Today I was listening to Fresh Air on National Public Radio. Terry Gross was interviewing a poet named Natasha Tretheway. She won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for poetry for her book Native Guard. Good stuff. Her latest book is Beyond Katrina: A Mediation on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, a book of poetry and prose.

The part of the interview that I heard included the poet speaking about her grandmother's faith and her funeral.

GROSS: You describe yourself as not a religious person. But do you ever wish that you could have religion like your grandmother did and therefore, find some kind of holy meaning in the most horrible things that have happened?

Prof. TRETHEWEY: I think, you know, she had such a faith and I understood it as a great comfort to her. And there are times that I think that I wish I had such a comfort.I remember when she was being remembered at her service, the preacher looking directly at me and saying, grieve not as others grieve. He was sermonizing about how the faithful don't have the same kind of grief, because they know that there is something else. And so I felt indicted as he looked at me and said "grieve not as others grieve," as if he was pointing to me and saying, I know that you are not the faithful and because of that you have a different kind of grief, the wrong kind.

GROSS: And were you changed by that at all? 

Prof. TRETHEWEY: Oh, I was angry.

GROSS: Angry at him for making you feel that way when you were grieving.

Prof. TRETHEWEY: Yes. I...

GROSS: As if there were a wrong kind of grief.

Prof. TRETHEWEY: I think I wanted remembrance of her and I wanted comfort. I mean, I think funeral services are for the living in some ways. They are to remember the dead, but in the face of the living, beloved. And so I didn't feel comforted. 

I was so sad listening to this. I wasn't there, but it seems to me from her telling that it is possible this minister was offering to her comfort and hope when he said "grieve not as others grieve." However, she certainly didn't take it as such. She took it as judgment, an indictment.

It seems that for some any word from a religious leader is a word of judgment. And it is true that up to and including now, most of the words of religion have been judgmental.

These are the questions I am pondering:

Why are religious voices always heard as judgmental (and I am specifically using "religious" and not "spiritual" here) even when they may not be? Is it only because of our horrible history? Or, is there something going on inside a person that makes them feel indicted by God?

How can we change our religious language so that those around us understand and experience that "God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world..." (John 3:17 NLT)?


I would love to hear your thoughts!

Last night, I attended the interfaith prayer circle for the National Day of Prayer in Lake Worth. It was a meaningful time for me. It is a powerful experience to gather with those of different beliefs who are willing to come together and make space for, and even engage in one another's practices.

Yes, sometimes another's ritual or practice is so different from one's own that it is a bit awkward, somewhat uncomfortable. But I see that as an opportunity for growth, expanding my understanding of God beyond what I am comfortable with.

Here is the prayer I shared, as best as I can remember it:

Our source of life, of love
We thank you for your presence with us
We thank for you for your constant, abiding presence with us always
And we thank you for this opportunity to see your light through the prism of your children gathered here
Allowing us to experience you in all of your colors and words and images and genders and sounds and silences.
Grant us your Spirit of imagination, allowing us each to see what would be possible if each of us gathered here lived fully our understanding of you, the shift that could happen in our culture, in our world
We pray especially today on this National Day of Prayer for our leaders
We start right here where we are by lifting up Renee, Cara, Suzanne, and Scott to you,
Encourage and enliven them, lift them up
Give them the courage to lead and to speak
Give them the humility to listen and make space for one another and for the voices of those they govern
Amen

Let me take a moment to explain my awe with Coach Jose. Coach Jose is my son's T-Ball coach. T-Ball, remember that? 5 year-olds and 6 year-olds (with a couple of 4's thrown in just to keep it interesting) on a ball field spinning around, kicking dirt in the infield, pulling up grass in the outfield, poking each other, and watching baseballs rolling by them.

If it's a boy or girl's first year, they know nothing about the game, especially if they have a non-baseball dad like me. They have few skills and a six-minute...tops...attention span.

