My Journey

Burping the Baby on a Non-Skid Sock (And Praise God for Mickey Mouse!)

2014-05-04T00:22:00.000-04:00

Author's note: Skip the initial paragraph if you're the sort of person who is offended by the mere mention of human bodily functions. Come to think of it, I'm not sure you should be reading my blog at all if you're that sensitive!

"Oh Dear Lord, help me!!" That was the first thought that crossed my waking mind this morning, as I sprung from bed and made a headlong rush for the downhill ski run that passes for stairs in our small house. I rounded the corner into the living room almost without touching the floor and dove into our tiny, cramped bathroom. Yeah, it was one of those mornings, when the cumulative effect of too much unfamiliar food over the past two weeks had finally exacted its toll on my intestinal fortitude, sending me on a frenzied race for the loo.

The balance of the morning brought more of the same. While Kristi wrestled a three year-old and a newborn simultaneously, I lay under a heap of blankets on the sofa, trying to recall any way in which I might have offended someone in a position to make a voodoo doll of my digestive tract. Finally by mid-day, Montezuma's revenge took its leave of me and I began to hobble weakly about the house, making my best efforts to help dress myself and my aforementioned progeny for what lay ahead.

First, we walked across the street to my home church, to say goodbye to a dear sweet Christian lady who has blessed our lives for years now. It was emotional for many reasons: our grief at losing such a dear friend; our heartfelt sympathy for her family; and the fact that it was our first real public outing with our new baby. Some of the people we met clearly knew that Cooper had Down Syndrome, probably by way of friends and neighbors and Facebook; others did not, and explanations had to be made about our extended hospital stay following his birth two weeks ago. While meeting all these people, Kristi was carrying Baby Cooper while I escorted my beloved little buddy Sawyer. I love the boy dearly--I really do, but if you have never had the pleasure of leading a three year-old through an event like a funeral visitation line, let me draw a comparison for you: Imagine, if you will, that you are on a deep sea fishing excursion and have just hooked a very large and active marlin on a lightweight rod. Now, imagine that said fish is slightly jealous of his new baby brother and expresses this emotion via a series of ear-splitting shrieks uttered at random intervals and in response to stimuli not immediately obvious to you. Now, imagine that many people want to shake hands with your marlin while you're attempting to land it. This is a fair comparison to today's experience at the funeral.

Now, I don't know about you, but when I'm stressed, I sweat! Add to that the fact that the temperature had climbed to around eighty degrees outdoors and all the entrances to the church were flung wide open. I was a perspiring, stressed-out wreck of a father, wrangling a child who saw every pew as an opportunity for climbing. Repeatedly, other people spoke gentle and consoling words over me as I removed my glasses to wipe my eyes. What they took for tears of grief or the emotion of retelling the story of our son's challenges, however, was actually the blinding sting of sweat pouring into my eyes.

At last, we had seen our friend's family, made the rounds of everyone in the community who wanted to see Cooper and hear our story firsthand and were ready to move on to the next event. Back across the street at our house, I helped Kristi load the kids into the van, then dashed inside to divest myself of my black suit jacket, pants and dress shoes in favor of cooler and more casual dress appropriate for the baby shower we were about to attend for two of our dear friends in another town.

As we rode to our second stop, about an hour away, Kristi sat in the back of the van in order to keep an eye on both Sawyer and Cooper. A short distance from home, Cooper awoke in need of feeding. Ever prepared, my dear wife whipped out a bottle and began to feed him in his carseat. This went well until he began to leak a bit, as newborns sometimes do. Over the din of "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" playing on the DVD for Sawyer, I heard her ask me if I happened to have a burp cloth at hand. "No," I replied, "I don't see one." "Well, check the console in the middle" she said. Groping my way across the cluttered console of our van while trying to focus on the road, my hand brushed something that felt textile-ish. "Found one!" I said. The object my right hand brought into view proved not to be a burp cloth, but a gray, rubber-soled nonskid sock my mother-in-law had brought home from her recent hospitalization for some tests. "Oops, wait! False alarm! It's just a sock your mom brought home from the hospital!"
"Well, pass it back here!" "Are you kidding?? It's an old sock!!" "It's all we have!"

Our second stop was the wedding shower, a time of celebrating with a couple who are among our dearest friends. Having been cooped up in the van for a good while now, I took pity on our older son, against Kristi's sound advice. Sawyer hit the church fellowship hall like a rabid weasel, careening from one person to another, greeting everyone and finding one thing after another on which to utilize his climbing skills. Soon, I was darting through clusters of people conversing and excusing myself over my shoulder while diving after him. Soon it was time to eat, a good excuse to return him to his stroller and offer him some dinner. After eating and watching our friends open their gifts, we reloaded the van for the trip home. Sawyer was tired and quickly joined his brother in dozing off, which gave me a opportunity to turn off the DVD player and have a rare conversation with my wife as we drove home...or so we thought. We were talking about all the events of recent weeks, about our hopes and dreams and fears for Cooper's future with Down syndrome, how tired we both were and what was on the calendar for the coming week.

Suddenly, Sawyer twitched and opened his eyes--eagle eyes that instantly latched onto the DVD player and quickly realized Mickey Mouse was no longer singing that infernal "Hot Dog Song." I was driving, so my only view was a quick glance in the rearview mirror, but judging by the sounds coming from the back seat, I can only surmise that by this point, my son's head had begun to spin around and flames may well have been coming from his nostrils. "MICKEY MOUSE!!! MICKEY MOUSE!!! MICKEY MOUSE!!!!!!!" was the cry from the right middle seat, half frantic and half enraged: "MICKEY MOUUUUUSE!!!!!!!!" As I scrambled to operate the DVD player while simultaneously keeping our vehicle upright, the cacophony behind me seemed to swell even louder, as if he had backup screamers. Kristi coached me from the back seat: "Press the 'mode' button....now 'DVD'....now hit number two, twice!"

Finally, the machine whirred and clicked and Mickey rejoined us, still in the middle of that blasted song. I have a love / hate relationship with the "Hot Dog Song" really--if I've heard it once, I've heard it at least a hundred thousand times; yet I catch myself humming it in the grocery store, even when I'm alone. At my desk, I often snap to from a brief daydream, only to realize that the soundtrack I'm hearing is audible to everyone else, too, and it's THAT SONG....but praise God for Mickey Mouse!
If it were not for the calming effect of watching a familiar video, we might have long since followed through on every parent's threat to sell our child to a passing band of gypsies--if such a thing ever traveled through rural North Carolina, that is.

Would we like to be the family who always have a supply of freshly-pressed, lavender-scented towels at hand for our baby's convenience? Sure we would! And would we prefer that our child calmed himself by meditating on the rush of the wind and the sight of budding trees and frolicking birds in the roadside forest? Naturally that would be great--heck, maybe we could get him hooked on memorizing poetry while we ride, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, say, or maybe Evangeline?

The point is, life is what it is, and many days that's not what you'd envisioned. Like every pair of new parents, before Sawyer's birth we envisioned having children who never fussed or pouted; never cried for ice cream or junk foods we don't normally let them have; and certainly they would wait quietly and patiently while we finished our adult conversations before politely raising their hands to interject something....but that isn't what we have. Strangely, it doesn't seem to be what anyone else has, either!
And so, we accept that some days our children will be well-mannered and some days they'll fuss. Sometimes there will be a pristine linen cloth, and some days you'll have to burp your newborn on a hospital sock...it's real life, so it happens. Too often, we're guilty of living in constant pursuit of some fantasy of life, some imagination of what things could be or "should" be, and in doing so, we can easily miss just how good things are.

Lord, teach us to number our days, that we would gain a heart of wisdom. Help us to rejoice in the here and the now and the real and the authentic, not fritter our time away chasing a pot of perfectionistic gold beyond an unending rainbow. We think it will be better, but often it won't. We think it should be more, but often that isn't your plan. Help us to celebrate Your gifts, Mighty God, and teach us thanksgiving so that every frenzied day of parenthood would become a precious memory.
Thank You, God, for our children...and Praise God for Mickey Mouse!

2014-04-04T13:30:00.001-04:00

"Differently Blessed?" No, Just Blessed!

2014-04-02T22:52:00.001-04:00

"Differently Blessed?" No, Just Blessed!

The first two hours of my son's life now seem like weeks, etched in my memory like the celluloid panes of a film reel, meticulously unraveling their story frame-by-frame. Somehow, when I replay them, it takes only moments to tell the tale; yet, I can see them in slow motion if I choose, remembering every shade of color, every shadow, every scent, every intonation and puzzled grimace. The days of waiting since have been at turns encouraging, painful, maddening and joyful. It's the waiting that really gets you--the vivid evidence, played out in Central Hospital Time, that time neither waits for any man nor does it hurry.

After five days of waiting for various test results, we finally know more about Baby Cooper's condition. We know that his heart and lungs are well developed and functioning just like they should. We know that his digestive tract is working and that he likes to eat! We know that all his parts seem to work and be just perfect. And now we know something else about Cooper that's very special: he has one spare part! Within the genetic material in all his cells, Cooper carries one extra chromosome, a microscopic body of exquisitely coded information, meant to direct his amazing body to do the things necessary to carry on healthy and normal life, but Cooper carries a "spare." Our beautiful, perfect, precious baby has Trisomy 21, the genetic condition that produces Down's Syndrome.

How does it feel to get news like this? Not exuberant or joyful, to be sure. There are challenges--many challenges, perhaps, ahead for Cooper and by extension, for us. Are we shocked? Certainly, though there's no good reason to be. Trisomy 21 happens in about one live birth out of a thousand. It's not rare--in fact, it's by far the most common genetic mutation in humans. We knew the odds when we had Sawyer, our first child. We also knew that there is a slight (slight!) increase in the incidence of Down's when parents are over forty. There's genetic testing. We could have done it, but we chose not to. Our doctor agreed. We are Christians, trusting in the God we know to be sovereign and immutable. We fear and we worry and we struggle and we moan and wail and cry....but still, we have faith. We are weak and mortal, but our God is not. It's a trite adage found on posters in school classrooms and office cubicles, but it still rings true: "God doesn't make mistakes." We believe it. We chose not to have prenatal tests because we have faith that what God decrees is good and perfect, and we knew that we would not change the course of the pregnancy based on anything we might find out. Statistically, 92% of pregnancies where Down's is identified end in abortion. So, while one in a thousand children is born with Down's, this only represents eight percent of those God created with an extra chromosome.

So, how to move forward? The diagnosis made its initial impact when a geneticist from the hospital visited Kristi's room shortly after blood had been drawn for testing. She informed Kristi that she was sure Cooper had Down's, even though it would be days before test results came back. We essentially dumped a satchel of three-ring binders and pamphlets in Kristi's lap and told her, "Don't worry--most Down's kids are sweet and loving!" This was our unceremonious introduction to the whole thing. Kristi called me in shock and panic and disbelief. We took turns having our emotional breakdowns--hers in her hospital room, mine in the van sitting on the lower level of the hospital parking garage. Comparing notes later, we realized that while we both were shocked and scared, neither of us doubted that we would love and raise this child and that he was a blessing from God!

We have a plan, however brief and tentative: we love our child. We learn what to watch for, and we stay vigilant for the potential health and developmental issues that can arise. And we go on with life!
We laugh and we play, we teach and we discipline and we set high expectations, because that's what we do in our family. We don't demand the impossible of Cooper, any more or less than is the case for Sawyer; yet, we don't lower the bar for him out of some negative assumption that he won't be able to grow and learn and achieve just like his brother.

Every child has learning challenges. It's a fact of being human. I struggled my way through much of my educational history, in spite of an IQ that meant I was well-suited for learning. Some kinds of mathematics are incredibly difficult to me, even after years and years of trying. I can't draw anything you could recognize beyond the level of crude stick figures. Kristi struggled through most of her primary and secondary school years not knowing why she found school so hard, until she discovered her dyslexia and began to unravel the mystery of reading. Yet, Kristi is an incredible artist and wonderful educator, having gone on to spend years in the public school system advocating for the rights of children with developmental disabilities. She is a brilliant and gifted person. I have much less on the "talent" end of the spectrum, but I learned that Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder was at the root of many of my study problems, and I have managed to acquire enough skills and knowledge to participate in and enjoy a wide variety of professional and personal activities. Much as we wish it were, life is not a level playing field for all children. We don't arrive from our mother's wombs as "blank slates" ready to be filled with information; rather, we all come with some challenges. All of us have to work through some things in order for our giftedness to shine through. That's what life in this world is--it's a process of overcoming, of survival, but also of thriving and blossoming and success. That's what we want for our child.

If you've read this far, odds are you're a friend of ours. We're blessed with so many! I'm overwhelmed by the number of contacts we've had via all sorts of media, from a variety of nations and in multiple languages, wishing well to Cooper and us! So perhaps--just perhaps--you're asking, "How do I participate? How can I help? What do they need?" So, here goes: First, we need your prayers for us. Perhaps you've heard the old saying that "God won't give you more than you can bear"? I'm sorry to say, this is what we in the theological biz call "B.S." It's well-intentioned B.S., spoken in the interest of offering comfort and encouragement...but B.S. nonetheless. If you read the Scriptures--or even if you've lived a few years on this planet--it should be abundantly clear to you that God does indeed give us far more than we can handle at times. In fact, the things that are beyond our management are generally the fallout of human sinfulness, not things God purposely inflicts on us--but God does allow them, and He uses them to teach us dependence on Him. There is an accurate version of this saying, however: "God won't give us more than He can handle." And in this, we have supreme trust. All this to say, please pray! We need God to show up. (Well, He already has, in BIG ways...but we're gonna need a lot more of His presence with us and His grace that casts our fear and overcomes every obstacle for His glory!)

