Showing up

I used to teach a small group of adults at my church.  We met every Sunday night in a different person’s home, and would spend time eating a meal together, and discussing a passage of Scripture. I remember one particular evening, we were all in a funk — all of us.  It was winter, dark early, cold, snowy, and one of those nights when it would have been easy to just stay home. We talked about the struggle we each had getting up the energy to walk out the door to our cars and come to our group. Even though most of us felt the same on this particular night, we were all there.

So we all had a weak moment together.  It was highly unusual for us all to feel the same way, so we began to talk about why we had come. Someone said guilt, which I totally resonated with.  Another said they had come out of obligation. And another said they missed the week before, and they just didn’t want to miss two weeks in a row. One person blurted out, I didn’t want to come, but my wife made me, so I put on my pants and just showed up!

“I just showed up.” I think there is something to be said about “showing up.” Now, I don’t mean to over spiritualize this, but that evening turned out to be one of the most meaningful conversations we had in weeks, talking about what it meant to be faithful to each other, to be accountable to a group of people, and that we were better people because we showed up.  It probably goes without saying that after that evening, no one wanted to miss, simply because we showed up.

Well, this weekend and next week is revival. I’m not certain about what God wants to say to us this week. I know we all have very busy schedules, and it isn’t possible for us to attend every evening service.  I’m not going to take attendance, and I don’t think God will either. I’m neither one who believes that God is limited to working in certain designated spaces. In reality, there is nothing special about a space; but there is about those who gather in the space. 

What I think I’m trying to say is that something happens when we gather. Something does happen when we “show up.” Just like it did for my small group that Sunday evening some two years ago, I believe that God has something in mind for us this next week. Because when we show up, we can be assured he is always there waiting for us. In the meantime, will you help us all prepare by praying?

Pray for Susie Shellenberger, that the message God has laid on her heart is straight from His heart to ours, through her.

Pray for Kyle Owens as he leads worship in chapel in the mornings, and in the evening services at College Church.

Pray for Kendall Franklin, and the staff at College Church.

Pray for those among us whose relationship with God has yet to be restored.

Pray for renewal for our campus.

Choosing your clothes

I woke up this morning and went through the same daily routine that we all go through — I chose my clothes for the day.  I’m not sure what you do, but the final approval on what I’m wearing is my wife.  This is the pattern I follow every morning: I get dressed, walk into our living room where she is usually seated with her cup of coffee, and ask the same question, “Does this look okay?” And my wife, true to her character, and because she doesn’t want me to embarrass her or my family always responds honestly with either  “You look good,” or, “You can’t wear that!” There are some days, though, where even I can sense something is off, and that happened today. As a matter of fact, as I walked myself in front of her, I didn’t ask her if this looked okay,. I asked her if this looked “wonky.”  Her reply was reassuring to me as she simply said, “yes,” and proceeded to help me find something that was a match. Well, my name had been preserved and my family saved another embarrassing moment, thanks to my wife. But my mind has wandered a little as I reflect on what happened to me this morning. This incident, which actually happened by the way, allows you a peek into the paranoia that is my life, where I find myself wondering every day whether my clothes match.  But as important as my “physical” clothes are to me, this also has me wondering about another set of clothing — the ones that Paul instructs us in Colossians that we are to “put on.”  Read again what he tells us to wear: “These are the clothes you must put on, then, since God has chosen you, made you holy, and lavished his love upon you.  You must be tender-hearted, kind, humble, meek, and ready to put up with anything.  You must bear with one another and if anyone has a complaint against someone else, you must forgive each other.  Just as the master forgave you, you must do the same.  On top of all this you must put on love, which ties everything together and makes it complete.”  Col 3:12-14, Kingdom New Testament Love is the “article” of clothing that, if you’ll allow me to say it this way, makes our outfit complete.  It’s like the sweater vest that brings together your pants and shirt, or the scarf that makes your ensemble “work.”  Love is what helps our outfit make sense, so it doesn’t come across “wonky.” I’m not sure about you, but I’d rather not have that happen. It’s written for those who might disagree, or at times even be offended. When this happens, Paul is telling us that, as people of faith, there is a proper way for us to respond, and that is by wearing a very specific set of clothing.  As my wife serves as the final word on my physical clothing, there is One to whom we are accountable for our spiritual clothes as well, the One who determines the wardrobe for us as described above. So, I’m thinking about clothing this morning.  And as I’m thinking about clothing, I also find myself asking a question: if these are the words that are the standard of dress that we don’t want to compromise, are my clothes matching today? As we continue to move through this semester, my prayer for us all is that we are wearing the right clothes, put together in the right way. Text for the week:  Colossians 3:12-14

A lesson learned

Have you ever heard the phrase, “don’t speak out of turn”?  I think the first time I heard this was in kindergarten.  According to my trusty Random House Dictionary, College Edition, this phrase carries several meanings.

