Jesus knew…

I’m sitting in Starbucks right now listening to two of my new favorite songs: Dance with Me and Obsession, relaxing the legs after three LONG days of work.  But an interesting idea came up and I think it’s time to break the blog hiatus.   One of my favorite theological-conversation-friends and I were talking about how to confront people in the church in leadership positions with behavior that’s not acceptable.  Or at least, the few glimpses we get of that behavior SEEM unacceptable.   My buddy brought up the great point that I need to be unassuming in my conversation with this person, because as of right now, I really have no idea where she’s coming from.  But I disagreed with him when he said that that’s the example that Jesus set for us.

Now we both quickly agreed on the fact that Jesus didn’t have to assume- He is God and He knows.  But I would say that the example Jesus gives to us who do not know is in fact the lack of condemnation that He had even when dealing with people clearly living in sin.

Look at the woman at the well (John 4):

Jesus knows from the beginning that this woman is living sin, and has been for a while, but He’s chosen her to be the one who carries the message of His “living water” to the Samaritans of her town.  He is not concerned for the damage His image will bear by talking to her, He’s not concerned with shaming her, or with using her as an example of the type of person we should avoid.  He’s concerned with her restoration.  From the very first words He speaks to her, He is preparing her to hear His message and be changed by it.

There is a bigger picture here- that the Samaritans in that area responded to Jesus with belief and an attitude of worship.  But I find myself enamored by the individual interaction here.  The care that Jesus takes in revealing Himself as the Messiah to a woman, a Samaritan (despised by the Jews), and a woman living with a man who is not her husband after divorcing many others.  Without getting preachy, this woman would be held in high esteem in our own culture today, much less in that day.

Why are we so intent upon condemning the behavior we see in the others around us?  We are so smugly satisfied and yet disgusted at the same time when we see a brother or a sister fall into sin.  We are quick to point out their fault and distance ourselves, and we are slow to forget.  Galatians 6:1 says that if any our brothers and sisters fall into sin, we should restore them gently.

How much pride must be rotting my soul for me to feel smugly satisfied seeing a brother or sister fall instead of feeling my heart break for the damage they are wreaking in their own life?  Which is why I’m drawn to the woman who finds Jesus at the well.

What an eternal honor to be one of the few in human history to have an audible conversation face to face with the Savior of the world and then to be used by Him to bring others into the Kingdom!   Jesus certainly knew the impact this woman could have on those in her community if her life was changed, but He also certainly believed that the heart inside her was worth saving in the first place.  And He gave her an invitation to her to worship Him.

Think about this!  If He gave her an invitation to worship (this is implied through their conversation about true worship, His revelation to her about His identity, and the many Samaritans who believed by her testimony), then we are to believe that He sought out the worship of a sinner, He brought her to belief, and then used her to change the world around her.

There is a lot more to talk about on this topic, but I think this is enough for now.  At least, it’s all my mind and heart can soak up right now.  Please, I would love to hear your thoughts on this.  Have a great night!

 

 

A Thought…

I wasn’t going to write a blog about this, but after talking with a close friend, he convinced to try and get my thoughts about this out on “paper.”  It’d be cool to get a discussion going on this too, so I’m not writing this as the Final Word, as much as a thought I’m still trying to work out.   And here we go:

This summer was the Summer of the Wedding.  I went to 7 weddings, which is a record for me, and I still have one more to go this year.  Besides just being plain fun, although a little exhausting too, there was an interesting thought that kept popping up at these weddings- a thought that has popped up before and, to be truthful it has bothered me each time.   I’ve noticed that during the period of engagement, the brides become more and more beautiful.  Not in a I-wish-I-was-the-one-they-were-marrying way, but in a way that made me think to myself, “what was I missing before?”  Let me clarify: I’m not saying that these women were never attractive, not at all.  And I’m also NOT saying that I was coveting other men’s fiances; please don’t think that.  What I was noticing is that these women were walking taller, smiling more genuinely, approaching the same everyday tasks with more confidence, and all in all less concerned about what others thought about them.  I guess another way to say it would be that the very traits that made them who they are were shining through more brightly; they had been unearthed.  And that’s what got me thinking.

At first it bothered me that I hadn’t seen those things before, even as a friend.  But the more I thought about it, the more it opened an idea up to me: we can have relationships with many people- some as acquaintances, some as friends, some as love-interests, and very few, usually one in a lifetime, as that person that you love above all others.  It’s no secret, to those of you who know me well, that I’ve been wrestling through the idea of how much of that specific romantic relationship is our choice and how much of it is a mystical sort of bond that forms when the stars align over two people.

