lost in a cloud

As I am writing this blog I am listening to The Transfiguration by Sufjan Stevens. The song ends by repeating: 

Lost in a cloud a voice: Have no fear! We draw near!

Lost in a cloud, a sign: Son of Man! Turn your ear!

Lost in a cloud, a voice: Lamb of God! We draw near!

Lost in a cloud a sign: Son of Man! Son of God!

The cloud being referenced is the cloud hiding the face of the Father, when He spoke of Jesus, to Peter, James and John on a mountainside. Jesus has just stood along side Moses and Elijah (Israels two greatest leaders/prophets) and was transfigured from a lowly carpenter into a the Lord in all His glory. 

I have read this story since I was a child, but Stevens has helped me go somewhere else. I have always stayed on the surface of the story; Jesus has been revealed as Lord, He is greater than Israel's prophets and is being affirmed by the Father. I felt very intelligent when I first put together that God's glory had been personified as a cloud during the Jews time wandering the dessert. It all fit so neatly, Jesus is clearly the greatest of all Jews, the messiah, God Himself. 

This is all true. 

But the cloud never meant a thing to me. It's just a cloud. 

This is no ordinary cloud though. This cloud engulfs them (Matthew 9:34), they are as Stevens puts it "lost in a cloud". 

I have grown obsessed with this song and as result, this piece of scripture over the past week. I want to be lost in that cloud. I am tired of the rest of the world. I am tired of my questions, my doubts, my responsibilities. I want to be in the cloud. I want to be engulfed in the presence of God. I want that foreboding cloud in the distance, the cloud that leads the way, to be close. 

wither

he is the vine, we are the branches

we are told to love, but we cannot

we are told to serve, but we want more

we are told to embrace the unembracable, but we shy away

he is the vine, we are the branches

we are told to love mercy, but we thirst for vengence

we are told to turn the other cheek, but we fear pain

we are told to be humble, but we want to know

he is the vine, we are the branches 

we are told to wait, but we squirm

we are told to recieve, but we are proud

we are asked to be intimate, but we are ashamed

he is the vine, we are the branches

paul

My friend Paul is a great guy. People always need a Paul in their lives. Paul is a constant servant, he always makes time for people and he loves to do things for his friends. Some people simply want to tell you how much they like you, or perhaps more telling, they want to convince you that they really are good people. Paul isn't like that, Paul will work his fingers to the bone to show you that he loves you.

Paul is not a well educated guy. He is not a professor or a theologian. He loves Jesus, but isn't all that interested in trying to tell other people the answers. Paul has never really figured out to condemn people...maybe his life has something to do with that.

Paul you see, in an alcoholic. For years he drank too much. Maybe it had something to do with seeing too many war-time duties. Paul never knew how to discern when he had too much, of course until the day he decided not to drink anymore. Never had a drop after that.

Paul also smokes. He knows he should stop, but it's a nasty habit you see. Besides, he already has the emphysema, so is it really worth stopping? Oh, and don't count on that emphysema thing keeping Paul from refinishing a table, painting a bathroom, building a garden or working on any other project that needs done.

Paul loves his wife, Bonnie. He talks about her all the time. She is the prettiest, smartest, most patient woman in the world, if you ask Paul. He cannot make it through a conversation without talking about Bonnie. Sadly, Bonnie passed away about three years ago, even though you would never know it by the way he talks about her.

Paul also loves the Raiders. I guess not anyone is perfect.

Paul just does things the right way, he doesn't know any better.

About eight months ago Paul took a job working at a church. He would be paid moderately, but he would be able to move out of his truck and into an apartment in the church. He took the job and did the right thing, and the right thing was to work hard. Despite his emphysema he got his jobs done, even if that meant working late into the night.

I don't know if Paul was working late last night when the shooter entered the church. He may have been working on one of his many projects. What I do know is where Paul was shot...in the church office. By the phone. Paul made a choice and it wasn't to hide in his well hidden apartment. Paul chose instead, to make for the office, for the phone. Paul never made the call he tried to make. He was shot too soon for that.

