Does God trust you enough to let you fail?

“What son is not disciplined by his father?” ~ Writer of Hebrews

Does God trust you enough to let you fail?

I have been taught from the time I was little that I needed to trust God.  But does God trust me enough to let me fail?  I have five children (1 son and 4 daughters) and on most days the workload is plenty big enough to keep my wife and I out of trouble.  Our goal as we teach our children is for them to learn from their mistakes when they are young so they will grow up to be productive and mature adults.  If I always coddle my kids and never let them experience the pain of failure, how will they ever learn the joy of hard work and success?

As God’s children, most of us are taught by our churches growing up to be spoiled rotten.  I’m sure that God wants all of His children to grow up to be productive and mature people of faith.  So then why would we expect God to give us everything we want and never learn the pain of failure?

My youngest daughter is just getting the hang of walking.  I watch her fall down over and over again.  But this is essential training so that she can learn balance.  If she doesn’t learn to walk, how will she ever run?  Does it hurt me as her father to see her fall?  Of course, but what kind of father would I be if I always carried her everywhere and never let her learn on her own?

Likewise, how will we ever grow up in our faith if we are coddled by our Heavenly Father and never encouraged to walk on our own?  How will we ever learn to be responsible and mature if we always expect God to remove the consequences of our own actions?  God wants us to grow up in our faith.  He wants us to be spiritually healthy and well balanced.  So then, does God trust me enough to let me fail?

Food for thought.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I must confess, first off, that my wife is a black Friday shopper.  Personally, I think the whole thing is completely ridiculous, but my wife uses the opportunity less as a money saving effort and more as a chance to connect with her 4 sisters (so she says).  Now, as I tend to be critical of many things, I have to admit that my wife did manage to wrestle a small flat screen TV away from a less deserving 10 yr old customer in the middle of Wal-Mart at 4:45 in the morning (not really, that just my dramatized version of how things went down).  So I guess my family can’t cast the first stone.  But I am so glad that K-mart decided to stay open all day on Thanksgiving so that weary Americans could forgo that silly family meal thing and, instead, seek out their true first love-Consumerism.

Everybody I know complains about how ridiculous it is for ordinary people to get caught up in the Friday frenzy just to rush into stores that are inevitably out of the item you sat vigil for in the parking lot.  But alas, it seems this, ultimately, is not a question of economic status as much as it is the American desire to save a buck.  Does the average American child really need more toys?  Does the average American homeowner really need a digital photo frame to display pictures?

After the Thanksgiving meal, the wives pulled out the store fliers and began to plan their attack, while all the husbands sat watching the Lions loose again, but more interested in a bad game that shopping.  As I think through the items the stores were holding out like a raw steak to a hungry lion, I realize that not one person in the room needed any of the items being strategized over.  We are so lame!

We constantly talk about American excess, but its always someone else- not us.  My family is very good at being good stewards of our resources.  But we still can’t resist the thrill of the chase.  My wife purchased the TV as a replacement for the prison TV ( no lie, the plastic case is see through) we received from my wife’s brother.  We would not have purchased it if it weren’t so cheap.  But we bought one anyway (it became my gift from the family, Merry Christmas to me!).   How convenient.

So, for those of you who partake in the festivities, was it worth it?  Were you able to get what you went in for, or did you settle for something else?  And for those who remain on the sidelines… does your heart still race as you look through the flier or hear about the sales coming up?  Do you still purchase or receive items you don’t really need?  How do we get beyond the hype and hysteria and return our focus to contemplating the true purpose of the holidays?   Your thoughts?

The Infamous Swear Jar

Ever utilized a swear jar?  I have to say that in spite of my colorful
language usage in high school, I was able to conquer that habit
without the help of an outside aid.
Our faith community will be moving to an off site location in a couple weeks and we have received the blessing? of a building in which to meet.  Now I have to say that I was very leery of having a building to call our own as it has the tendency to define your future much more than we often realize.  Certain factors such as the size, location, layout and even the look of the building can have a tremendous impact on a new faith community. We learned this reality in our last mission in Illinois.  But perhaps, even more importantly, inheriting a building can have a negative impact on how we express our faith as well.  Our words often betray us.

In the Old Testament the tabernacle contained the sanctuary, where the presence of God rested.  But when Jesus have up his life on the cross, the curtain that separated that holy place from the greater community was torn right down the middle and the presence of God was unleashed and no longer subject to a physical space.  Then the New Testament is very deliberate in pointing out the fact that the sanctuary has moved from a room in a building to the heart.  However, our language and practice often betrays this transition.   Most churches still call the main meeting room a sanctuary.  This allows us to become very attached to our buildings.  Instead, our lives should mirror what
happened when the curtain was torn in two.  The presence of God has been released into our hearts and we now carry that presence outside of the building and into our homes and neighborhood and workplace.