I’m going to be totally honest here: in my mind, it makes sense that females put the most work into their appearance when they’re single, then, when they know that they’ve got “their man” locked down, they don’t have to worry as much.  And maybe that actually is how it happens, but still that natural, authentic beauty continues to grow; no, not “grow,” it reveals itself.

In the end, I realized that what made these relationships so special, and what made them so worth celebrating, is that these two have found what is truly beautiful in each other and not only that, but they bring it out in each other.  That’s the key to what I was observing, in these cases specifically: the woman finds a strong man who, after earning her trust in their courtship, sees her at her core and the beauty there.  Then he provides a safe environment in their relationship for that beauty to come out, and as a result, what he saw more clearly than the others (“more clearly” is the key term here, I’m not saying no one else ever saw it) comes out for all to see.  Then we gather together to celebrate their decision to make that thriving relationship a permanent relationship.

This idea has helped me to understand a few things.  One, it affirms the idea that we need to be seeking a relationship where the two are better than one, and better than just the total sums of their parts.  If they both make each other better people, than they will be far better as a team than as two individuals.  Second, it immediately turns the focus off ourselves.  Charlie Sandberg, in a recent sermon, asked the question: are you dating whoever you’re dating because of your love for Jesus?  Well, I had never really thought of it that way.  I always thought that I loved Jesus and dated this other person that I was interested in.  But if, in our relationships, we are looking for the best for that other person, and trying our best to see how we can enable them to be themselves, it will be our desire to honor Christ that ultimately leads to the best for both parties involved.  To be honest, I think there will be many times where, no matter how great we think someone is as an individual, we won’t feel that special connection.  That’s ok.  And sometimes I think we will see that true beauty in someone else and at the same time realize that we won’t be the ones who help make that flourish.  Also ok.

But when you find someone that you can’t stand to NOT be around, and you realize that you see something in them that not only makes them uniquely special, but makes you feel uniquely special, you should probably hold on to that.  That is all.

The Observation Principle and My Condition

I was going through some of the old comments that have been made on my blog and some of the comments that I’ve made on other blogs today.  I found one comment from early in my blogging experiment where I actually wrote that my blog is not written for others to read it.  I just about laughed out loud.  It’s true that these thoughts need to be written down somewhere purely for the sake of letting some pressure escape from my brain, but these posts are most certainly written for people to read them.  And that changes the nature of what they are.  It forces the abstract, frustrating whisps of thought into something at least a tiny bit more coherent and organized.  It forces me to go from, “What am I trying to say?” to “This is what I think and now let me explain why.”  I like that; it’s been cathartic.

And with that, I open my first blog in… months (I’m too lazy to check how long).

Here is an update on my life for any who haven’t heard:  I am staying here in Fort Collins.  I said no to the Phoenix job, not because it was a bad option, but because I really came to the conclusion that my time is not done here in Fort Collins.  I will be spending this next school year working at Best Buy (rock on) and serving at Faith E. Free as the director for The Well (the college service) and one of the worship leaders for Faith’s main service.  I will also be pouring a substantial amount of time into Eikon to see how far that vision can go.

But that little piece of exposition does not by any means tell you the story of my life right now- and that’s why I’m actually writing a little blog post about this.   I titled this post “The Observation Principle and My Condition.”  The Observation Principle has to do with a theory from quantum mechanics that the act of observing something actually changes the thing itself.  I was loosely trying to connect that with how my act of writing this blog has changed by the fact that people actually read it.  But when I added the part that reads “My Condition” I was referring to what I really want to write about: an ongoing issue that I notice in me, an ingrained part of my humanity.

This summer was incredibly for a period.  After I had decided to let Phoenix go, school stuff had faded, the reality of no-job set in and I was faced with an interesting segment of my life.  The one constant in my life (school) was gone.   I did not have a career, I did not have my own family, and I did not have a job which meant I did not have money.  Not a great place to be, but, hey, how many college grads have been there?  But then I lost my car, followed shortly by my way, in a sense.  I literally had a space of about 5 weeks this summer where I felt like I was just floating adrift.

