GIVING GLORY TO GOD

When I became serious about my faith walk there was a word that kept occurring in the Scriptures; glory.  So?  So?, I thought?  Glory is glory.  That's sorta like saying nice is nice or something to that affect, it seemed.  Glory, to me, was a Bible term that did nothing, went nowhere, and seemed rather neutral in....well....in meaning.

But...I've changed my mind.

To give God glory is one of the utmost profoundationalisms ever!  To give Him glory is to brag upon Him.  It is to credit God with the valiant moves He makes.  To give God glory is to give intentional note to His might, His brilliance, His amazing love.  It's to talk about Him, to brag upon Him, and to include Him in strong awareness of our ordinary walk.

When things go right, I've learned to attribute them to God rather than a team, or a circumstance, or a person.  Even when human names may actually be connected to accomplishment, such recognition is given with the understanding that God is their Source and their Supplier.

Giving God glory has changed my prayer life.  Better said, it gave me a prayer life.  I once struggled to spend any time in prayer.  Yet, learning to give God glory activated my time with Him.  Every day, and many times during, I tell Him how much He means to me and how grateful I am for His being God; that I no longer have to fake my righteousness for He gives me His.

To give God glory may not sound like much of a church thing for we tend to be more impressed with things like assignments, destinations, and accomplishments.  But to praise Him strongly is precisely how the beginning Church was launched.  I'm learning that it is, also, how it keeps going.

Tell God often how you glory in His very existence.  This will positively impact your heart, your day, and your faith.

UNBELIEVERS MOCK AS FAIRYTALE. BELIEVERS CALL IT REALITY

I've lived on both sides of the Faith Fence.  There is a world of difference.  Let me say that another way.  There IS as WORLD of difference.  One goes by faith in unbelief.  These get their religious kicks from the pond of doubting.  The second batch operates upon a basis of the invisible world being more fascinating than the seen one.  Go figure.  No, I mean GO and FIGURE this out; rather than merely offering an indifferent shrug of the shoulders.

What real Christianity needs today is a huge dose of the Fairytale experience.  Only in saying this do I mean that we need to have a walk with God that is well beyond our obsessive, humanistic imagination.  I love this factor of Ephesians 3:20 which is encapsulated from cover to Bible cover.  That which can't happen did...and...still does.  Unbelievers wish to mock and call such Fairytale.  Believers call it Reality in Fairytale dimension; the impossible lives!

As churches assemble world-wide today, may we gatherers not throw cold water upon the absurd, the ridiculous, the outlandish truths of God past and His workings present.  We are to experience the unknown and the unexplainable, the undefinable and the undeniable.  Just as the Red Sea parted and the grave emptied, believers are to abide in a land of immeasurable opportunity for the God-demonstration.

By our repetitive repetitions, the Fantastic Faith element is being dismantled bit by bit within our very own gatherings.  Should such a mold not be broken, we will be a people who train our young to become unbelievers; yet in the name of believing.  Drastic faith has been dismantled by a humanistic try-to-be-good philosophy.  As a result, pews will be packed today with many calculating that, while they do misbehave, they aren't as bad as others they could mention. 

Living by comparison is clearly a doctrinal mistake communicated quite clearly in II Corinthians 10:12.  And, yet, this seems to be a popular road for the modern day believer to travel.

Faith.  Faith is bold, it is absurd, it is fascinating, and it is the ultimate of true reality.  May we accomplish matters through Him that would draw mockery from our critics.  Many of us have lived in this path for years....on both sides. 

May we be found on the side of reality rather than the one of mockery.

AUTHENTIC LIFE IS NONE OF YOUR BUSY-NESS

In the name of being a responsible individual, each of us becomes snagged in the "thinking it out, moving it forward" pressure scheme of, what we all regard as, normalcy.  Yet, there's a significant problem with that.  Happiness and joy seems to be an illusion.  We assume that such is reserved for the ultra-successful...and, therefor, maybe we ain't one of 'em.

My daily theme is, Don't you love right now?  This developed from my life of failure; repeated failures.  I was missing out of living because my walk had become buried (ahead of the grave) by busy-ness.  The problem with busy-ness is that it all seems justifiable to the thinking trend of earthiness.  We applaud it.  Too, we obey its wearying demands.

Don't misunderstand.  Not all of life is a breeze.  Not everyone is crazy about you/me.  Stresses mount.  Injuries occur.  These and other bandits do all they can to put on their masks and rob us a guiltpoint.

Could it be that the most consistent villain resides inside of our own heads?  Could it be that we persistently bark at ourselves with commands of More! when it would be a welcomed visitor if we could believe it alright to say, Less?

Why do you feel the need to hop at every one's bark?  Signed up for too many responsibilities?  Then resign from some.  Feel like you are letting people down?  What if by your backing off from an assignment, such would give opportunity for someone else to get to be invited into that responsibility or role?