So back to the swear jar.  We have been joking all summer since we decided to use the building that we should have a swear jar with special rules…

• whenever someone refers to the building as “the church” it will cost them $1

• whenever someone refers to the. Room in which we will meet as the “sanctuary” it will cost them $1

This exercise will allow us to maintain our focus on the building
being used as a public space and not as a religious security blanket.
I think its a small thing, yet a much needed preventative measure to
ensure that we refrain from developing an unhealthy attachment to the
building.   Its ok for the building to have a deep meaning in the life
of a faith community, but in the end we don’t worship the building.
Your thoughts.

On Loving Our Enemies

Our group has been wrestling through what it means to actually live out the teachings of Jesus in real life.  Last week we talked about the difficulty of actually loving our enemies, as Jesus so plainly taught and lived.  In speaking of a difficult situation in which a coworker belittled her in public, a friend managed to keep her cool and handle it through HR, but then vented to her understanding husband.

She wrote, “The red headed “Sargent [bleep]” in me would like to peel his skin off with a dull spoon and feed it to him….after he is buried in sand, to grind into his wounds, with flesh eating bugs. As he is eating he can taste the bile flavored rot his useless body is and know it will not nourish the bugs, but make them die a slow agonized death as well as he.

But, the “[named] good girl” says I should pray for those who persecute me.”

I just love the candor.  It’s so hard in the heat of the moment to actually live what Jesus taught.  Her experience is such a great example of the honest battle within each of us to lash out in the heat of those unguarded moments, which seem to unravel us and give others a chance, for ever so brief a moment,  to peer into the window of our true selves.  But as we practice the discipline of loving others, our mind also shifts to the reality that we are, after all, called to love our enemies- even when we may not want to.  In some ways it does become easier with practice, but as we can all agree, it is always a struggle.

May we continue in our struggle to love as Jesus loved.

Your thoughts.

The Body Pt. 3

The suburbs can be very Politically correct.  Even as a follower of Jesus, I find myself not always sharing my faith because I don’t want to offend others.  I don’t mean beating people over the head with my faith- just not talking about God at all so as not to be deemed “offensive.”  As I talked with my wife this week I realize how disingenuous that is- to have a great group of people to share life with, and to not make that available to others.  We often talk about how hard it is to get our neighbors to let us help them when they need it.  Even simple things like shoveling snow or raking leaves.  We are so conditioned to be self-sufficient that we bristle at the thought of being unable to “carry our own weight.”  But as my wife and I discussed this fact, we realize that we are just as guilty.  Just one example… Last fall our leaf blower broke down, and, instead of asking our neighbor to borrow theirs, we went out immediately and bought another one.  Then later that winter, we offered to clear the snow from the same neighbor’s driveway and almost had to argue with them for them to allow us to help.

Once again I am reminded of Ghandi’s statement, “We must become the change we want to see in the world.”  If I want to teach our neighbors to depend on others, we must be willing to set the example and depend on them when we are in need.

Over the summer, our faith community is collectively participating in a series of missional experiments designed to help us get out of the rut of seeing church just as a place you go, and engaging our friends and neighbors as we go about our lives.  Our group has moved off site from the church building we were meeting in as a way to help us reengage our faith life without the trappings of a building.

Well, the opportunity has come about for us to utilize a building rent free when we relaunch in the fall.  We have been hesitant to fall back into seeing the building as “church,” however, we have come up with a way to combat that.  We are planning to open the building up as a community center that our group serves as “tenants” in.  This will allow us to host events that will directly benefit a local neighborhood and bring the community together.  This way we can start to bring the positive change we want to see in the community and keep the building from being a potential barrier to bring that change.  Then the neighborhood can reap the benefits of a “church” being active and alive in the community, which is the real mission that God gave the church in the first place. I’ll continue to provide updates as we go along.

Passing Out Condoms In Church

Someone sent me a link to a story from the United Church of Christ.  You can read the entire article here.

The article begins, “Highlighting the need for churches to be places of spiritual and physical wellness, UCAN, Inc. (United Church of Christ HIV and AIDS Network) has issued a statement encouraging condom distribution at places of worship.”

Now I grew up in a very conservative tradition, but I work very hard to be understanding of differing viewpoints.  I also think its a great idea for the church to care for the physical needs of people as well as spiritual.  But passing out condoms during church?  Is this a practical joke?  Am I missing the seriousness of the need to pass out condoms?  I understand the need to prevent disease.  I understand the desire for people to want to help.  But passing out condoms at places of Worship?

