"Building Life Around Jesus!"

What I Hear Christians Saying

2012-02-23T22:16:00.000-08:00

My wife had two friends over tonight for some genuine conversation and crafting. I carted the kids around with me to karate and then to meet briefly with another brother in Christ. The kids and I arrived home around 7:30pm and I had them pretty well settled in bed by 8:30. While upstairs I heard bits and pieces of the conversation happening downstairs amongst the ladies. The conversation, I must say, sounded all too familiar: "I don't feel connected there". "I just want some genuine friends for myself and my kids". "We go there but we do not really know anybody". They were speaking of their individual churches.

So many Christians, I have found, are involved in churches but have no genuine friends within them. So many people go to church, appear to leave filled, but do not experience any semblance of genuine Christian community in their lives. Our churches preach the "correct doctrine"; we give people positive next-steps for individual spiritual growth; we even offer a plethora of support groups and Bible study groups for seekers, new believers and the aged. But the utopian ideals of the old Puritan, New England small-town, the ideals so prominent in the first churches of Christ we see in the NT, are so far removed from our experience.

I am hearing Christians say they want to live within a genuine Christian community. They want to know people and to be known. They want their children to grow up with life-long friends. They want to live in the times when everyone harvested their crops and brought them to the center of town where the elders of the church divided up the food to each as had need. But the reality is that the way we currently live will never accomplish what we say we want to experience. We must make changes in the very pattern of our lives if genuine Christian community will ever surface for us.

Christians today are facing the same challenges Christians in America have faced for centuries. They are trying to live between two opposing worlds. Page Smith, an author and professor of Emeritus at the University of California, wrote,

"Here again we have tried to trace what was to be, in many ways, the most profound and enduring split in the collective American psyche: equality (the single-minded pursuit of happiness-money), which also called itself by other names such as individualism, free enterprise, and so on; and community, which denigrated materialism and struggled valiantly to establish or reestablish true communities. In a sense, there could be no genuine reconciliation between those two American dreams" (Smith, 1980, p.48).

Smith said that Americans have tried, vainly, to reconcile individualism (equality, free-enterprise, etc.) with true community. American history has shown that as our wealth increases our experience of community decreases. The less we have the more we need each other and the more we have the less need we have of each other. The same can be said of our faith; The more we have the less we think we need Jesus and the less we have the more aware we are of our need for Jesus.

I want to know...is there a way to live in prosperity but not grow spiritually and relationally impoverished? I am hearing Christians say they want to. They say they want both. But history has proved it unachievable. The solution then? According to Smith (1980) the solution has been to "give money away". "Americans", said Smith, "were almost as ingenious in discovering new ways of giving money away as they were in making it...In time Americans became better at doing that than any other people in the world" (p.46).

I want to propose today that if we really want to experience genuine Christian community and not just 'go to church' we have got to become expert philanthropists. We have got to let go of the money the Lord has given us so that others in the church can live thereby. We have got to choose to live communally such that what the Lord has given me I loose for the sake of others. We must live by this truth: The Lord gave to me so that I can give to others. This was how the earliest church lived. They lived communally. "All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had" (Acts 4:32).

To the praise of God I am happy to say that over the past 8 years at BCC I have seen members of our congregation live communally. I have been blessed to be able to walk beside people who made a decision to build their lives around Jesus Christ. These people decided that what the Lord had given them was equally mine if I needed it. I am hearing Christians say they want to live in genuine Christian community- to do this, however, requires us to stop chasing the other, bankrupt, American dream- properity, wealth, money. We cannot have both.

Fred Baptized! Now he begins to build his life around Jesus.

2012-01-30T20:23:00.000-08:00

Hey all,

This was an exciting evening on Wednesday. I just met Fred last week through another brother in Christ who met him on the bus. Fred, myself and my friend talked for a while on Tuesday night. I got to know him. Asked a lot of questions. Shared the scriptures together. Slept on it, and then he decided he was truly serious about the decision to marry Jesus.

God had been working in Fred's life far before myself or my friend met him. Fred was ready to surrender. I didn't have to do much convincing. He just needed some direction on how to turn around and come home the to Father.

Now that he has been baptized the really exciting part begins: watching the Holy Spirit build Fred's life around Jesus.

Rejoicing over one soul who repented,

Shaun

Lauren Met Jesus This Week At...

2011-12-22T07:59:00.000-08:00

On any given day it is possible to find a number of news stories making known the vices of people of faith, particularly Christians. We hear more bad stories than good but that is not because there is more bad happening in Christendom than good; it’s just because bad news is more popular. Today I would like to give voice to how our congregation, just this week, made Jesus known to a woman named Lauren (name changed for anonymity).

Lauren in my opinion is on her way to becoming a Christian. She does not know about Jesus. She does not know that He died for her. She does not know that He loves her. She has not read much of the Bible. What she has read of the Bible she does not understand. So you ask, “then how is she on her way to becoming a Christian?” Well although she does now know Him intellectually, she met Him this week and it impacted her.

I met Lauren in a small bible discussion group at a Welfare motel 3 months ago. She only attended the group once. A friend of hers informed me about some of the things she was going through and since Lauren would not join the group again I began visiting with her once a week outside of her motel room. I showed up the first time just to listen and lend my support. I really wanted to get to know her. I wanted to discover what was shackling her. I wanted to find out the root of her deep shyness and the events which led to her extended-stay at this motel.

Lauren is noticeably fragile and as she talked more I began to discover why. Let’s just say the past has been dark for Lauren; darker than most. She can hardly get through 5 minutes of conversation without breaking down. Fear overwhelms her many days. When this happens she stays indoors and avoids human contact. I have invited her on a few occasions to church functions which were initially exciting opportunities for her. She wants to meet and be around uplifting people; she has not had much of that in her life. But as time passes between our conversations she is overcome again with fear and feels safer staying in her room. Through her fear and anxiety the Devil keeps her just where he wants her; alone with her own thoughts. Hence she has not attended one of our church functions yet. But she’s close!

Little by little Lauren is drawing nearer to Jesus. She now welcomes my prayers where before she seemed almost angry at organized religion. She now answers my phone calls and even returns them. She is open for a Bible study and such is our next step. But the one thing that really yanked on her heart this week; the one act of love that tops all the others at the moment; the one way she has most visibly seen Jesus and not even known it was when I delivered to her a Christmas Box from our congregation this week. She smiled. She got excited. She said a few different times, “This is wonderful”. She opened the card signed by various members of the church and said again, “This is so wonderful”. She gave me a hug and kiss on the cheek; that was a first! She still cried within 5 minutes of my arrival, but there was joy there as well. Lauren is not handicapped. She is not drugged up with meds. She’s not weird and she’s not, in my opinion, working the governmental system. Lauren is simply alone and shackled with fear. Lauren needs Jesus.

Well folks, Lauren met Jesus this week at the motel and she loves what she sees. Whatever she thought of “church” before has now been changed. Whatever she thought about Jesus before is now being refined. And now, soon, very soon I believe, she will discover Him in all His fullness and never be the same again! What the Christmas Box from our congregation said to Lauren this week was this: “someone loves you”. It said, “If no one else has ever loved you, we will love because Jesus loves you!”

Love is not enough we know. Truth and love make up Jesus. But love does come first! And now that Lauren has experienced Christ’s love both in our many conversations and, perhaps most visibly, in the Christmas Box this week, the truth of Jesus will be music to her ears. I believe it!

Folks Jesus is alive. He is risen from the dead. He is walking the sidewalks of the world today and visiting the down and out along the way. Lauren met Jesus this week at the motel; where will people meet Jesus next? The answer to that question largely depends on where you are going and whether or not you decide to take Him with you.

On behalf of the leadership of BCC I want to say Merry Christmas to all of you who, through the Spirit, are daily “incarnate deity” just like the Babe lying in a manger many years ago. Thank you Brunswick Church of Christ for representing Jesus so clearly this week.

Where are you and Jesus going now?

“And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit” (Eph.2:22).

How Have You Missed The Messiah?

2011-11-16T14:00:00.000-08:00

The following excerpt was taken from our "Acts of the Holy Spirit" series, November 2012.

“Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” ³⁷ When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” (Acts 2:37)

Dennis the Menace the movie tells the story of a good-hearted boy named Dennis who just can’t keep himself out of trouble particularly with his elderly neighbor Mr. Wilson. All of Dennis’ mischief seems to fall on the head of poor Mr. Wilson. In this movie Mr. Wilson has a flower garden that he has put years and years of work into. In his garden he has one of the world’s rarest plants that he planted 40 years prior. Believe it or not this plant blooms only once in 40 years. Once. It blooms when the moon is full; it blooms at night, and it blooms quickly. And just as quickly as it blooms it withers. So if you had this plant growing in your garden for 40 years; you tilled it and care for it for 40 years of your life, you could very easily completely miss its blooming if you were not prepared. You could know that it bloomed only once in 40 years and if you were one day off on its blooming calendar you could completely miss its bloom and never again get to see it.

Imagine the disappointment and frustration you would feel if the plant you had waited 40 years to see bloom you missed altogether. Well watch Mr. Wilson as he prepares for his plant’s special minute. Pay particular attention to 3:11-5:50 as this video cannot be shortened by me;

Can you imagine Mr. Wilson’s frustration? I can’t imagine it.

In this same way I don’t think we can fully imagine the disappointment, frustration and pain of the question that is asked in Acts 2:37 some 2,000 years ago: “Brothers, what shall we do?”

These people had looked for their Messiah all of their lives. Every prayer, every synagogue service, every feast day expressed the national longing for the Messiah’s coming

The Messiah was going to be their salvation. He was their hope. The Messiah was the one their ancestors had been waiting for for centuries. He was the One the prophets spoke of.

He was the One Who would restore the kingdom to Israel. He was the One Who would end all of their pain and suffering. Jewish people dreamed about the day their Messiah would come, especially in times of hardship. They talked about that day. They wondered what He might look like. They pondered what they might do if they got to meet Him.

Peter tells us that the Prophets who spoke of the coming of the Messiah “searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow…Even angels long to look into these things” (1 Peter 1:10-12).

If there was one question every Jewish man and woman wanted to know it was, “When is our Messiah coming?” And now the Apostles, by the power of the Holy Spirit, in this first Gospel sermon of Acts 2, announce in a most undeniable way that they missed the One they had prepared their lives to see. Worse than that…they even killed Him. Can you imagine the pain of that realization!!!?

I believe the greatest challenge the Holy Spirit faced in building the church in Jerusalem was getting these deeply spiritual people to accept the fact that they missed their Messiah. It is not easy to deal with that much pain.

Indeed many in Jerusalem would say, as to Dennis, “Get out of my face, I don’t want to know you.” Others, however, will desperately ask, “Brothers, what shall we do?” (2:37).

And here’s the Good News! Even as we cannot imagine the frustration and pain of murdering our Messiah, neither can we fully imagine the feelings of relief that must have flooded their souls when Peter answered: “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (2:38).

There was hope! Praise God that the terms of forgiveness were not beyond the reach of any of them; all of them could repent and be baptized!

Let me ask you today, how have you missed the Messiah in your life?

