the power of words

if you didn't know, i really like to read. and there are times when i'm reading where i will literally, out loud, say, "whoa" and just stop and rest in what i just read. last night was one of those instances.

currently, i'm reading "god never blinks" by regina brett. it's not bad. but here's what caused me to "whoa"

background: the author is talking about a movie she saw, chalk talk. in the movie, the host tells stories about people in recovery. he tells a story, "about a woman who had come to him in tears after her drunken husband called her a whore."

"would you be upset if he called you a chair?" he asked her.

"of course not," she said.

"why not?" he asked.

"i know i'm not a chair," she said.

"don't you know that you aren't a whore?" he asked.

it doesn't matter what people call you...

god is love, nothing is impossible.

boundless compassion

i've heard it said that if you don't slow down, god will find a way to slow you down. that doesn't make a whole lotta sense when i think theologically but it sure makes sense in my current situation. besides a few basic errands, i haven't been able to leave the house much since gettin back from tennessee. one trip i did make was to the doctor...apparently I have giardia...google it...or just know it's a stomach parasite that causes really bad cramps/pains and diarrhea (yeah, I know, TMI).

i had a lot planned for the nine days between tennessee and my trip to

guatemala, it's just how i roll...i'm always doing something. in fact, a few of my friends recently started calling me the energizer bunny...ha. anyways, somewhere buried in my to-do list was learning how to "slow down" and build "margin" in my life (thanks to my pastor, stephen redden, and a spiritual life class i'm helping teach this summer). whatta coincidence, huh?

probably because there's no better way for me to learn then through experience, i've been forced to slow down. and during this time i've done a lot of reflecting and reading. its been an amazing experience that has brought so much to the surface...and i was able to finish reading "abba's child" by brennan manning. it's really good, you should read it. here's an excerpt that really stood out to me (pages 128-129):

"upon being told by her sister martha that jesus had arrived in bethany and wanted to see her, mary got up quickly and went to him (john 11:29).

mary of magdalene is heartbroken and tearful when she finds the tomb empty. at the moment of recognition when jesus calls her name, she clung to him--"do not cling to me, because i have not yet ascended to the father" (20:17).

as soon as peter and john receive word of the empty tomb, they ran together to the garden, but the other disciple, runner faster then peter, reached the tomb first (20:3-4).

peter, the denier of jesus, a failure as a friend in the hour of crisis, a coward in his soul before the servant-girl in the courtyard, jumped into the water almost naked once john told him jesus was on shore. "at these words 'it is the lord,' simon peter, who had practically nothing on, wrapped his cloak round him and jumped into the water" (21:7). john notes that the boat was about a hundred yards offshore.

these biblical characters, however clean or tawdry their personal histories may

have been, are not paralyzed by the past in their present response to jesus. tossing aside self-consciousness they ran, clung, jumped, and raced to him. peter denied him and deserted him, but he was not afraid of him.

suppose for a moment that in a flash of insight you discovered that all your motives for ministry were essentially egocentric, or suppose that last night you got drunk and committed adultery, or suppose that you failed to respond to a cry for help and the person committed suicide. what would you do?

would guilt, self-condemnation, and self-hatred consume you, or would you jump into the water and swim a hundred yards at breakneck speed towards jesus? haunted by the feelings of unworthiness, would you allow the darkness to overcome you or would you let jesus be who he is--a saviour of boundless compassion and infinite patience, a lover who keeps no score of our wrongs?"

so, what will you do?

god is love, nothing is impossible.

focus

what do you notice most about the above picture? the black spot? yup, me too. it's kinda hard not to, right? but what about the rest of the picture? the part that takes up most of the page. the white part. oh yeah, i didn't even think about that...or notice it.

sometimes i think the hardest part about the christian walk is how often i spend time focusing on the black dot. you know, the areas where i fall short of god, the parts of my life i wish i could re-do, the bad parts. sometimes i spend a whole lot of time thinking about the bad parts. in fact, just recently, i was thinking about the black dot and i thought, "man, if i wasn't christian i wouldn't care about the black part...life would be so much easier." i went on thinking something like, "before i was a christian my life was a lot more simple...i just didn't care." however, i'm a firm believer in the fact that there are consequences to our reckless behavior...it'll eventually catch up to us (or at least they caught up to me).

but the black dot isn't what this christian life is about, it's about the white part...the part we often neglect...the good areas of our life, the areas where god has blessed us richly...that's the part we should spend our time focusing on, the white part. the amazing thing that i am constantly reminded of is how god sent jesus to be beaten, bloodied, tortured, and crucified on a cross for you and for me...and how three days later jesus rose from the grave to defeat death. why? so we can rest in the white part, knowing that we're forgiven and that each day our black spot grows less significant.

so if you're like me and find yourself focusing on the black parts, let me offer this advice:

stop. and then think about our god and all the amazingly good things he has given you...and the forgiveness that is available through his son, jesus christ...the hope for everyone. and then start making a list of the things you're thankful for...so that you can get in the habit of focusing on the white part of your page.

god is love, nothing is impossible.