Paul did, however, die as he lived. He died doing things the right way.

My friend, enjoy your new life without emphysema. Enjoy your new life without loneliness. Keep living the right way.

I love you.

a call to live

I have a confession for everyone... I am bored.

Bored, bored, bored.

I am bored of overly choreographed worship. I am bored of TV. I am bored with DVD's, video games, even (just a little bit) with sports.

All of it simply reeks of familiarity, it feels like I have seen it or experienced all too many times before. I want live an abundant life, but somehow, somewhere I have settled for a redundant one.

But I have to ask; does anyone really have the answer to that which ails me? Really? Is there anyone out there, any real saints or real sinners who can tell me what it means to truly live?

I have tried pretty hard a more worldly route. I have drank nights away, with only slight recollections to tell me what I missed the morning after. But those nights rarely ever led to any epic life giving morning. They were depressingly like each night that came before them. The script remained the same: Drink. Smoke something that would have me coughing for two days. Tell all my friends how much I loved them (which was very true, though I only seemed capable to say it when intoxicated). Hit on some girls. Abuse myself with a cookie sheet, a bush, or occasionally a lighter and then go to bed somewhere I never intended to. Repeat.

Is that really an epic or abundant way to live? I craved stories, something that would impress others, or make me some sort of legend. However, most those nights filled no real hole, except a legit desire to see my buddies.

But do Christians really offer a better path? As a Christian male I know that an entire Christian industry has formed around a basic acknowledgment that we are bored by Christianity. For awhile I found a lot of satisfaction in that industry, but I am no hunter or camper. I have lots of friends who are not Christians who feel manly out in the woods. I don't. I have to believe that Christ's promise of an abundant life still applies to me, as wussy as city life has made me.

Recently I thought that maybe abundant life would meet me if I took better care of my body, if I could simply do away with all of the pesky insecurities of the way I look, then life would suddenly grow easier and more exciting. So I changed the way I eat and started working out. Next thing I knew I weighed 40 pounds less and could run longer and play sports better then I ever had before. Surely life feels more abundant now! Nope. I am still me and perhaps that is the problem.

In reality I do want to be part of some epic story, the heart of what I was looking for when I would get wasted and use my hand for kindling. I do want to be part of an adventure, just not one in the woods. Furthermore I am correct in seeing that insecurity is holding me back. Unfortunately insecurity cannot be healed by looking good in facebook pictures.

Today is the day after Easter. Today is the first day to follow the resurrection of Jesus. For many of us, the resurrection of Jesus doesn't represent anything more than a fancy type of fire insurance, some guarantee that hell is not in our immediate future. I am banking that it means something more. I am banking that it represents a new way to live our lives. Life without nagging insecurities. Life that takes place in the midst of some epic story. Life that offers adventures and challenges that dare us to be more than we thought we can be. I need to live like Jesus' resurrection ultimately gives me an opportunity to fail. By fail I mean shoot higher and farther than I could if what I did depended on me and now that death (or boredom, they feel the same to me) is only temporary and that life really can be eternal.

I want to invite anyone who reads this to come along with me. If you are bored with church, your lifestyle or your own pesky internal monologue, let's live resurrected lives!

silence

iPods, laptops, elevator music, car CD players, generic muzak... is there anywhere that you can go for a little silence these days?

And if there were, would we actually want it?

This week I was at a staff retreat and we spent one day taking three separate SILENT retreats. I was forced to spend 6 hours quiet for one day. SIX HOURS?! How did I survive?!

Quite well, actually.

I heard from Jesus. I dreamed for campus. I recognized how exhausted my body was. I saw beauty in the world around me. I mourned the way evil had rocked my life and the lives of those I love. I recognized bad patterns in my life and the way I use my time.

Without my mp3 player, March Madness or Spring Training I was forced to look at myself. Some of what I saw was ugly, some was beautiful, some was just downright hilarious.

