"Here's another way to put it: You're here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We're going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don't think I'm going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I'm putting you on a light stand. Now that I've put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you'll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven."
5:14-16 MSG
Over and over again I tell people to be the light of the world. I say that when Jesus came down to earth. Light entered the darkness. Truth invaded this world. When we pull Jesus into our own hearts, and your lives are transformed, we become torchbearers for the same God-light. We in essence, become the light in this darkened world. Jesus told us to go about the world spreading his truth, teaching his ways and leading others to him. This is the way of love, the way of peace, the way of serving the poor. When we do these things we are Jesus' hands and feet in this world.
I have a story to share. It’s just an instance that a friend of mine shared with me today but it sums up well what it means to be a Christ-follower imbedded in this world. Everyone could share his or her own tales of people being the Light.
A lady friend of mine was working at a major retail chain store. Things weren’t going well. Whenever she went near that place she felt sick in her heart. She wasn’t happy with the pay. She didn’t like the work. She didn’t like her co-workers. It just wasn’t the job for her. Today she entered that store to tender her two-week notice. On her way in, she passed a Salvation Army bell ringer. He was an older man wearing a lightweight coat, not near the protection needed from the strong, gusty winds.
She reached into her coat pocket and grabbed a stray five-dollar bill and stuffed it in the kettle and exchanged a token Merry Christmas as she entered. Inside the store office she dropped off her notice and informed that manager of her plans. She learned her next paycheck would be availed for pick up later in the afternoon. So she gathered her belongings and left.
Hours later she entered the store again to get her paycheck. Who did she encounter at the front of the store? The same bell ringer, still standing there, still working in his light-weight coat, still smiling and wishing everyone a merry Christmas.
This touched my friend’s heart. Oh what service he was performing without complaint. How could she repay him for his hard work? So after picking up her check she headed down to the Wal-Mart deli area and picked up two large cups of cappuccino. She then exited the store and asked the bell ringer if he was due for a break. With a smile he relied, ‘Yes mam.” The two enjoyed their cappuccinos together and she thanked him for standing there all day. He thanked her for doing more than just shoving money in the kettle but actually taking the time to appreciate what he was doing. The two lightened each other’s worlds. The two were torchbearers spreading the Gospel of love.
Be the light.
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Running Up Stream
Running up stream is hard.
In the Christian version of Switchfoot's Dare You To Move video, found on the double-sided disk, the hero runs through the streets of a dark city. Storm clouds loom overhead. As he goes he begins to encounter other people running towards him, at first just a few, then more and more until he's battling a tide of people running the opposite direction.
He stumbles, nearly falls as he's knocked about like a pinball. In the end He finally breaks through the crowd, finally fights upstream and reaches the goal, the rain stops, the clouds break and he is surrounded by beautiful sunlight.
As Christ-followers it's hard. We have to struggle to make it against the flow of what everyone wants us to do. Often times it's tempting to turn and just follow the flow. But Jesus never gave up.
So when the burdens of life begin to pull at you, when your name is attached for your beliefs, when it might look easier to just go with the flow, remember, Jesus has worn those shoes. He's climbed that hill. He's gone through everything that you have...
Dare You To Move
In the Christian version of Switchfoot's Dare You To Move video, found on the double-sided disk, the hero runs through the streets of a dark city. Storm clouds loom overhead. As he goes he begins to encounter other people running towards him, at first just a few, then more and more until he's battling a tide of people running the opposite direction.
He stumbles, nearly falls as he's knocked about like a pinball. In the end He finally breaks through the crowd, finally fights upstream and reaches the goal, the rain stops, the clouds break and he is surrounded by beautiful sunlight.
As Christ-followers it's hard. We have to struggle to make it against the flow of what everyone wants us to do. Often times it's tempting to turn and just follow the flow. But Jesus never gave up.
So when the burdens of life begin to pull at you, when your name is attached for your beliefs, when it might look easier to just go with the flow, remember, Jesus has worn those shoes. He's climbed that hill. He's gone through everything that you have...
Dare You To Move
Switchfoot
Maybe redemption has stories to tell
Maybe forgiveness is right where you fell
Where can you run to escape from yourself?
Where you gonna go?
Where you gonna go?
Salvation is here
Monday, November 27, 2006
Bad
Sometimes in life you are cast as the bad guy. It doesn't matter if you sign up for the part or not. Sooner or later it happens. That's just the way life is.
You can lament. Feel sorry for yourself… Nash your teeth and cry. That doesn't change things.
You can fight it. You can call people names, flip people the bird, and argue with your rivals... but sometimes fighting a monster turns you into what you are fighting.
Jesus was charged as a radical, as a fool, as a man possessed by a demon... as just a carpenter's son, even as a Samaritan spy. Jesus never shied away from these charges. In fact, at times he seems to enjoy the role.
Instead of hiding on a couch with a pillow over his head, when accusations came his way he responded by blazing the shining light of truth at the world. He attacked them, not with fancy speeches and slick legalism. He told basic stories in everyday language the made his attackers look like fools. That's the trick with the truth... it's easy to mock and taunt, but it's hard to make go away.
If Jesus didn't run from the title of radical then neither will I. I will embrace that yoke. Praise the Lord... I'm a bad guy, too!
Bad
You can lament. Feel sorry for yourself… Nash your teeth and cry. That doesn't change things.
You can fight it. You can call people names, flip people the bird, and argue with your rivals... but sometimes fighting a monster turns you into what you are fighting.
Jesus was charged as a radical, as a fool, as a man possessed by a demon... as just a carpenter's son, even as a Samaritan spy. Jesus never shied away from these charges. In fact, at times he seems to enjoy the role.
Instead of hiding on a couch with a pillow over his head, when accusations came his way he responded by blazing the shining light of truth at the world. He attacked them, not with fancy speeches and slick legalism. He told basic stories in everyday language the made his attackers look like fools. That's the trick with the truth... it's easy to mock and taunt, but it's hard to make go away.
If Jesus didn't run from the title of radical then neither will I. I will embrace that yoke. Praise the Lord... I'm a bad guy, too!
Bad
U2
If you should ask then maybe they'd
Tell you what I would say
True colors fly in blue and black
Bruised silken sky and burning flag
Colors crash, collide in blood shot eyes
If I could, you know I would
If I could, I would
Let it go...
This desperation
Dislocation
Separation
Condemnation
Revelation
In temptation
Isolation
Desolation
Let it go
And so fade away
To let it go
And so fade away
To let it go
And so to fade away
I'm wide awake
I'm wide awake
Wide awake
I'm not sleeping
Sunday, November 26, 2006
Get Up and Stand Down
Where do you go to find God? Do you go to church in your best clothing to a big brick building? Do you go on Sunday like clockwork, when all your friends and neighbors are also filing into the same brick building in their own best clothing? It’s like a dance, a thing we do, like parallel parking. It isn't always enjoyable but it’s a part of our routine.
Somewhere outside the nice white shirts, the ties, the sport jackets, beyond the nice pantsuits and the dresses, there is another kind of Christian. They don’t exist in the same nice shining, clean world. They live in the dark, color-saturated world of real life beyond the picket fences, the smiling faces and the stained-glass windows on Sunday. These Christians aren’t interested in the comfort and the rhyme and meter of the Christina ghetto. They want to reach the poor, feed the hungry and comfort the orphaned.
Often times this brings these wandering missionaries in close contact with the very type of unsavory folks that the white-shirt crowd shuns. They would never be around drunks, druggies, whores, criminals, street people, homeless, smelly, and the crude. Christian equals white and clean. These types aren’t Christian enough for their circle.
But where is Jesus? Where did he go? And where are we likely to find him now? Is he trapped in the temple? Or is he found in the sea of humanity, the weak, the lame and the sorrowful people that once flocked to him on his travels?
I love church. For three years I never missed a Sunday service. I love the feeling of being surrounded by God-lovers and prasing together. I love to see what progressive chruches are doing in their communities. I love to see kids growing in the faith through years of mentering in the ways of Jesus. But is that it? Is that where our faith begins and ends? I go to church to worship the Lord God. But if I want to find Jesus, I put on my working clothes and head the other direction.
Jesus calls us to get up off the pew, to walk out the door and help people. He said that when we help the weakest we are helping him. He said when we feed the hungry we are nourishing him, when we give clothes and shelter to the downtrodden we are sheltering him. He doesn’t want an armchair faith. He doesn’t want followers doing nothing but mailing in praise and tribute from afar. He wants active, engaged people, carrying the cross into that color-saturated reality, reaching out to others. This is your chance. Start this week. Get up and stand down!
I Will Follow
Omaha VA Stand Down- 12/03/06
Stand Downs are one part of the Department of Veterans Affairs’ efforts to provide services to homeless veterans. Stand Downs are typically one to three day events providing services to homeless veterans such as food, shelter, clothing, health screenings, VA and Social Security benefits counseling, and referrals to a variety of other necessary services, such as housing, employment and substance abuse treatment. Stand Downs are collaborative events, coordinated between local VAs, other government agencies, and community agencies who serve the homeless.
Come help a homeless veteran. Make a difference. Touch a life. Be the change you want to see in this world. Be the light.
Jesus, help us have the courage to reach out and touch. AMEN!
Somewhere outside the nice white shirts, the ties, the sport jackets, beyond the nice pantsuits and the dresses, there is another kind of Christian. They don’t exist in the same nice shining, clean world. They live in the dark, color-saturated world of real life beyond the picket fences, the smiling faces and the stained-glass windows on Sunday. These Christians aren’t interested in the comfort and the rhyme and meter of the Christina ghetto. They want to reach the poor, feed the hungry and comfort the orphaned.
Often times this brings these wandering missionaries in close contact with the very type of unsavory folks that the white-shirt crowd shuns. They would never be around drunks, druggies, whores, criminals, street people, homeless, smelly, and the crude. Christian equals white and clean. These types aren’t Christian enough for their circle.
But where is Jesus? Where did he go? And where are we likely to find him now? Is he trapped in the temple? Or is he found in the sea of humanity, the weak, the lame and the sorrowful people that once flocked to him on his travels?
It was the very flowing tide where Jesus had commanded His disciples to live. Out there where the city gambles. Where no one believes. Out there among the thieves. In the face of abuse and mockery. Where love violently dies. Out there at their daily Calvary, to take up their crosses and follow. Not to holler but to follow. If only Jesus had said to Peter, “Pray this prayer and withdraw from the world and make sure you preach in every song.” He didn’t. He said, “Follow me into a daily dynamic of dilemma where they will misunderstand you and castigate you and call you all kinds of things. It’ll be messy, and every decision will not always be on the white or black side of gray, but follow me. Get involved. Where I walked.”
Walk On
Steve Stockman
p. 153
I love church. For three years I never missed a Sunday service. I love the feeling of being surrounded by God-lovers and prasing together. I love to see what progressive chruches are doing in their communities. I love to see kids growing in the faith through years of mentering in the ways of Jesus. But is that it? Is that where our faith begins and ends? I go to church to worship the Lord God. But if I want to find Jesus, I put on my working clothes and head the other direction.
Jesus calls us to get up off the pew, to walk out the door and help people. He said that when we help the weakest we are helping him. He said when we feed the hungry we are nourishing him, when we give clothes and shelter to the downtrodden we are sheltering him. He doesn’t want an armchair faith. He doesn’t want followers doing nothing but mailing in praise and tribute from afar. He wants active, engaged people, carrying the cross into that color-saturated reality, reaching out to others. This is your chance. Start this week. Get up and stand down!
