A New Look, A New Listen

"My Father's house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going." Thomas said to him, "Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?" Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." - John 14:3-6

Atheism: The belief that there was nothing and nothing happened to nothing and then nothing magically exploded for no reason, creating everything and then a bunch of everything magically rearranged itself for no reason what so ever into self-replicating bits which then turned into dinosaurs. Makes perfect sense. - Unknown

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. ... Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God." - C.S. Lewis / Mere Christianity

Like it or not Jesus does throw down the gauntlet. It took me a long time to accept this. I tried to wiggle my way around it, ignore it or simply rationalize it away. But I've begun this blog with that quote from James because, well, there is no wiggle room, you can't ignore it and - though faith can be rational - it is not the foundation of true belief.

Atheists - and I know a few - rail against Jesus because of what his followers have done (the crusades, abortion clinic protests, etc.). But that is unfair and only confuses the issue. Jesus came. He loved. At no point did he say "Go kill Muslims!" or "Go and corner that fourteen year old pregnant girl and mock her shame." Quite the contrary. He wept over unkindness, preached that a Samaritan (the despised people of the Jews) could be kinder than a Rabbi and knelt down to draw a line in the sand to protect a woman about to be stoned to death for adultery. And while we're on the topic? At no point, ever, did he walk up to someone and say "Believe in me or you're going to hell." I know too many people deeply scarred by a Christian who lobbed the "hell grenade" at them. It's sad. Jesus preached over and over again that we are not to judge, harm or condemn our fellow man. Judgement is up to God. He did, however, state clearly that he was the way to the Father. Again. That gauntlet. But guess what? Even that he does amidst parables, pleading and praying. For me. For you. For everyone.

The C.S. Lewis quote is one of my favorites and it carries us to the decision point of believing or not believing in Christ. In dismisses outright the notion that he was just a great teacher, life coach or wise prophet by using - oddly enough - Jesus' own words against him. Christ says "I am the Son of God." and "I am the way, the truth and the life." He doesn't say "I am one of many who can lead you through this life and on to the next." He doesn't say "Buy my speech on parchment paper, on sale by one of the apostles after the service." He wasn't up for debate and he wasn't for sale. What he did say, in many ways, over and over again?  "Listen to me."

agit8

"Sing to the Lord a new song..." Psalm 96:1

One of the greater joys of life is in discovering a context to it all. We often view things from one perspective or another, never realizing that, more often than not, few things are that simple. We need only breach a conversation about how to solve a "simple" problem like bringing water or the malaria vaccine to Africa before we realize, very shortly, that we've walked smack dab into a quagmire of political rivalries, tribal resentments and government mismanagement of resources. It shouldn't be that hard but, in truth, it's just not that easy. Hundreds of thousands will die of thirst and the want of a simple vaccine that, as Bono has pointed out, costs less than $1.00 per person to provide.

It's easy to be defeatist, to throw our hands up to God, to feel shame at bearing witness to the fact that, by all appearances, a human life is not even worth a SINGLE dollar. It's only when one steps back to ascertain the real culprit here - evil, as it lives and grows in the hearts and minds of men - that the battle becomes apparent. Over seventy years ago it was a monster sweeping across Europe with reckless abandon, killing at will, burning people in ovens and flush with a desire for power. Our greatest mistake then as a quiet nation was our very silence and, by the time we acted, it was almost too late.

But now we are not a tiny nation. We are the richest, strongest nation in the world. The enemy is not one man but an insidious wall of apathy. This doesn't mean we can wave the wand (or the stick) of democracy and force tribes with centuries old bitterness between them to come together, or power-wash their governments clean of corruption. We must remember the old adage about a trickle of water, how over time it will wear smooth the roughest of rocks, one drop at a time.

Don't let the enemy tell you that one tiny voice, your voice, is all for naught. It's for God, who is big enough to take the accumulated efforts and the tiniest gestures and turn them into a wave of love. Please visit the one.org website and join the agit8 campaign. They don't want your money. They want your voice. Extreme poverty in the world has already been cut in half and it's possible that it can be completely eradicated by 2030 if enough of us push the governments of the world hard enough.

Right now 100 artists are performing their favorite protest songs as part of the agit8 campaign. Why don't you join them, add your voice and sing along?

Blessed Assurance

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." - Philippians 4:6-7

In past blogs I've discussed the varying degrees of either angst or peace which we bring to our faith. That's an important distinction, by the way. Far too often we don't think of faith as something we bring, it's more like something we either have or don't have. But it's not enough, in any context, to just have faith. We must bring it: to our daily lives, to those around us and in the midst of all our circumstances.

To do so it helps to have the blessed assurance that the old hymn speaks about, which is a simple kind of knowing. I wouldn't even call it a confidence of any kind, for such an assertion might lead one to believe the assurance begins in oneself. It doesn't. It is an assurance that ebbs into us, from beyond us. The knowing is less rooted in a believing as it is in a being. This is not in any way to discount the believing, which is core to our faith and essential to the entire process. But every now and then in life we get to experience small moments of transcendence. In this form, our beliefs are no longer narrated, but elevated. The mind aligns with the soul and the heart beats to a universal rhythm. The adrenaline to this entire process, I believe, is God alone.

This past week I have felt the presence of God in such a simply peaceful way. I've had this feeling before, here and there, once for weeks on end. Words can barely describe it. Feelings conveyed in the midst of letters and sentences fall victim to a structure of thought that the Holy Spirit simply cannot be constrained by nor conveyed by. The best I can do is pray that you know what I'm talking about because you've had moments like this as well and, if you haven't, that you will someday soon. The best I can do is bring these thoughts to you to maybe help you find your own sense of peace or, at the very least, if you are in the midst of hard times right now, hope that such a peace does indeed exist.

