an examined life

check out johnny cash's last video... song is by 9 inch nails, but the video and story are pure johnny cash: depth, artistry, pain... and a haunting voice that confronts me with some facet of truth that I had overlooked.

in the video he stands at the very sunset of his life and he reflects back over it (BTW, it's not hard to see his love for Jesus and longing for him in this video).
there's lots of wisdom in reflecting on your life and asking the question, "am i living it right?"... there is even more wisdom in doing it before its all over, while you still have time to change.
Ps. 90.12.. 'Lord teach us to number our days that we might gain a heart of wisdom'

enjoy.. savor.. consider..

holiness.. restoring dignity to the word

the word holiness seems to have accumulated a good deal of baggage in modern parlance. we typically think of holiness as 'holier than thou' or in some sort of puritanical, self righteous vein.
holiness actually means something that is set apart for a very special use.
in the Biblical sense, it conveys the idea of purity and, believe it or not, beauty, particulary breathtaking moral beauty.

consider this quote by one of my mentors...

The life of holiness is the life of faith in which the believer, with a deepening knowledge of his own sin and helplessness apart from Christ, increasingly casts himself upon the Lord, and seeks the power of the Spirit and the wisdom and comfort of the Bible to battle against the world, the flesh and the devil. It is not a lonely or cheerless struggle, for Christ gives the Spirit to the members of his body to help one another…growth in holiness is always growth together”
- Edmound Clowney

how this plays out in our lives in in this manner: maturing in holiness means maturing in love, a love that knows God’s love poured out into our hearts and answers that love with obedience.

may God give you unusual grace in your pursuit of the moral beauty that he intends to restore to you..

unexpected beauty in an ugly place

Another clip from one of my most loved films, the shawshank redemption'.
This scene reminds me of what God has done in my heart... he brought the alien beauty of Heaven to my ugly heart.. unexpected beauty in an ugly place.
may our ears be tuned into the beautifying and resoritive song he sings over us..

The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing." Zeph. 3.17

courage... the forgotten virtue

'Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.' C. S. Lewis

'Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.' Anais Nin (1903-77)


'Anxiety is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all others thoughts are drained.' Arthur Somers Roche


i thank we can all identify with the above quotes......
God has told us in joshua, that our ability to be courageous is linked with our realization that we are not alone... that God himself is with us.
check out joshua 1.9

couple these thoughts with the last post.. 'get busy living or get busy dying..'
where is God calling you to risk something for Him?

risk or rust

The Pope

Concerning the Roman Papacy, Martin Luther once said that Roman Catholic Church is like "...lice placed by the devil on God's Almighty fur coat."  The famous reformer was obviously not a fan of the Catholic Church or the Papacy of Rome, but I would argue our dear Martin Luther would be a rather encouraged by the status of the contemporary Catholic Church. 

Pope Benedict XVI has been traveling around America the past few days, and yesterday while speaking at a Youth Rally, the Pope had these words to say. (Hopefully this isn't too long for ya)

