Well . . .

I think I’m done here.

But, you can now find me here.

Shoring up more oil . . .

A warm summer day, the sun is shinning, the ocean a glassy blue. The cooling breeze and calming sound of . . . offshore rigs?

Apparently the government is trying to lift the 20+ year ban on offshore drilling here in the states. Bush loves it. McCain loves it. Florida Governor Crist loves it. The thing is, it doesn’t make sense.

It is thought that the reserve off the coast of Florida holds enough oil to cover our consumption for 6 months. Is 6 months of potentially cheaper gas (not likely) worth potentially destroying not only the ecology of Florida’s coast but also it’s economy (very likely)?

Don’t get me wrong, I despise gas hitting over $4 a gallon like everyone else, especially on weeks we log 400+ miles of commuting. But even a discouraged working young adult like myself with little room in the checking account for inflated gas prices thinks this is a bad idea.

There’s all sorts of groups and petitions and what-have-yous out there, but I’m sure they won’t do much. You can call your senator or representative, or call our Commander in Chief if you’d like, but I’m sure they won’t field your call. But whatever the solution, I think it’s best not to keep quiet on this one.

And hey, it’s my first “environmental” post!

Spring cleaning . . .

Twelve cubic yards of trash have been removed from our garage. And there’s still more. Last fall we did some renovations and decided to store all the waste in our garage, and then in the spring get a dumpster and clean it up. Way too much work, but it’s almost done.

But I got to thinking about all the trash in our lives, about how we go through a process of storing up all this junk and then time comes to get rid of it all. Emotional, maybe some material, personal junk.

I have a friend who’s spiritual life seems to always be marked by junk. By this, I mean that when you ask them how they’re doing they typically respond with something like, “I am really feeling the weight of my sin,” or, “God is showing me what a sinful person I am.”

Yes, sin is heavy and we are sinful. But is that all that God is telling you?

I like to call that kind of faith the “college faith.” I don’t have the statistics to back this up, but I am guessing a majority of Christ-followers really dedicated their lives in college. They either really heard Jesus’s teachings for the first time, or maybe they grew up in a Christian home or became a Christian in middle-school or high-school, but then life happens in college and they finally really commit to pursuing a life in Christ.

Typically, college faith is marked by brokenness, lament, mourning, and a few emotional bruises. We begin to realize who Jesus really is, who we have been, and the stark contrast between the two. Our paradigms shatter, all that was comfortable we begin to tear away. It’s a hard and sometimes painful deconstruction of our lives in order to build it back up in Jesus Christ.

It’s a critical time. I think most of us Christians have been there.

But then there is a time of maturity, when you realize that you can’t just feel like a piece of crap all the time. God is trying to show you there is something better, that you don’t have to be weighed down by who you are. God is giving you the opportunity to become what He intended you to be.

What I hear from my friend’s faith is, “God is teaching me that I’m a horrible person. I can’t do anything right and it is pretty much crushing me daily. I can’t do anything to make God happy.”

Week after week. I don’t think that’s right. Sure, those things are true about all of us, but after understanding what Jesus did for us we are free from all of those things. God has removed the weight of sin. He has adopted us into His family. He has made us a new creation. We understood brokenness and mourned when we accepted Christ, but I don’t think we need to be in a constant state of mourning.

See, there’s a time for mourning and lament, but our lives are now to be a celebration of what God has done and is doing. Back in the day, Israel mourning and lamented all the time, but God always told them to celebrate His goodness and faithfulness after the fact. Okay, so you feel the weight of your sin, but what is that teaching you about God? It’s not just about our sin anymore.

It’s time to clean house, and move on.

Run down the aisle . . .

Last week my wonderful wife had asked me why I hadn’t written a blog about her yet. I had promised to, yet never had. It’s a tricky question.

“Uh, because I don’t know what to say?”

It’s a tricky answer because I’m not trying to be rude, it’s just that it’s true. What can you say about feeling completed by a person, more confident in their presence, motivated to love whole-heartedly? Well, that, I guess.

Jesus always talked about coming back for His bride. That the people who make up His Church are His bride. What powerful imagery. But how can you understand it if you have no frame of reference? I never understand what it meant to have my bride ushered down the aisle before me until I was standing at the end of the aisle. The anticipation was was killing me. I wanted to run down the aisle to my wife. Forget formality. Forget ritual. Just give me my wife!

He’s probably thinking the same thing. Jesus. He is probably standing there, screaming for us to run to Him, because He knows He can’t run to us. He wants for us to feel complete. He wants for us to feel confident. He wants for us to love whole-heartedly, to finally feel alive. Oh God. That is awesome.