Coach Jose has a background coaching baseball, real baseball, I think, high school kids. He is very knowledgeable. He told us he had never coached little kids before. Over the past several weeks, I have watched Coach Jose do drills, run bases, and explain the game to these kids. He is ever so patient. He goes over and over the fundamentals. Most of them don't remember. They will drill for an hour: catch the  ball..step...point...throw it to first base. The next practice, they have to start all over again except for maybe one or two that have a vague memory of doing something like that last week. Coach Jose doesn't get upset, he simply starts over again...catch...step...point...throw. I honestly don't know how he does it. It seems like somewhere deep inside he is 100% confident that each of those kids is going to get it, going to be a star, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

I get so agitated when people don't get it...when I don't get it. I have been on this spiritual path for so long and yet I feel like i never even get the basics down. I screw up, I don't pay attention. Then I look around at those I lead and, I hate to say, I get even more frustrated. "C'mon! We have gone over this time and again and it still hasn't sunk in even a bit!"

For myself and my fellow sojourners, I am going to follow my new idol, Coach Jose. "Alright Yankees, let's do it again: catch...step...point..throw"

"If in preaching the gospel you substitute your knowledge of the way of salvation for confidence in the power of the gospel, you hinder people from getting to reality."                     -Oswald Chambers



And yet, this is what happens over and over again. We make the gospel our pet, our servant. The history of the church is a history of taming the gospel. We fear it's power. 

I want people to get on board with my cause, sign up for my class, propagate my philosophy, but come in contact with the raw power of the gospel? Without me controlling it and mediating it? Are you kidding?

Forgive me God. May your fire of love purify my ministry, burning off anything that stands between me and the power of the gospel for those that I lead.

I have started utilizing Phyllis Tickle's Divine Hours as a resource for my spiritual journey. Of course, a consistent element of most daily prayers is the prayer Jesus taught.

As I was praying it this morning, I was reminded yet again that the prayer is prayed in first person plural. I know that. (You know that. We all know that and have heard at least a half-dozen sermons on the topic.) This morning, however, it dropped a bit from my head to my heart. When I pray that prayer, I am asking that God gives  all of us our daily bread, that God leads each one of us away from temptation, that God forgives my debts and your debts. If the prayer doesn't change the way I live than it is just a collection of meaningless, superstitious words.

I want to live the prayer.

That night the Lord said to him [Gideon], ‘Take your father’s bull, the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that belongs to your father, and cut down the sacred pole that is beside it; and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the stronghold here, in proper order; then take the second bull, and offer it as a burnt-offering with the wood of the sacred pole that you shall cut down.’

Judges 6:25-26


I've read and heard and been taught this story numerous times, but this little incident has always escaped me. God told Gideon to go tear down the altar to Baal, the altar his father had built. In order to have our own authentic relationship with God, it may be necessary to tear down some of the altars we have been left.

Very often, those who have gone before us have left us altars to small, tribal gods like Baal. And even those of us who have received the awesome gift of an altar to a mighty, awesome God need to rebuild that altar for ourselves, based on our own experience with God.

And when we tear down old altars, others take notice. When it got back to Gideon's dad that Gideon had torn down the altar, his response was "If he is a god, let him contend for himself, because his altar has been pulled down." I love it!

It's time to pull down altars. It is time to engage God for ourselves.

"The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners--of whom I am the foremost. But for that very reason I received mercy, so that in me, as the foremost, Jesus might display the utmost patience, making me an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life." Paul to Timothy in 1 Timothy 1:15-16

I am enjoying spending time in Timothy. I haven't read it in a while. It's good advice from a seasoned minister to a newbie. This passage from the first chapter just confirms what God has been communicating to me in so many different ways over the past few weeks. Paul got the whole Christ thing because he had experienced it and, as a result, his goal was to be an example to others of what Jesus Christ can do in a life--an example of Jesus' patience and love.

The Christ-following life is simple but not easy. It's practice is difficult, mainly because we make it difficult. Well, what's this we stuff, I guess. I make it difficult for myself.

Thank you, God, for your patience!

Sally Welsh is the director of the municipal pool here in Lake Worth. I heard her speak Monday evening at the Eden Place Neighborhood Association meeting and I came away inspired.