I Will Follow
U2
I was on the inside
When they pulled the four walls down
I was looking through the window
I was lost, I am found
Walkaway, walkaway
I walkaway, walkaway...I will follow
If you walkaway, walkaway,
I walkaway, walkaway...I will follow
VA Stand Down
Omaha VA Stand Down- 12/03/06
Stand Downs are one part of the Department of Veterans Affairs’ efforts to provide services to homeless veterans. Stand Downs are typically one to three day events providing services to homeless veterans such as food, shelter, clothing, health screenings, VA and Social Security benefits counseling, and referrals to a variety of other necessary services, such as housing, employment and substance abuse treatment. Stand Downs are collaborative events, coordinated between local VAs, other government agencies, and community agencies who serve the homeless.
Come help a homeless veteran. Make a difference. Touch a life. Be the change you want to see in this world. Be the light.
Jesus, help us have the courage to reach out and touch. AMEN!
Saturday, November 25, 2006
Control
Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father's glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.
Matthew 16:24-27
I see so many people that are fighting to maintain control. They want to be valiant Christians, but they let fear and doubt get in the way. They worry so much about saving themselves and creating a safe harbor, a nest to pad them and their loved ones from the dangers of the big scary world that they are actually insulating themselves from what is really important.
They are attracted to activities that are all about being the overseer, the watcher, the one in control. Maybe they pose men and woman on the stage like pawns, maybe they paint perfect little worlds that they lord over like a god.... maybe they set up little microcosms where they set every little piece in synchronized motion, a perfectly ordered little world where every variable is calculated and everything is under control. Everything runs right according to schedule and everything is predictable. Safe becomes the lack of risk. Control equals comfort.
Control is always just a mirage. It's a trick to make you feel comfortable and placated, pacified and cozy. It's the wool being pulled over your eyes. The truth is we aren't ever in control. We cling to a massive rock that hurls through the frozen void of space at about ninteen and a half miles per second. We can do very little to make us safe. All the locks and deadbolts and rules and structure in the world cannot save us from truth. And that truth is that we aren’t supposed to live locked away… We are charged as Christ-followers to head out into the world and help people, tell them the Good News and live as Christ did.
Jesus taught us not to hold onto what we have, He called us to let go. He didn't want us to be safe hoarders of things. He called on us over and over again to reach out to others. If someone steals your jacket, give him your shirt as well. If we see a stranger down we are to jump into harms way and rescue him. If someone strikes you, turn and let him strike your other side. We are to give up the idea that we have to be overlords of our own destiny and just live in peace that God's grace is enough, his plan is perfect and His promises assured.
Once you've given up control, life becomes much easier. You find a new freedom. This freedom from worry and doubt allows you to walk through the world as a light barrier. Snakes will not bite you, poison will have no effect and miracles will happen in your midst (Mark 16:18).
What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
Romans 8:32,33
Imagine that there was once a man in a boat. He had crafted it by hand and loved it with all his heart. He was sailing around just outside the harbor when a massive storm blew in from the ocean catching the sailor off guard. Before he could get back to safty, the winds rose and sheets of rain fell from the darkening heavens. Then, a massive wave came up and capsized his vessel. He scrambled quickly to secure the hold of the up-side-down craft. He held on and prayed for God to save him. He clung to the boat for dear life knowing that he had to hold on so he could wouldn't drowned.
Meanwhile, the Coast Guard came and saw the man and the capsized boat. They rushed to the rescue. The threw out a life line and called for him to let go and grab the rope. They promised to pull him in and take him to safty. But the man wouldn't let go. He couldn't accept the risk of losing control. So he was left there on the stormy seas.
Today is a good day to stop clinging to what we have. It's time to let go and let God take over. It's time to be cast onto the wind to spread the good news. It's time to leave the games behind and go out and change the world.
Matthew 16:24-27
I see so many people that are fighting to maintain control. They want to be valiant Christians, but they let fear and doubt get in the way. They worry so much about saving themselves and creating a safe harbor, a nest to pad them and their loved ones from the dangers of the big scary world that they are actually insulating themselves from what is really important.
They are attracted to activities that are all about being the overseer, the watcher, the one in control. Maybe they pose men and woman on the stage like pawns, maybe they paint perfect little worlds that they lord over like a god.... maybe they set up little microcosms where they set every little piece in synchronized motion, a perfectly ordered little world where every variable is calculated and everything is under control. Everything runs right according to schedule and everything is predictable. Safe becomes the lack of risk. Control equals comfort.
Control is always just a mirage. It's a trick to make you feel comfortable and placated, pacified and cozy. It's the wool being pulled over your eyes. The truth is we aren't ever in control. We cling to a massive rock that hurls through the frozen void of space at about ninteen and a half miles per second. We can do very little to make us safe. All the locks and deadbolts and rules and structure in the world cannot save us from truth. And that truth is that we aren’t supposed to live locked away… We are charged as Christ-followers to head out into the world and help people, tell them the Good News and live as Christ did.
Jesus taught us not to hold onto what we have, He called us to let go. He didn't want us to be safe hoarders of things. He called on us over and over again to reach out to others. If someone steals your jacket, give him your shirt as well. If we see a stranger down we are to jump into harms way and rescue him. If someone strikes you, turn and let him strike your other side. We are to give up the idea that we have to be overlords of our own destiny and just live in peace that God's grace is enough, his plan is perfect and His promises assured.
Once you've given up control, life becomes much easier. You find a new freedom. This freedom from worry and doubt allows you to walk through the world as a light barrier. Snakes will not bite you, poison will have no effect and miracles will happen in your midst (Mark 16:18).
What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
Romans 8:32,33
Imagine that there was once a man in a boat. He had crafted it by hand and loved it with all his heart. He was sailing around just outside the harbor when a massive storm blew in from the ocean catching the sailor off guard. Before he could get back to safty, the winds rose and sheets of rain fell from the darkening heavens. Then, a massive wave came up and capsized his vessel. He scrambled quickly to secure the hold of the up-side-down craft. He held on and prayed for God to save him. He clung to the boat for dear life knowing that he had to hold on so he could wouldn't drowned.
Meanwhile, the Coast Guard came and saw the man and the capsized boat. They rushed to the rescue. The threw out a life line and called for him to let go and grab the rope. They promised to pull him in and take him to safty. But the man wouldn't let go. He couldn't accept the risk of losing control. So he was left there on the stormy seas.
Today is a good day to stop clinging to what we have. It's time to let go and let God take over. It's time to be cast onto the wind to spread the good news. It's time to leave the games behind and go out and change the world.
Friday, November 24, 2006
Walk On
I'm half way through my new book, "Walk On: the Spiritual Journey of U2." Steve Stockman, an Irish chaplain presents the world's greatest rock band in a new light. It details their constant struggle to live their lives and make their art in a way true to Christ's teachings, not some dogmatic, legalistic code authored by suit and tie-wearing south Baptist preachers.
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
your young men will see visions.
Joel 2:28.
More than a window into their artistic process, I find the book a narrative of a group of Christ-followers on a great quest, to search through their teenage fairytale myths when their faith was young, to their cold confrontation with American evangelism and their plunge into Post-modern spirituality. Bono and company have battled so many of the things I have experienced. They have been bitten by many of the foes that have snapped my way. I am seeing Bono, a life-long hero do to his music, in a new light. And he’s even more of a guide now. Bono has a quote that sums up his theology of grace and the cross… and it’s beautiful.
"But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
Luke 6:27-31
Looking at his disciples, Jesus said:
"Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are you who hunger now,
for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you
and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man.
Luke 6:20-22
We are the artists that paint the pictures of what tomorrow might hold. We envision the future. We strive ever more to reach out and touch those that Jesus called on us to reach; the poor, the lame, the sick, the orphaned, the downtrodden. It’s time, friends, to grab our brushes and start painting those pictures, of the kingdom to come. Imagine, all of us united together, what light we would shine in this darkened place.
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
your young men will see visions.
Joel 2:28.
More than a window into their artistic process, I find the book a narrative of a group of Christ-followers on a great quest, to search through their teenage fairytale myths when their faith was young, to their cold confrontation with American evangelism and their plunge into Post-modern spirituality. Bono and company have battled so many of the things I have experienced. They have been bitten by many of the foes that have snapped my way. I am seeing Bono, a life-long hero do to his music, in a new light. And he’s even more of a guide now. Bono has a quote that sums up his theology of grace and the cross… and it’s beautiful.
“To me, faith in Jesus Christ that is not aligned to social justice- that is not aligned with the poor- it’s nothing.”
-Bono
"But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
Luke 6:27-31
Imagine a world where the blacks in South Africa could learn to forgive and live alongside their white oppressors. Imagine a white government in Pretoria that could see a new South Africa with, by some kind of miracle, Nelson Mandela as president. Imagine that there could be a ceasefire in Northern Ireland where the paramilitaries would lay down their weapons and sit together in a new Northern Ireland government. Imagine if enemies could be loved.
Looking at his disciples, Jesus said:
"Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are you who hunger now,
for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you,
when they exclude you and insult you
and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man.
Luke 6:20-22
Imagine if the hungry could be fed. Imagine if the meek could inherit the earth. Imagine a world where the first would be last and the last would be first. Imagine. Without the turbocharged engine of imagination, nothing can change in our world. God told His people that they would dream dreams and see visions.
Imagine another world and how it could be and how it could work and where to begin to put it together is where the kingdom begins.
Walk On p.82
We are the artists that paint the pictures of what tomorrow might hold. We envision the future. We strive ever more to reach out and touch those that Jesus called on us to reach; the poor, the lame, the sick, the orphaned, the downtrodden. It’s time, friends, to grab our brushes and start painting those pictures, of the kingdom to come. Imagine, all of us united together, what light we would shine in this darkened place.
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Happy Thanksgiving
This year let us skip all the pilgram and indian misinformation and get right down to the heart of Thanksgiving... We are blessed in America. We have so much stuff that we just expect, take for granted. We have warm homes, food to eat, clothing to wear, safe water to drink... and we live in relative safty. These are the things we should bow our heads and thank God for. We are blessed.
This holiday season we all will worry about gifts and money. We will question if we are getting big enough presents to show our love... I am guilty of this as much as anyone. But let us not forget the ultimate gift, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. He gave His life so that we might enter into communion with His Father. Remember Phil 2:5-11. Live it!
Say thanks for all we have and all we have been given.
This holiday season we all will worry about gifts and money. We will question if we are getting big enough presents to show our love... I am guilty of this as much as anyone. But let us not forget the ultimate gift, the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. He gave His life so that we might enter into communion with His Father. Remember Phil 2:5-11. Live it!
Say thanks for all we have and all we have been given.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Dec G-squared Flyer
Jesus in dreads is cool!!! Check out the G-squared December poster. Print it, hang it, give it to some friends. Let's pack the Barn!!!
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Political Correctness
POLITICALLY CORRECT LORD'S PRAYER
Our (mis)Concept of Patriarchal Authority, who, it can be said, inhabits the metaphysical sphere, privileged be your signifier.
May your social structure achieve dominance.
May the enactment of your desire be manifested throughout the physical-metaphysical dichotomy.