What else? Please (PLEASE!!!) do your best to treat us just as if you would have had we not shared this special secret with you! Do we want to ignore or deny that Cooper has Down's? Of course not! That wouldn't be in his best interest or ours. What we do not want, however, is to let Cooper become someone who is defined by Down's. You know how it happens: a person develops cancer, say. Suddenly, in everyone's minds that person becomes "the guy with cancer." Not Jim or Bob or Ted, but Cancer Guy. Everyone starts to see him in light of his condition first and foremost. He still has an identity as a person, but cancer has become the first thing everyone sees when they look at him. That's what we don't want for Cooper, any more than Kristi wants to be defined by dyslexia or I want to be defined by OCD or you want to be defined by your challenges and shortcomings. Just help us to be normal and not "weird." Don't feel awkward about asking questions about Cooper's condition--feel free to ask us anything and we'll do our best to explain. Don't focus on his Down's, but don't make it conspicuous by not talking about it, either. We don't want it to be the "elephant in the room" that everyone ignores. We just want to stay normal--whatever that may look like for us! And help us love our kids...both of them! Just continue to bless them as you have blessed us, and let them bless you. That's God's plan: we mutually encourage one another and challenge one another to live up to the promise of the Gospel, that God's love can surmount any problem and overcome every sin.

We love you, our dear friends, and we thank God for each of you more often than you probably imagine. Thank you for loving us and drawing us near and supporting us as we move forward, a day at a time, holding God's hand and figuring out this crazy business of life together!

God's best to you,

Steve, Kristi, Sawyer and Cooper Hawkins

Good for Your Prayer Life

2012-11-26T21:37:00.003-05:00

November twenty-sixth. Eight-forty p.m. It's been two days since I rousted our mated pair of white plywood deer from the far corner shelf in our musty basement and assigned them their place to stand--rain, snow or shine--for the next month. I gave their red ribbons a cursory fluff and even took a few moments to contemplate their placement, so as to give as good an illusion of reality as can be had from wildlife made of pressed veneer. The one thing I didn't do at that moment was to secure them to anything. And so naturally, by Sunday morning (when I was laid-up with an intestinal inconvenience of the sort commonly associated with budget Mexican resorts), the wind had toppled the deer onto their sides, giving not the desired illusion of wintry natural bliss, but the appearance of a government herd-thinning program on our front lawn, the effect of slaughter only enhanced by the sprays of red nicely aligned with their hypothetical carotid arteries.

And so, having finished dinner and watched "Jeopardy!" (I was watching "Jeopardy!" in the 70's, long before "Jeopardy!" was cool, and I'm certainly not going to miss it now that it commands a certain level of respect around the company water cooler. (When co-workers regale each other with stories of the latest viral quotes from "Duck Dynasty" (which I also watch) or "Jersey Shore" (which I only vaguely know exists and wouldn't watch just based on the hearsay comments I've heard), I whip out the trump-card: "Well, I wouldn't know--we watch "Jeopardy!" during that time." (I don't know if it actually carries the intellectual weight I wishfully think, but at least it isn't "Jersey Shore!"), I went out to address the issue of the fallen deer. It wasn't particularly cold out, so I was attired (rather nattily, if I do say so myself) in cotton pajama pants, a short-sleeved tee shirt and sandals. I carefully selected a few sticks of scrap lumber from my bucket of culls and whittled them into stakes under the glow of the carport light. Then, stakes, wire and mallet in hand, I headed out to the side yard to stake the deer.

Since I had my iPhone in my pocket, i decided the flashlight feature would be plenty bright for installing a few stakes. I tried kneeling but my knees quickly rebelled, due to the large crop of red oak acorns in the front yard; so there I was, sitting on my backside in the cool grass in my pajama pants, hammering stakes into the ground and wiring the deer's legs to them by the light of the cell phone. It wasn't quite a Norman Rockwell tableau, but it was pleasantly warm and I didn't really mind the task, so was humming "Silent Night" and hammering away...until I scooted to reach the final stake.

Having "scootched" (that's a word in every Southerner's dictionary that you'll never find beyond the Mason-Dixon) to the fourth and final stake, I raised my three pound sledge hammer to drive the wooden anchor deeper into the soil. That's when it hit me--not the mallet, but a realization: as I reached for the stake, it suddenly dawned on me that I was sitting in a depression. And let me assure you, it was not yet the middle of the next heartbeat before it occurred to me what might dwell in that depression!

A few yards away, under the other large oak tree in our yard, I had waged war on a nest of wasps for the better part of three months. They seemingly thrived on a steady diet of gasoline, insecticide, hot water and everything else we threw down their burrow, whose opening was the size of a one-quart Duke's mayonnaise jar. I shuddered at the thought.

If you need something to improve your focus on prayer, you could do worse that sitting astraddle a hole in the ground, wearing thin cotton pants, wondering whether a million yellow-jacketed, dagger-wielding demons of hell are plotting an invasion of your posterior regions!

Fortunately, the stings never came. I got the last stake in place (quickly!) and vacated the premises, proudly reporting to my Beloved that I had accomplished the task at hand and that there would be no further reindeer carnage on my watch. I got lucky. But what if? The truth is, this world is full of perils--many we see and many more we never do. God's grace protects us from most. Those we must endure, God uses to grow us. No experience, pleasant or painful, happy or sad, is ever wasted in God's economy. Rather, God bids us come to Him in prayer, trusting Him with our every need. Fears, struggles and failures are given us so that we can offer them back to God. And in bringing them to Him, we learn to know His goodness like the backs of our hands. Then, in the instantaneous flash of a car crash or a heart attack--or a suspected wasp nest--we don't hesitate to call out to Him. Instead of having to gather our courage to approach His throne, we already know just how much He loves us, and we shout to Him for rescue.

There are worse things than being stung--but not many in my book. I've had a couple of nasty allergic reactions to yellowjacket venom, and I certainly don't relish the notion of having anything sting me in such a sensitive anatomic region. But the beauty of God's love is this: nothing is too small or too silly for me to bring to Him. God loves for me to rely on Him, and He rejoices in giving me what I need.

What has been good for your prayer life this week? If nothing else, give thanks for the disasters that didn't happen!

Pardon Me If I Don't Join Your Drama...

2012-02-05T23:16:00.000-05:00

It seems to be a symptom of the internet age. Have you noticed? Without fail, every time I check Facebook, someone I know is outraged, frightened, angry or defiant about something! Not that there isn't a time and place to take exception with things, but I hope you'll pardon me if I don't join you in your outrage. You see, God's Word promises us something very dear to my heart in Psalm 125, verse 1:

Those Who trust in the LORD

are as Mount Zion,

Which cannot be moved,

but abides forever.

Can you imagine that? God says that those who trust in Him are immovable! No matter what happens, God promises that not only will I not come to ruin, but I won't even be moved from my spot. Mount Zion is a holy place, a symbol of God's abiding and of the permanence of what God has made. In face, it's more of a symbol that a reality, given that the actual location of Mount Zion has changed at least four times in the course of the recorded history of the Jewish people. But that doesn't really matter. God's purpose in using it symbolically in this psalm is to remind us that what God has made, what God has established and ordained and decreed, will never be brought to ruin or put to shame. Have you tried to move a mountain lately? It takes a lot more than a political election or a celebrity breakup or a financial downturn. Mountains even survive those who do not believe in them or share their viewpoint about God. Try convincing yourself that the mountain nearest to you doesn't exist; then try running headlong at it on a bicycle. You'll quickly find that no amount of disbelief or disagreement makes a mountain less intractable!

To put it another way, let me ask: If I trust God, if I believe these words to be true, why would I ever get very upset at all about the way the world goes? Presidents, preachers, politicians, popes and pop stars all hold their titles because God has allowed it to be so. If God has allowed a man (or woman!) to lead our nation, I have a duty before God to pray for that person--not to pray, "God protect us from this moron"--no, to pray "God bless the leader you have ordained for us. Guide him and help me to acknowledge that the government of nations is upon the shoulders of Your Son. Thank You, God, for the privilege to have my opinion heard; but protect me, God, from self-justifying rhetoric and hateful indictment of those You have allowed to rule." If my sports team (go Bayern-Munich!) wins or loses; if my favorite contestant does or doesn't become America's Idol; if things go my way at work or church or home or not, let me remember that the sovereign God of the universe has ordained it to be so, and let me shut my mouth from complaining and rather acknowledge that it is He who stands behind all of human history, and that nary a sparrow falls from the sky nor a flower blossoms that He does not see and care about.

As I alluded to previously, the great danger of these sorts of rantings is that they often amount more or less to a means to justify myself. When I hear someone who speaks evil of the president, I'm usually fairly sure that person has a deep-seated need to justify himself by degrading those who don't agree with him. Likewise, when someone casts aspersions on another church for the way they do things, or talks about the apparent flaws in the life of a celebrity or politician with venom and spite, it all sounds to me like a need to elevate oneself by degrading everyone who doesn't agree.

For myself, I know full well that there are many people in the world who disagree with me politically, theologically, culturally and in almost every other way you can imagine. Those people are not only entitled to their opinions, but I thank God that not everyone thinks just like I do. If you wan to positively identify a small-minded person, look for someone who has an obsessive need to make everyone agree with his own opinions and preferences. It has been well said, "Small minds talk about people; average minds talk about things; great minds talk about ideas." Even in complaining about such folks, I myself am guilty of the same kind of self-justification. It's a trap we all fall into, often without any knowledge that we are.

So, to recap:

My complaint: Those who feel the need to be constantly outraged or panicked about something.

My confession: It is those very people, not their issues, that make me crazy.

My solution: (Well, God's solution really!): Acknowledge and trust that God is God of Everything; that He knows and gives permission for many of the very things people go around ranting about; that He is in control, and that He has given each believer a firm footing, held fast by the gospel truth and the knowledge of God's power, making us as permanent and unshakable as the mightiest of mountains.

My advice: When the storms of politics, culture, religion, family life, economic troubles, health worries or anything else come to bear in your life, remember Who you belong to, and remember that in His power (not your own), you are immovable. Then, dare the storms in your life to shake you--refuse to be drawn into the drama of those who don't trust Him; feel compassion, not hatred, for those who don't share your views; and trust God to be all that He has promised He is.

May the peace of Christ guard your heart, and may the trust of God's Word give you boldness, for His glory.

Imperfect Advent: A Kiddie Pool Christmas

2011-12-08T01:27:00.004-05:00

"Uh-oh!" came my wife's words from the back bedroom where she was changing our young son, "I think the pool just blew away!"

Now, the first thing you need to know is that we aren't "those" people. Oh, you know who I mean--you talk about them, too--don't deny it! "Those" people are the ones who appear to live like a cross between June and Ward Cleaver and company and an Old Navy Christmas commercial--the ones who never have a wayward hair on the family pet, far less on their kid--and they certainly don't have any misbehaving kids. In fact, their lives are, to every outward appearance, practically perfect in every way. When I was a child, there was a family whom we knew as "those people." I'm not sure we actually hated or despised them in any way; more like, we were in awe of them (or at least of the way they appeared to be): every hair in place, children perfectly dressed and with impeccable deportment--heck, they were so perfect that the wife made it know among her friends that she ironed her husband's boxer shorts and socks. The man even polished the soles of his shoes--I mean, who does that?? We might not have despised them, but we certainly didn't appreciate their contribution to the community because, frankly, they made the rest of us (a/ka, the "normal people") look tacky and unaccomplished by comparison.

So, given that we're not "those people," Kristi's pronouncement didn't really surprise me a great deal.

The truth is, our life is imperfect. It's full of unfinished, incomplete things. It's cluttered with "I've been meaning to get to that" and "We've really got to do something about that!" It doesn't shine like the "those people" of my childhood. We used to say that the entire Those People family left a little path of clean in their wake wherever they went, sort of the antithesis to Charlie Brown's friend Pigpen. Our life is happy, but it isn't spit-shined and white-glove tested. When we have a Christmas party (sorry to tell you this, friends!) we always deem the first couple to arrive (you know, the ones who are perpetually thirty minutes early wherever they go) the "Oh @&*% They're Here Couple." So, when my wife shouted from the midst of diaper duty that the plastic baby pool had blown off the carport and was passing by the guest room window, it just seemed like the next logical turn of events to me. Racing outside in my Austrian felt mountain hat and bare feet, I slogged across the deep marsh of accumulated oak leaves outside our back door and lunged at the large flying object now making its way rapidly toward the open road a few hundred feet away. Turning wildly on its axis, the wading pool took an unexpected turn and briefly came at me as if it had some vendetta for having been left since Summer in a state of "yeah, I need to get that moved," then swung again, veering into our neighbor's driveway. As I finally nabbed my quarry, it very nearly took me down with it as my bare feet slipped on the wet grass, but at last I had the offending obstacle in hand and dragged it back to the carport. Looking around for a way to secure it, I seized on the nearest available object of weight: the cooler full of water, left over from the Thanksgiving turkey two weeks earlier. Planting the cooler of fetid turkey-brine in the pool, I happily re-entered our warm kitchen and announced to my very patient spouse that I had "captured the beast."