Jesus didn't reach the whole world with a stage and a microphone.  He did it by charging the twelve and then the seventy.  He took the time to invest in a few to reach the many.  His tactic is still reaching...us!

Such a concept would be known as discipleship.  Investing in fewer seems to reach more.  Odd, don't you think?  Try to grasp the picture; the theme.  Busy-ness, I am convinced is not as productive, as thoughtful, prayerful, intentional restriction.  While I'm certain my ideas here have a few holes, it just could be that some of you who are very kingdom driven would be much more effective if you could slow down a bit in order to get more accomplished.

Worn out is not a bibilical credit to us.  Being persecuted and dying to self is.  But somehow it seems we may be more inclined to the former in order to avoid the latter.

Busy-ness impresses ourselves...and maybe a few others who are also driven by the same crunch.  Be encouraged; you have a Father who gave us His Son so that we could inherit His Spirit so that we could really see things take place in an eternally defining dimension.

MAKE YOUR INSECURITIES SERVE YOU

There are no exceptions.  Every individual possesses a strong element of insecurity.  You can believe it, we've all got it and it's a heavy burden.  It's been a major battle for me; an inner war.  As strange as it sounds, this awareness has been the key that I use to reach to others.  I know no one, nor do I meet anyone, who is not riddled with inhibitions.  No.  One.

I am able to be outgoing because I became confident that far too many people are incarcerated within their own minds.  I was jailed myself and still seem to hand over the keys to the jailers who want to self-criticize and self-judge.  Yet, I must not.  And, you must not.

So, the question is how one goes about transferring insecurities to confidence?  We believe the Spirit in us carries His traits of love and joy for one reason.  We are to bear His fruit IN us TOWARD others.  IN us.  TOWARD others.  His fruit, us, and others....if one element is missing the world will go untouched from within our residence.

We gain confidence; but never in ourselves.  I learned through failure and weakness to risk in order to reach.  Each of us has our gifts that would thrust us into the mix of those intimidating interactive moments with neighbors and associates.  It isn't that some are gifted to reach and that some are not.

All are gifted; but it's just that our gifts are different.

Some are able to reach to others by sending a note.  Others bake cookies while, yet, others offer invitations to cook-outs.  Me?  I have many avenues but one of my easiest gifts is humor (and even there I run into many who don't think I'm funny.  Go figure).  Yesterday I was leaving the house and noticed a new couple; a young man and his girlfriend standing in a neighboring driveway as he evidently was the new owner. 

Suddenly, this idea just came over me.  I pulled over, lowered my window, and the craziest words came out.  Hi!  I'm Terry!  Are you the new owners of this cute house?  Welcome to the area!  You'll love it here!  You need to know that I'm the "main neighbor" of everybody around!

Whaaaat?  Where'd that come from?  But...it was funny and all of us laughed, smiled, connected, and they are awesome!  And, do you get it?  Who welcomes first-timers with those words?  I never know the right things to say.  I just know that others need welcoming as clutsey as my words may flow.

So it is with you; with all of us.  None of us are professional greeters, reachers, welcomers, etc.  Not.  One.  Of.  Us.  What we can do is to train our insecurities to serve us as we hesitantly try to reach to others...for that is precisely the direction Jesus would take each of us.

Our confidence....is always...in Him...and never....not one time....in ourselves.

DON'T WASTE YOUR BREATH. DON'T WASTE YOUR LIFE.

Waste is a terrible word.  There is far too much wonder within every person's heart...and reach...and scope to waste our breath-life in anger, resentment, or even bold hatred toward any person. 

There are at least two significant reasons that we should not waste our life.  For one, such an exertion drains us of productivity in other regions.  Our mis-attention dis-affects our hearts.  To be sour toward another person becomes the DNA of our day whether we see it (believe it) or not.

Second, whatever it is that we despise of another is blatant proclamation that we are just like them.  Romans 2:1-8 pulls me off to the side of my Critical High-Way every time.  Is wrong still wrong?  Is sin still sin?  Yep!  Yes!  Affirmative!

The revelation, however, is that this is not a "they" circumstance; but is also an "I" one just as clearly.  Therefore, when "we" realize this about all of "us", "we" are on target to value life; not waste it.

When we join the ranks of admitted sinners, we join the family of being viable help to all as we are drawn into the wonderful, and true, participation of bearing Holy Spirit fruit.  It is His love and joy, and peace and patience that must, should, and will come through. 

Why?  Because the distraction in front of us is too large for us to tackle from the human will.  Don't waste your life despising another when you are precisely packaged the very same way.  Thus, the demand from God that we permit the His Spirit to enter into...all...of...us.