For some of you the painful realization that you have missed Jesus for most of your life, or maybe just recently, will be more than you can handle. You will find it easier to continue to say to Jesus, “I want nothing to do with You”, than to ask, “Lord, what shall I do?”

For some of you it will be safer to push that painful realization aside. It will be easier to keep doing what you are doing than to painfully repent and say, “I have been wrong. I have loved my sin more than Jesus and have missed Jesus in the process”. It will be easier for some of us to ridicule Dennis for his message than to accept the fact that while being so preoccupied with budding plants we completely missed a grave injustice taking place in our own home.

How have you missed the Messiah in your life today? What would Jesus say to you if you asked Him, "Jesus, what shall I do?" I believe He would probably voice the same words as Peter did, but after that what else would He tell you to do?

Go reconcile with a friend?
Forgive your parents?
Start putting all your effort into everything He gives you to do?
Go sell your possessions?
Throw away your computer and never look at porn again?

What do you need to do today to more completely build your life around the Messiah Jesus?

Getting Back Our Prerogative

2011-11-03T23:08:00.000-07:00

In government and law there is a word that is not spoken of much today called "prerogative". Prerogative is basically "the power to act according to discretion for the public good, without the prescription of the law and sometimes even against it" (John Locke). Citizens give their rulers the power of prerogative in the judicial process because it is impossible to foresee all accidents that concern the public. There cannot be a law for everything and so judges are given freedom to make decisions for the public good where there is no stated law.

Prerogative is a good and necessary thing in the hands of good and selfless authorities. Place prerogative in the hands of a fool, however, and it becomes a weapon for submission. It becomes a king's tool for controling the population: "I will decide this..." (for my own benefit that is).

An evil steward of prerogative will be given less prerogative over time. Afterall, no one wants to give a selfish, power-gorged ruler the freedom to do just anything he wants to do. A good steward of prerogative, however, will be given more and more of it. The more the people's trust of their rulers increases, the more freedom they are willing to give them in the enforcement of the laws. Think about it; a boss gives his best employees the most freedom because he trusts them. They have proven, through character, diligence and honesty, they are worthy of more and more freedom. He gives them prerogative to make decisions for the welfare of the company without having to run it by him first. He trusts them.

Our Heavenly Father has all the prerogative one can ever have. He needs no one to sign off on His decisions. He needs no counsel from mortals, no help in deciding mercy or law. If the Lord needs something (He obviously needs nothing) He does not come to us. Psalms 50:12 says, "If I were hungry, I would not tell you; For the world is Mine, and all its fullness." The Father gave the Son, Jesus Christ, all power of prerogative. Jesus was well-pleasing to the Father and therefore the Father put all authority in His hands (see Philippians 2).

Our Heavenly Father has all the prerogative in the world and we are happy for it to be that way. Why? Because we trust Him. We want Him to have all the authority. We want Him to make the decisions. We want Him to do exactly what He pleases when He pleases to do it because we know Him to be good with a capital "G". Whatever our Lord wants to do we will follow because we know He knows best. He is the "Good Shepherd" (see John 10).

My wife and I give each other an incredible amount of freedom in our relationship. If I fail to call to inform my wife of my tardiness she does not gripe at me because she knows, deep down, that I have the Lord Jesus in my heart. And because I have the Lord Jesus in my heart she knows that I have her well-being, and the well-being of our children, always in my heart also. Over the years she has given me increasing amounts of freedom, and me to her. She has given me prerogative to make decisions without her even though we nearly always make decisions together.

I want to venture to say that in America we have lost the power of prerogative in almost all our relationships. Nobody trusts anyone anymore. Handshakes used to be enough; now we need attorneys, notary's and eyewitnesses. We used to give each other the freedom to mess up because we knew deep down that we had each other's best interest at heart. If you scratched my car I did not need an insurance company because I trusted that you had my best interest in mind and would resolve it just as soon as you could. I did not need to demand my rights because I knew you were thinking about my rights already. I was willing to give you the freedom to make things right, without 3rd party pressures, because I trusted you as a person. Now we are so individual that we are lucky if we know 3 people's persons.

Politics is such a heated subject today because no one trusts a politician. Politicians used to be the best of the best among us. They were the ones crawling up on the altar of service to be slain living sacrifices to God and for people (Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, etc.). Now we call them crooks. Politicians are supposed to be the people the nation gives prerogative to. They have a long road to recover our trust...and, sadly, so do our church-leaders.

Over time it has become clear to me that in many instances our flocks have wandered away from us. I attended a home-group bible study recently (not with BCC) where a heavy portion of the conversation between members was about keeping Pastors accountable. It sounded to me like Pastors had led them astray in the past and hurt them. Church leaders (myself included), I am finding that in many instances our people have ceased giving us prerogative to make decisions for their welfare. Perhaps they have doubted that we had their welfare in mind at all.

Men. Fathers. Elders. Deacons. Preachers. Let me challenge us to begin again to live up to the authority given us. Let us examine our hearts and ensure that every act in every day is motivated by the welfare of the people we serve. Let us not ask what is best for us; let us ask what is best for the people God has given us. Let us make decisions carefully, considering all of the people our decisions will impact. Let us pray religiously. Let us build our lives so completely around Jesus that everyone on the perifery of our lives is well taken care of. Let's lead our families, our churches, our communities and our nation forward by being imitators of our Lord Jesus Christ. When we do this our people will again give us the prerogative to lead on their behalf and they will follow without constant questioning. Let us lead the way and pray that our politicians will follow.

"You Harvested Little But Planted Much...Why?"

2011-10-12T22:53:00.000-07:00

Recently I have been challenged to think about how the church can speak to the economic situation in America. How do we understand our situation? How did we get here? How do we get out?

For years and years and years our parents and our schools have told us that we need to do well in school so that we can get into a good college, get a good job and make money. The money we make will then allow us to have a nice home and hopefully retire early. This ideology has been drilled into our brains since grade school. I remember hearing this when I was a kid.

This way of visualizing work is so prevalent today that if you were to ask the average high schooler why he wants to go to college he will likely say something like, “So that I can get a good job and make money”. This sounds innocent. It sounds like a decent School of Business motto at your local university.

However for the Christian today- for the one who desires to build all of life around Jesus Christ- we must ask ourselves the question; ‘Where in the Bible are we ever commanded to do anything in order to “make money”? When is the making of money ever to be a motivation for the Christian?’ Aren't we supposed to do everything for the purpose of glorifying God? (see 1 Corinthians 10:31).

Might I suggest that part of the reason this country is in such a downfall is because for the past 50 years we have been about the making of money in our vocations instead of the glory of God?

The fact of the matter is that some of the jobs we have created do not serve anyone; they manipulate people. They do not glorify God: they help people run after silly luxuries they don’t need. We cannot expect the Lord to bless such work. They do not glorify Him. We are finding ourselves working harder, working longer and gaining less from all our toil because our toil is void of the Lord's blessing.

Haggai warned his people in this regard saying, "Give careful thought to your ways. You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it...Why?” declares the LORD Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with your own house” (Hag.1:5-6, 9). Applied to us today Haggai says, "Why? Because you have run after money instead of the glory of God".

My concern is that over the past 50 years we in the church have come to believe that the only important work is missionary work. And the reason we believe this is because we have made our vocations about something that’s not important: MAKING MONEY!

Folks if we desire to build life around Jesus at every intersection of our city then the church cannot be the only place where we are doing something important. It cannot be the only place where Christ is crowned King.

It is the task of the church today to speak into our vocations such that we are challenged make our vocations about something important- again. If we cannot make our vocations about what is most important, if what we do for a living cannot please God, then we should put in our two weeks, even in this depressed economy, because such foolish pursuits are partly what put us here in the first place! We need to be spending our working hours (all hours really) glorifying God, and this includes not just what you do for work, but how you do it.

How have you made your vocation about making money? Have you justified that motive? How can you begin to make your vocation about glorifying God again? How can you challenge your employees to glorify God with their vocations and not just get a paycheck?

America Is Great Because...

2011-08-31T06:43:00.000-07:00

I once owned a 2003 Ford Windstar van that I bought off of ebay for $3,000. I remember one road trip we took with this van to visit family in NH. The van stalled in the middle of town just a day after we made the 6 hour trek north. We were driving on Russell St. about mid-day when all of a sudden the van just shut off. I tried to restart it but it would not kick on. Finally I got out, checked a few things under the hood and then called my father-in-law to see if he would bring us some gas. The gas gauge said we had a quarter tank but the van was acting like we had none. After adding gas to the tank, however, the van still would not start so a friend of ours came with a trailer and towed the van to his shop.
About the same time the next day our friend called us to say the van was fixed. He ended up replacing the fuel pump since it was clear that the engine was not getting gas. We arrived shortly after he called, paid for the work (at a discounted price graciously!) and headed on our way. We drove less than a mile from the shop and the van stalled again! With the whole family in the car I pulled the van to the side of the road, put the hazards on and walked the mile back to the shop to tell my friend what happened. Shocked by my arrival, our friend loaded in his tow-truck and towed us back to the shop again. We waited about a half hour while he checked a few things under the hood. Turns out the fuse to the fuel pump had blown. He replaced the fuse but it blew again almost immediately after he started the van. Partly embarrassed and feeling bad for our waiting at this point, our friend quickly rigged the fuse box with a special type of fuse attachment which required a lot more voltage to blow the fuse. This time, thankfully, we drove all the way back to my father-in-law’s house with no problems.

The next morning I was leaving to go back to NJ. Marci and the kids were staying behind and driving back to NJ with her mother a few days later. As I was about to leave town I stopped to get a coffee at Anderson’s bakery, shut the van off, got my coffee, returned to the van and, you guessed it, the van wouldn’t start. I couldn’t believe it. Since I had a deadline in getting to NJ I ended up trading vehicles with my mother-in-law so that I could leave. This also gave our friend a couple more days to actually fix the van this time.

Dumbfounded by the vehicle at this point, our friend brought it to another friend to see if he could accurately diagnose the problem. The problem, as it turns out, was not the fuel pump or the fuse or anything to do with the fuel system. The problem was a lot simpler than he realized. Turns out Ford installed an emergency fuel shut-off switch in the rear of the vehicle which was being engaged by the loose-jack bouncing around in the rear compartment. The jack was supposed to be secured so as not to bump into the switch but I never re-secured it the last time I used it. All we had to do was secure the jack and disengage the shut-off switch and all would have been fine. That would have been nice to know $300 prior!

So how is this experience spiritually significant? I believe the problems in our lives both personally, nationally and internationally are really a lot simpler than we initially imagine. We have many societal vehicles that are stalled on the side of the road right now. Our families are broken. Our government is in debt. Our schools are violent and chaotic (not all of course). Our personal lives are stressed and many times on the brink of a nervous breakdown. To “fix” these vehicles we employ many remedies: committees, counselors, credit card companies, the police. However, once we have exhausted all of our remedial agents we drive a mile down the street only to have those same vehicles stall again. During round 2 we replace fuses and hurriedly look for quick fixes to our heightened problems only to find that they work for a time, but stall soon again.

The fact is these societal vehicles will continue to stall until we discover that the real problem originates from an unsecured jack in the rear of the vehicle. Work hard as we may, the vehicle will continue to break down on us until that jack is secured again.

