church buildings

Once at a gas station a Mexican lady asked me, "How do I get to that big historic church?" She was talking about the Pentecostal church beside the interstate, actually two church buildings side by side. One is huge, the other is more huge. They also have a large, color animated LED sign. The place is fairly new, so the word "historic" was probably mischosen. However, it did make me realize that someday it might be. Hers was perhaps the first really positive reference to the place that I'd encountered from an outsider. Most people call it "Six Flags over Jesus" or something like that. I too viewed the place with some contempt; It is afterall somewhat imposing, and doesn't help that some Pentecostal people act so scared of people like me who don't tuck their shirts into their pants. Aren't church buildings like this simply arrogant displays of personal prosperity? A fellow college student said indignantly, "All of that money should have been given to the poor." Judas Iscariot, the apostle who never really loved Jesus and ultimately betrayed him said something like that when a woman anointed him with some very expensive perfume (John 12:5), to which Jesus responded, "You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me" (John 12:8). These verses helped to break me free from judging church activities, the most conspicuous perhaps being building projects. Only God knows our motives and for all we can see, these are legitimate attempts to honor Him. I cringe as others pass judgement on the church, and not because I don't know what they're talking about. It's because they may just be passing judgement on the Bride of Christ, and one day we'll all stand before her Husband.

Faith and Reason

A friend of mine, a follower of Jesus and a philosophy student, told me once that reading Kierkegaard had helped his faith which had been plagued by questions, I suppose scientific. He paraphrased, "Anything you can reason yourself into, you can reason yourself out of." I accepted that, and so when God confronted me with John 6:62-69 after I prayed about some confusing information brought up in one of my secular religious classes, I interpreted those life-giving words in light of what I'd accepted about faith and reason. In those bright and shining verses that nourish my soul, Jesus asks his twelve disciples if they too want to leave him. Peter answers, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God" (John 6:68-69). For a while I thought that here was Peter making a choice and asserting faith in spite of reasoning that would tell him to run for it. But that's not the case at all. What Peter exhibits so beautifully is good, solid reasoning. His logic is pure and simple. Where's he gonna go? God worked in me with those verses, but not, upon reviewing my own faith, what I had thought. If my faith in Christ relied on my choosing to believe something that I thought would make me feel better, I'd have become a Taoist by now. My faith instead is hinged upon the unlikelihood of my being unconvinced that Jesus left behind an empty tomb and has been changing people's lives for 2000 years. If your faith is not inseparable from reason, from reality, then why keep it?

Unwavering Faith

Someone I love asked me during a visit how it is that my faith seems so unwavering. If she only knew. I felt suddenly guilty of being pretentious. There was a time, early on, when I wondered if my faith, no matter how much it grew, would always be just a step ahead of ravenous atheism, the voice in my head that said "Never underestimate the power of suggestion," or "You're talking to yourself." While those particular reservations have grown distant and ineffective, others have risen which are of course more relevant to where I am now. My faith seems to move in a frequency pattern, with wavelengths, and so to describe it as unwavering is inherently inaccurate. Each choice we make to believe or obey God brings us to a new set of choices to be made and consequently new doubts to overcome. With the right choices, we move from such questions as "How can people in Australia be raptured up?" and into questions like "Would God really ask me to compromise the security of my family in order to travel to a particular place or be involved with this political activity?" Faith wavers, and doubts change but remain the same, for there is always a part of us that would resist his divine work and cling to an easier way.

For my 30th birthday, my hands broke out in festering sores and scabbed over so that I could barely touch anything. I also got a fever. I suppose I had imagined myself out skateboarding for my 30th birthday, a demonstration of my Peter Pan-like defiance of aging and the accompanying social expectations. I was able to go wakeboarding the weekend before my birthday. Wakeboarding is the latest adaption to waterskiing; the difference is that you stand sideways on a single board, so it's more like skateboarding or snowboarding, and you can do more tricks. It was my first time, and the only trick I could do was slap my face on the lake repeatedly and forcefully. So my neck was stiff for days. None of these ailments were conducive to an age-defiant attitude. I am glad that God reminded me that my life and times are entirely in his hands. I understand that there is no amount of willpower or positive thinking that can deliver me from every ailment, but there is a more insidious theology that creeps up from within my desperation for longevity and health, and that is the expectation that God will honor my attempts at what I regard as a full life by, I suppose, allowing me to persist in my activities. A danger is that I would begin to redefine a full life, and abundant life, by the fun I have rather than by the God I know. My meager physical inconveniences were reminders as to where my joy must come.

What does God do all Day?

