outside is better

Too Sick to Pray: What I learned about Prayer from Willie Nelson

I am a big Willie Nelson fan. Obsessed. When the times comes around, I might even name a child Willie. During my long hair days in college I even rocked the double braid/bandana look.

I have learned over the years country singers make wonderful practical theologians. They confront the world in a way many preachers should take notes on. In these songs the writers talk about pain,hurt, sin, goodness, human expressiveness and need while exert their influence in a way other writers cannot.

A country song lifts up the primary human emotion needed when asking for forgiveness.

Brutal Honesty reigns.



I love this song. For someone who struggled (and still struggles) with what a good prayer life looks like, Nelson gives us a great beginning point. It comes back to the honesty thing. In his almost sacrilegious treatment of prayer he doesn’t allow his condition to stop his movement towards engaging and encountering with God. I love how in the video he refers to this as “his loophole song”.

He breaks down the condition of life, talks about his own spiritual movement and prays for others. In his frankness of his own life he never breaks apart the idea God was the one moving away.

Yes, the lyrics encourage the false idea the human heart can reach a state of ill communication with God, but the awareness and openness redeem it.

Are we ever too sick to pray?

Catfishing and The Power of the False Self

How large scale can a lie be? In the last few weeks our world has seen two tremendous stories on the affects of falsehood. We have two heros with different stories...and the deep indwelling of a false belief joins the two conversations.

We teach our kids not to lie. Honesty and truthfulness are a mark of character. When we have to cover for ourselves we don’t consider it a lie, just an excuse. Very powerful speeches, blog posts and books have been written on the power of the phrase “I’m Sorry”, but we still don’t say it near enough. We will do anything to get out of a situation we have created at the expense of others and the truth.

We lie because we don’t like what is real. We instead choose to create a false self. I will let you in on a secret (and tell my own story in just a bit).

It never works.

In a more specific way, the influx of social media has invented a new type of falsehood. In the past you could move to a new area and attempt to reinvent yourself, but you had to actually pull it off. With a life lived online we are even encouraged to create the best version of ourselves to put forward. It might be for business, past relationships, finding new relationships or simply building up a different image.

This is part of the life we live now. It is a current reality. Our world encourages the false self to the point in which we convince ourself it is the truth.

The tough piece is to realize when we are being ourselves or when we are creating a false self.

When I started college I made the decision to go to a school where I knew no one. I thought it would be great. I had made some significant life changes during the summer and I felt I would enjoy a completely fresh start. I showed up to school and realized it would be a very different scenario.

The next 12 months were a journey of re-invention. A failed journey.

I see-sawed between versions of who I was. It was awkward. I remember a point in which I felt my false self had completely worked and I had pulled off what I desired to have throughout my entire adolescence. Even though I had reached the high point of my dreams, I was miserable. It wasn’t me.

Our online journeys of creating these false reality's  is equally as flawed. It can consume us as well. Just look at the popular documentary and MTV Show Catfish. Everything eventually comes to the surface.

We can tell tiny fake stories or we can tell big fake stories. They can come back to bite us in tiny ways or big ways. Lies can be discrediting or they can simple be weird.  While we might thought they would help us out they never really do.

For those who follow Christ, scripture opens up this principle for us, especially using the metaphor of “light”. Light allows the truth to be seen, to go into place of former darkness and to show the illumination of the presence of God.

Christ said “I am the way, the truth and the life” in John 14, exposing what is false and testifying to the dramatic and changing power of the presence of God. Christ came bringing grace and truth to our world.

As people of faith we walking daily not only in the assurance of this exposure to truth. We also are exposers ourselves. By our own openness, vulnerability and witness we serve as an example against the false self. When we are comfortable with ourselves, we don’t need the self protective layers of the false life in any part of our existence. We now become bearers of grace and truth to others who are living with the false security the false self brings.

Life is better than what we can come up with on our own.

Reading in 2013

Yes, I know this is pretty much a month late. Let's just say I wanted to have some time to think over my list.

Like many seminarians, I dreamt of the day in which I could spend my time reading any book I wanted, no matter how simple or complex it seemed. I thought days like that would come after school...but anyone on this side of education laughs at the thought.

Around October last year I actually began making the time to read again. It was great. I knocked out around 5-6 books in the last few months of the year and realized I wanted to plan out my reading in 2013.

