Thoughts on the Tsunami

As the death toll rises, and scenes filter through our television sets of what has happened with the tsunami in the Indian Ocean, I feel a terrible sadness and empathy for all the victims. This is the most horrible thing I have ever seen and my thoughts and prayers go to all of the victims, their families, and the horrible stuggle that the survivors are going through. The death toll is over 120,000 people so far and is sure to rise further as disease begins to have it's effect.

As I was watching the news throughout the week, however, I was really disturbed by some of the early coverage. By Monday, there were stories about how this could have been avoided through early warning systems, what the chances were of this happening to us, etc. I was kind of shocked. I mean, this was a 9.0 earthquake that spawned a tidal wave that travelled 500 miles per hour. It immediately hit Thailand and Indonesia. Within 3 hours it had hit Sri Lanka and India. Within 6 hours it hit Somalia. When hurricanes hit the U.S., we have days of warning and still not everyone gets out. It just struck me as being incredibly insensitive to the victims to be having this conversation at this point publicly as well as being unbelievably arrogant to think that we as humans have control over things like this. We don't.

The truth: life on this planet is full of heartache, death, and disaster. We in the West have insulated ourselves from it and we think that we can control everything through our technology, science, wealth, and just because we're special. Through 9/11 and now the thousands of Americans that are still missing as the tsunami hit these resort regions, we are getting a glimpse of the suffering that the rest of the world goes through. I was in India this past summer and I can tell you that these are real people with real dreams, families, occupations, and lives. We in America seem to see them as hordes of humanity, a hopeless rabble that we don't think about very much. The suffering that they are going through right now is incalculable and I hope that we are on our knees praying for them and doing all we can to help. I really hope that the U.S. gives more than $35 million for the worst natural disaster in modern times as well. I really hope that this is more than just an interesting human interest story when it is all said and done. Let's stop for a moment and really soak in the tragedy: 120,000 dead, at least. 9/11 was about 2,800 dead. The tragedy for both is absolutely horrible, but I hope that we really are motivated to act long term and see these people for who they are even if this did not happen in the U.S. I think that Jesus would have done that.

Something interesting to pray about as the new year hits, is, how does Jesus feel about these things? Does God just sit back and watch. Does He care? All of these questions were answered on the cross when Jesus took on the suffering of humanity. In truth, Jesus did not cause this to happen. It happens because the whole world is in captivity to sin and things like the earth convulsing through earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, storms, etc. is a result of things not being how they are supposed to be. Jesus came to save us and to redeem the world. One day, we will live in a world where these things do not happen when Jesus comes back. Until then, we hope for his return, we share his salvation with others, and we serve others as Christ served us, broken over the loss and death that we are still subject to. Jesus does save and God does love the world - He showed us that with the death of His Son to redeem us and to save us.

Happy New Year

Well, 2004 is ending. Time is travelling so fast. This has been an incredible year full of ups and downs, triumphs and struggles, success and failure, joy and pain. I guess every year is like that because that is really what life is about. I praise God for my incredible wife who blesses me so much with her love, grace, and understanding. She has given me so many wonderful gifts, including three beautiful children and a couple of amazing trips this year to Europe and India. I praise God for my children as well. My life is so full because of them. They bless me in ways I could never express. God is truly good.

I also praise God for my church. We have had some interesting things happen this year with our pastor leaving after 15 years. It has been difficult and times, but also exciting to think where God might be leading us next. He will lead us and guide us and I am excited about the future.

I thank God for my family - my father, my sister and her husband, my mother and her husband. Our family has been broken up over the last couple of years and it has been really hard on me to see that. I love my parents a great deal and they have suffered so much over the years. I wanted better things for them, but I am resigned to what has happened and I pray the best for them throughout their lives. My Dad is going through a really hard time right now, but I am trusting God to see him and the rest of our family through it.

I don't know what 2005 holds. If it is up to me, things probably won't go well because on my own I don't have much of a success rate. So, once again, I am going to trust the Lord to do things in my life that I cannot do. I pray that God gives us great grace, peace, and mercy. I pray that He lives His life through us in a way that I never could. I pray that many people are blessed through our lives as we give more than we receive. I pray that I see Jesus this year in a new and powerful way, that I be the husband, father, son, and pastor that I need to be for the people that I love so dearly. God, have mercy and help me in all things live the life that you have for me. You are so good.

Christmas

We're getting ready to actually celebrate Christmas over the next couple of days. I have family coming in from Florida and Mississippi and my children are really excited about Santa Claus visiting. I took my 3 year old son to his first movie (The Polar Express) the other day and he seemed to like it, but said he was scared when the train was losing control. I have a few last minute shopping trips to make, but we have mostly gotten everything for everyone.