Empower us this day with the means of material production,
And refuse to enforce sanctions against our behavior which some see as subversions of a moral perspective, just as we refuse to marginalize the moral perspectives of others who have exerted their individuality.
Don't lead us into situation that some would (mis)understand as detrimental to the full expression of our humanness, but liberate us from the concept of "evil."
For yours is the hegemony, and the dominance, and perceived mystification within the entire continuum of the Western concept of linear time.
Let's make sure we keep the Truth the truth. When we fuzz down the power and the pop of the Good News, soon the image of Jesus Christ becomes so blurred, so obscured that it fades away.
Remember that Jesus refused to be easy. He refused to water down His radical message to be popular with the powers that be. Jesus walked into the darkened room and blazed His shinning light. He refused to be filtered or toned down... He was awesome truth. And we should keep it that way!
Monday, November 20, 2006
Prayer
Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
How do you talk to your best friend? Do you open up and bare your soul? Do you whisper your little inner problems? Does just sharing them make you feel better?
I have a good friend. I tell all my deep dark secrets to her. I bare my soul to her. I pay lots of money and spend hours driving to the therapist, but in the end, my chats with my closest buddy are always the most healing for my soul. I share the good times and the bad. When I have a success, I quickly grab my phone to tell her the story. She is my confidant.
Here is the deal, God wants to have a relationship just like that! He wants us to pray to Him in the same way. Talk to Him. Tell Him your deep hidden secrets. Share your highs and lows. He is there for you!
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Two Week Warning
Greetings friends,
Happy early Turkeyday!!!! I know it's a bit early, but Thanksgiving is just around the corner. As I look over the calendar, I also noted that December Generation Genesis is just two weeks away. Now is the time to contact us to volenteer your talents. G-squared was designed to be a service for your age group, by your age group. Get excited and get involved!
Sunday, December 3rd, 2006
7:00 pm at the Barn south of Exira
We will be celebrating Advent, the coming of Christ and the holdidays. The entire band is back together after a few weeks off. We will rock, worship, pray, share, and do whatever else the Spirit leads us to do. Remember, our goal for this next get together was for everyone to invite three friends.
Stay tuned for more information. Call if you need a ride.
Grace and Peace,
Bollman
Happy early Turkeyday!!!! I know it's a bit early, but Thanksgiving is just around the corner. As I look over the calendar, I also noted that December Generation Genesis is just two weeks away. Now is the time to contact us to volenteer your talents. G-squared was designed to be a service for your age group, by your age group. Get excited and get involved!
Sunday, December 3rd, 2006
7:00 pm at the Barn south of Exira
We will be celebrating Advent, the coming of Christ and the holdidays. The entire band is back together after a few weeks off. We will rock, worship, pray, share, and do whatever else the Spirit leads us to do. Remember, our goal for this next get together was for everyone to invite three friends.
Stay tuned for more information. Call if you need a ride.
Grace and Peace,
Bollman
Saturday, November 18, 2006
A warm tingly feeling all over
Today I worshipped in a most unusual place. I was lying in the tanning bed at Back Alley Cuts, totally in my birthday suit except for the dishtowel I use to wrap up my tattoo. I had my earphones jacked into my Chocolate and I was jamming to some Jeremy Camp. The warmth of artificial sun was all around. As Camp belted out some good paise tunes I just couldn't contain myself. I started praise right there with him.
There I was, in the tanning bed, a hand stretched out as far as I could, tears rolling down my face, singing Beautiful One and Enough right along with him. I felt better than I had in days, weeks, maybe even months. It's funny, there is a great line in You Alone by Casting Pearls that speaks to the omnipresence of our God. If I wind up in China, He will follow. If I end up in a submarine at the bottom of the sea, He is still there. If I end up on the moon, God is still right beside me.
As I sat in that tanning bed, washing in the Spirit it became so real to me. God is always with me. He always has my back. He never loses sight of me. Even when I'm fake baking, Jesus is my homeboy.
You Alone
There I was, in the tanning bed, a hand stretched out as far as I could, tears rolling down my face, singing Beautiful One and Enough right along with him. I felt better than I had in days, weeks, maybe even months. It's funny, there is a great line in You Alone by Casting Pearls that speaks to the omnipresence of our God. If I wind up in China, He will follow. If I end up in a submarine at the bottom of the sea, He is still there. If I end up on the moon, God is still right beside me.
As I sat in that tanning bed, washing in the Spirit it became so real to me. God is always with me. He always has my back. He never loses sight of me. Even when I'm fake baking, Jesus is my homeboy.
You Alone
Casting Pearls
If I go to the heavens above Lord I know You are there
If I make my bed in the depths lord I know You are there
If I rise on the wings of the dawn or settle on the far side of the sea
Even still Lord I know You will, You will always be there with me
I'm letting go of all that I know
I'm holding on to You alone
I lay it all down down here at Your feet
I want You alone You alone
Friday, November 17, 2006
Thursday, November 16, 2006
blanket faith
Tonight I have been sitting around with my feet up on the computer desk, my guitar in hand lightly strumming as I send prayers up to my wonderful God in the candlelit little room that I call home. I started thinking about Paul. I love Paul. I think about him a lot... him watching from a distance at Stephen's stoning... that amazing moment on the road to Damascus, running straight into God in the flesh... the scales over his eyes... and the long journeys he made with his friends Barnabas, Timothy and the others. This evening I have been thinking about what a leap of faith it was for him to give up his comfortable existence to go follow Jesus and His radical message.
Remember, Paul wasn't joining the Christian Church... it didn't exist yet. The few believers that had rallied around Stephen were scattered and hopeless after his public murder at the hands of Paul's religious scholar buddies. The entering movement was little more than a few scattered men preaching a shocking message. Yet Paul gives up his path to power in their Jewish world anyway.
No Paul wasn't joining a church. He wasn't following a path that was easily followed. He was following a MAN. He was following Jesus. Our churches today are very different. Right when you walk in the door at most churches you are greeted by a volunteer that hands you a visitor's packet with a list of all the stuff that church can do for you. Some of it is very good like food pantries and other ministries... but most seem like social events, mix and meet event. The church has become so involved in every little thing in the community, bake sales, Christmas music concerts, piano recitals, even sillier mundane things.... all the while they lose sight of the purpose, the goal, the prize. Jesus. Paul stared straight at Him. We, too, should stay focused on Jesus.
It is easy today to join a church. You fil out the card and meet with the pastor, you pick which committee, which clubs or groups to join in that building. You buy into the package of activities that best suit your needs. You can see all the stuff that the church can and will do for you. Most join for the services and the show not for an image of Jesus. But Paul never did that. Paul's church was really simple... He loved Jesus so much that he wanted to tell others about him. And that he did his whole life.
I spent many years with scales over my eyes. For some of them I was even a pretty good member of the church. I was a terrible Christ-follower. I did everything I could to stay involved in activities so I couldn’t listen to what God was actually calling me to do... But once I actually opened my eyes and saw Jesus, stunning Jesus, beautiful Jesus, the same God-man that Paul saw, I could never be the same. I had to drop all the pretense and run after Him.
I see so much pretense. I see so much acting, and dancing and puffed up frosting that makes this church or that church look important... But really it just keeps them busy. These activities have become like a heavy blanket that is weighing them down. I pray that it is thrown off... and Christ be revealed in its stead.
Stained Glass Masquerade
Remember, Paul wasn't joining the Christian Church... it didn't exist yet. The few believers that had rallied around Stephen were scattered and hopeless after his public murder at the hands of Paul's religious scholar buddies. The entering movement was little more than a few scattered men preaching a shocking message. Yet Paul gives up his path to power in their Jewish world anyway.
No Paul wasn't joining a church. He wasn't following a path that was easily followed. He was following a MAN. He was following Jesus. Our churches today are very different. Right when you walk in the door at most churches you are greeted by a volunteer that hands you a visitor's packet with a list of all the stuff that church can do for you. Some of it is very good like food pantries and other ministries... but most seem like social events, mix and meet event. The church has become so involved in every little thing in the community, bake sales, Christmas music concerts, piano recitals, even sillier mundane things.... all the while they lose sight of the purpose, the goal, the prize. Jesus. Paul stared straight at Him. We, too, should stay focused on Jesus.
It is easy today to join a church. You fil out the card and meet with the pastor, you pick which committee, which clubs or groups to join in that building. You buy into the package of activities that best suit your needs. You can see all the stuff that the church can and will do for you. Most join for the services and the show not for an image of Jesus. But Paul never did that. Paul's church was really simple... He loved Jesus so much that he wanted to tell others about him. And that he did his whole life.
Oh, let us gaze into His eyes. Let us stand before this humble carpenter and let His beauty knock down our defenses. And our pride. And control and shame and hesitancy. And let us run with him a wild race of truth and beauty and grace. Let us pour out our most treasured prizes upon Him, only Him.
Let us abandon all for Him. Let us no longer be couch-sitting Christians who are known more for our dogma than for the actions of our hands and feet. Let us become people of the Way. Jesus followers. The word Christian implies religion and dogma and sedentary intellectual assent to a belief system. Enough of that!
Let us throw off this heavy blanket of cultural Christianity and relearn how to run. How to repent. How to lose our lives instead of always trying to save them. How to be used by God. How to change this world.
Let us relearn how to stare, how to worship, how to study, how to kneel, how to touch, how to trust. Jesus is so rich. So full. So utterly captivating and beautiful and worth everything we have. We is all.
God in the Flesh
Don Everts
p. 153-4
I spent many years with scales over my eyes. For some of them I was even a pretty good member of the church. I was a terrible Christ-follower. I did everything I could to stay involved in activities so I couldn’t listen to what God was actually calling me to do... But once I actually opened my eyes and saw Jesus, stunning Jesus, beautiful Jesus, the same God-man that Paul saw, I could never be the same. I had to drop all the pretense and run after Him.
I see so much pretense. I see so much acting, and dancing and puffed up frosting that makes this church or that church look important... But really it just keeps them busy. These activities have become like a heavy blanket that is weighing them down. I pray that it is thrown off... and Christ be revealed in its stead.
Stained Glass Masquerade
Casting Crowns
Is there anyone who’s been there
Are there any hands to raise
Am I the only one who’s traded
In the altar for a stage
The performance is convincing
And we know every line by heart
Only when no one is watching
Can we really fall apart
But would it set me free
If I dared to let you see
The truth behind the person
That you imagine me to be
Would your arms be open
Or would you walk away
Would the love of Jesus
Be enough to make you stay
Are we happy plastic people
Under shiny plastic steeples
With walls around our weakness
And smiles to hide our pain
But if the invitation’s open
To every heart that has been broken
Maybe then we close the curtain
On our stained glass masquerade
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Christian Napkins
I was in a big Christian bookstore last year during the holidays and I saw and amazing thing. There was a sign that read in big block letters, "Christian Napkins." I couldn't believe my eyes! What in the world is a Christian Napkin and how does it enter into the faith? Is it baptized as a young napkin and then grow up in the church or is it saved after saying the salvation prayer? Are you a really good Christian if you use them to wipe the crumbs from your mouth? It just seemed a little ironic to me.
Why do we have to label things as Christian or non-Christian? Now friends I do realize that the papergoods in question had little crosses on them and that’s what separated them from their counterparts, but what an absurd label. It makes me wonder why we segregate so much in this life. We have Christian music and secular music. We have private and parochial schools.