First, and the one most applied to my kindergarten classmates, it can mean that you’ve said something at the wrong time — like you’ve interrupted someone else while they were talking, or maybe it was someone else’s turn to speak.

It can also mean that you have said something that you had no right to say, or you don’t have the authority to speak on.  So if you make a decision at work that isn’t yours to make, it could be said that you have “spoken out of turn.”

Another way to interpret this phrase is to say that you have spoken unwisely.  Who wants to be accused of that?  How do we protect ourselves from unwise conversation, especially when dealing with the important issues of life and faith?  Well, like I said Thursday in chapel, there is a reason and a way we do this.

Remember, in his letter to Colossians, Paul is talking to a young church, a group that has quite possibly only been gathering together for five years.  They need a lot of instruction, and Paul gives them some sound advice in two verses, that I believe can help us as well as we move forward this semester.

The reason we have this conversation is because we don’t want to be deceived.  If we’re going to believe something, give our entire life away to it, we want it to be truthful.  We want it to be able to stand the test of time, and withstand the challenges that speak against it.  We need to be able to discern what we can know, and trust God with what we can’t.  I believe as we walk through this semester, God will be faithful by providing clarity for us.

The reason I’m confident of that is because of the way we’re told to go about it.  Listen again to the words that Paul uses to describe this conversation:  compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience, love and unity.  These are the “clothes” we want to wear, and the way we desire to speak and act with each other.

My prayer for us as we begin is that we won’t forget the lesson from kindergarten, not to speak out of turn, and that as we seek wisdom, we look and sound like Jesus.  May our minds and our hearts be shaped by the wisdom and heart of God.

Text for the week:  Colossians 2:8, 3:12-14

The rest of the story

One of my favorite radio personalities was a man named Paul Harvey.  He was from Chicago, and he had a 15-minute daily segment that was syndicated all over the country.  He was a master story teller, and a part of his monologue always included back story to someone who would have been a well-known historical figure. It was always intriguing because he told obscure, but significant parts of their story.  It helped the rest of their life story make sense, and he always ended by saying, “And now you know the rest of the story.” 

                                                                                                             

If you ever heard him, his voice and the unique way he would weave his monologue were unforgettable.  His use of the phrase, “the rest of the story,” has stuck with me over the last 24 hours.  I was having a conversation with a friend yesterday, and we were reflecting on Luke’s narrative.  While we were talking, it dawned on me that I left out a couple of the characters that were included in Luke — one in particular, whose name was Simeon.  I don’t think this story is complete without him.

                                       

Simeon, like Zechariah, was a priest, serving in the temple.   He, like Zechariah, was an aging man, but a man who had received a promise.  Luke tells us that God had made him a promise that would not die without seeing the fulfillment of the prophecy concerning the Messiah.  He worked in the temple, and happened to be there when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus in for his dedication.  Luke says that Simeon felt compelled to enter the temple while Mary and Joseph were there. Coincidence? Doubt it. Chance meeting? More like the fulfillment of a promise made. As the narrative says, the reason he went in at that exact moment was because he was “compelled by the spirit.”   

That’s just the way God is, and I think completes the way Luke tells the Christmas story.  First, we are assured that God hears us.  Second, Luke wants us to know that he finds favor with us.  He then, by including the shepherds, makes sure that we all know, regardless of who we are, that Jesus came for everyone.  And now, through this little “chance” meeting with Simeon and these young parents, a promise made was now kept. 

Luke wants us to know in the midst of everything else he is saying, that our God is one who can be trusted.  Again we are reminded that in the story, God never forgets the person.  In the middle of this story of the arrival of the Messiah, we get this amazing news.  He came to an old man, a young teenager, a group of stinking shepherds, and now a priest. So we can be assured that he hears us, likes us, included us, and can be trusted.  They mattered, and so do we.  Like Paul Harvey would say, “And now we know the rest of the story.”

