I've Got a Lot to Think About

So... I've got a lot on my mind right now, so forgive me if this post seems disjointed.

First off: Swaziland. I'll admit to being a little nervous about this trip, but it's probably not for any reason that you would think. You see, I've read through the blogs of a guy who went on the last two trips. As the senior male, he was asked to preach each time. And who's going to be the senior (and only) male on this trip? That's right. Me. There's a possibility that they'll ask Janice to preach instead of me, but I'm not counting on it. My guess is that they won't want to risk offending me by not asking. I'm going to be prepared, just in case. I just have no idea what to say. But... I have a month and a half to figure it out, I guess.

Second, I went with Alecia to her classes this past week. It was great to meet some of her seminary friends, and I really enjoyed listening to the professors. It was made all the better by the fact that I had no need to take notes, as I would not be writing any papers or taking any tests. I was a little intimidated, however, as people threw about terms that I couldn't even pronounce, let alone know what they meant. Going to her classes has gotten me thinking, though. I definitely would like to learn more. I'm not sure that a Masters of Divinity is for me, but there are other programs at CTS that I could potentially be interested in. But there's a lot of writing, and I'm not that good of a writer. And then there's the whole job thing, complete with international travel, sometimes on short notice. I don't know. Maybe a little down the road.

And then Rev. Nathan preached on courage this morning. The scripture passage was:

Matthew 14:22-33 (NIV)

²² Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. ²³ After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, ²⁴ and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it.
²⁵ Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. ²⁶ When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear.
²⁷ But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
²⁸ “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”
²⁹ “Come,” he said.
Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. ³⁰ But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”
³¹ Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?”
³² And when they climbed into the boat, the wind died down. ³³ Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

Nathan challenged us to be courageous witnesses. We must step out of the boat and trust the Lord to pull us to safety if we start to sink.

I've also been reading "Crazy Love" by Frances Chan. Today, the part I was reading talked about "lukewarm" Christians. There were many examples of what he considers the characteristics of a "lukewarm" Christian, but basically he's talking about someone who stops at being saved. "I believe, therefore I'm not going to hell." But that's where they stop. They continue to live their lives for themselves instead of stepping out of the boat onto the water when Jesus calls them.


What do all of these thoughts have in common? I don't know. Maybe nothing. 

Or maybe everything. 


I've got a lot to think about.

I Have Hope

Well, it's about to get real. Janice, our pastor's wife and mission leader, is going to be buying our plane tickets to Swaziland this week. Now it's time to start thinking about the trip itself.

Janice has picked "We Have Hope" as the theme for this year's trip. As Janice puts it, "Hope is so powerful.  Hope is a spark.  My most desperate moments have been when I did not have hope in a situation.  Hope makes everything brighter, possible, imaginable, new, tolerable, expectant...hope is a gift.  Think about Hope.  Think about when it brought you through a rough spot.  Think about how hope made you focus on a better outcome instead of focusing on disaster.Imagine being a child who is orphaned and starving.  Then a person arrives with food.  Food can transform your physical being.  Being remembered, being thought about and cared for can transform your spirit.  What if...?  HOPE?  Choose Hope!"

At Janice's suggestion, I'm going to focus some blog entries on hope leading up to our trip. I'll start with what I hope to do on this trip.

I hope to bring smiles and comfort to some orphaned and vulnerable children (OVC's). I hope to bring them food. I hope to see first hand the impact Christian love and compassion can have on a society so devastated by HIV/AIDS. I hope we can help. I hope we can make a difference.

As for myself, I hope to be changed. I hope to be challenged. I hope to be convicted.

I have a lot of hope for this mission.

"take this bread"

Several months ago, I read a book titled "take this bread" by Sara Miles. I copied a passage from that book into a blog post, but never sat down and thought about what I wanted to say about it, or why I had felt compelled to copy it down and remember it. So I never published it.

Here is the quote from the book:


"What happened once I started distributing communion was the truly disturbing, dreadful realization about Christianity: You can't be a Christian by yourself. Sooner or later, if I kept participating in communion, I'd have to swallow the fact of my connection with all other people, without exception.

