Jesus’ Power is Made Perfect

It has been a rough week in the Morris house. Amber, Molly, and I have all been down for about a week with this flu thing that is going around. For three days our house was predominantly us lying around, coughing, and watching old movies. Thankfully we seem to be nearing the end. While every day I long for the infection to pass, I wonder, “In the midst of this sickness and weakness, is there something I can learn about the ways of God?”

Principle 3 in Emotionally Healthy Communities is to live in brokenness and vulnerability. Peter Scazerro says, “[Weakness] is a universal human experience, cutting across all ages, cultures, races, and social classes. It is God’s gift specially crafted for you so you can lead out of weakness and brokenness, not your own strength and power.” Wait, did God give me this brokenness and weakness? God is not up in heaven handing out weakness and brokenness. He is our redeemer and restorer, and one day we will all be completely whole. But today we are broken and weak. This should not drive us away or remove us from God’s goodness. Weakness is actually intended to drive us towards God’s goodness, his great love, and his unending mercy.

Lying on my living room floor as the fever wracked my body, I felt the desire to be out doing and showing that the virus wasn’t going to get me down. It wasn’t going to stop me. But sickness is an unfortunate reality in our lives. We look forward to the restored Kingdom in all of its fullness where there will be no weeping or pain. But, we currently live in a fallen world where sin and brokenness still remain. We are in the in-between, and in the in-between we are broken and sometimes we get sick.

The good news of the gospel is that when we bump into our own weaknesses, God is right there with us. He is not mad or disappointed. He’s not waiting for us to power up before he encounters us. Jesus’ power is made perfect in our weaknesses. We don’t need to overcome to encounter him, but we encounter him in our brokenness and he puts us back together, and through him we overcome.

Before You Look Back, Stand Here

“The bare statistics of my ancestry I had always known, together with the fact that my first American forbear had come to the colonies under a strange cloud. Of details, however, I had been kept wholly ignorant through the policy of reticence always maintained by the Delapores. Unlike our planter neighbours, we seldom boasted of crusading ancestors or other mediaeval and Renaissance heroes; nor was any kind of tradition handed down except what may have been recorded in the sealed envelope left before the Civil War by every squire to his eldest son for posthumous opening. The glories we cherished were those achieved since the migration; the glories of a proud and honourable, if somewhat reserved and unsocial Virginia line.”

So begins one of my favorite short stories, “The Rats in the Walls”. It is a horror story, and an extremely frightening one at that. A synopsis would look like this: a wealthy American is led by fate to his ancestral family estate in England where the secret demonic truth of his family line draws him inextricably toward becoming a monster.

By the end, the main character is a murderer and a fiend in spite of all his desires not to be. The pull of his family’s terrible history proved an unstoppable curse that breaks him spirit, mind, and body:

“When I speak of poor Norrys they accuse me of a hideous thing, but they must know that I did not do it. They must know it was the rats; the slithering, scurrying rats whose scampering will never let me sleep; the daemon rats that race behind the padding in this room and beckon me down to greater horrors than I have ever known; the rats they can never hear; the rats, the rats in the walls.”

Now, why in the world am I bringing this up? Because this is exactly NOT THE CASE with anyone who is in Christ. Indeed, your family history can furnish you with iffy genetics, trauma, abuse, weird customs, strange habits, and a variety of “normal” behaviors that only seem normal to you, but there is no outside spiritual force pulling poor doomed Christians toward an unavoidable fate that has somehow been predetermined by their family.  

Some of us really need to hear this. Some of us have pretty disturbing and even evil things in our family’s past. Before you look back at it, remember that Jesus Christ, the Curse-taker and chain-breaker, bled and died to rip you away from the domain of darkness and plant you firmly in the Kingdom of Light. The Devil and his demons can exert no authority over you: Jesus has conquered them. Your family line no longer passes on its spiritual gunk: Jesus has given you a new spiritual lineage. Genetics, habits, trauma, and customs may remain to be dealt with, but any spiritual terror is beaten and gone.

Whenever you look back, stand here.

A Traitor, A Terrorist, and the Presence of Jesus

I want to introduce you to two of Jesus' earliest followers, among his "12 disciples":  Matthew the tax collector & Simon the Zealot.

Matthew (also known as Levi) was a tax collector by trade, which meant that he was contracted by the Roman Empire to collect taxes from the Jewish people. Tax collectors were notorious for lying about how much people owed and pocketing the difference. They were traitors. They were rich. They were hated and despised. They were seen as the worst kind of sinner. 