For many years America ran quite smoothly. In fact for many years America was like a brand new vehicle. She was the most admired vehicle in the world. America was the van everyone wanted an opportunity drive. But in recent decades the jack in the back of America has come loose. As a result many mechanics are being employed to “fix” the problem, but with only temporal success. They don’t yet see what the main problem is.

I believe the same is true of many families today. For many of you it may be that years ago your family ran like a brand new car. She was admired in the community, stable, financially sound, peaceful and communal. All family members seemed to know what was expected of them and honored and respected all others. But in recent decades the jack in the back of your family has come loose. Now you wonder if the family will survive to see another generation. Ever since your grandparents passed away it seems like everyone is rushing around trying to fix the problem but the van keeps stalling.

In the book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah the prophet said, “If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, ⁸ and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. ⁹ And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, ¹⁰ and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it” (Jer.18:7-10).

I believe one lesson from this passage is that the Lord, the God of Israel, the God who sent Jesus Christ is in control of the nations that rise and the nations that fall. The rise and fall, running and stall of all societal vehicles (families, governments, nations) are not happenstance; the Lord says He is in control of them. Since this is the case, He also gives conditions upon which those vehicles will remain running. They must “repent of [their] evil” (to repent means to turn 180°). They must “obey Me”.

In short, the loose jack in the back of the vehicle translates to sin and disobedience in our lives. When I allow sin and disobedience to enter my life I quickly detach the jack in my life. When I allow sin and disobedience in my life relationships begin to crumble. Families begin to deteriorate and divide. Communities begin to implode. Nations begin to invade.

Our American leaders today seem to believe that America is great because of her clever economics. They credit Capitalism. They credit our military might. They tell us that our national debt, high unemployment rate and ineffective school systems are the cause of our national stall and if we just fix them all will be fine again. I disagree. Those things are symptoms of the main problem, yes, but fixing those things will be equivalent to replacing the fuel pump in my van. They will help us run for a very short while, but be prepared to stall again.

When will we see that the reason America, our family and our community ran so good for so long was because for so long we were obedient to the Lord Jesus Christ? Or, in the BCC vocabulary, American ran so good for so long because America “built life around Jesus” for so long. The Lord, seeing our obedience, then blessed us with financial gain, peace and a just system of law. But ever since the American people considered alternative ways of life as preferable to the life of obedience to Jesus Christ, so have we seen our blessings float away. No matter how hard we try to fix the many problems in America, they will continue to recur until the jack of Jesus Christ is re-secured to His proper place.

So what about you? Is the jack of Jesus secure in your life? Are you being led by the Holy Spirit today? Are you stalled and dumbfounded how to get going again?

Let me encourage you to live out your faith today in every second. Slow down. Love your neighbors in their time of need because of Hurricane Irene. Intercede for your Mayor and councilmen in prayer. Be the example of Jesus in your family. Speak to your church leadership about getting out the in the community as a congregation and leading the way. Don’t be afraid to call evil evil. Refuse to believe that America, or your family for that matter, can never be what she once was. The Lord has reversed the curse of disobedience more times in the course of history than any of us can count. He can do it again!

I believe it’s time to re-secure the jack. Today I will do this by visiting the low-income neighborhood in our city to talk to residents about Jesus. I will also call some estranged church members to encourage them. What will you do today to resure the jack of Jesus in your life?

Are We Full of Talented People but Void of Spiritual Power?

2011-08-18T13:56:00.000-07:00

I don't know much about church growth anymore; I once thought I did. I got real heady a few years back when all of our church-growth plans began to come together in a fruitful fashion. Then, not long thereafter, they started to fall apart. Rapid growth (rapid for us anyway) turned to decline. The decline came with a full plate of humble pie; filling no doubt, but tough going down. Now, a few years older and wiser, I am again trying to give credit where credit is due. Having eaten more pie than I wanted I am confident in saying now that if I once thought I knew a bit about the subject I am now writing, I am convinced that I no longer do! What I do know, however, is that as the Lord extends patience to His church for their lack of trust in Him and over-trust in themselves, we must learn to be rapid learners.

To build our lives around Jesus, I am learning, is to make Jesus our foundation. It is to stand on Him. It is to gain one's strength, energy and motivation from Him alone. It is to awake each new morning with the awareness that, once accepting Christ in belief and baptism (see Acts 2:38-40), I am now animated by the Spirit of God so long as I do not quench the Spirit's work in my life. I am now become a temple on heals. I can move where the Spirit leads to do what the Spirit demands. When I get out of bed in the morning, the right side or the wrong side, I can shout with confidence, "I have power, through the Spirit, to put to death the deeds of my body and the thoughts of the mind and to accomplish supernatural things like moving mountains" (see Mt.17:20).

The more I trust in the truths of God's Word- the more I actually believe in what He has told me and live as if they were as true as the sky is blue, the freer I shall be to be used by Him. The Spirit is quenched, however, when we begin to believe and act as if we do not need the branch we are sitting on. Over time we begin to notice our gifts/talents and how good we are at them. We notice their effectiveness in impacting people. Our increasingly polished performance as a Christian leads us to believe we are quite special and needful and good enough. Our preaching becomes an act of creative persuation to make them like us. Our friendships become our attempt to network in order to move up the social and economic ladder. We become gifted salesmen instead of lamps of light who bring warmth and visibility to all we pass. As we graduate from Spirit-reliance to self-reliance we steadily cut through the branch we are sitting on and plummet to our spiritual death. And, as you can imagine, the church begins to decline.

This "cutting off the branch" is what I believe to be a fundamental wound in the life of many congregations today. It was for ours. We all want the church of Jesus Christ to grow. We all want to see every soul from here to Zimbabwe build life around Jesus. But in an effort to spread the gospel far and wide we have forgotten the life-source of our very selves. What I learned in our time in the valley is that it is not so much important for the church to figure out how to spread the gospel to her communities; what's important is to be people who deeply depend on the Spirit of God for all movement. You see it is the Spirit of God who will lead us and empower us to reach our communities. Jesus said,

"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen" (Mt.28:19-20).

As we look at this passage, how did Jesus intend to be with us to the end of the age? By His Spirit He would give. It was the Spirit Jesus sent whom Paul relied on to accomplish all he did. He said to Philippi,

"For I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death" (Phil.1:19-20).

Through other Christian's prayers and the supply of the Holy Spirit Paul was empowered to plant numerous churches. We need the Holy Spirit alive in our churches! By this I do not mean that we need more Pentecostals. We need congregations who are full of people walking by the Spirit, not by themselves. Francis Chan calls the Holy Spirit the "Forgotten God" of the Christian church. Have we forgotten the One who gives us life and breath and all things?

What would happen if our preaching (my preaching) was less creative this Sunday and more Spirit-empowered?

What would happen if my conversations with my lost friends were less about the right things to say and more about the love of the Spirit of Jesus exuding out of me?

What would happen if our worship gatherings began with congregational confessions of need for God's Spirit instead of incredibly talented and polished worship bands impressing us?

For us, and for many others, we were a congregation full of talented people but, in many ways, void of spiritual power. Years down the road now I believe our congregation recognizes better than ever that if we are going to unite to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ in our community, we must rely on the power of the Holy Spirit inside us to do it.

Creative preaching with out spiritual power is dead.
High energy worship without spiritual power is dull.
Highly motivated and talented Christians without spiritual power are fruitless.
Innovative and expensive marketing campaigns without spiritual power are a waste of the Lord's money. (Yes, we may have wasted some money).

May the church become, no, better than that, may I become a person dependant on the Holy Spirit (through prayer, fasting, scripture study and Christian community) who daily experiences the Lord's hand in my life. I won't expect anyone to do what I have not done first.

Let's Give A Microphone to Good Churches!

2011-08-04T11:21:00.000-07:00

On almost a weekly basis I hear someone talk about what’s wrong with churches today. Some say, “they aren’t doing anything”, “all they care about is money”, or “they are a bunch of hypocrites”. I do not completely disagree: there are some churches who aren’t doing much, some who care too much about money and no doubt there are some hypocrites out there too. Occasionally we need to give a microphone to what’s wrong in churches in order that they will be corrected. However, sometimes the best way to silence the bad is to give the good a microphone instead.

That’s what I would like to do today. I want to give a microphone to the ways in which I see the Holy Spirit animating the Brunswick Church of Christ.

BCC has been Praying Regularly

Prayer has not always been a core value of BCC. Neither has it been a core value of mine until recently (sadly). Just this year, however, prayer has grabbed a seat at the top of what members of BCC value. Each Monday night since the beginning of June members of BCC have gathered at the church building to simply pray. We pray for the lost. We pray for the sick. We pray for revival. We pray for the Lord to bring a flood of His Spirit into North Brunswick and awaken our community to their need for Jesus. We pray because we have learned, through the school of hard knocks, that nothing grows unless the Lord makes it grow (see 1 Corinthians 3:6). Prayer has brought a new dependency on God for all things and I am so grateful to see it.

BCC has been Transforming Daily

Daily transformation has been a core value of BCC for some time. However recently it has really become visible among us. For a while we did not offer people the invitation to respond to the message on Sunday. Instead we encouraged people to talk with a leader of the church afterwards if they had a need. In some ways we may have lost opportunities to call people to daily transformation by doing it this way. But ever since February of this year we have been offering the invitation almost every Sunday and the response has been very encouraging. One Sunday 5 people responded to the message resulting in a number of prayer stations around the room. Another time a gentleman came into the service with a very heavy heart and, rather than talk with him afterwards about his problem, the leadership asked him if they could pray for him right then and there in the service. The people of BCC have been asked to consider what transformations the Lord might be calling them to make today and they have responded!

BCC has been Building Genuine Christian Community

Community is hard to find nowadays. We may live directly above someone and not even know them. Even harder to find in the 21^st century is genuine Christian Community. We read that the church in Jerusalem,

“…were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved”(Acts 2:44-47).

This picture of the church is foreign to us at best. But those seeking to follow Christ will begin to break out of conventional, American ways of living and transition into new life in community. This is what I have seen BCC doing this year. The women’s FOCUS group had secret sisters they bought gifts for all semester long. This challenged each lady to intentionally think of another during the week. One of our teens has been spending a lot of quality time with her spiritual mentor this summer as well as with some other godly women in the church. The “older women” are “teaching the younger women” (see Titus 2:3-5). The church has been generous to one another by paying another’s rent, paying another’s fines and helping a member clean, paint and move for no charge at all.

BCC has been Serving Sincerely

Serving sincerely happens to be one of our core values at BCC. This summer has given us a few specific opportunities to sincerely serve together. To serve sincerely, as I am using it here, is to serve with no hidden agenda. It is to serve because He first served us (see John 13). Having said that, we understand that as we love others through service, God draws people unto Himself. As we love others through sincere service we gain entrance into the hearts of people whereby we can then share with them the essential message of Jesus Christ. One lady at our recent National Night Out event said to us,

“What you are doing in giving away school supplies is great. My daughter is a teacher and, because of budget cuts, has to purchase her own supplies for her children out of her own pocket. Keep up the good work!”

I have seen BCC serve sincerely this summer and it is so encouraging to see. Remember and cherish the Lord's words in 1 Peter 2:12: “Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.”