I was asked over lunch one day, "What does God do all day?" to which I replied, "He loves you, like you were the only one here." That has been my beautiful experience in walking with God, and I still am often surprised at it. The Creator of the universe not only loves the world full of people, but loves each person. He is bigger than time and space, and He bothers Himself with me, arranging circumstances and conversations and books and all of life that the Holy Spirit would use these things to teach me and guide me in all truth. In His tremendous grace He gives me chance after chance to live well before Him. It would be enough had the Son of God died to take away my sins, rose again to make certain our victory and hope in Him, and left us His word the Bible to show us the Way, and yet He even sends us His Holy Spirit to please us with His very presence. He is an intimate God. After all, "God is love," as many people like to quote. But the implications of this should transform our lives. If we understand that His church should be doing what He is doing, then we should also understand that to the world, God is doing what the church is doing. The question "What does God do all day?" becomes painfully poignant. We should search ourselves to ensure that the answer can never legitimately be mistaken for "Nothing," or even "Not much."
"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love" (1 John 4:8)

Communal Living

I packed everything I needed for the week in New Orleans into one backpack and strapped a sleeping bag to it, which was liberating. Everything, that is, except my guitar. If it came to it, I suppose I could trade the guitar for a ukulele. When I put my backpack on, I wanted to walk across town instead of just to the car. We worked hard each day but there was still energy in the evenings for playing guitar, and frisbee, and hackeysack, and for visiting with people. Some seemed rather engrossed in their own cliques but most were very friendly. The lady who asked us to be quiet the first night, Bridgett, worked in the same house as I, and she was radiantly friendly and funny and enthusiastic about Jesus. I realized later that she actually did have a real concern for silence on behalf of another in her group who revealed herself to be far less cooperative with the communal living arrangements. I'd underestimated this, but Bridgett, I think, must have known, and I hope that next time that sister in Christ will find a Motel 6. I personally enjoy living in community. That was one of my favorite parts of being in the army; there was egalitarianism and camaraderie. It was the perfect Marxist socialist society functioning to protect and propagate democracy and capitalism. At any rate, what I observed of the ongoing mission which I was so briefly a part of at Gentilly Baptist Church in New Orleans was the Kingdom of God coordinating in a way that was surely closer to the efficient ideal. People were coming together to give of themselves in order to be a blessing to a hurting community, inspired by our Lord who gave all to us.

A Flood Survivor

One day while hanging sheet rock in New Orleans, a dreadlocked rasta-type poked his head in the window and started talking to us. He lived in a FEMA trailer two feet away. He was 52 years old, but he also said he was two years old because he felt like he'd been given a new life when he survived the flood two years ago. His name was Christopher, he was chiseled and beautiful, with thick dreadlocks mushrooming off his head. He wore a flight suit. He said that when the flood came, some people were swept down the street, but he managed to just get around the corner of a house and therefore not to be caught by the current. "But I was wearing the wrong boots," he explained, for they were too heavy to swim in and his feet were planted to the ground. The water rose above his head, and he thought he was a goner, until he remembered a Sponge Bob Square Pants episode about a deep-sea diver and realized he could walk under water. He walked to his house. "If anyone had seen it, they'd have just seen a nose cruise by," he said. His arms were outstretched and his head was straight back as he demonstrated how he made this journey. "It was beautiful," he smiled. When he was underwater he became tragically aware of all of his life's regrets, and that he hadn't lived whole-heatedly for God. "One of the things that hurt me most was that I'd never married my old lady," he recounted sadly. He prayed that he would be given another chance, and his boot suddenly found the firm ledge of the sidewalk in front of his house. He pulled himself up on his porch. "The Lord saved me, and changed my whole outlook that day," Christopher told us. "That's why I say I'm two years old."

I was assigned to hanging sheetrock with Keith and Cody and a multitude of brothers and sisters from other churches. I was glad for the opportunity to practice something I hadn't done much of, and so to learn some new things. Keith fortunately was familiar with the science of hanging sheetrock, having done it for a living for a while, though commercially rather than residentially. The shotgun house we were remodeling may have been 600 square feet. We didn't meet the homeowner, but others who did said she was staying in an apartment and working, and eagerly awaiting the day when her 13 grandkids could come stay with her again in her house. There was a sleeping loft for them in the room where my group was working, which probably was a carport before. The house was charmingly minimalistic to me, but some were of the opinion that it should have been razed. Many whom we were with were inexperienced with manual labor and unaccustomed to the heat, which set the work at a rather leisurely pace. Keith was aggressive about his work and I could tell this frustrated him somewhat. It crossed my mind, purely as an observation and with no malice attached, that some people really can serve better by staying at home and donating money. Money, however, is such an impersonal and easily abused solution. At the end of the week, no one would have mistaken my work for professional either; it was done by amateurs for free. It was a beautiful thing to see children of God gathering from far away because they'd been shown a need, and given an opportunity to share a burden and love our neighbors, as Jesus commands.

Prayer

I woke up early with a gray light from a narrow window by my head illuminating my cot. I was almost a blank slate in regards to my expectations of the mission, but already in sacrificing my paycheck, and the politics and usefulness of the program. I propped up on my knees to pray about all this, entrusting myself again to what I believed God had called me to do. I had forsaken a Mexico mission, which I had hoped since the year before to attend, because I didn't feel the Holy Spirit's perfect peace about going after just the first meeting. It had seemed like a good idea to me, as I am a Spanish major and need the practice. Later I learned of the New Orleans trip and, with almost no further analysis, put my faith in God and went. I dare say I obeyed God and went. And so, for a moment, somewhere in mid-air between the leap an the palm of God's hand, I wavered. But the landing was beautiful. The serenity, the perfect stillness of thought that I experienced before God that morning was supernaturally sublime, nothing less than divine assurance that I'd found myself in the center of his will. "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do" (Eph 2:10). I didn't know what the day would hold, but my God knew exactly what to expect. He'd seen that place and the peole with whom I'd be working with long ago, and He'd made all the arrangements for me.

