The Magic of a Number

In a few days, magically everything will be new.

Think about it, 2014 ends and 2015 begins. In reality, Dec. 31st and Jan. 1st will have no real difference between them. If some monk 700 years ago had designated those days as March 15th and 16th we would care at all about them. But because they decided a new cycle around the sun would begin that day suddenly we go crazy. We party. We celebrate. We change.

What if we tried to change on December 15th, or June 12th, or April 22nd? What if we didn't wait for a magical number to encourage us to better ourselves and we simply tried to be better because we wanted to...

T

"I'll Remember"

I had a great idea for this blog this week. Something to do with Christmas, I'm sure. It was awesome if I do say so myself.

And I have no idea what it was.

It came to me while driving home from Chicago on Sunday. Right as I got on I-65 (I even remember where). And I thought to myself, "this is a great idea. I'll remember it." And now it's gone.

Usually I would make a note (I love Evernote), but this time, people were asleep in the car. There's nothing to do but drive, of course I'll remember. And then, the baby wakes up, Lorie isn't feeling well, we need to stop for gas,was I hungry when we stopped for gas? I don't want to spend the money on a $4 candy bar, get back on the road, will the baby wake up, I hope we get home before she gets hungry, what was I thinking about before?

And it's gone.

I know I have lots of ideas that disappear (some are probably for the best), but how about at this busy time of year? What about the ideas of inviting someone to a Christmas Eve service (I'll see them later, I'm too busy right now, poof, forgotten), or giving to the Salvation Army ringers (I don't have the cash, I'll do it next time, I come here all the time, and gone), maybe even just checking in with someone this holiday season (how many of those ideas have disappeared)?

Don't let the good ideas get away this Christmas. Act on them right away!

T

Are You Sharing Christ at Christmas?

I came across this story the other day. DL Moody, a public speaker for Jesus, was talking with a lady who did not like the way he was sharing Christ. The story goes that Moody said to her, “I agree with you. I don’t like the way I do it either. Tell me, how do you do it?” The lady replied, “I don’t do it.” Moody retorted, “Then I like my way of doing it better than your way of not doing it.

Too often we criticize how people share Christ when it's not the way we would do it. But the question is, is it worse than doing nothing at all?

At this time of year, people are expecting to hear you talk about Jesus. Why don't you oblige them?

T

But That's Not How I Remember It...

Every year the same things happens. And for some reason every year it astounds me.

We talk about the Christmas story and there are so many mistakes.

For most people, they have head the story of Christ's birth a hundred times. But they have never actually read it themselves. Instead, they've heard the G-rated edited for children version or they've seen it acted out by four-year-olds. Instead of the actual story of our Savior's introduction into the world they remember the version from so long ago and choose to believe that over the real one (I have actually had students argue with me about things they just heard about the Christmas story that can't be true because it doesn't line up with the story they already knew, even if I give them Scripture references). We would rather hold onto the childish version of the story than learn the real one.

My fear is this is only the beginning. So we have a childish view of the Christmas story, so what? What about Christ's teachings, are we going to stay at a four-year-old version of that too? His love, His grace, His majesty, His holiness, His death, His resurrection, at what point to we start to examine these as adults? In Hebrews 5 the writer talks about how just as people move from milk to solid food we need to do the same thing spiritually, we need to look at God as adults.

My challenge, try reading the Christmas story through the lens of an adult. Then, keep reading...

T

When Was The Last Time You Thought About Christ's Birth?

With the start of Advent yesterday, I was wondering this. How often do people actually think about Christ entering this world? I know the holy answer is "all the time", but I mean really. In July when you were sweating at the beach were you thinking about Christ's birth?

It's something we should be thinking about all the time, Christ entering our world, entering our lives. If you want to get an idea of how often this type of thing enters your mind, when was the last time you thought about Easter? When was the last time you contemplated the cross?

The whole point of Christmas is to get us to Easter. Isn't that something that should be on our minds all the time...?

T

Thanksgiving

No real message today, just after a week of rest I hope all my American friends can do the same over the next few days. Safe travels!

Fresh Eyes

Have you ever done something or heard something so many times that you're almost immune to the message?


This past year I've been challenged by this in two ways. First my soon to be one-year-old. Everything she sees is for the first time. How is she seeing it? What does she think? Does she like it/hate it?

