  I mean, there are various traditional things throughout the year, but especially around Christmas there is this whole extra set of rules and practices that goes into effect.  Presents, decorations, music, shopping, cards, and all kinds of other things that no one thinks that much about the rest of the year suddenly become the main focus of life (or at least it seems like that).  Not that any of those things are bad (except maybe the music *shudder* that gets piped into stores like the one I work in constantly and makes me a little extra cynical-- not carols mind you, which are about Jesus, but just songs... meaningless, mindless, repetitive, and totally empty.  This has been my bah humbug Christmas moment. We now return to the regularly scheduled blog [and sentence] already in progress), it's just that I feel like they all get done without any thought involved.  This is what we're supposed to do now, so it has to be done.

I guess I just don't like it when Christmas becomes a to-do list.  No wonder people are so stressed out and angry.  There's a whole load of extra things they suddenly have to take time out of their busy lives to accomplish!  What's worse, the whole process has (in many cases) been so completely divorced from the deeper meaning it was supposed to have that it has to leave many people scratching their heads as to why they run themselves into the ground trying to do it all.  I mean, the only possible way you could find out the real meaning of all this stuff from our "Christmas culture" is if you happen to listen to Linus in the Charlie Brown Christmas special-- which by some miracle, seeing as how it contains essentially the gospel message straight out of Luke, is still aired on secular tv every Christmas.

I'm going to stop right there before I start ranting about how secular culture is ruining Christmas by looking for it in all the wrong places.  I did that last Christmas (and it can be found in the archives of this very blog).  What I want to do instead is just ask the question that has been on my mind.

What if we could just throw the Christmas to-do list away?

Perhaps better stated, what if we should just throw the Christmas to-do list away?  Would we be able to do it?  Would we want to?  What if we really spent Christmas asking Christ how he wanted us to celebrate it?  What would he say?  Are we afraid of what he might say, so afraid that we won't even dare to ask?  How would it feel to be the only one in your family to be stemming the onrushing tide of tradition?

I guess that was more than one question.  I didn't realize how much was in that thought until I was writing it, but it's all what I've been thinking about.  And really, please do not hear me saying that tradition is somehow evil.  I think it often has great value, and Jesus himself instituted some traditions, most notably the sacrament of communion.  Speaking of communion, it seems like community and fellowship were things that Jesus cared about a lot more than material possessions.  Perhaps his answers to the questions of how we should spend Christmas would be along those lines?

Anyway, tradition isn't bad, but it is made for us, not us for the tradition.  All too often, I think, tradition becomes little more than a euphemism for blindly doing what we always have and an excuse for not involving Jesus in our decision-making processes.  All I know is, I did Christmas again this year.  Very little of it did I ask God about; some parts of it I liked, some I didn't.  I know it would be extremely hard for me to give up presents if God asked me to do that.  I just want to know that I would do it, and to be honest I can't say for sure.  I'd give up the music in a heartbeat, I know that much.  But what if I just put the whole process in his control?

Above all, I just want to be close enough to the heart of God to hear how he wants me to spend my time and money.  I hate the idea of doing things for no reason.  I want God to put on my heart the gifts to bring, just like he did for the wise men so long ago. I don't know what (if anything) he would have me change in my Christmas traditions for next year.  I just hope I listen.

Moving

As I mentioned last time, this is a season of many new things for me as I move out of my parents' house for the first (and hopefully only) time.  Well, it really did (after some unforeseen delays) happen, and the dust is just now beginning to settle a bit.  There are countless things that could be said about this whole process and all it entails, so I really can't let it go by without blogging about it at least once.  Besides, it's really the main thing that's been happening in my life and my heart recently, so I can't imagine writing about anything else right now anyway.  What follows is a sampling of my thoughts from the past few weeks.  If it seems a bit random or chaotic, then it mirrors exactly the process of moving in general, at least to me.

This may seem self-evident, but one of the biggest things about moving is all the movement it causes.  It sometimes seems like everything is constantly in motion.  I think this is one of the best reasons to do it every so often, especially for people like me.  Sometimes I can just get very stationary in life, not doing much or making much progress in any direction.  Moving does not allow for that option.  I feel like I've learned so many things and in so doing gotten out of my own little world and into the real world at large to a much greater extent.  It's a wonderful, beautiful place to explore-- it makes me feel small, and that's a good thing.  It breaks the illusion that I am a big deal in a small world that I orchestrate to orbit myself.  Instead, I'm just a little man in a huge world that revolves around God's never-failing plan.  And that, my friends, is a comforting thought.

Another big thing that moves when you move is emotion.  It's a good thing that God started helping me learn to deal with my emotions before I started this process, because I had no idea that I could feel so many wildly different things in such a short space of time.  I have felt overwhelmed, exhilarated, afraid, happy, sad, peaceful, lonely, joyful, confident and any number of other things that I don't know how to name, sometimes all at once or in rapid-fire succession, sometimes at longer stretches.  I say stretches because that what it's doing to me in a big way-- it forces me to go to God, feel what I'm feeling, and bring it to him for help.  The only other option would be implosion, I think.  Another good reason for moving: anything that brings our constant desperate need for God into such sharp focus has to be a good thing.  He always comes through when he has to, and being closer to him is the end goal of life anyway...

Moving has really highlighted the value of relationships for me as well.  The people I care about mean more to me than ever now that I have my own house to welcome them into.  That being said, if I just stay in my house and retreat into myself, those relationships will suffer-- they need investment and time.  I mean, it helps if you have a wonderful, like-minded brother to move in with you, but even (or especially?) that kind of relationship is not self-sustaining.  It needs care and time to achieve the constant growth necessary for health... but it's worth it.  I would argue that relationship (i.e. friendship, love, community and real connection) is one of the biggest things worth striving for in all the world.  If you count relationship with God, then it definitely IS the most important.