When I say adrift, I don’t just mean floating around, moving slowly.  I hope that I can muster the lyrical strength to provide you with the proper imagery here:  When I was in Florida a few weeks ago, I got to ride on a sailboat in the Gulf of Mexico.  It was a fantastic experience, one I will remember for probably the rest of my life.  But I will never forget my impression of one moment on that ride, and I’m not really sure why it made such an impression, because I’m guessing my family members probably don’t even remember this.  But there was a short period when the captain turned the boat’s engine off to just take it all in (yes, I meant to say “engine,” we used the engine to get out into open water).   What struck me at that moment was the total lack of motion; no wind, no lapping waves, not even fresh air.  The air literally was stale as we sat there, warm and stale, kind of like those summer nights when you wake in the middle of the night sweating and you realize the air is just warm enough that you can’t cool down at all, and the air is musty enough that you feel as if you’re breathing air that is twice-used.    You know, where you can fill your lungs with each breath and still feel like you’re suffocating? It gave me a small idea of the horror of being stranded in a life raft for days on the open seas with the sun beating down on you from sunrise to sunset: no escape, no a/c, no fans, no direction, no compass to even know which direction is the right direction IF you were even moving in a direction, sun burns, thirst, that slow feeling of suffocating under a bright blue sky… is this helping you understand my analogy at all?  I kind of felt like that for part of this summer.  I asked myself everyday: “Did I miss the boat somewhere?”  ”Where did I leave my compass?” and even, “Is anyone out there even looking for me?”

There are two things that I realized in this state, and these two things I will attribute to divine inspiration:

1)  I am not adrift in a life-raft, no matter how much it feels like it.  I am adrift in a sailboat.  It may occasionally run out of gas for the engine or lack wind for it’s sails, but it is a sail boat nonetheless, given to me by God (this is supposed to represent my life).  And…

2) It’s not my fault that there is no wind to fill my sails.  God brings the winds and He can certainly take them away if He sees fit (Psalm 135:6-7, Psalm 148:7-8).  In my short-sightedness, I may definitely have been the cause of running out of gas, but wind, in comparison, is surely the resource that could carry me round the world over and over, should God so desire to send me that way.

It really came down to a type of defining moment for me.  Because as I sat there wondering if my sails would ever really fill again and a fresh wind would carry me off to some exotic locale, I had to make a choice: I knew that eventually my sails would fill, to some degree, and I also knew that at some point I would be able to get some more gas.  But I needed to choose which I would let set the course for my life.

Will I be a boat that sputters along with a loud and inefficient motor pushing me along at a whopping 6 1/2 knots?  Or will I be a boat that opens the sails full and rides where the winds go, without thought for the return journey?  I know I’m kind of drawing this analogy/metaphor/whatever out, so I’m going to end with this:

On that same day of sailing, later in the day, after the moment of stale calm, after a little snorkeling, and certainly after beginning to wonder if it would be possible to be disappointed with my first sailboat experience, we saw some clouds approaching.  The captain smiled and opened the sails up all the way.  First came the fresh air, cool and fresh blowing in before the storm.  Then the sails began to fill; a gentle rustle at first, then the familiar whipping sound you’ve heard on every movie with a sail boat.  Then the storm front hit: a light warm rain falling in a strong wind.  The boat listed to the port side and we were off.  At our fastest point, which our captain insisted was racing speed, we couldn’t have been going more than 13-15 knots, but it was one of the most refreshing experiences I’ve ever had.  Part of it was the newness of the experience, I am sure.  But there was an intrinsic joy in the experience, something so much different than the feel of traveling at nearly the same speed with the motor.

The sound was completely different, for one.  Even though the sound of the rain and the wind and the waves were washing over us continuously with a natural rhythm, there was a natural peace underriding all of it.  No cars, no planes, no ipods, no cell phones, no business chatter.  But laughter there was.  The sound of laughter surprised me, especially because it started with Abby, who had been laid low by a headache brought on by the stale air and slow pace earlier in the day.  But with each sense that was stimulated came that intrinsic joy.

Images from that time came in snapshots that have become ingrained in my mind:  Abby moving to the front of the boat so the waves could splash her feet and the wind could toss her hair around.  The boat keeling over so far that one might think it would roll, even though we knew it wouldn’t.  The different shades of blues and greens in the water and sky as the storm moved past.  I know that we were likely never further than 10 miles from shore, but there was a sense of racing out into the unknown as our boat picked up speed.  Even our captain, who practically had lived on the water for the last 40 years, left a snapshot in my head: him standing there, legs spread, standing tall, wrestling the boat… and he couldn’t hold back a boyish grin as the rain soaked through his dirty t-shirt and shorts.

It’s hard to describe the smells because the ocean is so new to me, but there was a salty freshness to the moment.  And if the morning had been characterized by air the felt like a living suffocation, this could only be called the freshest air you’ve ever smelled.