Yeah, we're not perfect. But, I guess that's the point. I mean, is anyone, really?

And yet, we go on pretending as if we were. Not just practically, but spiritually as well. And if you ask me, it's about time we were honest with ourselves and everyone else! That lady at church who arrives on the neighbors' doorstep with a pie thirty minutes before anyone else knows their grandma died? She probably has some struggles you don't see. Chances are, if you poked around at her house, there are a few pots of dead petunias under her deck and her lasagna doesn't always come out right on the first try. That neighbor who's lawn is always perfectly trimmed, with nary a stray leaf or blade of crabgrass? He might well trade his manicured fescue patch for a single memory of his father just once hugging him and saying "I love you, son." If you went to the home of those "practically perfect" people, I'm willing to bet they have a "junk drawer" just like you and I, and they probably have unwashed laundry in the bedroom they seal off when company comes over. But the lure of televised celebrity perfection has long-since rubbed off on the rest of us. We feel the need to aspire to and attain the very best: to have perfection on every level, to be fully organized, fully decorated, fully in control, and to never look anything but clean and calm and glamorous while doing so. But to what end? We try to present a spiritual perfection that portrays us as shellacked and polished, flawless and mature...but we're not. We've been trained by seminars and sermons, ad campaigns and advice columnists to accept nothing short of perfection, physically and spiritually--but you and I, my dear reader, are messes. I'd be surprised if your life is much neater than mine.

I'm a pastor, a spiritual leader of others; and yet, I have issues. I'm easily disappointed and discouraged. I'm far too tender-hearted at times, not nearly enough so at others. I seldom get truly angry, but I'm often annoyed by things so minor they shouldn't matter at all. I don't take criticism well. I have experienced deep, haunting depression at times in my life, and I have abandonment issues that make me cling to my friends and family in a way that probably seems too "clingy" at times. When I smash my thumb with a hammer, my outbursts could expand the vocabulary of many a longshoreman. (I tend to create novel, "compound" curse words: you know, the kind where you string 'em together, occasionally adding an adjective or adverb ending, just to make the grammar work?) Oh, and I'm high obsessive-compulsive. I correct grammar at every turn, and I seldom see a menu or a department store sign without feeling the need to remark on the deplorable state of American education. I'm quite good at forgiving, actually, and when I forgive, I generally forget. Perhaps if my memory were better for these things, I wouldn't keep getting into the same scrapes with the same people over and over again. I'm a Baptist pastor, and yet I don't particularly like dress clothes. I wear them for funeral and weddings, but I'd far rather wear shorts and flip-flops. I counsel people on marriage, yet when faced with a disagreement with my spouse, I often find that I have much for which to apologize. Oh, and another pet peeve of mine is dangling participles!

In short, I'm a mess. And chances are, you are too. But it's okay. Jesus came for us messes! Jesus came to earth for those who screw up and get mad and get frustrated and kick the dirt and cuss and occasionally whine when they don't get their way. He lives here among us because He knows there will be nights when the kiddie pool blows away and I have to chase it through the neighbor's yard in my bare feet in freezing weather and I'm not happy about it. God knows my life is full of half-done things, because I myself am a work-in-progress.

If I can't accept my own shortcomings, how will I ever encourage others? I'm not making excuses for my laziness and inaction--I'm just saying that when I die, if my laundry's not folded and the trash still needs taking out and the yard is a little behind on mowing, but I've spent time loving others and encouraging some people to faith and sitting with the sick and hugging some people who haven't been hugged lately...I'm not going to see that as failure.

God loves the crippled and the inept, the lazy and the careless and the fearful and the the losers just the same. It's probably not a coincidence that the angels first announces the Messiah's birth not to senators or kings or celebrities of any kind, but to fearful, doubtful, workaday men who smelled of sheep and unwashed clothing and manure. Not a gilded palace, but a drafty, miserable cave was good enough for Jesus to come into this world--and I'm willing to bet the floors weren't swept and the livestock wasn't perfectly behaved!

As we celebrate the coming of Jesus, Savior of the Messy and Unfinished, why don't you try not to stress too much about the wreath you didn't get up on the mailbox or the turkey you know will be dry, no matter what you do to it? Why not put aside your "to do" list, even for a few hours, and sit in the light of your half-decorated tree that leans a little to the left because the floor's uneven there and drink a cup of something warm and remember that this season isn't about you or me or about anyone else who's got messy, unfinished stuff. It's about Jesus--and His stuff is always perfect. And in Him, our stuff is made perfect, too. God blesses the well-intentioned gift that didn't get bought in time. He blesses the not-so-juicy turkey and the lopsided gingerbread men who look like they're scowling and the messy floors and the hampers of laundry and the dirty, unkempt children when we put aside our striving after perfection and just celebrate Him. In fact, it is not in spite of, but in light of my messiness that Jesus shines; and when I seek Him, suddenly He provides all my needs and many of my wants...just as He has promised!

So this year, I wish you a Messy, Messy Christmas and an Imperfect New Year!

Thankful for a Mystery

2011-11-25T12:07:00.000-05:00

In the afterglow of Thanksgiving Day, I always find myself reflecting more on the things I'm grateful for. I suppose that's what the holiday is supposed to do for us--to make us more attuned to daily thankfulness, and to refresh our sense of it by gathering with those we love and enjoying some particularly tasty blessings and remembering how good life is. This morning, as I reflect, I am reminded of a blessing I am particularly thankful for: the mystery of God.

Now, let me say that by nature I am not a person who enjoys the unknown. Any of my close friends or family will quickly tell you that I am the kind of fellow who finds it necessary to get out of a warm bed in the middle of the night and go searching for a reference book to answer some sort of nagging question that has arisen in my mind as I was falling asleep. The very fact that I have shelf after shelf of books, many of them reference volumes, in my home is probably testament to the fact that I like knowing things, enjoy informing myself and learning new facts and skills, and that I prefer the known to the unknown. Since I was a very young child, I have always wanted to know about everything around me--to know the name of every creature, the workings of every machine, the minute details of even very mundane things. Long before I would reach the age for kindergarten, my older brother and his friends found it amusing to pull out the World Book Encyclopedia and quiz me by pointing out pictures of various birds, reptiles and mammals, which I could name from memory and often knew a few details about, despite not being able to read at all. My patient parents would explain everything I asked, read the encyclopedia and dictionary and every other book under the sun to me, and help me try to find out the things I wanted to know. I went through phases of keen interest in certain things, like the period when I was utterly fascinated with bats. I think my interest stemmed from a brief discussion of them in an elementary school class. At any rate, I remember the wonderful librarians who oversaw the local public library at the time sending off for loaner books for me--not picture books, but large, thick scientific tomes dedicated to the study of chiropterans (the fancy, scientific family-name for bats.) It came as no surprise to anyone that my undergraduate college major switched from journalism to science after the first semester, because it seemed to be born into me to be inquisitive.

In my graduate seminary studies, I found that I loved the historical details of people's lives, the understanding of culture and its impact on spirituality and faith.

And yet, one of my favorite aspects of God's nature is the sheer mystery, the abundance of the unknown in the personality of Him Who Was and Is and Is To Come. It seems to be part and parcel of God's nature that He is both known and unknown, knowable and unknowable, certain and mysterious. From the initial "Bereshit berah elohim..." of the book of Genesis, there is both revelation and mystery.
In the creation narrative, we see God as disembodied Spirit, moving across the face of utter void, creating earth and sky and sea and all the miraculous, mysterious, complex lifeforms that inhabit them just by speaking them into existence. From mud and the breath of His nostrils, El Elyon makes man and then, inexplicably, uses Adam's rib to create the second, fairer sex. The Word speaks of giants who once inhabited the land, of angels and men in intimate relation, of Leviathan which inhabited the deep and of the subsequent destruction of all that God had made, save Noah and his kin. The history of God's people--of His nurture and protection and preservation of those who love Him throughout the ages, is a mystery in itself. The fulfillment of age-old prophecies about the coming Messiah--of His lineage and birthplace and minute details of His life and ministry and death, defy all attempts at explanation. Jesus' life itself, from its proclamation to Elizabeth and Zacharias, to the angel's visitation of Mary, to the Savior's birth in a lowly backwater town--the list goes on and on of the incredible, mysterious, miraculous details of His life. In the gospels, we read again and again of the mystery of life, and of the mysterious process that will one day transform us into the image of glory for which we were always made. In John's vision, another mysterious and promising creation is revealed: a day when the toils and struggles of this world will have passed away and we will stand justified despite our failings, to live eternally in heaven--a mystery in itself. The Bible names no location, nor does it give more than symbolic detail of heaven itself. It's promise is alluring, yet we are told little about what will happen there. And in-between, we find ourselves in a perpetual state of mystery: plagued by the sinful limitations of our earthly selves, yet vaguely aware that we are spiritual beings only temporarily limited to the physical domain.

There is a lot of not-knowing in all of that--a lot of wishing and hoping and longing to know more, to better understand, to be less mystified. Yet, at the same time even I can see the incredible value of God's mystery. What if God had revealed to me all the details of times past, of the creation and the flood and the wonders of the first testament? What if it were given to me to understand the miraculous fulfillment of prophecy, the means of Christ's coming and sacrifice and transfiguration? What if I could know the inner workings of the soul and of how my physical body is connected to it? What if God had chosen to give me not just images and symbols and promises, but the exact details of this heavenly dwelling-place my soul seems to long for so much?

I suspect that in many things, not-knowing is better than full comprehension; that for me to rely in faith on the goodness and right intention of the Creator is better than for me to catalog facts and record observations and analyze facts and details. The truth is, a great many people have tried to reduce God's nature, even His very existence, to a set of verifiable observations. Many years of training in biology, graduate and undergraduate, have taught me that to take any being and reduce it to its statistical measurements and factual data is to drain it not only of mystery, but of much of its actual existence. Take, for example, a blue jay: from a very young age, I knew one when I saw it at the windowsill where we put out bird food. At a later age, I learned about its habits, its diet and its relationship to other birds. In college, I had a wonderful Ornithology professor who always kept the windows open while teaching. As we sat at our lab tables, taking notes, he would occasionally stop in mid-sentence during his lecture, cock his head to one side, and name the bird currently singing outside the window. From this, I will always remember that the blue jay's scientific name is Cyanocitta cristata (literally, "blue, chattering, crested bird") and if I took the trouble to walk a few steps to my bookshelf of field guides, I could no doubt retrieve its average length and weight, its home and migratory ranges, its primary diet and a litany of other factual details about it. Yet, if you had never seen a blue jay, to give you all of those details would do precious little justice to this noble, bossy, transcendently beautiful creature. For me to tell you every detail of what a blue jay is would, in fact, do very little in comparison to even a fleeting glimpse of the bird itself, because every living being is far more than the sum of its component parts; more than the cumulative sum of its statistical values. It has been my observation over the years that even quite young children are able to discern that the dead body of an animal or a person is missing something quite important--that it is no more the person or creature that it once represented, but that what remains is merely a shell, a husk of what once was.

And so it would doubtless be with me, if I were able to know all the mysteries embodied in the personhood of God. Like man who was made in His eternal image, God exists as spirit, quite apart from the limitations of the physical and temporal world. In Jesus Christ, God took on the cloak of humanity, so that we could see His divine nature more nearly, but the man, Jesus, was only a limited representation of the fullness of God--fully divine, but also only a bit of God's totality. If I knew more--if there were nothing left to my imagination--if I had no questions, only knowledge, I suspect that I would be much less enamored of God and less likely to seek after Him. Just as in romantic love, there is an element of discovery--the promise of learning more (or at the least the hope of it) that keeps us wanting more and deeper relationship. In some ways, my relationship with God bears good comparison to courtship--yet the mystery of the ages is that is the Divine Who courts the mundane--God who pursues my heart, and not vice-versa.

Yes, I am thankful for the mystery, glad that I do not understand nor hope to comprehend in this life all that is God. To know even a bit of Who He is gives me comfort and peace, because what has been revealed is so amazing, so powerful, so perfect that I can have abiding faith that the unknown aspects of my Creator can only be better. I long for the day when, in the words of Paul writing to the church at Corinth, "I will know, even as I am known." In the meantime, for the span of my days here, I choose to rejoice in the mystery, to celebrate the unknown and worship the Unseen and Almighty.

My prayer for you, my fellow-traveler, is that not too much will be revealed to you, and that you will continue in faith, content to rejoice in the mystery that is God, until that day when we discover together all that He has in store for us. May God Himself bless your journey today!

2011-11-19T01:04:00.002-05:00

Our church has an amazing team of volunteers who share their love of photography while producing photos and video for use in our worship services, publications, etc.
Check out these beautiful images of the mountains, taken by Grace Photographers. Enjoy!

Dimestore Theology and the Thinking Believer

2011-10-26T00:50:00.000-04:00

I have a confession: fun-loving as I normally am, I can be something of a killjoy at times, I suppose. Maybe it's my inquisitive nature; maybe the scientific training that for years has taught me to analyze and seek out what is provable, weeding out anything that is sentiment or prejudice.

At any rate, it crops up often at gift shops and Christian bookstores and the like: something catches my mind--a sign, a greeting card, some sort of motto on a bracelet or a t-shirt--and the next thing my poor wife knows, I'm rambling on, talking about theology!