"The power to destroy does, however, remain. To pretend otherwise would be to fool ourselves. Yet, it never triumphs; it is defeated. This is the essence of the hope that defines us as Christians; and the Church recalls this most dramatically during the Easter Triduum and celebrates it with great joy in the season of Easter! The One who shows us the way beyond death is the One who shows us how to overcome destruction and fear: thus it is Jesus who is the true teacher of life (cf. Spe Salvi, 6). His death and resurrection mean that we can say to the Father "you have restored us to life!" (Prayer after Communion, Good Friday). And so, just a few weeks ago, during the beautiful Easter Vigil liturgy, it was not from despair or fear that we cried out to God for our world, but with hope-filled confidence: dispel the darkness of our heart! dispel the darkness of our minds!
What might that darkness be? What happens when people, especially the most vulnerable, encounter a clenched fist of repression or manipulation rather than a hand of hope? A first group of examples pertains to the heart. Here, the dreams and longings that young people pursue can so easily be shattered or destroyed. I am thinking of those affected by drug and substance abuse, homelessness and poverty, racism, violence, and degradation -- especially of girls and women. While the causes of these problems are complex, all have in common a poisoned attitude of mind which results in people being treated as mere objects ? a callousness of heart takes hold which first ignores, then ridicules, the God-given dignity of every human being. Such tragedies also point to what might have been and what could be, were there other hands -- your hands -- reaching out. I encourage you to invite others, especially the vulnerable and the innocent, to join you along the way of goodness and hope.
The second area of darkness -- that which affects the mind -- often goes unnoticed, and for this reason is particularly sinister. The manipulation of truth distorts our perception of reality, and tarnishes our imagination and aspirations. I have already mentioned the many liberties which you are fortunate enough to enjoy. The fundamental importance of freedom must be rigorously safeguarded. It is no surprise then that numerous individuals and groups vociferously claim their freedom in the public forum. Yet freedom is a delicate value. It can be misunderstood or misused so as to lead not to the happiness which we all expect it to yield, but to a dark arena of manipulation in which our understanding of self and the world becomes confused, or even distorted by those who have an ulterior agenda.
Have you noticed how often the call for freedom is made without ever referring to the truth of the human person? Some today argue that respect for freedom of the individual makes it wrong to seek truth, including the truth about what is good. In some circles to speak of truth is seen as controversial or divisive, and consequently best kept in the private sphere. And in truth's place -- or better said its absence -- an idea has spread which, in giving value to everything indiscriminately, claims to assure freedom and to liberate conscience. This we call relativism. But what purpose has a "freedom" which, in disregarding truth, pursues what is false or wrong? How many young people have been offered a hand which in the name of freedom or experience has led them to addiction, to moral or intellectual confusion, to hurt, to a loss of self-respect, even to despair and so tragically and sadly to the taking of their own life? Dear friends, truth is not an imposition. Nor is it simply a set of rules. It is a discovery of the One who never fails us; the One whom we can always trust. In seeking truth we come to live by belief because ultimately truth is a person: Jesus Christ. That is why authentic freedom is not an opting out. It is an opting in; nothing less than letting go of self and allowing oneself to be drawn into Christ's very being for others."

get busy livin' or get busy dying...

Enjoy this piece of cinematic beauty. It communicates a crossroads in life that many of us need to confront our souls with.
Ps. 90.12 says that wisdom comes from considering the end of our days.
Morgan Freeman puts it in modern parlance here.

hope to see you tonite @ the gathering... talking about creation

The Temptation of Christ

As I posted a few days ago, Henri Nouwen has become a good friend of mine through his books. While reading Nouwen's book , "In the Name of Jesus" and spending some time in prayer, I sorta stumbled across this this idea.

And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the  wilderness for forty days, being tempted by the devil... And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, "To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. If you be then will worship me, it will all be yours." And Jesus answered him, "it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve" 

When I read the story of Christ's temptation I am unable to connect with the temptations that he was dealt. Christ's temptations seem to be on a different level then mine, I have never been exhausted from a 40 day fast, and then been offered the admiration and approval of the entire world. A typical temptation of mine is getting frustrated when I haven't had my morning coffee and I have to deal with a mile of traffic on the way to work. Even in the midst of much greater temptation, I have never been offered the world in exchange for worship. But we mustn't remove the ability to connect with Christ and forfeit the human qualities of Him in this story. Satan is enticing Christ with the same offer he tempts a believer with.

In suburbia time takes a toll on our soul. While sitting in Starbucks, relaxing in front of our TVs, working in our cubicles, reading our books, and talking to our friends, our lives
take a toll on us. They tempt us to build up walls and partitions against Christ and his community. Our constant temptation is to put up walls to remove all vulnerability and to become our own god. We desire the power that comes from being God, we desire the worship, the love, the acceptance, and the knowledge. Our temptation is the same as Adam and Eve's was in the Garden. Christ
was being offered the same thing in exchange for not going through with the rejection, hatred, betrayal and pain of the Cross. He rejected the qualities and temptation of being God to being murdered as a sinner.