Text for the week:  Luke 2:22-35

                                                       

Being grateful

Thanksgiving carries a lot or meaning for me.  In my home growing up, it was the day we busted out the Christmas decorations.  It was the first day Christmas music could be played in our house, and we put up the tree and hung the lights.  My dad would get out his Dickens Village, his trains, and our house was transformed every year from 8:00 a.m. – noon Thanksgiving Day.  My dad thought the best way to celebrate Thanksgiving was by beginning our preparation for Christmas. 

It also meant the agony of watching another Lions loss on national TV.  We would quickly follow that by eating away our pain with the traditional turkey and fixings feast — affectionately called “therapeutic eating.”  The afternoon would wrap up with a nap.  Not much has changed over the years for me.  As a matter of fact, nothing has, including the Lions and the nap.

Along the way, though, new traditions have come; shopping at 3:00 a.m. for Black Friday sales, the Ohio State/Michigan game, and transitioning from alternating holidays with our kids and my parents to my kids and their children alternating with us.  

For us around here, it means a break.  This break reminds us to reflect on what we are thankful for.  We have a lot to be thankful for, but today my thoughts have gone to a place in the world currently ravaged by missiles.  It is a place where no one celebrates Thanksgiving, and very few celebrate Christmas.  They aren’t getting a “break” this week.  As a matter of fact, they might be thrown headlong into war.  It is a confusing time for them, and a challenging time for us to think about.  What is it that makes us thankful during times such as these?

I want to say our thankfulness is shaped by the first verse in Chapter 11 of Hebrews, and the four-letter word contained therein; that word is “hope.”  “Hope” is a word we will hear a lot between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It will come at us as we walk through Advent, anticipating the coming of the Christ, “hoping” for a better day.  We long for things that can’t be seen, as Scripture says, with conviction.  We’ve never known a world without war, disaster, hunger, pain, and death, but we long for the day when all that will end.  We know that what is happening in parts of our world isn’t the last word, because we have hope.

Hope.  For us who live in the West, hope is easier to think about than it is for others who sit in refugee camps and bomb shelters.  Though this may be the current reality for many, we long for things that have yet to be seen.  So this week as we reflect on all we have to be thankful for, hang the decorations, put up the lights, watch another meaningless Lions game, shop while listening to Michael Buble, let’s also remember those for whom no music is playing, no decorations are going up, no game is being watched (there is mercy somewhere), and no turkey is being eaten. Let us remember those for whom hope seems a long way off.

Text for the week:  Hebrews 11:1

Another way

Not sure you realized it or not, but this week Skye brought us full circle.  Some of you weren’t here during fall 2012, but we spent that semester talking about the story of this amazing father found in Luke 15.  We talked about the two ways expressed in the lives of the two brothers and the fact that we all knew there had to be another way.

Skye brought us back to this story this week, and broke it down for us like this: we either see our lives as lived for God, a life of Christian activism – older brother; or life from God, where we live for what he will give to us – younger brother.  Both leave us feeling empty and longing for something else. We all know deep down inside there is something wrong with the way both brothers in this story are living, but at times it’s difficult to determine what that looks like. 

Thankfully, there is another way. 

This week, Skye put it like this: life with God.  In his thank you tweet to our campus, his stated prayer for us was that God would bless us with Himself.  That leaves us with a decision to make by answering the question, Is that enough? 

I would say, without a change of heart, the only answer to that question is no.  We will never be satisfied with our lives if we continue to see God as an object to be controlled by what we ask for.  Many in our society have limited God to a cosmic Santa Claus, crediting him for good, or blaming him for the bad that comes their way.  When things go wrong, we wonder where he is.  That is what Skye was talking about Wednesday when he said that our lives are not about what we do, but how we see.  I often ask the question, What are you hearing? This week I want to ask, What are you seeing?

How we see shapes what we do.  So we don’t respond to the need in the eastern part of the U.S., then expecting God to look at us as differently or better.  We have to fight off the urge to play the comparison game over the next couple of weeks, and just respond because there is need. We must realize they are like us, undeserving of the hand that has been dealt them, experiencing great need, and so we respond for these reasons — period.  We don’t do this to earn anything from God that we haven’t already received.  We don’t participate in service or ministry as a form of penance. 

Without this new heart that we’ve talked about all semester, what we do is just activism or point tallying.  My prayer for us is that the things that we do come from a heart that is shaped by the One who made us, so we act without expecting anything in return. 

Text for the week:  Luke 15:11-32