I listen to a lot of contemporary Christian music as well as a lot of secular alternative and hard rock music. Often times I see more of the Gospel in a ballad by Coldplay than I do in the words by Michael W. Smith. One throws in the word ‘god’ here and there and it becomes a ‘Christian song’ while the other may be about love and struggle and sacrificing your life for the one you care about… and it becomes the secular tune.
We run about to every item, every action, every activity and label it either Christian or Non-Christian. It is as if we have a big stamp and we slap down a giant red JESUS on everything that fits into the neat little category of 'Christian.' Then we go about separating the Jesus-stuff out from the other things and we make a nice little pile of Christian-things… We draw that line in the sand and tell people to chose which side they want to be on… the side with WOW pop worship music, Veggietales and Christian Napkins, or, the mountain of other stuff that doesn’t have the red stamp. It’s a difficult choice. Most of the stuff I like will be heaped on the ‘Non’ side.
But this raises a bigger question, what does the Christian Label mean to us these days? What does it mean to be Christian? Is someone a Christian if they belong to a church? Is someone a Christian if they are active in a ministry? Are they a Christian if they simply believe in Jesus? Do they need to know Him personally as Lord and Savior of their lives?
Friends, I believe in living life to the fullest. Carpe diem. Live everyday hardcore with Jesus. I do not follow Christ to be part of a group. I do not go to church to belong to happy smiling people. I do not go to feel better about myself. I do not go for the label, ‘I’m a good person… I am a Christian.’ In fact, I go for the opposite reason. I go because I am broken and need a medicine that only Jesus can give. I go to be transformed, to be made whole.
What if being a Christian wasn’t as simple as posting a sign, printing a cross or getting a red Jesus stamp? What if the name took on a deeper meaning? What if people stopped using the church as a social gathering and started using it as a place for social change? What if we reached for a thicker, meatier faith, not a religion but a relationship? What if Christianity was no longer a label for marketing books and napkins, but became mantra for passionate, energized people chasing after Jesus? What if?
Why do we have to label things as Christian or non-Christian? Now friends I do realize that the papergoods in question had little crosses on them and that’s what separated them from their counterparts, but what an absurd label. It makes me wonder why we segregate so much in this life. We have Christian music and secular music. We have private and parochial schools.
I listen to a lot of contemporary Christian music as well as a lot of secular alternative and hard rock music. Often times I see more of the Gospel in a ballad by Coldplay than I do in the words by Michael W. Smith. One throws in the word ‘god’ here and there and it becomes a ‘Christian song’ while the other may be about love and struggle and sacrificing your life for the one you care about… and it becomes the secular tune.
We run about to every item, every action, every activity and label it either Christian or Non-Christian. It is as if we have a big stamp and we slap down a giant red JESUS on everything that fits into the neat little category of 'Christian.' Then we go about separating the Jesus-stuff out from the other things and we make a nice little pile of Christian-things… We draw that line in the sand and tell people to chose which side they want to be on… the side with WOW pop worship music, Veggietales and Christian Napkins, or, the mountain of other stuff that doesn’t have the red stamp. It’s a difficult choice. Most of the stuff I like will be heaped on the ‘Non’ side.
But this raises a bigger question, what does the Christian Label mean to us these days? What does it mean to be Christian? Is someone a Christian if they belong to a church? Is someone a Christian if they are active in a ministry? Are they a Christian if they simply believe in Jesus? Do they need to know Him personally as Lord and Savior of their lives?
Friends, I believe in living life to the fullest. Carpe diem. Live everyday hardcore with Jesus. I do not follow Christ to be part of a group. I do not go to church to belong to happy smiling people. I do not go to feel better about myself. I do not go for the label, ‘I’m a good person… I am a Christian.’ In fact, I go for the opposite reason. I go because I am broken and need a medicine that only Jesus can give. I go to be transformed, to be made whole.
What if the church stopped the Grand Parade of Smiling Christians and instead found itself collapsing upon Him in its need? What would that do to us? And to the world around us? What if we stopped trying to hold it all together? What if we stopped medicating our inner pains with recreation and accomplishment and business? What if we ran and collapsed upon Jesus?
Perhaps we would find true shalom settling quietly into our souls. Not a sentimental, organ-induced ecstatic feeling. But a quiet knowledge of mercy. A true, slow peace.
Perhaps we could march forward as wounded healers, as beggars who have found bread, as peaceful sons and daughters. Perhaps our ministry wouldn’t flow only from the reservoirs of our broken psyches and desire to grasp apostolic success but from souls that know rest.
Perhaps this world could look at the church and be intrigued by the inexplicable peace they see there. Instead of looking at the church and finding forced smiles and nicely tucked-in shirts and short, glib answers to the pains of life, perhaps the world would find a community of people who have the peace of Jesus within them. Perhaps they’d see lived-out testimonies of how freeing it is to admit the pains and struggles of life and take them to Jesus.
God in the Flesh
Don Everts
p. 111-112
What if being a Christian wasn’t as simple as posting a sign, printing a cross or getting a red Jesus stamp? What if the name took on a deeper meaning? What if people stopped using the church as a social gathering and started using it as a place for social change? What if we reached for a thicker, meatier faith, not a religion but a relationship? What if Christianity was no longer a label for marketing books and napkins, but became mantra for passionate, energized people chasing after Jesus? What if?
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Explosive Seeds
Remember those vacation bible school lessons? Remember that happy jesus with the smiling face and the thumbs up? Remember how his teachings had all the gravity of a Veggie Tales video?
“And the moral of the story is…. Be nice to people! Now here is your cookie and Kool-Aid. Gobble it down and go play red rover.”
This misses the gravity of those stories. Treating the words of Jesus as good teachings with a happy ending misses the power, the punch and potency of the Living Truth.
I fear that people everywhere are still in that mode. They grow up and just wind up filling the seats of ‘big church’. They listen to the reading, hear that nice moral message, get their treat and skip off to play whatever games they played before entering into the church for the weekly dose of Jesus.
But God’s word is much more than a nice message. It’s more than a fable with a catchy slogan at the end. It’s life changing and powerful. It demands the Christ-follower to climb inside and transform.
Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides souls from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Hebrews 4:12
Everywhere we look we see hurting people. There are those hurt by the actions of others. We see friends in bondage to drugs, alcohol or sex. We find people destroying their lives to change the way they look because they hate themselves, inside or out. They need love, they need help, they need a powerful medicine that this world isn’t giving them.
How to Save a Life
Let him know that you know best
Cause after all you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you
Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life
What can change lives? What can drag people from the edge of ledge looking down and bring them back to hope? What can stop a life of pain and hatred?
There are many fancy programs and treatment centers for whatever ails you. I think most of them are positive things that help people straighten out their issues. But if you want REAL change... if you want your problems really washed away, there is only one councilor, one doctor, one program to try.
But friends, here is the warning. Jesus won’t just fix you a little. He won’t just cure one little thing that ails you. He wants to restore you completely. Sometimes this is scary.
“And the moral of the story is…. Be nice to people! Now here is your cookie and Kool-Aid. Gobble it down and go play red rover.”
This misses the gravity of those stories. Treating the words of Jesus as good teachings with a happy ending misses the power, the punch and potency of the Living Truth.
God has come enfleshed in Jesus to speak what prophets and kings and angels longed to hear. He sowed explosive seeds that were looking for good soil. The Good Samaritan is not a quaint moral story for kids. It’s the sharpest of knives flung strongly by Jesus. It is a theological nuclear bomb, a philosophical land mine-all wrapped up tidily in this simple story. The more you handle the story, the more you get cut and encouraged and challenged and enlightened and humbled.
God in the Flesh
Don Everts
p74
I fear that people everywhere are still in that mode. They grow up and just wind up filling the seats of ‘big church’. They listen to the reading, hear that nice moral message, get their treat and skip off to play whatever games they played before entering into the church for the weekly dose of Jesus.
But God’s word is much more than a nice message. It’s more than a fable with a catchy slogan at the end. It’s life changing and powerful. It demands the Christ-follower to climb inside and transform.
Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides souls from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
Hebrews 4:12
Everywhere we look we see hurting people. There are those hurt by the actions of others. We see friends in bondage to drugs, alcohol or sex. We find people destroying their lives to change the way they look because they hate themselves, inside or out. They need love, they need help, they need a powerful medicine that this world isn’t giving them.
How to Save a Life
The Fray
Let him know that you know best
Cause after all you do know best
Try to slip past his defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told him all along
And pray to God he hears you
And pray to God he hears you
Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life
What can change lives? What can drag people from the edge of ledge looking down and bring them back to hope? What can stop a life of pain and hatred?
There are many fancy programs and treatment centers for whatever ails you. I think most of them are positive things that help people straighten out their issues. But if you want REAL change... if you want your problems really washed away, there is only one councilor, one doctor, one program to try.
But friends, here is the warning. Jesus won’t just fix you a little. He won’t just cure one little thing that ails you. He wants to restore you completely. Sometimes this is scary.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Thrown Room News
As you can see, I am in the middle of a major overhaul on the entire website here at www.thrownroom.com. I want the blog and myspace to flow better with the rest of the site. The blog is almost done. In the meantime there are a few font color issues and a few bugs to work out.
New to the site will be the ability to add comments to the blog posts. Check it out.
Also, I am working on an image gallery of Thrown shows, G-squared services and service projects that we have worked at. If you have any such images please send to me at the thrown@thrownroom.com.
The next gig we have booked is the first Sunday in December at the Barn. If you are interested in helping out, singing, reading or speaking, shoot me an email.
Grace and Peace,
Bollman
New to the site will be the ability to add comments to the blog posts. Check it out.
Also, I am working on an image gallery of Thrown shows, G-squared services and service projects that we have worked at. If you have any such images please send to me at the thrown@thrownroom.com.
The next gig we have booked is the first Sunday in December at the Barn. If you are interested in helping out, singing, reading or speaking, shoot me an email.
Grace and Peace,
Bollman
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Landing
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
-Matthew 11:28-30
I have been studying the hands of Jesus these past few says. I have read books, searched the Bible and meditated on the gravity of His caring and His compassion. For days I have focused on how Christ's constant reaching pose should instruct my life and my ministry. I set out creating a series of paintings of people with radical faith like the gouche of Mother Teresa that I posted yesterday. As I draw these figures, I get a window into who they are. I pray for the Holy Spirit to impart in me the good lessons of these people's service and sacrifice.
But then, the heavier meaning of Christ's compassion hit me. Jesus was personal. Jesus didn't enter a town and wave His hand and heal everyone at once and stroll away. No! He called everyone to Him. He took them aside, sometimes literal holding their and as they went. He carried the ill and the dying. He spoke to the blind and the sick. Jesus wanted to look these people in the eye and heal them because He is a very personal God who wants to heal and save and comfort....
So while we, as Christ-followers must be like Jesus, the bigger message is that Jesus is calling for us to come to HIM and rest on Him. He wants to touch US! He wants to Heal us! He wants to save us!
Life is often hard. We find ourselves in moments of pain. We find grief washing over us, threatening to pull us under. We face odds bigger than mountains and we start to lose hope. But Jesus is no stranger to sorrow. Whatever we face in life, whatever challenge, whatever illness or odds, Jesus has been there. He was walked the walk. He knows pain and suffering. When we are down He has compassion on us.