For any assurance that is blessed must have hope.

Tiny Bubbles

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him" - 1 Corinthians 2:9


Tonight as I helped give my six year old daughter a bath I realized that such days, such moments, are dwindling. As she peered out at me between two mountains of soap suds, smiling and laughing amidst all those tiny bubbles, I had one of those moments of vivid clarity, as if I were a camera and God was taking a picture of this precious little angel, His creation, through my eyes. So I sat with her and we chatted about her day and mine and I watched with sweet joy as she spoke with her tiny mouth, her top teeth missing now, my own little Dracula.

Time waits for no one, they say. I cannot argue. It seems like only a few days ago that it was my son in that tub, playing with his Teen Titans figurines. He's twelve now. As he sits on the cusp of those formative years between playing the tough guy and becoming a man I cannot help but wonder at how far he has come in his young life. He loves to debate his ideas with me now; his eyes filled with the thoughts he's formulating, his hands moving expressively to draw them out and present them to the world. In his belief's he's a stubborn boy and I love him all the more for it.

I've been reading lately of time and memory, faith and profound appreciation for the lives we have been given. They are fleeting things, all of them. We all know this and yet, still, we live our lives by the hour hand, not the seconds. But there's not a bath bubble in the world that last for hours and baby teeth are only lost once. We do not get them back when they are gone and, rest assured, we will miss them all the more if we don't appreciate them while they are happening.

So take a deep breath. Notice the moments that God gives you. Then focus.

Defending the Faith

"But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect." 1 Peter 3:15

Odd thing, this life. I sometimes wonder how much we are products of our environments versus how much, in truth, we are actually beings who produce our environments. Lately, be it in conversations in church or in one of my small groups, the question of why Christians must constantly defend their faith has come up, over and over again. As it has, sure enough, I’ve had everyone from my godson to one of my employee’s either confront me or simply ask me to explain my faith, which has been either rudely described as “blind” or sweetly defined as “innocent”, as if I'm either ignorant or naïve to believe in Jesus, God or an afterlife.

What’s fascinating is how some Christians struggle with defending their faith, myself included. I've more often than not walked away from such encounters feeling somewhat defeated, as if my faith was so weak that I could not properly pound some intellectual sense into the other party. But last night I came to the conclusion that most of my internal debates come from, well, my debate training from school, back in the day, and even worse, from that old friend of “mind” that I used to hang out with alllll the time who goes by the name of Pride.

But Paul has instructed us, very clearly, to take a different path, to be prepared to answer those who attack our faith, yes, but to do so absent the presence of pride or any preconceived notions of victory or defeat, because anyone who asks us about Jesus or our faith has already “won” something, in a sense: that small kernel of curiosity that can lead to the manifestation of salvation. Our job is to answer what we can, when we can, with “gentleness and respect”.

One cannot “pound” Jesus into anyone, nor can one “reason”, or “cajole”, or “persuade”, or “convince” him into anyone. Jesus comes in his own time to those who need him, when that individual is ready to receive him and often before that individual even knows they are ready to receive him.

Free

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” - Corinthians 3:17

This week I was faced with freedom found and freedom lost, all in the span of forty eight hours. It matters not the how or why of the freedom. If confessed the tale would prove quiet droll, I’m sure, and do little more than subtract from the overall message of this blog. Namely that the very notion, the pre-defined concept of freedom, when couched in human terms, is a prison.

Some of us think that we’ll find freedom in our country or our friends or in the arms of the one we love. In many ways we do, but these freedoms are fleeting. So we seek freedom in self-confidence, or sport, or accomplishments. We find careers to chase and roles to fill. Our identity becomes defined by those things we feel we need to obtain to be happy. Because you have to be happy to be free, right?

Before long we wake up and realize that freedom is a want. No different than money or fame, sex or power.  We spend days and nights feeding the want, instead of nourishing our souls. As such, many of us find confusion, discontentment or disillusionment as triple cousins of a constant sorrow.  

Is it any wonder then that in going through life like this we fail to truly seek, and thus do not find? We knock, but do not even wait for the door to be opened. Then we blame anyone and everyone for our state of being and when we run out of “them” to blame? We start blaming God.

Real freedom is more about this thing called surrender. It's the oddest thing, but only through surrendering do we actually find ourselves less captive. To everything.

Here Comes Christmas / Part III

Jesus answered, “I did tell you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father’s name testify about me, but you do not believe because you are not my sheep. My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.” - John 10-25-30

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. ... Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God." - C. S. Lewis

Response and perspective can only carry us so far. Beyond that we need to produce a defiant faith. A faith that does not rely on logic, proof or any submission to the insistence of man for empirical evidence. In so many ways each person, when they take this step, becomes a living miracle. Much as that baby in the manger. It cannot be said enough that faith is the single most powerful human emotion, for it encapsulates not only the intellect but the soul, marries the two and produces a freedom akin to heaven itself.

Those that "buy in" to the Christmas Story find, before long, an unsettling sense of self. You, that person you know best of all, is getting pushed aside, on the inside. Not in a rude way. There is no imposition here, no forced entry. It is a sweet surrender. As scripture puts it faith, "..is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." (Hebrews 11:1). Note the words "sure" and "certain". How you view your inner-self, the world around you and your circumstances are all now subject to a transformation that is necessary, sometimes painful but always rewarding.

How does one become sure of "hope" and certain of what is "unseen"? It starts with the Christmas Story and emerges from there, in the narrative of the life of a man who was far more. A man who stopped for all the hurt in the world, took the time to listen and love, to heal and encourage. From one birth, against all odds and in defiant faith, has come the rebirth of billions of people.

I may not always have the best command of scripture. I often do not have the answers. But I do know one thing: I have that baby. And I will not let go of him until the day I die, when He, at last, will be the one holding me.