Happy Day!  We are all alike.  There is no exception.  Therefore, make your life count by attending, rescuing, cheering, and encouraging others all day today!!

SINCE YOU ARE LIVING OVERWHELMED...

Each of us has a lot going on.  We are engaged in the exertion of going on-ness.  Much of it we have arranged, scheduled, and planned on our own.  But more of it seems to come at us without invitation; with no previous awareness as to actual arrival.  I speak of misfortune or stress which seems to await at our doorstep.

My phone must be similar to yours.  It has a persistent "ding" or "bell tone" notifying me of an incoming communique.  Very much of it contains the happies.  Very much of it, too, reveals the opposite.  With increasing ability to be connected to more of our world in which we live, a sense of being overwhelmed is recurring.

What is one to do with this?  Run?  Hide?  Pretend ruggedness isn't happening?  Scream?  Pout?  Run...again?

What we are to do is to try to stay focused on God who has all of these moments in view.  He is bigger than big, wiser than wise, and surpassingly well beyond adequate.  God gets us when we don't get ourselves.  Don't let your distractions...distract.  God wants to be in the lead; but it is up to us to decide to let Him.

Following God isn't about keeping score: He answered one prayer and not another, He responded immediately person and then seemed silent to another.  To believe God is not only to look for the empty tomb; but to stay with Him when on the Cross.  Jesus did...and remember that he led the way.  There will be no resurrection without there being moments of painful defeat.

We do not live a faith-system of pretense; but rather, one of authenticity.  Bad stuff happens.  Sometimes we even cause it.  But the God of mercy and forgiveness and hope launches us into living an above-earth life.  It's real.  It's thrilling.  It's daring.  And...it's for we commoners who are often stumped by the latest fiasco occurring within our own minds.

Believe.  Big....bigger than whatever tries to overwhelm.

THEY APPLAUDED ME AT WALGREENS

Okay, I just had a very unusual experience at Walgreens.  I went in to pick up a prescription.  The clerk wanted to know if I had gotten my flu shot yet.  So...I signed up!  Clerks were at the counter as well as awaiting customers; maybe ten in all.

Once the lady gave me the shot, I stood and announced to all with great enthusiasm that "I just got my shot and didn't even cry once!"  One gentleman in line asked if I got my sucker?  "Do I get a sucker?", I asked with more excitement!

I turned to the counter only to see a clerk holding up the sucker for me to take home!  All smiles at my all-around success, I thanked all for attending my moment.  They applauded...and smiled even bigger!!!

Other than that....nothing.

CAN RELIGIOUS REPUTATION ITSELF BE SAVED?

Division is taking its toll upon the hearts of mankind.  There, indeed, must be a perpetual press for unity.  But, oh how we struggle to reach such a goal.  The battle itself should signal just how monumentally impactive, let alone important, such an accomplishment would be.

I'm wondering just how much this challenge is exacerbated because we live in the Western hemisphere where freedom and individualism seem to be perpetually noted.  While these two concepts are rich in blessings, one must be careful that the ego does not take center stage for every event.  Thus, the call from the Bible to consider others as more important than ourselves.  

I'm noticing a blurring of the lines between politics and religion.  It's becoming more difficult to discern on many levels just which one's voice is being heard.  And which of these two seems to be the more guilty of causing division?  It appears on several levels....to be a tie.

Is there a way, a hope, for authentic unity among us?  It appears there is such a dimension; such a direction.  The cost, however, is high.  Furthermore, it's of the highest caliber of challenge.  The trek to harmony for individuals, for families, for churches, and for nations is found in one word.

Humility.

Humility is the route to political effectiveness and the saving of religious reputation.  Are Christians to be known by our love or by our pet peeves.  By our compassionate reach or our rigid stances?  While we know the answer, the how-factor becomes a prominent element.  How do we obtain and then accumulate remarkable unity?  How?

The answer will not be found in the obsessive self-seeking promotion of rights.  That's being tried...and it divides at the starting gate.  The answer will not be found in withdrawal from community.  Neither will it be found in legislative law.  These do not survive the deep ocean waves of an ego-driven and demanding humanity.

Humility weighs the needs of others.  By this, it does not have to agree nor does it have to become subject to error.  Humility simply notes others before self.  This is major.  I said, THIS IS MAJOR.

Yielding to othes is the surprising path of Jesus.  He was no wimp; no coward.  He stood for some and, when doing so, stood against his critics.  Yet, at final straw, Jesus took the back seat to both on the Cross so that both would have opportunity to live.  It's this dying factor to self that finds us balking; especially when it involves anyone we don't much like.

Religion's reputation can be saved.  However, it will not survive our inner competition to see which divisive brand is most right.  It will be found in submission; a word that is not on the top-10 chart of popular doctrinal stances.  Yet, it is the route.  It is the secret med to cure all of mankind's concentrated ailments.  