"What is so exciting about a swimming pool?" you may ask. Everything about pools and swimming lessons and water exercise is exciting to Sally Welsh. She is positive and passionate about her job. I can't imagine there was a single person in that room who didn't at least contemplate checking out what the Lake Worth pool has to offer. I'm going to take Emerson there for swimming lessons, even though it will be less convenient for us than other places would be.

Being energetic, passionate, and positive can be transforming for those who surround us. As people of faith, specifically as people who have experienced the good news of Jesus Christ, we should be the most positive, passionate people of all.

When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. Matthew 14:32


I preached Sunday on Peter getting out of the boat and characteristics of water-walkers. I was thinking today that the biggest effect from Peter's water-walk came when he got back into the boat. The result was that he brought Jesus back in with him, Peter's life would be changed forever because of his experience, and the eleven others in the boat most likely had their faith strengthened. Peter getting back into the boat was just as important as him getting out of the boat. I had never thought about that before!

Rev. Kent Siladi, the Conference Minister of the Florida Conference of the United Church of Christ, preached at our church this past Sunday. It was an excellent message, which is available to listen to here. The central idea, for me, anyway is this. He commented that to be a Christian means that we have a life transformation. The purpose of the church is to invite people into transformation. The important question for us is "Are we being changed?"

I couldn't agree more. The question is foundational. It is primary. Because nothing else can happen unless personal transformation is taking place. As personal transformation takes place, then societal transformation can take place. Then the Kingdom of God starts to emerge, right here, right now.

So, I have access to my website again. My computer and external hard drive were destroyed in our recent move so I had to recreate from scratch. My website files, along with five years of sermons, and papers, and research are gone. I was, to say the least, disheartened.

And it made me think. Yes, about the importance of offsite backup, but also about who I am. I discovered something about myself. No matter what I say (or preach) to the contrary, I really do define myself by what I accomplish, what I produce. But that isn't who I am. I am a child of God, unconditionally loved by God, and a friend of Christ. That is who I am. Anything of worth that I happen to produce comes out of that understanding of myself, not the other way around.

...and, I have article insurance so a new MacBook is on its way!

Lately, it seems I am being asked more often about what I believe or what our church believes. Or maybe I am just noticing the question more. It is a difficult question for me, not because I do not hold strong theological beliefs, beliefs that I really enjoy discussing. It just seems the question is more often than not dogmatic in nature and I have no interest in debates of dogma. I know, I know dogma is important. It's just not my thing. I strive to live my theology. I relish discussing and even debating my ideas about God, but never in an "I'm right and you are wrong" sort of way. It probably is a result of my coming of age as a Southern Baptist during the great purge of the 1980's and 1990's.

That being said, I am realizing the importance of being able to speak to what one believes. It is what drives one and keeps one focused. The core of my theological beliefs is simply that the Gospel of Jesus Christ has the potential to transform lives and those thus transformed have the opportunity and the responsibility of participating in the Kingdom of God. My "elevator explanation" of that is that we are to love God, love one another, and serve the world.

For me this is the foundation. Everything else is detail. Everything else is subject to change. When I am 82, I will sit on my porch and figure out everything else and write a book. Until then, I work with what others are thinking that to assist in fleshing out my doctrine. Here are a couple of links to organizations whose work is helpful to me:

What Matters (I mentioned these last week. They come from my denomination, the United Church of Christ.)
The Phoenix Affirmations (I love these affirmations. They are unapolegetically Christ-centered yet theologically and socially progressive.)
The Center for Progressive Christianity (Skews a little more academic and cerebral than The Phoenix Affirmations, but very helpful)

Update: In looking at their websites, I learned that Crosswalk America (which produced the Phoenix Affirmations) and The Center for Progressive Christianity have merged. I love their stuff. It just needs to drop a foot from the head to the heart.

Last Wednesday as I was working on Sunday's sermon on the story of Jacob wrestling with God and how it relates to the power of change in our lives, a realization came into sharp focus for me. There are three of me.