Of course that was the point of the exercise and that is the role of silence in our lives.

So friends join me! Try taking some time each day to stop and be quiet.

what does a Christian look like?

Donan recently told me about a Bible study that she had where a woman in the study lamented that she didn't "look like a Christian".

Look like a Christian?

This has got me asking myself, what exactly does a Christian look like?

Well, if you watch a lot of TV, I suppose a Christian wears a lot of sweaters. You know, really tasteful ones. Oh, and khakis! I almost forgot the very well ironed khakis.

If you read Relevant magazine Christians dress really, really well. Tight shirts, emo pants, sports coats and trendy plastic rim glasses.

If you went the missions conference that I went to over Christmas break, you could buy all of the clothes that we were selling and look like a mission minded Christian!

If you hang out with me, mostly we wear t-shirts and jeans.

I am not making light of the question... in fact I think that it is a very important question. Is it wrong for Christian to look trendy? Sexy? Grungy? Should Christians spend a lot of money on good haircuts, or should that be spent on more important things?

What about at church?! In God's house should we dress up? Is it more authentic if we are more dingy in the presence of the Lord? Yesterday I wore orange and blue to church, a nod to the Chicago Bears, is this a sign of my idolatry, or a fun little riff that I was planning on wearing for the rest of the day?

This seems like a silly question I realize, but I am not sure that it actually is. I have seen this scene too many times, someone walks into a church and soon realizes they have violated some unspoken dress code. A college girl who is showing a little cleavage is all but ignored by the church, until a timid middle aged woman with a sweater buttoned up to her neck finally greats her. Awkwardness hangs over the conversation like a carport. Or a twenty something couple comes to church with their small child. All of them are dressed in their finest formal garb, unaware that this is a "cool church" where the congregation looks like they are following the Fray on tour.

Maybe Andre was right, "image is everything".

Or maybe not.

Jesus had quite a crew of groupies and I am sure they all dressed according to their roles, just like today. Think that the rich tax collector and the fishermen dressed alike? What about the prostitute and the religious zealot? Paul was one of the most respected religious teachers of his time and in those days the religious leaders tended to wear some pretty nice threads (sound familiar?), but after he gave his life over this subversive movement, he encountered a new church headed up by a fisherman! Quick, picture Billy Graham and you favorite fishing buddy. What do you think their closets look like?

Ultimately, I don't think that our church's are ever supposed to be full of similar looking people. The Kingdom of God is for everyone; cleavage, green hair, flannel, ties, holey jeans and bad perms be damned! When the unspoken rules of our culture start to dictate norms more than the word of God we have a problem. We need Jesus. His group of misfits worked, because He made it work.

What are we willing to lose to make it work?

failure

I am a failure.

I have failed my friends, my family, myself, my God.

I have betrayed more people than I can count, for my own purposes.

I am a liar, an adulterer, a fraud and a coward.

My biggest failure though? I fail to embrace my second chance.

I refuse to believe Jesus when He cries "It is finished".

Still I strive to prove myself, to stand out from the pack... to be known for my successes and to desperately hide my failures.

I have stopped believing that the cross is enough. I have tried to add another chapter to God's law. I heap these coals on those who observe me.

I am forgiven.

I am a forgiven failure.

I am going to fail again...

and again...

and again.

But I will be forgiven forever.

I will be free forever.

I am a free, forgiven failure.

That is better than being a success any day.

a story about peace

Do yourself a favor, open up a Bible. Go ahead, it will be worth it. Read John chapter 1 verses 1-18. Read it again.

And again.

And again.

Let it change you. Let perspective overcome you. It will be worth it, I promise. Untie some of the convoluted language. Take it plainly.

Let your heart rest in the reality that through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

The whole of history, the drama that we live in, the trials and the tribulations of our lives all boil down to one simple truth.

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

In Jesus is found life or as John puts it, "the light of man". We are unlit lanterns, Jesus is the match.

