Archive for May, 2008

Ear Infection

Published
by
Justin
on May 30, 2008
in Babies & Spirituality and From Out of Nowhere
. 1 Comment

For the past few nights Maisie has not slept well at all…I mean, it’s been brutal. Jen has been having a rough time. And it was getting frustrating. She would suddenly get pretty high fevers and she was teething like crazy….like four teeth coming in at a the same time. Not cool for her. Certainly not cool for us. 

So Jen ended up taking Maisie into a clinic yesterday and we found out that she has an ear infection. I, being the compassionate dad, was trying to tell Jen, “It’s no big deal. She’s just teething and it’ll be fine.” There’s a reason God gives women more intuition than men…we would waste and our insensitivity would overrun it anyway! Now, Maisie is doing better and has some anti-biotics. She was back to her feisty little self today…took a long nap (yes!) and even spent a few hours sans mom without losing it.

But here is what I’m learning through this…We all have issues. We all have our emotional ‘ear infections’…we could call this emotional infections. There are two ways to deal with them: My way: ignore it and pretend it’s something else. I think most of like to do this. In my case, I didn’t want Maisie to go to a clinic because I didn’t want to pay for it. I didn’t want to have to learn it could be worse…We do this with our own stuff too. We don’t want to deal with what’s real because it might be even worse than we think. Or we don’t want to deal with it because it may cost us too much to deal with what is going on. The sad thing is that our pain, if not dealt with, can become normal and we forget that we ever existed in a world without our wounds. We get so good at deceiving others of what is going on, that we start to even believe it ourselves.

The second way is to deal with our things in the light: Something doesn’t feel right and therefore we need to discover what is causing the un-rightness. It is worth confronting the fear of the unknown in order to have hope that what is going on can be redeemed. I know from recent experience that dealing with issues straight on is painful. It is not easy  and does not help us ‘look good’, for those of us who feel like we have to wear the mask of everything being ‘fine.’ I had many days where I wished that I could be the together person…the person with all the right answers and all the right things to say. But engaging in the issues that we were facing was exhausting and confusing at times. But by grace, God gave us what we needed when we needed it in order to bring our stuff into the light. And to deal with them there…in the place where we acknowledge with God and others what is going on.

It’s freaky to really pursue what’s going on inside of us when something is telling us that what’s there isn’t all good. But regardless of whether we seek it out or not, it’s still there. It’s the way in which we deal with them that makes the difference. In the book of 1 John, John urges us to walk in the light as God is in light. If we were to apply this passage to this topic, then it becomes an issue of obedience and spiritual vitality to deal with what what is going on in our lives. 

So, this is the stuff that I get reminded of when I am in the process of being a negligent parent! 

 

I want to be a worship rock star

Published
by
Justin
on May 28, 2008
in Head to Fingers, Missional Church and Posts That Even Make Me Mad
. 5 Comments

I’m in one of those moods. So, forgive me if this is too much pessimism…and if this resonates with you…let’s move from beyond complaining to figuring out some real answers and some real ways to frame worship…enough disclaimer. 

So, my brother-in-law and I were watching some worship stuff on tv by a really well known group of churches. I really like this groups music…I’ve lead worship playing some of the songs I was hearing…I want to be a worship rock star just like them! But there was something really weird about what I was seeing. It felt like I was watching a rock concert. People’s eyes were closed, packed up close to the stage, raising their hands, jumping around…It just looked like a middle class rock concert. The funny thing about ‘worship music’ and the worship phenomena in the Church today is that sometimes we come off as our own version of rock stars. We have our own celebrity worship leaders that charge royalties like in the real world. We have our own worship CD’s with trendy graphics and trendy recording (yes recording can be trendy…listen to how similar all ‘cutting edge’ worship albums sounded 5 years ago…and listen to how they have all ‘progressed’ the same today). Worship has become an industry. It has become another thing to consume. And we do a dang good job of it. And nobody seems to complain…our Jesus music gets better and better, the ‘worship experience’ becomes bigger, the fun factor for musicians goes up, and everybody wins…or do we? I want to be a worship rock star. 