The problem, as I see it, is that a very great deal of bad theology is conveyed by pop culture. Though many folks might think it's the territory only of divinity students with store-bought halos, slaving over thick volumes of obscure writings, the truth is, theology is everywhere! From "WWJD" bracelets to bumper stickers declaring everything from "God is my co-pilot" to "Honk if you love Jesus", there is a tremendous range of religious sentiment up for grabs on the shelves of stores across America; and like it or not, much of what is read sinks-in and becomes a part of our theological perspective. At least, that's what happens by default, when we don't think critically or attempt to sift through the barrage of inspiration and pure drivel that is American pop spirituality. Because I'm aware of this hazard, I suppose I tend at times to be overly analytical, going into what may be a bit more discussion and critique of such things than others really want to hear.

Yesterday, at a tourist spot, I rounded a corner to see the following hand-painted sign for sale, complete with angelic messengers:

Miracles happen

for those who believe

Honestly, I've gotten so used to this sort of thing, I hardly have to stop and think. In a flash I thought, "That's not right!" Don't get me wrong--like most such sayings plastered on trinkets and plaques, I'm sure it was probably meant by the painter in complete sincerity...but the fact remains, it's junk theology. I think even a modest familiarity with the Bible would suggest that miracles in fact happen not for the benefit of those who believe, but for the benefit of those who struggle to find faith. Jesus worked miraculous healing and did other signs and wonders in order to gain an audience with those outside the family of God, and to give them a cause to believe. And speaking of "believe", that word is probably at the top of my personal "hit-list" of junk theology. How often does a sign or card or shirt proudly bear the slogan "Just believe"? To be honest, though I can understand the kind of thinking that says any positive message is good, the truth is, it matters a very great deal what and in whom you believe! In our pluralistic, politically-correct world, it seems the prevailing message is that no one is allowed to claim to have absolute truth, and that to do so only serves to prove that you're short-sighted and intolerant. Further, our society seems to overwhelmingly teach that to disagree with someone else's viewpoint on religious matters is to judge, condemn and disrespect that person. I can't say I'm surprised that we've progressed in this vein, but it's certainly with chagrin that I contemplate the world my son will face one day when he stands up for the truth of the gospel. If you're still reading at this point, chances are you haven't been deeply offended and don't think I'm an idiot (else, presumably, you would have switched to reading something else, or are now telling your significant other about my lunacy!) But just in case, if you're appalled at my lack of "respect" for those who think differently, allow me to explain myself. In my opinion, anyone who isn't sure enough of his own opinion about something as important as the eternal destiny of mankind to share it with others, just doesn't have much faith in what he says he believes. Based on my personal experience, I am convinced beyond any shadow of doubt of the universality of the force of gravity on all things on the planet Earth. I have seen time and again how gravity brings objects earthward. From Gallileo's experiments, I know that mass of an object has no bearing on its rate of fall in a vacuum, but factors significantly into the equation where the resistance of air comes into play. Because I am convinced of this principle, I feel compelled, upon seeing a young child perched upon the edge of a roof with a bathrobe "cape", to inform the lad of the brutality of the impending education he is about to receive and to make my best effort at dissuading him from carrying out his planned experimental procedure. Failing his listening to reason, I even would feel the need to make at least some valiant effort to break his fall, because I am convinced beyond reasonable doubt that the outcome will not be to his liking. In the same way, my experience of years of living has shown me, beyond any reasonable doubt, that God is at work in my life even in those moments when I am convinced otherwise. I have experienced His care, His miraculous intervention in my poor choices and His pursuit of my soul when I was running headlong everywhere but toward Him. For this reason, when I see someone who is struggling, poised on the brink of putting full faith in some other principle than the one I have seen borne out time after time in my life, I feel a tremendous urge to intervene. When someone I meet doesn't listen to what I have to say, but instead launches himself skyward with faith in a feeble, ineffective means of salvation, I feel an obligation to at least make every effort in my power to spread a safety net, to seek a means to dissuade him or cause him to reconsider. I find it quite difficult to say, "Oh, well, Sonny--you've made your choice, hope the cape works for you!"

So, back to the sign: for whom do miracles happen? Is the sign suggesting "those who believe are the recipients of miracles?"; or "miracles happen for the benefit of believers?" Either way, I disagree. To suggest that belief is a prerequisite for God to do miracles is something I have seen solidly disproved, in my own life and in the lives of others. As the Scripture says, "...He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and unjust." (Matthew 5:45) Likewise, if the suggestion of the sign is that miracles are the benefit of believers, I find this hard to swallow. From what I have seen, and from what the Scripture clearly demonstrates, miracles are done for God's glory and the benefit of those who do not believe, that they might be convinced of the truth of the gospel. I don't condemn someone for having made what they probably saw as an encouraging sign, but it frustrates me that so much of the theology I see espoused on the internet and in churches seems to come from such "junk" sources, rather than from the word of God. I hear people tell others who are sick or suffering, "Just have faith!" and I wonder, "faith in what?" I hear people say they're "sending good thoughts your way" to someone in need, and I wonder if that's somehow helpful? I know that talking to the God of the Universe and interceding for those we love works, but I'm dubious about anyone's "good thoughts", well-intentioned though they may be. For my money, I'd rather have your prayers than your good thoughts, and I'd rather put my faith in God than in the power of believing. I can believe all day long that I could jump off that roof with a bathrobe tied to my back and fly, but there is a harsh, painful reality at the end of that experience, and that faith will prove to be misplaced. Why would I not want to share the faith that I have found saves me such pain and rescues me from hardship, not to mention the gift of eternal life?

I pray you will have good thoughts toward me, but moreover I pray they will result in your prayers for me. I believe God does miracles in my life, but I don't believe they're dependent on my faith or lack thereof, and I believe they are for His glory, not mine. My prayer for you is that you will consider well the things you believe, be a thinking consumer of popular theology, and make God's Word the only standard for what you believe about the gospel. God bless you on your journey!

Thicker Than Blood: A Theology of Heaven

2011-09-07T01:02:00.003-04:00

Like many of those who may read this article, my own path to Christian faith came by a winding (and often bumpy!) path. As I grew in faith during my early twenties, I found that God was bending my heart to mentor students, bringing the gospel to school classrooms and gyms and parking lots and cafeterias as much as to preach it in a white-painted church house. Along that path, a part of my earthly compensation has come in deep and lasting relationships, often with those many years my junior.

As a result, my life (and my home) have often been populated with youth. For years, they showed up unannounced on my doorstep, cleared the contents of my refrigerator, abused my furniture, slept on my floor--and blessed my heart deeply! Some twenty-plus years after my initial foray into youth ministry, my wife and I have served churches in a variety of capacities, writing and teaching and preaching and leading missions. As time has a way of refining us all, the unexpected late-night knocks on the window and impromptu sleepovers have faded into oblivion, but our lives are no less blessed by those younger than ourselves and, to our joy, their enthusiasm and frankness and energy now have become blended not only into our own lives, but into those of friends our own age and above, those of our parents and my siblings and now, that of our fifteen month-old son, Sawyer.

On any given weekend, you might find a rowdy crowd of laughing, loving but seemingly mismatched loved ones assembled under our meager carport or roaming our yard and home. From my wife Kristi, a career educator who has worked most with mentally and behaviorally-challenged children to myself, with my odd mix of undergraduate and graduate biology studies, seminary training and an assortment of strange avocations ranging from herpetology to cooking to carpentry; from my mother-in-law with her sense of humor and sparkling smile that definitely don't suggest a retiree with a grandchild; to our toddler son who is toying with talking and walking, we are a diverse group, just within our own family.

Those who gather with us, however, represent a motley crew of beloved friends. We have friends ranging in age from around 18 or so to their upper 70's; country folk and city folk; dropouts and the occasional doctor-of-something-or-other; professional and blue-collar, with vocations including (but not limited to): ministry, education, painting, nursing, sales, students, plumbing, banking, medicine, professional mothering, computer technology and retirees!

Among those dear to us are my friend since junior high school, whose passion for education and skills with technology might qualify him for much broader horizons than the small mountain college where he chooses to use them to benefit students so few he is able to know not only his own, but virtually every student in the school by name. Like the proverbial village needed to raise a child, he works in close rapport with a team of others who have brought their skills to bear in a limited focus, in order to better impact individual students' lives. We've traveled the world together for decades now, each of us seeing places we'd never have visited alone perhaps, and my wife, son and mother-in-law, as well as my parents and sisters, adore him. We've never had a seriously cross word between us in millions of miles of travel and untold hours of shared labor, and his family is equally like part of my own.

Another friend is my "prodigal son" of sorts. When he was young, I think more of his waking hours were spent at church or at my house or in my truck than at his parents' house some weeks. Like a majority of youth kids, there were times when college life led him to drift away, the sort of inevitable divide that's a consequence of spreading one's wings and sometimes, of a sense of disillusionment or awkwardness as the struggles of learning to live as an adult and deal with life's challenges and temptations make it tough to face those who have attempted to give form and substance to one's spiritual convictions. We never had a single argument that I can remember, but life made it too easy to drift out of touch for long periods. If anything, I may have failed him by not being more insistent about maintaining contact, or by not being quick enough to speak up when it seemed trouble might be brewing. At any rate, by God's abundant grace our paths crossed again, and each of us experienced deep and lasting growth as God moved in our lives individually about that same time. It doesn't seem like a coincidence to me that when God moves in my life, he often does it through the influence of someone near to me. I appreciate the depth of caring and the abiding sense of love that is shared between us, just hanging out, working together or cooking dinner. Again, travel has been a bond, taking us to several countries together, and through a variety of life's changes and stages of growth. In recent months, I had the privilege of forging the legal and spiritual bond that God's love had already made between my beloved friend and a woman so sweet and gentle that she has brought an even deeper level of closeness to our lives together.

One of my closest friends now lives far away, but somehow our relationship feels as close as it ever did in all the years we've shared. I remember the day when I made an announcement at church about an upcoming event for teens. When the service was over, a boy who looked to be about 11 asked, "Can I come?" I gave him a ride home after church that day, and it was just a matter of a few days until he first told me, "I love you." To be honest, given my experience with teenagers, I was a bit startled. When I seemed surprised, he cheerfully explained, "My dad says you should always tell people you care about, because you never know when you'll get to see them again!" Let me tell you, I say "I love you" to my friends a lot more than I ever used to. I feel the urgency of that mandate, to share love while we can, and I am constantly aware of the blessing of being part of a generation of men who are at peace with expressing their care for each other as friends. Again, travels have bonded us, as have untold hours of shared work and ministry, of prayer on the giant stuffed bass that used to grace my office sofa, of meals taken around his family's table, of movie nights and graduations and another blessed wedding that brought yet another beloved and gracious member into our extended family.

Another dear friend is the son of folks I've counted as dear friends since long before he was ever considered. Over time, God has brought our paths to cross in deeper and deeper ways. Now we share the same church home, lots of laughs and shared meals and of course, the infamous cookouts under our carport. My friend's shear goodness is just overwhelming--he has a way of finding the silver lining in everything; of always showing up or texting or calling at the moment most needed; of never failing to smile in a way that is entirely too infectious to avoid catching, and of a quiet faithfulness that gives me security, knowing there will always be someone who cares and listens and encourages.

...and the list goes on and on. I could talk for days about the fantastic, joyful, honest, real people God has brought into my life and my home. For the sake of this brief essay, I can't take space to relate all of the wonderful experiences I've had, but suffice it to say, I have been blessed very deeply by the breadth and depth and diversity of the friendships God has brought into my life.

Our friends encompass believers and seekers; the conservative and the freewheeling, the tatooed and the pierced and the traditional; couples and singles, young and...."less-young". But it's more than just a conglomeration of souls: this crazy, motley, extended family of ours is the work of God in our lives. I can't believe that such an assortment could have come together by random chance, any more than my scientific training and observation could allow me to believe that life itself is the product of random chance. In fact, the more years that pass, the better I can see God's hand at work, drawing my path to cross that of friends I've yet to meet. Those who once professed to hate me have come to be dear friends. Those who once thought what I preached was law and tradition have come to see God's grace at work in my life and have often opened the door for Him to work in their own.

I don't share any DNA or even particularly look like most of those dearest to me in life. But there is a bond thicker than mere blood that brings not only an assurance of love and mutual caring, but of the very purpose for which we were all made.

In short, these friendships--no, this family--is my vision of what heaven will be like. Maybe yours is different, but allow me to suggest that many will be surprised to find a heaven populated with people of every race, stature, personality, political persuasion and musical preference imaginable. Too often, our temptation is to envision an afterlife populated with those who look like ourselves, but given that much of the joy in my life comes through those who are most different from myself, and given that God made and dearly loves them all, I suspect that the crowd huddled under our carport on any given Saturday in September probably looks a good bit more like heaven than do the paintings of old. What would happen if everyone who claims the name of Christ would catch that vision? If we began to see the people we so easily categorize: "stoner"..."freak"..."geek"..."loner"..."loser"--what if we began to see those folks as our housemates in mansions where we will dwell in the eternal, uninterrupted presence of God? What if, when faced with someone's music that grates on my last nerve, I remembered: "God created that sound for His praise!" What then? What if the very differences that naturally make us shy away from others here on earth became the evidence of God's plan to fill heaven with voices of every timbre, with faces of every color and with the laughter of all those whom the Creator knew before they were ever born and destined to bring Him praise?