I made a short list. It is actually not very interesting, somewhat old and even trivial, but these are my official "must reads" of 2013.

1. You Lost Me: Why Young Christians Are Leaving Church...and Rethinking Faith by David Kinnaman. I actually finished this last week. It was as interesting and insightful as I have heard. Anyone involved in the leadership and design of the local church needs to read it. Kinnaman really makes the complicated social structure of sub 40's faith accessible.

2. E M Bounds: The Classic Collection on Prayer (Pure Gold Classic) by E.M. Bounds. This is a classic early 20th century collection of writings on prayer. Bounds was a Methodist clergyman who spent the last part of his life in publication and deep prayer. This is the type of book that really shakes things up. I started reading it late last year and hope to finish it soon. At almost 600 pages it can be quiet the beast, but the chapters are short and really easily read in devotional times.

3. Imagining the Kingdom: How Worship Works (Cultural Liturgies) by James. K.A. Smith. I read "Desiring the Kingdom" several years ago and it was amazing. I was really excited to find out he is continuing the thread. This isn't out just yet, but I am really excited about it.

4.Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life by William Law. This is old school. As a Methodist pastor I tend to be fascinated with John Wesley's devotional practices. This book was formative to him. I want to read it this year. I tracked down a good edition last year and I am excited to read it deeply.

5.Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church by N.T. Wright. FULL DISCLOSURE. I have never read ANY N.T. Wright. He never popped up on a reading list in seminary and I didn't fall quickly into him early on in my studies like many of my classmates (I read James Smith and Barry Harvey pretty heavily). When I began formal academic work on Revelation a few friends shared they thought I must have read alot of Wright. Since I never had, I considered my thesis an experiment in writing a modern eschatology without the influence of Wright. I need to now rectify the problem. I have been saving this book for about 2 years.

Those are my formal reading plans. I have finished a few other books and have some in my que, but they aren't "essential readings" formally. Did you plan any reading this year? Share what you are most excited about in the comments.

Sermon Preview: Culturally Relevant Evangelism

Yep. That's me. Back in my younger days when I spent most of my time on the road running sound. I had almost perfected the typical look of "the roadie". The only downside to it was the very occasional ribbing I would get from a place of temporary ministry. It never failed a few times a year, usually when we were in a rural setting, I would have someone pull me aside and jokingly quote 1 Corinthians 11:14.

Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him? (KGV)

My normal routine was to smile, tell them thank you and get back to work. It might have even been this semi-regular conversation with complete strangers that made me started really studying scripture. What I would never tell the stranger was Corinth was known for it's pagan temples. In Corinth, long hair on a man denoted his status as a temple prostitute (and short hair on a women the same thing). This admonition was just part of a much larger theme in 1 Corinthians.

So much of the books of 1 and 2 Corinthians are about Christian distinction. Paul really had to encourage this little church, existing in the Las Vegas of the Roman Empire, to seek out what was truly Christian.

Our Scripture this week comes from a section when Paul is explaining his idea of ministry in context, a culturally relevant ministry.

Even though I am a free man with no master, I have become a slave to all people to bring many to Christ. When I was with the Jews, I lived like a Jew to bring the Jews to Christ. When I was with those who follow the Jewish law, I too lived under that law. Even though I am not subject to the law, I did this so I could bring to Christ those who are under the law. When I am with the Gentiles who do not follow the Jewish law, I too live apart from that law so I can bring them to Christ. But I do not ignore the law of God; I obey the law of Christ.

When I am with those who are weak, I share their weakness, for I want to bring the weak to Christ. Yes, I try to find common ground with everyone, doing everything I can to save some. I do everything to spread the Good News and share in its blessings. (NLT)

The culture in which we live in really matters because it sets up what is considered appropriate or offensive. Paul wrote to Corinth, a city were almost nothing was considered offensive. It was a boom-town, supported by several major crossroads. Due to it’s economic and trade status, it was quite the exquisite place to live. They thrived in excess. What happened in Corinth stayed in Corinth.

In the middle of this fast paced, thriving and very wordly city was a fledgling group of Christians, trying to find out how to live out the message and life of Christ. They weren’t without their problems. Paul wrote several letters and spent time with them trying to sort out their issues. In this passage today he talks about how he has adjusted his life to the mission of Jesus and how they should understand their specific role as well. He writes to them about distinction. That is where we find our message today.