New Orleans

At a moderately nice restaurant some customers left a large hunk of chocolate cake and an almost untouched scoop of ice cream at a booth near my table. I eyed it and considered swooping for it like Crucial Mike. My apall at waste, my primal appetite, and my carefully calculated budget combine to bring me great pleasure in free food. I've never eaten after strangers though. It remains disappetizing to me. I almost grabbed a Burger King bag out of the trash one night on campus, but I didn't do it either. Stuff goes into the garbage for a reason. I let the cake go, but I did clean up some left over quesadillas from someone in our group. We drove the rest of the way to New Orleans laughing and joking deliriously, at last arriving at a dark and looming church building at almost midnight in a neighborhood that seemed much abandoned. We met Jackie the head coordinator who debriefed us somewhat as to what the next day's schedule would be like, and we were shown our cots. A lady from another group requested politely more than once that we be quiet because people were sleeping after a hard day's work. "After you've worked here a day, you'll understand," she said. I was thinking, if you're so tired, go to sleep.

Expenditures

We were able to go to the beach by splitting costs with gracious extended family. So, for a few days I was able to skimboard and listen to waves break and breathe ocean air and marvel at the beauty and expanse of God's sea, the ancient waters out of which the earth was formed (2 Peter 3:5). When we came home, we were able to purchase wood floor for our new place of residence at a discounted price from my place of employment, and with skillful leadership of our dear friend Terry, we were able to lay the floor ourselves throughout the house. I feel mostly justified about large expenditures when I am able to cut costs in any creative or fortunate ways, but I still agonize to some degree over every decision regarding where my money will go. In fact I feel a need to justify my expenses because I'm sometimes embarrassed of my standard of living in light of global conditions. I am quite torn about my modern needs, and I think the tension is biblical. Jesus says, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me" (Luke 9:23) while Paul reasons, "He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all- how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?" (Rom 8:32). This is part of the careful balancing act that keeps us walking on the narrow path, and entering through the small gate (Matt 7:14).

5 Things I Dig About Jesus

I am honored to have been tagged by Alyce and Bryan and these are the rules as they were written:
1. Those tagged will share 5 things they dig about Jesus.
2. Those tagged will tag 5 other bloggers.
3. Those tagged will provide a link in the comment section so that others can read them.

Here are the 5 things I most dig about Jesus:

1. I dig the way He blows my mind. "'No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him'- but God has revealed it to us by His Spirit" (1 Cor 2:9-10). Jesus expands my mind and inspires my imagination.

2. The way He created a natural world so accommodating, even while fallen. While natural disasters and wildlife aggression are always a risk, they are for now anomalies. Not only is nature beautiful to behold, but we even make sport of it, sailing frisbees and kites on His wind, surfing and swimming in the therapeutic salt water of His oceans, climbing rocks and snowboarding mountains and hiking forests. "Worship Him who made the heavens, the earth, the sea and the springs of water" (Rev 14:7)

3. I dig the way He makes Holy God my friend. Almighty Yahweh, who said "you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live" (Exodus 33:20), was also "pleased to have all His fullness dwell in (Jesus), and through Him reconcile to Himself all things" (Colossians 1:19-20). Jesus our mediator brings us into the presence of God, and calls us His friend (John 15).

4. The way He makes us a family. I enjoy crossing paths with otherwise random strangers to discover they are my brother or sister in His kingdom. We are unified by a common focus and mission in Him. We are a kind of free-floating community of love when at our best, frequently unwittingly appointed to encourage or exhort one another at just the right time, according to His purposes. To have opportunity to fellowship with some of His most divinely inspired has been an adventure for me. "But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin" (1 John 1:7)

5. I dig the way Jesus is making me better. "No one who lives in Him keeps on sinning" (1 John 3:6). I'm excited about that.


All my friends have been tagged except Mervey. I am tagging Mervey.

Moving and God's Will

We found a house we liked. We had good feelings about it. I sought the Lord's will, asking Him that if the house was for us, it would fall into place for us, as did our last house which has been such a blessing to us for five years. We put our house up for sale and it sold the next day, for what we'd always hoped and expected to trade for it, and so we were able to buy the place we'd found. Three weeks later we're all moved in. How beautiful it is to "be able to test and approve what God's will is- His good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:2). What simplicity and freedom there is in Jesus Christ to have the Holy Spirit light up the single path that our Father would have us to take. And to experience beyond this that truly God has "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future" (Jeremiah 29:11), is inexplicable joy. That the Creator of the Universe would involve Himself with me leaves me no room for pride. It makes me want to cry out as Peter did, "Go away from me Lord; I am a sinful man!" (Luke 5:8), at the same time clinging to Him, begging Him not to go. The house is squarish, three little bedrooms all on one side, a screened in deck, and a big open space that will be party central. I've been skateboarding through it. It's not unlike the simple designs I'd been sketching on my graph paper.

Skating and Universal Salvation

Gilbert and I changed out some storefront glass and made lots of money. The best part was that the storefront was for lease, so inside was just a huge open space. Even the floor was stripped bare. I came prepared with my skateboard. It was premium. I manualed the length of the store.