Simon was a part of a Jewish sect known as the Zealots, who were bent on revolution and looking for a Messiah to violently overthrow Rome, the oppressor. In the mind of the Zealots, the promised Messiah would come and lead a Jewish military uprising, re-establishing Israel as God's land and Jerusalem as God's holy city. They were violent. They were extreme. They were the worst form of religious passion. 

Simon was called, chosen by Jesus to be one of his earliest followers. Simon didn't choose Jesus; Jesus chose Simon, a religious extremist who justified violence as a means to liberty. And he taught him to love his enemies. 

Matthew was called, chosen by Jesus to be one of his earliest followers. Matthew didn't choose Jesus; Jesus chose Matthew, a despised tax collector who was seen as the filthiest of sinners. Jesus dined with him in his home, with his friends. When the Pharisees got mad at him for it, he told them "It's not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. …I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners" (Matt. 9:12-13). 

Simon and Matthew were on opposite sides of the political spectrum, and yet they were chosen and called by Jesus to follow him together. This would have been impossible, but Jesus made it beautiful. 

It wasn’t their proximity to one another that changed them, but their proximity to one another centered around the presence of Jesus. 
That’s what Jesus does. He changes us in proximity to one another centered around his presence. It’s in that space we find that we’re more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe, yet at the very same time more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope. This is the good news of Jesus, and it’s worked out in the community of his people following him together.

The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry

Busyness and hurry seem to be our constant companions these days. When I ask, “How are you doing?”, the most common response is “busy.” We wear busy like a badge of honor. It proves that we are valuable, that we are important. Most don’t even question this, but I believe that this busyness and hurry is a massive detriment to stepping into the abundant life that Jesus has made available to us. 

Dallas Willard, a prolific writer about spiritual formation, is known for telling those who want to be spiritually healthy that they need to “ruthlessly eliminate hurry from their life.” This is a challenging call for modern American Christians. Eliminate hurry? How am I supposed to get everything done? Well, maybe you won’t. And that’s OK. 

“Hurry is not just a disordered schedule. Hurry is a disordered heart.” -John Ortberg

In the gospel of Matthew a man came to Jesus and asked, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

The greatest commandment was not get more things done. It was to love God and to love people. And the unwavering truth is that to love well takes time. It isn’t rushed. If we want to love others it means spending time with them. This can happen by taking time out of our busy schedules to turn up for Community Group. It can look like calling a friend to talk instead of scrolling through Twitter again. It can mean eating lunch with a coworker instead of another working lunch in front of your computer screen.

Loving God means spending time with him. The Lord calls us to “Be still and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10). How do we do this when we are running frantically from one thing to the next, barely keeping our heads above water? I don’t know. If this is our reality it may be time to reconsider our schedule and our obligations. We need to look at what is in our hearts pushing us to do, do, do - accomplish, accomplish, accomplish.

Let’s remember that an important part of Emotionally Healthy Community is doing the work of knowing ourselves and knowing God. These things can only happen as we slow down and be with God.

Emotionally Healthy Community

“If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 2:1-5)

The Bible is very clear about the necessity of living with Christ-like character. Too often we think living Christ-like is limited to issues of personal sin and the temptations we may face. But it is more important to understand that it applies primarily to our relationships with others. In fact, a powerful truth is that we can find victory over personal struggles with sin, destructive behaviors, and thoughts through our healthy relationships with others. 

God created us to live in community. And it is community that forces us to deal with our emotional health, as well as provides opportunities and help in learning to grow healthy relationally. 

A big idea in our next series, Emotionally Healthy Community, is that our spiritual maturity is directly linked to our emotional maturity.  We cannot separate our spiritual condition from our emotional condition; they are intricately interconnected. Too often we see spiritual gifts or knowledge as indicators of spiritual maturity, and overlook the emotional state of ourselves or those we see as spiritual. 

Peter Scazzero, in his book The Emotionally Healthy Church, says, “The sad truth is that too little difference exists, in terms of emotional and relational maturity, between God’s people inside the church and those outside who claim no relationship to Jesus Christ.”  The verse in Philippians above states it is from being united with Christ that we should live in healthy community. Jesus died not only to save us from hell and eternal separation from His presence, but to transform our lives now to be rich and full emotionally, happy, and fulfilled relationally.  

Over the course of the next few weeks, we will explore seven principles of emotional health:  1) Looking Beneath the Surface, 2) Breaking the Power of the Past, 3) Living in Brokenness and Vulnerability, 4) Receiving the Gift of Limits, 5) Embracing Grieving and Loss, 6) Making Incarnation Your Model for Loving Well, 7) Slowing Down to Lead with Integrity. I am confident that each of us will grow both emotionally and spiritually as we learn to implement these principles in our lives, our homes, our church, and our communities.  Let’s learn how to better be the body of Christ representing Jesus to those around us! 