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

As I read through the first few chapters of John this morning, I felt myself being unwound. Weeks of stress and weighty obligation began to lift and in its place came life giving perspective.

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

The ridiculous simplicity of it all makes me want to chuckle at my last few days, days of stress and insecurity. Days in which I have felt all too important and all to unqualified.

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

Throughout scripture Jesus will call me servant, worker, disciple, teacher and friend. All important roles, all carrying a certain degree of responsibility. But they never overrule a simple and life-giving truth;

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

Rest in that truth friends. Remember who Jesus is. John calls him the "One and Only", other times he is called "the beginning and the End".

If we can slow down and make ourselves stop and dwell in that truth, it will change us. I am trying to allow it to change me. The weight of expectation can slip away. The ridiculous clamoring of doing everything right can finally begin to slow down. The guilt of what we have done and have not done can begin to look small in the light of Jesus.

So please, rest with me in a simple truth...

Through Jesus the world came to be and through him the world is restored.

tv can inspire

I want to create something.

I have been watching "Freaks and Geeks" lately. It's one of the best pieces of digital entertainment that I have ever seen. It is funny, heartfelt, awkward, it is just a pitch perfect show. Every once in awhile I see something that does more than entertain me, it actually makes me want to jump in and do something. Too often I think that we limit ourselves to thinking that we can only be inspired by some classic book or epic movie, "Freaks and Geeks" is just a high school dramady, but I feel creatively juiced by it. It makes me long for the nights when Patrick, Dylan, Aaron, Nick and Adam and I would just run a muck with video camera. I am sure much of what we created was unwatchable to many people, but some stuff was just plain good. I want to make something good again.

Any else ever feel like this?

nice guy

I have a confession to make... I am a nice guy. I say "thank you" often, I want to be helpful, I would prefer if none of you reading this never were offended by me and I will apologize for things that are not my fault. I like to be liked.

I also hold grudges when people can't tell that I am offended, dread conversations with people who might be upset with me, don't stand up and tell people to back off when they're wrong. I pretend everything is okay, even when it so very much not.

The funny thing about all of this though is that most people I really respect are not all like me. When I was a kid my heroes were Wolverine, Snake Eyes, the wrestler Ricky Steamboat, not exactly the greatest negotiators in the world! But they were just. They knew justice, they fought for justice. They sacrificed their safety what they knew to be right. As I got older I changed, but the heroes were just new versions of the same theme, replace the old list with Martian Luther King, Daredevil, Jesus Christ, William Wallace, again heroic people who are willing to lay out for justice. Sure, MLK and William Wallace practiced very different methods in their fight for freedom, but both risked in spite of their own relative comfort and both died at the hands of their oppressors. In fact the theme is the same throughout history, especially church history, some people need to step out of line and challenge the structures that oppress others and rob God his glory. This is how God uses people to change the world.

And I believe how God chooses to change our individual lives. Bus boycotts are heroic. So are blistering sermons against corrupt leadership. And so is swinging your sword in the right circumstances. I believe this is practiced everyday. When I choose to reconcile with a friend instead of just swallowing back my frustration, I think I am taking one step closer to becoming someone God can use. When I choose honesty instead of empty flattery, confession instead of justification, Godly conflict instead of avoidance... all of these are muscles that need to be developed.

These are the workouts that I am trying to practice. So invite all of my nice friends to join me. Are you also sick of having the desires of your hearts be so inconsistent with your day to day life? Do you feel like life should be an adventure and instead has become a chore? Let us join together is prayer that God can make us like his prophets, his people. Let us have the hard conversations and confrontations. Let us be radical in our love and forgiveness, but also in our honesty and forthrightness. People will get upset. Harmony will be shattered. But I also believe that our friendships will become deeper and our relationships will become more real. Is that worth it?

