people matter

In my June 26 post, I was trying to muddle my way through Jesus' commandment to love.  The first part of this love commandment makes sense: love God.  God gave us life, he gave us salvation.  We ought to love him.  It only makes sense.  

But the second part doesn't always make sense to us.  We're told, in addition to loving God, to love each other as we love ourselves.  

I don't want to try to broadefine (that's my made-up word for trying to broaden a definition into a perversely general form ) "love" to prove that loving people can be done.  Loving people is hard, because sometimes they're pretty darn unlovable.  But I do want to revisit the topic because I'm undergoing a fairly remarkable and drastic purging of formerly held attitudes, one of which was that other people don't matter that much.

There's a common acronym for TEAM: Together Everyone Achieves More.  I've always thought it a little cheesy, but every part of my life is confirming this immutable truth.  There was a time when I thought a little bit too highly of myself, and that I didn't really need other people.  What I'm finding out as I meet more people is how valuable their knowledge and experience is.  There are millions of things to learn just by meeting a new person, and there's seven billion of us here.  When we are with people and trying to accomplish something together, we become a monolith of thought and experience.  I love it.  

So what I'm positing is this: there's logic in the second part of the love commandment.  God must have known we're at our best when we're among other people, so he must have known it would have been wise to command us to love one another.  Loving one another is the most expedient route to the most efficient team.  It's not always easy, but it's always worth the cost.  Without it we forfeit the opportunity to maximize our potential, and that is the tragedy of living by the "go-it-alone" mentality. 

What I'm saying is I'm coming around.  I used to not value the company or discourse of other people, and I was missing out.   So, I'm doing away with that attitude.  People simply matter too much.  I guess I've decided to be a people person.  

Now you're probably thinking I was just trying to bait you into commenting. There was far more behind this post than that, but I would sure enjoy reading your thoughts.  

gift exchange

I just unloaded a whole lot of negativity towards gift exchange in a conversation with one of my closest confidants. It's not really the typical anti-materialistic animosity towards the holidays many people profess to have this time of year. Though I certainly share those sentiments, I've got another bone to pick with this season. 

You see, I've been accused of being an old Ebenezer when it comes to the holidays. I love the idea of Christmas--the festivities, the time with family; but, I have a difficult time with gift exchange. Giving the perfect gift is fun. Getting something you like is fun. But the pressure of communicating what you want, and the process of unwrapping it in front of a group of people is almost unbearable. Then there's the whole futility factor: the word "exchange" itself literally expresses the nullifying effect of giving something only to receive something else. If allowed to, the whole process becomes just another holiday formality.

It's said that gift exchange is supposed to be some type of symbolic expression to commemorate God giving us Jesus, "the first gift of Christmas."  Our culture has sentimentally conjured up this thing we call the "Christmas spirit," centered around overt generosity and, in many cases, an expectation of reciprocity.

I have trouble seeing the symbolism.  My problem with it is that the whole notion of "exchange" implies this thing of reciprocity. Often, receiving a gift from someone without having something to give in return feels awkward; until a gift is given, there is an outstanding debt to repay.  It can be very subtle, but I'm sure many people can relate.

I understand this is coming across very cynical, and I know that there are many of us that don't treat gift-giving this way.  Plenty of people see Christmas as an opportunity to bestow love and generosity, and really do not expect anything in return.  But I'm guessing there are a lot out there that do see it as a true exchange--giving and getting all at once.

And that's what I'm trying to point out here.  Our practice of gift exchange is an impure symbolic representation of what happened at Christmas.  God did give us a wonderful gift, and His only expectation was that we accept it.  Having received the gift, to now scramble to try and find something to give back is at it's very core faithlessness.  It's trying to find another way to God besides Christ.

Maybe this is a fruitless rant.  In truth, if we call what we do at Christmastime something other than "exchanging" gifts--say we just call it "giving" gifts--all of the sudden the symbol retains it's original meaning.  I suppose there's an argument to be made that I'm just splitting hairs here.  But it's worth asking myself how I view the practice.  What do I expect in return for my gifts?  If I do expect something in return, how is my celebration at Christmas symbolic of Jesus?   

Humbug.