*this post (and the white page concept) was inspired by the book "good and beautiful god" by james bryan smith. it is fantastic.

forgiven people forgive

about a month ago i traveled to georgia to visit mecca...i mean...north point. i'm kidding...kind of.

anyways, when i was down there, i went to brown's bridge community church which is a satellite of north point church. i've heard a lot about it and wanted to see what it was all about. and i'll be honest, i wanted to hear andy stanley speak...but he didn't. instead, pastor jeff henderson gave a powerful talk on forgiveness. his point was this: "forgiven people forgive." i don't know about you but that's pretty meaningful in my life.

in his sermon, henderson told the story of louie zamperini, an olympic runner and WWII prisoner of war. in short, zamperini represented the US in the 1936 olympics and later joined the US army air forces to serve in WWII. during the war, zamperini's plane crashed into the pacific ocean and he floated on a raft for 47 days with no food or water before being captured by the japanese military (that's not a typo, 47 days). not long after being captured and placed into a prisoner of war camp, zamperini was identified as a US olympian by the ruthless japanese

guard mutsuhiro wantanabe. on a daily basis, wantanabe sought out zamperini to beat him and torture him. at one point, wantanabe hit zamperini so hard with his belt buckle that it fractured zamperini's skull and left him unconscious. after the japanese surrendered and released all prisoners of war, zamperini came home to california. shortly thereafter, zamperini turned to alcohol to numb the painful memories of the war and to stop the horrendous nightmares he was having of wantanabe beating him. he eventually began plotting his return to japan to find wantanabe and kill him.

all of the rage, revenge, and hatred that had built up in zamperini was quickly replaced one night in a tent in LA. after the gentle persistence of his wife, he went to see a young man, billy graham, speak about the love of jesus christ. after accepting jesus, zamperini's life drastically changed and he forgave all of the japanese guards who treated him so cruelly, including wantanabe (it was actually his second night in the tent, read the book for the whole story). he began traveling around the country to speak on forgiveness and started a children's home for underprivileged kids. and then, in 1997, zamperini traveled to japan to meet wantanabe and forgive him in person (although wantanabe never showed up for the meeting).

to end his sermon, henderson brought 92 year old zamperini on stage to read a letter he had written wantanabe. in the letter, zamperini forgives wantanabe and invites him to become a christian. powerful.

what an amazing story of forgiveness. one that truly humbles me.

i just finished a book detailing zamperini's life, which is way better then this blog, called "unbroken" by laura hillenbrand. it's a powerful story of redemption, grace, reconciliation and forgiveness and it's a book that i highly recommend.

if you'd like to watch jeff henderson's sermon on forgiveness, you can find it here.

the jesus juke

a few months old but still hilarious...this blog is from "stuff christians like" by jon acuff. check his blog here: here.

Weird things happen to me when I fly. If you followed me on Twitter you would know this because I tend to have “tweet explosions,” when I’m at airports.

Last Sunday morning, as our plane lifted off the ground, the person behind me started to play what sounded like a pan flute. Just as we began to soar above the clouds, we were greeted with a Zamfir melody from what I can only assume was some sort of satyr. In his defense, the flight attendant did not say, “Please return your seats to their upright position, carefully stow your carry on luggage and put your pan flute back in its elk skin satchel.” He had every right to play that beautiful wooden instrument and play he did.

At another airport I went to, a humongous bodybuilder spent his time in the terminal doing ferocious push ups right beside me. I tweeted about it and folks told me to prove it with a photo. Not likely. One of my rules for twitter is never snap photos of people who can snap you. And this guy could have broken me in half like a thin blogger branch.

But in all the responses from people asking me questions about the terminal B2 bodybuilder, one stuck out. It was different than the rest, but is something I am growing familiar with.

I call it the “Jesus Juke.”

Like a football player juking you at the last second and going a different direction, the Jesus Juke is when someone takes what is clearly a joke filled conversation and completely reverses direction into something serious and holy.

In this particular case, when I tweeted a joke about the guy doing pushups, someone tweeted me back, “Imagine If we were that dedicated in our faith, family, and finances?”

I was fine with that idea, I was, but it was a Jesus Juke. We went from, “Whoa, there’s a mountain of a man doing pushups next to the Starbucks at the airport,” to a serious statement about the lack of discipline we have in our faith and our family and our finances.

I don’t know how to spell it, but in my head I heard that sad trumpet sound of “whaaaa, waaaa.”

And that wasn’t even a bad Jesus Juke. I didn’t mind that statement at all. That guy seemed fine. I’ve heard much worse. I once tweeted about going to see Conan O’Brien live and how big the crowd was. Someone wrote back, “If we held a concert for Jesus and gave away free tickets, no one would come.” Whaaa, waaaa.

Chances are you’ve experienced this. Someone pulled the Christian version of the Debbie Downer, they threw out a bit of Jesus Juke on you. If you have, or even if you haven’t, there are three things we all need to know about this particular move.

1. It generates shame.

The Jesus Juke is a great way to tell a friend, “I wish you possessed the uber holiness I do and were instead talking about sweet baby Jesus in this conversation.” It’s like a tiny little “shame grenade,” you throw it into an otherwise harmless conversation and then watch it splatter everyone in guilt and condemnation.

2. It never leads to good conversation.

I’ve been Jesus Juked dozens of times in my life and I’ve never once seen it lead to a productive, healthy conversation. You might think it will before you juke, but what usually happens is just raw amounts of awkwardness, similar to how I felt sitting in a theater watching the Last Airbender.

3. I’ve never met someone who was “juked to Jesus.”

I once tweeted, “No one’s ever said: ‘The way you bitterly mock other Christians helped me begin a life-changing love of Jesus’ (Be kind).” I wrote that because I wanted to remind us that our jerkiness never led folks to Christ. I don’t think our jukes do either. I don’t really see it as a conversion technique. It’s more of a conversation killer technique.

I hope we all keep talking about Jesus. I hope we talk about him lots and lots. I hope he defines our life and conversations. But if I tell you that when it comes to My Little Pony, I tend to prefer Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie and that Toola Roola has been riding their coattails for years, please don’t respond, “You know who created ponies? Our Lord God did, that’s who.”

Has anyone ever pulled a “Jesus Juke” on you?