I pray God would grant you the kind of love and joy we find in our beloved friends; that you would catch a glimpse of heaven's glory in the faces of those you pass on the street each day; and that you would say "I love you" as often and as passionately and as freely as God Himself loves you!

I'd like to teach the world to sing...

2011-09-05T15:39:00.001-04:00

Does anyone else miss the days when songs actually meant something? Not to sound like an "old timer" at 43, but I have to confess, I do occasionally pine for the days when I was a child and the music streaming from our radios and 8-track tape players (yeah, I remember those!) was a bit more cerebral and considerably less self-focused than a good part of what I hear on the airwaves of today.

Instead of "...I'm richer than you'll ever hope to be / I love me some drugs and money / I wanna **** that chick...", much of the music of the 70's went more along these lines (click the song titles for links to YouTube video of performances):

I'd like to build the world a home

and furnish it with love

Grow apple trees and honey bees

and snow white turtle doves

I'd like to teach the world to sing

in perfect harmony

I'd like to hold it in my arms

and keep it company

I'd like to see the world for once

all standing hand in hard

And hear them echo through the hills

for peace throughout the land

I'd like to teach the world to sing

in perfect harmony,

A song of peace that echoes on

and never goes away...

They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel *, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

They took all the trees
Put 'em in a tree museum *
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see 'em

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

Hey farmer farmer
Put away that DDT * now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees
Please!

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

Late last night
I heard the screen door slam
And a big yellow taxi
Took away my old man

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

They paved paradiseAnd put up a parking lot

You could argue that "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing", originally written and performed as part of a Coca Cola ad campaign or "Big Yellow Taxi", which lapses between concern for the environment and lost love (the titular "big yellow taxi" refers to a police car, which were yellow in Joni Mitchell's hometown of Toronto) are sappy and sentimental. In fact, I might agree to an extent; but my point is more about the subject matter they address: Jim Croche, Joni Mitchell, Cat Stevens, John Lennon and a host of others certainly experienced the drug culture and free love that were a part of the 60's and 70's, but even with a penchant for experimentation and a free-wheeling spirituality that tried to synthesize transcendental meditation, Christianity, secular humanism and a variety of other beliefs, the net effect of much of their music was a cry for peace, a seeking after balance and human decency and mutual respect.

My thoughts are filtered through the mind of a Christian believer, and I can't completely put that aside. Certainly there was a good deal of music in my childhood that was experimental, some that was obscene--but for the most part, it feels in retrospect as if there was much less self-focus and self-promotion. Croche sang about "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" and advised us "You Don't Mess Around with Jim"--but most of his work wasn't about abusing women, amassing wealth and glorifying excess. The 70's singers seem, if anything, to have had a note of apology about their own shortcomings--a sense of some level of personal humility--that's much more appealing to me than today's self-promoting, self-absorbed rappers and rockers.

If you're interested, let me add that I don't just like 70' music; in fact, I enjoy a wide range of current and "oldies" tunes, and I like a lot more than the so-called peace songs and ballads. Creedence Clearwater Revival, Pink Floyd and Meatloaf, along with Waylon Jennings and Tanya Tucker, Lynryd Skynyrd and Charlie Daniels shaped my musical heritage. I like rock, pop, country, soul--you name it. I'm not much for rap, but I can appreciate some of it as artistic, though much of it feels far from artistic to me.

I just long for the days when music encouraged us to love peace and harmony, not drugs and drink and sex. Doesn't the world have enough violence and injustice and immorality already? I can't say radio dictates what the world does but, like television news media, I believe it probably influences a lot of listeners, younger ones in particular. Anyone have a song about peace? How about a sappy love song or a hippie environmental tune? I'm all ears!

A Cup of Cold Vinegar in Jesus' Name

2011-07-12T22:54:00.000-04:00

And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to

one of these little ones because he is my disciple,

I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward."

Matthew 10:42 (NIV)

It has occurred to me that Jesus' words and others in the Bible that talk about "sharing a cup of cold water" with others have become grossly distorted in the lives of today's Christ-followers.

I don't know about you, but I'm a big water-drinker. I rarely drink sodas or sweet tea these days (although I agree with the sentiment that sweet tea is the "house wine of the Southland", and I have NO idea how anyone could even entertain the notion of drinking it unsweetened!) Pepsi is fine with some things like pizza, and I will drink tea occasionally, but when it comes to quenching thirst, there is only one beverage in my opinion, sweet Carolina spring water! When I first began working with a missions agency in Northern Mexico, leading students in learning to build homes for poverty-stricken locals, we were reminded by the first aid team that sodas contain so much sugar that drinking one not only fails to hydrate your body, but requires more than four times the same volume of pure water to clear the sugar from your system. In essence, to drink sugar-sweetened drinks depletes your body of water even more, so the effect is quite the opposite of staying hydrated by drinking water.

In biblical times, as is still the case in much of the world today, the availability of fresh, clean water was the primary limiting factor on human life. Before the advent of well-drilling technology, hand-digging a well with no means of accurately determining the likelihood of actually striking water, was at best an often-futile venture. One of my dear friends, Kieth Larrimore, finds his ministry calling in teaching technological principles and skills that can be transferred and applied in various places. One of his primary focuses is teaching well-drilling and water-acquisition technologies to missionaries headed to third-world countries. If you don't know it, water-borne illnesses still kill a tremendous number of people around the world and many people die for lack of clean, drinkable water in the world each month. In a big way, Kieth's ministry is about "teaching people to fish"--about teaching missionaries to teach local people in remote places how to acquire and manage clean water sources. I'm saying it just because he's an amazing friend to me, but Kieth is a really good example of someone who has recognized his God-given talents and passions, found a practical way to apply them, and rejoices in serving God where he's been planted. God grant that we would all find that kind of fulfillment in life!

So, when Scripture speaks of "offering cold water" in Jesus' name, the reference is to more than refreshment--it's talking about giving life! When we offer a cold cup (or perhaps a dipper-gourd or mason jar-full?) of chilly water to a friend, stranger or enemy in His name, we bring refreshment for the moment, but in that refreshing, we also give new passion and energy for life. How often have I been rejuvenated by a swig of ice water from a quart Mason jar, wrapped in a brown paper bag and carried to the hayfield by my loving grandmother? How many times has even a sip of cool water cleared the dust of Mexican streets or Appalachian gravel roads or Alpine trails from my lungs and not only reduced my body temperature, but also given me the sense that I might go on a bit longer, keep pushing to load the last bale or finish shingling the roof or building the wall or climbing the mountain? To be sure, more than refreshment comes from this gift of cool water, both literally and figuratively.

In the figurative realm, which likely is more of what Jesus had in mind, our gifts of refreshment may consist of cool water...or homemade jam, or a cup of coffee (even if it's from the office dripolator--it's better than nothin'!) We might give a smile or a hug or best of all, maybe some kind words or a listening ear. Sometimes, we must fall back on the Ministry of Presence, for those situations where there are no cheering words and trite sayings would be like pouring salt on an open wound. The point of Jesus' words is this: ALL ministry to others in His name is worthy of reward from God, and nothing we do to serve and bless our fellow man goes unnoticed in heaven.

The problem, I think, comes in with human nature. Within each of us, as a result of Adam's sin, is a deep-seated urge to justify ourselves. And when it comes to making myself feel better, nothing beats putting down a fellow pilgrim! I'm faced continually with opportunities to bless those in spiritual or emotional need. I can choose to acknowledge the pain in their lives, which often drives them to sin and practical separation from God in their daily lives. In my brokenness, I am tempted to withhold the spiritual refreshment someone else needs to receive from me.

A cup of cold water doesn't seem like much. Neither does a hug or a word of praise. Yet, the smallest and most basic gifts we give others may have the effect of restoring life to someone who is dying emotionally or spiritually. The least act of kindness may be like a lifeline for someone who is, or feels like she is, drowning in a sea of despair.

Jesus' word to us is this: in sharing tiny things, we may open the door for miracles in the lives of those around us. Everyone needs refreshing--from the most successful to the least; from the most socially-popular to the outcast; both enemies and friends. And if you truly want to make an enemy into a friend, try offering some words of compassion, some practical acts of care, or simply the reassurance that you respect and admire someone, regardless of their professed liking or dislike of you. There is incredible power in sharing such gifts, and God works powerfully in the lives of others when we are faithful to draw from the well of blessing we have been given and cool and comfort our fellow weary travelers.

This week, look for at least a few opportunities each day to offer something refreshing to a neighbor, coworker, friend or stranger. As you do, pray that God will give a deeper refreshing that comes from the well of eternal life, for Jesus says that when we drink deeply from that spring, we will never thirst again!

Grace in the Garden: Grandmother's Love

2011-02-14T00:49:00.000-05:00

To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven... If it weren't for winter's cold and gray, I don't suppose Springtime would be as warm and bright. How much better my life is when I rejoice in the sure promise of what's to come, and see past the momentary chills and gray skies of the present! Since I was a little guy, lots of friends would talk about being excited to see all the toys and stuff in the new Sears and Roebuck catalog that always came out before Christmas each year. For me, the highlight of the year (literally!!) was the day that kraft paper-wrapped full color catalog arrived in the mailbox from the Walter Atlee Burpee Seed Company. I would take it and sprawl out on the floor in a room all by myself and savor every picture and every word. From Burpee, I learned what Celeriac is (not a disease, but a really tasty root vegetable! I first ate it in Germany, but now we cook it often at home.) I learned about growing zones defined by the Department of Agriculture, and which plants were hardy in certain areas and which were not. I learned about grafting, budding, cross-pollination, how hybrids were created and how grower select for specific traits. I memorized the scientific names of hundreds of vegetables, flowers and fruits, almost all of which I can still recall off the top of my head to this day. I read about exotic species from the far corners of the globe, and wondered if some day I would travel to those places, too. THEN, I would take the catalog very carefully (I became quite upset if anyone wrinkled it, or wrote on the cover!)--I would carefully take it with me to my grandparents' house, where my grandmother Hawkins would sit down with me on the couch in the den and lovingly re-read the entire thing, with one of her strong arms around me. We ooo'd and ahh'd and plotted and planned, making a list of all the seed we'd order and planning what amounted to a majority of the food we'd eat in the coming year. When the seeds came, I would plant them with care and tend them in a coldframe my Dad built for me when I was in elementary school (I was in 6th grade when I got my first greenhouse; two more would follow, the current one 28 x 40 feet). I planted them carefully, tomatoes and peppers and eggplant always in clay pots because they held moisture better and because they retained heat best in the coldframe, as they had to be started in January, long before the fast-growers like squash and cucumber, which I raised in peat pots and planted just a few weeks before they would be planted out in the big garden at my grandparents, the garden plot that sat where a fort once protected the first settlers from thieves and natives on their trek Westward. Having learned from the Burpee catalog and from James Underwood Crockett's 'Victory Garden' books that one always plants two seeds per pot, I would agonize when the day came to snuff out the weaker of the two seedlings then, steeling my nerve, carefully snip the runt, leaving the stronger contender to grow proud and strong before assuming its rightful place in the garden row. I loved my Grandmother Hawkins dearly. I loved everything about her: how every time I stepped into her kitchen through the carport door, she would hug me: not a 'forearm hug', not a pat on the back—no, my Grandmother gave great huge, full-body hugs—the kind you only get from a large, bosomy woman who loves you so much she envelopes you and practically suffocates you in the process of expressing it. Of the many, many people who have influenced my life, I think often of the gifts I received from Grandmother. I'm not referring to material gifts, but to those gifts that touch spirit and character and soul, often given unawares and likewise received. Such gifts are of things like so many things in life, better caught than taught; and they often work like timed-release capsules, yielding their results in our lives subtly and gently and gradually, yet often with considerably more impact and success than any effort to forcibly “inject” character, manners or empathy. One of the great things about love is that while each of us knows it when we experience it, no one—scientist, poet or philosopher—can define it, manufacture it or create a formula to teach it to others. Love is unique for each of us, and each of us defines what it looks like and feels like, based largely on some set of past experiences. In many ways, it's like the presence of the Holy Spirit: I can't tell you how it will feel for you, nor even a set of absolute traits by which it can be identified; but I know without doubt when He is moving in me. For me, the moments that define love are many, and a number of them revolve around my Grandmother: those giant embraces which seemed at times like a caress from a grizzly bear, but I longed for them so much! the times spent poring over the Burpee catalog; the shared savoring of the feel of warm, soft Carolina clay earth in our hands as we planted my lovingly-grown peppers and tomatoes together; the won't-take-'no'-for-an-answer love that would wrestle a good-sized kid to the floor, if necessary, to feed him one more chicken leg or piece of chocolate cake. And then there was the watermelon! When I was young, we all did a bit of farming in our family: my dad raised beef cattle, my uncles hogs and chickens. My cousin had turkeys and he and my brother used to show ponies which, along with my Dad's Tennessee walking horses and a revolving assortment of other critters, inhabited my Granddad's property. And we all raised a garden! One big, sprawling patch of ground, anchored by a wizened old Bartlett pair tree with a partially hollow trunk. When you farm, the calendar is marked not with greeting-card holidays or the days of patron saints, but with the cycle of tilling and planting and tending and harvesting, a cycle that no doubt marked Adam's primeval calendar, as well. It was all fun—I loved every part, but the very best was harvesting, which usually came in the evening, the pear tree's shade bringing welcome respite from the day's work of bailing and loading hay. And of all our produce, none was more welcome—whether homegrown, storebought or bartered, than the first watermelon of Summer. In my Grandmother's mind, no melon could possibly be fit for consumption until the first day of July; and so, I waited impatiently for that arbitrary moment when Grandmother and I would sit down alone at the rough concrete picnic table in her yard with the enormous fruit that had inhabited my dreams through Winter's snow and April's rain, taunting me day-by-day until, to borrow the words of Holy Scripture, “...in the fullness of time...” it was ready for consumption. Four things occupied that concrete table, like the obscure evidence in a Raymond Chandler detective novel: the fruit itself, chosen for its mottled appearance, hollow 'thump' when palpated with the fleshy heel of my Grandmother's palm, the absence of either a stem or the little disk of tissue to which the stem would be attached (very important, because melons don't ripen after picking!), and for it's belly. The successful candidate for First Melon of the Season must be possessed of a belly flat (but not concave), slightly roughened by its time on the soil and—most of all—of a pale colored, like the yellowed page of a family Bible or the shade of a day-old squash blossom. Yes, there was the melon, and alongside it, the tools for its slaughter: a large, tarnished butcher knife with a wooden handle, used from time immemorial to butcher both hogs and watermelons; a roll of paper towels (the eating of watermelons is, after all, not an activity to be entered into tentatively: it must be pursued vigorously and with gusto, preferably using the entire body forward of the shoulders; and such an act of vegetarian gluttony requires considerable provision for cleaning oneself. The last item on Grandmother's watermelon spread was a salt shaker. Strange though it may seem to those not raised in the South, there is no better complement to fresh melon than the ubiquitous sodium chloride. My Grandmother's saltshaker was shaped roughly like the Eifel Tower, with a square bottom, flared at the corners, then sloping upward like the arc of a whippoorwill, startled on its nest, taking flight; it was crowned with a shiny silver cap like a bishop's miter, perforated with several dainty apertures, each yielding a single grain of salt, as if to emphasize the value of the mineral within. As my Grandmother's beefy forearm plunged the knife into the melon, we each held out breath, hoping for the much-desired 'crack' that is the joy of all who spend ten months of every year longing for the two in which we harvest melons in North Carolina. Though we knew the code—the etiquette of choosing the perfect melon—still there was always an element of surprise, a revelatory instant in which a sharp cracking sound heralded melon nirvana. More times than not, her choice gave forth the desired crack, and we would smile and breath deeply, knowing that this would indeed be a fine melon. The moment of peril past, my Grandmother would quickly draw the knife through the fruit, its ruby fruit unctuous and deeply perfumed; then, she would slide the first giant slice across the table to me. I waited for a moment as she cut her own, then we bowed our heads and thanked the Maker of Melons and Men, acknowledging how good it is to be blessed, with a July day and a melon and a grandmother or grandson to love sharing it with. I can't remember a time when I haven't loved food, not in small part because of its inseparable connection to the love of so many wonderful people in my life; but the First Melon, in addition to being a harbinger of Summer, was one of the experiences to which I can point, recognizing that I have long loved food with a passion that goes beyond what most people seem to experience. Year after year, we shared this ritual—and year after year, even when I was in college, my Grandmother reminded me not to swallow the seeds, “...because a watermelon vine'll sprout out of your ear!” In my enthusiasm, I often chewed up the seeds anyway, and in my younger years, often woke in the night to wonder what, exactly, the initial symptoms of a melon vine growing from one's ear might be. My Grandmother finished her course in this life as I knelt over her on the floor, right in front of the sofa where we used to read the Burpee book. I remember touching her head and telling her how much I loved her, and I couldn't help thinking of our 'wish book' and that first melon I'd have to eat alone come July. Now I have a little boy of my own, and I pray that in the grace of sharing melon in the shade and other rituals, he might catch a bit of that same wisdom, love and character I learned at my Grandmother's table. Thank God for watermelon, July days and Grandmother's love!