Choose Your Character

A well-known young man named David once met a murderous giant on a battlefield and said this:

“...You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.  This day the Lord will deliver you into my hands, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head. This very day I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds and the wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel.”

At this point, if this was a sermon, we would all expect to hear something about David’s incredible faith or God’s incredible faithfulness. While those are two primary elements of the story, I think we usually miss something else that is very, VERY important. 

This month in Youth Group we did an RPG-themed message series called  “Choose Your Character”. In week one, I talked about how the little decisions we make every day slowly forge us into a certain type of person. On week two, I talked about the need to carefully think about and plan the type of character you want to become. We do this in video games; we should certainly do it in life! And lastly, just this week, I drove home the point that the character you choose is really and truly YOURS. When the time for character testing comes, usually unexpectedly, you will be bound to be the type of person you have become. 

You will have chosen your character, for better or worse, and your options to act outside of it will be limited or nonexistent. This is what many of us need to hear from the story of David and Goliath.

When King Saul asks David why he thinks he can triumph against a belligerent giant, David says this:

“Your servant has been keeping his father’s sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock,  I went after it, struck it, and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it, and killed it. Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God.”

Let me offer an abbreviated version of his response: “O King, know what’s scarier than a nine-foot-tall man? A bear. Know who I am? A bear-killer. Know what else is worse? Lions. Know who I am? A lion-killer. This Goliath punk is a warmup. God’s been training me for this my whole life.”

“Giant-killer” was David’s character. When the giant showed up, there was no doubt in his mind.

So the question is, who are we? What is our character? What type of person are you building yourself into? Are you cooperating with God as he builds you into a giant-killer or do you resist fighting the bears and lions that show up?  It’s worth thinking about. Once the giant shows up, the time for building is over.

Life is Sacred From Beginning to End

Great, heated debates have been taking place in our universities and places of higher education for the last several decades on the nature of human life, the value of life, and the ethics of its ending. With advances in technology & changing of societal norms (among other things), the question is a big one: what is a human life? Where does it begin, where should it end, and who should determine its beginning and ending? Is it something intrinsically valuable, worth fighting for, or is it valuable with certain conditions? 

Some would argue that life is valuable to the degree that a person can think, act, and function in some useful manner, but throughout history, and in modern times, Christians have argued that life is valuable, period; that all human beings are made in the image of God; and that simply by existing, all human lives are equally sacred, holy and worth protecting.

Eleven years after the Roe v. Wade decision in which the Supreme Court issued a ruling that guaranteed women access to abortion, President Ronald Reagan issued a proclamation that Sunday 22, 1984 would be the Sanctity of Human Life Day. This Sunday, January 19th, 2020, that tradition continues, as many Christian communities across our nation stand in solidarity with the belief that human life begins at conception and is to be seen as sacred and worth protecting. 

The conversation and issues surrounding abortion and women's rights is a complex one that should be approached with close compassion and humble conviction. Sadly, it is too often approached with an arms-length judgement and arrogant shouts. My challenge for us this week is that we would choose the posture of close compassion and humble conviction, and that we would be consistent in our sanctity of human life ethic. Here's what that could look like.

Begin by seeing your own life as intrinsically valuable. This isn't just an abstract thought; this is real life, flesh and blood. Once it's personal, begin to apply a consistent value for human life across the board. The unborn child and the mother. The friend and the enemy. The patriot and the immigrant. The citizen and the criminal. Those who you look up to, and those you look past. All human life is made in the image of God and worth protecting. Simply by existing, all human lives are equally sacred, holy and worth protecting. Do what you can this week, this year, and with the one life you've been given to live a life that truly values life from its beginning to its ending.

Protectors, Predators, and Possums

For this week's blog, I’m sharing an excerpt from the JOY Starts Here book that is the basis for our January series. I found this comparison to be an accurate description of what I’ve encountered personally and have seen pastorally many times. The goal is to grow in our role as protectors and learn how to avoid being -- and respond healthfully to others when they may be -- predators or possums. 

“By delighting in relationships, we create belonging around ourselves. “Creating belonging” means that we continually create a joyful place for others to belong with us. When we create belonging, our joy extends an invitation for others to grow joy together with us. Joyful belonging grows relationships, seeks others, and builds when others smile back. Creating belonging is the best indicator of maturity at any age. When we create belonging around us, we are growing a network of joyful relationships. Our “herd” is connected and empowered by joy, and seeks to invite others to share joy with us.