Just a thought . . .

Maybe God wants us to stop talking about who we think He is and just listen to who He is telling us He is. Just a thought.

Attention shoppers . . .

There is a theory in the search for truth called the marketplace of ideas. The concept is similar to our free market economy – you allow ideas to circulate and be debated, and the truth will always rise above other lesser ideals. The more I think about it, the less I believe it can work.

Think of it this way, the economy isn’t always operating in an ideal manner. Advertising convinces you to purchase things you don’t need. We place false or inflated value on items in a completely subjective manner. There are relatively few influences that dictate the outcome for the masses.

This is how the marketplace of ideas works.

The biggest problem is that the ideas are completely subjective, just like the prices of goods. We evaluate our surrounds and come up with “good moral standards” of how to function, but they are not necessarily true. The social giants spout forth lofty ideas to explain why people act the way they act (think of Nietzsche, Freud, Locke). There are people pressuring you to side with them, even though the small voice in your head is telling you that you shouldn’t be pressured into believing something.

The reality is we have a bunch of broken, messed up people dictating what truth is. How can we see truth come to the surface if we are all blinded? I’m not buying.

Childlike . . .

I heard this amazing, yet heart-wrenching story of an artist named John Sarkin. John was a successful chiropractic doctor who had suffered a stroke on the golf course. He’s given up his practice and now given himself fully to creating wonderful drawings and paintings.

John’s stroke has left his mind in a state where it is quite literal. He admits, and his family can confirm, that his mind is very childlike. It becomes very apparent in his artwork. The shapes, the colors, the freedom to express. You just don’t see that in every day art.

What’s so heart-wrenching about it? John really is more like a child. His attention span is incredibly short. His actions are literal. He sees the world through a much more naive lens.

But you can see such freedom in his artwork.

It makes me wonder how we are to capture this idea of a “childlike faith.” Children have such few limitations. They are free to envision God with no boundaries (like He truly is). Their faith can comprehend and defeat any situation (like it truly can). Their innocence can see and experience the world through a clean lens (as God intended).

Being a child means having a reckless abandon. Who cares who is watching? You are free to express yourself how you need to express yourself. I think of King David dancing in the street, and everyone telling him that is no way for a king to act. He was excited. He expressed it.

When did we start stifling the our feelings so much that it becomes inappropriate to shout for joy? Our great God deserves that kind of expression.

Ticket to ride . . .

So the guys were hanging out and asked Jesus how they were supposed to pray. He told them that when they pray, to say something like this:

“Our Father in Heaven, may your name be holy. May your kingdom and your will in Heaven be done here on Earth. Give us all we need today. Please fogive us for what we hold against our brother, and forgive them as well. Lead us in righteous living, and save us from wickedness.”

Makes a pretty nice thing to say on occassion. A lot of people have unpacked different aspects of this prayer, but I keep getting caught up on the whole kingdom and will be done on Earth stuff.

Are we really praying that God’s Kingdom would reign on Earth like it is in Heaven? Do we understand the repercussions of such a statement?

It seems that our understanding of God’s Kingdom reigning on Earth is if people have been “saved” from themselves. “Given your life to Jesus yet? No? Well pray this prayer and then wait for Heaven.”

Please hear me out, I’m not saying that eternity isn’t important, but Jesus didn’t say, “May you grant people eternal life so that they can get a free ticket into Heaven and not make a difference here on Earth.”

So what does God’s Kingdom in Heaven look like? For starters, it’s total allegiance to God. I have certainly failed that one. In Heaven we will be worshipping God constantly, forever singing His praises. How often do we worship and sing praises to ourselves, or the things that will bring  us perceived happiness?

Heaven is free of suffering. New bodies! No more tears! Wait, sounds an awful lot like what the apostle Paul said of our lives here – something about being a new creation. And then James said something about joy in trials. Heaven is sounding a lot closer than this distant place where we float around in white robes.

Heaven is a cross-cultural, multi-lingual experience where we use our unique skills. Heaven is like the best job ever, doing what we love to do for God with people from literally everywhere. Dude, where to I apply?!?

So that’s Heaven. But what about Earth? We are supposed to pray for Earth to be like Heaven, and I think there’s a lot of responsibility and work that comes along with that. It’s not enough to have a “personal relationship with Jesus.” We need to weed out the things that take our allegiance and worship only the one true God. There is suffering in the world that we need to alleviate through truth and action. Jesus was a healer. The disciples were healers. We are called to be healers. And we need to get over our arrogant culture and build bridges into the lives of people from all tribes, tongues, and nations and use our desires, passions, and skills to make much of God.