Miracles on the Shore

2010-12-09T01:46:00.001-05:00

Caswell Beach, at the Southeastern tip of North Carolina, holds many amazing memories for me. When I was an undergrad student in biology, we used Caswell as a base for field work in zoology in the Fall, after all the campers had cleared out, probably about this time of year or a little later. We would spend entire days up to our necks in lagoons and swamps and ocean water, catching fish and invertebrates in seines. If we were lucky, there'd be the occasional gator or snake to chase after, too. I saw my one and only wild coral snake on Caswell Beach--so be careful walking after dark! In later years, while doing youth ministry, I took groups of kids there several years, and I have amazing memories of squatting out on the dunes with kids pouring their hearts out to Jesus and not even caring that the mosquitoes were eating us alive. I got stuck in quicksand twice (out of the three times it's happened to me...so far!) on Caswell Beach (beware the cove at the far end of the island, where the inlet of the waterway slips up alongside what appears to be the gentlest, sandiest beach on the island!). The buddy with whom I shared my first quicksand experience is gone now, having died at far too young an age. But of all the amazing times I saw God at Caswell, the most amazing by far was a night when we were out casting surf nets for jellyfish. We were wading in the edge of the rising tide well after dark, and we started seeing something that looked like a faint, greenish glow a few feet out where the island's shelf drops off sharply--just dim enough that it could have been imaginary, and yet we all felt we'd seen something. Suddenly, a whole crew of twenty-something guys were no longer worried about sounding cool or what the girls were doing or the beer smuggled onto the Baptist-owned compound from the local convenience store--suddenly, the whole lot of us were caught up in the grip of the passion for life that had made us aspiring zoologists in the first place (and which later drew me to pastoral ministry). Before we even consciously recognized it, all of us were plunging headlong into the deep surf, fumbling with the cast nets, splashing and cursing and completely driven by pure, unstoppable fascination and the desire to discover. Within moments, one of us--who knows which, because we only cared about this amazing gift of God's
ocean--stood cupping in his hands a few ounces of seawater and something soft as an eggwhite
and complex and other-worldly as if it had just fallen from a passing Martian spacecraft. The transleucent, pulsing bag, about the size of a Kiwi fruit, was covered in rows of undulating tentacles, all moving in perfect rhythm, and it gave off a greenish glow like a million-mile-distant star as it swam, cupped in the hands of a student who suddenly felt like the first man to walk on the moon. It turned out to be an adult ctenophoran, a group of invertebrates only distantly related to the jellyfish they closely resemble. In my life, I have encountered God in churches and lumber-yards; in nursing homes and third-world slums; in streets and subways and sawdust-strewn aisles under a brush arbor, but I can honestly say I have never been more awed
by His power than in that moment, standing knee-deep in an Autumn surf. Revelation of the Divine is all around us. The very rocks and trees cry out the glory of God Almighty. Take time today to listen to their song and see God's handiwork in even the lowliest of creatures. May God bless your own journey of discovery as He has mine!

Salvation Before Christ?

2010-12-09T01:25:00.002-05:00

One of the consequences (and, in my opinion, benefits) of serving God through the office of pastor is that I often field questions from friends on theological issues. Heck, sometimes they come from complete strangers! In this case, the source is a dear friend and dedicated Sunday school teacher, who asked for my take on how (or if) salvation was accessible to God's people prior to Jesus' ministry.

There might have been a time when I would have easily answered that salvation before Christ came as the result of obedience to God's law; and on the surface, that appears to be a reasonably logical answer. But a few moments' reflection on the logic of that supposition leaves us with some serious stumbling-blocks in our theology. If, for instance, performance of sacrifices--or avoidance of sins--could somehow have saved those with whom God first populated the earth, then why would those same means no longer suffice? I can find no indication in scripture that God ever pronounced a change in the rules, and if God changed the rules and didn't tell us...well, that would mean that God was changeable (in direct opposition to what James writes when he says "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, Who does not change like shifting shadows." (JAS 1:17, NIV) Likewise, if salvation were accessible by work of any sort, why would the God of the Universe choose to give of His own suffering, humiliating Himself and suffering derision and torture, to make available what would then amount to just another option? Certainly, it was Paul's understanding that no one could be saved by actions: "...nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified." (GAL 2:16, NASV)

So, we have what appears to be pretty clear Biblical evidence that salvation never was by works. The fact that God required sacrifices of His people, that He set down laws for them, and that His presence was not to be entered into without fear and trepidation all had one aim: namely, they were "types", that is, images, of what God desired for His people. In the case of the sacrificial system, the important lesson was to be found in the futility of attempting to be at peace with God through actions or gifts. No matter how many rams or bulls or goats or pigeons were killed upon the altar, the sin of the people had returned before the blood had even dried on the horns of the altar. Such is the lot of man: we are doomed to perpetual shortcoming, to be slaves to our own lusts and seekers only of our own happiness apart from intimate and abiding relationship with God through Christ. Likewise, laws taught that no amount of not-doing, no amount of abstinence or sobriety or spiritual martyrdom could ever suffice to do more than make us prideful and lead us to consider ourselves better and others inferior by virtue of our keeping of the covenant. Indeed, this became even more intensely evident by the intertestamental period, when the rabbis and commentators had amassed and codified laws to dictate every breath and every movement. Clearly, in trying to achieve holiness by the law, we were as the proverbial man trying to dish out the ocean with a teaspoon. Again, because their sacrifices were incomplete, the Israelites could not face God in person, and when even Moses, their leader (who himself was a foreshadowing of the Christ), was in God's near presence, the lingering aura of YHWH's glory on his person was stunning to those whom he encountered. Yet, in God's timing, the coming of Christ would remedy all of these shortcomings: sacrifices and law-keeping were no longer matters of requirement or necessity for salvation, because God had provided as a gift all that was needed. And the same God whom the high priest himself scarcely dared to approach at the appointed time of sacrifice had, in Christ, breached the fabric of time, space and the separation of uncleanness and unholiness, and in a stunning plot twist, the Savior had come to seek those in need of salvation.

But still, what of the time before John lept in his mother's womb and Elizabeth pronounced to her cousin that she had been chosen to bear the Messiah as a tiny child? How did those whose lives were fated to end before the coming of Christ have access to salvation? Or did God somehow deem that not everyone He had created would have access to dwell with Him in eternity?

The key to understanding pre-advent salvation, in my opinion, lies in the teachings of the New Testament. First, let's look at Hebrews, where the author asserts that "...Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here,He went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God! For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant." (HEB 9:11-15, NIV) In other words, Christ did permanently and completely what the Old Testament law and sacrificial system could do only temporarily and partially: He eternally, permanently made peace between God and man, and His work on the cross is the only work that can provide salvation. The author of Hebrews makes it clear that this sacrificial work of Jesus was not only for those blessed to be born in the "anni domini" (as we mark our history still, the 'years of God', those times following the birth of Christ), but that His work also made intimacy with God, forgiveness of sin, and access to the divine throne of grace available to all the descendants of Adam.

So how was salvation accessible in the days before Christ? Quite simply, by God's grace. Adam and Eve had the privilege of walking with God in the garden in the cool of the evening. Jehovah revealed Himself to the children of Israel as they crossed the wilderness in a pillar of fire and a cloud of smoke. Jacob wrestled with an angel of the Lord, certainly the presence of God Himself confronting Jacob mano-a-mano. And so it went, God's people encountering God's presence, being challenged to consider God's love for them, and finding faith and hope in the knowledge that He Who Was Before There Was Anything, He Who Made the Worlds, He Whose Banner Over Us Is Love had been abiding with them and providing for them all along.

How does God choose who may be saved? His Word shows us clearly that salvation is, in the words of the angelic messenger in Luke's gospel, "Good news of a great joy, which shall be for all people". As in our day, there have always been those who chose to reject this Good News, and there have been those who outwardly professed to follow Him, but whose lives bore other testimony. Neither has salvation ever been inaccessible to mankind, nor has it ever required any work on our part. In fact, even our faith is not a work in the sense that it is born of some right action or wise choice on our part; rather, it is the result of the work of God's Spirit, drawing us to repentance and conversion. If our faith were a saving work, then surely we would be doomed as soon as doubt began dogging us, as it always does, even for those most sure of their faith and salvation.

Thus salvation has been accessible since God first looked on Adam with love and saw past his transgression to rescue his heart. It was, and continues to be, a free gift from God's heart, not a concession grudgingly made as an alternate route for those who could not perform according to the law. As Jesus reminded us, we who are in Him will one day each find his name on a place card at God's banquet table in the company of Moses, Abraham, King David and all those down through the ages whose freedom was bought with the blood of God Himself.

May God bless you as you dwell in the promise of His salvation this good day!

For further references, see the following: 1 COR 10:1-5; 1COR 15:1-5; GAL 3:8; HEB 4:2,6; HEB 11

And as always, your comments and discussion are welcomed!

Abiding Faith (Lessons from Life's Dullest Days)

2010-07-27T01:03:00.000-04:00

I've been doing some thinking about the sort of faith I've found helpful, partly in light of some fresh attempts at writing a series of devotional essays for publication. As a pastor, I spend a lot of my time trying to communicate to others how I have arrived at my own personal faith in God through Jesus Christ. Early in my ministry, I often stepped away from the podium after speaking about faith, only to realize that I had at best failed to bring much passion to the pursuit of faith, and at worst done a disservice to the gospel by leaving my audience with the impression that true faith is something other than the product of daily living in personal relationship with the risen Christ.