And of course, moving teaches many more mundane or practical lessons as well.  For example, it is a better idea to wait for your roommate to help you move large furniture up two flights of stairs than to do it yourself because you just want to be finished with the task.  Similarly, it is a good idea to bring a quarter to Aldi when you go there and get a cart, rather than trying to hold your whole trip in one big box that was lying around.  On a related note, Marc's doesn't take Visa cards (or any other kind except Discover, it turns out).  What?!?! Who knew?  And who knew how expensive most of the things I really like to eat are?  And who knew that garbage disposal and recycling require a six-page manual?   Paying bills, repairing locks, cooking food... man, I'm starting to feel like a freaking adult.

And it's all exactly where I'm supposed to be.

Devotion

There's an old saying that goes, "Don't put all your eggs in the same basket."  This is commonly regarded as wisdom, since obviously if you drop the one basket carrying all your eggs, you then have zero eggs, which would be the worst possible outcome.

I'm not sure it works that way in God's kingdom, though.  Check this out:

"Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching.  Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.  Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress."

--Paul, in 1 Timothy 4:13-15

Paul is asking Timothy to put all his eggs in one basket.  Devote yourself, be diligent, give yourself wholly.  These are all or nothing phrases.

I think we shy away from approaching life like this for a couple of reasons.  For one thing, devoting yourself to anything (which implies complete focus and being set apart for a task--similar to holiness, actually) is hard work by definition.  It is all consuming, and a lot of us have trouble committing to things like that.  So, laziness gets in our way.

Even deeper than that, though, I feel like we avoid this devoted lifestyle because of fear.  We are somehow afraid that it won't turn out to be that great and we'll be left with nothing else after the eggs drop.  We really don't think God's plan is the best, so we follow halfway just in case it is the best, while also making our own plans and holding onto those.  It doesn't seem to work, but that doesn't usually stop us.  Maybe that's why Jesus said we have to lose our lives to save them.

Then another thing we fear is the reaction of others.  Paul comes right out and tells Timothy that everyone will see his progress: little or much, good or bad, it will be right out there.  Streetlights are right out in the open, not hidden.  If we devote our lives to following the Lord, people will be able to tell, and our successes and failures will be much more visible if we're willing to be real.  I think that's why we paradoxically try to save face by not trying as hard as we can.  That way if what we're doing fails, we always have the out that "we weren't really trying our very hardest."  Who knows what would have happened if we were?

So that's where I find myself today.  I know that I want to devote myself to following God, reading the word, and using my spiritual gifts.  I want to be diligent.  I want to devote myself wholly to this.  I am also afraid.  But, I know the times when I am most devoted to God are the times I am most free.  The same decision presents itself every day, every hour, every moment.  All I know is, regardless of my past choices, my current fears, or old sayings, right now I choose devotion.

One Step

I'll start off today with a poem I wrote a while ago as I was preparing to graduate from college:

One Step Forward Taken


Somewhere outside empty,
around the corner
from unrest and
down the next
street from destiny
is my intended
destination. I sit
in my life
like a kid
in the car
in the family
driveway and say
Are we there
yet? knowing only
leaving and arriving.
Wherever there is,
I can’t get
to where real
and fake diverge
all at once,
so I tend
to take less
than the first
             step.




I wrote this poem in the midst of thinking about moving out of academia into "real life," but I've realized since then that it applies to so many different situations.  It seems like my brain always wants to do things later or somehow start at a more easily defined time, e.g. "I'll start my workout plan on Monday, but today's Thursday so there's no use starting it now"  or  "Next month I'll have to eat healthier, but this one is already pretty shot" or "Next year I'll really start working towards my goal of dunking a basketball"-- you get the idea.  Goals that seem very big just can't be accomplished all at once, and that can often lead to putting off even their smallest beginnings (which then leads, of course, to putting them off again later).  Those are just examples, but it can happen with anything.

Am I the only one that does stuff like that?  No? Good, I didn't think so.  I think it's really an example of how we listen to the voice of fear in our lives.  The whole situation reminds me of something my pastor likes to say, which I will paraphrase from the Ricktionary like this: "Our enemy always wants us to do things a little, and later.  God wants to give us more, and now!"  And isn't that the truth?  It seems like there is often a questioning voice advising us to hedge our bets or put things off until we're more ready or the time is more right.  But when is that, exactly?

What I'm trying to learn to do is take the first steps.  If I realize something needs to change in my life, I don't want to finish out this week doing it wrong and start trying it the right way on Monday!  I need to accept that real change is messier than that and can't be confined to my (sometimes unreasonable) desire for order.  I want to take the first step toward doing the things God has placed in my heart right now, right here in the middle of all the ridiculous mess and chaos.  I don't have time to wait for things to be more right or ready.  A little and later just isn't going to cut it for me; I need more of God and his help, and I need it now!

That might seem a little demanding, and I guess maybe it is.  All I know is that God has given us the green light to come after him with that kind of intensity.  Check out Genesis 32.  Jacob wrestled with God (!!) all through the night and wouldn't stop until he received a blessing.  He wasn't like, "let me just get things straight with my brother who wants to kill me and then I'll start following you and seeking your blessing."  He knew he couldn't go any further without God's blessing and he needed it right then.  He took the one step he needed to take, even though he took it (and every other step from then on) with a limp.

I don't want my fear of limping to get in the way of my taking that first step, whatever it may be.

There's no time to waste.