Folks I know there are many things wrong with many churches. But I can vouch for BCC when I say that she is the best congregation I have ever been a part of and the greatest light for Jesus I see in our area.

Please pray that the Lord will draw many, many more people from our community to Christ through the tilling, watering and sowing efforts of BCC!

From Spiritual Bondage to the Promised Land: But How Long?

2011-07-21T08:02:00.000-07:00

It’s always a mystery to me how God brings people from a spiritual Egypt (slavery) to the Promised Land through Jesus. It’s been a mystery to me because each person seems to have a different exodus experience. For some it seems like they need all ten plagues to hit their lives before they look up and give up in surrender to Christ. Others only need 3 or 4 plagues. Still others hear God’s plague warning for the first time (either in an experience or through the preaching of the Gospel) and never have to endure a painful plague before they turn to Jesus. I believe Steven is one of those guys on plague number 7.

Jail, drugs, grand theft auto, broken relationships, working a minimum wage job into his 30’s, still living with his parents; all of these things have described Steven’s life thus far, and these are just the things I know about. Some days are better for him than others. There are days when he would rather not live. Other days there are enough positive things happening around him to keep his spirits high for a while. Thankfully, Steven is slowly beginning to see that the straight and narrow path of Jesus is the way to life. He tried his own way for a while and found it wanting.

From my end of Steven’s journey, his exodus is far too slow! I want Steven to just “get it”. I want him to realize that it is Jesus Christ or nothing. I want him to drop every evil way that once brought him an ounce of pleasure and pound of pain and never again contemplate them. I feel like he is so close. An elderly customer approached him at work recently and asked him if he had a church. He said, “Yes, the Brunswick Church of Christ is my church and Shaun is my Pastor”. When he told me this I thought to myself, “Huh? You come to church once every 6 weeks and I have known you for less than a year. How have you concluded that we are your church and I am your Pastor?” He makes me chuckle.

I pray for Steven. I want him to understand the Gospel of Jesus. I want him to lasso the Gospel’s implications for his life. But I can’t force him further than he is. I can open the Scriptures with him. I can share with him Matthew 7:26-27:

"But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand: ²⁷ and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.”

I can persuade him. I can counsel him. I can let him know that if he keeps toying with evil he will die. However, I can’t make him repent and be baptized. The reality is that he may need a few more plagues in his life before he turns to Jesus for good. And so I will pray for him.

At least I know this: when God draws Steven for the last time, he has a church he will turn to and a “Pastor” he will call. Please pray,

That God will have the patience to bring Steven to repentance, and
That Steven will listen to the plagues he has already seen in his life and begin building his life around Jesus.

Freedom: The Right To Do What We Ought To Do

2011-06-30T08:53:00.000-07:00

1 Corinthians 8-10

Recently our congregation went through the books of 1 & 2 Corinthians to learn some general truths about “Living Joyfully in Biblical Community”. 1 Corinthians chapters 8-10 were the passages of discussion on June 11^th. I have included a part of that lesson here for discussion because I believe our understanding of “freedom” is very important to understanding how to live for Jesus in these times.

The problem which Paul is going to address in chapters 8-10 is not really food sacrificed to idols, although that seems to be the topic at hand. The theological issue of food sacrificed to idols is limited to two verses in 1 Corinthians 8 which makes me think that the actual issue is not the real issue. In 1 Corinthians 8: 4-6 Paul basically says

Idols are nothing.
They aren’t real.
There is no God but one God.
Jesus is the only Lord.

Then in verses 7-13 the real issue arises: Listen to Paul’s words;

"But not everyone possesses this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat sacrificial food they think of it as having been sacrificed to a god, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. ⁸ But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do. Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak...”

Did you catch that last verse? It seems that what Paul is really concerned with is how one person’s freedom in Christ, the freedom to eat meat or not eat meat, might hinder another person’s walk with Christ. Many times joylessness in the church has less to do with the issues that arise and a lot to do with the manner in which those issues are handled between people at different places in their walk with Christ. Listen as he continues;

1 Corinthians 8:9-13:

"Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if someone with a weak conscience sees you, with all your knowledge, eating in an idol’s temple, won’t that person be emboldened to eat what is sacrificed to idols? ¹¹ So this weak brother or sister, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. ¹² When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. ¹³ Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall.”

Notice what our Lord is concerned with regarding food sacrificed to idols; it’s not the food sacrificed to idols. It’s the faith of other brothers and sisters in Christ.

I would venture to say that 90% of people who leave churches today to go to other churches leave not because they disagree with other members on issues of faith, but because they have been hurt by the manner in which those issues of faith were handled.

In Christ we have been given the freedom to do many things, but those freedoms must never weaken the faith of others in the church. True freedom in Christ is not the freedom to do whatever I want to do; it’s the freedom to do what I ought to do for the faith of others.

True Freedom

In approximately 2 weeks, if the Lord answers our prayers as we have been requesting, our brother Ken will be released from jail to finish out a final 90 days in a rehabilitation clinic. When Ken’s final day in jail is up he will stand on the exterior wall of the jail and the guards will say to him, “Ok Ken, you are free”.

And at that point every former prisoner must ask himself or herself one question: “Free to do what?”

To those who have not learned their lesson they will say, “Yippee!! I am free to do whatever I want to do!”

Those who say this forget that the reason they were in jail in the first place was because they took the liberty to do just whatever they wanted to do. The freedom to do whatever we want to do will never, never, never, hardly ever, no never bring us freedom.

When Ken is released from jail I believe he will leave knowing that he is free to do not whatever he wants to do…but free to do exactly what he ought to do. That is the essence of freedom, true freedom. And if the church is going to be a joyful beacon of light to our communities we must preach and exemplify true freedom among us and not some false definition of it.

Contemporary Application:

This is important today because in our society the words freedom and liberty are passed around with different meanings. Many people today believe freedom gives me the right to do just whatever I want to do.

A man and a woman have premarital sex together. Not wanting to have a baby they decide to have an abortion. They believe they are free to do so because the laws of our land give them the freedom to do so. What they do not realize, however, is that if they choose to define freedom in this situation as their right to do whatever they want to do (the type of freedom which got them in their predicament in the first place) they will free neither themselves nor their child. The freedom to do whatever they want to do will result in the death of an innocent child and the further enslavement of the mother and father in sin. That's not freedom, folks; that's death. And we can't give it a softer name.

The Devil has convinced us through the media that in order to be free we must have the right to do just whatever we want to do. The truth is, however, that if I take the freedom to do just whatever I want to do in my life, I will quickly find myself a slave. If a country takes the freedom to do just whatever they want to do they will quickly find themselves in shackles as well.

We can give sin a softer name if we like; but the fact is sin by any other name, be it “freedom”, “tolerance”, “human rights” or “alternative lifestyle” is still sin and will always lead to death, not freedom.

True freedom, according to the Bible, is not the right to do what we want to do…it’s the right to do exactly what we ought to do for the benefit of others.

The question for us as believers is: "Who has the right to tell us what we ought to do? The government or God?" (see Acts 4:19-20).

No Spiritual Navy Seals In This Church

2011-06-08T22:16:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago our congregation talked about how the church of Jesus resembles in many ways that of a military team. In fact Paul the Apostle used military terminology when speaking to Timothy: “Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer” (2 Tim.2:3-4).

In this lesson we talked about how that if you are a Christian then you are a soldier of Jesus Christ. You experience a daily “training in righteousness” (2 Tim.3:16). You experience a very real war everyday all day. As a member of Christ’s church you are part of a soul saving mission to rescue prisoners of war from their captivity to the Evil one by the power of Christ’s Spirit within you.

We also said that different than the Navy Seals who killed Osama Bin Laden on May 1st, in the church there are no heroes besides Jesus.

It does not matter who we are.

It does not matter what we accomplish

It does not matter what awards we receive or how many people we rescue and lead to Christ; in the church of Jesus there is only one hero in the camp and that hero is Jesus.

We concluded by recognizing that as the church seeks to build herself around and on top of Jesus- her foundation (1 Cor.3:11), the life of the church will be a joyless drag in conjunction with how many people there are vying to be the hero. The quarrels in the Corinthian church in particular were largely because some were following Paul, some were following Apollos and some were following Cephas instead of Jesus alone (see 1 Corinthians chapters 1-3).

We would be kidding ourselves if we did not confess the evil desire within us, especially us men, that wants to be the church’s Navy Seal. We want to be the commando. We want to be the Green Bureau. We want to be the knight in shining armor rushing in to make history and receive the recognition.

But the reality of the church is quite different. The reality is that in the church of Jesus, the church Jesus built, there are no spiritual Navy Seals. Instead, we find a whole assembly of former Prisoners of War. Former POW’s. Today we are either former POW’s or we are POW’s. And when God through Jesus makes us former POW’s, we come hard to the fact that we did not have anything to do with Jesus’ rescue mission.

We didn’t plan for it.

We didn’t train for it.

We didn’t even know it was coming.

So what does that have to do with building life around Jesus? Well as long as we live by the illusion that the church should be filled with spiritual Navy Seals, we will never be able to love one another for the bruised, scarred and beaten POW’s we really are. This seems to be some of what Paul gets at in this passage:

”Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth" [i.e. there were no spiritual Navy Seals among you]. "But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. ²⁸ God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, ²⁹ so that no one may boast before him” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31, parenthesis mine).

What were these Corinthian Christians before they were Christians? They were spiritual POW’s. They were not wise. They were not influential. They were not of noble birth. They were not the ones chosen to rush in and make the kill. They were prisoners in need of rescuing, and so were we.

How many times have you started a new job thinking it was a perfect match only to discover 2 years down the road that it is not at all what you thought it would be?

How many times have you gone to see a movie that you were told would be spectacular only to leave feeling disappointed?

How many times have you dated someone that you thought was Mr. Right only to realize a year later that he is pretty messed up in the head?

How many times have you bought a new flavor of coffee creamer at the store, maybe a flavor of creamer others raved about, only to get home, try it in your coffee and regurgitate it in your cup because you couldn’t stand it?

How many times have you involved yourself in a congregation that for the first 8 months you truly loved, only to discover that joyous Joyce is not always joyous? In fact she even gets angry.

In each of these situations what do we do? We jump ship! We find a new job. We find a new movie. We find a new date. We find a new coffee creamer. And it’s perfectly fine to do that with some things.

What really blows it for us in all of these situations is not the bad movie: it’s the expectations we attached to the movie. You see if we had gone to the movie thinking, ‘this movie is probably not going to be as great as everyone says it is’, we might have walked out thinking, ‘hey that was a pretty good movie’. The astronomical expectations killed it for us.

In the same way our perfection expectations of the church can sometimes kill the church for us. Forgetting that there is only one spiritual Navy Seal in the camp- Jesus- we often put the church down for resembling former POW’s. Many say, “I don’t go to church because they are a bunch of hypocrites”. My reply is, “Well at least they go to church, which is more than you can say”.

The fact that the church is not perfect by no means frees us from the fight to become perfect by the power of the Spirit; but it should at least grant us the humility to show compassion and patience with other believers who are just as bruised and scarred as we are. Remember...there is only one spiritual Navy Seal in this church- Jesus.

