Own your faith because your forefathers deserve your best:

I'm amazed at the efforts we as Christians put forth to not offend.  Our faith is offensive; Jesus offend the defensive Pharisaical machine of His day.  Jesus says His followers with be on the ropes from friend, family and foe because of His message.  


That doesn't mean we try to be purposely offensive, immature, or obnoxious, it's simply true that the radical changes our faith calls for offends people.  If the Bible hasn't ruffled your feathers, maybe you need to re-read it.  If Jesus' message hasn't challenged you, maybe you aren't ready to challenge others to find their faith, yet.  


Our sinful hearts are prideful and stuck in a rut until God liberates us, and no one who thinks they are free appreciates being told they are a foolish slave to sin.  Therefore, our message is offensive, but not in a punitive way.  Think of it like an intervention with an addict; how many addicts start out immediately thanking the group?  No, there's the denial then defensiveness, and then the attacks they aim at the group and their refusal to accept personal responsibly.  Sharing the Gospel can sometimes have that same affect...


Oh, and for "religious people" or "intellectual superpowers" I Cor 1:23 clarifies most people are flat-out offended by our message, "but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles..."  We either risk angering people or appear looking foolish, unless we are merely snake-oil salesmen...


More to the dangerous point I really want to make, in our efforts to not offend we sometimes try to not offend the memory of those who went before us in the faith.  It's not that I'm opposed to the proper respect due to those whose shoulders we stand on; I'm against misplaced respect that nurtures nostalgia over personal growth.  "We've never done it that way before" or a host of synonymous phrases become nothing more than the sandpaper we smooth our collective coffin with.   


A personal faith that truly honors our heritage will be a vibrant faith that goes deeper, gains more individual ownership, and reaches out with more influence on unbelievers than ever before.  If we want to authentically honor our heritage and respect our heroes in the faith, we won't memorialize the past to the extent that is handicaps our creativity or mobility to learn and grow.  Or, as Solomon put it in Eccl 7:10, "Say not, “Why were the former days better than these?”  For it is not from wisdom that you ask this."


Paul wrote in I Cor 11:1-2, "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. Now I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I delivered them to you."  Paul advocated a tradition that reproduced imitators of Christ, not a cookie-cutter program that simply defended it's own self-perpetuation.  May we learn to follow Christ through those who went before us, with a consistent fresh vitality not with stale cliches that only make sense to those within our country club.  

The hardest part of change:

One lesson I'm learning well in our wilderness wandering is that looking back is pointless.  I want to look forward, perhaps more than at any time in my life.


Let me quickly circle back for one moment and say "yes" I said wilderness wandering, it's a great metaphor for where I feel we are.  Why? Having left the security of the enslavement of institutionalism, I feel like we are on the verge of the Promised land.  I can't go back to the golden-chains of the mainline, institutional structure that I was once deeply enmeshed in.  What the future is holding, only God knows for sure.  


I mean no disrespect for people who can thrive in an institutional-mainline church setting; simply put, personally I can't.  some of the people I love & respect the most are in that type of setting.  I'm not saying I'm out of full-time ministry for life, but I am saying I can't ever go back the same-ol-same-ol structure I've been in.  I love doing ministry because I want to, not because I have to. I'm thankful for being sidetracked in the desert, it's rather liberating.


Okay, back to the point I was trying to make about looking forward...
Recently we were having a great discussion with a few friends, discussing Bible things, and someone asked a question.  We had looked at a passage in I Timothy 2 at length, and we saw it in a different light than our heritage typically has.  Someone asked, "How would you help someone see this particular point?" (my loose paraphrase of their question)    


At that point something clicked in my brain, and I said, there is a certain powerful phenomena we experience when we weave/braid together: Nostalgia over our golden-years, our Comfort-zone, and our hesitation to rock the boat/upset, or make people uncomfortable.  That emotional rope can hold us back from seeing Scriptures in a fresh way.   At that point, the person who asked the question about helping others see I Tim 2 more clearly, mimicked wrapping a rope around their neck and said, if we aren't careful that rope we weave is the noose we hang ourselves with...  


So, as I work concrete these days and feel like we are being led by a pillar of Cloud by day & a pillar of Fire by night, I've thought about change quite a bit.  I know I can never go back to the garlic, cucumber or pots overflowing with meat (Check out Numbers 11:5) and I'm looking forward to where God is leading us.  Change, even when we can clearly see it is a change for the best is still hard for most of us. The hardest part of change just might be the willingness of letting go of the one so you can grab onto the other...