And the feeling! Being tossed by waves, moved by the wind, it was … well, here’s my point: I have this tendency to freak out when the wind leaves my sails.   Who knows exactly why God pulls it out sometimes?  Maybe it’s so I can get a rest, maybe it’s because I need to stop and think, and maybe it’s simply because His timing is not my timing.  But many times my first reaction when the wind dies is to check my gas cans, and even if I know I don’t have enough gas to get anywhere in particular, I start up my engine and start moving in some direction, just so I know I’m moving.

This is not a perfect analogy, but the reality of it for me is this: I do not have nearly as much control of my life as I would like to think.  I have a responsibility to stand at the helm of my boat and wrestle it as best I can when the strong winds come, and to stand by it when the winds disappear.  But as long as God is the one who

“makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth;
he sends lightning with the rain
and brings out the wind from his storehouses”

then I will choose the joy of the sails and wind that fills them, and forego the pride of my pitiful gas engine and it’s feeble attempts to control my destiny… I’m saying that life is good.

The Gods at War

Tonight I witnessed the greatest thunder storm I have ever been a part of. It was unbelievable. For about an hour there was a surreal calm over the town as the sun was setting and the clouds rolled in from the north and the south, at one point, I was playing volleyball with some friends and for 360 degrees around us there was lightning but no rain.

But oh, when the rain started, things got GOOD. For at least an hour, maybe more, we were hammered with rain and the sky was lit up as the sky put forth a light show beyond any I had seen. No joke, about a strike a second all around, every where. It reminded me of all those old legends about the gods going to war in the skies above us. I drove up to the mountains to one of my favorite lookouts by Horsetooth reservoir and just watched. The sky would get so bright that I could actually see the colors around me: the greens and browns of the hills across the lake, and the blue of the water beneath the hills. And of course, that beautiful blue-white that fades to purple as lightning sears through the clouds.

I heard once that a single lightning bolt could power New York City for a year. I was trying to grasp that as I watched bolt after bolt fly across the sky. The beauty that went hand in hand with the potential power of this storm was paralyzing. If God was using this to display His might and the devastation of His wrath, it was a perfect example. In fact, I was a little nervous. I posted earlier that I have been feeling a little off recently, more honestly, disconnected from God and many of those close to me. But the thought that hit me as I took this storm in up in the mountains was that if this is God’s wrath, it is no longer directed at me. I’ve been pulled back from the ledge that I threw myself off of and have been spared. This show wasn’t so that I would weep in terror, but so that I would more fully understand what God has withheld from me even though I was fully deserving. And in that same moment, what He has given when I was undeserving.

The beauty that really struck me was not just that I am not going to incur God’s wrath, but that I now am an heir in His kingdom. He was inviting me to enjoy the beauty of that storm as He directed each bolt in His grand symphony. My God is not a clock maker, we are not a set of dominoes that He set up and then sat back and watched as we each fall into our pre-ordained place. No, He is a creative God, delighting in His creation and interacting with it regularly.

I am part of that creation.
I am dearly loved.
I threw it away.
I settled for less.

He gave it back, and so much more.

I am in the process of being restored. I needed tonight though. I had been in such a funk that I had almost forgotten how to really just talk with Him. It’s funny but for me, tonight, a thunderstorm led to repentance.

Last note: there was a point when the storm had moved out east where I was able to get out of the car and breathe the fresh air around me as I watched the storm move away. There were bolts that stretched the length of Fort Collins high above the city. And bolts that stretched from the reservoir to Severance. Each with enough power to run New York City, man’s triumph of modern civilization, for a year. And God was just having fun out there. We’re in good hands.

A lot to think about

I’m sorry I haven’t written very much recently.  It’s not that I’ve had nothing on my mind, it’s that I’ve had no resolution for it.  Honestly, going through this transition from college to not-college has been weirder than I thought it would be.  I’ve done a lot of things in the last 5 years, but through it all I was a student.  Now, that’s done.  What now?  Well, I know what I really feel called to do, but as of yet, I am not making money doing it.

So I need a job that will be flexible and let me pour into the things that will set me up to be the leader and worship pastor that I want to be.  It’ll take some work, but I do believe that it will happen.  But I am now a proud owner of a college degree, so what’s the problem?  Why do I feel like there’s a bit of a cloud here?

Well, I’m not entirely sure.  I wonder if maybe I’ve tried to grab a little too much control over my life.  Some people know exactly what they’re going to do with their lives, the steps are laid out before they even begin and they find joy in taking that path.  In fact, I really think that God works it that way for some people.  Why is my life different?  I’ve never been able to see the next step before me until it hits me in the shins.

I can only hope that it’s because God is trying to grow my ability to live by faith.  But that alternative scares me: that I’m really just kind of blind to a lot of the things that I think that I see.  I think I’m going to need a period of really humbling myself and prayer to get a handle on this.