There are three response styles that distinguish people in our herd. Any one of us can have all three. The first type of herd member is protectors. Untraumatized people who grow up in high-joy homes tend to become protectors. Protectors have strong joyful identities that welcome others and have tender hearts toward weakness. Protectors do not exploit weaknesses, but instead help vulnerable herd members grow in joy. Protectors do not enable dysfunctional behavior but quickly protect the weak. When our herd has high joy, the members tend to develop strong protector skills. 

Predators are the primary fear-based response style in the herd. The brain is pre-wired for predator responses. Without training, predator responses are all we have. We need training by gentle protectors who respond tenderly to weakness, or we will respond like predators and prey. Predators discover the weaknesses and vulnerabilities of others and exploit them. Predators use weaknesses to obtain or train dominance in the food chain. Predators fiercely guard their positions and will hurt others in the herd if threatened. Predators also do their best to hide their weaknesses and appear strong to assure their positions. Predators are the most common product of low-joy herds. 

Possums are the other fear- and anxiety-based response style found in low-joy herds. Possums do not occupy positions of dominance in the herd, and their style is based primarily on avoiding being exploited by predators. Possums have usually been hurt in relationships and will do most anything to avoid being hurt again. Possums hide, avoid, minimize, withdraw, and conceal their weaknesses as much as possible. Unfortunately for possums, their low-joy environment creates weaknesses and vulnerabilities that are impossible to conceal. Predators on the prowl are likely to spot and exploit these vulnerabilities, leaving possums feeling ashamed, used, and even more fearful.” 

(Dr. Wilder, from Joy Starts Here pf 13)

Learning to Pray

Prayer has never come easily for me. It is a discipline that I value because our Lord valued it. I believe that it is powerful because of the powerful testimony of other prayer warriors. I know that it is something that I should do because Jesus, as well as the gospel writers, Paul, and James under the direction of the Holy Spirit call followers of Jesus to lives of prayer. Paul even says that there are three things we should always be doing: rejoicing, praying, and giving thanks. I don’t know about you, but I find that to be challenging. Pray without ceasing? If this is the command, perhaps I don’t understand prayer at all. 

What I have learned is that, at its core, prayer is connecting with God. It is the practice of living in an awareness of the presence of God with us and us with God. I have found so much growth in my life spiritually and emotionally as I have learned to practice prayer as presence. The trick is to stay in the presence of God throughout the day: trying not to compartmentalize life into “spiritual activities” and “regular life”. I invite the living God into all of it. I talk to him and listen to him throughout the day. This practice makes stepping into more formal times of prayer simple. It becomes as normal as sitting and talking with Amber.

This is not to say that I am a prayer champion. I still have to put quiet time on my calendar and discipline myself to do it. I still find myself wondering if this practice of prayer really makes any difference. But, like most good things, the result is not immediate, but is found in the consistent repetition of the practice. I don’t feel close to God after one day of prayer, but after a week, a month, or a year? Yes, then the results are keenly felt.

In 2020 we have a bunch of great stuff we are exploring as a church. In January we will be talking about living lives of joy, and in February we begin a series about emotional health. I am confident that these sermons will be good with valuable insights and solid application. But, if we want to truly grow spiritually, to be people of emotional health living lives overflowing with joy, we need to pray. We need to allow God to work in our hearts regarding the things that we are learning about on Sunday.

Let’s turn up our level of prayer as a church. Let’s allow the Holy Spirit to work in and through us so that we can step into abundant life for our sakes and for our communities.

Hearing God for the New Year

There are three Greek words used to refer to God’s Word in the New Testament.  One is logos, as used in John 1:1: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  Logos is a very general term that means the idea, thought, reasoning, motive, or meaning of something. It can refer to a specific saying or, as it is used in this verse, something as grand as Christ Himself.  

Graphe is the second Greek word, as used in 2 Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” This term is the most specific as it refers to the written word.  The written word of God, the Bible, is our only authoritative source of revelation. All other forms of hearing from God and being led by the Holy Spirit must be submitted to the objective standard of the Bible, rightly understood and properly applied.  

Rhema is the third Greek word, as used in Matthew 4:4: “But he answered, ‘It is written, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'" It refers to something spoken, an utterance. So someone would read a graphe, but hear a rhema, in order to understand the logos. Keep in mind that, as in English, these words are sometimes used interchangeably and this illustration is to help us understand the general use of these terms and to grasp how God actively communicates with us. 

As Christ followers we deeply value all the ways God communicates to us, and we strive to hear, understand, and obey God’s word in every sense that it is conveyed.  This Sunday (12/29/19) and next Sunday (1/5/20) at Nichols, we are offering the opportunity for everyone to receive a Rhema word.  Rhema ministry is also offered regularly at both Vine and Vandalia.  