In God's hands:

After a 15 or 16 year break from it, I've been back into concrete full-time for a few weeks now.  My hands are past the stage in this picture, blistered; my hands are callousing up rather well..., well accept for the tips of my fingers and creases in my thumbs that have cracked open. But this post isn't about blisters or tough skin.

I want to write about how God works out awesome circumstance in my life:

For starters, one of our former neighbors had a new concrete driveway poured just days before we moved.  Tammy saw the concrete crew doing the driveway and mentioned to me that I should check-out the company.  The company had stuck a sign in the yard, kind of like a Realtor sign.  I didn't talk to the crew, but did look up the company online.  Turns out, on their website they were looking for a finisher.  Since I really only know two areas of work, ministry and concrete, I called.  I met with the owner, at Starbucks :-) and we spent the entire morning talking.  We really hit it off, and he hired me.

It gets better.  My new boss is a Christian, and, he's interested in developing his people...  He has in the past (several years in a row) taken his employees to Catalyst in Atlanta.  If you aren't in Church leadership, you may not have heard of Catalyst.  Catalyst is a conference I'd love to go to, haven't had the opportunity yet though.  

Think about this for a minute, a concrete company taking its crew to Catalyst.  To really appreciate this, picture your stereotypical construction worker in a setting like a Bible lectureship, but instead of a general audience in mind, the speakers are bent on equipping leaders.  Picture yourself at this high-powered leadership conference with speakers like Jim Collins ("Good to great"), and instead of "just" seeing preachers and youth minsters in khakis and Polos, you see a group of guys in flannels and jeans... and scruffy work boots.  Think Acts 4:13....

It is interesting to me that a concrete crew would end up at a high profile leadership seminar, one that is mostly directed to ministry leaders.  My boss paid for everyone's ticket, meals, lodging, etc.  The economy, being what it is the last couple of years hasn't been helpful, so my boss didn't take the crew last year or this year.  Oh, By the way, my boss doesn't know I blog, so this is for your benefit, no kissing-up here!  Bottom line, my respect for my new boss went way-up when I heard about the trips to Catalyst.  

I guess what I'm really trying to say tonight is that I'm feeling so very blessed right now.  I have a boss that not only is a Christian, he's truly interested in developing his people.  It blows my mind how God works.  When things went down last Spring the way they did, our friends said time and again (as they supported us spiritually and emotionally), "God has something great in store for you."  I know what they meant was, there was some awesome church "out there" waiting for us.  There was no "out there" in the end.  God had plans for us I didn't see.  We're still here, much to the surprise of most everyone.  

Don't get me wrong, concrete is tough work.  I come home exhausted, sore, and starved most nights.  But, I love where God has brought me though.  I thank God just about everyday for my job.  As much as I miss the rhythms and cycles of full-time ministry and look forward to being back in full-time ministry, God has led me to a place I never would've found on my own -- into a place where He is growing me in new and exciting ways.

One more tidbit: My blood pressure has dropped from 149/95 to 122/84, coincidence, I think not.   

Eccl 9:10, "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might, for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going."

Baggage

Drew (our oldest) and I hiked about 12 or 14 miles on the Appalachian trail this summer.  I can't wait till we can hit the trail again!  Was it easy, no.  It was humbling.  I thought we could go 30 +  miles in three days & two nights.  Drew thought it though before we left for the trail-head & mentioned we should try out two days & one night our first go-around, he was right.

It's amazing how heavy your backpack gets when you pack for one overnight camping trip...  My pack felt like it was about 70 pounds.  Still, as heavy as that pack was, it was a liberating experience knowing you could carry everything you needed for your survival.  

In our family's recent move across the subdivision, I joked that a house fire wouldn't have hurt my feelings.  Obviously not the kind of house fire where anyone was hurt; just the type of house fire that would've removed the responsibility of packing, loading, moving, unloading & unpacking... 

Before you misunderstand me, we aren't hoarders or pack-rats.  Nor are we people who have a lot-of-lot stuff.  Also, let me add, Tammy impressed me with what she was able to pare down &  pack away for an upcoming yardsale.   

I have a new philosophy on possessions.  My new view is that I'd like to pare my possessions down to what would fit into my backpack.  No joke.  