Jeff

great expectations

Thanks to Dickens for leaving behind a great book and a great phrase.

I have just discovered something disturbing about myself:  I'm okay with mediocrity (it helps to start saying it out loud).

I've made "showing up" my own brand of success, silently congratulating myself for being such a selfless donator of my time.  Well, at least I'm here, I say to myself.  Those people didn't even come.  The problem is, when showing up is all it takes to succeed, what do I do once I've arrived?  I mean, once you've won the game, is there any reason to keep playing? 

I think I'm coming close to pinpointing some of my motivation problem.  I do not have great expectations.  Instead, I set the bar so low that it's nearly impossible not to succeed.  Without great expectations and nearly unreachable goals, it makes the epic life decidedly unepic.

The reason I'm discussing this is because so much of it relates to how I see my role in "The Church" (by "The Church" I simply mean whatever community of believers I happen to belong to at any given moment) and the post a couple months ago about living strategically.  We were made to live epic lives, which is not possible when there is no conquest or war.  Setting goals is great, but if the goals themselves are not great, achieving them means nothing.

This is a huge subject, and there's a lot more to it.  But I wanted to introduce the idea and confess that until now, I have had a misunderstanding of what it means to achieve and succeed, and I'm afraid I have severely overestimated myself. 

If anyone out there has any additional thoughts, I'd be glad to read them.

Jeff 

faith and feeling

I'm a huge C.S. Lewis fan. I've been working my way through "Mere Christianity" for quite a long time now, trying my hardest to take it slow and think through what he's writing, while at the same time wanting to gulp down more and more of his analogies.

I read the chapter on faith last week. If you look at the post from Oct. 6, you'll recall I was in a bad mood.

Lews speaks to the issue of mood swings in the faith chapter. I'll reproduce an excerpt here: ". . . Faith . . . is the art of holding on to the things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods." It seems to me that the claim relies on two premises: first, that reason is the basis of the choice to accept whatever "things" you believe (assuming you believe anything at all), and second, that your moods will change. I like this perspective because it provides a place for both logic and emotion in regards to faith. Do I have faith in God? Sure do. Do I always feel like I have faith in God? Nope.

What inspires me about Lewis's definition of faith here is that faith itself is separate from the feeling. Feelings come and go, but faith is something far deeper. So, the measure of my faith isn't how good I'm feeling; it's whether or not I still believe what I've said I believe when war, famine, and pestilence (figuratively speaking) come. Even better, the notion of "blind faith" doesn't really apply since reason has already overcome doubt (again, assuming I have any beliefs at all).

All this is to say: I'm encouraged. For years I've been basing my faith in God on the feeling. When I screw up and do something stupid, it takes me days to regain my "faith" because I think I have to wait for the good feeling to return. So I am now at the point of "[recognizing] the fact that [my] moods change" (another quote from the faith chapter), and I can now move on to the next part of the prescription. More to come about that.

Appreciate your thoughts and comments.

Jeff

fire

In many ways my negligence towards the blog has been just another symptom of an overall crappy month. It has been crappy because of me. God does not change. When I have a "bad" day, week, month or year, it's because of me. I hate that I have the power to affect my own attitude. I love that God is never the problem, because then I at least know which of us needs fixing.

I'm really glad Bernice shared those lyrics in her comments to the last post. The last 10 minutes have been the divine confluence of a series of thoughts that have all had the flame metaphor burning at the core. I'm going to share them now.

Let me start with a book I've been reading. It's called "The History of God" by a reknowned religious scholar named Karen Armstrong. Let me tell you, this book will mess with your theology. To start, it's not clear what the author's own views are, though she attempts to explain them in her introduction. Basically the book is exploring the "god" of the 3 major world religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Maybe a better way of describing it is the book is exploring the human perception of God in all 3.

So far I'm just reading about the God of Judaism. It has been fascinating to me to learn about the culture and the social context in which God revealed himself to the Israelites. These were polytheistic times. The Babylonians believed in a number of deities, and the Israelites would have too. Then they made a covenant with God, and vowed to serve him above all the others. That was unprecedented for the time, and the whole Old Testament records the Israelites' struggle in upholding their end of the covenant, and continual dabbling with other gods.