One thing I have learned by working in ministry is that there is temptation to put up walls of a puffed up resume, stories of successful ministry, theological knowledge, and efficiency. I have been tempted to become someone I am not. The reason it is so enticing is because if that version of myself gets rejected, it doesn't hurt as bad as if it was myself. If I was completely vulnerable and didn't hold my self-worth to how other's think of me I could very easily hear and become acquainted with the voice of God. I could experience what Christ experienced right before his temptation. I could be completed under the blessing of God's love and companionship. In Matthew 3, right before Christ goes into the desert he receives what every follower longs for. A visitation of God's Spirit, singing a melody of love over him, as he brings all of himself to the Jordan river. He lifts His eyes to the maker of the world that He will redeem, and His father says "This is my beloved, with whom I am well pleased." If we would let the walls down, show up to God with all of ourselves, we would be complete and we could tolerate the temptations of the Devil himself.

These walls, this false self that we all develop comes from multiple places, just like Christ's temptation. Satan gives us an ultimatum which says, "If you prove yourself to me I will accept you." In my life it has come from every angle, as I suspect it has in your life. From my parents, my bosses, my wife, and one day it will probably come from my children. It is an inherent command that we all make on others, and continue to have made on our own lives. These commands spiritually bankrupt us! There is no way that we can fulfill everyone's expectations and neither can we fulfill God's expectation. Our hearts react in two different ways; pride and fear. When we examine our fears in the presence of the gospel, our heart is thawed out of its frozen state by the realization of

God's grace in the midst of our misguided intentions and actions. When we examine our pride through the lens of complete depravity and irresistible grace, we are quickly humbled by the love we receive free of demand. The presence of Christ, the presence of the Spirit, and the presence of a loving Father is all too close for us to neglect. They are fervently pursuing our hearts, and a supernatural experience (supernatural does not imply that it is always easy, enjoying, or even practical) is only minutes of meditation away. We can lift our eyes to the maker of our pain and our pleasure, and be told, "This is my beloved, with whom I am well pleased." This knowledge is what will bring us through the temptation of building walls around us that prevent vulnerability and true self experience.

a wasted life happens gradually

The safest road to hell is the gradual one-the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts. C. S. Lewis


One of my mentors said it this way: 'some men die by shrapnal, some men die by flames, most men die inch by inch playing silly little games.'

The fatal waste of a life, like the fatal waste of your money is in small meaningless expenditures.

'be very careful how you live, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most of every opportunity.. do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is' Eph. 5.15-16

Dangerous worship?

i sometimes find my relentless consumerism finding its way into my church experience on sunday...
for example, i often think as follows:
'the music was... to loud/ to quiet/ to old/ to new...'
'the sermon was... to long/ to short/ not enough script..'

how often I forget that it is called a worship service
hmmmm... that brings up an interesting question: who is getting served? us or God?
many of the critiques I have point to the fact that I'm looking to be the primary one served..

we often forget that we are there, in church, not to be entertained but to be led into the presence of the HOLY God...
to sing to Him, to pray to Him, to listen to His Word in honor of Him... it is about HIM.

I'm struck by the following quote:

“Why do people in churches seem like cheerful, brainless tourists on a packaged tour of the absolute? Worship is dangerous.
Does anyone have the foggiest idea of what sort of power we so blithely invoke?
Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it?” Annie Dillard

May God give us greater grace to have our eyes opened as we prepare our hearts for worship this coming weekend and enter into His presence...
May He change us as His people to love Him more than we love anything and to Know Him more than we Know anything.
Rom. 11.33-36

The Holy Inefficiency of My Hero Henri Nouwen

Hey Everyone,
I encourage you to read this article when you get a chance. This is an amazing story about a man who's writings have changed my life. The article is written by Phillip Yancey the lead editor of Christianity Today.

