Trick-or-Treat

On October 31, my neighborhood comes to life. Nearly all the houses have their lights turned on and most everyone comes out to happily meet passers-by. In addition to the people sitting on their porches with goodies for the neighborhood, there are the kids who are dressed up and excitedly going house to house to support their sugar fix. It is the one day of the year that I feel like I actually live in Mayberry. I meet neighbors who've moved in but I haven't taken the time to meet yet. And tonight some of our neighbors came up the idea to schedule our first neighborhood progressive dinner. Halloween is actually one of the few reasons neighborhoods have of actually coming to life and interacting as neighbors. Maybe we should do this more often. This year we followed our little "Cowboy Woody" house-to-house while we carried a "Lion." We came across some houses that were dark and I paused, thinking "too bad that these folks missed a great opportunity to meet the neighbors."

Before I put Caden to bed he wanted to read the story of Daniel & the Lions den in his Bible. After we read the story I prayed silently that God would prepare him to be a good neighbor. That he would care about his neighbors and be involved in their lives. That he would trust in God, boldly, as Daniel had and that his love for his neighbor would overflow from his love for God.

80's Party Recap

Look at that good looking couple.
Looks like they just walked off the set of music video, ha.

Saturday nights 80's Party proved to be a night immersed in the 80's. Kudo's to those who jumped into the merrymaking with two feet. We were visited by the "GhostBusters" and the "Scooby Doo gang". Not too mention some preps and some goths with a few 70's throwbacks. But one word seemed to carry the night....karaoke. I think there is some hidden talent just waiting for the R.E.S.P.E.C.T. they deserve.

Click here to check some pics of the event and make your comments.

You can't win 'em all

Nothing like a game of Jenga to blow off some mid-week steam. That was my remedy tonight. The cares of the world faded away as I focused on these tiny little blocks. Every Jenga player knows that it takes patience, touch and the nerves of a brain surgeon to piece together a Jenga win. But it all depends on your competition. If your competitor is distracted or jittery, they are done.

Well tonight, I overpowered my jenga-mate 4-1. Nothing short of a landslide...yah, I know. But what do you expect when you play a first-timer. I actually had to teach him the rules of the game, if you can believe that. He is really inexperienced in pressure situations and seems to lack concentration at times. What's wrong with this guy, you're thing. Ok...I was playing my 2 year old son. There I said it. And yes he did win a match, it was the first game that we played. I knew he was pretty good at building blocks, but I didn't think he had it in him to stick it to dear old dad in our first ever competition. I'm not supposed to lose to him when I'm actually trying (and I was) for at least another 10 years, when I'm good and ready to realize that I'm over the hill. But I'm still young and resilient, so I rolled off 4 consecutive wins (although he hung in there) before I changed his diaper and put him in bed. Jenga anyone?

Where has all the curiosity gone?

I was recently listening to an interview with noted historian, John Lukacs. He shared that sometime back in the 16th century the French word used to refer to historians was 'curior' or 'curious one.' Thus, those who sought to know where they came from and how thought, art, politics and culture developed were driven for such an understanding by an insatiable curiosity about such things.

Which leads me to look in the mirror and ask...Where are the curious ones? Where is such curiosity that would turn off a TV a read a classic book or bypass the local theme park and go on to the historic museum. Has curiosity about people and places and religion and language...died? Or is there a pent up curiosity still within us. A muscle that has atrophied from too many late nights of Seinfeld and Saturdays of MTV & ESPN.

Without such curiosity is possible to know God? Isn't there a holy search that we embark upon, driven by a life-and-death type of curiosity to find answers to the big questions of life? I a reminded of first commandment, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your MIND and with all your strength (Mark 12:30)." Might our curiosities be released so that we learn to love God with our minds. At the next commercial break maybe we should pick up a classic allegory. After the next movie maybe we should sit down with a systematic theology. At the next library maybe we should thumb through a good journal. Here's for feeding your curiosity.

The invisible sin

Today's post is probably mostly directed to guys, because its about pornography. With the proliferation of low-cost cable TV and satellite dishes and the instant access to the Internet, pornography is readily available free-of-charge, within the privacy and comfort of your most private space. And more often than not - men, boys and sometimes women open the door to this insidious and destructive world. My fear is that it is the silent demon that many Christians wrestle with. We must shed light on this dark closet of our lives so that through exposure we might find forgiveness from shame, power over the flesh, and redemption of our hearts and minds in the area of sex.