There is Jason Fairbanks, the industrious, creative pastor and preacher and father. I like that Jason. And I like the responses, quite often of admiration, that Jason receives from people. But there is a second Jason. The Jason that is prideful and fearful and lustful and undisciplined. That Jason I don't like so much. I keep that Jason hidden because I'm pretty sure folks wouldn't like him quite as much. I'd like to change that Jason, and sometimes I try. But it's really, really hard.

Now, what I have described about myself is true of everyone to some extent or another, it's widely accepted psychological theory. But I've noticed that we good church folks have raised this to an art form. We have become masters at portraying what people want to see and hiding what we are struggling with. The problem with that is we never getting around to being changed. We keep the second self hidden instead of exposing it to the healing, transformative power of Christ and the support of community.

But that is just two me's, and I promised a third. After Jacob struggled with the angel of God, the angel asked Jacob his name. Jacob responded with a confession, his name which means usurper or grasper. The angel gave Jacob a new name, Israel. The third me is the me that God sees. The me that has been made new in Christ, the me fully accepted and infinitely loved by God.

I am practiced at being the Jason that everyone likes. And the second Jason is always there causing me guilt and shame. I want to spend some more time getting to know the third Jason, the one that God is so in love with. I think I'm going to like him.

In my ministerial ethics class we were asked to respond to the idea of a minister or pastor claiming to "know the mind of God." It was a great discussion. We were all agreed that we could never completely know the mind of God. A few questioned whether or not we could know anything about the mind of God.

To use blatantly anthropomorphic language, I believe that God speaks to us and reveals his heart and mind to us. The discussion made me pause to remind myself why God reveals God's self to us. It is so easy to get in the habit of running to the pulpit or the computer to preach or blog about "God's latest revelation" to me. But maybe God's word is for me. Maybe God wants me to use the insight that I graciously received before I spout off about it, or (gasp!) instead of me spouting off about it.

My scripture reading this morning included two passages, interestingly juxtaposed: Luke 21 and the story of the widow's gift, and Isaiah 6, the story of Isaiah's "Here am I, send me" moment. I was struck anew by the widow's gift and Jesus' response. It is easy to give out of our abundance. It is easy for me to do something if I have the time. It is easy for me to give if I have a couple of extra bucks in my pocket and I'm not jonesing for a candy bar. It is easy for me to respond to God's call if I feel that I have enough ability.

But she gave out of her poverty. She reached in, pulled out all that she had to give, and gave it. And she gave the better gift. Better for whom I wonder? Did it actually benefit her life or did it just make her "more religious"? I guess one doesn't know until one tries it, steps out and finds there actually is something there.

Why do the greatest adventures, the most meaningful experiences, always require faith?

In our Bible study at church we have been exploring the book of Romans. We have spent the past couple of weeks in chapter 8 and the question arose "What, exactly is this life in the spirit?" A great question. And I can give all manner of spiritual sounding answers for it. But how do we achieve it? And does it make any difference. The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard, a true masterpiece which will become to be considered a spiritual classic, I am sure. He speaks of five dimensions or phases in the process:

1. Confidence and reliance upon Jesus
Before we can start the process we have to be confident that following Jesus will get us there.

“...and everyone who looks up to him, trusting and expectant, will gain a real life, eternal life.”
John 3:15 (the Message)

This confidence leads to:

2. A desire to be Jesus’ apprentice
Willard: “Only a sustained historical process involving many confusions and false motivations could lead to our current situation, in which faith in Jesus is thought to have no natural connection with discipleship to him. Our apprenticeship to him means that we live within his word, that is, put his teachings into practice (John 8:31). And this progressively integrates our entire existence into the glorious world of eternal living. We become ‘free indeed’ (John 8:36).”

3. Obedience
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments...They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.” John 14:15,21
We have to put into practice what God reveals to us.

Willard: “Love of Jesus sustains us through the course of discipline and training that makes obedience possible. Without that love, we will not stay to learn.