I candidly expressed some universalist inklings at a home bible study. No one kicked me out. I think most related to my struggles. If universalism would have any substantial argument, surely it would appeal to the New Testament, to the atoning death of Jesus Christ. The result of that "one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men," (Rom 5:18). Patronizing talk of "whatever feels right for you" seems a feeble attempt to dismiss an impossibly difficult question. Karma would have us recycled here forever. Allah promises a fire, an "evil resting place" for wrongdoers (Koran 18:29). The mosaic law would have had me stoned multiple times by now. The cross is my only chance. It's anyone's only chance. So I begin to wonder just how big God's grace in Jesus Christ is. Will it cover our denominational differences? Major ecclesiastical differences? Those who've never heard the story of Jesus? Those who doubt? Those who reject him vehemently and condemn His people's attempts to share His truth with others? For now, I trust only God to judge others, and not even to judge myself apart from the Holy Spirit and the scriptures. Maybe that's the only answer.

Culture or Fashion

We might have the impression that certain activities inspire their own cultures. Dirk and I discussed this while at the skatepark. Surfing would seem to inspire its own culture, as would skateboarding. But that doesn't work at all. "I don't think I could recognize a surfer in a crowd, unless he was carrying a surfboard or something," Dirk observed. Skate shoes don't mean we skate. Long hair doesn't mean we play guitar. People in neckties might be the biggest environmentalists, dreadlocked people can be the biggest snobs. People are full of surprises. Even siblings don't often look or act alike. Through families God teaches us to cooperate in, if not to enjoy, diversity. Nobey and Peter look and act quite differently, but they're best friends. They have the same Papa. Because of that, they are together and have everything in common (Acts 2:44), and they share everything they have (Acts 4:32). Jesus promises to inspire His own culture. "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God" (1 Peter 2:9) "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind" (Rom 12:2). To expect that culture to appear in look or lexicon of course is to trade the profound spiritual work of Christ for the superficial religious work of men. To admonish diversity is to resist nature, as God demonstrates in the biological family, and to detour challenges to our perceptions and understandings, and subsequent spiritual growth. I've learned much about faith and love from all the weird people at my church.

I zipped over to the skate park early one morning on the Honda 350 with my board strapped to my backpack. The weather was balmy, and I was changing lanes and pulling away from work traffic. The bike is a 1971 and in excellent condition, but the pipes has been modified so it's kind of noisy. I would prefer the less obtrusive little buzz of the original stock pipes, but the choice is not mine since the bike is borrowed. God really knows how to give good gifts to His children (Matt 7:11). I had been thinking hard about how I might get one, especially when we had only one vehicle and I was relying on the bus to get to college. I don't think I ever outright prayed to God for a motorcycle, not since junior high anyway, but one evening a friend from church brought this vintage beauty to the house and left it with me, hoping it would be of use. I've kept it a year now. I was the only one on the road leading to the skate park. I could see and smell the river, and I enjoy being alive.

scars in heaven

My wrist hurts just a little. I don't know if it's from falling off the skateboard or from punching the punching bag. It could be collaborative. I think some of us will have scars in heaven. Jesus, in his resurrected body, still had nail holes in his hands or wrists, and a spear gash in His side. (John 20:27). It didn't cause Him any discomfort. Our scars won't keep us from soaring on wings like eagles, running and not growing weary, walking and not being faint (Isaiah 40:31). I wouldn't expect our injuries sustained in mere daily life in an imperfect world, nor those due to sinful activities, to carry over into the next life, not for those made new in Jesus anyway, but those wounds acquired in obedience and service to the Kingdom will still be visible somehow. Paul will still bear in his body the marks of Christ (Galations 6:17). He and John the Baptist, I expect, will surely have their heads reattached, but somehow we will recognize what happened. As for Jesus' martyrs who were burned at the stake, for example, I don't know how, but I think we'll know them, too. So I wonder if I, at the renewal of all things, with my shins and knees and arms all baby fresh and clean again, will be ashamed before those people whom the world was not worthy of (Hebrews 11:38). I wouldn't expect to have any good conversations with them about how I kept my mouth shut to avoid contraversy, or how my feelings were hurt a little when someone disagreed with me about Jesus. I don't want to spend my brief time on earth carefully considering what everyone thinks about me. Should God have a long and safe life in mind for me, then there will be no reason for shame. But should He will that I know "the fellowship of sharing in His suffering" (Phil 3:10), then I don't want to miss it. I want to say that I "consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us" (Rom 8:18).

Worship

Nobey sits in my lap and pats my arm while telling me some intricate story about spaceships or dinosaurs. He is extremely articulate for four years old, and creative. Pete gives good hugs and kisses. Adah studies my face with her big brown eyes, and adores me simply because I put a bottle in her mouth. My beautiful Mervey tells me she misses me when I call from work. I barely work 40 hours a week and she wants me to come home, or wishes I didn't have to go. These people bring me great joy. I love them, and I remember, God loves me even better. I've been thinking about worship, and how we please our Father. It's beautiful to be shown affection or complimented and admired, but what's more touching is to see their love expressed in the subtleties of people's behavior, according to their individual personalities. I like to see them enjoy a meal, or for my kids to appreciate their toys. I like to teach them things, show them things, and to see their fascination. Jesus sanctifies daily life for those who are His. "To the pure, all things are pure" (Titus 1:15). For God's children there is no more distinction between the common and the sacred. We ourselves have become a temple of Holy God (1 Cor 3:16). So worship is more than vocalized adoration in church, or fixating on His greatness in our personal meditation. Worship is a perspective, a conscientiousness, by which we walk through each day with a heightened enjoyment and gratefulness for every good thing, no matter how small, as a gift from Heavenly Papa.