The other is the story of Jesus. In II Timothy 2:8 Paul reminds Timothy to remember Christ risen from the dead. Why on earth would Paul need to remind a young man who has grown up knowing Jesus and is now the pastor of a church of such a basic concept, the crux of the story, of his faith? Because we forget. even this season that's coming, Christmas, do we just glance through the story or do we see it with fresh eyes and all the craziness and miraculousness that ensues inside our culture's number one holiday?

And soon, those two start to converge. How will I tell the story of Jesus to my daughter for the first time...

Here's a challenge, look at the Christmas story with fresh eyes. You may be astounded with what you missed (or just accepted as truth without thinking about it).

T

Convenient Jesus

This past weekend at our annual Real World Retreat we focused on one thing. Music. Kinda.

We took a look at how music has changed in the last 15 years. Not the style of music, but the quality. The music we listen to now has been changed so much to make files smaller that the music is actually distorted and compressed with piece of musical information missing. And there's only one reason why the general population has put up with it. It's more convenient.

The music industry (and other industries have followed suit) have learned that people will sacrifice almost anything for convenience. Make it smaller, lighter, crappier, whatever you need to do to make it more convenient for me. If I really wanted to hear better music I would need to find a stereo system and get some actual physical recordings, but that's really hard to jog with. So instead I'll listen to 2 hours of music, the files shrunk down to fit on my iPod through the horrible little earbuds I got for free with my phone. The quality of the music is horrible, but it's convenient for me to listen to wherever I am, right?

So, the question we led this to was this: How do we shrink down the symphony of Jesus to make Him more convenient for our lives? What are we trading out to have a convenient Jesus? I'll probably have a better quality relationship with Jesus if I take some time to spend alone with Him, reading His Word and talking with Him, but how convenient is that? What if I just listen to the podcast of a sermon while driving and call it a day?

The interesting part of this whole thing to me while researching this was seeing some of the interview of musicians and how they feel about this (I wasn't able to show it at the retreat, just a slight bit of bad language from musicians). It makes me wonder how Jesus feels about it, Him trying His best to have a relationship with the one He loves and getting a "when it's convenient for me" answer.

The real question is when it comes to knowing Jesus Christ, is it about quality or convenience?

T

The Blame Game

I was reading a book the other day that with a very interesting statement...

I’ve always found it interesting that people ask why bad things happen to them, but they rarely ask why good things happen to them. - Altar Ego by Craig Groeschel

That's a pretty good question. Have you ever noticed how often we play the blame game with God but seldom the thank-you game? If something bad happens, "God, why me?"

What if instead of blaming God for bad things we started thanking Him for good things? What do you think our outlook on life would be then?

Be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from you in your life in union with Christ Jesus. ~ I Thessalonians 5:18 (GNB)

T

System Crash

Sorry this blog is a day late. Yesterday my system crashed.

I don't mean my computer. I mean me. I was done. I did incredibly little yesterday. I just couldn't do it. I doubt I could even form coherent sentences.

But I did have a thought yesterday. What if I lived in a place or society where that was not even possible? If I was in a village in Africa or a serf in the Middle Ages or even someone living day to day in America, I wouldn't have been able to just stop and rest. If my well of fresh water is a mile hike away, I don't get to just sit and have water enter my house through the magic pipes, I would have to walk tired or not. If I didn't have a fridge with food in it and a microwave or even have the ability to make a phone call and have food delivered to my house, the work necessary to catch and cook my food would have been astronomical to me yesterday. I even got to lie on a couch in an insulated house with the heat on rather than go out and collect firewood and make sure the fire was constantly burning to keep warm.

It's amazing the blessings that we not only take for granted, we count them as necessities or inalienable rights we deserve. Yesterday my system crashed for one reason, it was able to. And for that I am incredibly blessed.

T

Is It "Us" Or "Them"?

If you want to know how much you really care about someone or how connected you are in your world, ask yourself when something happens if it happens to "us" or to "them".

Who is hurting right now, "us" or "them"?
Who had a bad day at school/work, "we did" or "they did"?

Who contracted the ebola virus, "us" or "them"?

Who succeeded on the project, "we did" or "I did"?

 Whose church is this, "ours" or "mine"? (or Jesus'?)

When it happens to you, does it also happen to "them" or "us"? What it happens to us, does it also happen to you?

T

Can It Be Done?