I am kind of down this year for Christmas because of some pretty severe circumstances concerning my Dad. It is pretty tough when you are supposed to be going through all of the holiday cheer but don't really feel it. I am really glad that the true meaning of Christmas is not about family, presents, caroles, turkey, and Santa Claus. We put so many expectations on a whole month of our year with all the parties and events and it is so easy to lose sight of why Christmas is even celebrated. Our culture desperately wants to redefine the second most holy Christian holiday and most Christians seem to go along with it.

But, I for one am glad that Christmas is really about:

Emmanuel
God With Us
The Coming of the Prince of Peace
The Lord of Lords
The ending of the old age and . . .
The birth of the new
The invasion of the heavenly Kingdom
to bring about the redemption of the sons of men,
the healing of Creation,
Redemption . . . Salvation . . . Completion . . . Restoration
Emmanuel . . . God With Us.

So, for this Christmas season, I have hope in Jesus and hope in His care and love for me, my family, and my church. Thank you, Jesus, for loving us and coming to set us free, to destroy the power of the evil age, and to restore the Kingdom of God to this world. Thank you for taking away my sins and for giving me a new life. Thank you for giving me hope and a purpose. Sometimes, I shakily grasp it, but you are faithful to hold out life to me. I worship you this season and join with the angels singing, "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God almighty, who was, and is, and is to come."

Searching for God Knows What

I am reading a really great book right now by Donald Miller called Searching for God Knows What. I just read a chapter called "Adam, Eve, and the Alien." Alien? What the heck? you might be asking yourself. No, this is not some strange theory about Adam and Eve being aliens. It asks the question, what would an alien think if he came to earth and saw us in our fallen state? What would he find unique about us?

Miller suggests that the one thing that is really unique about the human race is that we are all trying to compete with one another to establish some hierarchy of worth, beauty, skill, wealth, athletic ability, etc. All of our lives are spent trying to be better than others so that we can fill this void that was created when we left God. He was supposed to fill the void with His approval so that we would be free to love others and to care for others. Unfortunately, a result of sin is that we run everywhere trying to get affirmation by exalting ourselves or hoping that others will love us and tell us that we are worth something. The "something" ends up being that we hope we are worth more than others, but that is assurance is fading because we will never top the ladder.

I really struggle with this, as do all folks, I guess. I am constantly measuring myself against some standard and I am constantly finding myself falling short. I compare myself to others and hope that I come off respectable and honored. I so want others to think well of me, or not think of me at all - but, whatever it takes, don't criticize! Your criticism just affirms that there is something wrong and we spend our whole lives trying to mask our nakedness with the fig leaves of success, accomplishment, beauty, friends, competence, relationships, wealth, etc.

Jesus calls us to come out of hiding, however, and to receive our healing. He came to set us free from the bondage of trying to heal and satisfy ourselves. Newsflash: we cannot fill the void and no one else can fill it for us! Only God can fill it because we were created to be in relationship with Him. Our sin stands in the way of that because we choose other things and we cannot return to God on our own. Jesus took all of that on himself and makes the way open for us to receive forgiveness, healing, and satisfaction in our relationship with the Living God if we just trust Him. I am so glad that I do not have to compare myself to others and that I can be free to be the person God created me to be! All that really matters anyway is my relationship with Him and how I love others through the love and strength that He gives.

Anyway, read Miller's book - it really rocks! It would make a great Christmas present for someone who maybe wants to know God but doesn't really know how.

What is Worship Anyway?

I posted this on The Grove blog a little while ago, but I liked it so I thought I would bring it over here.

What is Worship Anyway?

I am really excited about The Grove tonight. I pray that God uses it to reveal Himself to us and that it becomes an environment where people can really meet with God and worship Him. John 4 talks about how the Father seeks worshippers, those who worship in Spirit and in Truth. Sometimes, though, when we are trying to do something different, we can fall into the trap of being cool or trendy. I was reading the blog of a friend of mine today named Andrew Jones. I go to his blog pretty often to see what is going on in his life and ministry. He lives in Scotland and works as a missionary to emerging generations of young people all around the world. He had some really thought provoking comments on worship that I thought were relevant to us as we begin this journey together. The whole thing can be found here in a post called Is Our Worship Cool?. But, here is an excerpt:

I do not want to serve coolness but neither do i want to serve the tradition of worship. My worship should be a response to the goodness of God, to His revelation of Himself in me, to me. If my worship is to be given in spirit and in truth, it will most likely come from the deepest part of me and be communicated with art forms that are mine, words that are my language. If i use the language and tools of another, then the gift of worship may be offered by me but may represent the gift of another. Doesnt God ask for my gift?If i offer God my worship, in the artforms that i hope will carry the gift, there will be some who see the result as cool, and others who will see it as lame. This will always be the case. And even if my gift is called cool, the same gift will be not cool in 5 years time. Even lamer in 10 years. To attempt a "cool" worship offering is therefore an impossible task.