Can religion's reputation be saved?  The more we die to self, the more we will see others come alive with a new perspective on what it means to really live.  Humanity was created to experience the Divine Partnership.  May we make strides today toward more Holy Spirit joy and less self-centered fragmentation.

HAS THE NEWS OF THE RUGGED CROSS BEEN CLEANED UP A BIT OVER TIME?

Go with me in your mind to the Hill...three Crosses...and three Victims (two thieves and then there was the One).  Take a look at it...at them.  How do you see it?  Clean; like the paintings of the event portray?  Manicured?  Silent?  Not a peep; just a sad respect?  Well-staged; three crosses stationed equal distance apart with the men hanging in some sort of rather sterile and graphicless coordination?

Yes, I say that basically the perception in our Modern Age mind is somewhat presentable.  The rough edges seem to have been sanded.  We do still recall this scene at least every Sunday.  In doing so we offer God, and certainly Jesus, a moment's gratitude for pulling off the world's greatest upset.

If I wouldn't be offensive, may I ask you to rethink this famous scene which is just a stone's throw from downtown Jerusalem?  Might we do away with the sanitation that resides in our minds as to how crisp and well-presented this event is assumed to be?

The landscape was cluttered with citizens; some scrambling, others wailing, while soldiers strong-armed the crowds by pushing, by shoving.  The panic must have been backed by a momentary senseless loss of bearings.  What is happening?  Rumors are flying!  Occasional screams from the whips' piercings indeed alarm the innocent in the crowd!  And where are the little kids?  Who's got the kids?  Find them!

Has Jerusalem gone nuts?!?!?

Yes, note how we've, at least mentally, cleaned up this tragedy just a tad.  We've added gloss to the printed artwork which has been handed down through the ages.  The ruggedness has been smoothed over via the centuries.

But....but peer now into Las Vegas.  Take a look...a good look...at the brutality.  Hear the screaming, feel the sickness in heart, and the inability on the part of thousands to grasp what has happened.  Take inventory of this train wreck; this absurd event of humanity gone awry.  See.  Hear.  Feel.

And as we do what we can to absorb the Nevada massacre, might we take a bit of the numbness, a bit of the ugliness, a bit of the disbelief of it all and gain a bit of insight as to the stark reality of Jesus stranded upon his cross for all to observe?  Might the sickening feeling of human disaster be realigned at the scene of the Cross as well?

The Cross wasn't a photo shoot for the Palestinian Gazette nor the American Journal.  It was a terrible scene of destruction.  Moreover, it was a picture of mankind gone bad; at its ultimate worst.  It wasn't slick in finish.  Neither was is smooth in communication.  It was rugged and then more rugged and then even more rugged as the torturous screams surely echoed across public square and down dark alleys.

May the awful news of today cause an appreciation for the awful news of Jesus' day to be restored. If it could be, we might find even greater consolation that we will survive this national disaster just as we did the eternal one on that famous Hill.

RESURRECTION POWER...QUICK...SOMEBODY LIGHT THE FUSE!

I want to encourage you about you.  All throughout our church experience, attempts--serious and strong--are made to step up the pace.  Above all else we want to appear to have cleared the faith-opposing hurdles with the assurance to others that we have learned well to follow Jesus.  Yet, very much about such a trek, if we are going to learn from him, is the constant upendedness of both our efforts and our understanding.

So often we seem to be left standing empty-handed when we thought that we were giving Him our best shot.  From Peter denying Jesus to Thomas doubting him, life unfolds constant lineage of frail betrayers who had surely hoped to accomplish quite the opposite.  What's with this picture?  Why does this road seem to be, evidently, such continual terrain?

One's deep desire to look the part may cause true discipleship interruption.  To look the part will, in our minds, mean that we appear to have matters under control.  Above all else, we want to come off looking good.  This is precisely why we settle for controlling such little turf; because that which we can control is quite a restricted territory with seeming little risk of failure.  Therefore, to be in control is to remain in a world that stays small.

Personal lack and frailty is the door opener!  That's weird, huh?  We read these, though, as to be quite the opposite.  From early childhood we do everything we can to look anything but weak.  Inadequate is not very complimentary.  But it is the road to magnificent impact.

Jesus.  Rejected.  On a cross.  Dead in a grave.  Not the appearance of world changing and quite dynamic individual, huh?

The look of a true disciple may be far from the image we strive to portray.  Have we not traded our vulnerability to grow and improve for a bowl of limited understanding?  When the Holy Spirit, coupled with the word change, are regarded as threats rather than thrill, the church will feed from a constant diet of human historical leftovers rather than sitting at the table of wonder, awe, wow, and joy.