What a radical concept. We look at the God of Everything, and we see such tenderness, such mercy and such compassion.
Jesus was gentle and humble in heart. He had mercy in his heart. And gentleness in his touch. A man with such mercy and compassion is a place to go to for rest. Foe comfort. To collapse upon. I think it is significant that Jesus described his Spirit as "Counselor" (John 15:26). Ever think about what that implies? It implies that we need one! It implies that the essence of His Spirit is compassionate and caring and understanding. We can weep with Him. Collapse upon Him. Know that He knows and feels and weeps alongside us.
God In the Flesh
Don Everts
p107
Friends, I am a lover of David's Psalms. David describes the all-powerful, uncontainable powerful GOD that surrounds and has control. He is solid and He is unshakeable. His truth is like standing on a mountaintop. He is a fortress and a tower of safety because He is unbreakable. How wonderful is the irony that this strong tower, this solid rock, this mighty, mighty God also has tender hands? How beautiful to see this God coming down and carried sons to their mothers and healing the sick with a touch of His hands? How awesome is it to know that He is there, calling us to come to Him now and lay down our burdens and rest on Him. It is a tender, compassionate landing... But it is solid, sure and safe.
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
-Hebrews 4:15-16
I love my Jesus. I love his strong arm and His gentle hands. I humble myself at His feet. Yes I will serve as He did. But I will never run from the fact that I am just as broken as the crippled woman, I am just as sick as the leper, I am just as blind as the men on the side of the road. I am just as in need of His loving hand to come touch me and make me whole again.
Jesus, you are my rescue. I lay all I have down at your feet. I give you my talents for service but I also call for your mercy on me. Heal me, save me, renew me. Make me workable clay for your purpose. AMEN!
-Matthew 11:28-30
I have been studying the hands of Jesus these past few says. I have read books, searched the Bible and meditated on the gravity of His caring and His compassion. For days I have focused on how Christ's constant reaching pose should instruct my life and my ministry. I set out creating a series of paintings of people with radical faith like the gouche of Mother Teresa that I posted yesterday. As I draw these figures, I get a window into who they are. I pray for the Holy Spirit to impart in me the good lessons of these people's service and sacrifice.
But then, the heavier meaning of Christ's compassion hit me. Jesus was personal. Jesus didn't enter a town and wave His hand and heal everyone at once and stroll away. No! He called everyone to Him. He took them aside, sometimes literal holding their and as they went. He carried the ill and the dying. He spoke to the blind and the sick. Jesus wanted to look these people in the eye and heal them because He is a very personal God who wants to heal and save and comfort....
So while we, as Christ-followers must be like Jesus, the bigger message is that Jesus is calling for us to come to HIM and rest on Him. He wants to touch US! He wants to Heal us! He wants to save us!
Life is often hard. We find ourselves in moments of pain. We find grief washing over us, threatening to pull us under. We face odds bigger than mountains and we start to lose hope. But Jesus is no stranger to sorrow. Whatever we face in life, whatever challenge, whatever illness or odds, Jesus has been there. He was walked the walk. He knows pain and suffering. When we are down He has compassion on us.
What a radical concept. We look at the God of Everything, and we see such tenderness, such mercy and such compassion.
Jesus was gentle and humble in heart. He had mercy in his heart. And gentleness in his touch. A man with such mercy and compassion is a place to go to for rest. Foe comfort. To collapse upon. I think it is significant that Jesus described his Spirit as "Counselor" (John 15:26). Ever think about what that implies? It implies that we need one! It implies that the essence of His Spirit is compassionate and caring and understanding. We can weep with Him. Collapse upon Him. Know that He knows and feels and weeps alongside us.
God In the Flesh
Don Everts
p107
Friends, I am a lover of David's Psalms. David describes the all-powerful, uncontainable powerful GOD that surrounds and has control. He is solid and He is unshakeable. His truth is like standing on a mountaintop. He is a fortress and a tower of safety because He is unbreakable. How wonderful is the irony that this strong tower, this solid rock, this mighty, mighty God also has tender hands? How beautiful to see this God coming down and carried sons to their mothers and healing the sick with a touch of His hands? How awesome is it to know that He is there, calling us to come to Him now and lay down our burdens and rest on Him. It is a tender, compassionate landing... But it is solid, sure and safe.
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
-Hebrews 4:15-16
I love my Jesus. I love his strong arm and His gentle hands. I humble myself at His feet. Yes I will serve as He did. But I will never run from the fact that I am just as broken as the crippled woman, I am just as sick as the leper, I am just as blind as the men on the side of the road. I am just as in need of His loving hand to come touch me and make me whole again.
Jesus, you are my rescue. I lay all I have down at your feet. I give you my talents for service but I also call for your mercy on me. Heal me, save me, renew me. Make me workable clay for your purpose. AMEN!
Saturday, November 11, 2006
Lay your hands
"Keep the joy of loving the poor and share this joy with all you meet. Remember works of love are works of Peace. God Bless you."
-Mother Teresa
Yesterday I discussed the Bible’s frequent descriptions of Jesus coming to those in need and reaching out His hands and touching them. How does this make us feel in today's politically correct world? What do we make of a man who was God in flesh who when He finally arrives on this earth He doesn't use His power to destroy armies or conquer nations or gather great wealth. Instead He humbles Himself and become a servant, granting mercy on the meek, the lame, and the rejected. He championed their cause. He reach out into their world and touched them. This touch wasn't symbolic but was a real, physical human contact.
But what, if anything, does that mean for us? So what! Jesus touched people. Big deal.
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
-Phil 2:5-8
We are as Christians to be like Jesus. Out goal should be to serve as He did on this earth. We should to then reach out and touch others. Touch, as I have blogged before is so vital to human interaction. Dispite a society of sterile, bleached clean fear of relational outreach, as those in Christ's image, we must keep reaching out, keep making contact, and keep touching the needy.
It’s important to not only look at what He did but also whom He did it. Jesus Christ, the living embodiment of God Almighty reached out and touched blind beggars. He touched them and gave them sight. He went to lepers, those society had cast away as broken and useless, people who where no longer seen as part of humanity but now viewed as creatures to be shunned. Jesus defied social mores and sought these people out, reached out his hand and touched their ailing skin. He forgave them, healed them and gave them new lives. He was amazing.
If we are to be Christ-followers we must follow Jesus’ lead. We can’t just give lip service to the causes and actions that Jesus ardently pursued during His ministry. Our tithing and benevolence are not enough. We are to literally take on the appearance of Jesus. We are to find His heart and His teachings and do these things. We are to love everyone regardless of their past, their health, the skeletons hidden in their closets. We are to be that Light of the world that Father-God shot down that first Noel oh so long ago. We are to do the things He did here in our day and age.
We all know the name Mother Teresa. It has come to mean someone who lives a selfless life helping others. But the more I study the diminutive woman in blue-rimmed sari, the more I see an example of how we are to live. I see a reflection of Jesus.
As a young nun in India, she was assigned a job teaching geography in a Catholic school. One day she was riding a bus through the streets of Calcutta. Stricken by what she saw, she could no longer overlook the hoards of suffering people crowding the streets. Everywhere there were the lame, the blind, the sick, the malnourished, and the dying huddled in allies begging for scraps from unmerciful passersby. She felt the Lord calling to her. This was to be her mission, the great vocation of her life. She returned to the school and asked for immediate reassignment to head into the streets, to touch the needy.
Over the next five decades, Mother Teresa turned her life into an offering for Christ by serving the less fortunate. She started her own ministry called the Sisters of Charity whose mission is to devote their life to serving the poor without accepting any material reward in return. Centers to treat lepers, the blind, the disabled, the aged, and the dying were soon opened worldwide. She reached out and touched the needy. She never strayed from her mission and became the greatest humanitarian of the 20th century.
"Mother Teresa has opened for mankind the portals of heaven and shown us the Heart of God. Jesus is saying to her, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father. I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I was alone, forsaken, sick, abandon, poor, heartbroken, and desolate and you took me in. What you did to the least of these My Brethren, you did to me.’ Mother Teresa had a Mother’s heart, great and strong, and courageous enough to embrace the whole world. She will not soon be forgotten. Her reward will be great in Heaven. We pray for her and for those who follow her, that her work may go on. She has done something beautiful for God."
-Sr. M. Raphael, PCPA, Our Lady Of Angels Monastery, Birmingham, Ala.
In Mother Teresa we see someone wholly committed to the Lord. She transformed her life into an offering for the Lord. She walked as Jesus did. She traveled humbly and found those in need and reached out a literally touched them. She wasn't content with a passive mission. She wanted to be the hands and feet of Jesus in her world. And with God's blessed help she was.
We do not have to become nuns. We do not have to take vows to follow anyone but Jesus. But we should open our hearts to the transforming power of Christ. And friends, that happens when we stop being the center of our own universe. When we serve others in Christ's name, His Spirit works in us and through us. We become like wet clay on the potter's wheel. We are molded and transformed. As we focus on giving and not taking, as we focus on helping and not collecting, we begin to live that Bible verse. We become the image of Jesus.
"You and I, we are the Church, no? We have to share with our people. Suffering today is because people are hoarding, not giving, not sharing.
Jesus made it very clear. Whatever you do to the least of my brethren, you do it to me. Give a glass of water, you give it to me. Receive a little child, you receive me"
-Mother Teresa
-Mother Teresa
Yesterday I discussed the Bible’s frequent descriptions of Jesus coming to those in need and reaching out His hands and touching them. How does this make us feel in today's politically correct world? What do we make of a man who was God in flesh who when He finally arrives on this earth He doesn't use His power to destroy armies or conquer nations or gather great wealth. Instead He humbles Himself and become a servant, granting mercy on the meek, the lame, and the rejected. He championed their cause. He reach out into their world and touched them. This touch wasn't symbolic but was a real, physical human contact.
But what, if anything, does that mean for us? So what! Jesus touched people. Big deal.
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
-Phil 2:5-8
We are as Christians to be like Jesus. Out goal should be to serve as He did on this earth. We should to then reach out and touch others. Touch, as I have blogged before is so vital to human interaction. Dispite a society of sterile, bleached clean fear of relational outreach, as those in Christ's image, we must keep reaching out, keep making contact, and keep touching the needy.
It’s important to not only look at what He did but also whom He did it. Jesus Christ, the living embodiment of God Almighty reached out and touched blind beggars. He touched them and gave them sight. He went to lepers, those society had cast away as broken and useless, people who where no longer seen as part of humanity but now viewed as creatures to be shunned. Jesus defied social mores and sought these people out, reached out his hand and touched their ailing skin. He forgave them, healed them and gave them new lives. He was amazing.
If we are to be Christ-followers we must follow Jesus’ lead. We can’t just give lip service to the causes and actions that Jesus ardently pursued during His ministry. Our tithing and benevolence are not enough. We are to literally take on the appearance of Jesus. We are to find His heart and His teachings and do these things. We are to love everyone regardless of their past, their health, the skeletons hidden in their closets. We are to be that Light of the world that Father-God shot down that first Noel oh so long ago. We are to do the things He did here in our day and age.
Mother Teresa 1910-1997
We all know the name Mother Teresa. It has come to mean someone who lives a selfless life helping others. But the more I study the diminutive woman in blue-rimmed sari, the more I see an example of how we are to live. I see a reflection of Jesus.