I'm betting that it is.

interesting

Each month I receive an issue of the videogame magazine Electronic Gaming Monthly. I enjoy the magazine not because I am a hardcore gamer, but more because it is well written, funny and offers a very in depth picture at an industry that is rapidly growing. One of the writers for this magazine is humorist by the name of Seanbaby. In the most recent issue, he is wrote a very funny article about the simply bad ideas that came out the E3 game show. One of these ideas that got the treatment from him was a Christian Worship rip-off of Dance, Dance Revolution, called Dance Praise. His quote concerning the game was; "In the end all I learned was that Christian anything sucks more than Regular anything. Which knowledge I think we all had before this ordeal of mine began". I would like to point out that Seanbaby's "ordeal" was pretty a heinous example of a Christian (or at least someone promoting a Christian game) being extremely defensive and judgmental, and I do not blame Seanbaby for his frustration. But that is not the point of this blog, what is the point of this blog; is Seanbaby correct? Is Christian art simply derivative drivel that insults the intelligence of its audience?

I am not sure. For the longest time I would avoid all Christian music like I avoid the Lifetime channel. It all seemed so phony. No one ever seemed to have any problems, and if they did have problems they all seemed to resolve the songs four minute runtime. Now, I do listen to it, mostly because I can relate to the theme of trusting an all-knowing God. However I must confess, that I have had to tone down some of my objective standards for musical quality to enter into the Christian music scene. With a few very notable exceptions, much of the music still rings hollow and a little disingenuous. Also some of it is just bad. I am not talking about lyrically and I am certainly not implying that I am offended by it. I mean it is simply low-quality pop, that is over-produced. But why is this? Shouldn't Christian music be the most vivid and the most honest music there is? When singing about an infinite God, shouldn't things to say be, well, infinite? When basing your life on Jesus, shouldn't your art be as edgy as he was? Wasn't he edgy enough to get himself killed?

A popular Seattle Christian music station brags about its music being non-offensive. I simply don't believe that is something to brag about. Jesus is offensive.

Let me repeat that, Jesus is offensive.

A living, breathing man saying he is God is an offensive concept.

A man who walks into churches and flips tables and drives people out by using chords as whips, is offensive.

A man who tells parables about comfortable, rich people going to hell for not taking care of the poor around them is offensive.

A man who tells you to get over yourself and that until you do your not fit for the Kingdom of God is offensive.

And if that offends us, it is time to get over ourselves.

Becky Manly Pippert is a popular Christian writer. I saw a video of hers where tells a story about telling a man on a plane that she is a Christian and him giving her a look implying that she as a result must not be very intelligent. This video was filmed in the 80's and I am not sure the intelligent piece is all that relevant anymore. Now I think it is about being interesting. I think it is the perception of the world and even the lie that Christians often believe about themselves, that the belief in Jesus makes us less interesting. That it is the work of God to remove everything that makes us unique and maybe controversial, in order to make us "good Christians". The lie is that God wants us to be "safe" and to "well-behaved".

Well I am sorry to say that is not what I signed up for.

When I relented to Jesus, it was because he was the most radical and scary thing I had ever encountered. And it is an insult to God simply try and "Christianize" the things around us. When we say yes to the freeing grace of God, our art and our lives should be the most vivid and real thing this world has ever seen. And I pray that by the grace of God that we get from wherever we're at, to that place soon.

Madrox

Last week I went to see X3 with Donan and Sean. Donan and I had seen it already, but Sean had not and it was being shown at our local cheap theater. I actually enjoyed the movie more the second time through, my nerdy qualms have mostly been dismissed. I however struggled more with one character than I did my first time through; Jaime Madrox, "Multiple Man".

As one can guess by the code name, Madrox is able to create duplicates of himself. No one is really sure how many he can create. In the movie, he uses these duplicates to rob banks and to fool the police into thinking they had found a giant mutant camp. That's it. That is all we get about my favorite comic hero of the moment (obviously, on film he is not heroic).