One of my own personal challenges as I grow in faith is the temptation to believe that it is only in the exceptional, the transcendent and the critical that I am likely to make much progress in faith. Tempting as it may be to believe that it takes some exceptional moment, high or low, in life to prompt my faith to grow another inch, the truth I've found in practice is much different. In fact, it seems that our intuitive notion of needing some jarring event, some landmark "red-letter day", to spur our faith is actually quite opposite of what experience proves out.

In fact, it is on life's level plains, between mountain and valley, that we spend most of our time in this world. To encounter and engage God here is to grow faith that will withstand both highs and lows. Look for joy in the plain and ordinary, and it will seek you out in the time of deepest need or highest celebration. It is in the ordinary, the unremarkable moments of life when faith must thrive; else, we will find that when our earthly support systems fail, we are left with little of substance to bind our hearts to God.

Beyond the fact that faith must live in the ordinary to survive the exceptional, I also find that it is in the most unremarkable moments of life that I find the purest transcendence--the point where I realize that God's Spirit has invaded my world and is beckoning me to step closer, to breathe deeper, to taste more fully the sweetness of God's love for me. If the Bible recorded the practicalities of daily life, rather than the extraordinary achievements of God's people, we would probably lose interest and never take its lessons to heart; yet I find the most extra-ordinary, the most otherworldly, the most divine evidences of God's favor in nights spent rocking my newborn son and singing him to sleep, in planting cabbages in the Springtime, or in the impromptu symphony of a Southern dog-days thunderstorm. If I fail to see the hand of God at work in the silence as Elijah did, then I will have missed the very best moments of my relationship with Him. If I enjoyed my wife's presence only on the day of our marriage, and on the few other occasions that represent either great joy or great sorrow, then I would find at the end of our life together that I had gained very little from being her husband. On the other hand, by learning to savor time spent doing even such mundane tasks as hauling away the week's trash or painting the bathroom, and by making an effort to do those tasks together, we feel that we have found a level of joy in our marriage we could never have by waiting only for the highlights of special events and celebrations.

Two points, then, that our marriage has taught me are that personal relationships are deepened and strengthened and grow in trust when we purposely emphasize sharing time and activity together, especially the mundane, and that this same trust and love allow us to cleave to each other in moments that break the daily rhythm of life, whether high or low. It would seem that a process by which we (my wife and I, or my God and I) learn to trust and rely on each other is always part and parcel of shared experience, shared time, and shared affection day by day.

As I was typing these words, I decided to take a "stretch break" and stepped into the next room to see how my wife's work on rearranging the guest bedroom was progressing. As I stepped around the corner, she turned and we embraced each other and whispered our love to each other, as we do several times each day. As we stood there hugging, I thought about these reflections and their meaning for my relationship with God, and I was reminded of the words of an old favorite hymn that says

I am loved, I am loved,

I can risk loving you;

for the One Who knows me best loves me most

...we are free to love each other,

for we are loved...

My prayer for you, my friends, is that you would hear the winsome call of God's Spirit and open yourself to the presence of His loving care, day by day. May it be so for Jesus' glory!

Connected

2010-01-31T23:15:00.000-05:00

(I've been essentially snowed-in all weekend. Truth be known, I could escape the confines of the house if I wanted--I did venture out briefly yesterday, to reset the security system after an annoying false alarm. But for the most part, I'm in a sort of self-imposed house arrest. It's not a bad thing, certainly: I've gotten to spend quiet, unscheduled, unhurried time with my beloved wife; I've taken care of a few chores around the place that have gotten back-burnered in the course of busy weeks; I've caught up considerably on sleep, perhaps too much so; and I've managed to even do a bit of thinking along the way.

The funny thing about being snowed-in in the twenty-first century is that there's really no such thing as being isolated by it any more. Time was, even a few short decades ago when I was a boy, that we often had no telephone reception when the heavy snows came, and the only real interaction we had was with family and snow and cattle. But that's certainly changed! I'm now connected to the world at large, friendly or not, by telephone, cellular phone, internet, mobile, cellular internet (just in case the old-fashioned hard-wired kind should go out!), and a satellite dish that brings about 900 channels into our living room while rarely affording anything I deem worthy of lifting my head off the sofa to observe.

We connected, all right--all of us are! Nowadays, grandmas and grandpas are just as apt to have cell phones and personal digital assistants as teenagers are, and nursery-schoolers as much so as grad-schoolers. We're a thoroughly connected world, at least in electronic terms. But what worries me is the tremendous extent to which we have come to substitute this sort of "being in touch" for the actual physical touch of those we love. How much easier it is to text than to confront someone! If you doubt it, read the headlines: today's USAmericans (let alone the rest of the world) announce births and deaths digitally, propose marriage and business, accept proposals both of matrimony and of commerce, all without having to breathe the same air for even an instant as those to whom we profess to be connected.

And what of God in all of this? If we can't be troubled to talk on the phone, but only to text, if we substitute IM for letter-writing and LOL's for hugs, how are we to remember the humanity of the Godhead, distilled and condensed and squeezed into the form of a perfect man, a teacher, who came not because He sought to connect with us, but because He wanted to rescue us. How can God hope to fair any better than bff's and gf's and bf's in a world that can't be troubled to even give a relationship a real name, settling instead for meaningless abbreviations? How can God honestly hope that we will sit down and bathe ourselves in His Word to us? How can He hope that we will feel the onionskin paper and smell the leather and bask in the warmth of His Words of Life?

For my part, I want a change! Much as I use electronic means to communicate, I want to trade in some Facebook and e-mail and MMS and SMS (which is which? I can never remember anyhow!) for some true connection. Instead of LOL'ing and ROFL'ing, I want to spend more time sharing belly-laughs and falling out of chairs from the sheer joy of laughter that will not be quieted by the stroke of an "enter" key or a "send" button. I learned a valuable lesson some years ago from a young child, who is now a grown man and a great blessing to me. Having received a lift home after Bible study one night--perhaps about our third meeting, I'd say--he looked over at me as he exited the truck seat and said quite plainly "I love you!" The moment I heard it, I knew those words meant something. You see, for many years, I've worked with young people, both as a volunteer and as a paid minister. But the thing that's kept me working with them, and that's kept me close to many of them as they grew and matured, is this: young people have an incapacity for "faking it". Simply put, they do not lie easily or well. When a young child tells you "I love you," it's quite often the truth. When I inquired about what he meant, he said "Just that. I love you. And I always say it, because you never know when you won't see someone again, so you should never miss the chance."

I don't do it enough, I'll admit, but I try--I really try. I don't say it lightly, and I don't say it to appease people or for appearance sake. If I say it, it's because I mean it. "I love you." That's what God wants each of us to hear, as the first sound to fall on our ears each morning, and as the final whisper as we drift to sleep--the whole of history is the expression of God's love for mankind, and if we can find it in ourselves to connect--to really connect with other people, then we can be agents of God's love, as well.

Who have you said it to lately? Whom have you hugged? Whom have you kissed? Whom have you patted on the back or shaken hands with or expressed in some way the depth of the love of God that resides within you? Know that it is by our ability to share God's love that we will best experience it, and that it is by our connectedness--not our chats and our texts and our noise, but in those blessed moments when we clasp someone around the neck and squeeze and say "I love you"--it is by those moments that we will best serve the purpose of God in our lives, and in which we will best live out the likeness of our Savior.

God bless you this week as you love others in His perfect name!

Attaining God's Holiness

2009-10-26T23:02:00.067-04:00

...For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. -2 Corinthians 4:16

Referring to Paul's commentary on the renewing power of the Holy Spirit, St. Augustine wrote:
"We are renewed day by day by making progress in our righteousness and true holiness through the knowledge of God. For those who do so transfer their love from temporal things to eternal things, from visible things to invisible things, from fleshly things to spiritual things....They do this in proportion to their help from God. For God said, 'Without Me ye can do nothing.'"

It's no secret that life comes with an expiration date. Daily we see those around us whose lives reach a sudden and sometimes unexpected end. With every passing year, time seems to move more quickly. And, in a society obsessed with conserving its youth, we are faced with constant reminders that we just aren't as young as we used to be.

Do you want your life to matter? Do you look at the years of your past and see days and even years wasted, with nothing spiritual or eternal to show? Have you determined to make every hour and every breath count for the rest of your life? The difference between a day wasted and a day lived for God's glory is the renewal that God's Holy Spirit brings.

Like the inspection sticker on a car or the neglected dairy products on the back of the refrigerator shelf, life quickly expires, and that expiration is counteracted only by being renewed spiritually. Unless we strive to care for our bodies with exercise, nutrition and proper rest, they will expire. Likewise, Augustine points out, we must take an active part in the renewal of our spiritual selves.
Not that we can by any means create for ourselves, or even earn what God has made available to us--we can only receive and find ourselves humbled by our inability to renew ourselves. But prayer and fasting, meditation on God's Word, serving those less privileged than ourselves--all these disciplines and more serve to draw us into the "sweet spot" where we can best receive the renewal God has intended for us.

And as Paul preaches, when we do these things, we find that though our earthly "tents" are perishing and one day will pass away, yet our inner self--the real self, the incorruptible self, the eternal self--is being daily made new, as it will be through eternity by the power of Jesus' atoning death.

As we learn to focus on those activities that lead us into the sweet spot of God's Spirit, there is bonus, too: we find that we no longer let our minds linger over the brief nature of our earthly life, but we find ourselves tuned in to the glory of heaven, the eternal nature of salvation, the enjoyment of Jesus' personal existence in us. What could be better? Renewed for free, by a power not our own, we are set free from the fear of death to rejoice in the goodness of God!

May God help us as we practice the presence of His Spirit and learn to enjoy Him more day by day!

The Hardest Person in the World to Love

2009-10-26T00:06:00.002-04:00

The Hardest Person in the World to Love

1 John 4:16-19 (New International Version)

And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.
In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him.
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.
The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
We love because he first loved us.
1 John 4:16-19

It's no secret to most of us that life is full of struggles. Personally, I have plenty--from controlling my temper (thankfully much less of a problem than in my younger days!), to patience (especially with our current influx of leaf-gazing tourists--or as well call 'em, "foreigners"). Like most people, I probably mis-evaluate my own shortcomings, but if you ask me, I'm likely to say that loving people isn't one of my struggles.

Truth be known, though, love is never quite as easy as we make it sound. The way we toss "love" and related words about makes it seem like a foregone conclusion that we love people, but God's Word exposes a much deeper--and far more challenging--view of love. In light of Jesus' example, we see a standard for love that is intimately bound with sacrifice and enmeshed with a willingness to overlook justice in favor of compassion. It's a high mark, and if we're honest with ourselves, we know at times we all fall short. Much as we want to, we rarely feel that we have given as much of ourselves, felt the pain of our friends (or enemies!) sufficiently, or forgiven often enough to satisfy the demands of true godly love.

And if you think loving others is tough, try turning that critical eye for just a moment on your relationship with yourself!

John writes first that God is love. Imagine that--not only are called to practice something difficult, but John tells us that God is the physical and spiritual embodiment of the very trait that we're called to mirror! When I read this, it feels to me like I'm already set up for failure. I mean, who can possibly out-love the God who is love itself? That's like trying to "out-hurricane" a hurricane, or "out-bomb" an atomic bomb! Thankfully, though, John follows this mile-high standard by telling us that Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us... In other words, God is not only the standard for our love, but He Himself becomes the source of our love, as well. And because God is the perfect, unending, original source of love, He makes us complete--fulfilled, lacking for nothing--in love ourselves. What a gift! And like our righteousness, it's not only something we haven't worked for or earned, but something we never could do for ourselves. God's love is such a high standard that we are, by definition of our frail human nature, incapable of attaining it. There is no hope for us to love as God loves, just as there is no hope for us to be righteous, apart from the life of Christ, expressed in His people. Thank God that He has given us the capacity, not only to love friend and foe, but to love the most despised, most patently un-lovable, most difficult person of all: the sin-frazzled, weary, drunk-with-self-righteousness, utterly despicable face that gazes back from the bathroom mirror each morning, full of venom and loathing, reminding us of how unworthy, unsuccessful and unrepentant we truly are. If we can find a way to turn the lens of God's love on the self, we can surely love any other person we may encounter, no matter how different or how difficult to pity.

In light of our recognition that God has given us that amazing capacity to love ourselves, the Beloved Disciple reminds us that it is given so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.

How amazing! The capacity to love--especially to love oneself, is a mark of God's favor in our lives so powerful that it will lend confidence to those of his saints who endure this life until God calls them home. Remember that judgment has not been annihilated in light of Jesus' sacrifice. Rather, we are told we have been given "confidence to stand" in that day. And when we do stand toe-to-toe with the Creator of the universe who gave us life and breath, John says, we will draw strength from the knowledge that we have been gifted by God with the power of love--and that by seeing love at work in our own changed lives, we will perceive the depth of God's care for and delight in us His creations!

John doesn't intend, I'm sure, to suggest that all fear is evidence that we lack love--rather, he points out that in that day of God's wrath, we will be filled not with fear, but with the truth of God's eternal love for us, and in that love we will stand firm in His presence, not cowering like whipped animals, but holding our heads high and facing God to see Him at last even as we are seen, to know as we are known, without fear of condemnation, because the Spirit bears witness of our salvation through the love that God has imparted to us. Likewise, we are told that this love will be the mark by which even the unsaved will know Jesus' followers. The power of God's love is infinite, and the power it can have when applied to ourselves is likewise beyond our wildest imagination.