Spiritual Roadblock to Building Life Around Jesus: Pointing the Finger

2011-05-05T17:29:00.000-07:00

Suiting up in a high school locker room before a Saturday football game was a serious and energizing experience. Away games in particular were the most intense. We would load up on the bus Saturday morning; shirt & tie, walkman if you had one, you may bring your play book or you may decide to sleep.

When we got to the opposing team’s school a couple hours before game time it was silence from the time you exited the bus till the time the whole team gathered in the locker room facing the coaches. As we faced the coaches about to go onto the field for the first time the coaches were trying to do one thing and one thing only; they were trying to get us fired up. They would have some sort of prepared motivational talk. At times they would tell us a story about why we should really hate this team. They lied about us, or their coach said something nasty in the newspaper, etc. Each of our 4 or 5 coaches would get their say and then came the 3 captains turn to talk.

When the captains talked you really listened. These guys were the best players on the team. They were the ones you were going to follow on the field. They were the ones representing the rest of the team. And the captains also knew that goal of the pre-game talk was to get us pumped up. And so by the time we left that locker room after hearing both the coaches and the captains talk we were like foaming at the mouth. I mean we were ready to tear the doors off the hinges! And as I look back on those experiences I think, “Man it was football not war, what was wrong with us???”

So what does that have to do with Amos? Well in the first chapter of Amos Amos appears to be using his oratory skills to get his own little pep rally going. He seems to be getting them fired up. You can feel it. Listen to the momentum building speech of Amos 1:3ff:

“This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Damascus, even for four, I will not relent. Because she threshed Gilead with sledges having iron teeth…This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Gaza, even for four, I will not relent. Because she took captive whole communities and sold them to Edom…This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Tyre, even for four, I will not relent. Because she sold whole communities of captives to Edom, disregarding a treaty of brotherhood…This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Edom, even for four, I will not relent. Because he pursued his brother with a sword and slaughtered the women of the land…This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Ammon, even for four, I will not relent. Because he ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead in order to extend his borders…This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Moab, even for four, I will not relent. Because he burned to ashes the bones of Edom’s king…”

You can feel the momentum building as the Bethel crowd cheers Amos on. They love it. Amos is the prophet who speaks what the people want to hear. 7 nations which Israel has a few things against are getting verbally thrashed by Amos. You can hear the crowd yelling, "Go Amos! Go Amos!"

And then Amos gets a little closer to home...

“This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Judah, even for four, I will not relent. Because they have rejected the law of the LORD and have not kept his decrees…” (Amos 2:4).

You can envision the people quieting a little as they think to themselves, “Woa, he’s getting a little close to home. I guess our brothers haven’t been very good down there.”

Then comes the final words from the captains. This is the point in the pregame pep talk where you are supposed to charge out of the locker room ready to make war. Here it is:

"This is what the LORD says: “For three sins of Israel, even for four, I will not relent. They sell the innocent for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals. They trample on the heads of the poor as on the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed. Father and son use the same girl and so profane my holy name. They lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge. In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines” (Amos 2:6-8).

Nobody is cheering anymore. No one leaves the locker room on this day. There is an enemy within that poses a stronger battle that must be dealt with first. The rest of the book of Amos, the next 7 chapters, deal exclusively with the sins of Israel.

There is something terribly energizing about pointing the finger, is there not? One of the things that hinders our spiritual growth immensely, I have discovered, is pointing the finger at others around us when we ourselves have our own list of un-repented sins.

How many times have you said,

“If it hadn’t been for my parents things would be different in my life”
“If my brother had not did what he did I wouldn’t have these problems”
"If it wasn’t for my boss my job wouldn’t be so horrible”
“If it wasn’t for the Governor, life in NJ wouldn’t be so bad
“If my wife was a good wife I wouldn’t struggle with sexual addiction
“If my husband would actually be the spiritual leader of our family I could really grow spiritually"
“If my uncle had not abused me as a child I wouldn’t be so messed up today”
“If it wasn’t for the incompetent lawyer I would not have had to spend any time behind bars”

Off we going pointing the finger at everyone around us.

Don’t get me wrong; I understand that people have hurt you and some have hurt you really bad. I understand that what they did to you was not right. And Amos is not saying that Israel’s neighbors were right either. They all did wrong and would eventually face justice. But Amos’ message to God's people is this: “If you want to grow spiritually, if you really want to be God’s people you need to take a deep look at yourself before you point the finger at anyone else.”

Reward versus Goal

2011-04-20T20:12:00.000-07:00

On Monday evening my family and I took a dinner drive to the ocean. It had been one of those days, if you know what I mean, and a quick get-a-way was in store. Pt. Pleasant this time of year is a great place to be in my book. It’s cool. People are clothed. There’s free parking. There’s available parking, and you can have any space on the beach you want. And so we parked at Jenkinson’s Aquarium right off the boardwalk, loaded up the stroller with dinner and beach toys and walked our way to the beach. It was colder on the shore than we anticipated so we didn’t stay too long. We set up shop on the beach, prayed over our dinner and ate.

At one point after dinner Marci and I stood close to one another gazing out at the ocean pondering all the power of our awesome God. Standing there at that moment looking out at the ocean was the reason we went to the ocean that day. Our goal in going to the ocean that day was to stand before the ocean and be reminded of our smallness. It was to experience God’s power as seen in the ocean. It was to ask God to put our lives back into perspective for a few moments.

I remember glancing to my right as we stood there and watching Mason dig in the sand with his toy truck. If you could have seen him at that moment he had his back to the ocean, his face toward the boardwalk and his eyes fixed in the deepening sand as he dug. I felt like saying, “Mason, have you seen the ocean?”

For Marci and I, playing on the beach and watching the kids dig in the sand was the reward for having gone to the ocean; but it wasn’t the goal. In other words we did not set out to play on the beach and build sandcastles. We set out to see the ocean. Playing on the beach was simply the reward. But if you were to ask Mason why he went to the ocean he probably would have said, “To build sandcastles of course”.

You see the youthful mind can innocently confuse reward with goal. And if we are not careful reward can become our goal too. This happens all the time. Consider these items;

1. World Peace: We all want world peace, but world peace is not the goal. World peace is the reward that comes with the goal of loving Jesus.

2. Strong Families: We all want strong families, but strong families are not the goal. Strong families are the reward God gives to parents who love Him.

3. Civil Rights: We all want justice in our land, but justice is not the goal. Justice is the reward that comes when a society builds life around Jesus.

4. Freedom: All of us want freedom. But freedom is not the goal. Freedom is the reward people receive as a result of following Jesus.

5. Balanced budgets, health care, education: All things we want. But they are not the goal. They are the reward of a society for whom life revolves around Jesus! We don’t spend more than we have. We care for one another’s health. We teacher our children about life. We take responsibility for those who brought us into the world and those we brought into the world.

6. Or how about Eternal Salvation: Everyone needs the eternal salvation Jesus offers. But eternal salvation is not the goal. Eternal salvation is the reward for following Jesus.

Listen folks, when I married Marci I did not marry her for the inheritance I might one day receive from her family. I married Marci to have more of Marci. Everything else is a perk. If I get an inheritance that’s simply one reward for having married Marci. And if my goal for marrying Marci had been to ensure myself a handsome reward, you might question my love for Marci. In the same way we can often approach walking with Jesus youthfully. We know about Canaan. We know what’s there. We know what it’s like. We try our best to take the Bible’s description of Heaven and imagine being there one day. But Canaan is not the goal. Canaan’s the reward! The goal is more of Jesus! And if we are not careful we can easily confuse reward with goal and turn our walk with God into nothing more than a greed for ultimate gratification.

I believe Moses’ trek to Canaan serves as a powerful example of a youthful heart that begins to slowly long for the ocean.

Moses was an outcast for 80 years in both Egypt and Midian. After 80 years he is finally on his way to the promised land where he can finally set down roots and call it home. But just at the peak of freedom, just when everything seems to be working out to his favor, God tells Moses, “Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them” (Num.20:12).

What sobs must have flooded his chest on that day. After 80 years of being a stranger Moses learns that he will spend his last four long decades wandering a trackless and hostile “no man’s land” in the desert. Let me tell you folks if anybody wanted to get to Canaan’s land in a hurry it was Moses! Canaan would be the home he never had. It would be the place where he could finally settle. The place where he actually belonged. The place, however, that he would never see.

And then we come to Deuteronomy 34: the last chapter of Moses' book, the last day of Moses' life. Up walks Moses to Mt. Nebo alone, probably lonely. Through glistening eyes he listens to God speak these last words to him; “This is the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when I said, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’ I have let you see it with your eyes, but you will not cross over into it” (Deut.34:4).

Were there tears? I’m sure. But maybe not the kind we would expect. You see after 120 years of life you learn something about goals and rewards. I believe that on Mt. Nebo that day Moses knew he had finally reached the goal: In less than 24 hours Moses would never again leave the presence of God. He knew that Canaan down below was just a perk of the journey. On Mt. Nebo Moses actually stood much more firmly on the promised land than those who would settle on the real estate beyond the river.

When The Struggle Defeats The Dream

2011-03-31T23:17:00.000-07:00

(excerpt from "Going Deeper With Christ" teaching series, 3/27/2011)

My Junior hear of High School I had the opportunity to play in a state championship football game against the Kingswood Knights from Kingswood, NH. For anyone unfamiliar with HS football, the state championship is the ultimate dream game for any HS team. The championship was what you worked so hard for. It was what made all the hard work worth it. I remember the game quite vividly. Fans surrounded every square foot of the field. Television crews were there to take brief shots to show on the news that night. Bands, cheerleaders, parents, old alumni players and radio announcers. I remember the lockeroom conversation prior to the game. I remember the quiet and serious bus ride to Kingswood. I remember walking out to the field suited up, pumped up, wondering if I would ever get this chance again. It was a dream day.

Go back 2 months, 6 or 7 games prior, to a weekday practice after school. Practices were brutal for me. 2 ½ - 3 hours, hot, tiring, non-stop running, non-stop yelling, non-stop put-downs from coaches who seemed to know only swear words. All I wanted to do some days was take off all my equipment and go jump in the river that ran beside the practice field because it was so physically and mentally strenuous.

I remember on 3 or 4 different practice days the practices became so hard for me that I literally said to myself, “This is my last day playing football. This is not worth it to me.” And as I think about the championship game that we played in Kingswood that year that we lost, and next year’s championship game in Kennett that we won, I think to myself, “How sad it would have been if I let the struggle defeat the dream."

Sometimes life becomes so strenuous for so long that we let the struggle defeat the dream of wholeness. We come to points in our lives where we say, “It’s easier to go jump in the river than it is to keep fighting for the dream”. It is easier to stay the way I am than it is to go through this struggle. I give up. I turn in my pads. I resign from the team. It’s too difficult. And jump in the river we can. Stay the same we can. Remain lame we can; but not if we want to see a championship.

When Jesus asked the lame man in John 5, "Do you want to get well" I believe Jesus knew something about the lame man we don't. After 38 years of lameness I think it is reasonable to assume that the man's 38-year struggle may have defeated his dream of wholeness. It could be that this man's main problem was not his paralyzed body, but his paralyzed will. Perhaps he no longer wanted to get well. The solution to a paralyzed will begins with a gut check from Jesus, "Do you want to get well?"