Madrox has he is portrayed in the comics, is infinitely more interesting. For one he is not a petty bank robber, but a hero. He leads a team called X-Factor, who function as a mutant private detective organization of sort. While teams like the X-Men focus on the global issues, X-Factor lives in a place called "Mutant Town", where less glamorous mutants live in a slum-like community. These are the people X-Factor serve. They rarely save the world, instead they save the forgotten and neglected members of their own minority population.

Madrox's power is also more interesting in the comics. While the movie gets it basically right, it leaves out all of the good questions that arise when you are truly a "Multiple Man". Madrox's dupes are not exact duplicates, they are actually physical representatives of his own personality. So one duplicate can be fool-hearty, but brave hero. Another, a complete coward. Still another, an over-sexed ladies man. When they return to Madrox they bring with them all of their experiences, memories and knowledge. One dupe became a lawyer. As a result of all of this extreme multi-tasking Madrox is one of the most intelligent people on earth. He also is an Olympic gymnast. He is a martial arts master. Not bad skills for a one man army! This comes at a cost though, he is borderline insane. He doesn't know what thoughts are his own. Some of his duplicates have done some villainous things. But what does that mean? Doesn't the evil that leads to those acts come from his own soul? And what happens when your power is to create duplicates, but you are not even sure if you can trust those duplicates?

Madrox is the reason that I love comic books. I have these same questions about myself. I can I long to do good, yet commit evil? How can I be drawn to things I view as wrong? How do I sometimes surprise myself by doing something brave? Just what is going on inside of me?! As Paul puts in Romans 7:15; "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate to do". I am a conflicted person, trying to do right, but often desiring and doing wrong.

In comics these questions can be given a dramatic platform to be asked in. In comics you can create Jaime Madrox, a normal and conflicted guy, trying to fight evil around him and inside of him at the same time. You can create a character capable of doing great good and great evil. You can create the most vividly human character that I have ever encountered in any form of fiction.

superman returns

A few days ago I saw Superman Returns and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was relevant to today, had top notch acting and a compelling cast of characters. The effects were done very well and the new Supes did a decent job (though at times he seemed to be doing a really good Christopher Reeve impression rather than putting his own spin on the character). The movie did make Superman's life a lot messier and I think the film is better off for it. The dude is so freakin powerful I want him to have daddy and relationship issues. I guess I am cynical. I am ready to finally admit that it was a LITTLE long, but in the theater I hardly noticed. I was in Metropolis and I think that is all that really matters.

a really good story

A couple of years ago, when I was still in school, a friend asked me an important question. To some degree it is the question that the rest of my life revolves around. It is a question that has determined my vocation, the major that I had in school, the decision to date and ultimately marry Donan. The question was, "so how does the whole Jesus dying on the cross thing work? How does that forgive sins?". I froze. I was ready to talk about Jesus' heart for the poor. I was ready to speak volumes about how Jesus doesn't belong to a political party. But this question? I truly was stunned that I had nothing to offer. I told my friend, one of the best friends that I have I might add, a jumbled bit of nothing. I think I rambled about the Jewish people having a system of sacrifice or something like it. And that was the end of the conversation.

As I reflect of this, I think it is too easy to say that I was scared, because to be honest I wasn't. I wasn't scared, like I said this is a really good friend of mine, no matter what I said that wasn't going to change. It is also to easy to say that I had been equipped to answer that question he would've been excited or accepted the answer, because me and this friend debate everything under the sun. The biggest problem is that I believe that the cross and the resurrection, are the most important events in human history. In those three days I believe that for the rest of time and whatever happens after time, we can know that God cares. We can be assured that we can spend time in God's presence. All of the doubts about our worth can be healed. Every question can be answered, every injustice can be reversed and our hearts can find the home that they have thumped in our chest for and longed for everyday since we left our mother's wombs. That is huge. That is really good news. I think it is important that I am able to articulate that, at least as well as I can articulate why Empire is the best Star Wars movie. So here it is, three years late I am going to try and answer my friend's question.