I recently shared my new stance with a longtime mentor of mine, a dear friend Ted Matthews.  Ted pointed out how that might seem nice, but with having a family comes the responsibility of caring for them, and that requires stuff/things.  I guess Ted is right, but I still would like to be able to only own what I can carry on my back.

This is not one of those emotional rants where you are challenged to "prioritize" your possessions and share what you'd put into your backpack, like at some Summer camp devo, or Youth retreat.  I've seen those talks, I'm not going down that path.  

This also is not a guilt trip, i.e., sermonizing post, where I tell you how the Bible is full of passages (which you could read them) which lay out the truth we brought nothing into the world & we'll take nothing out of it either.  You know the old cliche about how there are no U-hauls heading into the cemetery...  Keyword, cliche. 

Finally, this post isn't some "spiritual" superiority complex where I say I want to be more like Jesus than you are.  After all, He had nowhere "to lay His head..."  This is self-centered talk here!  This is what I really want for me, I'm not pushing this off on anyone.

No, this feeling I have about wishing I could pare my junk down to what I can fit into my backpack is something that I can't shake.  Since we spent a few weeks packing, then a solid week/week and a half, trudging our stuff to our new place, and then all the getting settled in..., I really think having a bunch of stuff is overrated.  

Tonight while I was reading a historical account about one of the most successful inter-generational families, I thought to myself -- what in my life would change if I were independently wealthy, or were a millionaire?  How would I live or act differently?  I may be naive, but I can't think of much changing.  I'd still want to be with and eat dinner with my family every single day.  I'd still want to read voraciously....  I'd still want to invest my life in helping people know God.  Sure having wealth would ease some stress, and maybe make it possible to do some traveling.  But I'm guessing 99% of my existence would be about the same.  

I don't sit around wishing I could accumulate more stuff. Instead, lately I think to myself daily, maybe hobos aren't as dumb as we think they are?

It's been about 6 months since I've blogged.  A lot has gone on in our lives since I've transitioned out of the NE church.  The Lord blessed our family with a great summer together.  If you've followed any of our FB or Twitter posts, you know we hit the beach, went to D.C. for a couple of days, relaxed, Klay and I drove to AR and visited Drew & Laura once, and every week we've grilled a lot, a lot.  Want to hear something funny?  About two years ago I asked the church for a Sabbatical, at the time I didn't get it, so I'm thanking God for the sabbatical I did get this year...

Life has felt disoriented over the last several months, as you might expect.  Not working, moving, trying to find our way, wondering what God is teaching us in all of this, you name it.  Many good friends, from near & far, have come along side us in our pain and have offered much needed encouragement.  I've had a lot of heartfelt phone calls from friends out of state, and several meals with good friends in town.  I'm looking at life differently than I did one year ago, even six months ago.  Many blessings have given us glimmers of hope, and we've seen God's hand in weird ways we wouldn't have normally thought about, too.  Some people have distanced themselves, while other people have drawn closer.  I don't really expect anyone to understand how we feel, but it's true, you do find out who your real friends are.

I'm back to working concrete for the time being.  With the economy still limping along and the weather turning, well you can figure that one out.  I'm thankful for a job and hope for the best.  Nervous?  Somewhat.  It's a little bit surreal, working construction after about a 17 year break from it...

In many ways, after the experiences of the last few years, my adrenal glands and my sanity needed a breather.  So I'm thankful for the past few months.  Now, I'm looking around and I feel kind of like Mel Gibson's character in the Road Warrior after his wreak, mixed with Tom Hank's character in Cast Away.  I'm not sure where I am in the plot of Cast Away right now, I'm certainly past the plane crash, but I don't know if I'm past the scene where he knocks out his tooth with the ice-skate, or if he's back in civilization already?  I think I'm learning about myself, that's always a good thing.  I know my prayers have changed, and I appreciate the small things more.  I don't take a lot for granted these days.  I miss my old life, sometimes, but I don't want to go back, not one little bit.

Why haven't I blogged?  Honestly, my mind pretty much shut down over the last few months.  I lost a lot of creativity.  Well, let me rephrase that, I haven't felt creative.  My mind, emotionally & intellectually kind of went into hibernation.  This year, the rhythmic centering I usually experience preparing lessons, sermons, articles, etc. has all been shifted.   I'm just now lately feeling like I have a voice, or have something worthwhile to say, or an interest to write.    My mind has felt starved.  My spirit felt flat.  Now, I'm feeling the tingling sensation bears certainly must feel when it's time to wake up and feed themselves.  It's almost midnight here, my alarm clock is set for 5:55 a.m., and I probably should be in bed now.   