I was going to have to see and understand the hunger of other, different men and women, and make a gesture of welcome, and eat with them. And just as I hadn't 'deserved' any of what had been given to me...I didn't deserve communion myself now. I wasn't getting it because I was good. I wasn't getting it because I was special. I certainly didn't get to pick who else was good enough, holy enough, deserving enough, to receive it. It wasn't a private meal. The bread on that table had to be shared with everyone in order for me to really taste it.

I was not going to get to sit by myself and think loftily about how much Jesus loved me in particular. I was not going to get to have dinner, eternally, with people just like me. I was going to get communion, whether I wanted it or not, with people I didn't necessarily like. People I didn't choose.

Conversion isn't, after all, a moment: It's a process, and it keeps happening, with cycles of acceptance and resistance, epiphany and doubt. As I struggled with bread and wine and belief...I began to understand why so many people chose to be 'born-again' and follow strict rules that would tell them what to do, once and for all. It was tempting to rely on a formula-- 'accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and savior,' for example-- that became itself a form of idolatry and kept you from experiencing God in your flesh, in the complicated flesh of others. It was tempting to proclaim yourself 'saved' and go back to sleep." (Emphasis mine)

Wow... As I re-read that I am struck once again with conviction about my own life. There is a lot in that passage that challenges me. Am I communing with others? Am I sharing the bread? Am I relying on a formula or am I truly experiencing God? Am I asleep?

Another reason I am taken by this passage and this book is because of the mission trip that Alecia and I are taking with our church this summer. We're going to Swaziland, Africa. Two years ago, through some generous donations, our church helped set up a food program that provides food to orphaned children in Swaziland. See, Swaziland has the highest per capita rate of HIV infection in the world, over 26% of the total adult population and over 50% of all adults in their 20's. That's a mind boggling statistic. And one of the effects of this HIV pandemic is the large numbers of orphans left behind. So, as I said, our church has helped set up food distribution centers for orphans. And now, we and our local partners have taken the next step at one of those distribution centers by setting up a farm that will actually grow some of the food that they're giving away. Our group will be going this summer (which will be winter there) to see how this program worked out in its first year and to learn more about the needs of the community there. We'll be looking at how we can expand the farming to other food distribution centers.

So much of the world needs food and water, bread and wine, communion. They need that interaction, gathering at the table, partaking together. We have so much in this country and so many countries have so little.

Jesus talked about the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven, but he wasn't talking about the apocalypse. He was talking about bringing the Kingdom of Heaven to earth now. The Lord's Prayer says, "they kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven." Jesus gave us two commandments to guide us in establishing His Kingdom on earth: Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. So simple, yet so difficult. As Sara pointed out in her book, loving your neighbor means you might have to commune with people you don't like, people you don't agree with, people you have nothing in common with. But by doing so, we come closer to realizing the Kingdom of Heaven here, now.

Please consider helping with our mission project. Or donating to a local food pantry or homeless shelter. Anything that tugs at your heart. Just, please, don't go back to sleep. We all have work to do, here and now. God's work.

There's Hope For Our Future

A couple of days ago, I came across a video on facebook and I had to share it with all my friends. I don't think it's a new video, but I hadn't ever seen it before. The video shows a news story about an autistic boy who had served for four years as a manager of his high school's basketball team. As a reward for all his unselfish hard work, the coach had him dress for the last game of the season. No one expected the coach to actually put the boy in the game, but with four minutes left, he motioned for the boy to report in. The fans and the teammates cheered wildly when the boy took the floor. He took a three-point shot: airball. He took another shot, and missed it too. Then he took his third shot, a perfect three-pointer that hit nothing but net. The fans and the team went crazy. But he didn't stop there. He shot and made five more three-pointers before the end of the game, the last coming just before the buzzer. The fans and team got wilder and more excited with each made basket, and when the buzzer sounded, they ran out on the court and hoisted this boy onto their shoulders. Here is the video.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150373441113934

I admit that the video made me tear up. But my tears were not only tears of joy for what the boy was able to do and what he was able to overcome. My tears were also for all the fans and the teammates. These were people who did not see this boy as disabled. They did not see him as inadequate. They delighted in his joy and were excited to see him succeed. There was no ill will in that gymnasium that night. There was no teasing, no ridicule, no bullying.