But I have to wonder, was Jesus’ vision of His Church’s worship rock and roll? For me, and many others, Church is no longer defined by gatherings on the weekend, music, teaching, and programs. Church for me is the people of God living out redeemed life together in this world. Talk of being in the presence of Jesus is still there, but it comes through clothing Him, “when we see him naked.” Or by giving Him food, “when we see him hungry.” Or talking with Him, “when we see Him lonely.” I want to be a worship rock star…but not when I’m holding a guitar. 

I am a wanna be worship rock star. In all of my critique of this scene, the irony is that I am a worship leader for Church gatherings. I led worship at a church a few weeks ago. I played guitar in a band at a church in Portland for a while too. And I love good worship music…I connect with God when I sing along with music that I like and when I play guitar to music that is fun. Singing, playing instruments, and worshiping God through song are all found in the Bible as expression of praise…and it is a good thing. But it is not another thing for us to consume…worship in song is only true worship when we expect to get nothing out of it…only to bring focus to our hearts desire to give something back to God. I’ve expressed on my blog before that my fear with some of the trends in Christianity today are that we are just reproducing a young generation of consumer Christians whose palates are more refined than ever to critique every Church experience that we come across. I just get this gross feeling in my gut when I think about all of the times I’ve heard people say, “I didn’t get a lot out of worship today.” *pause while I run to bathroom and lose my dinner* 

I just wonder…How would our world more accurately reflect the Kingdom of God if we spent as much effort, money, and time on missional expressions of worship as we do with music? I think that’s a fair question. Worship through music is generally for those of us who are already believers. Some people will experience God for the first time through our music, but honestly, worship can be polarizing as well. I wonder how the Church would be a more effective agent of global change if we were to serve as wholeheartedly as we sang. I know that if practiced serving as much as I do the guitar I would be changed! The one thing that went through my mind as I was watching this production was, “For all of the emotion, power, and experience that these people were having, how many left truly transformed by the presence of God?” If we really touch the living God in our times of singing, why do we still get caught up in the worries of the world week after week. I mean, if God is who we believe that He is and we spend 35 minutes a week in an atmosphere where His presence is that intense…why aren’t more of us being transformed? Why am I not more transformed when I am the one leading these songs?!? Is it me? God…help me to be changed when you are near. 

I want to be a worship rock star…but I don’t care about experiences where I (and others) are left unchanged…I want to offer God worship that expects nothing in return. That simply desires to reveal God for who He is. That stretches my life…not just my vocal chords. 

On Being Molded

Published
by
Justin
on May 22, 2008
in Head to Fingers
. 4 Comments

So I was talking to a group of friends from Christian Associates tonight about the past year of our lives. I haven’t really written much on my blog about this past year. When I don’t know how to communicate what’s going on in my heart/mind/soul I just don’t even try. But the truth is, this year has been incredibly challenging and molding for me. This has certainly been the most unique year of my life. I have never ‘accomplished less’…well maybe other than my freshman year of college…and I have never had ‘less to do.’ It’s hard to describe this past year other than I feel like God gave me a very simple job description: wait on Me. 

Now, for me, I like to have things defined. I like for even complex things to be arranged and for there to be a clear objective and goal. But waiting? Seriously God? Couldn’t you have given me something a bit more tangible? A bit more explicable to people? Trust me, it’s not east to describe to others what this time has been like. Waiting on God has been the most difficult discipline that I have ever practiced. (Fasting has to be up there as I have never managed to fast for more than 12 hours…and even then I thought more about eating at a Chinese food buffet than I did about seeking God…I digress)

So…what I’m getting at is this. I’ve been molded into something that I didn’t see coming. I was telling Jen tonight in the car that I’m finally feeling like my old self, but only I’m not my old self…I’m like this new hybrid Justin…my time in Paris has forever molded me. In the successes and the trials God was there, redeeming every experience, and every day moving me closer to a heat source…These experiences both the good and the bad were preparing me to undergo a transformation. Most of the time we believe that our ‘failures’ are what eventually end us in God having to turn up the heat on our lives…leading to him having to remold us…or fix what is broken. But I no longer believe that God only works and repairs what is broken. Our successes also move us towards trust, and because God cares about us He wants us to be molded and grow. But the best molding happens when the heat is on…

I believe that God brings the heat in our lives when He is moving us towards change, maturity, and greater trust. 