-James
______________
Once when I was dining with a group of writers, the conversation turned to letters we get from readers. Richard Foster and Eugene Peterson mentioned an intense young man who had been seeking spiritual direction from both of them. They responded as best they could, answering questions by mail and recommending books on spirituality. Foster had just learned that the same inquirer had also contacted Henri Nouwen. "You won't believe what Nouwen did," he said. "He invited this stranger to live with him for a month so he could mentor him in person."

Most writers jealously protect their schedules and privacy. Nouwen, who died of a heart attack this past September, broke down such barriers of professionalism. His entire life, in fact, displayed a "holy inefficiency."

Trained in Holland as a psychologist and a theologian, Nouwen spent his early years achieving. He taught at Notre Dame, Yale, and Harvard, averaged more than a book a year, and traveled widely as a conference speaker. He had a résumé to die for-which was the problem, exactly. The pressing schedule and relentless competition were suffocating his own spiritual life.

Nouwen went to South America for six months, scouting a new role for himself as a missionary in the Third World. A hectic speaking schedule on his return to the United States only made things worse. Finally, Nouwen fell into the arms of the L'Arche community in France, a home for the seriously disabled. He felt so nourished by them that he agreed to become priest in residence at a similar home in Toronto called Daybreak. There, Nouwen spent his last ten years, still writing and traveling to speak here and there, but always returning to the haven of Daybreak.

I once visited Nouwen, sharing lunch with him in his small room. It had a single bed, one bookshelf, and a few pieces of Shaker-style furniture. The walls were unadorned except for a print of a Van Gogh painting and a few religious symbols. A Daybreak staff person served us a bowl of Caesar salad and a loaf of bread. No fax machine, no computer, no Daytimer calendar posted on the wall-in this room, at least, Nouwen had found serenity. The church "industry" seemed very far away.

After lunch we celebrated a special Eucharist for Adam, the young man Nouwen looked after. With solemnity, but also a twinkle in his eye, Nouwen led the liturgy in honor of Adam's twenty-sixth birthday. Unable to talk, walk, or dress himself, profoundly retarded, Adam gave no sign of comprehension. He seemed to recognize, at least, that his family had come. He drooled throughout the ceremony and grunted loudly a few times.

Later Nouwen told me it took him nearly two hours to prepare Adam each day. Bathing and shaving him, brushing his teeth, combing his hair, guiding his hand as he tried to eat breakfast-these simple, repetitive acts had become for him almost like an hour of meditation.

I must admit I had a fleeting doubt as to whether this was the best use of the busy priest's time. Could not someone else take over the manual chores? When I cautiously broached the subject with Nouwen himself, he informed me that I had completely misinterpreted him. "I am not giving up anything," he insisted. "It is I, not Adam, who gets the main benefit from our friendship."

All day Nouwen kept circling back to my question, bringing up various ways he had benefitted from his relationship with Adam. It had been difficult for him at first, he said. Physical touch, affection, and the messiness of caring for an uncoordinated person did not come easily. But he had learned to love Adam, truly to love him. In the process he had learned what it must be like for God to love us-spiritually uncoordinated, retarded, able to respond with what must seem to God like inarticulate grunts and groans. Indeed, working with Adam had taught him the humility and "emptiness" achieved by desert monks only after much discipline.

Nouwen has said that all his life two voices competed inside him. One encouraged him to succeed and achieve, while the other called him simply to rest in the comfort that he was "the beloved" of God. Only in the last decade of his life did he truly listen to that second voice.

Ultimately Nouwen concluded that "the goal of education and formation for the ministry is continually to recognize the Lord's voice, his face, and his touch in every person we meet." Reading that description in his book ¡Gracias!, I understand why he did not think it a waste of time to invite a seeking stranger to live with him for a month, or to devote two hours a day to the menial care of Adam.