This video gives me hope for our future. Hope that we can all learn to live together. Hope that we can learn to accept and love people who are different from us, rather than condemn them. Hope that we can look beyond our differences and view everyone simply as different parts of the body of humanity. Romans 12:4-5 says: "For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us."

I think the younger generations understand this better than many of the older ones do. I realize there are still issues with bullying and discrimination in our schools, but it appears to me that these issues are less prominent than when I was a kid. A far greater percentage of kids today seem to know and accept people that are different than them. Disabled children seem to be less ridiculed today. Different races appear to get along better. Obviously, we're not where we need to be on these and other issues yet, but they appear to me to be progressing.

Some will, no doubt, disagree with me that progress is being made in all of these areas. Others will argue that the change isn't progressing fast enough. That's fair. I'm only stating my opinion based on my experiences.

And in my opinion, there's hope for our future.

Journals as Prayers

(Note: I wrote this journal entry yesterday.)

As I write this, I am flying from Salt Lake City to Indianapolis: the last leg of a series of flights that started over 24 hours ago in Beijing, China. I've had a lot of time on airplanes and in airports on this trip to be able to read. And my mind is swimming with the things I've read. The latest is a book called "Prayer For People Who Can't Sit Still." I bought this book at General Assembly this summer, but haven't taken the time to read it until now. In the book, the author writes about alternative ways to pray besides sitting still and concentrating for extended periods of time.

I have to admit that prayer is a big weakness in my spiritual life. Whenever I try to pray, I find my mind wandering. I can't focus on what I'm wanting to say to God, or on listening to what God has to say to me. I feel guilty. I feel inadequate (which, of course, I am). There have been exceptions to these feelings, though. When I was on my Emmaus Walk, I found myself praying and listening to God several times. I don't really know how long I prayed, but it was for considerable lengths of time. That was the first time I truly realized that God was speaking to me; the first time I truly heard and listened. Since then, though, my prayer life could only be described as pathetic.

One of the books I read this week recommended spending a minimum of 30 minutes each day in prayer. And this book made a point: How can we expect to have a relationship with God if we don't spend time communicating with Him? The author asked what our marriages would be like if we spent as little time communicating with our spouses as we do with God.

So the first method of praying discussed in the "Prayer" book is journaling. As I read the chapter, I started to understand why I sometimes feel compelled to blog. Originally, I thought it was just a way of organizing my thoughts, but now I realize that some of my entries are prayers. This is an exciting realization for me. This is something I can do. This is a way of listening to God's message that I can understand.

As I write this, I'm listening to my ipod on shuffle, and the song "Word of God Speak" by MercyMe just came on:

I'm finding myself at a loss for words
And the funny thing is it's okay
The last thing I need is to be heard
But to hear what You would say

[CHORUS]
Word of God speak
Would You pour down like rain
Washing my eyes to see
Your majesty
To be still and know
That You're in this place
Please let me stay and rest
In Your holiness
Word of God speak

I'm finding myself in the midst of You
Beyond the music, beyond the noise
All that I need is to be with You
And in the quiet hear Your voice

[REPEAT CHORUS 2x]

I'm finding myself at a loss for words
And the funny thing is it's okay

God is speaking to me again. I thank you, God, that you speak to me, and I pray that you'll continue to teach me how to listen to you.

I Want 20/20 Vision

Yesterday, I attended a stewardship seminar on behalf of my church. (I think. They asked me and a couple of other people if any of us could go, and I was the only one to say yes. But no one has said anything about when or if they want me to share what I learned, and I'm not on the finance committee.) At any rate, I learned a few things.

