Blew Me Away

Based on Proverbs 7:10-23 from NewSpring Media on Vimeo.

This blew me away. (ht)  It’s based on Proverbs 7:10-23

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The Funniest Thing I Heard Today Was

“I’m objective about myself.”

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Engaging Reconciliation

Tracy wrote a great blog post over at Thrive on engaging reconciliation through the Thrive process of clearings.  Read it here.

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Overheard In A Coffee Shop

“Maturity is growing into the awareness of our ignorance.”

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Restoration Observations

At first glance this is likely going to seem like a really strange post but I promise you it’s actually an observation on restoration of the human soul.

Recently my son was playing some games on the web.  I decided to join him and found this game called Death Row.  The name immediately intrigued me and so I clicked on it to play.  The purpose of the game is to “reform” the prisoner, discover clues to his innocence and get him pardoned before he is executed, all within fourteen game days.  To successfully accomplish the mission you have to reform the prisoner by increasing his health, mood, respect, and worth ethic, which is no small feat.  Accomplish the mission quickly and your score goes up.

The prisoner begins the game very angry.  He’s been hardened to the point of rage and lets you know it immediately.  He is no one’s friend. In order to find the hidden clues you have to purchase items (rug, desk, linen, computer, etc) that fill out the cell.  To make money, you send him to work, trying different jobs in order to find the one he likes.  When you do he makes works harder.  To make money faster, you have to increase his work ethic.

What I found interesting in playing the game several times was the pattern that emerged in reforming the prisoner.  First I had to increase his health by feeding him well.  As silly as this seems it made a big difference.  Then I had to buy a toilet, sink for hot water and then a mirror.  Once this is accomplished, I could have him look at his image in the mirror and his work ethic and mood went up incrementally.  Once his work ethic was at a sufficient level, he worked harder.  And this allowed him to make money faster, which then allowed me to buy more stuff faster and win the game.

It was really interesting to me that the makers of the game understood the basic role that our dignity and self-image plays in our own restoration.  When the prisoner looked at his own image in the mirror and his health was low he hated himself and his mood and his respect for me went down.  During one game, I irritated him mercilessly, dropping his respect for me to zero.  He hung himself in despair and the game was over.  But when I helped him take care of his basic human dignity he improved dramatically.

What was also surprising to me was outside of food, the other functional objects in the room made little difference in improving his work ethic.  Items like a blanket or television set did little other than affect his mood.  In other words, stuff didn’t really matter in his restoration.

Once I had accumulated enough money I could purchase a computer for his cell.  Again the makers of the game seemed to understand the basic role of dignity in our humanity.  The computer allowed the prisoner to take an online course in law, economics and computer design.  Each of these skills dramatically increased his work ethic at exponential levels.  In other words, when he could participate in his own restoration he reformed at unprecedented levels.

My total score was how reformed he was based on the four categories.  In other words, I to score really well I had to affect the whole person.  I couldn’t just focus on one category and leave the rest.  I had to restore all of him.

I say all of this because in Thrive, understanding the role of dignity and the whole person was huge for us.  It was central to understanding the love was the restoring or holding of the person’s dignity, which was established by God in the act of creation. It wasn’t something ooey-gooey or codepently sticky sweet.  It was in fact deeply courageous and restorative. And as human beings we aren’t just a body, or mind, or a soul.  We’re all three.  We can’t just fill people up with information and assume we had done our job.  We had to create a space that allowed people to work through stuff and deal with not just what they thought but how they felt.

How often do we assume that following Jesus is simply about memorizing the right verses or serving on the right committees?  Jesus came to heal, not to create some religious program that led to boredom, yet how much of what we do leads to the latter?

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The Human Heart

I’ve now found an interesting graphical representation of how the journey of following Jesus feels sometimes.  But in the end my heart always feels like its coming back to wholeness. (ht)

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Group Think

I was talking with a friend of mine about how much of our thinking is internal and how much is give or even inflicted (for lack of a better word) on us from outside of us, the community, our tribe, etc.  In business we called this group think.  Others call this the collective conscience or consciousness. It’s this idea of a thought pattern the emerges that we succumb to.  We see it in mobs, or cliques, or any space where peer pressure can be high.  We can also see it in our churches and our approaches to doctrine.  We believe because that’s what the group thinks.