The bad news; all people, everywhere, anytime are sick. Really sick. It is why we fight wars. It is why we rape and murder. It is why we are jealous of each other, objectify each other, feel insecure, blow off each other and ultimately act wrong to each other. We also all are on some level aware of this sickness. We try and cure it with a lot of self-discipline, we try and justify it with humanism and we try and self-medicate by getting drunk and stoned until our heads finally shut up. But it doesn't work, ever. With this sickness our world and our hearts will never know peace. Ever.

This sickness separates us from God. This is the uncomfortable, but ultimately unavoidable reality of our condition. When we try and self-medicate or deny our condition, we are denying God and his power. We are choosing our own. And when we die (which we will, another part of this disease) this good God will not force Himself on us. We are truly sick and need healing to enter the presence of God. Our sickness, uncured will separate us from God. Forever.

Okay so the good news. God was and is not pleased with this reality. So he did something about it. He became a person, Jesus. He lived and taught a better way. The best way. He taught against a rigid and futile self-disciplined and proved it didn't achieve anything. He dwelt with the self medicators and showed them a freedom they never knew. Then he died. He died because as God, he knew that his very real death would work as an antibiotic for our soul sickness. That shed blood is necessary to change our lives, now and forever. Then something even more amazing happened, Jesus did the one thing no one had done since the sickness entered the world, he didn't stay dead. He rose again and told others that they could do the same.

Jesus died, so that we could live. Jesus died to offer us freedom for ourselves. Jesus died to clean the slate, to make us right with God and to give us freedom from our profound guilt. The only condition is to let Him lead us. Follow his way, to give up all of our little tricks and listen to him instead.

That is the answer to the question. That is the case the Bible makes and that is the reason I am who I am and live as I live. That is why I care about justice and care about this world. As the old creed goes;

"I did not make it, for it is making me. It is the very truth of God and not the creation of any man."


*The terms sickness and antibiotic are borrowed R. York Moore. I thank him for his help in articulation.

a quick thought

A Christian writer named Eugene Peterson holds to a belief that the act of worship is essential to people. That we are made for it and our lost without it. That our focus cannot leave ourselves and that we our enslaved to to our feelings of shame without worship that invites us to look out and see God and realize how ridiculous it is to ever suppose that we could make ourselves okay to begin with. In this process we find that we have immense value in the very fact that we matter to this infinite and amazing God. We also recognize how much we need God and our illusions of self-sufficiency begin to fade away.

I am dependent on this process. Without I begin to see myself as far too important and far too much of a failure. I lose my ability to see God and to be astonished at who He is. The world becomes about me and I become very depressed indeed.

I think maybe this is why I am a Christian. Without worship my life spirals out of control. Worship is north on my compass (so I have never actually used a compass, but people who do seem to find it terribly important). I can only worship something that I truly believe to be greater than I can ever strive to be, which is why human heroes always fell short. This left God. A God who cares and a God who allows Himself to be accessible.

I think I am being called to get back to the simplicity of my younger faith. God is good. Worship is something that He deserves and brings me great satisfaction to do. Inviting others into this life is good is good for both parties.

This seems simple and to be honest is not a complete theology, but I think this is all I can truly cling to in this moment.

Worship is maybe the only truly free thing I do. Maybe that is why Eugene Peterson argues for its importance.

Thoughts?

my thoughts on brokenness

A couple of days ago I posed a question about why my church placed the most famous failures of Peter and Paul on their stained glass. Here are my thoughts a to why and what that means about the Christian faith.

First I considered that maybe the inclusion of the rooster and of the scales are an example of a society that loves to tear down its heroes. Think about it, we love the National Enquirer, more people know about John F. Kennedy's relationship with Marilyn Monroe than his civil rights bills, we love to see heroes fall. So maybe these windows are just an example of that morbid fascination with failure. Maybe the mistakes of these men make us feel better about ourselves. Maybe those who installed the glass found Peter and Paul easier to relate to than Jesus, with all of his being God and such.