Someone who is doing something about this is www.xxxchurch.com. They published these staggering "Porn Reality" stats:

• Number of pornographic web sites: 4.2 Million
• People who regularly visit Internet porn web sites daily: 40 million
• Christians who said pornography is a major problem in the home: 47%
• Breakdown of male/female visitors to pornography sites: 65% male - 35% female
• 30% of unsolicited e-mails contain pornographic materials
• Women, far more than men, are likely to act out their behaviors in real life, such as having multiple partners, casual sex, or affairs.
• Porn revenue is larger than the combined revenues of all professional football, baseball and basketball franchises.
• US porn revenue exceeds the combined revenues of ABC, CBS, and NBC at $6.2 billion.

Don't let this be the invisible sin. It is real. It happens in our homes, in our churches and in our families. To those who are burdened by the heavy yoke of sexual addiction I offer an alternative. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." Matthew 11:28-30

A Place or a People?

My mind raced to that simple question after a short discussion with a friend at church last Sunday. He was sharing with me how he was inviting co-workers to our church. He shared that he described our church as a place where people do more than go to church on Sundays, but that we are involved in life. I was pretty happy with his description. And my thoughts fell back to that simple question of identity, are we a place or a people. Recent history has answered that question for us and we have been formed in the midst of its answer. But does its answer live and breathe with he rich vitality of the gospel.

My own thinking on the subject was fertilized by the collection of essays entitled "Missional Church." Within its pages I discovered that during the Reformation the Reformers, in a desire to correct the wanderings of the church emphasized some "true marks" of the church. In an attempt to realign the church with Scripture they suggested that the true church is a place where the gospel is rightly preached, the sacraments are rightly administered and church discipline is exercised. And as the modern thought grew to embrace the autonomy of the individual and capitalism and consumerism rose to power in the west the church increasingly was viewed as "a place where certain things happened."

But does a this "place where" language accurately represent the scriptural call to go and make disciples. Now I am not suggesting that we sell off our church buildings, but maybe more how we think about our relationship to church and how we talk about our church. Think about how we talk about our churches (Missional Church, p.58). ...you "go to church" much the same way you might go to a store. You "attend" a church, the way you attend a school or theater. You "belong to a church" as you would a service club with its programs and activities." This language is often the way I speak of my church experience. But it has created the experience of "church hopping" where we shop churches to find which one serves us the best array of clerical delicacies.

But I'm increasingly finding this "place where" language devoid of the power that the gospel appears to bring in the writings of Paul and the acts of the apostles. The apostles seem to be gathering "a people who" will die to themselves and live for Christ..."a people who" will submit to another as to the Lord..."a people who" will give of their plenty to meet the needs of others. If our church is a place where certain things happen, then we might be missing the richness of alternative-community that the gospel can create when we are a people who are faithfully living out the gospel amongst one another.

Are we consumers shopping for a place where they play the best music, deliver the best sermon and look and dress just like us? Will we leave if the pastor says something we don't like or the elders make a decision we don't agree with? Then we go down the road to find another place where they don't do that.

Did Jesus have elbows?

An odd question I know but strangely enough elbows are a hot topic around our house these days. At least with my 2 year old. Yeah, that's right he has an obsession with touching peoples elbows. You know when you straighten out your arm and there is that extra skin that you can pinch between your fingers...that is what he likes to do. We had "Movie Night" at the house the other night and as he is sitting next to me, eyes glued to the tube, he instinctly starts pinching my elbow skin. Last night in fact, he had an especially hard time falling asleep. He was screeming "MOMMYYYY!!!". This is not his usual ritual, so my wife went up to see what he needed. His response..."I need to touch your elbow." After a few pinches, he laid down and was in dreamland.

I'm not really sure how this applies to life, but I'm beginning to see how kids have a complete fascination and amazement with some of the most basic and mundane things. Maybe that is part of the reason Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these."