Whoa. I don’t know if I can pray that today. But Jesus said when you pray to pray like this. Here we go . . .

Don’t miss it for the world . . .

I saw a church marquee the other day that made me hang my head in shame, like most marquees. This one read, “Don’t miss Heaven for the world.” It seems like this concept is one of the very reasons people turn away from Christianity, or run the other direction when they see Christians coming their way.

What is this sign saying to the unbeliever? It says, “You’re wasting your time.” People outside of Christianity don’t understand Heaven, and most of them think they’re going there anyway. The problem isn’t that people are missing out on Heaven. The problem is that people are missing out on real life. Life as God created it to be.

But the thing is, they don’t realize they are missing out on life. In fact, I think their idea of the “Christian life” is often times what is holding people back from accepting Christ. There is no longer a battle for “Is it true?” The battle is for “Is it worth it?”  And unbelievers reject Christ because to them, it’s not worth it.

So what is their perception of the Christian life? It’s a bunch of hypocrites going to their secluded building where they judge people and listen to lame music, all the while having no fun whatsoever. The sad fact is there is a reason for this idea; there are a lot of Christians who are hypocrites going to their secluded building where they judge people and listen to lame music, all the while having no fun whatsoever.

Don Miller (sorry, I’m on a Don Miller kick right now so bear with me) made a great point that we first have to debunk people’s ideas of what Christianity is and who Christians are before we can ever defend our faith. This guy’s perception of Christianity is way different than that girl’s because his friends abandoned him to “pursue God” and her “bible believing” uncle abused her.

Generations of “believers” have caused a cancer that we now have to go in and carefully remove from the hearts of those affected. Jesus said to love unconditionally, and radically, so that people may know there is a God in Heaven who loves them.

So until we learn to radically love people who will continue to ridicule us, to malign us, and even beat us for our beliefs, they will continue to walk past an offer for eternal satisfaction on their way to worldly pleasure to be experienced for a moment.

Facing the giants . . .

I understand that not every story in the Old Testament is a parallel to life lessons. As Don Miller put it, maybe David’s five stones aren’t five theological points, but just five stones. But as I studied the book of Numbers the past couple weeks, narrative become personal.

The story goes that Moses was commanded by God to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt to the land that He would show them – the promised land. This was a place flowing with milk and honey, so to speak, where Israel could finally be Israel. A people with a place. After a long journey and a few commandments, the Israelites get to the boundary of this land, called the land of Canaan. They’ve arrived.

So God tells Moses to pick twelve guys to go check out the land and then they would walk in there, kill some people, and get the land. Unfortunately, the people who lived in the land were huge, giants even, and the Israelites got scared. Ten of the guys said it would be utter destruction to try and fight the guys, even though this was indeed the land flowing with milk and honey that God promised them. Two of the surveyors said they should still go for it, and one of them (named Caleb) tried to get to get the Israelites pumped up to go in for the kill.

But what happens? The Israelites weep and moan, grumbling to Moses and God that it would be better to go back to Egypt, even to go back into the wilderness and die rather than get beat by these Canaanites. God decides He’d heard enough and was just about to kill them when Moses convinced Him to be gracious, and give Israel another chance. Instead, God listens to their complaints and sends them back into the wilderness for this generation (except for Moses and the families of Caleb and Joshua) to die off. They got what they wanted.

What amazes me is that despite everything they knew about God, they decided not to believe Him at His word. Every promise God had made up to this point had been true. He brought them out of Egypt. He delivered them to the land. He was with them by day as a cloud of smoke and by night as a piller of fire.

And despite all of this, they don’t think God will give them victory over some really tall guys.

Caleb tried. He stood before all of Israel and pleaded with them. He reminded Israel that God had been and will continue to be with them. They just didn’t listen, and they got what they asked for.

Oftentimes I wonder what I sound like to God. Is He leading me toward His promise, and when I see adversity I start to shake my fist at the sky and whine? Does He shrug His shoulders and sigh, then let me wander back into the wilderness?

There is no doubt in my mind that we have giants in our lives that God has already promised He will help us defeat. He has given us victory over this thing called “sin,” which I would just call rebellion – stupid decisions and stupid mistakes. He has given us value, so we no longer have to live in shame. He has given us everything, if we would only believe He is bigger than all of our crap.

I wonder what giants I will face today, and what I will do when I see them. Will I believe God is bigger than I can imagine? Or will I just turn around and walk back into the wilderness alone.