This is where the flame metaphor comes in. God asked for complete and unconditional loyalty. He asks nothing less of us. This is why a flame is such an appropriate image: something is either on fire or it's not. I'm not a chemist or a physicist, but as I understand it, there is a combustion point of every material. Once ablaze, we say it's "on fire." There are varying degrees of heat, of course, but there's still the point at which something catches fire.

Nearly every song I've heard on my computer's playlist for the last little while has been about this very thing. Right now it's Delerious: "All the Way." Am I going all the way with God? Are you? You've either been set on fire or not. If not, then pray the lyrics of the old song "Lord light the Fire Again." That's what I'm going to do right now.

The best part is, fire spreads.

Jeff

Update: Strategic Living

Nothing's been formalized, but in my head I have pretty much divided my life up into the following responsibility quadrant: home, work, ROL, and me. They're all pretty self-explanatory, right? "Me" sounds a bit egotistical, I admit, but honestly, if I don't take time for introspection and spiritual growth, not much else seems to matter.

I'm starting small.

Let me tell you how foreign the ideas of goalsetting and listmaking are to me. For about 10 years, I was the type of person who remembered almost everything. I never missed appointments, classes, or work because I forgot (overslept? yes). I never forgot homework due dates or test days. And I never wrote a schedule down, used a planner, or set a goal.

But I'm changing. And as evidence of the change, I'll let you in on one of my small personal goals. Let's call it the first:

1.) Develop dexterity with iCal

There you go, it's out there. I've articulated it. Now you all need to hold me accountable.

Tell me one of yours and I'll do the same for you.

Jeff

living strategically

I've been on this planning and strategizing kick for the last couple of weeks.  Part of the motivation for said "kick" is a sudden realization that without plans, dreams and goals generally remain unreached.  And, I do not want to be guilty of treating the dreams and goals God has given me trivially.  So, I'm embracing a new way to be.  For the purposes of the blog, I'm going to call it "strategic living."  The essential idea is to examine all of the things for which I am responsible, set measurable and practical goals in each, and develop a plan to reach them.  What's revolutionary is what this lifestyle is doing for my time allocation; any time spent not in pursuit of a goal, whatever it may be, is time wasted.  So, as long as I have an understanding of my goals, and a basic outline of the steps it will take to reach them, it is becoming increasingly difficult for me to waste time.  It is just too painful to spend any one moment not in pursuit of a goal.

Since beginning to live strategically, however, I've been encountering this massive gray area: where is the line between faith and fervor?  

Strategy is good and necessary.  One can imagine the amount of planning it took for Moses to lead the Israelites, for Solomon to govern his kingdom, or for Paul to establish the early church.  And God has given us the mental capacity to be pragmatic.  There really should be no question that God has designed us to live our lives with order and purpose.  Yet I think I've had this thought that living by faith requires the adoption of a sort of hippie lifestyle--one that involves a haphazard approach to decision-making, and a distaste for organization.  I've reduced faith to a total rejection of order, cloaking it in rhetoric that claims to "put God in a box" whenever discussions of organization arise.  But all you have to do is look at a pinecone, or take a math class to know that God likes pattern and order.  He may not always operate within their confines, but his creation screams beauty in chaos, order in disarray.  Still, we know faith requires some element of the unknown (i.e. God's promise to Abram), and action when no discernible plan or strategy is in place.  

So my question again is this: when does my fervency to plan and achieve goals begin to exhibit a lack of faith?

a much needed break

I've spent the last several weeks living the paradox of Hebrews 4:11.

"Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience."  

I'm confused by the coupling of "effort" and "rest" in the same statement, especially because what's implied is that entering into God's rest (the rest to which this verse refers) requires effort.

What's interesting to me is that for the last several weeks I have been exhausted in every way.  I had a week off from work (this week), and to get to the point where I could take the week off, I had to redouble my efforts at work.  I'm also trying to find a way of taking a break from other things, which will require a similar level of effort to make happen.  Why should rest take work?  Why should "God's rest" require effort to enter?  What's the broader theme of Hebrews 4:11?You will need to read the passage on your own to identify the antecedents and place it in correct context.  What are your thoughts?  