Our Rhema teams have been trained to hear from the Lord and share what they feel God is speaking to the person they are ministering to.  Jesus said in John 10:27, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” So this is something every Christ-follower can learn. But our teams are trained to share in a way that remains consistent with Scripture and submitted to the guidelines and protocols that maintain a safe use of this powerful gift.  

I strongly encourage each of us to get a word from God for the new year. 2020 is destined to be a pivotal year. The analogy of 20/20 vision and getting a perfect vision from God for your new year cannot be understated. It’s also just a good way to start off every year. 

Tell the Stories

Let’s talk about the wonderful works God has done! The Bible teaches us to share stories from our lives, from the Bible, or from others’ lives where God has miraculously intervened. We need to keep a record of the account of God’s activity with us, then share the testimonies! People are so hungry to hear good news. 

The Bible expresses a cool and important reason for us to share testimonies in Psalm 78:4-7:
“We will not hide them [testimonies] from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and His strength and His wonderful works that He has done… make them [God’s law and testimony] known to their children; that the generation to come might know them... that they may set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments.”

Wow, this verse tells us to share testimonies because it causes the next generation to put their hope in God! How vital it is to pass these stories on to young people, or any aged person for that matter, because there’s something about hearing a testimony that causes us to trust in God when a tough time comes. Hearing testimonies deposits faith, hope, and confidence in us. The response to difficulty becomes, “I’m gonna trust God because He works wonders. I don’t know what He’ll do or how He’ll do it, but my hope is in Him.”

I will share a few of my stories with you. Recorded below is one of my journal entries.

Jehovah Rappa - The Lord my Healer                                                                                     August 22, 2016

Yesterday I attended a healing workshop done by Anthony and Jen Wickey. They spoke about how Jesus accomplished our healing over 2,000 years ago when He died on the cross. When we pray for healing, we are grabbing hold of what was already done. We also learned that healing is a process, long or short, we praise Him in the process and rejoice in small beginnings. I received prayer for my toe. I received healing. The numbness went away and I began to have feeling again in my toe and the pain was no longer there when I moved it around. 

Praise the Lord! 

It’s funny, that’s not the first time God has miraculously healed one of my toes… Once, Sarah Gerber prayed for healing in one of my toes after I injured it and God miraculously healed me. Another time I stubbed my toe horribly on my way to bed in the dark. It was a Sunday and Pastor Cameron had just taught that morning that physical healing was as simple as grabbing hold of it out of heaven. So I prayed and did just that. The pain went instantly from very high to completely gone, WOW! 

Another time, I fell down the stairs when a bunch of girls were hanging out at a friend’s house. I was in a lot of pain, especially my knee, and it significantly decreased when a friend prayed for me. 

A few years ago, during a women’s retreat, I was having shoulder issues. My rotator cuff was injured, making it impossible to raise my arm up and back. Well, in my small group, Laura Shockley prayed for me and instantly I could move my arm fully with no pain. It was amazing. Praise the Lord!

It is so good to remember how God has healed me again and again. I resolve to record the instances when miracles take place through my prayers or others’ prayers. 

Those were only a few of the many instances God has miraculously intervened in my lifetime. I love how He so often used the prayers of my church family to bring about healing. How encouraging to read back and remember his great kindness toward me. 

I never want us to get so focused on “unanswered” prayers or current pain that we forget who God is, what He’s done and what He can do again. I hope my stories have encouraged you and that you too will resolve to record all His miraculous works in your life, then build hope in others by sharing them! Bless you, my friends.

The Life of Jesus

“To experience the life of Jesus, we have to adopt the lifestyle of Jesus.” Pastor John Mark Comer, in a sermon I was listening to recently, made that powerful statement. I’ll quote it again so we don’t move past it too quickly: “To experience the life of Jesus, we have to adopt the lifestyle of Jesus.”

What is the life of Jesus? The life of Jesus is the full, abundant life. In John 10:10 our Lord says, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” Eugene Peterson in his The Message paraphrase says it like this: “I came so they [Jesus’ followers] can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.” Following Christ shows us what real life looks like. This begs a clarifying question: “What does the real life of Jesus look like?” 

When we look at the life of Jesus, we see that he was never in a hurry. He always took time to stop and be present with whoever he encountered. I see this in Jesus’ life when he stops his journey up to Jerusalem to stay with Zacchaeus the tax collector. Did Jesus have important stuff to do? Yes. Did he stop to hang out with a sinner and traitor? Yes. Jesus also wasn’t worried; he was a non-anxious presence wherever he went. In one story, the disciples were freaking out because a storm was threatening to capsize their boat. But was Jesus worried? No, he was asleep. I want to be that calm in the face of the storms of my life.