Death

A student killed thirty something people at a college in Virginia. You never know when you're going to go. It bothers me. I don't take a day for granted, not only because it might be my last, but also because I'd like for it not to be. Not taking life for granted means not only acknowledging that life is short, but also doing our best to make it long. So we try to be healthy, and we try to be careful. What else can we do? I've always had an overactive imagination. I mostly consider it a good thing. As Jack London wrote of the man in his story "To Build A Fire," the man's problem was that he lacked imagination. He never foresaw himself freezing to death. I've done, and still do, some daring things, but never without practice and careful assessment, and maybe that's helped to keep me from any serious injury. Imagination on the other hand can also paralyze us with fear. I've worried sick over uncontrollable, even ridiculous, possibilities. Jesus doesn't want us to fear. God is in control. Not even a sparrow "will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father" (Matt 10:29) Tragedy disturbs me terribly, and never as much as senseless, stupid violence. Sometimes I break into a sweat when I consider that I have brought kids into this place. I have to trust God, to trust Father's good plan and align myself with it. I want to truly say, "To live is Christ, to die is gain" (Phil 1:21).

Laying on the couch in the dimness before sunrise with Adah in my arms as she gulps down a warm bottle, drifting in and out of sleep. Those are some of my happiest moments. I open my eyes and see her big brown eyes studying my face, and she stops drinking a minute to break into a big grin, and it overjoys me. I feel great, warm overwhelming hope that this little baby loves me, she'll always love me, we'll have a good long life together. "You just don't understand," I tell her sometimes, "what you mean to me." She plays with my hair, rubs my face, pats my shoulder. These are some of the most peaceful moments for my mind. It's a tremendous assurance to know that she, along with the other 2 kids in the house, really seem to think I'm great, no matter what, even while to society I probably don't look like much of a contributor, and to some who know me well I'm probably a real smart alec or worse. The boys revere me as if I were Spiderman. I never want to spoil that for them. Pete says, "Can you do that because you're very strong?" I'll have done something like bring the play-do bucket down from the top shelf. "Yes," I tell him, "I'm intensely strong." Nobey asks sometimes, "Why you have to go to work?" He wants me to stay home with him. I tell him they're counting on me to build those windows, and he discusses with me how very big they all are. They treat me like I'm amazing.

More Than a Carpenter

I recently finished More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell. A youth minister gave me a copy of that book 15 years ago, and what parts of it I read haunted me in the section of my life when I wanted God to leave me alone. Still, all the best reasoning and evidence in the world is useless unless the Father who sent Jesus draws us (John 6:44). Reasoning void of the experiential is vanity. Some people report flipping the Bible open at random and being shown exactly what they need. What I find more beautiful is that I can set out reading the bible very systematically every day for years and sovereign God arranges for whatever section I am on to speak to me or coincide with what I need that day. In pursuing my religious studies minor, I was exposed occasionally to questions and arguments contrary to a Biblical perspective, and for which I wasn't smart enough to reason out the answers on my own. That year of college remains invaluable to me. I remember one sunny day at the fountain on campus praying to God about these conundrums, then opening the Word to the pre-determined segment of scripture I was to read, in John 6. Jesus asks the 12 disciples after some hard teaching, "You don't want to leave me too, do you?" John 6:68 reports, "Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.'" I was smiling and crying, because his answer became my answer, and remains so, in a divinely profound way. McDowell writes, "Christianity is not a religion; it's not a system; it's not an ethical idea; it's not a psychological phenomenon. It's a person. If you trust Christ, start watching your attitudes and actions because Jesus Christ is in the business of changing lives." (p 119). While skeptics continue to look at church buildings and insist that Christianity divides people, those of us following and loving and being loved by the living Jesus Christ are meeting brothers and sisters in His kingdom wherever we go. Brian and Tara Riley exemplify this in their mission experience. They told of Jesus' people from every denomination seeking Him in unity. The Holy Spirit is not at all confined by our church building walls, and His movement perhaps borders on heresy. The Riley's, beautiful fascinating people, are a part of it, and I want to be a part of it. God is cutting edge and I can't wait to see what He does next. Meeting these missionaries gave me a joy that reminded me, in the midst of some sadness that Jesus brings not peace but a sword between me and some who reject Him, to keep my eyes on His kingdom, lest I miss the beauty and blessing of this new and ever-growing family He has adopted me into.

Skateboarding

Ditch and I went skateboarding one night, jumping down stairs and popping ollies over curbs and such. Ditch is really good. I am okay sometimes. I think I do well for a 29 year old who has been skateboarding with any real dedication for less than a year. Whenever I'm having fun on my skateboard, I praise Jesus, because I consider it a gift from Him. I have felt like giving up more than once, until praying to the God who renews our strength (Isaiah 40:31), who even told me I would skateboard about a year and a half before I could afford a good board. Ditch and I found a really good spot at a big church, which was really productive until we noticed the "no skateboards" sign. I was hesitant to leave, but I didn't want to offend anyone, and I definitely didn't want to be a bad example to Ditch, who has yet to receive Jesus. He seemed to be waiting on my decision; it was entirely my call. I ollied down the steps on my way out.
More recently, Josh and I were at a little church where we'd just finished playing bass and guitar, respectively, for their multi-night revival. It was the final night and I'd been casing the parking lot for two nights; there was a low wall with a maybe two feet drop-off on the other side, and I wanted to ollie it. First we hit the kitchen and scored some strawberry cake. It was late and most everyone had left. Josh had already told me he used to be able to ollie down about 12 steps at a time when he was the age that normal people skateboard, so I knew whatever happened wouldn't be too impressive, but I was already committed. I'd landed something similar though smaller before in a parking lot where we'd randomly pulled the van over because smoke was coming out of the dash. This night I barely launched, much less landed. So it goes.