The sad thing is that most of see heat or fire as a way that God punishes us…and when we’ve learned our lesson then the heat goes away. And subsequently God grows us up. But that’s not the point. Our poor behavior is not the catalyst for God to grow in us. It’s His love for us and His grace for us that make God the interactive God that He is. The heat will come into our lives at any time because God knows what circumstances we best grow in. That’s what I’m getting at. I’m tired now. 

How To Kill a Movement Series…

Published
by
Justin
on May 14, 2008
in Leadership, Missional Church and Movements
. 0 Comments

If you want to kill a movement, get spooked by supernatural phenomena outside your paradigm…

I grew up in a fairly normal evangelical environment. The most charismatic thing that I saw were people holding up their hands in worship…and this was even pushing it for some. So, it’s safe to say that when my best friend from college started going to a church that practiced spiritual gifts outside of the raising of the hands, I thought it he had gone off of the deep end. Seriously, I thought he was in a cult or something and I thought I had to get him out of there.

In my past, the Holy Spirit for me was pretty much a retired author and I found it easy to pick and choose from scripture what ways His working was still applicable to Church…those days are long gone.

Here’s my theory…’Being Spooked’ (not my words) basically means being surprised…or not being in the know…And most leaders don’t like not being in the know. In fact, we like the opposite. We like being in control. So the ways that the Holy Spirit works can be contradictory to the way we want to work.

In my experience, the reality that the Holy Spirit would trust me with being surprised is evidence that He is getting ready to do something new in me. But on a movement level I think that we have to ask the hard questions: Do we even want the Holy Spirit to speak into plans? Are our plans so set in stone that we couldn’t follow even if we wanted to? If God showed up in a new way in our movement would we act like healed lepers, or blind Pharisees?

The truth is that we need to be careful not to too greatly define our Holy Spirit paradigm. We run the risk of idolatry when we allow our view of the Spirit to be tamed and captured by our paradigm. After all…Jesus is the head of the Church and He clearly left us a Helper to guide us as we manage and steward what is His…Imagine if Peter and the rest of the disciples had not allowed the Spirit to speak outside of their paradigm. Would we even be having this conversation? It seems to be pretty effective when the Spirit leads as he did in Acts 2. If you had told the disciples a few days before Pentecost what was getting ready to go down, they may had not even shown up for prayer meeting that morning! Being surprised by the Spirit is great, because it makes us into the empty and willing people we need to be in order for big, movement type, things to happen! My prayer is that we would allow the Helper to define our paradigm and not our comfort, plans, or strategies. A willingness to obey in this type of way reflects the kind of leadership God would trust to initiate a movement. 

Is There Just Too Much on the Jesus Sandwich?

Published
by
Justin
on May 12, 2008
in Missional Church, Posts That Even Make Me Mad and To Think About...
. 5 Comments

Yesterday I went over to my buddy Jeremy’s place to help put in a fence…I got in a conversation with one of his neighbor’s friends who had recently started going back to a church because of his kids. As the conversation went on we started talking about the Church. I was asking his thoughts about his new church experience and stuff. He was saying he grew up Methodist, so the new rock music at church was quite different. His wife still did not attend as she ‘didn’t have any experience with the Church as a kid’…i.e. there was nothing to return to, because she had never been. He asked me my thoughts on ‘contemporary’ church…this is where is gets a little tricky. Because on one hand, I didn’t want in the least bit to discourage him from going to his new church, yet on the other hand, I wanted to be honest. 

So, I told him that I thought that church’s efforts to be more relevant to culture via music and style were great. However, my fear is that we as church leadership are only creating a tastier religious culture for the churched to consume. I have this creepy feeling that we are replicating the sickness of consumerism from our culture in the Church. ‘I’m not being fed. The teaching isn’t my style. The kids ministry doesn’t do enough. The music is to loud. The room is too dark. The room is too big. I don’t like the color of the pastor’s shirts. I have to park so far away.’ … and even…’I am so fed at my church. I love the pastor’s wardrobe. I am only asked to give 10% of my income at my church. I love the dark and more spiritual feel of the auditorium.’ … these are the cries of people who have become connoisseurs of the Bride of Jesus. And sometimes all we do as leaders is refine their palates. But don’t worry…I didn’t go into that detail with this guy…I instead tried to offer the positive (and less prophet sounding) answer…

I told him, that I think that all of the new things that we are trying are good and express a good heart and good intentions, but I felt like so often we add too much ‘mustard and mayonnaise’ to a simple Jesus sandwich…and never taste the real meat. Call me crazy, but I told this guy that Jesus teachings were very simple, but would take a lifetime of devotion: Love God with your heart, mind, and soul…And love your neighbor as yourself. Trust that Jesus was who He said he was and follow Him. It’s that simple. 