Well, I am praying that we are "cool" to God through our true worship so that He is pleased with us and so He receives praise. That is what it is all about anyway.

Life is a War

I'm finding more and more that life can be really hard, as I mentioned in my previous post. Yes, as Christians, we are terribly blessed and we have joy unspeakable in the Lord all the time. What I mean is though, we are not in control. Things happen to us and those we love that can literally take us out of the game if we allow it to. Once again, we desperately need people around us who will encourage us, pray for us, and show us the bigger picture. We need people to tell us what they think that God might be up to in the midst of certain struggles and heartaches. I think that He really wants to walk with us through everything we go through. I think that more than anything, He is there and wants us to know that He will carry us through every heartache and every pain. When life is hard, when Satan attacks, when we completely blow it, Jesus is there, taking it all upon Himself and winning the victory for us if we would just believe in Him.

He is bigger than all of our struggles, and I thank God for my wife, my friends, and my church family who is faithful to lift me and my family up to the Lord when I ask them to. I am so grateful that we are all in this together and that God has not left us alone. The fact that we feel alone so often is such a lie. God wants us to be in relationship and Satan wants us to think that we are in this fight by ourselves. I'm glad that God is right. It kind of creeps me out to think that I would have to walk through this life alone. Praise God for family and friends - brothers and sisters in Christ.

Silence in the Face of Struggle

Sometimes I don't really have much to say. This seems like one of those times, but I will probably end up saying a lot about having nothing to say. I am kind of overwhelmed right now with the fact, or the appearance of the fact, that life is just hard sometimes. We all have problems and issues that we struggle with - holes in our hearts, so to speak, that we try to fill the best way we know how. This search for healing, fulfillment, acceptance, and love drives us into dangerous places at times. I have come to find that Jesus really does meet all of those needs and He is always loving, forgiving, and healing. Once you understand that, the problem comes in relationship with other people. How do you forgive those who have hurt you and what do you do when you have failed and hurt people that you love? You can't change the past and you cannot take back things you have said and done. You can't go back and not be hurt by others. The pain is there and it is real. How do we learn to forgive, receive forgiveness, and move on?

Only God can bring that healing to our lives. But, He normally does not do this in isolation. He uses others in our lives. This is why a community of faith that relies on Jesus is so important. Your family can embody that community, as can a small circle of friends, or even your church. We are called to live our lives in relationship with one another in a way that brings healing and forgiveness - in a sense, we actualize the work of Jesus through His death and resurrection. We need to be able to confess our sins one to another and hear the words, "You are forgiven." We need to have people pray for us so that we can forgive one another, just as Christ forgave us. This is only possible when the Holy Spirit is in our lives and is making the truth of Christ come alive within us. Grace is a word that we are afraid of because we are afraid that we will just use it as a license to sin. We are so concerned about each other's behavior and making sure that we line up with the right way to live and be, that we do not want to extend grace to one another for fear that they will turn and hurt us with it. In reality, we do not extend grace and forgiveness to sinners because we are protecting our own heart from them and we do not trust God to do that for us.

Dear God, help me to forgive. Help me to trust you with my heart so that I can forgive others without fear of what they might do to me or how they might hurt me. God, help me to receive the forgiveness that I need from others. I want to know your grace and live in relationship with others that experience your love and mercy. I want to be transformed by your power and experience healing in all of those places that are shot up with holes. Lord, I want that for the people I love as well who are trying to protect themselves from more pain. Help us to trust you. Make us whole human beings.

I think that is what Jesus is all about. I really think that He wants to answer that prayer. Well, I guess I did have something to say afterall. I thought that might happen.

Next-Wave Article

I think a lot about what the church is supposed to be. I guess that I am really wanting to experience God on a regular basis with a community of people who want the same thing and get so excited about it that they can't help but share it with others. I want to be a part of a community where healing takes place, where people are truly set free, and where we are not just told what to do to serve God better, but we actually get to encounter HIM. You see, I desperately need Jesus. I've come to the conclusion that on my own, I am pretty much a mess. I don't really have anything to offer anyone except a bunch of selfishness that is dressed up in piety and a handful of screw brained opinons. But, with Christ, I have meaning and purpose and I get to radiate His glory and help set others free. Yes, I desperately need Jesus and I pray that I never overcome that.