A couple of things that were said really got me to thinking, and not necessarily about stewardship as it relates to the church. First was the discussion about "vision." If you're involved in any kind of organization or business, you are probably aware that the organization should have a mission statement and a vision statement. He said the vision statement outlines how your organization would look if it were, in fact, able to fulfill its mission statement. He said vision statements need to be big, bold, clear and compelling if you want anyone to support your organization. He kept drawing comparisons between vision statements and actual eyesight. He said that he could take off his glasses at home and, although everything was blurry and not very clear, he could navigate sufficiently within his house without them, because he was comfortable in his surroundings. But he couldn't venture out beyond his own small, comfortable, world without clearer vision. If we want to venture out, grow and expand, we need clearer vision.

The second thing that really got me thinking was right at the end of the day. He talked about the old TV show, "This is your life." In the show, a guest would be surprised and friends and family would share stories of the person's life. Yesterday's speaker asked, "What would be said about you if you were on that show?" That made me think:

First, what would be said if they were profiling our church? Would people come on and say that our church had a positive impact on their life? Would they tell a story of a time where we showed compassion, love and understanding, or would it be a story of being judged and made to feel inferior? Would anyone outside of our membership have anything at all to say about our church? Taking that a step further, if our church closed its doors tomorrow, would anyone outside of the current member miss it? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that the answers for my church are negative. I'm saying, these are thoughts that should always be in our minds and helping to govern how we act as disciples of Jesus Christ. And these thoughts apply for any church, not just the one I belong to.

Second, what would be said about me? Would people have good stories to tell about me, or bad ones? Would I be portrayed as a loving, compassionate person, or a jerk? Would people say I was a positive, upbeat guy, or would they say I was always complaining? Would the stories told about me make it clear that  I strive to live a Christian life, or would I end up looking like a hypocrite? I'm not fishing for compliments here. I'm simply saying that I should constantly evaluate what I'm doing to make sure I'm setting a positive example and leaving behind the right kind of legacy.

Along those lines, I got to thinking... I should have my own mission statement and vision statement. Proverbs 29:18 says, "Where there is no vision, the people perish." I've been looking at my life through my own, blurry, human vision. Has my inadequate human vision kept me from venturing out of my comfort zone, the places I can navigate without having to see what's around me too clearly? Or, have I tried to venture out, only to become lost and on the wrong path because I couldn't see where I was going? 

I realize this is not a new idea, but it's not something I currently have. So, I'm going to start praying and working on my personal mission and vision statements. I'm praying that God will open my eyes (no pun intended) and allow me to see my life through the "corrective lenses" of Jesus Christ.

I want 20/20 vision.

Spiritual or Religious?

Recently, a friend of mine posted a link to an article about Religion vs. Spirituality. Basically, the article (Spiritual but Not Religious? Please Stop Boring Me.) was written by a minister who was irked by people telling her that they were "spiritual but not religious." The article is a bit "snarky" for lack of a better term, but there was a lot of good debate that went on in the comments of my friend's status. It made me think a lot about my own situation.

For years, I would have put myself in the "spiritual but not religious" category. Loren-Paul Caplin, in a different blog post (Religious vs. Spiritual: Semantics or Neurotics?), described spiritual as such: "I just assumed that if I held some personal 'spiritual' belief in, let's just call it, a beyond-our-physical-universe reality (the nature of which won't be discussed here) that includes a very personal conception of humans (and other living things) having an eternal essence that transcends their bodies -- that I'd share enough common ground with devoutly religious people to, well, at least not piss them off." That pretty much describes how I felt. I felt like there was something out there, and I thought that was enough. As long as I acknowledged that there was something beyond me, then I would be alright, right?

Here's the problem, with being "spiritual" without being "religious," at least as it applied to me for 20 years. It was about me and only me. I took comfort in this idea that there was "something" out there beyond me. But I didn't have anything to share with anyone else. What could I tell other people? "Ummm.... Yeah.... I believe there's something beyond us." How does that inspire anyone else to believe? Does it help them develop their own spirituality? I had nothing to share.

Now, though, I have a lot more to share. I have my story of how I came to Christ. I have direction and a path. I know that there's a whole lot more to this than what's in it for me. And I'm eager to share what I feel and know with others. I'm now proudly religious.