How much of our influence do you think comes from this group think or the world around us?  Interested in your thoughts.

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Say What You Need To Say

Sometimes we need the space to be honest. I’ve said before, one of the real values of having people we can truly trust is the ability to be honest when we really, really need to.

John Mayer wrote on of my favorite songs.  It’s call “Say”.  My favorite line is the little bridge to the chorus

“If you could only…Say what you need to say.”

And as I was listening to the song today I had the thought of people speaking honestly to their pastors about their own journey of faith.  (Don’t ask me why.)  And so I thought I would ask, if you could say something to your pastor or some person in spiritual authority, and really say what you need to say, what would it be?

If you need to use Anonymous, that’s okay.

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The Human Condition

Magnolia is one of my favorite movies of all time.  It is one of the best stories of the human condition and the space we find ourselves in. Everyone is searching for love in their own way only they keep bumping up against the brick walls.  And what is amazing is how the soul just has to keep going.  As human beings in the midst of suffering and our brokenness we find a way to keep searching.

What I loved about it was P.T. Anderson’s subtle conclusion that the movie presents, and culminated in this song.

“It’s not going to stop till you wise up. So just give up.”

May we as followers of Jesus live lives of surrender every single day.

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The Funniest Thing I Heard

The funniest thing I heard this week was: “I want patience.  And I want it now!”

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Thoughts From Portland

I love it when I can spend a moment outside of my own element.

Yesterday I got to fly up to Portland, Oregon to spend the day with a long time friend, Chuck Bomar.  Chuck is one of the true pioneers in the church and is the leader of collegeleader.org, a ministry focusing on college age people.  I got to spend the day working with him on ministry development for the next chapter in where he’s going.  It was a lot of fun.  If you’re church doesn’t know Chuck, it should.  He’s got some really big things on the horizon for those reaching out to college age people.

But being in Portland got me really thinking about people.  Portland is such a beautiful and diverse city.  I got to see much of the downtown water district and take in the park by Portland State area.  I was also able to grab a beer at Henry’s, which was cool.

Portland has gotten a lot of attention, some through Rick McKinley’s great work at Imago Dei, and Don Miller’s work.  It has one of the highest youth homeless populations, one of the lowest church participation rates, and one of the highest church start failure rates, all in the country.  It’s known to be very liberal politically and rain a lot, even though it was partly cloudy when I was there. Interesting observations to mull as I was walking through the city.

And as I sat in the midst of this new world, I kept thinking one thing.  These are people just like me.  Everyone I ran into was human.  They may have had a pink streak through their hair or a few more tattoos or piercings, but they walked and talked just like me. Everyone I met was incredibly nice and polite.

It’s easy to assume that those who don’t know God, in a historical or traditional sense, fall into a “them” category.  But they don’t.  Part of what we as followers of Jesus offer is the ability to see the “us”, to see the humanity that we are all part of, that brings us together rather than separates us.  This is what love does.  It builds bridges by focusing on what brings us together. It restores everyone to a living, breathing creation loved by God.  And we are the messengers.

So much love to my friends in Portland.  I hope to see you soon.

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A Slow Growth

God is Brilliant!

I had a thought the other day while eating.  I eat because I like flavors and tend to eat too much.  And then food just sits in my stomach trying to digest, so I suffer for about an hour with the idea that I’ve apparently enjoyed a meal.  Basically I’ve caught myself in gluttony.

No this isn’t a post on the seven deadly sins.  I could count on six hundred fingers and toes the list of imperfect things about me.  And as I was sitting in Starbucks, I had a thought.  When we choose to follow Jesus we don’t become perfect in the sense that we stop screwing up.  And I was wondering out loud, why?  Why wouldn’t God create a situation where being empowered by the Holy Spirit immediately changes you to perfection?  It would seem to make sense, wouldn’t it.