I will miss Henri Nouwen. For some, his legacy consists of his many books, for others his role as a bridge between Catholics and Protestants, for others his distinguished career at Ivy League universities. For me, though, a single image captures him best: the energetic priest, hair in disarray, using his restless hands as if to fashion a homily out of thin air, celebrating an eloquent birthday Eucharist for an unresponsive child-man so damaged that many parents would have had him aborted. A better symbol of the Incarnation, I can hardly imagine.

don't judge a book by its cover

This video is one of the most beautiful expressions of humanity I've seen in a while.
It reminds me of God's exhortation to the prophet Sammuel...
'For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart' (1 Sam. 16.7)

Hope you enjoy this as much as i do... I still get a little teary-eyed when I see it.

observations about life

If you are occupied with your own faults, you'll have no time to focus on the faults of others............

if you are occupied with your own needs, you'll have no time to focus on the needs of others.....

just something I'm reminding myself of today.
i tend to find the faults of others far easier to focus on than their needs.
this is very antithetical to what Jesus taught and modeled.
perhaps you have similar struggles...
may we find our way to the cross for 're-wiring'

the way up is down

'The cross is not primarily a burden (although it is that indeed); it is first of all an instrument of death. Jesus demands of those who follow Him that they must lay their lives on the line; they must be ready to suffer as Jesus suffered.
They must be willing to literally lose their lives.'
George Eldon Ladd

Christ is not valued at all unless he be valued above all. -Augustine

Two good quotes, in my opinion... Ladd and Augustine's sentiments both take shots at unconvincing american 'churchianity'.. where the point of God is to throw rose pedals into the path of your life and the consumeristic demand to be celebrated rules the day.

we all want life.. Jesus says the way to real life is in laying down our lives... not getting life just how we think it should be..
check out Jn. 12.24-25

would anyone even notice?

"'Edith, I wonder what would happen to most churches and Christian work if we awakened tomorrow, and everything concerning the reality and work of the Holy Spirit, and everything concerning prayer, were removed from the Bible.
I don't mean just ignored, but actually cut out -- disappeared.
I wonder how much difference it would make?'
We concluded it would not make much difference in many board meetings, committee meetings, decisions and activities."

Quoted from Edith Schaeffer, The Tapestry, page 356

may we be guarded from doing the work of God without the Word of God and the
reality of God deeply embedded into all we are and what we do.

a profound song

many of you are like me in this way: we have strained, complex relationships with our dads.
this is a song that bono wrote about his relationship with his own dad, bob.
i with i could have written it because it so resonates in my soul.
perhaps the words will encourage you as well.

"the creed"

an interesting take on some of the things I talked about in the gathering last week.
if you weren't there, check out our new series: "my problem with religion"

the creed of modern america

by Steve Turner

We believe in Marxfreudanddarwin
We believe everything is OK
as long as you don't hurt anyone
to the best of your definition of hurt,
and to the best of your knowledge.

We believe in sex before, during, and after marriage.
We believe in the therapy of sin.
We believe that adultery is fun.

We believe that everything's getting better
despite evidence to the contrary.
The evidence must be investigated
And you can prove anything with evidence.

We believe there's something in horoscopes
UFO's and bent spoons.
Jesus was a good man just like Buddha,
Mohammed, and ourselves.
He was a good moral teacher though we think
His good morals were bad.

We believe that all religions are basically the same-
at least the one that we read was.
They all believe in love and goodness.
They only differ on matters of creation,
sin, heaven, hell, God, and salvation.

We believe that after death comes the Nothing
Because when you ask the dead what happens
they say nothing.

If death is not the end, if the dead have lied, then its
compulsory heaven for all excepting perhaps
Hitler, Stalin, and Genghis Kahn

We believe that man is essentially good.
It's only his behavior that lets him down.
This is the fault of society.
Society is the fault of conditions.
Conditions are the fault of society.

We believe that each man must find the truth that
is right for him.
Reality will adapt accordingly. The universe will readjust.
History will alter.

We believe that there is no absolute truth
excepting the truth
that there is no absolute truth.