Universalism

Many people I meet probably float in the pool of universalism. Consistent denial of the supernatural simply requires more angst than is often sustainable, but the even bigger problem is that of death. Nothing disrupts our mazeway like the curse of death. So, in order to restore comprehension to our cosmos, we eventually succumb to some form of spirituality, some belief in an afterlife, whether by adopting an already established religion or by designing our own. The latter, I think, is increasingly popular, usually manifesting as universalism in one form or another. Universalism avoids the hard theological questions such as "What happens to the heathen who never hears of our Messiah?" We had lunch with some friends, not all Bible-believing, and someone said, "I can't believe in a religion that says Gandhi goes to hell." Laura said, "No one said hell was for bad people." But really, we're all bad people. I looked in the university library for some theological work of William Channing, credited with having much influence on the formation of Unitarianism. I found only humanitarian related commentary among his writings.
Hell is a hard thought. If the "Noble Savage" really does exist, surely loving God can impart to him righteousness as He can an unknowing child. I have much greater concern for my dear friends who consciously and persistently reject so great a salvation through Jesus Christ.

The Misery of Agnosticism

I made an attempt at atheism, influenced by a few different contributing factors. One was the circle of flavorful people I'd met who seemed apathetic if not incredulous toward the God I'd learned about in church. Then there were those in church who seemed equally apathetic, if not mean. Also, there is of course the persistent inundation of introductory level science that always left the impression that man has it all figured out, and complex life is not so complex, but sprouts like bread mold under the right conditions. At any rate, my attempt was short-lived. Atheism would be impossible to maintain without ample doses of misinformation and a strict adherence to daily rigorous exercises in closed-mindedness. The spiritual is simply too obvious, whether in order in the cosmos, beauty in creation, a miracle in a hospital or a timely word from a friend or stranger. And so I arrived at agnosticism, perhaps the most miserable of all religious points of view. Militant skepticism avails itself no pleasure, or at least rest for the mind, in the beauty of nature, or purpose in life, or faith in truth, lest one be deceived. Yet surely there would be more peace in being sincerely wrong than in the constant distrust of experience, emotions, or knowledge. While agnosticism feigns open-mindedness, it is actually a stubborn refusal to reach some informed conclusion. At last I'd indulged the nagging suspicion that God wasn't there, only to be confronted with the nagging dread that He was. I was haunted most by the empty tomb of Jesus of Nazareth. It loomed occasionally in my mind, inexplicable, indismissable, a reminder of a real and personal God, who was "pleased to have all His fullness dwell in (Jesus) and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, by making peace through His blood, shed on the cross" Colossians 1:19-20.

The Simple Life of the Atheist

Life might be simpler if I could be convinced to be an atheist. I wouldn't have to think so hard. I could smugly reduce all religious experience to the power of suggestion, morality to superstitious tradition. Maybe I could use people's religious convictions to manipulate them and have my way. It would be perfectly acceptable for me to be as aloof and inconsiderate as I tend to be; and much more so. In fact, regarding nature, or more specifically random chance and survival of the fittest, as the highest authority, that would be the only reasonable behavior to exhibit. Nevertheless, many atheists seem to spend much time attempting to convince themselves and others that we don't need a god to motivate us toward good deeds and being nice, which would seem to me to be an exercise in hypocrisy. Their altruism betrays the Tao, the Absolute Morality, the crucified and resurrected Messiah from whom all charity and self-sacrificing flow, and perhaps their fear of that Truth. Perhaps we find that helping out our neighbor adds meaning to an otherwise pointless existence in an accidental universe, but for the atheist to do so is to defy the highest authority, which mandates that I allow the weak to be eaten if I don't eat them myself. The Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy tells us everything is winding down, and so the chief end of everything in the universe is to collapse and implode into non-existence. Life would be simpler without heaven, hell, and the God who calls to us, "Here am I, here am I. All day long I have held out my hands to an obstinate people, who walk in ways not good, pursuing their own imaginations." Isaiah 65:2

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...