Thanks for waiting patiently for this update.  Time simply goes by too fast sometimes.

why do we worship together?

I've been questioning the value of corporate worship.

If I could have, I would have recorded a conversation I had about this last week, since it was that conversation that squeezed a lot of thoughts out of me. I'll just have to do my best to reconstruct some of those thoughts now.

At the core of my questioning was a perceived disjunction between what I understand to be the purpose of church (specifically, Sunday morning services), and the result of our Sunday morning worship. The purpose of our Sunday morning services is manifold, but of course one of them, in my opinion, has to be the development of lateral relationships between us. If we come to the service and truly experience God, that's a wonderful thing. But you don't have to be with people to experience God. We can experience God alone in the wonder and mystery of nature, or in the quiet solitude of our homes early in the morning.

So why bother coming together on Sunday morning? Because we get energy and encouragement from being with other believers. That's the easy answer. The truer answer for some of us may be routine. Or because some of us still believe that God likes us better when we come to church. Blech. . .what a thought. I'm afraid all have been true for me at one point or another.

My argument last week was this: if we come on Sunday purely for personal edification and worship, that is in fundamental opposition to the chief aim of a corporate service. Even if we have what we later call a "good service," have we not missed something if no relationships between us were strengthened? If the worship and the word were both amazing, and we leave feeling closer to God than ever before, but we don't feel closer to one another, was the service everything it could have been?

That's a tough question. It's hard to say anything can be better than getting closer to God, and there's no biblical justification (that I know of) for the opposite view. If getting personally closer to God requires, or is even just made easier by, a corporate setting (live worship music, listening to the sermon together, etc.), then that's a good thing. But is that really everything Sunday morning can do for us (now by us I'm referring to ROL)? I truly hope we are all personally growing closer to God as a result of coming to church on Sundays, but I also hope we're coming to encourage others, as much as to be encouraged ourselves.

I feel like this is a scramble of ideas. So let me try to unify them with something I just read. I trust God's words to convey thoughts far more than my own: This is in II Chronicles 5 (NKJ). Context? Solomon has just finished building the temple, and the ark has just been placed in the inner sanctuary.

13 indeed it came to pass, when the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the Lord, and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and praised the Lord, saying: "For He is good, For His mercy endures forever," that the house, the house of the Lord, was filled with a cloud, 14 so that the priests could not continue ministering because of the cloud; for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God.

Has that ever happened at ROL? If so, I'm afraid I was busy playing songs on my guitar. Don't get me wrong, I believe God has done amazing things in our services. And we have the promise of God being present when we gather in His name. I'm not questioning that aspect. But at the same time, I don't think we've experienced God's glory that way. Bummer.

My thoughts then: corporate worship tends to facilitate personal edification. That's a good thing, but it does seem to violate the basic purpose of corporately gathering to worship.

My thoughts now: corporate worship gives us the opportunity to feel the weight of God's glory! When we reach the level of unity in praise and thanksgiving the Israelites did that day, look what happens. Personal edification, corporate edification. . .they're both trivial compared to the possibilities of experiencing God's glory.

I'll be honest, I didn't see where this was going when I started writing. But I think I've just clarified something here. We worship corporately because that setting allows for God's glory to fall in a way that no personal setting does (or seems to do). Seems simple, I guess. It gets complicated when we actually try to praise "as one."

Thanks in advance for your comments.

Jeff

of uninspiration

I was just eating dinner and thinking about why I haven't updated the blog in a while. I was trying to tell myself it was because I haven't been "inspired" by anything in a while.

Then I realized something: I use that excuse all the time! Or at least I use some variation of it all the time. I've been down on myself for the last couple of weeks because I've lacked motivation and initiative in several areas of my life. There's nothing worse, in those moments of lethargy, than feeling uninspired as well. But how do we know when we're inspired? It seems like one of those paradoxes; maybe we have to experience the absence of inspiration (uninispiration) before we can recognize inspiration itself--sort of how you can't recognize light without first experiencing darkness. If that's true, than thank God for uninspiration!