We believe in the rejection of creeds,
And the flowering of individual thought.
If chance be the Father of all flesh,
disaster is his rainbow in the sky

and when you hear:
State of Emergency! Sniper Kills Ten! Troops on Rampage!
Whites go Looting! Bomb Blasts School!
It is but the sound of man worshipping his maker.


jesus says, 'I am the way, the truth and the life.. no one comes to the Father but through me' jn. 14.6

fantasy or reality.. which are you living in?

i found this quote to be penetrating in its insight...
let me know what you think.
it seems as though we tend to turn things upside down in our thinking.
truth centers us in reality

Simone Weil, the French Jewish intellectual, said,

"Nothing is so beautiful, nothing is so continually fresh and surprising, so full of sweet and perpetual ecstasy as the good.
No deserts are so dreary, monotonous and boring as evil.
But with fantasy it is the other way round.
Fictional good is boring and flat, while fictional evil is varied, intriguing, attractive and full of charm."

Quoted in Geoffrey Barlow, Vintage Muggeridge: Religion and Society, pages 91-92.

a slow wednesday

i decided that the last post was profound enough to be free of competition..
watch below if you haven't yet..
i'll blog more tomm.

no point, this is just hysterical..

one man who has taken something very average and exceedingly mundane and made it memorable..
my brother actually drove to montgomery to meet this man and found him to be a very sweet, gracious and accomdating gentleman.
enjoy, or scratch your head at my sense of humor :)

how is the gospel confronting you?

the gospel of grace not only consoles us, it also confronts us.

consider the following quote by anne lamont...
interesting/ challenging

"You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do."
-Anne Lamott

we must be careful not to make God look a lot like us.. with all our same preferences, bias, and opinions... in my case, God is not a white, capitalistic, moderate republican with a master's degree... read through the gospels as if you didn't know Jesus, try to pick up what's important to him.. how offended he makes you.
to rightly respond to the gospel of grace, you will find yourself both wounded and healed.

a speech by one of my heros...

Where are the dreamers of our day? Let these words of hope wash over you. Let them inspire you. Let them move you from disconnect and indifference to action and passion.
Let's steward our humanity well.

A man without equal

the story of Jesus is one of glorius obserdity... he is a Man without equal.
He is the way, the truth, the life, and no one comes to the Father apart from Him.
Consider the following... (the author is unknown)

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in still another village, where he worked in a carpenter’s shop till he was thirty. Then for three years he was an itinerant preacher.
He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never had a family or owned a house. He didn’t go to college. He never visited a big city. He never traveled two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He did none of the things one usually associates with greatness.
He had no credentials but himself.
He was only thirty three when the tide of public opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves. While he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth. When he was dead he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.
Twenty centuries have come and gone, and today he is the central figure of the human race. All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not effected the life of man on the earth as much as that one solitary life.

pride wins out

"I did this," says my memory. "I cannot have done this," says my pride, remaining inexorable. Eventually, my memory yields.

Friedrich Nietzsche, Aphorism 68.

hmmmmm.. what do you think about this quote? By saying this, Nietzsche is displaying a massive dose of the common grace that he dismissed as thoughtless myth. Pride fuels the false self. It will own the day unless confronted and defeated by grace. Pride melts in the shadow of the cross.

the point of our new series in the gathering, my problem with religion

"The final problem is not to prove men wrong, but to win them back to Christ. Therefore, the only ultimate successful apologetic is, first, a clear, intellectual statement of what is wrong with the false doctrine, plus a clear, intellectual return to the proper scriptural emphasis, in all its vitality and in its relation to the total Christian faith, plus a demonstration in the life that this correct and vital scriptural emphasis meets the genuine needs and aspirations of men in a way that Satan's counterfeit does not."..........Francis Schaffer

we purpose to do three things:
(1) expose what is false
(2) set forth what is true
(3) though imperfect, seek to be a community that is living proof that the gospel makes beautiful human beings.

my problem with religion

do you like religion? me neither. religious people tend to scare me a bit, i mean they killed Jesus, didn't they?
well, if you come to the gathering (sun. nites @ 7.15, perimeter church.. in the hanger).. you can check out our new series 'my problem with religion'..
this week we're going to discuss the question, is Jesus the only way to God..
we will do it in a talk/ q and a format.
come check it out.
bring a friend.
submit a question.
go to taco mac afterwards.
mattb