But, as Comer said, if we want these characteristics in our life, we need to do what Jesus did. What Jesus did was often get away to lonely places to pray (Luke 5:16). Jesus, being a good Jew, practiced the Sabbath. Jesus spent time in community. Jesus served others. Jesus knew his scripture. All of this takes time and effort, but the payoff is huge.

We all want the life of Jesus. We all want to grow in love, joy, peace, and self-control. But are we willing to do the practices that enable these things to flourish in our lives? Are we willing to live the way that Jesus did to experience the life of Jesus ? It takes time and effort, but the payoff is huge: full, abundant, eternal life.

Hide an Elf, or Something Else

Chloe and I are in a state of our lives, our marriage, our parenting, where we are actively on the look-out to start new family traditions. We've each had various annual or semi-regular traditions that were a part of our upbringing, and now we're asking "what do we want to keep?" and  "what do we want to start brand new?"

The most prominent family traditions in our culture usually emerge around the holidays, particularly Christmastime. There are traditions that have to do with hiding an elf (huh?), cutting down a tree, decorating a tree, singing carols, baking cookies, going shopping, wrapping presents, giving presents, eating big meals together, the list goes on. I wonder, what are your traditions? 

Something new we've started to do this year is on each day of December leading up to Christmas (for each night of Advent), we have a short Bible verse to read together as a family, a question to consider, and a succinct prayer to pray for every night of Advent. We've got candles set up by our window, and I light them to start our time. After we finish, our kids love to blow them out. At ages 5, 2 and newborn, they're hardly able to sit still for this time, and are more fascinated by the candles than the Scripture, the prayer, or anything else. And that's okay. It's about having something that we look forward to, that brings us together and creates space for memories to be made. The candles are definitely the best part, but the whole experience is seeping into them through repetition. That's the power of tradition. 

I want you to consider, what are your traditions? What are the things you do with your friends & your family around this time of year? These things are significant! Do them with gusto! Maybe you’re in a place where you can't think of any meaningful traditions that you do. Start one! Just one. Keep it simple. Or maybe you're in a place where you've had traditions, but things have changed. Kids have grown up. It's not like it used to be. That's worth recognizing & processing, so do that, and then consider how you could start a new tradition in this new stage of life you find yourself in. Give yourself, and your family, something meaningful to look forward to this and every holiday season. Or perhaps, see the meaning and significance in what you're already doing.

He Came!

He came! He comes! And he’s coming back again!

The season of Advent is here. If you’re like me, you may not be very familiar with that word - Advent. You might have a vague notion that it is connected to Christmas - that people eat chocolate out of cardboard calendars or light candles or something like that. But what does it really mean?

Advent comes from the Latin word Adventus, which means “arrival, appearance, ripening, or invasion”. In our context it refers to the incarnation of Christ. Our creator God came to earth and became a human. John captured this in his gospel when he wrote this about Jesus:

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”  [John 1:14 NIV]

So Advent is a time to remember that Jesus came. We remember his birth, his life, and ultimately his death on a cross for the forgiveness of our sins. We remember that three days after he died, he rose again.

Advent is also a time for Christians to kindle their faith and hope in the return of Jesus. He’s coming back again - the second “arrival.” The Apostle Paul talks about this in 1 Thessalonians 4. He ends the passage by reminding us it is at this return of Christ that “we will be with the Lord forever.” And he asks us to “encourage one another with these words.”

We remember the first arrival of Jesus at his birth. We look forward to his second arrival when he returns for us. But did you know there is another arrival sandwiched in between? A university professor named Pfatteicher writes, "Since the time of Bernard of Clairvaux (d.1153), Christians have spoken of the three comings of Christ: in the flesh in Bethlehem, in our hearts daily, and in glory at the end of time" (emphasis mine).

It is this third arrival I encourage you to embrace today, this advent season, and every day of your life. Jesus came! Jesus will come back again! Very true. But equally true is this - today is the day that he wants to show up in your life. I encourage you not to put your head in the sand and wait for his return. Look up, look around, come toward him, and find his “appearance” in your life today.

“Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  - Jesus

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving was one of the first national holidays in the USA, commissioned by George Washington in 1789. It was celebrated by the early settlers of this land as early as 1621. An early record of the celebration lists that there were nearly twice as many indigenous American Indians as there were European settlers at the first Thanksgiving feast. We have so much to give thanks for in this amazing nation. 