About fifteen years ago I remember having a conversation with someone who thought they were an expert on computers (you know what I mean, people that are sure of what they're talking about but the facts are a little off). I was told by this person that our current situation of computing, our RAM speed, had maxed out. That scientists and computer developers had hit a wall, it was impossible to get more than 512k of RAM in a machine.

A few years later I was talking with someone else, this person actually knew a little about computers, and we were talking about processors. He was explaining how our processors were now working as fast as possible, that electrons were actually skipping off their pathways because we were trying to push things too fast.

Now, my phone in my pocket does more than that. We can now buy laptops with 16gig or RAM and quad core processors (some machines can go higher).

Why? Because when we reached an impassible problem, instead of being the group that said, "it can't be done" another group of people said, "let's solve this and push through".

Which one are you?

When it comes to knowing God better, are you in the "I'm too busy, I can't do it, there's too much to know, it's hard, I've done all I can" group, or will you push through?

T

Real Dreams

Have you ever had a dream that was so real when you woke up you had to figure out if it really happened or not?

I have one. I don't know why or what caused it, but it involves traveling from a frozen tundra of way north Canada, driving and almost getting killed, all to make it to New Mexico to apply for a job I don't get. I can even see the building I'm trying to get to just off the expressway. For some reason this dream is so embedded in my head that it even affects other dreams, like last night. I had a dream and in it I remembered making that drive and how bad it was and not getting the job and it changed my whole night. Again, I woke up trying to differentiate what was real and what was not.

Here's the thing, in my dream last night, I was being held back by another dream, another unreal scenario. I was hitting a wall because of something that never actually happened. My question is, are you allowing things to hold you back, even ones that aren't real? Is there something that seems real, but isn't and it is challenging your day to day life?

T

Focused Time

Last night at Drink Deep we talked about how we can worship God through choosing to spend time with Him. But it was more than just the amount of time, it was focused time.

We can spend an hour kinda praying, interrupted, distracted, daydreaming, etc. Or we can spend 15 minutes of actually praying, focused prayer.  It is too easy to say we are doing something but not be focused and have our goals not met. Like this past weekend, we had our all-church retreat. It was great, but for me, it was not a retreat. I was running around, leading worship, speaking, etc. The first time Lorie and I took a walk the entire weekend was after it was all over and people had left. I was not retreating or resting in God. I may have been on a retreat, but I wasn't doing what it was meant to do. I had to find another time to rest.

Too often we find time, just not focused time. When was the last time you gave God time that was completely devoted and focused on Him?

T

Trust

I just had a minor epiphany.

Someone recommended an audio product to me a few minutes ago. As someone who likes sound and shiny new tech gadgets (we call those people "guys") I was intrigued and kind of want what they were talking about, even though they said very little about the piece of equipment. And then it donned on me...

This person has no audio training whatsoever.

I am trusting a person who doesn't know sound, I have no idea what kind of stereo equipment they have in their home, I don't even know what kind of music they really like. Yet, here I am wishing I had the money to buy a piece of equipment I've never even heard for myself.

Why? Trust.

If you truly trust a person, you listen to them and even believe them. Even when they have nothing to back it up or proof, you follow. Simply because they have built up that trust with you.

Here's the two big questions: Who do you trust? Who in your life could sell you magic beans if they wanted to because you trust them that inherently? And on the flip side, who trusts you that much? How much have you invested in being trusted and trustworthy?

It's more valuable than you may think...

T

Losing Assistance

Last week something broke. It happens, but this one is really frustrating. It was a tiny piece of plastic that broke and fell off of our lawn mower. Super glue won't put it back on, I've tried tying it with wire and broke that too (maybe I need thicker wire, I'll try that later), I have Macgyver'd that thing as much as I can.

It was the power assistance for the mower.

The good thing, the mower still works. But for the last three years I have been using it and not realizing how heavy that piece of equipment is (or how angled my yard is). I did not realize how much work the mower was doing for me.

I wonder how many things in our lives we are assisted with and we don't even know it. Are we thankful for it or do we not even care until we lose it?

The LORD Himself watches over you! The LORD stands beside you as your protective shade. ~ Psalm 121:5 (NLT)

T

"Then Jesus brought them to the Temple"

Have you noticed this line is not in the Bible?

When Jesus talked to people and shared God's love with them, it wasn't by inviting them to come to His place of worship. Instead, He went out to where they were and talked to them there, at dinners, at parties, at their homes, at wells, wherever they may be.

