by Joshua | Dec 6, 2011 | Faith
Contrary to the cultural craziness of December, and even contrary to the practice of many churches (unless you are one who follows the Christian Year, and in doing so might lose the relevance of all this out of yearly routine), this is a season giving us space to explore and feel what’s missing.
Just like a time is given to eating, sleeping, working, and other routine so Advent is an annual occasion holding in it a specific purpose and gift. While attempting throughout most of our year to cope with our whole-less-ness, Advent invites us to experience the ache of our humanity and the hope of an arrival – of redemption, renewal, newness, miracle, Jesus.
Can you really know these things of promise if you’re not in tune with the antitheses of such things within you? In these weeks we’re invited to come out of denial, experience our brokeness, and wait in hope.
The Savior, Jesus, has come. He is coming again. He is coming to us now. And so we are offered this annual gift to face our darkness and wait for the light. In fact, in facing the darkness of our own soul light begins to shine, because what lurks hidden within us no longer goes unnoticed but is exposed.
Exposure isn’t enough, however, because it’s not transformation. That comes on Christmas Day when the Savior arrives and does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. But we can’t get to Christmas Day until we experience Advent.
by Joshua | Oct 23, 2011 | Faith
I’ve been without a cell phone for the last 8 weeks. At my former church we were equipped with our choice of Blackberry or iPhone, complete with plan. I was in the kind of environment where information, emails, and texts flew around all the time. If things ever died down there was always my Facebook app. I was wired 24/7.
Upon taking a new job at a different church I made a decision: no phone. I looked at trying to just get a regular old phone in case there were emergencies or people needed to get a hold of me. It was actually difficult to find a plan offering such simple amenities, and the phone quality and selection were a big step down from what I used to have (the iPhone was still in my blood making me a techno-snob).
So I’m 8 weeks into the venture, and this is what I’ve observed:
1. I Feel Different My old church, The Meeting House, did a series called Rage Against the Machine. In it I remember our teaching pastor describing research stating the impact on brain chemistry of waiting for the next ring-tone, vibration, or alert setting. I used to check my phone constantly for emails, texts, whatever. I had it on silent most of the time, but there was always this anxiety I felt anticipating the next thing. That’s gone. I feel more relaxed.
2. I’m More Present My wife and I won’t let our kids have a DS because it blocks them out to the world around them. But I had an iPhone, and believe me, I didn’t manage it well. There were countless times where my kids would ask me to put it away (or give them a turn).
It has also made me available to the people I’m with. I never hit this extreme full tilt, but I’ve observed it. You know, you’re talking to someone or having lunch, and they whip out their phone. They might start texting in the middle of a conversation. Nothing makes the person you’re with feel obsolete like checking your phone in the middle of the conversation, No phone enables me to be fully present…now it’s just my wandering mind I have to keep in check (don’t act like you don’t have one too!).
3. I’m Where I Say I’ll Be, When I Say I’ll Be There Ever shoot the text saying you’re running 10 minutes late or stuck in a meeting? Ever wonder why you didn’t leave on time or call the meeting when it was supposed to be called? It’s because you have an impersonal way of saying, “Hey, I realize it’s important to be with you right now, but I’m important (whoops, I mean I’m in an important meeting) and so I’m running late. I actually call people if I’m running behind. This enables actual conversation, and it forces me to get my butt out the door, because calling and apologizing for being late is a bit embarrassing.
4. It’s Given Me Space You ever wonder why you can’t unplug? It’s because you only have to plug those things in while you sleep to recharge! Otherwise, it’s plugged in your pocket at all times!!! In the old days, in my profession, people could call you at the office or home. Within a reasonable time-frame their calls would be returned. I think it models something positive: setting boundaries. We have a life outside of our work, and it’s equally as important as our work. We need to play, have dinner with our families, help our kids with homework, and talk to our spouses…without being interrupted (or having the nagging feeling you’re going to be).
I’m not saying technology is all bad, but it’s not all the bill of goods it’s sold to be either. It should be used with discretion. For me, less is more. Not having certain technologies re-humanize the world around me.
by Joshua | Oct 17, 2011 | Discipleship, Faith, Holiness
All of us grow up with deficiencies – some of them greater and more noticeable than others. I grew up in a really good family. For the most part we were stable and the environment was supportive and enjoyable, although as I grow older I realize how much it lacked in depth. We didn’t process well, and when we needed to we didn’t know how.