Anyway, I think that's a huge obstacle to me, inasmuch as it relates to the "Git-R-Done" concept. I feel like unless I have something great or profound to say or do, it's better to not say or do anything. Seems like a crappy approach to life, and an even crappier approach to God. I think the true test of faith is how we act when we do feel uninspired. Do we just give up? Or do we keep it up?

What do you do?

Thanks for reading.

Jeff

why people?

Love God and love people.  This is what we're told to do somewhere in Matthew.

I guess I don't have much to add to this, so this will be short.  Mostly, I'm just going to pose this question: why are people so important?  Everything we believe hinges on a personal relationship with God.  That same idea was central to Luther's revolution.  I might even go so far as to suggest (for the sake of argument) that salvation would be easier without people.  If there were no other people to deal with, would we struggle with sin as much?  There would be no cause or occasion for gossip, offense, stealing, adultery, murder, etc.  This is not to say there wouldn't be sin (Adam and Eve did a fine job sinning without other people around), but there would be fewer opportunities for it.  

However, there would also be fewer opportunities to grow!  Every uncomfortable, unpleasant, and seemingly unnecessary interaction with each other is what gives us the chance to learn how to love.  Someone once said (sorry I can't attribute this properly) that our time on earth is practice for heaven.  If that's true, then I say let's have a good practice! 

There may be more about this topic to come.  This was all kind of on the fly, based on a conversation I had last night.  Let me know in your comments why you think people are so important.  Oh, and the answer to my cheesy riddle on the last post is the Fibonacci sequence.

Jeff

 

half of an insight

Last night I had a thought about the David Crowder song "We Win!" we've sung during services a couple of times now, and the associated story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho.

I think we probably all know the story: after the 40 year wilderness wandering, the Israelites cross the Jordan River and encounter the city of Jericho, the first obstacle to claiming the Promised Land (besides the Jordan River itself). God tells Joshua to take the fortified city by marching around it 7 days in a row (accompanied by soldiers, priests, and the ark of the covenant, of course), and on the 7th day, to make 7 laps. After the 7th lap, God instructed Joshua to have the priests blow their horns and the people "shout with a great shout." Simple enough.

What I realized last night, for the first time (and believe me, I have heard this story many times) was the order in which the events take place. In our modern culture, which Daniel talked about a few weeks ago, we have a very linear way of thinking. Think about it: "I" before "e" except after "c." Don't eat your dessert before the main meal. Don't try to get the cart before the horse. Work before play. We are a read-from-left-to-right society, and we approach everything with that perspective. We think that's organization.

That's why the Jericho story sticks out to me. God had them do it backwards! He had the Israelites shout their victory before the walls came down. Just like Crowder's song lyric: "We're gonna shout loud, loud until the walls come down." What!? "Until" implies a lack of finality. What did they have to cheer about? The walls were still standing when they shouted for victory. Can you imagine a sporting event where fans cheered before the big moment? Try. You know those moments in a football game where the running back gets the hand-off? He busts through the defense. . .an amazing dodge here. . .a spin with some fancy footwork. . .and he's off. . .30 yd. line. . . the fans stand. . .20 yd. line. . .the fans murmur, anticipation growing. . .10 yd. line. . .will he make it?. . .still a few more tackles to dodge. . .wait!. . .the crowd's gone crazy!. . .the announcer calls the touchdown!!. . .the fans are shouting and hugging each other for joy!!!. . .the sound of their cheers is deafening!!!!!

Sounds bizarre to me, but that's exactly what God had the Israelites do. He had them shouting for victory before anything happened! Apparently, God didn't understand that you have to wait for the victory before cheering. . .

Wait, God already knew the outcome, didn't he? And He let the Israelites enjoy the thrill of certain victory, for a whole week. That must have been pretty satisfying.

I don't really have any more insight into this (hence the title of today's blog), but it really struck me last night. Can someone help me out with the relevance? The only thing I can think of right now is somehow we've got to get out of this reactionary, linear type of thinking. God is bigger than that. Why wait for the outward sign of victory (i.e. the "walls" flattened) before celebrating the victory? We've already won. We've already won! And because of that, we have hope that does not disappoint.