So that I’m not a total downer today, I’m going to leave you with the lyrics to one of my favorite hymns that I’m singing at a wedding this weekend (Congratulations Ryan and Kelsie!):

        Come, thou Fount of every blessing,
	tune my heart to sing thy grace;
	streams of mercy, never ceasing,
	call for songs of loudest praise.
	Teach me some melodious sonnet,
	sung by flaming tongues above.
	Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it,
	mount of thy redeeming love. 

	Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
	hither by thy help I'm come;
	and I hope, by thy good pleasure,
	safely to arrive at home.
	Jesus sought me when a stranger,
	wandering from the fold of God;
	he, to rescue me from danger,
	interposed his precious blood. 

        O to grace how great a debtor
	daily I'm constrained to be!
	Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
	bind my wandering heart to thee.
	Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
	prone to leave the God I love;
	here's my heart, O take and seal it,
	seal it for thy courts above.

The Sun Is Out

I’ll take a break from my philosophical ponderings to point out that, for the first time in a while (which is weird for Colorado), the sun is out and shining bright.  Clouds are indeed rolling in, like they have for the last week or two, but nevertheless, it’s good to see the sun.  Summer, with all its life, fun, and adventures, may actually get here; instead of this rainy season that seems to come straight from Seattle.  It feels fresh and clean.  It feels good.

“And now I’m walking in the park,

And all of the birds they dance below me.

Maybe when things turn green again,

It will be good to say you know me.”

NYC – Marty Sampson

I didn’t write this, I wish I did though. You should check out this album on iTunes. http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?i=220012754&id=220012732&s=143441

I’ve seen all the adverts
Stared at all the billboards
Waited for the taxis
Ate your popcorn in movies

But only when i lost myself

I’ve walked through New York City
I’ve seen the ugly the pretty
The less fortunate and wealthy
But none can compare to you

I’ve jumped out to the ending
Been bleeding from wounds of nothing
I’ve listened and been ignored
Been hungry I’ve been bored
Been left out in the storm

But only when i lost myself
Is when I found you

I’ve been so many places
Seen too many faces
Heard too many cases
Of dreams without chasers… so

I’ve lost myself
And all my wealth
I broke my pride
I stepped aside
And threw away
The best of life
What I held dear
Achingly tight

To lose my lot
Ruin my life
To lose all else
To find myself
With you.

Something to think about

http://www.boundless.org/2005/articles/a0001123.cfm

Sunday morning thought

This thought was sitting at the forefront of my mind for some reason today: there are people who like me and people who don’t, but what I notice bothers me the most is when people are indifferent or ambivalent about me. I don’t know if this is good or bad, or if this is general to all people or just me. But I’ve noticed that getting no response at all out of people bothers me far more than even a negative response. Is it some desire to know that I can be a mover? Ego? I’m really not sure, I’m only making this post so I don’t forget this topic, I need to be able to come back to it. But as always, share your thoughts:

Ready… Set… Nope, not yet.

You want to know what I was most excited for with end of college in sight?  Doing stuff.  College is about preparing for the rest of your life, so naturally, I was pretty excited for The Rest of My Life to arrive on May 18th.  It was going to be great.   The Rest of My Life would come, we’d become fast friends and be off to change the world, and our exploits would be heard of all over the world.  Well, apparently God saw fit to delay the arrival of The Rest of My Life, and instead is asking me to patiently accept only The Next Chapter of My Life.  Blast. 

Don’t get me wrong, I am excited for The Next Chapter of My Life.  It’s just… I’m going to have to wait for a lot of things.  And I’m not very good at waiting.  At least, I don’t want to wait.  A good friend of mine reminded me of a story about waiting.  This guy leaves his home, finds the girl of his dreams and a potential job.  But he essentially enters indentured servitude for 7 years, just to win the girl.  Only he gets tricked, he ends up having to work another 7 years to finally get the girl.  Then, it’s another 6 years of work till he has enough to set out on his own.  20 years. 

I know people lived a little longer back then, but seriously, 20 years?  I’ve barely been alive 20 years, but I imagine it might have been the same with Jacob too.  Here’s how I noticed he approached his time of waiting: he got to work.  He worked HARD.  And he was smart too.  He not only just put in his time, but he spent years separating strong livestock from weak so that when his time came, the livestock that he was allowed to take would be the strongest (=most valuable) possible. 

If ever there was a guy who balanced the American Dream of controlling your own destiny and yet knew his utter dependence on God, it was Jacob (see the conversation he had after wrestling with the angel). 

And so, the fact is, I’m waiting, but in the meantime- it’s back to work.