Be encouraged.  Your disappointments in yourself are mere calls for realignment with the Call and the Cause.  Knowing Bible has left church paths strewn with fearful, angry, pew-roosters.  For me, when I began to yield to the Father, the Son, and the Spirit of that same Bible information, a new freedom to try, to fail, and to try again began to arise from the self-built, self-inhabited grave I had dug for myself.

Resurrection power....quick....somebody light the fuse!  I need it again today!

WHEN LIFE FALLS APART, WATCH FOR IT TO FALL TOGETHER

We don't like the bad days.  Our preference is surely bent toward the good ones.  I know these latter ones have my attention.  Yet, in reality, we deal with both.  I wish to cheer you on regarding our unfavorite days.  What are we to do with them?  How might we handle them?

First, this world we live in is very broken.  There is no person who ever lived that was not diseased with devastating sin.  We try to/wish to/want to believe otherwise.  But if we believe the Bible, all have sinned and fall short of what God had anticipated.  Breakdown occurs.

Second, since we do experience rugged times, what can be done to endure such harshness?  One thing that is merely a thought away is the fact that we can, at the moment of discouragement, begin to calculate the blessings which saturate us; even in the midst of the dark times...Philippians 4:4-9.  And then there is another element which might surprise you.

When life is falling apart, note that it seems to be at such times that we give God a second look.  Could it be that if everything went well every moment of every day of every month, that we might begin to believe that we've got life under our own control?  Might we begin to conclude that God is not needed?  Yes, for this very trait is going on among many of the rich and the famous today.

When life is falling apart, the blessing is that it very likely is a divine signal to look UP!  No one desires stress.  None prefer angst.  But each contest to the heart has embedded within a renewal of the faith processes.

Read the Word of God.  Time after time, when life was falling apart, the Spirit of God caused it to fall together.  Therefore, try to remember that your bad days are simply another stage allowing His performance where a story of recovery and hope will lead to your positively and profoundly very good days.

THE HOLY SPIRIT: AN ABSOLUTE TRAIN WRECK TO RELIGION

For the longest time as a student in preaching school (and once graduated), I understood that the Holy Spirit was a topic to avoid.  Only the radical nutcases who no longer faithfully operated from the Word of God would go near the subject.  Or, so we taught and thought.  Eventually I changed my mind about Him, wanted to learn of Him, and wrote a very elementary book regarding the Spirit of God. 

I was immediately labeled and shunned by so many in the church.

The Father, Son, and Spirit are expressly mentioned throughout the Bible as vital to our existence and performance.  To function in faith with one of these missing (eliminated) would be like trying to drive from New York to Los Angeles with one flat.  It would be a treacherous trip of unnecessary frustration when all it would take would be to put some air in the tire.

The Holy Spirit is our air; our God-air.  He's like the wind.  In scripture, at times, He's portrayed as a dove...soaring, moving, landing, taking off in multiple directions.  Fundamentalists don't like this dimension of the God-head because we have such a need to control Him, what we believe, and what we think others should believe.  All the while, we are supporting a false doctrine that the Holy Spirit activity has expired.

The Holy Spirit is not a train wreck to religion because He's out of control.  He's a train wreck because we've cut Him off from participating in the most elaborately thought out plan ever...the Kingdom of God.  He's willing to participate; but only where we will welcome His presence.

Without the Holy Spirit inclusion, we are trapped with a Father/Son format which leaves the church driving the religious bus out of fear, out of division, and without enthusiasm for life.  Left with two-thirds of the godhead, we've learned to be both critical and suspicious.  Our Go into all of the world command died when the essence of the Holy Spirit was basically removed from the written Word...which He wrote in the first place.

The Holy Spirit isn't a train wreck to religion because He participates.  No.  He's a train wreck to religion when a faith system eliminates Him and is left to function on its own human prowess.

WHEN JESUS ENTERS THE CHURCH

Jesus' leadership is surely baffling to the ordinary concept of being, what we would assume, a point-person.  He carried no sword.  He owned know pulpit.  Neither did he have the community powers-that-be in his hip pocket.  Jesus was just out there in the midst of the hurting, the forgotten, the neglected, the lonely, and the abused.

Jesus honored Father; not himself.  He was incredibly available to the powerless.  Too, he seemed to intentionally identify with commoners.  After all, isn't that why God came to earth in the first place?  To experience earthmanship in human form?

One of my favorite things about this Son of Man is that he successfully made the much needed break from worshipping religion and all of its rules.  He so did not go there that the leaders of such played the jail-card which eventually led to his execution.

Churches are struggling today because religion does what religion will do; weight us down.  Church location nor funds nor programs are the culprits to be blamed.  The buying into religious formatting is.  He told us and told us and told us that repetitious habits and regulatory rules would not produce.  The Pharisees insisted they would...but they didn't.  All the while, we preach against the Pharisaic stumblings while, simultaneously, grasping to imitate their controlling nature.