As a young nun in India, she was assigned a job teaching geography in a Catholic school. One day she was riding a bus through the streets of Calcutta. Stricken by what she saw, she could no longer overlook the hoards of suffering people crowding the streets. Everywhere there were the lame, the blind, the sick, the malnourished, and the dying huddled in allies begging for scraps from unmerciful passersby. She felt the Lord calling to her. This was to be her mission, the great vocation of her life. She returned to the school and asked for immediate reassignment to head into the streets, to touch the needy. Over the next five decades, Mother Teresa turned her life into an offering for Christ by serving the less fortunate. She started her own ministry called the Sisters of Charity whose mission is to devote their life to serving the poor without accepting any material reward in return. Centers to treat lepers, the blind, the disabled, the aged, and the dying were soon opened worldwide. She reached out and touched the needy. She never strayed from her mission and became the greatest humanitarian of the 20th century.
"Mother Teresa has opened for mankind the portals of heaven and shown us the Heart of God. Jesus is saying to her, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father. I was hungry and you gave me to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I was alone, forsaken, sick, abandon, poor, heartbroken, and desolate and you took me in. What you did to the least of these My Brethren, you did to me.’ Mother Teresa had a Mother’s heart, great and strong, and courageous enough to embrace the whole world. She will not soon be forgotten. Her reward will be great in Heaven. We pray for her and for those who follow her, that her work may go on. She has done something beautiful for God."
-Sr. M. Raphael, PCPA, Our Lady Of Angels Monastery, Birmingham, Ala.
In Mother Teresa we see someone wholly committed to the Lord. She transformed her life into an offering for the Lord. She walked as Jesus did. She traveled humbly and found those in need and reached out a literally touched them. She wasn't content with a passive mission. She wanted to be the hands and feet of Jesus in her world. And with God's blessed help she was.
We do not have to become nuns. We do not have to take vows to follow anyone but Jesus. But we should open our hearts to the transforming power of Christ. And friends, that happens when we stop being the center of our own universe. When we serve others in Christ's name, His Spirit works in us and through us. We become like wet clay on the potter's wheel. We are molded and transformed. As we focus on giving and not taking, as we focus on helping and not collecting, we begin to live that Bible verse. We become the image of Jesus.
"You and I, we are the Church, no? We have to share with our people. Suffering today is because people are hoarding, not giving, not sharing.
Jesus made it very clear. Whatever you do to the least of my brethren, you do it to me. Give a glass of water, you give it to me. Receive a little child, you receive me"
-Mother Teresa
Friday, November 10, 2006
Jesus didn't stay behind a warning tape
Don Everts
The four Gospels are full of emotional details. For example, they describe Jesus holding a man's hand, shedding tears for a friend, and sighing deeply in his spirit. They also painstakingly describe the anger of Jesus' enemies and show us Jesus getting spit at and slapped and ridiculed.
p 99
Jesus spoke with power. Jesus spoke with authority. He performed miracles that left crowds stunned and in awe. In His conversations with the religious figures of the day He spoke with razor-sharp truth. But yet, despite His awesomeness, despite all the people that fell at His feet and worshipped Him or those that bent in fear, the Bible captures an amazing amount of detail about his hands... His hands.
Jesus had compassion on them and touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight and followed him.
Matt 20:34
Filled with compassion, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!"
Mark 1:41
Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!" Immediately he was cured[a] of his leprosy.
Matt 8:3
He touched her hand and the fever left her, and she got up and began to wait on him.
Matt 8:15
Then he touched their eyes and said, "According to your faith will it be done to you"
Matt 9:29
But Jesus came and touched them. "Get up," he said. "Don't be afraid."
Matt 17:7
He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man's eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, "Do you see anything?"
Mark 8:23
Once more Jesus put his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.
Mark 8:25
But Jesus answered, "No more of this!" And he touched the man's ear and healed him.
Luke 22:51
This man of divine authority, this walking God, this God-made-flesh was compassionate, and caring. He used his hands to reach out and touch the sick, calm the fearful, and hold people gently. The awe-inspiring God of all creation, that made people tremble, reached out and softly held the hand of a blind man. He touched the ears of the deaf. He touched the deformed, rotting flesh of lepers. Jesus wasn't afraid. He was never repulsed nor did He shy away. He saw the hurt and He went to them. He reached out and touched them... and that touch restored them, freed them of their burdens and made them whole again.
When Jesus left Jericho, (Matt 20:29-34) a mad crush of people followed hoping to catch a glimps of His wonders. He and His disciples fought the crowds. Along the way, his handlers pushed back anyone that got in the way. "Out of the road, Jesus is a busy man. He has important business to do!"
But then two blind men approached. They too were rebuked by entourage but they didn't give up. They turned in their desperation and started screaming at the top of their lungs for help. "Help Jesus! Help! We need your mercy! We need your help!! We are desperate! We need your mercy!" The blind men hollered at Him as He passed. (v 30)
Jesus stopped, and looks their way. He calls out to them, "What is it that you need?"
Can you imagine? These men, mostly forgot by society, begging for coins on the street, desperate and at the end of their rope, call out to God for help... and He stops and answers... He literally stops and asks what it is He can do for them.
They answer, "Lord, Open our eyes." (v 33)
Moved by compassion, Jesus touched their eyes.
-Matthew 20:34
He showed mercy on them, poured out His grace upon them, gave them what they desperately needed and set them free. He reached out to them in compassion and touched them.
It wasn't just the sick and the desperate. Jesus also touched others. When children were brought His way, His handlers tried to turn them away. But Jesus said, "No, bring them here... This is what the Kingdom is all about." Jesus held babes and told children stories as they sat on his lap.
The strong-fisted, wrathful God of Israelites, as it turns out, has gentle hands.
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Emerge
I have had conversations with some of my friends regarding last Sunday’s G-squared.
A theme keeps repeating itself in what they say. It touched their hearts. There was a life-changing power present there that night. It was far bigger than Cody Haner and far cooler than Joel. It was smarter than Chris and more whatever than I am. It was electric. It was sublime. Sometimes the Spirit works right through you. We weren't several people ministering to a small group of believers. We were one. We were united by the Holy Spirit.
There is something amazing that happens sometimes during worship, when ritual is stripped away and the masks are removed… When we stop worrying about status and roles, and such man-made barriers that we put up and we just focus on communing with the Almighty. It’s life altering.
This lead me to ponder, what are the most effective example of Postmodern, Emergent, Experimental Worship I have encountered?
I love the monthly Service of Praise and Worship (SPAW) at First Assembly of God in Harlan. It has a round table feeling. Everyone comes to share bible verses, testimonials, prayers, and their song of their choice. Time after time, everyone’s message blends together in this perfect divine chorus, as if God had lead each of them to the same place and the same course to form the perfect message. I have worshipped there and felt so surrounded by a family of worshippers all yearning to praise God… openly and freely. It shouldn’t be shocking or scary to other believers. We all are destined to do this! Someday I will sit, stand and jump and shout on the golden shores worshipping in heaven. SPAW leaves you refreshed, not by the waters of this world, but as if pulling away a veil to the next, living water that quenches the soul.
Another Postmodern worship experience that I love is Immersion at Church of Hope in West Des Moines on late Thursday nights. To praise unhindered, to be immersed, to be surrounded by the sights, the sounds, the smells, the art… to break the bread and drink the wine, to sing and dance. Immersion gets it right. The relevant message screams to the millennial generation. I go to Immersion when my tank is running low and I need filled up. I never leave the same as I enter.
But truly I say to you, never has worship been so meaningful as Elk Horn Luther League’s Easter Walks. What else is more postmodern, more emergent, more experimental than the drama, the testimony, the evangelism of a bunch of teens giving Jesus to you… the path of Jesus, the ministry of Jesus, the footsteps of Jesus, then finally, in a tearful climax, the image of Jesus on the Cross. The Easter Walk isn’t about one man or woman preaching, it isn’t about a performance of a talented musician or a praise band. It’s kids, each one taking a bit of the story of Jesus, drawing it in tight to their souls, and lovingly passing it back to you as you walk the steps that Jesus did on His route to vindicate the sins of the world… my sins and yours. It can stun and it can transform.
I remember my first one. I wasn’t prepared for what was coming. I only knew it was going to be a nice little Easter play. I did not know I was about to encounter Jesus there…. The real deal Jesus. Not the calm, safe Jesus that is dispensed like candy in our mega-churches and at our vacation bible schools. It was God in the Flesh, He was real, He was radical, He was something totally different, and He was wanting to change my life.
There was one powerful moment I remember like yesterday. Breaking bread in the Upper Room has amazing. Chris Williams headed the group that dispensed communion with just ordinary bread and grape juice. While a pastor's son and a devout Christ-follower, C-dub holds no title in any church. He isn’t ordained by any organization nor school. He just came to that Easter Walk with a servant's heart wanting to reach people and teach them the Good News that Jesus Christ is alive and well and available today to start an ultimate extreme makeover in your life…. And He started one that day in mine.
Never has communion been more real. Never has Christ been so present. Never has Christ reached down in such a meaningful way and blessed me as He did right there in that Sunday school room. You can say all you want about the sacrament. You can quote dead theologians and legalistic dogma... but Christ is the only thing necessary to validate the life changing power in Communion. Christ and a receptive heart.
Last Sunday was extra special to a few people that have contacted me. Some have felt old burdens lift; others have recommitted their hearts to the Lord. Others just needed to attend church; to sing, dance and confess. Evermore we strive to capture that magic we find when worship goes right. We want to be unbridled. We open ourselves up to the Lord and we ask Him to use us to touch lives, change hearts and spread the Good News that Jesus is AWESOME. He isn’t timid, fragile, trapped, out-of-date, for one generation and not another. Jesus is NOW!
A theme keeps repeating itself in what they say. It touched their hearts. There was a life-changing power present there that night. It was far bigger than Cody Haner and far cooler than Joel. It was smarter than Chris and more whatever than I am. It was electric. It was sublime. Sometimes the Spirit works right through you. We weren't several people ministering to a small group of believers. We were one. We were united by the Holy Spirit.
There is something amazing that happens sometimes during worship, when ritual is stripped away and the masks are removed… When we stop worrying about status and roles, and such man-made barriers that we put up and we just focus on communing with the Almighty. It’s life altering.
This lead me to ponder, what are the most effective example of Postmodern, Emergent, Experimental Worship I have encountered?
I love the monthly Service of Praise and Worship (SPAW) at First Assembly of God in Harlan. It has a round table feeling. Everyone comes to share bible verses, testimonials, prayers, and their song of their choice. Time after time, everyone’s message blends together in this perfect divine chorus, as if God had lead each of them to the same place and the same course to form the perfect message. I have worshipped there and felt so surrounded by a family of worshippers all yearning to praise God… openly and freely. It shouldn’t be shocking or scary to other believers. We all are destined to do this! Someday I will sit, stand and jump and shout on the golden shores worshipping in heaven. SPAW leaves you refreshed, not by the waters of this world, but as if pulling away a veil to the next, living water that quenches the soul.
Another Postmodern worship experience that I love is Immersion at Church of Hope in West Des Moines on late Thursday nights. To praise unhindered, to be immersed, to be surrounded by the sights, the sounds, the smells, the art… to break the bread and drink the wine, to sing and dance. Immersion gets it right. The relevant message screams to the millennial generation. I go to Immersion when my tank is running low and I need filled up. I never leave the same as I enter.