Tears of Joy

I had a pretty average day yesterday. I felt quite productive in the office, studying, administrating, planning and composing. But in the back of my mind was a responsibility that I had and that I am still getting used to....hospital visitation. Part of pastoral work is comforting people in time of need. I have often been comforted by some quite godly and gifted men and women in my own time of need. But I feel quite unprepared for the task. It is a good thing, when someone gifted in mercy and compassion is able empathize and encourage someone with great need. But I often feel that my portion of these gifts pales in comparison to others around me.

There appears the great pressure to do and say the perfect thing to relieve hurt from the individual or to point them to the greater spiritual lesson of the moment. How long do you stay? How do you pray? When do you counsel? What do you say? These thoughts flooded my mind as I drove to the hospital to visit someone much older and wiser than I was, so that I could comfort them. (Who would comfort me?) I dismissed these questions and strolled confidently into the room.

For 30 minutes we shared pleasant conversation and they put me at ease with their calm demeanor. I felt no expectations heaped upon me, just the simplicity of gratitude for a few minutes of my time. Before I left I held the hand of the man I was visiting and prayed a simple prayer for him. Then as I looked into his eyes to say goodbye I noticed a tear falling down his cheek. Nothing profound had occurred. I had offered no counsel and actually had talked very little. But we spent time together, just talking, and we prayed together. Sometimes being is more important than doing.

An upside-down world

The more I study Jesus the more I become uncomfortable with his life and his teaching. Although he stirred quite a following (and an opposition) while he walked the paths of Galillee, Judea and Samaria...he message was shockingly backwards. He wove elaborate parables in which the current enemies were the heroes of his stories. He spent intimately personal social time with people that others shunned. He even brought together two opposite ideas like kingdom and suffering...or even Messiah and suffering. If there was one thing that Messiah would not do, it would be to suffer. The Messiah would be one like Moses, who with the supernatural power of God would lead a million Jews triumphantly out of the oppression of Egypt. That was a messianic-type of action, that was the act of a Savior.

But Jesus waxed on his reign in paradoxically down-in-the-dirt descriptions that turned kingdom language on its head. He unveils this upside-down world plainly to his twelve disciples the night before he was killed (Luke 22:25-29). He told them that if they wanted to be the greatest in his eyes, to become the least. He challenged his followers to not be like the leaders of the world who expressed their superiority over their followers, but to follow in his steps and take the place of the lowest servant. The reality is that the kingdom of God values the humble not the proud, the poor not the rich, the persecuted not the comfortable, the ostrasized not the included (Lk 6:20-27).

I'm not quite sure I am comfortable embracing the paradox of the kingdom. It doesn't seem successful, or comfortable or even enviable. But I'm sure Jesus can turn my ideas of success and comfort on their head too.

A Lust for JayJay

Have you ever met Jay Jay the jetplane? If you have a toddler then you know who he is. He is the shiny, happy little jetplane that adorns the local PBS station every morning right at my kids breakfast time. He and his friends from Tarrytown Airport (like Big Jake, Herky the Helicopter and Snuffy) make child-like mistakes and by the end of every 30 minutes episode they have learned a valuable moral lesson that is supposed to prepare my toddler to be a good person.
All is well and good. My boys stay seated during breakfast and sometimes even dance during the cute little songs. But Jay Jay has become an obsession for Caden. We thought the good parent thing to do was to buy him the figurines so that he could create his own "Jay Jay" adventures. But soon after we gave him the planes, we noticed that he would not let anyone else even near the things.

He grabs them out of his cousins hands if he picks them up. He knocks his brother (only 1) down if he even walks near Jay-Jay and friends. And if I or my wife pick them up he throws a fit. You don't have to tell me twice that we are sinfully selfish from birth, I see it everyday. I have seen Caden so obsessed with these planes that he will carry them around, so that they don't even get out of his sight. It got so bad that last night I had to have a little devotion with him about this concept they call sharing.

But isn't that where we all find ourselves. We all have something in our lives that we don't trust anyone else with, even God. Maybe its our money, relationships, kids, control, future.... you name it.

If Jesus were here he would find it in our lives. Like the time when he was approached by a rich & pious ruler. This man was a spiritual specimen, but he was holding onto his Jay-Jay. In spite of his stoutly pious life Jesus said to him, "One thing you still lack; sell all that you possess and distribute it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me."
That is the problem with holding onto things, like Jay-Jay. They keep us from following Christ... from being true disciples... from being true Christians. We must be willing to give up Jay-Jay and Herky and Big Jake and the whole Tarrytown family, or we will be too bogged down to follow Him. One day, I pray, Caden will be willing to lay down Jay-Jay.