Paul adapts the cultural customs of those to whom he ministers to so nothing will hinder people’s embracing of the gospel of Christ. In this adaptation, Paul exercises missional distinction. He changes in the ways he needs to in order to make the message of Jesus completely relevant to the people he minister’s too, because different groups will need different approaches to Jesus.  There are things that are fundamentally Christian, and we shouldn’t move from them...but we also have a missional lens to our world that we should conform to in order to reach others. This isn’t living a false life. We aren’t lying about who we are. It comes from a compassion to bring Jesus to others in a saving way.

God looks for men and women who live and share the Good News of Jesus Christ with cultural relevance, sensitivity, and power so that the eternal truth of the Gospel will be understood and received in every culture of the worl.

Sermon Preview: A Passion for the Harvest

As we enter the second week of Christian to the Core we come to this core concept.

God looks for Men and Women who are share a passion for those without Jesus.

Evangelism frightens people. Something about it gives us the image of the ruddy faced street preacher screaming condemnations at all those around him. It makes us think of folks who (in our mind) often show the opposite of what we feel Christ tells us in the Scripture. As we journey this week into our core concept let's allow the words of Christ to form our idea of evangelism.

Jesus traveled through all the towns and villages of that area, teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed every kind of disease and illness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. He said to his disciples, “The harvest is great, but the workers are few. So pray to the Lord who is in charge of the harvest; ask him to send more workers into his fields.” Matthew 9:35-38

Two connected concepts really drive Jesus in this section. The first is that of the harvest. Harvest time was a cyclical pattern in the life of the 1st century Jew. Many things revolved around the harvest; religious feasts, local taxes and for most people subsistence. If the harvest was good, life was good that year. If it wasn't...things might get a little tough. Harvests must be brought in the moment they are ready. That brings us to our second concept; urgency. You can't wait and let a harvest pick itself. There is a window in which a harvest needs to be brought in.

As Christians we have an urgency to realize the world is ripe for the message of Christ. The way we carry it matters. Relationships, choices and personal testimony are just a few of the things that matter and will be part of our conversation.

Come to worship this Sunday and let's dive in deep into the word of God.

 

 

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Sermon Preview: Intimacy with God

When I was 10 years old or so I realized I wasn't cool. Until then I don't think it crossed my mind. At that time I instantly wanted to be interested in everything the "cool kids" were. In my neighborhood, that meant sports and sports cards. I had to trade in my Hardy Boys books for a Beckett magazine. In hopes of skipping a few steps in the cool ladder I wrote to a famous sports start asking for his autograph. A few weeks later, what I believed to be a genuine, signed picture from Bo Jackson showed up on my doorstep.

My Father, who practiced the parental strategy I call "brutal honesty", was pretty quick to help me understand this was not really signed and probably sent to anyone who wrote to him. My hopes of getting cooler had to find a new avenue. Me and Bo had a non functioning relationship.

Over the next two months at St. Paul's our entire church is focusing on Christian to the Core in both worship and Sunday morning discipleship. Our sermon this week will be the first in the series and we will be talking about Intimacy with God.

At times we hold God off at a distance and have as much claim to a relationship with him as I did with Bo Jackson. This isn't the relationship God designed us for. Our scripture focus comes from Exodus and talks about the magnificent encounters Moses had with God.

Whenever Moses went out to the Tent of Meeting, all the people would get up and stand in the entrances of their own tents. They would all watch Moses until he disappeared inside. As he went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and hover at its entrance while the Lord spoke with Moses. When the people saw the cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, they would stand and bow down in front of their own tents. Inside the Tent of Meeting, the Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Exodus 33:7-11a

What God desires for us is for you and I to have the full relationship He created us for. We work best when we are in a deep relationship with God. In it we are formed in the image of Jesus, turned not into idolaters, seeking after our own desires, but into worshipers...focused on the glory of God. We are called friends of God.

We will spend our morning talking about the essential elements of this friendship. I invite you to come and worship with us.

Saturdays in Scripture: Walking Steadily with God

These last few months I have been using The Message for my 90 day reading cycle. I have a theological crush on Eugene Peterson, so I figured it was time to give the paraphrase a chance. Some folks knock The Message. It has worked very well for me. I want to share with you just one of the great little joys I have found.

Genesis 5 is one of the family tree (or begat) passages. Most folks quickly skip over these. They tend to get boring and unless you really understand what is going on, they appear to be almost useless. I will save my thoughts on their necessity for a later post...