I ran across an article today by Mike Smith on Next-Wave. It is a response to a satirical article that is written on that site from someone from the future dealing with the implications of our present mode of thinking about the church. Mike took issue with some of the conclusions of the article and gives a brilliant response. It was really encouraging and I found myself wanting to be a part of the community that he was describing. How many of us really long for Jesus? I pray that my desire for Him increase more and more.

"My power shows up best in weak people."

That is a quote from 2 Corinthians 12:9 in The Living Bible. Paul had asked that God would take away the thorn in his flesh. We don't know exactly what the thorn was, but it was obviously some type of physical or spiritual attack that weakened him. Paul prayed three times and the whole verse goes like this:

Each time he said, "No. But I am with you; that is all you need. My power shows up best in weak people." Now I am glad to boast about how weak I am; I am glad to be a living demonstration of Christ's power, instead of showing off my own power and abilities. Since I know it is all for Christ's good, I am quite happy about "the thorn," and about insults and hardships, persecutions and difficulties; for when I am weak, then I am strong - the less I have, the more I depend on him. - 2 Corinthians 12:9,10.

How true that is. I often feel so weak, like I have absolutely nothing to offer anyone. Does anyone else ever feel that way? That's actually a stupid question because we all get to that point regularly. Just last night, I was supposed to lead worship and teach a bible study on Galatians for our Wednesday night gathering. I had had a "not so great" day and had absolutely nothing to give. My prayers were hitting the ceiling and I just wanted to go home and go to bed. I kept asking for strength, but nothing happened. I finally got desperate enough to confess to God my total weakness and that if He wanted anything good to happen that night He had better show up - I was His. Well, I really feel like He did show up during my teaching of Galatians 4, and though I was dry to begin with I encountered Him as I stepped out and let Him speak through me. He is so faithful to do that if we just trust Him and step out anyway. When we are weak then He is strong. I'm glad that I know a God who doesn't want or need my strength or my best. He just wants my weakness and my dependence so that He can receive the glory. Yeah, that fits just right. That's the kind of God that I can give my heart to.

The Grove

Something pretty exciting is going on here that I will hopefully be writing about quite a bit in the future. God seems to be bringing together young people from a whole bunch of churches in our city to come together and spend time worshipping, getting to know one another, and hearing about God in a relational way. Drew Burton, our student minister, initiated the idea about 6 weeks ago. Since then, it has caught on and we have a couple of dozen folks from all over the area who want to begin meeting regularly in a coffeehouse style environment on Tuesday nights.

Our first gathering is at 7pm, December 14th, and we are calling it The Grove. I'll get to speak on that night, but we will have a pretty wide rotation of speakers after that. We are still in the initial stages, but I think that it could be amazing. I pray that God uses it to bring people to Himself and to create Christian community in a life giving way for a segment of our city that desperately needs it.

What Should Our Focus Be?

I read an interesting article today by Mike Bishop over at Next-Wave. He quotes Reggie McNeal, the author of The Present Future as saying:

"The point is, all the effort to fix the church misses the point. You can build the perfect church - and they (people in the world) still won't come. People are not looking for a great church. They do not wake up every day wondering what church they can make successful."

Outstanding. I've been thinking this for some time. We have to go to people and incarnate the gospel in their lives in a way that makes sense. But, more than that, we really have to listen to God, find out where He is working, and allow Him to do what He wants to do to bring salvation to people. Our churches need to be healthy and life giving so that when people do come to Jesus they have the experience that they were meant to, but all of the energy spent trying to make our churches or ourselves perfect can be very frustrating. Bishop gives the following five points to avoid as well as the five things that we should focus on:

If you are reading this and have some vested interest in a community of faith - whatever your flavor, old-school or new-school, emerging or submerging - do yourself a favor and stop caring about the following things:

1. The number of people in your church. Really, it doesn't matter.
2. The "relevancy" of your common worship.
3. How often or if ever a new person shows up at one of your common worship times.
4. The size of your church budget, building, or paid staff.
5. What any other church in the world is doing - good or bad or otherwise.

And please start caring about the following things:

1. Actively looking for the evidence of God's kingdom - where what he wants done is done - at work, at home, at Starbucks (heaven forbid), at the beach, and anywhere else you might find yourself in the course of living your normal life.
2. Simple, honest worship.
3. Having friends that don't give a rip about your church. Maybe you might just rub off on them.
4. Giving away money to people who need it; using existing, familiar (and free) spaces for common worship such as homes, restaurants, parks, or community centers; flattening the organization's need for paid leadership and support roles.
5. Go on a unique, unreproducible journey with a group of people and rejoice with other groups of people who do the same.

Excellent. I couldn't have said it better myself. Let's focus on Christ and allow Him to take us where He wants to. Not where we think we should go. Any Jesus followers in the house?