Time to ride

Earlier this month I took my old Trek to the bike shop for repairs, $140 later I was good to go... I forgot how much I enjoy the greenbelt, a trail here in Kingsport - the trailhead pictured above. I throughly enjoy the pleasing smells of honeysuckles, fresh cut grass and nature this time of year. The occasional sighting of a turkey or a deer crossing the trail, and the rare appearance of a red-tailed hawk along Reedy creek catching a little lunch, keeps the trail interesting.

I gave up riding a couple of years ago when we stated back at the gym. I didn't feel like I had time to ride & workout. This week I have to choose between the gym or the trail, but next week I'll have a little more time on my hands to do both.

I admit, looking around my 1/2 packed office, it's a little strange knowing & not knowing what our future holds. For those of our friends who haven't heard, we are making a transition in ministries. This Sunday concludes my responsibilities at NE, what's next is still unknown.

What will I do with my summer? As I prayerfully send out resumes and hang out my fleece, I will get caught up on some much needed rest. I admit, I feel like I've run a marathon and then jumped on a treadmill. So, I look at a little time off as a gift from God.

Drew is coming in for a visit, he and I will hike the Appalachian trail for a few days; I'm super excited about that. Tammy & I plan to take the little guys to DC sometime this summer. Maybe Zach & I can play chess more often too.

I have a couple of writing projects I've neglected that I hope to revive; in fact I plan to dedicate however much time to writing as I'd normally would preparing sermons and classes. I have a few books to catch up on in my free-reading time as well.

Time to sleep, write, pray, exercise/ride, be with family... oh yeah, and wait.

Is it really the end of the world...?

I have been inspired to address an issue by friends who are believers, and by some friends who aren’t. Thank you to all of my friends who have generated discussions based on the destructive crackpot Harold Camping, whether in person, or on FB.

In case you still haven’t heard, Camping has predicted the “Rapture” will happen on May 21st 2011, and the end of the world is then to follow in October 2011. Harold Camping obviously is a false prophet and has ignored Jesus Himself: “But concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.” (Mark 13:32 ESV)

Quickly let me address two problems in Harold’s predictions (I don’t have a lot of time if he’s right. Just kidding) 1st of all, the Rapture is a misnomer. There is no “rapture” in the Bible as Camping and others have described. The Latin word for “caught up” in I Thess 4, “rapio” is where we get the English word Rapture; rapio is from the Greek, “harpazo.” There is no Biblical notion of believers being caught up, while the rest of the world suffers in a temporary probation awaiting the final destruction. When we are “caught up” in I Thess 4, that is the end of time.

2ndly, Harold is exactly the type of problem that critics of Christianity need to make their point: We have problems. We are a jumbled mess. We get things wrong. I personally have no problem admitting we need help. But, why would I want to give people ammunition to find fault, unnecessarily, by making claims that are obviously false? Jesus died for imperfect people, which I openly admit to being. Harold Camping, a laughingstock & rightly so, has just made our task of sharing the Gospel harder.

Christians backbite-in-fight, ect-ect, judge each other, gossip, in general embarrass each other, and probably disappoint God too. A vast majority of the New Testament was written addressing the dysfunction Christians get embroiled in... period. When Church leaders today molest children, and when believers act hateful to other believers over political party affiliations, is it any wonder why there are so many people skeptical of our faith? Before you panic as a believer, the list of our failings go on-and-on, and non-believers are intelligent -- they know all-too-well about the skeletons in our closet, even if we turn a blind-eye to them... As Paul once wrote, “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called...” (Ephesians 4:1 ESV)

My answer to this debacle is that people need to look to Jesus, not at His followers. But there’s the rub; the way the world sees Jesus is through those of us who call on His name. This paradox is humbling: Jesus is perfect and I’m clearly not, yet the only way people see Jesus is through His Body of Believers... I want to scream at the top of my lungs “Don’t judge Jesus by us, His followers!” but I know it doesn’t work that way. As true as it is that we need to point people to Jesus, until we in the Church “convert” people to Jesus and quit trying to convert them to our version of Jesus, this problem isn’t going away.