Obedience , with the life of discipline it requires, both leads to and, then, issues from the:

4. Pervasive inner transformation of the heart and soul
WE BEGIN TO CHANGE.

Galatians 5:22: By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

These “fruits of the spirit” are examples of what starts to naturally happen to us. We don’t try to be patient. We don’t force ourselves to be peaceful. That is just what we are.

This, in turn, leads to an area we rarely, bordering on never, talk about:

5. Power to work the works of the kingdom

Jesus said to his disciples in John 14:12: “Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these...”

Do we believe this?

Willard: “Perhaps we feel baffled and incompetent before this statement. But let us keep in mind that the world we live in desperately needs such works to be done. They would not be just for show or to impress ourselves or others. But frankly, even a moderate size ‘work’ is more than most people’s life could sustain. One good public answer to our prayer might be enough to lock some of us into weeks of spiritual superiority. Great power requires great character if it is to be a blessing and not a curse, and that character is something we only grow toward.

Yet it is God’s intent that in his kingdom we should have as much power as we can bear for good. Indeed, his ultimate objective int he development of human character is to empower us to do what we want. And when we are fully developed in the likeness of Jesus, fully have ‘the mind of Christ,’ that is what will happen--to his great joy and relief, no doubt.”

When two of you get together on anything at all on earth and make a prayer of it, my Father in heaven goes into action. And when two or three of you are together because of me, you can be sure that I’ll be there.”
Matthew 18:19-20 (The Message)

In my devotional reading I read Matthew 18:15-35. The pieces of the passage were familiar to me, but maybe I haven't read them together before. Or maybe God opened my eyes and my heart. The section is all about relationships. It begins with how to handle a situation in which we perceive someone has hurt us. It ends with forgiveness (70x7 times, Peter!) and the well-known story of the two debtors.

Tucked between those two ideas is v. 19-20. It's like Jesus is saying, "Here is why this is so important: God responds when you are together, when you are in agreement." That is so incredibly powerful. And if I were completely honest, I have a hard time believing it. But what I am going to do is practice what I preach and try it. It's huge. In my Greek class yesterday, we were talking about how the Christian faith and practice was very much thought of as communal. We are in this together. Many, many, many (I can't say most because I don't know for sure) of the "you"s in the New Testament are actually "yous"- they are plural. Maybe the key to actualizing, hmmm...spiritual effectiveness, power...for lack of better terms right now...is to join together before God in prayer.

"put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch." Luke 5:4

"The purpose of a ship isn't to stay docked in the harbor. Our human souls weren't made for shallow water. We must dive into deeper waters with the help of the Holy Spirit. In these deep places the wonderful treasures of the spiritual life are found." Joshua Choonmin Kang, Deep-Rooted in Christ

Staying in the shallows is safe. It is comfortable. I know what is in the shallow water. I have been splashing around there my entire life. But Jesus always beckons the disciple to go deeper. That is where the "good catch" is. There, in the deep, is the stuff of transformation in love. Can we, will we, trust the one that beckons us to "put out into the deep water," confident that he has our best interest at heart? I, for one, am beginning to be able to imagine taking the risk.

True ministry begins not with giving but with receiving. We need to be filled up before we have anything to give to others. John told us that "God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him" (Colossians 1:19 NIV). (p. 25)

Jesus enjoyed his solitude, but he was also at home in a crowd. He was balanced. The time that he spent alone prepared him for the times he spent with people. In the same way, his time in the crowds prepared him for the refreshment of solitude. (p.26)

- Joshua Choonmin Kang
Deep-Rooted in Christ: The Way of Transformation
IVP, 2007

I started reading this book because I have definitely been lacking on the "filling up" side of things lately. It came highly recommended from the folks over at Renovare. It is so easy to get caught up in the "doing." It's exciting. You can see the results. But you dry up so fast.

It's so hard for me still to get to the place to be able to say that, for me, a pastor, the filling up is just as important, more important than the doing. And it's exponentially harder for people not "in the biz" to get that. I need to live it and model it.

So I am setting aside the church growth and effectiveness books for a bit and focus on sitting with Jesus. Then I'll go back into the crowds--that's my job and I really do love it. But who I am is a child of God and friend of Jesus, and that I must nurture.