When Jesus enters the church we can anticipate new direction, challenging the status quo, from generation to generation.  Refreshing approaches to Kingdom work often eventually develop into more repressing habits which constantly bid for support when they have long past lost their cutting edge of success.  But how we try...and how we debate...and how we defend...all the while studying in our Bible classes how Jesus rattles the religious culture.

We so subtly assume that we are not like them.

Nothing has changed.  The Good News is that Jesus saw through man's need for power via structure and regulation.  Churches have never met anyone like the tender, brave, and insightful Son of God.  We know it.  We believe it.  But we must help one another have the courage to dare step out onto the the threatening waters of hope with the faith in his call to move closer to him. 

As we make progress toward Jesus, the back doors to our gatherings will be closed.  The front doors will need a larger Welcome mat.

THE STRENGTH OF FOLLOWING THE JESUS WALK

Jesus' style blows the mind of our casual day-to-day walk.  He turns the anticipated and the expected and the assumed way of doing life on its head.  He fascinates me and really challenges me for his approach is so often backward; even to my assumed best thinking.  He doesn't make my arguments right.  His isn't the role to endorse my debates. 

He does, however, make me acceptable to Father for I can't reach such a level of effective ministering to those in need on my own.  It is our call to endorse his reach; not his call to endorse ours.

The strength of following the Jesus walk is that he breaks our complacency toward human suffering.  He draws us into attentive action to the underdog.  In doing so, he simultaneously reduces our smugness that we seem to find in doing church right.  We are to do caring for others right.

Finally, the strength of following the Jesus walk is that we expect something productive to transpire.  This has become a problem with the modern Christian mindset; too many basically expect nothing.  If there is little anticipation that God can/is/will work in our midst, we are left to only to be poised for competitive argumentation of everyone's preferred pet peeve.

When we expect our faith to experience the working hand of God in our settings, joy and hope arise.  This is a difference-maker.  Even as parents, if we are trying to raise our kids to be good without leading them into the zones of community heartbreak and ruggedness, these young ones will find no place to engage in Holy Spirit activity.

May we cheer each other on as we, like Jesus did, walk into situations beyond our ability to control.  At these holy points, may we see Jesus arise to the demonstrative level of help, hope, and happiness as he bears his Holy Spirit fruit from within us.

THE NFL PROTEST AND GOD'S PROTEST

(I'm terribly uneasy in posting this.  I deeply wish to be a help to our separated communities.  The current social stresses are serious callings for a serious response; one that will have lasting impact for healing and hope.  When you've completed this post, you may be one who wished I would have deleted it.  Just know of my sympathy as I want to speak words of restructuring strength...but feel quite inadequate even in the trying.)

Protest.  What a mixed bag of implications, denunciations, and exorbitant frustrations stream from this current-day seven-letter word.  It's contagious conflictionatory style is so strong that Protests are Protested!

The latest to arrive on the scene is the NFL Protest over, if I understand this correctly, the playing of the National Anthem.  Before this one, political protests have been making the rounds.  What are we to make of this?  Where do we fit in?  Do we fit in?

I have close friends on both sides of this inflammatory aisle.  Stances are firm.  Some tempers are aflare.  Boundaries are drawn similarly to the setting at the OK Corral.  And, what is one to do with this differing array of opinionation?  What would Jesus do?

The answer is found in the reframing of the question.  It isn't, What would Jesus do?, but rather it may be, What did Jesus do?  We have the answer.  What he did do corresponds to what he would do.  He died for the enemy because he loved the enemy...more than himself.

Our general populace, quite oddly, resents such a directive.  The bent seems to lean more toward divisive suspicion.  Hype to hate seems to be a much more attractive motivator than learn to love.  When one loves one searches for ways to respect, to listen, to make personal adjustments in favor of the other (even our enemy other).

To love others is not to shrug our shoulders in indifference.  No, to love others is to count them more important than self.  To love others means we will sacrifice that they experience grace and life at my expense.  This is the way of the Cross.  This is what God did for us...when we were the enemy.  He noted our disrespect as well as our contrary selfishness.  God protested by absorbing our sins so that we wouldn't be blamed for them.  In other words, He blamed Himself.

Could it be that the NFL protests bug us because they represent a sub-nature that we each possess; but the problem is that these are doing so in front of the entire world?  Could it be that, before we are miffed from either perspective regarding their position, our own admission of guilt and failure just might bring resolve to our country?

The NFL Protest is not the first nor is it the final nudge to divisive judgment of any others.  This has been mankind's style forever.  What are we to do?  We are to do what Jesus did, die for our opponents that they might experience a profoundly new kind of life.  Rights are not the main stroke of freedom.  Dying that others may live....is.  Isn't that precisely what brave soldiers did for us along the way?