How can the church stand for bringing people into wholeness under the Shalom of God and at the same time support a practice that undermines the longterm health and stability of our culture?  I know its considered old- fashioned to support the idea that sex should be reserved only for a lifelong commited relationship.  But if the church never stands apart from the prevailing culture, then what’s the point of being Ekklesia in the first place?  What do you think?  Is this is a good way to support the community?  Do you agree/disagree?

On “Those Beautiful Church Buildings Downtown”

Recently, my family and I took a couple days off and invaded a hotel swimming pool and hot tub as is our household custom.  One of our favorite stopovers is a lodge in Geneva on the Lake, Ohio.  As we made our return trip we drove through East Cleveland into Little Italy to enjoy some fresh pastries (nothing beats a fresh cannoli).  Because it was a nice day and we weren’t in a hurry, I decided to get off the interstate and drive through town.  As we made our way through the neighborhoods my wife and I began discussing the innumerable houses and businesses that were either vacant or boarded up.  This is nothing new, as this is one of the most onerous signs of urban blight.  But what struck me as I drove from street to street, was the beautiful church buildings that anchored many of the street corners.  For the most part they were updated and in good repair.  But as I surveyed each one compared to the neighborhoods that surrounded them, I was struck by the fact that, from the outside looking in, they seemed to have almost no connection to the rest of the neighborhood that enveloped them.  They were sitting quiet- empty- as most church buildings do during the week.

This certainly isn’t the first time I have seen the depressed state of urban neighborhoods.  Though I do struggle to understand the conditions that contribute to this reality, I am not so naive as to think there are simple solutions to the problem.  But what made this day different was the way these church buildings seemed to stick out as memorials to a Christiandom that is just as faded as the glory days of the neighborhoods they inhabit.  I often hear the lament by those in the suburbs that our churches throughout the inner city are closing.  But this day, I remembered something that a man named John wrote in a letter to the church in the first century.  He said, “if anyone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need and refuses to help–how can God’s love be in that person?”

As someone charged with the task of starting communities of faith to connect with people who won’t ‘come to church,’ I can’t help thinking that God’s intention for the church was not to have a building serving as a monument for a life giving group of people who used to inhabit the neighborhood with the love of God.  And, sadly,  the lament from most suburban Christians is not for the neighborhoods that are in decay, but for the fact that the church buildings are no longer filled with people.  And our number one strategic priority for parishioners in the suburbs seems to be, “how can we improve our worship service so people will want to come to our church?”  Is that really supposed to be how we define success?

The organization given the primary charge for the care of the ‘poor’ is not the government, but the church.  Are we not a people charged with the task of physically showing others that God is alive and well by how we care for those around us?  How can we worship, in comfort, a God who chose to become homeless for our benefit, when the physical needs around these church buildings are so great?  I’m sure there are spiritual problems in these communities that need to be addressed.   But how can we seek to meet those needs when the neighborhood is physically falling down around the church buildings?

Some ideas…

We tend to prefer to throw money at the problem, much the same way the government does.  But we have decades of evidence that money alone doesn’t solve the problem.  It requires our personal investment.

Instead, what if suburban churches adopted neigborhoods as many churches do communities in other countries?  What if we sold or mortgaged the church properties and used the funds to bring in entrepreneurs who will start businesses and train those who need jobs.  First thing on the list… remodeling homes and businesses and restoring a sense of pride in the neighborhoods.  What if suburban churches came together and transformed vacant lots into gardens that provide fresh perishables to the segment of the population most in need of healthy food?  What if we provided job training, literacy classes, tutoring, and counseling, simple things the government is, frankly, not proficient or efficient at, free of charge.  Then, when the residents in the neighborhoods have their lives transformed, we can engage them in helping to carry on the blessing to others in need.  And what if we, the suburban Christians, drove by our suburban churches on our way to serve as pioneering members of urban congregations?  What if some people made the ultimate sacrifice and actually moved into one of those neighborhoods?

Just a few quick thoughts on the fly.  Maybe I am just naive, but I think that may be a more Biblical (to use a “churchy” word) model of Church to neighborhoods in need.

Your thoughts… other ideas?

On Dairy Farms and Sea Kittens

Once upon a time, my family was on the road and stopped into one of those massive fueling mega franchises complete with subway, Wendy’s and DQ. It was a very warm day and as we were filling up with fuel and snacks, a truck hauling dairy cows pulled in to refuel. My kids 6 and 3 at the time were so excited to see cows up close, and as their excitement grew, my wife and I agreed to walk them over to get a closer look. As the children stood there gazing at the mass of strong smelling bovines packed into the trailer, I started asking my kids questions. They began to challenge my conclusions as I described where milk and steak comes from. Their eyes grew as I described how cows are milked and that it ends up in our refrigerator and in our cereal, Mac and cheese, and tea.