But it doesn’t work like that.  The path to restoration is often painfully slow.

The Scriptures tells me that God still loves me.  I am being redeemed.  And to be honest some days I feel like God is not keeping up his ends of the bargain.  “Bring on the wholeness already.  I really am ready for it God.”  But I’m not done. I am then reminded of the days that I have felt done, that I have it all figured out.  What an ass I am.

And then I begin to realize that the problem isn’t God.  The real problem is me. I’m broken.   To follow Jesus puts me at odds with my brokenness.  When I stare myself in the face, I see the flaws and problems that I have inherited but refuse to let go of.  And it is at this moment that I am astounded that God can actually love me.  It would be easy to love Jesus.  He was perfect.  But how can God actually love me?  I sometimes don’t get it.

What if the problem is not simply our brokenness, which God tends to remove slowly and over time, but our ability to receive His love in spite of it.  My brokenness demands a verdict.  It shouts from the rooftops and begs to be heard.  And I can run, ignoring the bullhorn of my stupidity and feeble attempts at humanity, or I can face it and deal with its truth.  One requires courage and one a good pair of running shoes.

So I ponder the reality that my brokenness reflects the brilliance of His love.  It reveals God’s glorious nature, which is that He actually loves me…even in my brokenness.    Could I actually be of value to God, my Father?  Could love actually transcend my brokenness.  I want to know this God who could actually love me.  His love asks me to love my self at the deepest levels of my soul, to care for it and surrender it to back into the hands of my Father.

And this love doesn’t stop at my brokenness.  It calls me forward, to address my wounds, to confront the divides that have destroyed relationship.  It calls me to remove the obstacles between us.  I no longer want to walk away from but run to this God. And then it hit me.  Part of my restoration is my own participation in growing up.  If everything is done for me, if I never have to surrender, then I’m simply a passive observer. But if part of my growth requires me to get involved, to let go of my own bullshit, then I’m always being called into something.

When I look back on the journey, I realize that it was in the fumbling and falling that I was given the choice to continue.  Would I get back up?  And when I got back up, I was choosing to accept that love, to believe what my Father had told me.  And then I stand there realizing that it was the slow growth that made the story.  It was real.  It was true.  And it was mine.

Listening to: Mercy Street by Peter Gabriel

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The Older Brother

I love grace but I wrestle with her nature.  Her arms are wide and inviting, embracing and perfecting. She comes with a sweet aroma and a welcoming smile to all who would see her.  And I often wonder if grace will be a thousand times better than we could ever imagine, infinitely more than we every thought.

I often wonder if the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son is what some people will feel like in the Kingdom of God.  They will say,

“How in the hell did YOU get in here.  This isn’t supposed to happen.  What about what I did?”

I think we’re all going to be surprised.

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Waiting

What if there really is a value in waiting?

I have a significant event in my life that requires me to wait.  There is absolutely nothing I can do to change the outcome or make it happen any sooner that it will.  I can move no mountain that will affect it in anyway.  I can turn no stone that will make it any easier.  I simply have to wait.

Inside I want the Holy Spirit to move.  I want my Father to makes things the way “I” want them.  I want him to fashion the world in my image.  And I laugh at myself for trying, for wanting what I really would not want.

Waiting asks me to trust.  It asks me to set aside what I think I need for what my Father wants to give me, which has the potential to be infinitely better than I can imagine, and usually is…when I wait.

And if I’m honest, this waiting process feels like dying.  If feels like I’m killing the desire of my heart.  It is requiring me to love in a way that is uncomfortable, to be what I say I am.  I say I stand for love and in this specific instance only waiting will reveal that I do love.  Only when I let go of the outcome will I become love.

And what is surprising to me is that the more I wait, the more I give up what I want, the more I become what I say I want to be.