Other interpretations are welcome. And you will get extra points if you can detect the method to my mad use of exclamation points in the last 4 lines of the 4th paragraph. :) The answer is forthcoming.

But in all seriousness, be encouraged. We win!

Jeff

a look in the mirror

Okay, it's confession time.

About a week-and-a-half ago on Sunday morning, we played the song "Undignified." I blabbed a bit about the biblical context of the lyrics and challenged us to push the limits of our typical patterns of worship. It was all relevant, and I'm not a bit sorry for saying any of it, but I admit I feel a little bit hypocritical making the challenge behind the safety of my guitar and mic.

What am I confessing here? That I am unbelievably challenged in the area of demonstrative worship! I used to chalk it up to the introverted personality and unemotional demeanor. But last week I was thinking about how big God is, and how small our words of praise really are. Song lyrics have incredible meaning, and when sung with the right attitude must be beautiful to God. BUT THEY'RE STILL JUST WORDS. They can't possibly capture all of God's glory. We sing them because that's all we have.

Or is it all we have? I'm beginning to realize that worship must involve every part of our being. Singing words and being cognizant of their meaning is important. But so are our emotions! And emotions are demonstrated through action. David chose to demonstrate emotion by dancing around in a linen ephod. To his wife, he looked like a moron. But I'm pretty sure that is closer to an attitude of true worship than I have ever had, and that's an incredibly humbling thought. I wonder what it's going to take for me to be okay with appearing undignified before people.

Well, I'm glad to have that off my chest. Can anyone relate?

Since we're on the subject, what's the one thing you feel "pushes" your comfort level in worship? Mine is raising hands. . .makes me feel very uncomfortable. Someone might see me, you know. :)

Jeff

A Thought

Sorry for the delayed update.

Here's something I've been thinking about: why do we think God thinks like us? Or maybe the better question is, why do we act like God thinks like us? This is going to be a difficult thing to try to conceptualize, but I am going to try nonetheless.

I've had a frustrating week, but it's been the little things that have frustrated me. . .the little things. You all know what types of things I'm talking about: details that are so unimportant in the eternal scheme that when you really reflect on them, you find yourself shocked that you ever even cared about them. I hate that I'm affected by these trivialities!

What I'm getting at is this: our distinction between the important and the unimportant, the trivial and the nontrivial, is our distinction. Take what follows for what it's worth, as I have no concrete theological basis for what I'm about to say, but I don't believe God operates in these distinctions. The basis for that argument is in the way God views sin. We know God sees all sins, big and small, as the same evil that separates us from Him. God does not distinguish between what we see as big and small sins. Why do we think he distinguishes between the big and the small in other parts of our lives? Maybe we don't show this outwardly or even think this explicitly, but do we believe in some corner of our minds that God doles out different levels of generosity, based on the "seriousness" of the situation? Different levels of blessing? Different levels of healing?

I think what I'm trying to say here is that I've been hung up on details lately, yet I've seen God really come through for me. His blessings have been there, even in situations that in retrospect seem so absurdly unimportant. I guess the relevant point for ROL might be that somehow we've got to convince ourselves the way we think about gifts, healings and blessings is probably nowhere close to the way God thinks about them. I think God is so big that what we see as "big" and "small" are pretty much the same to Him. . .kind of like how a billionaire sees another $1M pretty much the same as another $1K.

That took more words than I hoped. Sorry. Maybe you can help me boil down some of these points a little more briefly. And let's keep breaking the ice. . .what's something you do that you feel betrays your age (something you feel either childish doing, or more mature doing)? Mine is the way I drink out of a glass. If I don't put every effort into avoiding it, I will end up with a mustache of whatever substance is in the glass. That of course makes me feel juvenile. :)

Thanks for reading.

Jeff

Continued

Well, this is off to a good start. I'm excited about where this is headed.

I'm going to try to run with Maria's comment here, and this whole concept of the River of Life being the source of power and healing for the infirm. I really think it may be the broader theme that could tie some of these ideas together.

I originally outlined my interpretation of the River of Life being a place where all our streams merge--a body of water brimming and rushing with all the different talents and perspectives each of us brings to this community of believers. But where does that river flow? Eventually the river has got to feed some larger body of water. For our purposes, lets call that "ocean" our community.