Genesis 5:24 is a great little nugget.

We really don't hear much else about Enoch. The best understanding really comes from Hebrews 11:5-6 (NLT)

Heb. 11:5  It was by faith that Enoch was taken up to heaven without dying—“he disappeared, because God took him.” For before he was taken up, he was known as a person who pleased God. 11:6 And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.

While there is some pretty awesome linguistic and literary parallels going on in Gen 5 (7th son line...compared to 7th son of Cain, you know..cool bible geek stuff), the lesson here really is about faith.

Enoch had it.

He had TONS of it. He walked steadily.

When you understand death comes as a curse and consequence of sin and the fact the writer told us Enoch DIDN'T die, something has to be said.

What type of life do we have for God to take us away from death? The whole thing is pretty dramatic. So in the middle of a huge list of people's names, children and age at death, the writer of the Genesis tells us about a man whose faith is so great God simply took him.

Sandwiched between the story of the Fall into Sin, Cain and Abel and the story about the world going completely too crazy town with Noah being the last man standing...we hear about a guy who walked steadily with God.

We don't get much information because I imagine there wasn't that much to say. Enoch was so focused and faithful God is what shone through...and not him.

Friends-we need to be walking steadily.

Why This Pastor Believes in Bigfoot

I joke about Bigfoot fairly regularly. This week I even signed a “We the People” petition on whitehouse.gov regarding the existence and protection of the great North American primate.

A couple of months back I made a Bigfoot joke and my wife asked me “You really don’t believe in all that...do you?” This after years of me listening to various podcasts and watching television specials!

I totally believe in Bigfoot.

This isn’t a blog post trying to convince people of the various forms of anthropological evidence.

It’s about belief and story. I have a little introduction to myself I use when I teach to new groups of people. Part of it is me mentioning I believe in Bigfoot. But I always follow it up by telling people we should all have something we believe in that is unbelievable.

When we loose the childhood grasp on the unbelievable we loose so many other things.

When it comes to faith, this is pretty important. The second we quit believing in things is the second we start taking ourselves too seriously. In that moment we begin becoming our own God. We take on the idea we can do anything on our own. We don’t need anyone or anything else.

A time will come when we will each be very disappointed.

"No chance at all if you think you can pull it off yourself. Every chance in the world if you trust God to do it." Matthew 19:26 (The Message)

To call ourselves people of faith means believing in what others call nonsense. That a Jewish guy living 2000 years ago called himself the divine (yet human) son of the creator. Not only did he make that claim, but he called us to come alongside him in his efforts. The world he then talked about was one filled of upside down values so audacious they became practically the most unbelievable part of the whole thing. To tie up the whole piece, he died and then came back. Finally, he promised to come back again and really wrap things up.

This makes my whole Bigfoot fascination seem kinda tiny.

The path of trusting in faith leads to a path of believing the unbelievable. It means believing it so much people start asking you “Do you really believe in this...”. It means trusting like a child. Taking the truth in a plain sense. Letting go. Your quest to be in control and in charge is null and void. You stop taking yourself seriously and start taking Jesus seriously.

How is God calling you to let Go and believe?

Saturdays in Scripture: The benefits of the long read..or what you didn't learn in VBS about Daniel!

I love having the time on Saturday to do a long read of scripture. Picking a book and reading it all the way through, jotting down a few notes and perhaps chasing down a rabbit trail. It is amazing how much clarity a confusing piece of scripture might have when it is read as part of the whole book.

This month I am doing a pretty deep study of Daniel. Today I wanted to read Daniel again and try to get a grip on the timeline. Daniel jumps all over the place and I wanted to get in for myself and sketch out the chronology.

Daniel is a real booger.

Even conservative scholars are comfortable dating it outside of the time most classicists place for the Old Testament (sometime around 200BC..smack in the middle of those 400 years between the Old and New Testament). They have interesting arguments, but my reading today wasn't focusing on that. Most people know I am fascinated with the apocalyptic. Daniel is the best Old Testament representation of the genre. It has fantastic stories set inside the context of a group of people struggling to maintain their distinction as the people of God. Plus it has really crazy stuff!