A person who has learned to love himself is set free from the shackles of self-defeat and the bondage of self-judgment. Too often, I fail to try great things for God because I believe I'm unworthy or that God couldn't possibly think highly enough of me to give me success at such a great endeavor. When I stare into the mirror, I do not like the person I see, for I see the baggage of self-absorption and years of sinful indulgence. I see every failure and every snap of temper or shortfall of patience. I see everything I wish I were, and everything I admire in others, and I fear the pitiful creature I see there. But when I truly gaze through the lens of God's love at my own hapless self, somehow that face in the mirror is transformed and I begin to get an inkling of what my Heavenly Father sees when He looks at me. Suddenly instead of failure, I see potential--instead of anger and impatience, passion and drive. And instead of measuring myself by the standard of my friend's abilities and achievements, I begin to allow myself the same grace I attempt to extend to strangers.

...and John reminds us that this amazing gift is nothing of our own doing, nothing I could have drummed-up or created for myself:

We love because he first loved us.

God's powerful love is a balm for the wounded heart, a refuge for those under attack by the world's opinions and a sanctuary for the Holy Spirit Himself to dwell in our midst and continue His work of transforming us back into the perfect, loving creatures God intended us to be.

I pray God will lead you to apply His standard of love to yourself, and that you will discover the eternal, irreplaceable joy of being accounted worthy to be loved by the King of Heaven!

Asleep...but not dead!

2009-05-16T23:34:00.002-04:00

Well, as those of you who have made any effort to follow it know already, my blog has taken a serious hiatus--but it has not completely died. In fact, I've been rolling it around in my head for a while now, and I've decided I'm going to make a serious effort at posting at least a bit of writing every few days. I can only say, please, if you're reading this, let me know! Thanks!

Things That Make You Go "Hmmmm...."

2008-06-05T23:16:00.002-04:00

It was an interesting day today. I've been praying for God to refine me--my thoughts and my judgments and the way I extend or withold grace with those I encounter--and it seems like I've been given plenty to think about today.

I was once again up against the issue of using the force of the law to collect a debt from someone who had been repeatedly untruthful. As a matter of personal opinion, I believe all people should pay their debts, yet I have to admit I've made mistakes and messed-up on this accidentally myself, so I believe a measure of grace is necessary.

Still, Paul tells us this in 1 Corinthians 6:1-11:

1 Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust, and not before the saints?
2 Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters?
3 Know ye not that we shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life?
4 If then ye have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church.
5 I speak to your shame. Is it so, that there is not a wise man among you? no, not one that shall be able to judge between his brethren?
6 But brother goeth to law with brother, and that before the unbelievers.
7 Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you, because ye go to law one with another. Why do ye not rather take wrong? why do ye not rather [suffer yourselves to] be defrauded?
8 Nay, ye do wrong, and defraud, and that [your] brethren.
9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.

Clearly, Paul is saying that Christians shouldn't use the force of the law against fellow believers to settle personal disputes or debts. What does that imply about my being involved in doing so on behalf of a corporation that happens to belong to our family? Would it be different if I worked for a corporation in which I had no interest or stake?

I believe the person I was moving to collect from today was given a "generally Christian" upbringing, but I don't really know. Is he a believer? I can't say.

How do I respond? What am I supposed to do with this?

On one hand, I feel what I want to call "righteous anger" against someone who repeatedly lies and refuses to pay a debt. On the other, I want to be an agent of grace to the world, and this is kind of where the rubber hits the pavement.

I'm struggling inside. Am I doing right or trying to convince myself I am?

Add to that a very odd conversation with another person in my life, and some discussion that frankly hurt me a lot and sort of shocked me. I'm trying to decide how to do what I believe is best for the spiritual life of someone I care about, while balancing the need to show grace to that person. After all, if it's grace that best leads people into relationship with God, I know that's where they'll find their problems fall away. Yet, I struggle with fear and hurt, wanting to do what I know is best for the person in the short-term. I want God to "fast track" things. I want to say "Get to work, God! Let's speed it up a little!"

I'm puzzled...hurt...sad...anxious...reflective...happy...tired...optimistic--all at once.

It's been a weird day. Pray for me, and I'll do the same for you, if you'll let me know you were here.

God's peace, everyone!

Church Update

2008-05-31T23:18:00.002-04:00

We've been spending Sundays the last few weeks with the folks at Grace Community Church in Mills River (off I-26 between Asheville & Brevard). We'll still look for opportunities to visit other new churches and gain insights about their missions and methods, but we really love the feel and the mood at Grace. Right now, it's a good time of refreshing and of being able to worship God in freedom and truth.

Please keep in touch & let me know you've been here--comments are appreciated, because I know someone is reading this thing! :-)

Suggestions for posts, questions and friendly commentary are welcome, as well.

God bless you as you serve Him this week!

Swimming in a New Element

2008-04-20T22:32:00.003-04:00

It's Sunday, and it's been a wonderful day! This morning, Kristi and I worshipped at Highlands Christian Church, which meets inside the Orange Peel, a nightclub in nearby Asheville. We had heard some great stuff about Highlands, and their website was certainly intriguing, so I was eager as always to visit someplace new, see how they are connecting with people who don't yet know Christ, and (hopefully) find some great ideas to rip off!

What we encountered, as usual, set my mind to work, busily contemplating and drawing conclusions. One of the most awesome things about being between traditional ministry assignments (that is, not currently serving in some sort of pastoral ministry--a situation that hasn't happened in my life in many years, and certainly not in the time we've been married)--one of the most awesome things about being "between things" is that Kristi and I get to sit together on Sunday morning and participate in worship alongside each other. When we get back to the car, we can actually talk about what happened, too, because my mind isn't 100% engaged with the schedule for the day and how we're going to accomplish what has to happen before the evening service, which is usually a scant five hours away when we break for lunch, and often much less than that by the time we've managed to leave the church building.

What I've discovered in these conversations is not exactly startling or new--but it's a good reminder. God made people differently. He certainly made me and Kristi alike in some ways, but all in all, God seems to have brought us together through our differences more than through our sameness. Predictably, I'm very analytic--but at the same time, I've found that when it comes to worship, I tend to have a more wholistic approach to the service, and surprisingly, Kristi is much more focused on the individual elements. Proof again that we don't have just one assigned role from God in marriage, but that we both must function as a team at all times.

In terms of tastes and preferences, I think it's fair to say that I'm more accustomed to--or at least, more comfortable with, a rock-n-roll, sometimes loud, musical style. Though both of us like good rock music, and both of us enjoy a variety of Christian music, Kristi is more at home with hymns and "peaceful" worship music. For my part, I like it all, but I guess I'm more at ease with electric guitars and drumkits for worship than she is. That's great, because it means we each appreciate different aspects of the worship experience, and we're able to work together to get a balanced view of it.

One of the most interesting things I experienced this morning, though, was the realization that I was a minority at Highlands. For one thing, I'm probably about fifteen years older than the average "Highlander", and I come from a background steeped in wide-ranging Christian traditions. To be honest, I felt my "hip-n-cool" factor slip just a knotch as we entered the door.
But it was great! I felt very at home and very at ease. Strangely, the oversized sign designating the bar-area and the posters about alcohol abuse and date-rape on the men's room doors didn't detract at all from my sense of "holy space", and I've thought about that a good deal as the day has gone on.

What is "sanctuary"? What is "holy space"? Is it a consecrated, set-apart place that's far away from the hustle and bustle of the marketplace and the village?

...or is it a place right in the midst of where things are going on?

The Biblical temples were a focal point for commerce, social gathering, entertainment and more.
They weren't far-removed from the location and the energy level of the city, but were places right in the midst of all that was happening--right in the midst of political debate and goat-trading and the delicious smell of spicy foods. Right in the midst of the slave trade and prostitution and drug trafficking. Right in the midst of adultery and murder and homosexuality. Right in the midst of the very things we often seem to be trying to shut out, because our sanctuaries have become places of refuge, not battlefield hospitals.

Is there a time and a place for pulling away from all the noise and the cares and the danger and the nonsense over which the world makes such a great fuss? Of course there is. To truly encounter God, we often need to remove ourselves from our own daily routines and change up the speed of lives that have long-since escaped their leashes and begun to set their own pace.

But, if we do not make our stand in the market--if we do not gather to praise Jesus in the courtyard where the moneychangers have gathered--if we do not sing our praise over the din of the raging traffic and the haggling merchants, then how will they, too, encounter the resurrected Lamb? How will they, too, come to know the sillyness of profit-making and the futility of pleasure-seeking? How will they come to know that it was for them that God shed His own blood?

I am challenged by this need for balance, this desire for peace and sanctuary juxtaposed against the desperate, subconscious cry of a dying world for faith that bears witness of truth.

I can't say I have many answers at this point, but the questions have come into focus, and God has taught me long ago that it is often more valuable to ask than to know.

Pray for me this week as I clutch His hand and walk fearfully through a world where I am a stranger. Pray that I will not grow too bold, nor venture away from His sheltering grasp, and I will pray the same for you.

Prayers/Hopes/Expectations

2008-03-06T11:50:00.004-05:00

Right now is a time of transition in my life and Kristi's. We've just stepped away from pastoral ministry at a local church, we're contemplating lauching into a much bigger endeavor in the future, we're adjusting our schedules and our incomes and my sense of accomplishment and self-worth to new circumstances, we're hoping and praying for a family in not-too-distant future if God wills, and to top it all off, I just turned 40!

(By the way, I'm confused--maybe someone out there can clear this up: Is 40 too young to go ahead and have my mid-life crisis and buy a Porsche? To be honest, it doesn't really matter--on my budget, all I could afford would be a 15-minute tantrum and a used VW anyway!)

It's an interesting time...and an exciting one for me, at least.

The author of Hebrews talks about just such circumstances when he refers to faith as "...the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

If you read those words and meditate on them and really let them "sink in", you'll realize, I think, that we are being told by God that there is a "substance"--that is, a definite, tangible, touch-and-feel reality to those things we hope for, and that there is sufficient evidence to produce faith, even in many things which are not readily seen.

One of my favorite stanzas of poetry comes from the German poet of the 1700's, Matthias Claudius, who wrote:

Seht ihr den Mond dort stehen?

Er ist nur halb zu sehen,

Aber ist doch rund und schön!

So sind wohl manche Sachen,

die wir getrost belachen,

Weil unsere Augen sie nicht sehen!

Translated, it reads:

Do you see the moon, standing there?

It is only half visible,

But is surely quite round and beautiful!

So are many things

about which we carelessly laugh,

(merely) because our eyes cannot see them!

In a world where we look to science and technology to explain everything, and in which we expect our lives to be ordered and scheduled more by our calendars than by our God, I think it is wise for us to occasionally remind ourselves of the value of recognizing that we don't have all the answers.

What lies ahead? I can't say. But by faith in the God Who has made me and loved me and Who, in the words of a beloved hymn, has brought me safe thusfar, I can know that what lies ahead is good, that it will work for blessing to me and to others who love Him, and that it will bring Him glory as He deserves.

Your prayers are appreciated in this time. Though we may not show it, there is a lot of uncertainty right now, and it's a time when we need the support and encouragement of our friends.

God bless you as you follow Him this day!

Nice Saturday, Kinda Slow

2008-03-01T23:20:00.003-05:00

It was an unusual Saturday today. Slept a little later than originally planned, worked on some things around the house, then drove to Morganton to see a friend in the hospital. In-between, discovered that I'd driven from Old Fort to Asheville and back last night with the oil fill cap off my car!! That was crazy!! Anyway, three quarts of 10W-40 later, I was on my way to Morganton with the iPod (my new #2 on the list of man's best inventions, just behind air conditioning!) pumping out some old favorites and a beautiful, sunny day ahead.

Some of my plans got changed today, but I managed to visit with my friend, help Kristi clean house, build a new bookcase for the upstairs study, spend some extra time in the Scripture, visit my 96 year-old grandmother, my mom and dad, e-mail with my sis a couple times, talk to some other friends, and get in a really nice hot shower before blogging and bedtime.

Sometimes, I feel like every day--especially every Saturday--needs to be crammed full of activity, yet I always enjoy those days that are a little more low-key and I feel like they're good for me on a lot of levels.

As a race, humans have gotten quite used to the idea of constant excitement--of unless sensory input and a ongoing state of elevated adrenaline. Maybe it would better please God and better serve us if we let ourselves be comfortable with the mundane and the ordinary more often.

Some of the days of my life I'll remember as most enjoyable have been spent mending fences or sitting at the foot of an ancient old oak near the parkway or rocking on the porch with family.

This life we live is so FULL of paradoxes! The very quest for supposedly joy-giving wealth guarantees misery. The desire to make oneself spiritual seems to perfectly ensure a state of legalism and dryness. Striving to be the "top dog" results in trailing the pack when it comes to the things that really matter.

...and BUSINESS does not equate to having used our lives well.

Sure, I want to BURN out, rather than RUST out, as the saying goes...but I'd like to take a little time to rust along the way, too. Antiques are at their most valuable when they are unrestored. The patina of age and the blemishes and imperfections that come with passing years make them far more valuable than brand-new paint jobs and perfect varnish would. Our lives are a lot that way, too.

Perhaps we should focus a bit less on the accomplishments of our lives and a bit more on the quality of how we accomplish things.

Just some thoughts at the end of a day well-spent. Now for bed...