Often in our daily struggle to get through life, we can forget how blessed we are. Recently I spent several weeks in Mexico attending a Spanish-language school. I go to Mexico often, so I thought I was prepared to live on my own. But I quickly learned how much I still took for granted – in particular, drinking water. No one in Mexico can drink the tap water. Everyone has to buy water or use a filter system. Normally when I go to teach, I am provided with an endless amount of bottled water. But this time I had to get it myself. Keep in mind that I drink a lot of water – now I know just how much. Every other day I had to carry a 20-liter (45-lb) bottle of water three blocks back to where I was staying.  It wasn’t terribly hard, and I’m thankful that it was only three blocks away. But more than once after a long day of school and doing homework, I had to calculate if I had enough water to get through the night and morning, or if I had to make the trek to the store for more water.

God commands us to be thankful many times, and living in Christ gives us endless reasons to be thankful. “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Th 5:18) is a powerful verse that tells us we can be thankful in all circumstances even if we’re not thankful for the circumstance. In other words we can be thankful in the midst of difficult, even painful, times because we have hope in Christ. 

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God” (Php 4:6). In this passage, the prescription for anxiety is prayer “with thanksgiving.”  There is a spiritual dynamic released when we begin thanking God in difficult times. It brings a realignment of our spirits and minds to recognize how much we have from our heavenly Father.  

So let’s celebrate the holiday and hopefully have a good meal. But let’s learn how to live a life of thankfulness because of all that God has done for us!

Where Ostriches Dwell

I think that Where Ostriches Dwell could be the title of a Shel Silverstein poem. But I digress. Isaiah mentions the ostrich three times in his book. These big desert-dwelling birds were a common sight in Israel during Bible times and were used in scripture as an image of desolation. “Where the ostriches dwell” would not have been a good slogan for a vacation resort. If ostriches lived somewhere, it was not where people would want to be.

Chapters 13-27 of Isaiah can be a bit of a slog. In these 17 chapters, we find Isaiah prophesying against all of the nations surrounding Israel. God is declaring universal judgment on the nations, including Israel and Judah, in order to show everybody that He is supreme over all things, even the superpowers of the day that everyone was afraid of. In the opening oracle, Isaiah prophesies that Babylon will be destroyed. How bad will it be? The once great city will be full of owls, the ostriches will dwell there, and wild goats will dance there (v. 21).  Yes, it will be that bad! The ostriches will dwell there!

Isaiah goes on to say that Israel should remember that the same thing that happens to Baylon will happen to them unless they change their ways and put their trust in God. But Israel continues to put their trust in the nations. What Isaiah prophesied of course happens to Israel and then to Judah. After being conquered and exiled, they become the land where ostriches dwell.

But there is hope! A servant will rise from the house of David! The chosen one on whom the Spirit of God rests will bring salvation to the remnant of the nations (42:1-4). The servant will bring life to the people, he will open blind eyes, and set prisoners free (42:5-7)! Does this sound like anyone you know?

Then, through this servant, Israel will be redeemed. In the goodness of God he will take the ostrich-dwelling-place and bring rivers of life-giving water! In the day of salvation the beasts of the field will glorify God, even the jackals and ostriches (43:20). What a beautiful picture!

You may be going through a tough time right now. You might feel like you are dwelling with the ostriches. But God is full of mercy and grace. He has sent His servant, Jesus Christ, to restore you, to bring you into a family – a community of people who put their trust in the Lord. When we trust in God, He will turn our wilderness, our ostrich-dwelling-place, into a place of victory and praise.

Big Bird

I was recently, well, “challenged” by someone (indirectly) to write an exhortation about an ostrich. Now, who they are isn’t important (*cough* Marilee *cough*)—what is important is that the moment it was mentioned, I knew what I wanted to say! Behold, the difference between a person and an ostrich:

For starters, the ostrich is a huge bird. How huge? The hugest. 340lbs. Friends, that’s REALLY huge. Naturally, it lays the world’s largest eggs. It is also super-duper fast. How fast? The fastest two-legged animal in the world, capable of 70kph sprints and 16ft strides. And forget that nonsense about the ostrich burying its head in the sand. Why should they? If running away from a threat doesn’t work, they can kick it to death. Yes, that’s what I said. Ostriches are capable of death-kicking LIONS. Don’t believe me? I don’t blame you! Just check this site out to verify and see lots more cool facts: https://onekindplanet.org/animal/ostrich/

So, what’s the obvious difference between an ostrich and a person? Is it that they have two toes and we have five? Maybe the fact that they have over 2lbs. of rocks in their stomachs at all times to grind up their food because they have no teeth? Nope. 

The obvious difference is that an ostrich never focuses on the fact that it can’t fly and other birds can. 

If we people turned into ostriches, I dare say being the biggest and the fastest wouldn’t hold our attention for long. I reckon we’d soon start pondering the one thing we couldn’t do. It’s how we work. Our default setting is to focus on the negative. 