TRY NOT TO WASTE YOUR TIME WASTING YOUR TIME

Just when is it that a person gets to like the moment?  I mean, when will the steady gnarly interruptions to our negative thoughts toward others stop?  Are not life's intended grand procedures pelted with distraction which keeps us from liking several of our days?  It seems this is the case.

And what are we to do?  Can we do anything that would curb the frustration of an irritating time-frame?  Indeed, there possible avenues and I'm convinced you all know of many more to build a solid list of hope.

First, do what you can to recall that all of us sin and fall short of the glory of God.  We seem to conveniently forget (or else disregard) this when we have been the target of some one's ultimate failure.  Yet, no person is exempt.  And sins aren't categorized into lesser, really bad, and absolute worst.  Sin is sin and it took the torturous Cross of Jesus to put a dent into it.

Sin is devastating to the inner man at any level and of any dimension.  Self-justification, however, wants to balk at this truth in order to always allow some sort of self-made exemption before God for "my tiny" sin.  That dog won't hunt.  We are all alike...and doesn't that just bug you?

Rather than wasting our time trying to live comparatively to others, might we find our time better spent praising God that He would deem us salvageable?  Instead of disgust toward another, wouldn't we find our time better spent living in gratitude that the blood of Jesus "reaches me"?

Yes, we must not waste our breath in resentment, irritation, nor disgust toward one other person when we are individually ranked (lumped) into the sinners group with any whom we would choose to criticize.  We are all alike.  And this does not mean that we, therefore, pull all others down with us; but that we allow Jesus to pull of us up to him.  This...would be another matter worth reflecting upon the glorious idea that we are most grateful to be forgiven.

Try not to waste you time being disgusted with one other person...for in God's eyes...we are all like.  In God eyes, due to the extensive work He did from the Cross...we are made whole.

WHY CHRISTIANITY HAS VIBRANT HOPE!

There is a developing void in the very center of the Christian realm.  It's subtle.  It's gentle.  It seems to be acceptable.  And, it's devastating to the very cause of which we believe/assume we promote.  Christianity seems to operate from the hub of sight; not the flow of faith.  There is a difference; an honest world of difference.

Faith is the dynamic of God-led/God-backed power.  It defies logic and promotes risk.  It promises without predetermined proof.  By it great things happen that can't.  Without it, activity scrambles to wear some sort of fake faith-mask which would lead one to believe that there is an actual walk of faith; when in reality, it is merely a trek of humanisticly sightful calculation.

Christianity has vibrant hope when we set aside the lure of things working because we see how such could come about.  And then, when we walk out on limbs of conviction (even when there is no physical format of support), the stage is set for God to do His thing.  He has always led this way.

Jesus (CHRISTianity) baffled and still baffles the odds-makers.  Yes, this Son of God/son of man, ruined all of the earthly cause and effect rules.  Jesus doesn't call us into a better humanity mode.  Rather, he promotes us to an increasingly higher spirituality which breaks down barriers of fear, and control, and over-bearing personalities.  Jesus introduces an entirely new way of operating as a human being....and, oh, how he led the way!

Christianity has vibrant hope because His grave is empty and our dreams are given reason to rise.  Short-"sight"edness will perpetually operate from fear's domain.  Yet, we are to walk by faith..and not by sight.  Really?  Then, why do we dare allow our sight at the table of propositions, decisions, and conclusions based upon what is clearly an inferior mode?

In my own life, faith isn't natural; it is spiritual.  Thus the battle rages within as to which gets the final vote; flesh or spirit.  We must try not to be deceived.  Much of our efforts are energized by what we can calculate according to our limited imagination.  Ephesians 3:16-21 insists that it is our faith that thrusts us into His realm of working beyond our greatest fathomilistic concepts.

This...this working, engaging arm of God...is why we have vibrant hope!

FAITH: THE GIGANTIC FALL FROM GRASPABILITY!

Ephesians 3:20 is ungraspably graspable!  We are to get it; to understand it.  Yet, its content and context is so magnificent that not only can we not grasp it, we aren't supposed to.  That's the point of the verse.  We are to get it that we can't get it.  We can only believe it.

Yes, we are to believe it.  This is a wild train wreck to the minds who only believe God as far as we can throw Him (explain, understand, express Him).  In essence church has become the product of the best, or most respected, thinkers among us.  Yet, leadership must be presented under the mantle of faith--a purely unprovable, unexplainable, unthinkable dimension of which usually bugs the spiritual tar out of us.

The key to faith is to yield into it being graspably ungraspable!  Faith truly is one gigantic fall from graspability.  It is within these unborders that the impossible becomes possible; that the can't become actually becomes.

