I wonder which section of the grocery aisle your church looks like? Seriously, next time you are in the grocery store, take a look at the section for mustard. How many different varieties do you have to choose from? There is yellow, brown, spicy, Grey Poupon, and probably 15 different other variations to choose from. There is a wide diversity in the choices you can make and types of mustard available. Now take a look at the ketchup aisle. Well... there is ketchup. Different brands, but all basically the same. No variety. No differences. Just your normal, plain ketchup.
Ketchup is comfortable. The brands are all just like each other. I wonder if that is what our church is like? A place where diversity doesn't exist. Does your congregation look exactly like the one down the street? Are you doing the exact same thing as them? Maybe you are a different brand. Maybe they are methodist or baptist or Church of Christ or whatever, but do the people, programs, etc. look exactly like yours? I wonder if we are called to be what are community needs? Maybe that should look a little different than any other church name you could pull out of the phone book. Maybe our church should look more like the community with diversity in race, age, ethnic cultures, etc. Maybe we need to do things differently to reach people instead of offering the same type of ketchup as everyone else. Ketchup is comfortable, but really it isn't very exciting. Just wondering. Should comfort and familiarity be what defines us?
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Quick book update
Mentioned a little while back (Can't believe I didn't post anything for nearly three weeks! Lots of thoughts, just not many to write about on here.) that I had several books lined up to read. I finished "Forgotten God" by Francis Chan last week and am currently reading three other books right now. They are very diverse which may make my thoughts even more random than normal. (That should scare you.) Current reads include "What the Dog Saw" by Malcolm Gladwell, "The Gutter" by Craig Gross and "Scouting the Divine" by Margaret Feinberg. Just wanted to give you a warning as I am sure these will invade my thoughts and influence what I write here. Basically what I've read so far deals with the following - Have we denied the power of the Holy Spirit? (Forgotten God), random interesting stories of people that have influenced your life that you may not ever have heard of (What the Dog Saw), the difference between "them" and you is small (The Gutter), and how the life of a modern shepherdess brings to light a lot of what the bible has to say in its use of shepherding language (Scouting the Divine). Just wanted to give you a quick update (or warning depending on how you view it) of some of the things that are on my radar.
Not sure if I will give a full review on any of these books (not really my thing), but I am willing to give a recommendation (unlike Lane and movies now) if you want more details. I really appreciate the encouragement from Sheyenne and Joel about reading "The Gutter". From the other books I've read by Craig Gross, I really like his style of just telling it like it is. I like the challenge to be thrown down. Sometimes we need that raw challenge instead of trying to wrap it up all nice and neat so that it doesn't seem as daunting. When it seems so great that I can't handle it just means that I will have to rely on God to do it. I can guarantee you that will produce better results every time. Hope you encounter some of those challenges this week. Hang on as we enjoy the roller coaster.
Not sure if I will give a full review on any of these books (not really my thing), but I am willing to give a recommendation (unlike Lane and movies now) if you want more details. I really appreciate the encouragement from Sheyenne and Joel about reading "The Gutter". From the other books I've read by Craig Gross, I really like his style of just telling it like it is. I like the challenge to be thrown down. Sometimes we need that raw challenge instead of trying to wrap it up all nice and neat so that it doesn't seem as daunting. When it seems so great that I can't handle it just means that I will have to rely on God to do it. I can guarantee you that will produce better results every time. Hope you encounter some of those challenges this week. Hang on as we enjoy the roller coaster.
In the middle of the mess
Life tends to be...umm...a little messy to say the least. We currently have a mini-van with a rear door that won't completely close. (I have this vision of my wife driving down the street with it flying wide open. There is absolutely nothing on the inside of the door that you can tie it down with.) We have a son who took a kick at our neighbor's...umm...private area yesterday and now is not particularly liked by his parents. (This also being our currently reforming thief and liar.) We spend every payday figuring out how exactly we are going to manage to pay the bills, feed three boys (with usually at least some occasional friends thrown in as well) who seem to eat all of the time (You know it is a bad sign when the people at Wal-mart are impressed with how many groceries you are buying and it is just a normal amount for you. Two carts tends to be the norm these days.) and maybe have enough left over to go on a date if we had the time. Sporadic friendships; the busyness of work; chaotic schedules of soccer, basketball, gymnastics, scouts, and guitar lessons; ungratefulness for the things we have...again life is a little messy. The thing is I don't think we are unusual. Maybe our messiness looks different than yours, but I am guessing we all experience a slightly chaotic life at times. But through all of the chaos is woven hope. Hope for what is to come. I was reading Lamentations this morning (not a particularly uplifting book by the way) and realized again that it is the hope in God that makes it worth it.
Even when life tends to be over abundantly messy, can we stop and be thankful? I am learning that when I am thankful, the messiness of life doesn't seem quite so bad. It doesn't necessarily change the circumstances, but it does change my attitude...and that can make a huge difference. So no matter what your current situation, what can you be grateful for? Take a minute and think about it. Is it the fact you have a car? Is the fact you have food to eat? Do you have people who love you? Maybe you need to just pause and remember there is hope. Maybe you need to write a note of thanks to someone. Maybe you need to go wash your car and be thankful for it. Whatever it is, even when life is messy, we have a lot to be thankful for.
Even when life tends to be over abundantly messy, can we stop and be thankful? I am learning that when I am thankful, the messiness of life doesn't seem quite so bad. It doesn't necessarily change the circumstances, but it does change my attitude...and that can make a huge difference. So no matter what your current situation, what can you be grateful for? Take a minute and think about it. Is it the fact you have a car? Is the fact you have food to eat? Do you have people who love you? Maybe you need to just pause and remember there is hope. Maybe you need to write a note of thanks to someone. Maybe you need to go wash your car and be thankful for it. Whatever it is, even when life is messy, we have a lot to be thankful for.