Since we are in the midst of a series called “People of Truth” and since it’s November, I offer this friendly challenge: Discipline yourself to focus on the positive aspects of your life and yourself. Ask God to show you what makes you awesome, and then stop comparing yourself and your attributes to others. Do what you can do and be who you are. Energetically. Happily. Thankfully. Just like an ostrich.

“And I Was Going To Stay Home Tonight…”

Have you ever, in the moment of decision, found it easy to make excuses? You've committed to something, whether verbally to another person or just internally to yourself, saying "I'm going to do this thing," whatever it is. But then when it comes time to do that thing, a subtle and tantalizing line of thinking slips in and says, "Is that really going to be worth it? Wouldn't it just be nice to not do that thing? You've had a long day…you didn't sleep well last night…you deserve ______." Anyone? 

I was encouraged at Community Group this past week when one of the folks in my group, who actually had a good list of reasons not to come, decided not to stay home but to come anyway. Not only did this person show up, they came willing to let themselves be known, to open up about the difficulties of life, to be asked and to answer questions, to be prayed for and to speak honestly to God where "two or three are gathered." As Jesus promised, he was present with his people. 

At the end of the night, I heard them say, "And I was going to stay home tonight…" We were all glad they didn't. 

No matter how old you are, you've got a whole history of dreams, fears, stories, pains, joys, friendships, jobs, places you’ve lived, things you’ve done, and interesting, hard-to-explain family dynamics. A six-week Community Group can barely break the surface of some of the most basic information about you, let alone the deeper realities of your soul. But as I witnessed this last week, it does create the space for you to open up your life, your heart, little by little, where the love of community can meet you in the real stuff of life. 

When life gets hard, may we be a people who don't withdraw into isolation and feel the pain of life alone. May we have the courage, with the wind of the Spirit at our back, to press in to community, to let ourselves be known, to open up and trust again even (especially) when it's hard. Don’t stay home.  

For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to self that we are born to Eternal Life.

• St. Francis of Assisi

Following Jesus

Last week we began our new series called People of Truth. The goal of this series is to remind us to consider our thinking, our actions, and our emotions in our everyday lives and whether they are aligned with Jesus. Does it really matter if we mentally agree with the Nicene Creed that we recite every month if it doesn’t actually affect how we think, act, and feel? As Christ-followers we are pursuing a righteousness that is higher than that of the scribes and Pharisees.

Now, here is the problem. For too long, many of us have believed that Christian faith is saying a prayer and turning up for church on Sundays. Maybe we serve in Children’s Ministry and throw some money in the offering, but the bulk of our Christianity is merely believing certain things about Jesus. We see something different in the New Testament. 

For example, look at the call of Matthew the tax collector: “As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. 'Follow me,' he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.” Jesus didn’t ask Matthew to believe some facts and say a prayer, he invited Matthew to follow him. Was this the day that Matthew was “saved”? Or was it the next day? Or a month later? I don’t know. But, what is important is that we see the example of Matthew and ensure that we are actually following Jesus. We follow Jesus by learning the beautiful way of Jesus and coming into alignment with how He thinks, how He acts, and how He feels.

We Need Community

We were made to be together, in families:  natural families and spiritual families. We thrive in community, in relationship. We receive love from others and learn to love others well. When mistakes are made, forgiveness mends, making us stronger than before. Iron can sharpen iron in community, and we are more like Jesus each time the metal scrapes.

After God created Adam, He said these words: “It is not good for man to be alone.” God was saying that the animals and Himself were not enough community for Adam. Adam needed people. God created Eve to meet that need in Adam’s case, but not everyone must have a spouse because God gives some the gift of celibacy. That means the statement stands for everyone inside and outside of marriage: “It’s not good to be alone.” 

Being connected to the people in your church family is one of the ways God planned we would not be alone. The early church in Acts met in people’s homes and gathered at the temple throughout their week. 

“Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts...” (Acts 2:46)

Meeting regularly, both in a congregation setting and in one another’s homes, is vitally important to our personal and spiritual wellbeing. That doesn’t mean we can’t ever be alone. Many of us are wired to rejuvenate during alone time. But we don’t stay there, refusing to pass the hurdles that hold us back from engaging with community. 

When I say “engaging with community”, I mean intentionally spending time with other believers from this spiritual family. Sharing life and truth with one another will grow our faith and friendships. As we individually determine to pursue community, the whole will be transformed. 

Maybe you have never engaged very much with community, or maybe you did in the past but aren’t right now. I encourage you to. It’s healthy, godly, and right to pursue community to a greater degree, so let’s go for it together! Bless you, beautiful church.