I wonder how long I could convince myself that a pleasant life was the product of my positive thinking. I can make healthful, disciplined choices about my diet and activities. I can make informed decisions to hopefully procure future economic viability, but that always involves uncertainty. An upbeat attitude, or even faith in some higher power, can help us overcome illness or addiction. But that is virtually nothing in light of all time, space and energy in the universe. Whatever I suspect that I know or that I am capable of must be purely by the grace of God. I had no control over my arrival and placement in the vast universe, and I have minimal control over the six billion people I share the planet with. All the positive thinking in the world won't stop us from getting old, or getting run over or killed in some mishap. Positive thinking has never caused me to be able to grow a full beard, or caused my very straight hair to dreadlock, in spite of my preferences. Positive thinking, whatever power may exist therein, is certainly nothing worth designing a religion around or making an idol out of, though it is an attractively self-gratifying, perhaps self-justifying concept for those of us born beautiful, intelligent, and in the peak time and location of all human civilization. Life and social stability are far too precarious to take credit for, or to take for granted. A more significant observation than this is that the closer I walk with Jesus, the more I recognize that there is no positive thinking apart from Him. My mostly pleasant life has still been accompanied by a plethora of negativity on my part. "I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature" (Romans 7:18).

If I'm on my skateboard, coasting toward a curb with intentions to ollie up on top of it, I can watch the curb and begin to think about timing it, and then notice how fast I'm going, I get worried and mess up every time. But if I let the curb fade into the peripheral, and focus on the skateboard under my feet, and think about performing tried and true technique, I surprise myself by putting it right on top of the curb where it should be. I had trouble with math because I could never bring myself to trust the formulas. It wasn't enough that they demonstrably functioned to generate correct answers. Because I couldn't understand why they worked, I couldn't bring myself to commit to them. I've since learned that it is okay to trust the mathematical geniuses who've understood more than I ever will and have graciously left their methods behind for us to follow. Though I once regarded formal education as an inhibitor to creativity, I now see that learning and applying techniques, whether they be epistemological or martial arts, is conducive to freedom and spontaneity. Ensuring that we commit ourselves to the correct techniques, then, is critical. So I begin with reason to discern the technique which has taken its masters the highest, and following reason is a decision to place my faith in this technique. Faith is not careening toward the curb wildly hoping I can ollie it. Faith is concentrating on what I've been taught and shown, knowing what I must do and doing it.

Darwin Day

I emailed the sponsoring Professor of the Anthropology club's Darwin Day display in the university library. Darwin Day is February 12. The display contained books, articles, quotes, pictures, all quite appropiate, except for multiple stickers depicting "icthus", the Christian fish symbol, with added legs and labeled "Darwin". I took a cultural anthropology class once for my religious studies minor. The most astute and useful observation I made was in noticing the consistent hypocrisy among some of those who presumed themselves to be observing human behavior objectively without noticing the blatant double-standard they held due to their own biased contempt for anything nominally Christianity. For the cartoon show South Park to parody anything possibly held sacred by any group in America, religious or otherwise, is comical and even progressive, but for Christian missionaries to unwittingly disrupt an indigenous culture's social structure by bringing gifts of axes for chopping firewood is contemptible, an inexcusable act of ethnocentric hubris, condescension typical of white Americans. And so it was with the Anthropology club's display: biased contempt, not objective Science, betrayed by the inability to resist an inflammatory signal to the less educated bible-thumpers. In a "Christians are Stupid Day" display, the modified Jesus fish would be appropriate; in a Darwin Day display, they are insidious. I begin to wonder if Darwinian Evolution can even be disconnected from anti-religious agenda. I think as an experiment, Christian fundies should begin to zealously advocate rapidly occurring macro-evolution as the only reasonable explanation as to how every species of non aquatic animal could possibly have appeared from Noah's ark, and then watch how quickly "respectable" science vacillates.

I once talked to a young druid at Paganfest. He'd been practicing druidism for a decade or more. His father was buddhist and his mother, he told me, was christian. I asked him what he found in druidism that appealed to him so. "Harmony with nature," he replied. "Nature has almost no one to defend her, and druids are her guardians." He wore a long, black robe and sold staffs which he whittled and ornamented from, as he pointed out, "already dead" forest material. We were at Paganfest peddling tie-dye. Next he flipped my question on me: "What do you find in being a christian?" I wasn't expecting the question; my subject had suddenly become the scientist. I had rather anticipated demonstrating to him that, whatever his answer, my God would not only put his talents and interests to good use, but bring them to completion. I was working off of the presupposition that no religion has anything good to offer which cannot also be found in serving Christ, and I still believe that to be true. We are broken and incomplete fragments of what He intended for us to be, prior to our acquiescing to His perfecting hands. In God's kingdom there is a place for environmentalists and capitalists, vegans and ranchers, poets and warriors. To cast myself upon God's mercy, His Son Jesus Christ, is not, I have been pleased to discover, to be brainwashed and assimilated. "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation" (1 Cor 5:17a) but that doesn't mean God threw all the old pieces away. Some of them were quite salvageable, and He doesn't like waste. I have been a dirty, outdoorish, guitar-playing daydreamer both out of His beautiful will and in the dead center of it. Nevertheless, "the old has gone, the new has come!"

Skimboarding Feb 07

It snowed lightly. The roads looked to me unworthy of travelling with only liability insurance, and so I delayed going to work. I instead spent the morning skim-boarding across the front yard while Nobey wrote his name and made tracks in the snow. I was pleased to discover last winter that the skimboard I bought at the beach also works over ice and snow. I've even used it though with little success in heavy rain when the driveway flooded, but the concrete really scuffed it up. "Buenos Dias," I called to my Mexican neighbors. No matter how much spanish I use in conversation, native speakers consistently insist on speaking to me in english. It kind of hurts my feelings. They watched with grins as I made an attempt to skim the snowy lawn, and of course that time I only made it a foot or so and slipped off. They went back inside. Making my feet stick to the board is the most difficult part. Everyone knows that surfers use SexWax, but I don't know if I could find that in Arkansas. I had a few successful runs anyway. Skimboarding is a sport in which one must content himself in the pursuit, rather than the achievement, of the ideal. I resign myself to the possibility that failing at this repeatedly is somehow beneficial to my mind and body, and in the rare event that I do go gliding gracefully 15 or 20 feet over surf or snow, it's beautiful.