Should we be inviting people to worship with us or to FIRE & WATER or whatever it may be? Yes. But that's not where you start. You don't start by finding someone on the street and giving them a church flier. No, you start by entering their life, joining them where they are, loving them there and sharing Jesus with them there. Bring Jesus to them and allow them to meet Him where they are.

Jesus sought out people where they were,we should too.

Matthew 13:1-2 ~ Later that same day, Jesus left the house and went down to the shore, where an immense crowd soon gathered. He got into a boat and taught from it while the people listened on the beach. (LB)

T

Why Would A Loving God Ask Abraham To Sacrifice His Son?

This was a question that came up last night at FIRE & WATER. We were looking at the root of worship, the first time the word appears is when Abraham is telling his servants he is going to "worship" with Isaac, aka, sacrifice him. How could a loving God ask someone to do that?

Here's my question, do you think God would need Abraham to sacrifice his son to know how much he loved God? I wouldn't think so, God knows the heart of each person. So then who was the test really for?

Or put it another way, if I were to ask you do you love God enough to choose God over your only child, would you say "yes"? Would you actually believe that or would you think in the back of your head it's the proper church-y answer?

So then who was the test really for?

As much as it sucked, I bet Abraham learned a lot more about himself, more than God learned about him. It was a hard test (one that God never intended to go all the way, obviously by the end of the story), but I bet Abraham came out with a lot more confidence in himself and his faith in the Holy God who made all these promises to him.

And now Abraham (and us) know how fully Abraham was willing to worship God.

What would it take for you to really understand how much you love God and how far you are willing to go to worship Him?

T

Ignoring Signs

Just up the road from me (conveniently between our house and church) there is a bridge out. They will be working on it for the next few months. Really inconvenient to lots of people, but funny at the same time.

I love watching the people ignore the signs. There are two eight foot signs blocking the road that say "construction" and "local traffic only". And yet, people drive around the signs and continue on, only to turn around about 100 yards later. There is no way these drivers did not see the construction signs, it's impossible (they weaved through them to go on), so there's really only one logical explanation. They believe the sign does not apply to them.

There's construction ahead, but I don't believe that. They say the bridge is out, but really, I can make it. Maybe most traffic can't get through, but I can. Whatever the reasoning is, these drivers do not believe the signs apply to them and continue on only to discover, yes, the signs apply to them.

I wonder how many times we see signs from God, but feel they don't apply to me. Maybe it's ways to improve your soul or things to avoid, but they don't apply to me, I'll be fine. That's for everyone else. Maybe God is trying to tell you something, but that's a message for someone else, not for me. I wonder how many glaring eight foot orange and white signs God has placed in my way that I literally had to drive around to avoid and still thought "that doesn't apply to me".

What if on the drive of life (isn't life a highway), we started paying attention to the signs? Maybe even doing what they said? I bet there would be a lot less detours, u-turns and accidents...

T

Toronto - Recap

We're home, it's been a few days, I've had a shower, a bed and a meal that was not described in the menu by a number. It's good to be home.

But this was a great trip. There's an easy way to tell. By how much I'm hated Monday.

Monday is the first day of mission sites. And for many people, this was an incredibly uncomfortable day. It was hard than expected. Many were not doing what they thought they wanted to. The people we hoped to form relationships did not open up right away, or opened up too much. Monday is the day I hear, "I don't like this. I don't want to be here."

You can't judge a trip by Monday. Thursday paints a clearer picture. The students that hated Monday, many sing a different tune. They are going to miss who they are working with. They don't want to go home. They want to keep serving. Some even admit it's still really hard, but they want to stay anyway. Students who thought they were enduring something grueling have come to realize they are actually doing something they were created to do, they simply needed to be pushed out of their comfort zone and have this experience thrust upon them.

Many students who were uncomfortable with the elderly, the handicapped, the poor, the destitute, by Thursday they call them friends and they want to continue serving them and having them in their lives. To fully understand this, I encourage you to be at FIRE & WATER Sunday August 10th at Fishers United Methodist Church (8:30, 9:45 & 11:00). You can hear the stories first-hand from students and adults who had their perceptions of people changed in only 4 days, 24 hours of serving.

I love seeing the 180 degree change in people from Monday to Thursday. It's amazing what God can work in someone's heart in less than a week...

T