Okay, let's quit the metaphor and start talking sensibly. How can we bring life and healing to this community? Here's my thought: it can't (or maybe "won't" is a better word) happen until we ourselves are alive and healed. And that's really the driving factor between fellowship, corporate worship, small groups, and things like this blog. Healing begins with openness and honesty; I have found that being open and honest is much easier among those you can trust--and you can't really trust people you don't know. So I suppose if I had to boil down the real purpose of this blog, it's to start building trust between us--trust that invites openness and honesty, and paves the way for the healing we desparately need.

Does that resonate with anyone? Let me know in your comments. Also, for fun. . .you know how people like to talk about their pet peeves? Well that's annoying, and frankly, my pet peeve is listening to people recite their pet peeves. Oops.

So don't tell me your pet peeve. Tell me one of your pet joys. Here's one of mine: I like to set my alarm clock early just so I can be jarred awake. In that moment of self-inflicted grog, there is nothing like the sheer ecstasy of remembering that I set my alarm clock early and don't really have to get out of bed.

Jeff

The Start

I always try to start these types of things out profoundly, as if to generate interest and credibility. I usually end up confusing myself, so this time, I'm going to let Martin Smith, lead singer of Delirious?, present the basic idea. In the song "Did You Feel the Mountains Tremble?" you will find the following lyric: Did you feel the darkness tremble?/When all the saints join in one song/And all the streams flow as one river/To wash away our brokenness.

There are a hundred ways to interpret the river metaphor we've developed here at ROL church. For the purposes of this blog, the interpretation is simple: we're as much a river of lives as we are a river of life. What I mean by that is we are all individuals with our own ideas, opinions, relationships, callings and lives. Yet we are all members of a single community of believers, a community seeking to spread the love and life of Christ to everyone we meet. Taking the metaphor to the logical end, we are all streams flowing into the River of Life.

So what does this blog have to do with it? I admit I have been cynical of the whole blog thing since people started talking about them. It first seemed to me like another one of those other self-serving trends like YouTube or reality TV. . .everyone wants his or her "moment in the sun," his or her slice of fame, his or her chance to speak up and be heard. Then I realized what an amazing tool this could be for our church. What a great opportunity for us to share thoughts and ideas! What a great chance to share our lives! My hope for this blog is that it gets us talking, not as we do on Sunday mornings, but as families do around the dinner table. This is a perfect place for real, raw and relevant conversation, a place to let our personalities come out, and a place for tranparency.

At the very least, this experiment is going to help us get to know each other better. Maybe in that respect it is a little self-serving. . . and I'm okay with that.

Here's how it's going to work, at least to start. My plan is to update the articles and discussion topics on a frequent basis (at least weekly). As time goes on and the participation level increases we can add more writers/contributors, but I think we need to start simple. Initially, I'm volunteering to manage, maintain and moderate the blog. Mostly, I'll just be writing about things I'm trying to hash out, and asking questions that will get us all thinking and talking. We want to be very careful to avoid divisiveness and negativity, so please be conscious of that when posting comments. We want this to be something that reflects Christ.

These posts will probably not always be this lengthy, but of course this is the first one. A little background is necessary.

So how about a discussion to get the ball ROL-ing (ha! my first blog pun!)? I'm going to share with you a timeline of important "red-letter" dates in my relationship with God--a paired down testimony, if you will.

1985: Born, physically
1994-5: Grapple with conviction, condemnation, and confession. Develop understanding of sin. Get baptized in water.
Late 90s: Struggle with fear, doubt, compulsive tendencies. Experience some deliverance.
1998: Begin involvement with worship team
2000: Gain desire for deeper personal relationship with God. Recognize need for fellowship.
2006: Start to give Godly desires more importance than worldly desires
2007: See God's plan beginning to unfold. Begin to learn how to trust God more fully.
2008: Continuing to recognize and appreciate God's faithfulness and blessing. Still learning how to trust God. Trying to learn what worship is and how it works.

Well, there you have it. Now it's your turn! Also, let's kick around this question: what would you like to see happen with this blog?

Looking forward to your comments,

Jeff