But truly I say to you, never has worship been so meaningful as Elk Horn Luther League’s Easter Walks. What else is more postmodern, more emergent, more experimental than the drama, the testimony, the evangelism of a bunch of teens giving Jesus to you… the path of Jesus, the ministry of Jesus, the footsteps of Jesus, then finally, in a tearful climax, the image of Jesus on the Cross. The Easter Walk isn’t about one man or woman preaching, it isn’t about a performance of a talented musician or a praise band. It’s kids, each one taking a bit of the story of Jesus, drawing it in tight to their souls, and lovingly passing it back to you as you walk the steps that Jesus did on His route to vindicate the sins of the world… my sins and yours. It can stun and it can transform.
I remember my first one. I wasn’t prepared for what was coming. I only knew it was going to be a nice little Easter play. I did not know I was about to encounter Jesus there…. The real deal Jesus. Not the calm, safe Jesus that is dispensed like candy in our mega-churches and at our vacation bible schools. It was God in the Flesh, He was real, He was radical, He was something totally different, and He was wanting to change my life.
There was one powerful moment I remember like yesterday. Breaking bread in the Upper Room has amazing. Chris Williams headed the group that dispensed communion with just ordinary bread and grape juice. While a pastor's son and a devout Christ-follower, C-dub holds no title in any church. He isn’t ordained by any organization nor school. He just came to that Easter Walk with a servant's heart wanting to reach people and teach them the Good News that Jesus Christ is alive and well and available today to start an ultimate extreme makeover in your life…. And He started one that day in mine.
Never has communion been more real. Never has Christ been so present. Never has Christ reached down in such a meaningful way and blessed me as He did right there in that Sunday school room. You can say all you want about the sacrament. You can quote dead theologians and legalistic dogma... but Christ is the only thing necessary to validate the life changing power in Communion. Christ and a receptive heart.
Last Sunday was extra special to a few people that have contacted me. Some have felt old burdens lift; others have recommitted their hearts to the Lord. Others just needed to attend church; to sing, dance and confess. Evermore we strive to capture that magic we find when worship goes right. We want to be unbridled. We open ourselves up to the Lord and we ask Him to use us to touch lives, change hearts and spread the Good News that Jesus is AWESOME. He isn’t timid, fragile, trapped, out-of-date, for one generation and not another. Jesus is NOW!
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
David
The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart
1 Sam 16:7
Oh, the statue of David. What a timeless symbol of art. I often think about that young man there, standing confidently before the battle. He stood there against rational human odds. Man thinks in the physical. "Big guy, big sword... equals death." But David thought spiritually. He thought, "Big GOD, little giant, big squish!".
David stood there with big faith and big faith always trumps physical power.
I was doing some studying of OT bible heroes and suddenly it struck me. David was one of us!!! I don't mean he was a member of the band. I mean he would have fit right in with our little emergent movement. Let's take a look.
I have seen a shepherd from the backwoods, Jesse of Bethlehem's son.
He is an expert player of the harp.
He is a brave man and a warrior.
He speaks well and is a fine-looking man.
And the light of the LORD is with him.
1 Samuel 16:18
David was one of us. He wasn't trained in military strategy. He wasn't a politician or a priest like his other brothers. He was left to tend the flock. David the shepherd hung in the highlands with a sling and his harp. I can see him now, laying on a rock, his sheep all about, his harp in hand, worshipping the Lord all day.
He wasn't part of the establishment. When they were looking for a king, Jesse looked to every one of his sons before David. He never even considered it could be the wild boy out with the sheep that strummed his instrument all day. They counted him out; looked past him, thought he didn't belong and when the battle came, left him behind. But Dave never got down. He had a never-say-die spirit that we all know.
To some, Dave was probably scary. They looked at him, a youngster from the outside, he could give a fiery speech and he was charismatic, he was a master musician and penned so many new songs that were radical and forward thinking. They may have even called him a "rock-star wanna-be". But people from the establishment are always scared of change. Change challenges us to adapt or become obsolete.
King Saul was confronted with a crisis, a giant standing before his armies calling him out. King Saul was a coward and wouldn’t rise to the challenge. But not Dave. Our hero, our outsider, our shepherd rock star, our handsome fighter, he stepped up, sling and stone in hand, and took on an impossible foe.
Time and time again, David challenges the norm. He does things that shock and amaze. He never settles for the comfortable, the safe. He is a radical God-chaser. He leaps for joy in undignified ways, he writes praise ballads still sung today. He made worship the meaning of his life.
And that is the most important quality of David. It wasn't his guitar playing, or his speaking ability. It wasn't his boyish good looks or his fighting skills. The light of the Lord was with him. He had passion for the Lord and walked with HIM. This wasn't lip service. This was his heart. He took everything he had and with radical faith made his life a work of art that glorified GOD. Oh what his opponents must have thought of him. He was the outsider that crashed the party, killed a giant, united a kingdom and rocked the Gospel... Yeah, I think Dave would fit right in at G-squared.
ROCK THE GOSPEL!
1 Sam 16:7
Oh, the statue of David. What a timeless symbol of art. I often think about that young man there, standing confidently before the battle. He stood there against rational human odds. Man thinks in the physical. "Big guy, big sword... equals death." But David thought spiritually. He thought, "Big GOD, little giant, big squish!". David stood there with big faith and big faith always trumps physical power.
I was doing some studying of OT bible heroes and suddenly it struck me. David was one of us!!! I don't mean he was a member of the band. I mean he would have fit right in with our little emergent movement. Let's take a look.
I have seen a shepherd from the backwoods, Jesse of Bethlehem's son.
He is an expert player of the harp.
He is a brave man and a warrior.
He speaks well and is a fine-looking man.
And the light of the LORD is with him.
1 Samuel 16:18
David was one of us. He wasn't trained in military strategy. He wasn't a politician or a priest like his other brothers. He was left to tend the flock. David the shepherd hung in the highlands with a sling and his harp. I can see him now, laying on a rock, his sheep all about, his harp in hand, worshipping the Lord all day.
He wasn't part of the establishment. When they were looking for a king, Jesse looked to every one of his sons before David. He never even considered it could be the wild boy out with the sheep that strummed his instrument all day. They counted him out; looked past him, thought he didn't belong and when the battle came, left him behind. But Dave never got down. He had a never-say-die spirit that we all know.
To some, Dave was probably scary. They looked at him, a youngster from the outside, he could give a fiery speech and he was charismatic, he was a master musician and penned so many new songs that were radical and forward thinking. They may have even called him a "rock-star wanna-be". But people from the establishment are always scared of change. Change challenges us to adapt or become obsolete.
King Saul was confronted with a crisis, a giant standing before his armies calling him out. King Saul was a coward and wouldn’t rise to the challenge. But not Dave. Our hero, our outsider, our shepherd rock star, our handsome fighter, he stepped up, sling and stone in hand, and took on an impossible foe.
Time and time again, David challenges the norm. He does things that shock and amaze. He never settles for the comfortable, the safe. He is a radical God-chaser. He leaps for joy in undignified ways, he writes praise ballads still sung today. He made worship the meaning of his life.
And that is the most important quality of David. It wasn't his guitar playing, or his speaking ability. It wasn't his boyish good looks or his fighting skills. The light of the Lord was with him. He had passion for the Lord and walked with HIM. This wasn't lip service. This was his heart. He took everything he had and with radical faith made his life a work of art that glorified GOD. Oh what his opponents must have thought of him. He was the outsider that crashed the party, killed a giant, united a kingdom and rocked the Gospel... Yeah, I think Dave would fit right in at G-squared.
ROCK THE GOSPEL!
Monday, November 06, 2006
How Great is Our God
Last night was our monthly youth service at the Barn. It was an amazing night. Sometimes the Lord just takes over and you become vessels for something so much more than the sum of your parts.
Amanda started things off with a mind stretching Call to Worship about God's grace and forgiveness. Kiah sang a rocking song by Barlowgirl that also challanged me to think about God. Where is He when I feel alone? Then Joel gave an amazing message about a tiny but massive word, Why. He listed all these questions he has for God some foolish, some funny but some that made your bones ache. Why do bad things happen to good people. Why do little babies die? Why do bad people abuse little kids. Why do kids feel so lost that they commit suicide?
These are hard questions. Ones that we all will hold onto till we get to heaven. But God is the answer to all of our questions. We ended with an active worship where we knealt and wrote down questions for God, lit them with a candle then tossed them in a bucket to watch them burn. The smoke plumed up to heaven like in the temple in days of old.
Prayer, tears and soul searching followed. I am so glad we are together. The Lord is shaping us for something amazing I can feel it. Our little group (everyone not just the band) is going to share the light in a dark recess of the world I can feel it.
Here is a poem Joel shared with us.
“My King”
My King was born King.
The Bible says He’s a Seven Way King. He’s the King of
the Jews – that’s a racial King.
He’s the King of Israel – that’s a National King.
He’s the King of righteousness.
He’s the King of the ages.
He’s the King of Heaven.
He’s the King of glory.
He’s the King of kings and He is the Lord of lords.
Now that’s my King.
Well I wonder if you know Him.
Do you know Him?
Don’t try to mislead me.
Do you know my King?
David said the Heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament show His handiwork.
My King is the only one whom there are no means of measure can define His limitless love.
No far seeing telescope can bring into visibility the coastline of His shore of supplies.
No barriers can hinder Him from pouring out His blessing.
Well, well, He’s enduringly strong.
He’s entirely sincere.
He’s eternally steadfast.
He’s immortally graceful.
He’s imperially powerful.
He’s impartially merciful.
That’s my King.
He’s God’s Son.
He’s the sinner’s saviour.
He’s the centrepiece of civilization.
He stands alone in Himself.
He’s august.
He’s unique.
He’s unparalleled.
He’s unprecedented.
He’s supreme.
He’s pre-eminent.
Well, He’s the loftiest idea in literature.
He’s the highest personality in philosophy.
He’s the supreme problem in high criticism.
He’s the fundamental doctrine of proved theology.
He’s the carnal necessity of spiritual religion.
That’s my King.
He’s the miracle of the age.
He’s the superlative of everything good that you choose to call Him.
Well, He’s the only one able to supply all of our needs simultaneously.
He supplies strength for the weak.
He’s available for the tempted and the tried.
He sympathizes and He saves.
He’s strong God and He guides.
He heals the sick.
He cleanses the lepers.
He forgives sinners.
He discharged debtors.
He delivers the captives.
He defends the feeble.
He blesses the young.
He serves the unfortunate.
He regards the aged.
He rewards the diligent and He beautifies the meek.
Do you know Him?
Well, my King is the key of knowledge.
He’s the wellspring of wisdom.
He’s the doorway of deliverance.
He’s the pathway of peace.
He’s the roadway of righteousness.
He’s the highway of holiness.
He’s the gateway of glory.
He’s the master of the mighty.
He’s the captain of the conquerors.
He’s the head of the heroes.
He’s the leader of the legislatures.
He’s the overseer of the overcomers.
He’s the governor of governors. He’s the prince of princes.
He’s the King of kings and He’s the Lord of lords.
That’s my King. Yeah. Yeah. That’s my King. My King, yeah.
His office is manifold.
His promise is sure.
His light is matchless.
His goodness is limitless.
His mercy is everlasting.
His love never changes.