Feb 2007 Love and Prejudice

There was a presumably Muslim fellow in the gym on campus. He was working out as was I, maintaining my ultra-elite athleticism. I wanted to talk to him, and I hoped to catch his eye, but he avoided my glances. I am often unfriendly because my own prejudices intimidate me. I am convinced that Muslims hate me so I ignore them. The more logical response would be to reach out and make peace, but prejudice is not logical. I did not find opportunity to converse with him, but the event was still significant. I wanted to talk to him. I looked on him with a compassion that suddenly almost made me cry, and I have discovered it happening increasingly, and towards lots of people. I have been praying for love for a long time, and while I have made observations as to what love must be like, it is only recently that I have felt love growing exponentially within, that I have noticed compassion welling up, on the verge of overwhelming my own introverted personality, and my isolationist propensity. Maybe Father never fixes something about us without also showing us, in spite of our disappointment, where the problems lie. My lack of love was obvious to me, but my prejudices much less so.

Mervey signed us up for a two week free trial of Netflix, the movie rental program in which they ship you requested movies as quickly as you can watch them and ship them back. She said, "Someday people might stop sending us free trials," that is if they notice we consistently partake and then cancel promptly. It is part of her surpassing mastery, as the wife of noble character, over living cheaply in America. I hope one day we write a book about it, not unlike the beatnik classic "Steal this Book," except perhaps titled "Wait for This Book to Go on Sale" or "Buy this Book at a Yard Sale." Our motives have not always been perfect; there is after all only one perfect motive: that "Christ's love compels us" (2 Cor 5:14). Nevertheless, in God's grace, we continue to grow toward great gain as He teaches us true contentment (1Tim 6:6). As for movie renting, it is difficult to set aside time for viewing, only slightly less difficult to justify. Four to five movies, for example, in the course of one month is many hours dedicated to almost complete non-productivity. Granted I have been invigorated, inspired, and educated by an assortment of movies, but they are mostly diversions from the discussions, contemplations, studies, relationships, prayers, work, play, and sleep that make life beautiful, and conducive to divine abundance.

Ultra-Elite Athlete

We experimented with a computer program supposed to customize a physical fitness program for a person. It calculated my resting heart rate at 48 beats per minute and concluded that unless there was a mistake or I was on medication, I am an "ultra-elite athlete." That's what I like to hear. I should reach my target age of 120 no problem. I started bicycling to work six years ago motivated by something like misery, hatred and guilt. Even after Jesus stepped in, I would still scream at people who honked at me, invite motorists to stop and fight, and try to chase cars down occasionally. Now, after five years of learning under His yoke, my outbursts have become a non-occurrence. Granted, I've found a more remote route to travel, but avoidance of temptation is far more essential to godliness than feigning some pious disinterest in worldly pleasures or carnal passions. My motives for commuting by bicycle are different now, in fact my motive is mostly singular: Joy. God's having set my heart at peace actually enables me to enjoy life, because I no longer have something to prove. All the other incentives, though profound, such as ecological responsibility, economic necessity, or achieving ultra-elite athleticism, are subsequent, even merely collateral, to the exuberance of abundant life in Jesus.

We had waterfront property for a little while. We rented a small storage unit for a month, and just across the chain link security fence was a pond. Retrieving the few pieces of furniture we had stored, I savored the quiet view one last time before closing the account. It appears that we will not be moving as quickly as we, in our finite reasoning, had determined we should. The storage unit compound is on a gentle slope with smooth pavement and lots of little drop-offs built in, and I looked up and down with my skateboard in hand after loading up the Explorer. I really wanted to skate the place on my final departure, but the security cameras intimidated me. Had I thought better about it, I'd have realized that surely no one is employed to stare at a huge storage unit complex on screen. That would be intensely boring, and probably useless. Still, I didn't want any trouble before I got my deposit back. I suppose that was a violation of Resolution number three: fear less. I slipped my board back into the back of the Explorer, beside my great-grandfather's delapidated red vinyl chair, and left quietly.

Sunday, 31 December 2006

My three New Year's resolutions are to give more ruthlessly, love more intently, and fear less. It may seem that giving is the only resolution I have any control over, while love and fear are contingent on what God enables me to do. In fact, everything is contingent on soveriegn God's enabling, so an act of giving is no more in my ability than an act of loving or an act of not fearing. Conversely, decisions to love or to be more fearless are no less beyond my range of responsibility than is a choice to give. God is in control, and our greatest and most underesimated power is prayerfully seeking Him in worship, study and meditation, for without Him, as Augustine said, we cannot will to will. All of these-- giving, loving, and fearlessness-- are so closely related as to be intertwined. Ultimately, I want more than just what's right. Doing what's right is for religious people. I want to learn self-sacrifice from the King who endured a cross, and who calls to us, "Follow me."