Now having grown up on a farm, I was devastated that my own offspring had no connection whatsoever with the food on their table. I have vivid memories of collecting eggs, shearing sheep, and digging up potatoes. So since then, we have made it a point to visit working farms so they can understand where our food comes from.

So, fast-forward to last night. We were sitting down for dinner- my wife and I, and our now 5 children. I grilled steaks for the family. As we passed the A-1 and mashed potatoes, my five-yr-old daughter asked me, “Daddy,  which animal does steak come from?”  I went on to answer her question, and then another about where mashed potatoes and stuffing comes from. As we talked I realized that my kids have a very difficult time understanding the connection between their food and the resources that make it possible. My wife commented that she would be a vegetarian if she gave too much thought to the steak she was eating. So I guess my family is not alone in this.

In our culture, we have made the consumption of food so efficient that one can go to the grocery or McDonald’s without even thinking about how the food they eat comes from or even got to them. I’m sure this only contributes negatively to our nation wide obesity problem. We can get virtually any food item we want, even cooked to our particular taste, and not have to give one thought to where it came from or what’s in it. It is basically blind consumption. This idea is so far removed from how people interacted with their food throughout human history. Native Americans, for example, saw killing buffalo as a sacred and difficult thing, even asking forgiveness for the taking of the life.  They used every last piece for food, clothing, tools and shelter, considering it a sin to waste even the smallest part.

As people of faith, do we not have a great responsibility not just to recycle our trash, but to respect and steward the resources that make our dinner possible? Now, I am certainly not suggesting we, as followers of Jesus, begin throwing paint on people wearing fur coats, or renaming fish ‘sea kittens’ in an effort to stop potential abuses. But shouldn’t we re-personalize our food consumption and seek to rebuild our connection with where the food we eat comes from and how it reached our dinner plate?  And, should we not take a renewed interest in buying what is grown and raised locally in order to make this possible?

What are some practical ways we can accomplish this? Your thoughts?

Coming Soon to A Future Near You

I am trying really hard to stay up with the pace of technology and how it relates and informs the values and culture of the emerging generations.  I want to pass on the ancient art of following Jesus and submitting one’s life for the Kingdom of God.  What strikes me is how far behind the institutional church is in preparing and discipling the emerging generations in the way of Jesus.  I consider myself to be pretty adept at bringing the timeless truths of scripture into the 21st century.  And yet, as someone in my mid 30’s, I struggle to comprehend how the generations coming after me process information and see their world.  Frankly, the way I teach should have been the status quo in the church for the past 30 years.  I think I understand my generation pretty well.  But, I fear we are falling further and further behind the curve.

So how does the church respond to the reality of where the world and our culture is heading?  What does this mean for the way we love others; the way we teach the succeeding generations; how we as a church impact our world?  What does this mean for our global mission? And what does this mean for me in my context?  Is the church, as we know it now, flexible enough to reach these generations as it is currently constructed?

Holiday Reflections

It has become increasingly obvious to me that the preparation for and the celebration of the event under the tree on Christmas morning has become the dominant focus of the advent celebration in the Western world over the last few years.  In our gatherings over the last few weeks, we have been challenging each other to restore the proper focus of the holidays as a part of our celebration and reflection.  And as part of that challenge we decided, as a group,  to post the result of our efforts over the past few weeks on this blog.

For our family, we took a week of vacation to visit my wife’s family in Chicago over Christmas.  This created a bit of havoc for our children as we were not in our own home.  Being shuffled back and forth between family members wishing to visit with us is not exactly refreshing or conducive to slowing down and reflecting on Christ’s birth.  But my wife and I managed to spent time in conversation about how we could help our children celebrate and reflect on the birth of Christ.  One of the ways we decided to do this was to watch the movie The Nativity Story on Christmas Eve following our family tradition of opening one present (which is always new pajamas- which the kids still haven’t figured out yet).  The movie is not exactly fast moving- which made it somewhat difficult for our 2 and 4 year olds to sit through it.  But the relaxed pace was nice, as it allowed us to focus on the central theme- the coming of the promised deliverer.  I also think it was by far the best time we have had as a family on Christmas Eve, compared to scurrying to get the family dressed up and keeping our kids from burning the church down during the Christmas Eve candlelight service.  I think the way we chose to spend Christmas Eve helped us to slow down enough to make the time together richer, and much more enjoyable.

So what’s your story?  Were you successful in bringing the season into greater focus?  Did you crash and burn?

Your thoughts…