Climb high, Sleep low

Do you know what I look forward to?  I look forward to Heaven.  I know, I know, there is not much about that statement that sets me apart from millions of other Christians.  But here is the deal, the streets of gold, no more pain or suffering, an endless day of praising God, that is all wonderful, but not why I am making this post today.  I am looking forward to heaven for the mended relationships.  I can't wait to see the people who I, quite possibly, might never truly fellowship with in this life again.  The reasons for this foregoing of fellowship range from my personal frustration with how certain people have treated me or how I witnessed them treat others, as well as on their part, by them cutting ties with me due to my affiliations with people they do not agree with.  Regardless I know that in heaven all of these reason will be silly and inconsequential, because once we are there the "trials of this life will be over", including our petty differences and disputes, and I praise God for that.  Once we get to heaven there will be nothing more important than, and there will be nothing to distract us from, praising our Lord.  I honestly can't wait to make new friends out of old ones.  Have a blessed day.

I had a revelation the other day.  It is ground breaking, humbling, awe inspiring, or at the least mildly interesting.  The Church in no way is "like riding a bike".  Obvious at first reality check, but with deeper investigation I think we would find many in the Church to be taken completely surprised by this revelation.  So let me take a moment to explain from which this epiphany came.  I spent nine months attending and volunteering at a congregation in Fayetteville, NC, the Helen Street Church of Christ.  Up to this point in my life it has been the healthiest congregation that I have had the privilege to associate with.  In response to my most recent dealings with the Church I posed a question to myself, "What made Helen Street so healthy"?  I came to the conclusion that it was due to their constant flexing of the muscle groups of love, cooperation, humility and self-sacrifice.  Now this congregation is in a military town and comprised of a majority of military families, and as a product is way more diversified culturally and racial than any other Church I have been to.  I think it is this constant influx of different ideas that make Helen Street what it is.  There is no chance for a tradition to remain unquestioned for twenty plus years in this environment.  I think that this is a good thing, and if you are wondering they have many long standing traditions, but they can tell you exactly what purpose they serve and are always ready to try a new method and see if it works better.  Another thought on this subject led me to a simpler solution, that being that most Churches have nothing better to affix their concern to than the strength of their defenses against the "over-whelming" power of the progressive and liberal theology in the brotherhood.  That was never a concern at Helen Street, mostly because there were bigger happenings vying for their attention, namely deployments to truly hostile environments.  Now back to my first point, and it is simply this, the longer we go with out testing our reasons for particular traditions, the more time we go between hearing new ideas or new perspectives, the harder it is for us to consider them.  Our discernment muscle group atrophies to a point that even if we wanted to we could not move, or use it.  Once you learn to ride a bike you never forget or as the saying states, "It's like riding a bike."  The church is NOT like riding a Bike.

It is amazing what one collects in a paltry six months.  I feel it is healthy to move at least every other year, just to get rid of the things you don't use anymore.  Ok, maybe that is a little extreme, but only just a little.  Now I have done my fair share of moving over the last ten years, and as I mentioned before, I still find it hard to believe how much stuff accumulates between each move.  I can't imagine how much stuff I would have to go through if I lived somewhere for twenty years.  And that got me thinking about how this truth might cross over into other areas of life.  My experience has taught me that what holds true for one thing usually holds true for others.  So here you go a glimpse into my thoughts.
"Cleaning is mandatory for healthy living.  Now spot cleaning works good for most things, but it is inevitable that at certain points you will have to have a major cleaning session, this is what most of us call "Spring Cleaning".  The necessity of cleaning comes from the fact that we are dust machines, as we shed countless skin cells every day.  Not to mention that we coop ourselves up inside buildings and let fans continuously circulate contaminated air, which in turn helps propagate the numerous microbes and fungi that love to feast on our filth.  If we are not diligent in our cleaning, we can quickly be overrun by these little nasties, and be overcome by the scent, the sight or even the illnesses they spread.  It is a lovely picture I know.  This happens every day, however, the physical house is not what I am concerned with.  I am worried about the spiritual one.  I think that if something can happen to you physically then it is possible for it to happen to you spiritually.  I think that you need to clean house spiritually every once in a while.  Now I don't mean that you get rid of everything you know and start from scratch; that is not what you do with your physical house, so I would not suggest it with your spiritual house either.  But it must be cleaned and straightened up just the same.  We keep so many useless and out dated ministry techniques in our spiritual houses.  We must have a time when we can evaluate them and if they no longer connect to the culture we should just get rid of them.  If we don't, if we hold on to the way we have always done it, if we never let go of the idea it "worked for me, so it should work for them" and the mentality that goes with it, then we are doomed to clutter and filth and illness in our spiritual lives."
So there is your glimpse.  I could probably show you some more, but if you see too much then I might lose my intrigue and mystique.  And really, what is a man without those things???