Monday, November 2, 2009
When speechless isn't a good thing
A couple sits together in a restaurant, but they might as well be at totally different tables. He watches a college football game on the TV, she stares out at the people in the restaurant. No words spoken to each other. I watch them for close to an hour and no more than 10 words are said between them. Maybe it was an off day for them. Maybe they were having a bad day. I don't know what their situation was. I was just observing them at a restaurant in the airport. My thought though was how do you get to that point? How do you sit at a table with the person who should probably know you best and have nothing to say?
My next thought was how do I guard against that? How do I continue to communicate to Lisa how much I love her and the importance she has in my life? I don't think you wake up one day and you no longer have anything to say. You give it up little by little. You let the unimportant distract you from the important. You let your selfishness become the guiding factor instead of thinking of the other person. Really, we are all capable of being there. We have no problem focusing on ourselves, but seem to constantly struggle to place others in front of our own selfish wants.
I have no clue how that couple ended up there. All I know is that I don't want someone to one day be watching me sit at a table in a restaurant with my incredible wife and have nothing to say. (Unless it is because I am speechless because of how amazing she is.) How do you protect the important in your life? How do you keep from living your life based on your own selfishness? What's your plan?
My next thought was how do I guard against that? How do I continue to communicate to Lisa how much I love her and the importance she has in my life? I don't think you wake up one day and you no longer have anything to say. You give it up little by little. You let the unimportant distract you from the important. You let your selfishness become the guiding factor instead of thinking of the other person. Really, we are all capable of being there. We have no problem focusing on ourselves, but seem to constantly struggle to place others in front of our own selfish wants.
I have no clue how that couple ended up there. All I know is that I don't want someone to one day be watching me sit at a table in a restaurant with my incredible wife and have nothing to say. (Unless it is because I am speechless because of how amazing she is.) How do you protect the important in your life? How do you keep from living your life based on your own selfishness? What's your plan?
Surrounded by isolation
It is funny the things you can see in an airport, especially when you are in Vegas on Halloween. I will just let your imagination run with that one for a while. You are creative people, I am sure you will come up with some pretty interesting scenarios all by yourself. Here is something I noticed though.
People everywhere, but most of them isolated. IPods turned on, games being played on their cell phones, working on their computers - everyone plugged-in and the rest of the world tuned out. We are constantly surrounded by people, but I wonder if we have forgotten how to interact with other people. We control our worlds. We have tons of friends on facebook or people we follow on Twitter, but still we are lonely. We choose to limit the people we let into our world. We are busy, rushed, always have a full agenda, with little or no time to give to others. We are lucky if we make time for our families, let alone time to invest in having a conversation with a friend. We rarely fully engage. We text and twitter others even while we are having a conversation with someone else.
Don't get me wrong, I am not against any of these conveniences and ways to keep up with people. They are useful and can be fun, but I wonder if they don't reflect our selfishness sometimes. It is easier to limit what people see on facebook and we can keep people at a distance when the only way we talk is through texting. Letting people into the middle of your life or making a commitment to be invested in someone else's can be hard. It requires us to be real. It requires us to make someone else a priority. It can be messy. Much of life is like that, but isn't that why we need each other. People to encourage us and who we can encourage, people to help us and for us to give to others, people to share our lives and people we can invest in.
I was thinking about how I often hear people talk about their college years and how much they wish they could capture that feeling again. I wonder if that is because that was when we made the time to hang out with friends. You could talk late into the night with others about the things going on in your life. We connected to others, we lived life together, we shared the experiences, we lived in community. Why can't we do that now? I think we settle for less because it is easier. Sometimes it might be better when we don't know any better, like when we were in college.
What about you? Are you plugged-in and tuned out or involved in others lives? Do you long for more than the surface level? If so, what are you going to do about it? Why are we willing to take the easy, when it is usually the harder things that shape us? These are my thoughts as I sit and watch hundreds of people live around each other, but still choose to live in isolation.
People everywhere, but most of them isolated. IPods turned on, games being played on their cell phones, working on their computers - everyone plugged-in and the rest of the world tuned out. We are constantly surrounded by people, but I wonder if we have forgotten how to interact with other people. We control our worlds. We have tons of friends on facebook or people we follow on Twitter, but still we are lonely. We choose to limit the people we let into our world. We are busy, rushed, always have a full agenda, with little or no time to give to others. We are lucky if we make time for our families, let alone time to invest in having a conversation with a friend. We rarely fully engage. We text and twitter others even while we are having a conversation with someone else.
Don't get me wrong, I am not against any of these conveniences and ways to keep up with people. They are useful and can be fun, but I wonder if they don't reflect our selfishness sometimes. It is easier to limit what people see on facebook and we can keep people at a distance when the only way we talk is through texting. Letting people into the middle of your life or making a commitment to be invested in someone else's can be hard. It requires us to be real. It requires us to make someone else a priority. It can be messy. Much of life is like that, but isn't that why we need each other. People to encourage us and who we can encourage, people to help us and for us to give to others, people to share our lives and people we can invest in.
I was thinking about how I often hear people talk about their college years and how much they wish they could capture that feeling again. I wonder if that is because that was when we made the time to hang out with friends. You could talk late into the night with others about the things going on in your life. We connected to others, we lived life together, we shared the experiences, we lived in community. Why can't we do that now? I think we settle for less because it is easier. Sometimes it might be better when we don't know any better, like when we were in college.
What about you? Are you plugged-in and tuned out or involved in others lives? Do you long for more than the surface level? If so, what are you going to do about it? Why are we willing to take the easy, when it is usually the harder things that shape us? These are my thoughts as I sit and watch hundreds of people live around each other, but still choose to live in isolation.
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