The Spirit of Christ reigns over a systemic factuality that will not submit itself to the highest scientific borders nor the strongest mathematical restrictions.  He does this through one quality available to all mankind; faith.  Read the Word.  Story after story after story; what couldn't possibly happen did.  What held His people in fierce bondage couldn't.

Church is destined to be platitudinously dull?  Oh....I don't think so!  Not with a beyond our imagination God like ours!

CONSERVATIVE-ITES AND LIBERAL-ITES ARE CUT FROM THE SAME CLOTH

There is such a strangeness about you and me.  We have our likes and dislikes.  There are those topics we find controversial on one hand while others note the same discussion is loaded with intrigue.  The strangeness is how we seem to assume that we are in one camp or another when, in reality, we are very much alike.  

Liberals view conservatives with a rolling of the eyes.  Conservatives squint through theirs as they smirk the Liberalites.  Yet, truth be told, we are all exactly alike.  We are correct in our judgment in places.  And then, we (all of we) hold errant positions....of which we do our best to deny.

Each group thanks God they are not like the other.  Profoundly, God says we are just alike; that we seem to plod through this wonder called life with a bee in our bonnet at how off-base they are.

Here's the sticky wicket.  Liberals are conservative in areas.  These may be open to new ideas yet stingy in their giving.  Conservatives are liberal in areas.  These most likely hold to strict view of scriptures while liberally dismissing those teachings which don't float their boat.  This goes on day by day...in both camps.

God declares that we are to drop the perpetual drive to live by comparison.  Our position is never to be how well we are doing compared to another for we are all alike.  Each of us possesses both tendencies; liberal and conservative.  It just depends on the topic at hand.   

For we are not bold to class or compare ourselves with some of those who commend themselves; but when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding.
                                                               II Corinthians 10:12

Yep!  Conservative-ites and Liberal-ites are just like each other...and this really seems to get under our skin.  But if we could see it (admit it) about ourselves, the harmony and unity driven by the Spirit just might be significantly refreshing....for all of us!

HOW TO OVERCOME THE "QUITTERS" MENTALITY

Much damage is done, it seems, everywhere we turn.  From natural disasters to human casualties, pain reigns in, oh so many, hearts.  The toughest is death; not just the physical death of a loved one, but the relationship death when we walk away from one another.  One of the strongest destructions within the framework of humanity is the "Quitting" factor where we give up on others and walk away.  Family?  Church?  Goals?  Career?

Something happened along the way of my walk at the Memorial Drive congregation that turned my world upside down...in a positive way.  Before Tulsa, I'd been at my first church one year.  My next two years.  And then Tulsa forty years.

Memorial was significantly discouraging in 1977.  Having just fired the preacher in a brutal battle within the congregation, I found myself to be the target of much congregational Hatfield vs. McCoy-isms....caught in the middle of a church whirl I knew nothing about.  An unlikely scenario came into simultaneous play.  I began receiving multiple inquiries as to whether I would consider relocating with other churches.  (I joked that if any such invitations for me to move were to come from outside of Memorial, I might consider it!)

In the middle of church hostility, I made a decision that has turned out to bless my heart deeply.  I share it should such do the same for you.  I decided two things: to stop the pattern of quitting and moving on, plus I determined to learn what it was God was trying to teach me with all of these trials.  My conclusion was that I wasn't going to learn what I was supposed to learn in year three of a local work if I kept moving away by year 2.  I made the decision to learn what it was that hadn't developed within me yet.

Here's one thing I saw unfold.  Endurance is a biblical theme which carries a sober message much needed by all of us every day.  I learned things in year ten at one church that I wouldn't have learned in two five-year terms elsewhere.  I experienced the revealing of God in year thirty-six that I may not have seen within nine-year terms at four different congregations.

Do not misunderstand.  I'm not saying that one does not naturally learn simply through the measure of time as we age.  But what I want to convey is that I began to wonder if I were to move on after two years, would I carry to the next job two years worth of sermons and experience that would not afford me the insights gained from longer tenure.

Now, for those who have served ten churches in ten years, I'm not saying your labor doesn't matter.  The Apostle Paul never lasted a whole year and he served God fairly well, don't you think?  No, my emphasis is not in the number of years one rings up at one location.  My goal is to get you to personally make a correction in your walk that is a threat to every one of us; stop the quitting.  Learn, rather to learn when under fire.  You may choose to move on (for God may be calling you to such); but learn from your struggles rather that run from them.

Throughout the Scriptures, the disciples encountered rough stuff.  Such is the core design of the church.  We are called to "take up" our crosses.  I'm watching too many throw them down in frustration.  The Cross IS frustration...the intentional pain for which we volunteer so that the hurting ones out there can find reason/hope to come alive.

We are to die that others might live....so don't quit.  Learn to learn what it is you lack in order to reach the whole dying world.