"I have been an elder for twenty years.  I have witnessed a steady decline in attendance and commitment during that time, and I want to see that trend averted.  I see too many groups moving to the left; too many people who are abandoning scripture so they can feel better about themselves.  Most people today hold to loosely to the understandings and traditions that made the Church great (before our decline).  We need to tighten up shop and reign in the flocks before we lose everything.  I believe that young people today don't know how fine the line is between saved and unsaved; how easily they can be swept up into denominationalism and be lost to Christ.  On top of that we have parents who see this happening and do nothing about it.  Again, I believe this all comes down to a lack of understanding, or possibly even knowledge of scripture.  With all of this said we now need to make a plan to stem the tide, how do we get the young people and their parents back to church?  And not just coming, but coming regularly?"
I have heard these opinions and these questions too many times to count over the last five years.  I have offerd ideas, as well as, any insight I have just as many times, and have witnessed others offer their opinions.  However no matter how open to these suggestions the leaders seemed they were never acted on (at least with any kind of commitment from their part).  Why would that be so?  Then it hit me.  I have been looking at this all wrong.  There is more to the answer that I had been allowing myself to see.  I cut off my thought process once I had a viable answer and never looked further to see if there could be more to it.  I have always chalked it up to not just a generation gap but a cultural one as well.  I thought we were just dealing with trying bridge the gap between modern and post-modern.  Now I see there is more to it.  It is simple, but completes the picture for me.  Why would elders never take my advice or the advice of other leaders, like deacons?  It is because we are tainted; we are stereotyped in with the rest of our generations, which they believe are perverting all they hold sacred.  As much as they want people back in the church, they want them back on their terms.  They see us as uncommitted and essentially spiritual children who go with their desires instead of scripture.  With that standard set why would the truly consider any ideas we may offer?  They would not, so that is why our suggestions receive a thoughtful look "Yeah that makes sense" or "I see your point", and then once we leave they dismissed it out of hand.  This also helps explain why the older more conservative and "grounded" members hold so much sway, when it comes to the decisions made in the church.  If all of the younger generations can be stereotyped than the same can be done to the older generations as well.  So as long as they hail from the "glory days" then they understand our plight.  They know what works and how church should be done, and the commitment that it takes to be successful in this world of degrading moral values.  It seems to me that it could be argued that spirituality is no longer based on scripture but adherence to a generational philosophy.   Well...it is just a thought.

We pride ourselves on the simplicity of the Gospel.  We hold fast to the teaching of Christ to, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.  I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” – Lk. 18:16b-17.  So why do we find it so hard to communicate our beliefs to unbelievers and the un-churched in a language that they can understand?  Let, me try to explain this predicament another way.  I told the story of Jesus’ resurrection to the Tuesday School group this week.  On more than one occasion during the story I had to stop and search for a word they would understand to communicate more effectively the point of the story.  An example would be instead of saying tomb I would say grave, or instead of spirit I used ghost.  Now this may not seem like much, but if the students did not understand what a spirit or tomb were then how much of the story would they understand?

On that same token if I tell someone who is not familiar with the language of the church that they must be washed in the blood, sanctified, spirit filled, Jesus lives in me, I am saved, reconciled, redeemed, Body of Christ, the Lord’s day, power in the blood, give it to God just to name a few.  I am willing to bet that most of these statements make perfect sense to you.  I am also willing to bet that to a non-churched person they are the equivalent of quantum physics to yourself.  Now does quantum physics seem like child’s play to you?  It doesn’t to me, and so now I must reflect on how I share the Gospel.  I must rethink my approach and reword my thoughts so I can present the message clear and plain to those who do not know God.  Do you need to retool your message?  Have you been communicating with a message that is full of your culture, but over the head and beyond the experience of your audience?  Hey, it is just something to think about.

There is saying I once heard, something a kin to “why do you say, I will do this tomorrow…”  Ring a bell?  We have all had an experience where we have planned an event or activity for work or for our family; and then life got in the way.  If we are not careful these interruptions can really get us frustrated.  When that happens we tend to react in ways that are not consistent with who we are, and we say things that we do not mean to people we love.  We have to have a plan of action, a default to revert to when life throws us a loop.  For me that default is “adventure” (my wife hates it when I say this while we are driving).  I use this word a lot when I make a wrong turn or we are trying to find a new place based on someone else’s directions.  I use it to remind myself that we may not know where we are, but on the Brightside, at least, we are going someplace new that we may never see otherwise.  Do you have a default?  Do you have a reminder to make lemonade out of life’s lemons?  If not, get one, you might just be a little happier with it.

Now I don’t have to tell you this, but please indulge me.  Life is hectic!  It does not always travel down the path we have made for it, no matter how meticulously we have prepared the way.  I don’t believe that I ever forgot this fact, but I was sure aware of it a couple months ago.  December was a chaotic month for me, but my wife and I did manage a vacation to Denver.  It was fun but very, very busy.  On one of our last days there we got to drive up into the mountains, to The Rocky Mountain National Park.  In Denver that morning it was approximately 50 degrees (balmy), and from Denver it is about an hour and a half drive to Estes Park which is the town right outside of the National Park.  The weather in Estes Park was 36 degrees and drizzle.  At the entrance to the National Park it was 33 degrees and the snow was very wet, but by the time we reached our final destination in the park it was 31 degrees the snow was dry and the wind was gusting at 15 mph.  Not only was the snow falling but it was being picked up off of the ground by the wind, a proverbial blizzard, especially for a Texas boy.  By the time we got back to Denver it was 60 degrees and there was no trace of precipitation.

                Some times life is unpredictable, and sometimes we predict life.  We knew that there was a possibility of snow in the mountains.  We had the opportunity to turn around at any time, but we chose to push forward.  Life gives us warning signs when we are pushing too hard.  We all have our Estes Parks.  Most of us choose to push past them.  Maybe it is our pride or we are too caught up in life to recognize them.  The important thing to remember, no matter where you are on the drive, is that God is in control, and even when we push past the place He wants us to be, He has a retreat for us in our own Denver.