I have been reading and re-reading Dallas Willard's Book The Divine Conspiracy. It is truly a masterpiece of spiritual formation and growth. Well, actually a masterpiece about life since he, more than any other Christian writer I have encountered, describes what holistic life in Christ is all about. Sometime I'll write more about my experience with the book.

He quotes an author, Clyde Reid, whom I hadn't heard of. He was the Secretary of Evangelism for the Board of Homeland Ministries of the United Church of Christ (we love the titles in our tribe) when he wrote the book The God Evaders in 1966. So here is Dallas Willard, a Southern Baptist and philosophy professor at The University of Southern California, quoting a UCC denominational minister. This has got to be good stuff.

Willard quotes Reid's "Law of Religious Evasion," which states that, "as a kind of principle or law of human nature: We structure our churches and maintain them so as to shield us from God and protect us from genuine religious experience." [Willard, 201 quoting Reid, 41]. Willard goes on to share this from Reid's "telling observations of church life:

The adult members of churches today rarely raise serious religious questions for fear of revealing their doubts or being thought of as strange. There is an implicit conspiracy of silence on religious matters in the churches. This conspiracy covers up the fact that the churches do not change lives or influence conduct to any appreciable degree [Willard, 202, quoting Reid, 19].

I have a copy of God Evaders on the way to me. And I am wondering why no one was listening to Reid--especially folks from his/our own denomination--when he wrote this back in 1966. It's good stuff, and it gives me hope. We can turn this thing around!

I'd love to hear responses to these ideas. Do you agree? Disagree? Do Reid's words describe your experience? How can we change it?

Post here, email me, or discuss in the forum (if it's your first visit, you'll need to register). For a lengthy, insightful discussion of the book, head to this blog.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

As I was working on my sermon for this Sunday, I ran across a word that intrigued me. Ephesians 2:8 reads, "For by grace are you saved, through faith ..." Faith is a word we hear all of the time; it is central to who we are and what we do. And I talk to a lot of people who wonder if they have "enough" of it. So I decided to do a little research on it. It turns out the Greek (the original language in which most of the New Testament is written) word for faith means something a shade different that what we mean by faith. It isn't a mind game, screwing up our face and mind and heart and trying to the best of our ability to believe something. It has more to do with trust, allowing oneself to rest in something. What a wonderful picture that is of who we are as people of faith--not people who are trying hard to believe "10 impossible things before breakfast," as someone described Christianity, but people who are simply experiencing, resting in, and trusting the goodness of God.

In my scripture reading lately, I have been sloshing through the instructions given to the people of Israel for the construction of the tabernacle in Exodus. It seemed like every verse of that part added a few ounces to my eyelids. It is not exciting reading. As I kept going, a little bit of anger started to build. "What is this bull#%^$?" I started thinking. Where did it come from? I have a hard time believing that God cared about all this pomp and pageantry. It's just religion run amok. Church always runs the risk of falling into this nonsense, it is in all sides. We make crazy rules about decorum, political correctness, dogmatic correctness, etc., obscuring the simple call on our lives to come to Jesus.

When I cooled down a bit, a spark entered my imagination. What if the tabernacle was re-imagined as an interior structure, ala the interior castle of St. Teresa of Avila. I come to God so often on my own terms, when I want, lackadaisically. How much good does this do me? Not that God cares, I am sure. But would it help me more to really start to tend that relationship--to put practices in place which provide some structure to my relationship with the Divine? An interior tabernacle, not built for the sake of legalism, but built to nurture and strengthen my relationship with God.

In my scripture reading last night, I came across Ephesians 2. It really is the key to this whole thing. I need to read it every day--a reminder of who I am and why I am here.

"Ephesians 2 is such a powerful passage. Ephesians 2:8-9 was drummed into me growing up, but, like so much of the theology that I was exposed to, it only tells part of the story--a very small part. We have to back up and look at the big picture. In 4-7, Paul imagines us "alive together with Christ...and raised...up with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace toward us in Christ Jesus" Wow! Good stuff! And why? Why did God do this for us? V.10 "For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life." Shazam! Bang! Here it is! So incredibly simple. Seven verses that explain the whole thing. Jason is a glorious child of God, seated with Christ, created to do good works. Let's get on with it boy!"