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An Observation On Relationships

Most of my healthy human relationships are those that have forgiving boundaries of interdependence and mutual respect for dignity.  In these relationships diversity and differences are celebrated in a way that leads to creativity and admiration for the best of that person.

Most of my unhealthy relationships are those that I seek to be validated from or to be fixed by.  In these relationships I am needy, demanding and sometimes a jerk.

I’m trying to live in the former.

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A Threatening God

Growing up God always seemed angry to me.  My image of Him was someone always watching out, the great cop in the sky.  He always had one eye glued in my direction, waiting for when I screwed up.  And this image, which I now hold was my own image cast upon him, drew me into a deeply religious life of perfection.  I had to be good.  Then God would like me.

This image was like a threat.  If I wasn’t good, I was going to hell.  And so I said the sinner’s prayer (like many) a thousand times.  I wondered if I had said it right because it didn’t seem to change my life in an observable way.  Perfection was not to be had.  Throw girls and puberty in the mix and I was a disaster.

But now it seems to me that the issue of threat is such a fantastically easy yet somewhat immature motivator for action.  I can use it on my children, but it does little more than get them to stop what they are doing.  It doesn’t change their heart.  It is only when I approach them in love, as human beings with a heart that I affect something deeper.

Is God’s use of punishment deeper than simply a threat?  Is it more wholistic than that?  If it’s restorative, then how does that influence our views on punitive justice and even hell?

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The Will To Courage

I finally figured out why I like this commercial.  It’s about courage.

The commercial, which is for Nike, is not the best of what we can be.  It’s not what we typically think of when we think of sports.  It’s not about the glory or the even the victory.

The dominate image in the commercial is the moment when we doubt, when we wonder IF we can.  It also reveals the fear, the moment before someone scores, the moment when we haven’t done it yet.  This is the moment, not of victory, but of courage.  And I believe it is this moment that we need more than the one that follows.

I think of all the great heroes in my life, or in history, and I think about why they are my heroes.  It actually wasn’t because they were always victorious.  It was because they weren’t afraid. I think of Gandhi who was willing to put it all on the line and starve himself to death.  I think of Lincoln who almost lost the soul of the people of America only to regain it with his victory against slavery.  And he gave his life for it.  And I think of Jesus, who could have easily walked from the Garden of Gethsemane left us to our own devices.  But he didn’t. He chose the cross.

I want to be the one who faces my deepest fears, my most notorious enemy, and say, “Screw you.  I am not afraid of you.” I want to be able to rise up to the moment I am called and say, “I will trust you Father.”  I wish for the victory, but I need the courage.  It is in the will to courage that I find my soul.  It is in the will to courage that we find love.

Many of you pointed out that it has a killer (no pun intended) soundtrack to it.  Music has a way of resonating at a level of the soul.  And the line “I’ve got soul but I’m not a soldier,” speaks of fighting not just for a medal or award but also for our dignity.

PS: I completely forgot to mention my appreciation for all those who helped me with this.  It was very helpful.  Thank you very much.

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My Church Experience 3

I’m gonna do this one last time.  If you participated before you can see the responses here and here.

If you went to a church today, what is the one sentence that would describe how you felt during the experience?  And if you didn’t go to a church today, what is the one sentence that would describe how you felt during that experience?

And if you did this last week, was anything different?

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I Got Soul

Tell me why I dig this commercial.

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My Own Private Brokenness

One of the tensions in following Jesus is this stupid call to repentance.  Yes I know I just said that.  But if I’m being honest, seriously, I hate that sometimes.  What is the friggin’ value of discovering my own brokenness?  What could possibly be gained from realizing that I am a broken human being.  These are the questions I have often asked myself as I ponder the footsteps of Jesus.  Everything in me wishes to hide, to pretend and to cover.  But Jesus still, in this very state, calls me to follow.  Why?

And what I am beginning to learn is that it is in this very pathway that I discover the depths of his love.  It is only in the shadow of my brokenness, the deep chasms of my inabilities that I can discover how good my Father is, how good love is.  And it is this love that helps me trascend my brokenness.

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