I cannot deny this train of thought outright, it is too intriguing and has an element of truth in it. It does comfort me (as I am sure many others) that Peter and Paul were people and that there was no attempt to hide this by either the early church or my own church. What I do reject though, is the modern cynicism that revels in their failures as some attempt to justify myself. The failures of humans cannot be something voyeristically fascinating for a Christian. Peter and Paul cannot become ancient Brad Pitt's or Ricky Williams', they need to be our models. Try as we might, perfection is not something that we are going to stumble upon or cultivate with rigid discipline. Our mistakes stay with us, follow us, hound us and mock us. The answer to this dilemma that I often see in our culture is to revel in and celebrate these failures. If you struggle with lust the answer I hear is; "Great! It is your natural nature, don't deny yourself!", if you are liar, the response seems to be; "What is truth anyway?". I think the response to these thoughts are displayed in those windows, your mistakes to matter, those scars remain.

Of course this is not the only response we have to our failings. There are also those who take every mistake as evidence that they should never again try or never again step out. If we are a generation that is marked by being great justifiers, we are also a generation that feels profoundly guilty, that is essentially not able to believe our own bullshit. Deep down, everyone I know, Christian, Buddhist, Agnostic, atheist or other, is riddled with a profound sense of guilt. Whether our exterior is marked with our intense discipline, or if we wear our hair long and our tattoos proudly, we are all unified by our shame. Their is a seemingly universally unsettled nature within us that counts our failures and we are internally mocked by them.

Here is where I once again find hope in the glass. Peter was a coward. A man who was so bold that he stepped out onto the water with Jesus, yet was so fearful that he hid with shame his affiliation with Jesus from a slave girl. Had he allowed guilt to dismiss himself from service to the early church, then the church would've suffered a great leadership vacuum. Instead he excepted the grace offered to him by a resurrected Jesus and stepped with boldness as a leader. He was what Henri Nouwen would describe as a "wounded healer". A man who had a well-known and shameful past, but represented Jesus by living as a free man. He was not shackled to his failings, thus people saw Jesus in him. I like to think that fearful people were the ones most drawn to him. That rooster is a picture not only of the man that Peter was, but also the gospel truth that we can become more than slaves to ourselves, that there is hope for even the most broken among us.

I wonder what would be on my own stained glass. What failings of mine, past and present would be up there? I also wonder whether I have accepted Jesus' invitation to reject justifying my acts and to reject guilt. This freedom is the most counter-cultural invitation that has ever been offered. It is simply my prayer that I would accept it and begin to live.

Still in Madison

Still in Madison, and feeling a bit tired. I have an idea for a blog topic, but since I am too tired to write about it, I thought that I would just leave it as a question, then fill in my ideas tomorrow.

At my church we have some amazing stained glass. The Prodigal Son is depicted. So is Jesus. However, my favorite two windows are the one depicting Peter and Paul. Peter and Paul are the two most influential fathers of Christianity whose names aren't "Jesus". In these windows these two giants of faith look distinguished and wise. These are worthy depictions of two strong and heroic men. The actual pictures of them don't really interest me though, it is what else is on their windows. Peter has a rooster on his window, an illusion to his three denials of Jesus before the coming of morning. Paul has three scales (like that of a lizard) on his window, representing the scales that fell from his eyes when his Jesus caused blindness was healed.

Why? Why do these windows depict the most famous failing of these men? Why choose to display Peter's most cowardice moment? Why show Paul's spiritual blindness?

Why are those images so compelling?

Please respond.

ONS Day 2

So this is going to be another short blog. The problem is that they are keeping us quite busy here, so I am pretty wiped come bloggy time.

God is doing some really good stuff. For those of you in the know, I have had a long journey to this conference and going on staff in general. So much trust has been restored to me this week. I am falling in love with IV again.

I will elaborate more later. This is a good place and I glad to be here. I will try and give an update tomorrow.

Hopefully.