Living Simply In A Complex World

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

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).