So in just 1 hour or so of reading I came up for breath. I had read the book through and taken a few notes. I will say I accomplished my goal but also found a bit of serendipitous information. Once placed inside the chronological framework of Daniel, this tidbit was even more interesting. We are all familiar with Daniel and his mad skills of dream interpreting. That makes up the bulk of chapters 2-6. We got all that down in VBS as kids. The new little bit I came across today was how Daniel himself had to get some help interpreting dreams/visions he had!! In chapters 7 one of his servants assists him. In chapters 8 and 9 Gabriel, an angel, tells him and comforts him.

What makes this even more interesting is if we place these chapters in their proper chronological order. Chapter 7 and 8 are dreams daniel had during Belshazzar's reign. Chapter 5 gives us the great story we are all familar with regarding the writing on the wall. Reading these dreams and then reading chapter 5 is real interesting.

Chapters 6 and 9 can go hand in hand. They both identify pretty early on during the reign of Darius (9 uses the term 'in the first year') so it is hard to exactly time them out. I chose to read 9->6.

We think of Daniel as this sort of superman, with creepy powers to interpret anything. I remember a Sunday School drawing of him in which he looked like a combo of Ironman and Captain America! But now we see Daniel himself could get frightened and needed help. But no matter, he always relied on God. The power of the Spirit kept him strong when he was in situations that could easily get him killed. Daniel was a type of the ideal Christian leader in a world that would love to kill him. Daniel was a person to be emulated not because of his great strength, but on how he depended, leaned and looked to God for everything.

Oddly enough, this reading is probably the most accurate anyway!

Todays reading was great. I wasn't expecting anything half this serious or good to happen. The frame of mind I was in had me noticing things I might not otherwise. This is the biggest reason I try to get people to read large pieces of scripture fairly often. Write in your Bible. You might not know when a note you made 2 years before could jump start an amazing time of personal study.

Beatles or Stones? Asking ourselves the hard questions....

Beatles or Stones?

Earlier this year I asked this question on Facebook and got around 200 comments. I love the question. It tells me so much about a person and their musical taste and preferences.

Good questions tell us so much more than a simple answer.

Earlier this year I wrote a piece on Why I became a Methodist. In the article, I mentioned one of the primary decision points being my belief in the effectiveness and necessity of Wesleyan discipleship.

Part of  historic discipleship and formation (growing closer to Christ) in the Methodist tradition is the act of asking questions. We ask them to ourselves in our own personal devotion. We ask them to others we are in accountability with.  This was important in the Methodist movement and I feel a recovery of the asking of questions will be a key thing to any spiritual development in our world now.

A little history...

Wesley organized his folks (you couldn't really call them a formal church yet) into 3 groups. From largest to smallest; the Societies, The Classes and The Bands. Part of the fundamental design of the two smallest (classes and bands) was a series of questions designed to keep each person in forward motion towards Jesus Christ. The Class met as a mixed group of sexes and ages. When they met, these questions formed the main conversation points. They got SERIOUS!

When the Bands met, the questions got even more in depth. They also centered on this small group (usually no more than 5-6 and same sex) really keeping each other on track. You gave the others the permission to get into your business.

Here are another set of questions Wesley and his original small group, called The Holy Club, asked themselves in their lives and meetings.

Our life now

These questions matter. They help us to be real and honest with each other. One of the best small group experiences I have ever had focused on asking a few of these questions every week. This isn't casual discipleship. It is changing and transformational discipleship. It is the kind of spiritual relationships each Christian needs to have in their life.

Several groups have done a great job trying to incorporate these classic notions of discipleship into current life. Most of them are going really well. What I really appreciate are the attempts to quickly get the emotive qualities of these HUGE lists into a few simple questions. You can answer them openly, in front of people you know and don't know. You can be asked them by people who know you really well. The most important quality is these questions are approachable. It is frightening allowing others into what most modern Christians consider to be pretty private.  Here is a listing of the ones I have found, liked and used.

1. Are you growing closer or further away from God since the last time we met?
2. How do you see God moving in your life right now?
3. How is your life in God?

Lately, I have a new one I have been thinking about, asking myself and asking others. It comes from my own personal conviction and values.

How have you allowed God to change you lately?

This question tells much more than a simple yes or no. In my own examination it causes me to think about my openness to Christ, my expectation of his presence and activity, how my false self is being broken down, etc, etc. It is great and broad.

Self-examination has long been part of Christian tradition. It helps us to make the points in which we have grown closer to God, progressed in our sanctification, won victory over things controlling us or simply mark our maturation in Christ.

So friends, How have you allowed God to change you lately?