His Word is enough.
His grace is sufficient.
His reign is righteous.
His yoke is easy and His burden is light.
Well. I wish I could describe Him to you, but He’s indescribable. He’s indescribable.
Yes. He’s incomprehensible.
He’s invincible.
He’s irresistible.
I’m coming to tell you, the heavens of heavens cannot contain Him, let alone a
man explaining Him.
You can’t get Him out of your mind.
You can’t get Him off of your hands.
You can’t outlive Him and you can’t live without Him.
Well, Pharisees couldn’t stand Him, but they found out they couldn’t stop Him.
Pilot couldn’t find any fault in Him.
The witnesses couldn’t get their testimonies to
agree.
Herod couldn’t kill Him.
Death couldn’t handle Him and the grave couldn’t hold Him.
That’s my King.
Yeah. He always has been and He always will be.
I’m talking about He had no predecessor and He’ll have no successor.
There was nobody before Him and there’ll be nobody after Him.
You cant impeach Him and He’s not going to resign.
That’s my King! That’s my King!
Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory.
Well, all the power belongs to my King.
We’re around here talking about black power and white power and green power, but it’s God’s power.
Thine is the power. Yeah. And the glory.
We try to get prestige and honour and glory for ourselves, but the glory is all His. Yes. Thine is the Kingdom and the power and glory, forever and ever and ever and ever.
How long is that? And ever and ever and ever and ever.
And when you get through with all of the evers, then, Amen.
Amanda started things off with a mind stretching Call to Worship about God's grace and forgiveness. Kiah sang a rocking song by Barlowgirl that also challanged me to think about God. Where is He when I feel alone? Then Joel gave an amazing message about a tiny but massive word, Why. He listed all these questions he has for God some foolish, some funny but some that made your bones ache. Why do bad things happen to good people. Why do little babies die? Why do bad people abuse little kids. Why do kids feel so lost that they commit suicide?
These are hard questions. Ones that we all will hold onto till we get to heaven. But God is the answer to all of our questions. We ended with an active worship where we knealt and wrote down questions for God, lit them with a candle then tossed them in a bucket to watch them burn. The smoke plumed up to heaven like in the temple in days of old.
Prayer, tears and soul searching followed. I am so glad we are together. The Lord is shaping us for something amazing I can feel it. Our little group (everyone not just the band) is going to share the light in a dark recess of the world I can feel it.
Here is a poem Joel shared with us.
“My King”
Dr. S.M. Lockridge
My King was born King.
The Bible says He’s a Seven Way King. He’s the King of
the Jews – that’s a racial King.
He’s the King of Israel – that’s a National King.
He’s the King of righteousness.
He’s the King of the ages.
He’s the King of Heaven.
He’s the King of glory.
He’s the King of kings and He is the Lord of lords.
Now that’s my King.
Well I wonder if you know Him.
Do you know Him?
Don’t try to mislead me.
Do you know my King?
David said the Heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament show His handiwork.
My King is the only one whom there are no means of measure can define His limitless love.
No far seeing telescope can bring into visibility the coastline of His shore of supplies.
No barriers can hinder Him from pouring out His blessing.
Well, well, He’s enduringly strong.
He’s entirely sincere.
He’s eternally steadfast.
He’s immortally graceful.
He’s imperially powerful.
He’s impartially merciful.
That’s my King.
He’s God’s Son.
He’s the sinner’s saviour.
He’s the centrepiece of civilization.
He stands alone in Himself.
He’s august.
He’s unique.
He’s unparalleled.
He’s unprecedented.
He’s supreme.
He’s pre-eminent.
Well, He’s the loftiest idea in literature.
He’s the highest personality in philosophy.
He’s the supreme problem in high criticism.
He’s the fundamental doctrine of proved theology.
He’s the carnal necessity of spiritual religion.
That’s my King.
He’s the miracle of the age.
He’s the superlative of everything good that you choose to call Him.
Well, He’s the only one able to supply all of our needs simultaneously.
He supplies strength for the weak.
He’s available for the tempted and the tried.
He sympathizes and He saves.
He’s strong God and He guides.
He heals the sick.
He cleanses the lepers.
He forgives sinners.
He discharged debtors.
He delivers the captives.
He defends the feeble.
He blesses the young.
He serves the unfortunate.
He regards the aged.
He rewards the diligent and He beautifies the meek.
Do you know Him?
Well, my King is the key of knowledge.
He’s the wellspring of wisdom.
He’s the doorway of deliverance.
He’s the pathway of peace.
He’s the roadway of righteousness.
He’s the highway of holiness.
He’s the gateway of glory.
He’s the master of the mighty.
He’s the captain of the conquerors.
He’s the head of the heroes.
He’s the leader of the legislatures.
He’s the overseer of the overcomers.
He’s the governor of governors. He’s the prince of princes.
He’s the King of kings and He’s the Lord of lords.
That’s my King. Yeah. Yeah. That’s my King. My King, yeah.
His office is manifold.
His promise is sure.
His light is matchless.
His goodness is limitless.
His mercy is everlasting.
His love never changes.
His Word is enough.
His grace is sufficient.
His reign is righteous.
His yoke is easy and His burden is light.
Well. I wish I could describe Him to you, but He’s indescribable. He’s indescribable.
Yes. He’s incomprehensible.
He’s invincible.
He’s irresistible.
I’m coming to tell you, the heavens of heavens cannot contain Him, let alone a
man explaining Him.
You can’t get Him out of your mind.
You can’t get Him off of your hands.
You can’t outlive Him and you can’t live without Him.
Well, Pharisees couldn’t stand Him, but they found out they couldn’t stop Him.
Pilot couldn’t find any fault in Him.
The witnesses couldn’t get their testimonies to
agree.
Herod couldn’t kill Him.
Death couldn’t handle Him and the grave couldn’t hold Him.
That’s my King.
Yeah. He always has been and He always will be.
I’m talking about He had no predecessor and He’ll have no successor.
There was nobody before Him and there’ll be nobody after Him.
You cant impeach Him and He’s not going to resign.
That’s my King! That’s my King!
Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory.
Well, all the power belongs to my King.
We’re around here talking about black power and white power and green power, but it’s God’s power.
Thine is the power. Yeah. And the glory.
We try to get prestige and honour and glory for ourselves, but the glory is all His. Yes. Thine is the Kingdom and the power and glory, forever and ever and ever and ever.
How long is that? And ever and ever and ever and ever.
And when you get through with all of the evers, then, Amen.
Saturday, November 04, 2006
I usually say Christ-follower but still a good poem
Christians
Maya Angelou
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I'm not shouting "I'm clean livin'."
I'm whispering "I was lost,
Now I'm found and forgiven."
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I don't speak of this with pride.
I'm confessing that I stumble
and need Christ to be my guide.
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I'm not trying to be strong.
I'm professing that I'm weak
And need His strength to carry on.
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I'm not bragging of success.
I'm admitting I have failed
And need God to clean my mess.
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I'm not claiming to be perfect,
My flaws are far too visible
But, God believes I am worth it.
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I still feel the sting of pain.
I have my share of heartaches
So I call upon His name.
When I say... "I am a Christian"
I'm not holier than thou,
I'm just a simple sinner
Who received God's good grace, through Christ!
God so loved You that He gave His only son to Die to atone for your
sins.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
Billy Graham's Ticket is Punched
Here is a little story I got in an email that touched my heart. When I was a child I used to watch the Billy Graham revivals. It's an early memory of the ministry. Billy Graham is now 86 years old with Parkinson's disease.
In January 2000, leaders in Charlotte, North Carolina,
invited their favorite son, Billy Graham, to a luncheon in
his honor.
Billy initially hesitated to accept the invitation because he
struggles with Parkinson's disease. But the Charlotte
leaders said, "We don't expect a major address. Just
come and let us honor you."
So he agreed.
After wonderful things were said about him, Dr. Graham
stepped to the rostrum, looked at the crowd, and said, "I'm reminded today of Albert Einstein, the great physicist who
this month has been honored by Time magazine as the
Man of the Century. Einstein was once traveling from
Princeton on a train when the conductor came down the
aisle, punching the tickets of every passenger. When he
came to Einstein, Einstein reached in his vest pocket. He
couldn't find his ticket, so he reached in his trouser
pockets. It wasn't there, so he looked in his briefcase but couldn't find it. Then he looked in the s! eat beside him.
He still couldn't find it.
The conductor said, "Dr. Einstein, I know who you are. We all know who you are. I'm sure you bought a ticket.
Don't worry about it"
Einstein nodded appreciatively. The conductor continued
down the aisle punching tickets. As he was ready to
move to the next car, he turned around and saw the great physicist down on his hands and knees looking under his
seat for his ticket.
The conductor rushed back and said, "Dr. Einstein,
Dr. Einstein, don't worry, I know who you are. No problem. You don't need a ticket.
I'm sure you bought one."
Einstein looked at him and said, "Young man, I too, know who I am. What I don't know is where I'm going.'"
Having said that Billy Graham continued, "See the suit I'm wearing?
It's a brand new suit. My wife, my children, and my grandchildren are telling me I've gotten a little slovenly in
my old age. I used to be a bit more fastidious. So I went
out and bought a new suit for this luncheon and one more occasion.
You know what that occasion is? This is the suit in which
I'll be buried. But when you hear I'm dead, I don't want
you to immediately remember the suit I'm wearing. I want
you to remember this:
I not only know who I am .. I also know where I'm going."
In January 2000, leaders in Charlotte, North Carolina,
invited their favorite son, Billy Graham, to a luncheon in
his honor.
Billy initially hesitated to accept the invitation because he
struggles with Parkinson's disease. But the Charlotte
leaders said, "We don't expect a major address. Just
come and let us honor you."
So he agreed.
After wonderful things were said about him, Dr. Graham
stepped to the rostrum, looked at the crowd, and said, "I'm reminded today of Albert Einstein, the great physicist who
this month has been honored by Time magazine as the
Man of the Century. Einstein was once traveling from
Princeton on a train when the conductor came down the
aisle, punching the tickets of every passenger. When he
came to Einstein, Einstein reached in his vest pocket. He
couldn't find his ticket, so he reached in his trouser
pockets. It wasn't there, so he looked in his briefcase but couldn't find it. Then he looked in the s! eat beside him.
He still couldn't find it.
The conductor said, "Dr. Einstein, I know who you are. We all know who you are. I'm sure you bought a ticket.
Don't worry about it"
Einstein nodded appreciatively. The conductor continued
down the aisle punching tickets. As he was ready to
move to the next car, he turned around and saw the great physicist down on his hands and knees looking under his
seat for his ticket.
The conductor rushed back and said, "Dr. Einstein,
Dr. Einstein, don't worry, I know who you are. No problem. You don't need a ticket.
I'm sure you bought one."
Einstein looked at him and said, "Young man, I too, know who I am. What I don't know is where I'm going.'"
Having said that Billy Graham continued, "See the suit I'm wearing?
It's a brand new suit. My wife, my children, and my grandchildren are telling me I've gotten a little slovenly in
my old age. I used to be a bit more fastidious. So I went
out and bought a new suit for this luncheon and one more occasion.
You know what that occasion is? This is the suit in which
I'll be buried. But when you hear I'm dead, I don't want
you to immediately remember the suit I'm wearing. I want
you to remember this:
I not only know who I am .. I also know where I'm going."
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