Going Deeper With Christ: Discipline Desire

2011-03-17T08:20:00.000-07:00

My family and I recently watched the movie Hachi, a story about a dog who shows incredible loyalty to his master. Hachi was found abandoned at a train station back in the 1930’s by a man returning home from work. A puppy with no one to care for him the man picked him up, asked the train station manager what to do with the puppy and ended up taking him home for the night intending to bring him to a pound or locate its owner the following day.

As the story goes one thing leads to another, the owner cannot be located, the man does not have the heart to put Hachi in a pound, and so he keeps the dog.

Over time Hachi grows to love his master and his master loves him. One day the master came home his usual way on the train to find Hachi sitting outside the train station waiting for him. Surprised and bewildered by the fact that Hachi found his way to the train station all by himself, the master walked home with Hachi. From that point on Hachi would faithfully meet his master at the train station each night, day after day, year after year to walk him home.

But then one day while Hachi was waiting for his master the master did not show. Hachi waited and waited and waited until a car pulled up late that night. It was the master’s son-in-law arriving to take Hachi home. The master had died of a heart attack while at work that day.

Hachi went to live with the master’s daughter in a nearby town. The master’s home was sold and all that was familiar to Hachi was now gone. Something was not right with Hachi from this point forward. He lived in a nice home with familiar people but he was not the same. He was depressed. Escaping one day out of the house, the daughter and son-in-law searched all day for Hachi finally finding him sitting at the train station waiting for his master.

Hachi was brought home that night but the daughter knew that Hachi was not well. And so, compassionately, she let Hachi go. For the next 9 years Hachi lived under an abandoned rail car close to the train station. Every day for 9 years Hachi would make his way to the train station to sit in his special place and wait for his master's return.

Folks, Hachi had a one-desire heart. Nothing would ever again satisfy Hachi’s heart except the presence of his master. Not a plush dog house. Not flavored kibbles n bits. Not a new home with laughing children. For Hachi his heart desired nothing other than to be with his master.

Hachi’s desire for his master’s return dictated everything he did. It dictated where he lived, what he ate, what he spent his time doing. Everything in Hachi’s life was centered around his desire to be with his master.

This is exactly what building life around Jesus is for us: It is an intentional centering of all of life around Jesus our Master. It is not that we abandon all that we are currently doing in our lives in order to live for Jesus; although some may be called to that. Instead, we bring Jesus into everything we are doing. Everything we do gets transformed into God's work as we bring Jesus into it. Now some things we cannot bring Jesus into. There are just some things Jesus will have no part of, and those things must go. But for most people there are ways to do what we are currently doing in Jesus name.

The story of Hachi reminds us that if we desire to go deeper with Christ we must discipline our desires such that we do not desire anything other than our Master. Listen to what Paul said,

"I once thought these things were valuable, but now I consider them worthless because of what Christ has done. Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith. I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead!” (Phil.3:7-11, NLT).

Let me suggest three practical things we can begin to do today to discipline our desires for Christ alone. There are surely more and perhaps better things to try, but here's a place to start:

Make Every Thought Captive To Christ. We need to question every thought and every intention we have. Never assume that what you automatically think about is what you automatically should be thinking about. Paul said to the Corinthians, “We demolish arguments and every pretention that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ" (2 Cor.10:5).

If, when you have nothing to think about your mind automatically goes to your Fantasy Football League, you may a divided heart. If in your downtime your automatic thoughts go to food or alcohol or drugs or women: let’s face it, you have a divided heart. We need to clean out our minds so that Christ can reside there.

Understand the Urgency: Death and damnation are real! Earthquakes and other natural disasters are all too frequent reminders of the reality of death. None of us are promised another day. For this reason we must heed the urgent call of the bible to get on board with the Savior: "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).

We must discipline our desires now because the consequences of a many-desire heart are eternally real.

Lastly, Make time to go to the train station (figurative of course) to sit before the Master and pray. Pray big prayers. Make note of this passage: "Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generation, for ever and ever! Amen" (Eph.3:20-21).

This passage reminds us that God is able to do more than we can ask Him to do and more than we can imagine He can do. As you sit before the Master be bold enough to ask God for big things. Not cars, houses and other perishable things; but ask for people. Ask for souls. Ask for revival. Ask for miraculous change from the inside out. Ask for those you know to be released from the debilitating way of life they have been lured into. We can even ask God to heal people of their diseases and ailments. The important thing is that we pray believing and we pray humbly.

Let me encourage today to go deeper with Christ by disciplining your desires. Let me encourage you to desire One.

Living Simply In A Complex World

2011-02-17T09:57:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday I was sitting in a Wells Fargo branch waiting for a banker to assist me with a transaction. Wells Fargo, as you may know, recently merged or bought out Wachovia and to be honest I sort of like the new Wells Fargo look. Their logo includes the words "Wells Fargo" with a picture of an old stage-coach being pulled by a team of horses below the lettering. As I sat in the waiting area I studied the large mural on the wall beside me which included old farming pictures and what seemed to be a number of newspaper headlines from Franklin Township back from the years of the horse and buggy. One picture in particular really caused my imagination to run. It was a picture of a man sitting in a horse-drawn cart outside a 2-section barn. Imagining myself in that scene for a few minutes was serene for I thought, "How simple life must have been".

I cannot tell you how many people I have talked to who have said in one way or another, "I miss the days when..." If you have not said it I'm sure you have thought it many times.

I miss the days when everyone knew your name.
I miss the days when no one worked on Sunday.
I miss the days when families sat on their front porch in the evenings and talked with their neighbors.
I miss the days when doctors came to your house if you were sick.
I miss the days when families lived in close proximity to one another.
I miss the days when parents gave their neighbors permission to punish their children if they misbehaved.
I miss the days when you never had to lock your house.
I miss the days when we had less and yet had more.

Technology, if we are honest, has made life a lot easier in many respects, but it has not done much to improve our relationships with those we really care about: God and neighbor. If my relationships with God and people have grown over the years it is not a result of the many new forms of communication I have access to. Strangely I find that my relationships with God and people improve most when I simplify and just sit with them outside under a shady tree.

Folks I want to live simply. On Wednesday I wanted to be the guy sitting in the horse-drawn cart on the Wells Fargo mural. Today I want to get off this computer and sit with people. But I am deceived, I know, if I think simplicity of life comes just by changing my context or reducing the amount of activity in my life (although that may be included). I am learning that the remedy for any Christian when facing any problem is not to change the outside circumstances but to change the inside first. The outside will quite naturally change in response to internal change, but the opposite is not always true.

I believe living simply in a complex world begins with identifying a singular purpose. It begins with naming that which is at the center of our lives and discovering what it means for everything to revolve around that center. Now be careful though because if we put the wrong thing in the center we will soon feel the disequilibrium. Life will begin to feel like we are driving on square wheels.

There are two bible characters who illustrate this truth well. The first is the rich young ruler from Matthew 19. The rich young ruler appeared to desire God at the center of his life. He even asked Jesus, "Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life?" (Mt.19:16). However, the truth of matter was that though this man had many riches, his many riches had him.

After the rich young ruler went away sad Jesus told His disciples, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God" (Mt.19:24), and they were baffled. Part of their baffledness stems from the fact that many Jews believed material prosperity was a sign of God's favor and poverty the opposite. Their response makes sense given their theology: "Who then can be saved?" (v.25).

When Jesus said "no one can serve two masters" (Mt.6:24), He did not mean, 'It is unwise to serve two masters'; He meant 'It is impossible to serve two masters'. One will always assume the center role. Simplicity was not possible for the rich young ruler until he identified a singular purpose for his life and centered all of life around it. You see if God were at the center of his life he could have had a care-free spirit regarding his wealth such that the poor would have already had access to much of his fortune. Instead, losing his wealth was surely a terrifying thought. Jesus could have said, "Take the heart out of your chest and you will have eternal life", and the rich young ruler would have responded the same. You see for him his fortune was at his center. If that were taken away his whole world would cave in.

The second character, the one we must seek to emulate if we desire simplicity, is the poor widow of Mark 12. Sitting over against the treasury in the temple courts Jesus witnessed this poor widow put two mites into the treasury. Jesus' comment on her gift was, "For they all contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living" (Mk.12:44). Richard Foster said about this woman,

"Her giving had a certain reckless abandon to it. She evidenced an undivided devotion that fulfilled the command to love God with all the heart, soul, mind and strength...Here was a woman free from idolatry to mammon, devoid of greed and avarice. Here was a person in whom extravagant giving exceeded prudent thrift. Here was a widow, helpless and defenseless, who had learned to trust the Father for her needs day by day, one who sought first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Dare we follow her lead?" (Freedom of Simplicity, ps.59-60).

The difference between the rich young ruler and this poor widow was the purpose for which they saw their lives. The rich young ruler purposed and centered his life around wealth even while wanting to center his life around God. The lack of simplicity in his life was a consequence of having one too many masters in his heart. Freely giving his money to those who might need it was not possible for him because he was not free from his money. He was not free! Many things pulled him in many directions. The result, if we consider how this might affect our own lives, was worry, fear, joylessness and unlove. How many of us can honestly say that if all we had to live on today was daily bread (i.e. no month's supply of food in the pantry/freezer) we could still live with joy? That thought probably terrifies most of us.

The poor widow, however, had only one pull on her heart: God. As a result her life was very simple. It was simple not because she was poor but because she was living for one purpose alone: to love God. To have one purpose does not mean that we refrain from making provision. No, we continue working but we work in faith not in the anxious concern of distrust. What comes to us from our work is not so much the result of the fruit of our labors, but the gractious gift of God; "Apart from Me you can do nothing" (Jn.15:5).

How often in a given day do you think about success? How often do you think about how much money is in your bank account? How often do you think about your career path? How often do you think about food? How often do you think about rent or a mortgage? How often do you worry about all of those things? A good indication of what's at the center of your life is to identify what your mind thinks about the most.

How would life be different for you if the thing you thought about the most was Jesus? How would life be different for you if your work, your family, your free time, your bank account, your car, your clothes, your health and your future was all centered around Jesus? How would life be different for you if you asked God to empower you to take your mind off of all the things you don't really control (all of the above) and put it on the only One who is really in control? Jesus.

I believe living simply in a complex world begins by identifying the purpose and center of your life and pulling everything into that center. When everything in your life begins to revolve around Jesus I believe you will find a simplicity of life and heart that brings joy and true freedom. That's what we long to do at our congregation; we desire to see a whole community united to build life around Jesus, our Center.

"Father in Heaven, please lift from us the burden of those things which we do not control and yet worry so much about. Free us from the bondage of the world around us. Free us from the bondage of sin, and empower us to walk by the Spirit in carefree-ness knowing that without Jesus we can do nothing. In Jesus name, Amen"

Getting On Board With What God Is Growing

2011-02-03T08:19:00.000-08:00

When we first moved to NJ to plant the Brunswick Church of Christ we were a little naive. We did not really know what we were doing but we were convicted to step out in faith and walk in the direction we felt God was leading. I wouldn't change that step of faith for the world. I do not believe we could have learned the lessons we learned any other way. I am convinced however, that it is our duty to help prepare, train and coach others who are called to start churches so that they can avoid some of the pitfalls we encountered. I suppose that is the desire of all parents literal or spiritual; to guide the next generation through the lessons of our own experiences so that they do not have to repeat them.