The ‘good church-leader’ in me balked. Inside I heard a voice say, “But be sure and add in all the stuff about going to church!…oh and tithing…oh and doing a quiet time…oh and serving in the kids ministry…gotta get that in too! Quick, make sure he knows right away everything that he’s supposed to do or you’re not doing your job!” But I stopped with Jesus. I stopped where He stopped. I believe that Jesus is THE message and that in Him we are guided by the Spirit in God’s timing to maturity. I wanted this guy to hear clearly my belief in the simple message of Jesus, the most simple/dangerous/costly/attainable message in history. 

I could have talked all about being missional, being incarnational, being relevant, being worshipful…but instead I walked away from the conversation certain that I had done my Lord right, by putting Him at the forefront, in the center of all things, and as the most important thing. My prayer is that we as followers of the Way would come to believe that Jesus is the way, He is our salvation, and we can trust Him for guidance. I believe that as we live as Jesus lived, a light, an offering, one poured out, touching the ugly, restoring the shamed…He will orchestrate koinonia…true ‘fellowship’…around us…and that is the Church. The earthly manifestation of God’s good intentions for the world. 

Trip to Barcelona

Published
by
Justin
on May 5, 2008
in Missional Church and Movements
. 1 Comment

Number of Metro Trips: 11

Number Cafe con Leches: 8

Number of Gaudi Buildings seen: 1

Number of people who most likely don’t follow in Jesus: 1,400,000

Number of steps taken while praying through this city: My feet say close to 1.4 million!

Number of pictures taken: 175

Number of facial piercings seen : ???

Number of tattoos seen: ???

Number of reasons why this would be a great place to live: At least 30!!!

Number of reasons why this would be a great place to begin a new church: 1,400,000

 

More thoughts coming when I have time to write…gotta catch a plane!

 

 

A video of my little one

Published
by
Justin
on May 4, 2008
in Life
. 0 Comments

After six days…I’m missing the family just a bit! Jen was kind to put this on her blog for me…I’m sure you won’t enjoy it near as much as this daddy did!

 

 

Made it to BCN

Published
by
Justin
on May 3, 2008
in Life
. 1 Comment

BCN is short for Barcelona…and is so much easier to type when you are as tired as I am tonight!

I walked for long time tonight. Long enough to have to tell myself to ‘dig deep’ to make it home. I only brought my Chuck Taylor’s for my week in Spain, and they brought the pain tonight. I can’t believe that people really played basketball in those and considered them athletic shoes! I can feel every stone, every crack, and every bump in the sidewalk in those things. but alas…I blog on. 

I got into bcn at around 3pm…I was giddy to get here. When we left barcelona after our ‘holiday’ last summer we both had a feeling we’d be back. I didn’t expect it to be so soon…and certainly didn’t expect this time here a week and a day ago! But I can’t say enough how stoked I am to be here. 

I’ve already taken probably 100 pictures…this place inspires me. I was snapping away pictures as soon as I got my camera out…I’ll post some here someday. Too tired right now to keep my eyes all the way open! 

Tonight I walked and prayed through the area of town that we stayed in last year. There is a lot different even from a year ago. A park has been made and it changes the shape of the little square that was just a construction site a year ago. There are now north-African kids playing ‘futbol’ in the little pitch that was built. A group of guys plays ping pong and whistle at some girls going by…ironically, one of them had a baby with her. These guys must be ignorant to fact that she must already got a man….

 

ok, so I fell asleep and am now writing Saturday morning.

 

Today I’m planning on getting out of the apartment and heading back down to the center of town. I might go up to the Graçia neighborhood first and go to the beach this afternoon. I need to get some sun block or my bald head is going to get cooked pretty quickly! 

I’ll write some more tonight….