This was a huge gap for me, and it impacted other areas of my life. I was not the most confident kid (deficiency #2 among many…not all to be listed here), and it would have been good to process some of the feelings of loneliness and questioning with my parents. When I got to the teen years I hadn’t developed a pattern of communication, so everything was always ‘fine’ and my struggles remained internal.
All of us lack something from our early years, and perhaps our later as well. I used to get frustrated by the presence of these imperfections, but I’m learning to look at them in a different way now. Truth: No one has a perfect life. Some of us may have less painful lives, but we all share the presence of imperfection. It should come as no surprise to us imperfection, and therefore the pain and consequences thereof, are a part of our history. Their presence is certain. What is uncertain is what we will choose to do with them. As much as it is true no one has a perfect life the following is also true: Life is a journey where God makes old things new, ugly things beautiful, and empty places full.
For most of my life, as I began to realize and experience the effects of my shortcomings in character and development, I would become frustrated, angry, or bitter at why things couldn’t have been better. Why couldn’t things have been better, different? As I began to accept the fact no one has a perfect life I also began to understand how God makes beautiful, new, whole those areas that I formerly lacked. Instead of seeing them as deficiencies, I now see them as grace. I look over the sum total of my meager thirty-three years of life and see how, in a relatively short time, God has filled in the gaps.
God has used experiences, other people, learning, and the like to fill in the missing pieces. While I won’t be perfect, I will be whole. The areas of emptiness will be filled as God, who is rich in mercy and love toward me (and you) meets the voids with overflowing grace we cannot plan for.
Our pasts are imperfect, fragmented, and fractured. If we look in retrospect at the years gone by we may be able to see how God worked in very gracious ways, even when being uninvited. He loves his kids (you and me) that much.
Questions:
– What are the areas of pain in your past?
– Where have you felt the effects of your own imperfections or the imperfections of others? How have they impacted you?
– Where is God in this? Has he worked to remedy what has been done to you, or what you have done? Are there things you still hold onto in a broken state you need to allow God to make whole?
– Does the pain of your past, other’s shortcomings or your own, define you? Or, does grace overflow into those areas, redefining them?
by Joshua | Oct 5, 2011 | Faith
For the chemist a periodic table represents a realm of possibility. Combining different degrees of various elements produce something greater than if the elements stood on their own. They change properties to form something entirely different, yet they still maintain their identity. Alone they are good and necessary, but when they interact with another element their potential is greater than anything they could have ever been on their own.
When it comes to faith we see similar characteristics experienced by the elements. Alone we are good in that we are created by God. However, we were never meant to be on our own but in community with God and others. We were meant to interact with other elements to grow as a creation. Faith formation takes the self and sees everything around us as an experience to shape who we are becoming.
Mindlessly we muddle through our days hoping something will happen, while around us circles an array of opportunities to open us up to the world that is God’s. Blindly we plod through our duties, lifeless to the potentials waiting for a chance to shape our life and character.
Faith and spirituality take the everyday elements of life and allow them to collide with the whole person. A word directed to us in harsh tones open the way to a gracious spirit. Rolling out of bed and noticing feelings of apathy or hopelessness lead us to the seat of dependence on the Divine Life. No element of life is wasted for those thirsty to encounter God. Each element of life brings new life when it encounters the Creator.
May pain teach us healing
May anger teach us to let go
May the questions help us trust
May each element be a seed that is sown
God redeems everything for his glory in us. Christ in us, the hope of glory.
by Joshua | Oct 2, 2011 | Family
No matter what great things you may do outside of your home, the greatest things you will ever do will be with your family.
While your family may be proud of whatever you accomplish, if they lose a piece of you in the process they may later resent your accomplishments. As fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, our kids and spouses want our time more than our success.
Family calls us to relationship – the depth of which our culture tries to avoid at all cost. Relationship means time: time taking walks, listening to the activities of the day, playing, laughing, and being unproductive. It is means a depth that comes from knowing who you really are when only they see, and loving you anyway. These things are unquantifiable. Family slows us down, focusing us on the long road of life.
However, many times it is the first to go and be replaced. I’m convinced if I want a tight knit family when I’m old(er)it beings with each moment I spend with them now. My kids bring me back from adult world into a world of presence. My wife grounds me with her insight. When it comes down to it, they just want me for me – not because of what I do but because of who I am.