If I could share one word to those Christians who feel called to start new churches that will lead their communities to build life around our Savior Jesus, it would be this,

You are not off to start something new...You are simply choosing to get on board with what God has already been growing.

I sort of understood this a few years into the church plant, but not really. I remember praying through a cemetery saying, "God I know You have been at work in this community for much longer than I have been alive", but I did not fully understand the truth of that statement.

Sunday night I returned from a rejuvenating weekend at Harding University where my wife and I were involved in a weekend conversation about world missions. Coming back from this weekend I was convicted to pay closer attention to the people whom God has been working on all around me that I have failed to get on board with. "If it is true that God is the one working and the one able to produce a harvest", I thought, "then I need to get on board with what He is doing and stop trying to make my own unfruitful way."

I quickly thought of 2 fellow bus drivers. One gentleman, whom I will call Terri, I wrote off as unreachable about 3 years ago. He is married with children but has a chronic flirtatious spirit. Nearly all the conversations I had overheard in which he was a part were sexual in nature and involved women. He was also quite rude to the students on the only bus ride I took with him. For all I knew about him I did not really like him.

Just after Christmas, however, he told me someone gave him a Bible as a gift (someone had not written him off!). He said he had been reading it every day. Two other bus drivers were sitting at the table with us when Terri told me this. Sarcastically and with a loud chuckle one of them responded, "You are reading the Bible?!" I was just as shocked. Terri was not bothered by the chuckles and told me some of what he had been reading. I encouraged him to keep reading and boarded my bus so as not to be late.

The other gentleman has on numerous occasions asked me questions of faith. He is in his 60's, struggling financially and socially, yet has one of the humblest spirits I have seen. With these two gentlemen in mind I felt like God was calling me to get on board with what He was already doing in both of them. So I asked each one of them separately, "If I could get 3 or 4 guys together between bus runs on a certain day of the week to have a Bible discussion group, would you join me?" They both quickly said they would.

How might the past 6 years have been different if I was more keenly in tuned with what God was doing all around me? What harvests would I have seen if, instead of trying to make something grow that God was not growing, I noticed what God was already growing and simply got on board with it?

I think about the Pharaoh of Egypt in the time of the Exodus. This Pharaoh, who did not know Joseph, spent his whole term as Pharaoh trying to stop what God was growing. He said, "Look, the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country" (Ex. 1:9-10). This Pharaoh organized all of Egypt around trying to suppress a people that God was blessing. The result? "The more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread" (Ex.1:12).

Part of God's promise to the Israelites included the promise to bless those who blessed them (See Genesis 12:3). How might Pharaoh's future have been different if, instead of fighting what God was growing, he got on board with it? What blessings might have come his way? What devastations could he have avoided? There was nothing Pharaoh could have done to stop what God was growing; so why fight it? Why not just get on board with it?

For any future church planters out there who are trying to discern where to go and what to do when you go, I offer this small piece of advice: Go where God is growing. Go where God has been preparing a harvest. Take the time with your team to pray, fast and be still in order that you may discern what God is up to in the place where you are going. Because if you try to grow something that God is not growing already, you will not see any fruit. It does not matter what outreach methods you employ, if God is not already at work where you are, or if you do not get on board with it, you will not see fruit. Hugely successful churches have sent out church planters to start new churches in new communities by doing exactly what the hugely successful mother-church did, and it flopped. Why? Well I believe they went to a place where God had not, yet, prepared a harvest. Or the harvest He had prepared they did not get on board with. Perhaps they set out to reach a people group whom God had not been working on in that community.

Folks I am learning that life, church, work and family would be a lot easier if I learned to recognize the things God was growing and joined the team. As Gamaliel once said to a group of people attempting to imprison what God was growing, "Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God" (Acts 5:38-39).

Parenting According to Jesus

2011-01-13T19:13:00.000-08:00

The first two Sundays in January at BCC we have taken life lessons from John 15 where Jesus speaks of Himself as the "Vine" (v.) and His disciples as the "branches" (v.5). With that metaphor in mind many meaningful lessons can be developed regarding what it really means to live for Jesus, or build life around Jesus as we have coined it.

Lessons like,

'Branches do not live on their own'
'Fruitful branches get pruned and become even more fruitful'
'Unfruitful branches get X-ed'
'Fruitful branches bring honor to the Gardener'
'Branches remain alive only as they remain attached to the Vine and fill themselves with the same substance as the Vine'

Many more lessons can be developed as well. But as I took a prayer walk last Thursday night one very important lesson occurred to me that I believe has a great application for parenting today.

While praying I walked past tree after tree thinking about Jesus' vine-branch metaphor trying to take in both the simplicity and profundity of the concept. At one point during my walk the simplicity of the metaphor stopped me in my tracks and I stood there gazing at one branch on one tree as the crisp winter air chilled my face. As I stood there I remembered that Jesus said this, "I am the vine, you are the branches. He that abides in (remains in, NIV) Me, and I in him, the same brings forth much fruit..." (John 15:5).

Listen to the simplicity of this verse: Jesus says,
'If you are a branch and you remain attached to Me, You will bear fruit.'
'Also, if you are a branch and do not remain attached to Me, You will not bear fruit.'
And by implication He also says, 'If you are a branch and are attached to the vine and are still dying and not bearing fruit, then you are probably attached to the wrong vine'.

The parental application I took from this passage was so freeing to me that night. It was like the deepest lesson on faith development had been right there in front of me on a thousand different trees every day, and I was not aware of it. That night I learned that as a Christian-branch it is my primary responsibility to remain attached to the vine of Jesus at all times. It is not my responsibility to worry about the fruit that comes from my branches, when it might sprout, what it might look like or how it might compare to other branches around me. I must only worry about remaining attached to the vine of Jesus myself. And as I, day by day, fasten myself to Jesus the long-term result (as fruit is often slow-growing) will be new faith in my children. The faith of my children, Jesus says, will sprout from my deep and intentional attachment to Jesus.

I have met a number of individuals in my past who went about choosing a church based on the size of the youth group, the contemporariness of the worship, the youthfulness of the congregation or the charisma of the preacher. These are the things they truly believed would help sprout faith in their children long-term. Notice that each of the aforementioned things are completely outside of the person of the parent. When I hear things like this from parents it is sort of the equivalent of them saying, "I know the leaves in my front yard are lying on the ground and the branch they were attached to is lying on the ground as well, but I think if I just add more sun, water and soil to the leaves they will grow again."

Well I don't care how much sun, water or soil you add to a detached leaf, it will never grow! What that leaf really needs is a healthy attachment to a branch (a parent) who is strongly attached to a Vine (Jesus). That, says Jesus, is what produces fruit.

The promise of John 15:5 is quite remarkable too: "If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit" (NIV).

Parents, if we desire that our children build their lives around Jesus then the number one thing we can do, and the only thing we really have the power to do, is remain strongly attached to the vine of Jesus ourselves. The fruit, Jesus says, is up to God. That is such a relief!

Keep building!

90 Day Spiritual Resolutions: A great way to build life around Jesus more intentionally in 2011

2011-01-06T20:28:00.000-08:00

Since 2011 rolled in I have asked a number of people if they have made any spiritual resolutions this year. One guy told me he was trying to rest more in the Spirit by allowing the Spirit to give him words to speak when speaking with people. Another lady had a number of prayers as resolutions: peace, healing (she had cancer), staying focused, etc.. Another guy said he was just trying to take it a day at a time.

So how about you? Have you made any spiritual resolutions this year?

Inspired by my church and my wife my 2 spiritual resolutions are the following:

Read through the Pentateuch (first 5 books of OT) in 90 days. I will start a new bible reading challenge on day 91, 181, etc. I am basically committing myself to reading God's word every day. For those of you not in the habit of daily bible reading I highly recommend a 90 day challenge. A 90 day challenge is easier to commit to than a whole year for sure. And just like working out, it is those first 3 months or so that are the most difficult. For the first 3 months you don't see many results, the routine is awkward, and it is painful almost to the point of not being worth it. Once you pass 90 days (or thereabout), however, working out becomes more enjoyable because you begin to see results. Working out has become a regular routine at this point and the callouses on your hands and feet have healed and hardened to make working out enjoyable again. To find a list of 7 possible 90-day bible reading challenges and one 1-year bible reading plan you can go to http://www.njmissions.com/.
Less face to computer time, more face to face time. As a church leader I know that the less I am actually with people the less effective I will be as a leader. I do not have any research to back up what I just said but common sense tells me this is true. For this reason I want to spend only the morning hours, say 9-12 or 1pm, on the computer. The rest of my day, in general, I want to spend connecting with people. I will need help with this resolution for sure. Reading the bible every day is already a habit for me. Limitting my face to computer time, however, will take work. I think it will probably be most effective to make this a 90-day challenge as well. Perhaps if I work hard for 90 days to stick to this ratio of face-computer, face-face time then on day 91 it will be habitual for me.

I believe spiritual resolutions, particularly 90-day spiritual resolutions, can be a great way to build your life around Jesus at the start of a new year. The practice of spiritual disciplines is essential for every Christian and a 90-day challenge can give you the impetus to get started on some disciplines you know you have needed to do but haven't done yet. Keep in mind that the fruit of regular spiritual disciplines is not always seen immediately. Fruit takes time to grow. Give it your all for 90 days and then gauge what fruit God has produced in you.

What spiritual resolutions have you made for 2011?

Who have you told about your spiritual resolutions that can hold you accountable?

Would you be willing to share your spiritual resolutions here to inspire and motivate others?

"And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart" (Galatians 6:9).

Happy Holy-Days From Brunswick Church of Christ!

2010-12-23T08:17:00.000-08:00

I love Holidays! Holidays are days of celebration. Days of recognition. Days to reflect. Days for ceremonies and festivals. Holidays are those days which bring us back to our roots and drive us onward to build the future. Holidays in my home, no matter which one it is, are those days which bring us to our knees in prayer and thanksgiving and compel us to keep building life around Jesus till He returns. But as with your first full-time, minimum-wage job, if performed enough over a certain amount of time in the same prescribed way with the same uninspiring results, a Holiday can lose its luster. In fact unless a Holiday remains strongly connected to the holy event which sparked its beginning we will soon wonder why we celebrate it at all.

In the same way that a broken tow-line renders useless both the barge and the tug-boat, so a Holiday detached from meaningful-event centered-celebration can render both the holiday and those who celebrate it useless. An important point about a holiday (or "Holy-Day" as it is derived from) is that it is always tied to an historical event. No one ever celebrated America’s hopes for independence. No, America celebrates her Independence Day- the actual historical day commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776 which declared America independent from the Kingdom of Great Britain. When Columbus Day rolls around in October of next year we will all celebrate Christopher Columbus's arrival in the Americas, which occurred on October 12, 1492. None of us will feel all that inspired to celebrate Columbus' high aspirations or noble intentions. No, we will celebrate Columbus' actual arrival in the New World.