We had a great meetup last night. 5 people were there--all of on similar, if not the same, wavelengths. For me it was definitely a nourishing conversation. The group decided that we would tackle Brian McLaren's A New Kind of Christian for the next couple of meetings.

I was preparing for confirmation class tonight when I came across this passage from Philippians:

Celebrate God all day, every day. I mean, revel in him! Make it as clear as you can to all you meet that you’re on their side, working with them and not against them. Help them see that the Master is about to arrive. He could show up any minute!

Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.

Philippians 4:4-7

Fantastic stuff, good for the soul, challenging for life. It makes it sound so simple. I want to be the one who makes it clear to all that I meet that I am on their side!

I was talking to my friend and colleague Carol about some plans and dreams for the church. Her wise and valuable counsel to me was to make sure that I don't get drained by taking on too much. The challenge, however, is that there is more to be done right now than is "reasonable." So pulling back is not an option.

What I need is to increase what I have to draw upon. I need to be connected to my Source so there is a constant flow. It is impossible to think that I can accomplish what I feel called to accomplish unless I am drawing on God.

I can't speak for everyone, but I thought that our first "Meetup" was a fantastic experience. I had the opportunity to connect with two fantastic people, both searching for answers in their spiritual lives. In this new world of spiritual interest, there is an incredible opportunity to connect and learn from one another. In an age of spiritual awakening, we can share with one another the tools that we have to pursue the Divine. Now, my hope, of course, is that can happen in and through the Christian church. If it is, we must be nimble, willing to change and then change again. We must hold on to what we understand to be the fundamentals (and I believe our grip even on those must be loose). And everything else must be released if necessary.

In fact, I am willing to go out on the limb and say that, as we Christians would explain it, the only thing that matters, the only thing we insist upon, is a relationship with Jesus. That is our point of commonality. We don't judge those who don't share that. We can still dialogue and work with them and learn from them. But, our touchpoint for deep community comes through that relationship and the language surrounding it.

In the traditional church calendar, the four weeks prior to Christmas are not the "Christmas season," they are Advent. While the world celebrates the season, many churches utilize music that hangs out in a minor key. While Christmas carols play everywhere else, the church sings song of expectation and waiting. We tell stories about John the Baptist and the Apocalypse. There is a massive disconnect between the "sacred" and the "secular" if you are in a church that follows the church calendar.

This year, I decided to get rid of the disconnect and gear my sermons and our worship toward Christmas to, hopefully capture some folks in need of some Christmas spirit. So, we started singing Christmas carols at the beginning of December and there wasn't anything anyone could do about it!

The crowds didn't show up, however. I was a little disappointed that we didn't have more visitors. It seems that waiting won't be denied. Whether we like it or not, we will have to wait. Wait to grow, wait to get better at preaching, wait for transformation to happen.

This afternoon, I read an article by Richard Foster over at Renovare. It was a great reminder of the importance and benefit of waiting.

Waiting, however, is not a passive activity, however. That is where I find the "waiting" of Advent as typically practiced as boring and frustrating. We wait and wait and wait and nothing...ever...happens.

We wait because we must, but that waiting is active. It is the runner at the starting line, itching to move at the sound of the gun. It is the race car mired in the pack looking for an opening to move into. Waiting is an active activity. When we must wait we are driven deeper into the Divine.

In my scripture reading this morning, one of the instances of Jesus' feeding of the multitude popped up. It is a good reminder that God's plan is for there to be enough. It is a major theme of scripture. So often, in our personal life and in our church life, we get used to there not being enough. We accept that state as normal. But it shouldn't be. This story, which shows up in all four gospels, and many, many other stories in scripture--a preponderance of evidence, I guess we could say--point to the fact that when the Divine becomes involved, there is enough and more than enough.