My hands said it all

This week didn't start the way I had exactly planned. I left some drinks in the freezer over the weekend and guess what happened to them. So I return to the office on Monday to the news that there is a mess in one of the freezers. So I spent the first 2 hours of my week cleaning out a freezer. And all the time I'm complaining to myself about the fact that I'm cleaning this freezer. I'm thinking, "this is below me"..."this is a waste of my time"..."I should be doing more important things for the church or for God or for me"....Pretty lousy attitude huh?!

So Tuesday comes and again I am reminded of another mess from the weekend that I have to clean up by the end of the day. This time it is some dirty, rust-covered, soot-filled barrels. Great now I'm gonna get dirty. I look around to see who I can get to take this mess off my hands, but I can't sluff this off on anyone else. So I get out the sun and start cleaning up these barrels and putting them away. During the task I have some time to do some thinking...and I'm right back where I was on Monday...grumbling. Insert previous grumblings here. Then at some point in the process I get sick of my own complaining. I just stop working, sit still and look down at my hands....

....Staring back up at me are a pair of dirty hands. I don't normally get dirty hands in my line of work. But at the sight I pause and ask myself, "Is this really below me?" "Are there really more important things I should be doing for God right now or is that just my selfishness rising up again?" Then I began to consider, what might Christ be thinking about as he did these things. Would he grumble? Would he delegate to a disciple? And I was reminded of some words that described him.

"For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Jesus, the God-man, the King of Kings and Prince of Peace the one who was above everyone he interacted with, did not seek to be served but to serve others.
"he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him." Jesus willingly did what no one would choose to do. He humbled himself to the position of the lowest servant. He didn't demand a high position or special treatment. He did the unthinkably mundane and low task, to express his humility to the task given to him by his Father.

"being in very nature God, [he] did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross!" The king became a servant so that undeserving servants could reign with the king. That is the gospel. My desperate need for repair drove Jesus to give up his status to serve my punishment. So how should I, a forgiven sinner, respond when mundanely low needs arise? As a someone who expects to be served or as one who (being forgiven much) is willing to follow in the steps of my Savior and humbly serve others. And although my heart was in the right place, my hands said it all.

If in doubt Jesus

So it's Sunday afternoon and I get to ask Caden, our 2 1/2 year old, one of my favorite questions. Well there are actually lots of questions that I like to ask him, even when I know what he is going to say. For example, I love to ask him how his sleep was at breakfast. And every time he answers, "good" while banana bread crumbs come tumbling onto the table and the floor. And then I like to ask him how his banana bread is. And yep, once again he comes up with his rote answer, "good." He's said "good" to both of those questions for months now, but I just love asking him just to hear him say it again.

So it's Sunday afternoon and I'm back to one of my favorite questions, probably the one that every parent asks there kid after bringing them home from Church. You might have heard it yourself, "Who did you learn about in church today." Caden looks at me and says confidently....J-E-S-U-S. I like the answer, but it's not true, because when I picked him up from his class his teacher was quizzing each toddler as they left. "Who built the ark?" And when each student chimed in "NOAH" they would receive an animal sticker. So I smile and I try to draw right answer out of Caden. "Noooo....who did you learn about today?" He thinks, then goes to answer #2...."G-O-D." Good answers, but his little 2 1/2 year old mind can't quite remember the mantra of the day "Noah built an ark."

But I'm a lot more like my son that I think. I can come and go to church and often the only thing that sticks is a hallmark card-like stanza about Jesus or God. Lacking is an appetite for a full course meal of truth. Missing is a zealous passion for morsels of truth that will propel me into a week of reckless abandon in serving my Savior. Invisible is a man broken by his sin, coming to the cross to wash himself in forgiveness of Cross and bask in the GLORY of "I AM". Absent is the conviction of the Holy Spirit that my comfortable life is a far cry from the kingdom lifestyle that I've been empowered to experience. And I know it's me that is distracted not Him. Lord, Awake in me an honesty and humility that is zealous for YOU