In the same way, the many Holy-Day celebrations found in the bible were celebrations of what God had already done. They were celebrations of actual-historical days. The weekly Sabbath holy-day, for example, was a celebration/recognition of the day the Lord rested from His work in creation on day 7 (Genesis 2:2-3). The Sabbath was celebrated not because of what God would do or because of what God intended to do in the future. The Sabbath was a celebration of what God had already done on a specific day in history many moons ago. The Passover and Feast of Tabernacles were of the same sort: they celebrated actual events in the past. If we wish to be faithful to the term Holiday we must understand this important concept.

The “Holiday Season” is not about celebrating peace, hope and joy because peace, hope and joy are not historical events. I might as well throw a Holiday to celebrate the concepts in this blog post. What is an historical event, however, is the incarnation of Jesus Christ which makes peace, hope and joy possible! If we intend to celebrate Hanukkah this Holy-Day season then by all means let's celebrate the rededication of the Holy Temple (the Second Temple) in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt of the 2nd century BCE and note its implications for our lives today! But let's not celebrate freedom on Hanukkah for freedom is not an historical event. To limit a Holiday to a lofty ideal is really to cut the tow line and make celebration void of meaning.

Having said that, the real power of a Holy-Day, the real power of Christmas for us as Christians, is in what Christmas compels us to do after the celebration is done. When celebrating Independence Day as an example, the question for me needs to be, "Am I more strongly committed to fighting for the men, women and children under my care as a result of celebrating those that fought for the freedom of men, women, and children under their care?" If the holiday does not compel me to action then, again, I might as well cut the tow line and go frolic in the sea.

So what about Christmas? What is it that December 25th, 2010 aught to compel me do to on December 26th and all the days following?

The first thing I believe Christmas Day aught to compel me to do is bow my knees in worship to the God Who would dare incarnate Himself. If I were God I could probably think of a number of better ways to spend my time then by submitting myself to mistreatment and even death by those disobedient creatures I created. As I think of myself I don't see that I am much worth that cost. But I am not God! And thank God I am not God because Christmas Day may never have happened if I were! As one Bible writer said, “What is man that You are mindful of him, or the son of man that You take care of him?" (Hebrews 2:6). But on Christmas Day (maybe not the actual day I know) the eternal Creator sent Jesus so that "He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone" (Hebrews 2:9. Folks, Christmas is not about the celebration of Jesus' noble teachings: it is about His inconceivable sacrifice begun at His birth!
Christmas Day aught to compel me to take a serious and strong stand against evil. When God became man He placed his flag post on enemy territory and said, "If Satan is going to take this world to hell in a hand basket it will have to be over My Son's dead body". Through His incarnation God would make a way for all nations to receive the blessing promised to Abraham from the beginning. The angel said to the shepherds, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord" (Luke 2:10-11). In Jesus God took a serious and immovable stand to restore the world to its original goodness and my life aught to reflect that restoration as well. My life aught to be about living by heaven's laws here on earth. It aught to be about living like Abraham in lands like Sodom.
Christmas Day aught to compel me to build my life around Jesus at every point! Through believing the story of Jesus we allow our minds to be continuously renewed by the normative narrative of God. As Greensdale (2002) stated so well, "Jesus calls us away from a faith in which God is available to bless our business and into a faith in which we are available to be a part of His business. And God's business is a multi-national company with branches everywhere!" (ps. 42-43). The incarnation brings God right alongside us and calls us to embody Christ ourselves.

If you choose to celebrate a holiday this season then ensure for yourself that two things occur:

You celebrate an actual historical event.
You let that historical event change the way you live today!

May your faith in Jesus Christ increase this season as you allow yourself to be changed by His birth, life, death and ultimate resurrection.

In this year of our Lord 2011,

Shaun

What Building Life Around Jesus is Not

2010-12-16T06:09:00.000-08:00

My wife creates and publishes Christmas Cards each year for friends and family. She is very talented in design and throughly enjoys the opportunity to help others shine their family through cards. However each year she runs into the same problem. Some years the problem is minor and causes little disruption, but other years, like this year, the problem is major and creates a big ordeal. My wife designs the cards, orders the proofs online through a third party company, and then waits for the prints to arrive so that she can ship them to the right persons. It is in her dealings with this third party company that the problem always surfaces.

Inevitably every year the company will either ship the prints late, print the cards off-center or, like this year, develop a problem with the online ordering system not allowing my wife to order the cards until much later than anticipated. This last go around my wife was told story after story, reason after reason for which her cards could not be ordered. Each story from each person on each call was a different story and she quickly lost confidence in anyone's word from the company. The quick solution for my wife...get rid of the third party source of course! In her case, however, this is really not an option. She does not have the capacity to print the quality or quantity of cards she needs without them. So next year she will design cards once again, perhaps going with a different printing company this time, but keeping the third party nonetheless.

I can imagine that the way my wife felt during the past month of Christmas Card creations is likely some of the way God feels when He deals with His third party people: us. She felt frustrated and delayed. Unlike my wife, however, God does not need to continue to deal with us. He does not need a third party in order to accomplish His will. But His goodness and enduring love for mankind drives Him to exert great patience with us. The Lord recognizes the inherent risk involved and utilizes us anyway. It was not until recently that I realized just how frustrated with us God must be at times.

I have talked with an Islamic man on 7 or 8 different occassions now at a Dunkin Donuts locally. I visit this particular D&D's once a week for a few hours each week typing, thinking, planning. My Islamic friend is always there for some time during my stay. We initially met on account of his (not mine) evangelistic initiative. He noticed an open bible beside me and said, "Oh you don't read the rest of that I guess". I asked him to clarify what he meant and he gave me a discourse on the "Holy Koran". The 10 minutes we talked that first day could not be called a conversation as much as it was a monologue. I listened, he taught. I chuckled at the brief encounter that first day and went about my work again after he left.

The conversations that have ensued since them have been of the same style. He shows up to teach me what he knows about "Allah" and leaves puzzled that I have not understood his "revelations". Today in particular was the day that his musings broke the camel's back for me. I entered the D&D's, bought my coffee, plugged in my laptop, sat down in an adjacent table next to him, we greeted each other and the conversation began. He started by mentioning his 2 day fast that he was beginning at sundown after the order of the prophet Muhammed . His tone, facial expressions, gestures and over-all milieu were as they had been each time prior. He behaved as if he knew something within himself about "Allah" that I did not know and it was his direct order from "Allah" to teach me. Rather fed up with what I perceived, over time, to be self-righteous pride, I said to him,

"So you can teach me but I can't teach you. You have nothing else to learn, is that what you are saying?"

With half a smile he replied, "Well Allah has shown me the truth".

I said, "So if you have nothing else to learn then why are we having a conversation? Why should I even talk to you if you won't even consider the fact that you may be wrong in some of your beliefs?"

"Well Allah will reveal it to you if you want him to".

Increasingly perturbed by his self-righteous-God has spoken to me not you-attitude, I made it clear that I did not believe what he believed, that Jesus was more than just a prophet to me, and that his spiritual experiences, even though he was convinced they should have been proof to me of his connection to the divine, held no weight whatsoever in convincing me that "Allah" had spoken to him. In fact I made it clear that his spiritual experiences may just as well have been the work of Satan and his angels.

Shortly then-after he quit talking for the first time in 8 encounters.

My point in telling these two stories is to make the point that sometimes dealing with third-party sources can really mess things up. Every time I spoke to this man those 7 or 8 times I left wondering if that is the way I as a Christian come across in conversation to others who are not Christians: self-righteous and all-knowing. In fact I am convinced that this is exactly how I have come across in times past. God forgive me.

Folks, God is good. Jesus is Lord. But it is me, the third party, that oftentimes significantly distorts those realities and leaves others frustrated and delayed when I talk to them. Building life around Jesus is not about walking into a D&D's to empty onto the closest individual all that we know about Jesus. It is not about feeling superior to others under the hightened assumption that God has been working in our lives more than others. Building life around Jesus is about living gratefully in response to God's gift of mercy in Jesus. It is about praying face-down with the publican saying, "God have mercy on me a sinner" (Luke 18:13) and inviting others into the same face-down posture with us. The grace of our Lord Jesus breaks our resolved to feel superior to anyone. Instead it drives us to our needs in prayer, thanksgiving and sincere conversation with others longing for them to experience the fullness of joy, love and freedom we now know is only available in Christ.

"But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior" (Titus 3:4-6).

Busy-ness: The Enemy of Love

2010-12-10T15:25:00.000-08:00

The past 24 hours in my home has been a lesson in busy-ness. It began last night when a computer virus forced me to work quickly to save important files before I lost them. I had planned on being done with the computer by 6pm, eat dinner with the family, talk about the day thus far and assist my wife in preparing the house for guests who were to arrive by 7:30pm. Well by the time I could leave the computer without fear of further infection it was nearly 7pm and all I had done was cram a bowl of chili down my throat while my wife took care of the kids and started the cleanup.

Needless to say the last 30 minutes before FOCUS Group were filled with short tempers, annoyed tones, a broken drawer with papers all over the floor, a crying toddler and 2 completely unfocused adults. The rush from 6-7:30pm made loving each other rather unappealing. Instead we were ready to make war. But at least I got the dishes done in record time!

As I was leaving the house earlier today I was again in a rush. A couple of weeks ago I had been told by my supervisor at my part-time bus driving job that 2pm sharp was my arrival time, not 2:05pm. I now know exactly when I need to leave the house to arrive by 2pm and that time was quickly approaching. I gave the kids and my wife a kiss goodbye and ran out the door. Lately, however, a kiss is not enough for my 7 year old daughter. As I ran out the door I got half-way to the truck and realized I forgot some papers and ran back inside. My daughter was now insistent on a hug before I left again so I quickly squeezed her head in my hip and tried to run out. But in my house a kiss always follows a hug and if a kiss does not follow a hug a wining child follows a hug. So in order to pursuade my daughter to let go of me I quickly bent down and gave her a kiss.

Then, just as I got to the truck door to hop in, my daughter and 5 year old boy began yelling from the steps of the house, "We want a hug. We want a hug!"

"I just gave you a hug!", I replied and motioned to them to run out to me quickly. We embraced, I left and all is still well for my bus job.

The point I am trying to make with these two stories is that busy-ness makes loving people well about 300lbs heavier. In fact loving people well while running at warp speed is such a difficult balance to keep that most people, if not all people, collapse under the pressure. What's worse, when we are so busy for so long time continues to fly by and before we know it our children don't have time for us either. We feel estranged from them. They feel estranged from us. Trying to build our home life around Jesus after many years of unhealthy busy-ness becomes an attempt to "re-build" life around Jesus because so much of what we orginally built has fallen down.

Perhaps the greatest testimony to busy-ness as an enemy of love is Harry Chapin's 1974 hit song" Cats and the Cradle". No song that I know preaches busy-ness as an enemy of love like this one. Watch...

Folks I am learning, and so are you I'm sure, that if we want to build our life around Jesus we must reject as practically as possible the temptation to busy-ness. Busy-ness is an enemy of love.

In a future post I may, for those who are interested, list some practical things we can do in the 21st century to slow down while still remaining faithful to our work responsibilities.