Stuff Christians Should Stop Saying - Part 1

I would like to propose a plea be made to eliminate certain words and phrases from our Christian circles. There are various words and phrases, which do to my ears and brain what forks do to microwaves. You know the feeling!

So here begins an ongoing list I intend to keep of words and phrases I'd like to see eliminated from our terminology...please!

"PROBE"
Whether it be the scriptures or the deep recesses of the human heart, we like to probe the depths of it all. Can we please stop probing the scriptures, and can we especially quit probing people. We are not sci-fi aliens from the 70's. We are not qualified medical doctors with the proper equipment to probe anyone. Do not probe this request any further. Let's just not...

"PUTTING SKIN ON JESUS"
Jesus ascended into heaven and left the Holy Spirit for a reason. Jesus is not looking to be grafted into materializing, and if he were, from where would be taking this excess skin to be put onto Jesus? I know what we're all thinking: probably from whichever donor most represents that painting of Jesus we most identify with? That white, flowing brown-haired, blue eyed Jesus? Probably?

Putting skin on Jesus is not only a failure to "hope for what is unseen" but it is a little creepy.

"BIRTHING"
Can we stop birthing new small groups, ideas, visions, and leaders? Any parent who remembers the after-birth realize why we need to stop birthing things. Enough said!

"TOUCH"
In the age of heightened social-awareness, we need no longer touch people and sing of how he touched me. We should really stop trying to create events to touch people. That's all I think I need to say here, but I'm willing to probe it further if need be.

What words and phrases would you like to see removed from our Christian vocabulary?

------------

LISTENING TO: "Time Without Consequence" by Alexi Murdoch
READING: "Own Your Faith" by Mark Tabb

DISTORTION - God Who Abandons

I have been teaching a 6 week series through various distorted images we have of God, while announcing the various topics on facebook and twitter. After announcing the last session's topic (The God Who Abandons), there were several people who wanted to know if they could read it. So...here it is! Keep in mind it is written as a manuscript for speaking...

------------

DISTORTED IMAGE OF GOD - The God Who Abandons

We are continuing in our “Distortion” series tonight, and the basic understanding behind this series is that we have within each of a gallery of sorts. This gallery within our soul has images, which form a foundation for our relationships, including our relationship with God. They form a foundation for what we end up expecting from those relationships. Images are not abstract ideas. These are pictures…they are powerful combinations of thoughts and feelings, and they profoundly impact our spiritual well being, because we allow a lot of these images to impact our relationship with God and how he is perceived. The problem is that a lot of these images are distorted images we have been given by or relationships with family, friends, Christian leaders, and various other relationships we have. Those distortions, when projected onto God, create a spiritual distress within us. We try as hard as we can to throw scripture at these images in hope that they will stick, but these images are deeper than that. They have formed impressions on our heart, and these images push past verses and words used as quick fixes. You have to REPLACE the distorted image.

READ MOTHER TERESA ARTICLE QUOTES

Can you guess who this is? These are the words of Mother Teresa. A lot of us have felt close to God at one point and then felt completely abandoned the next. For most of us, this is a simple challenge of faith and a point of growth, but there are others of us who have this difficulty because of a distorted image within our soul’s gallery.

Separation, Divorce (parents, or yours), Death, Endless hours your caretakers spent away are all experiences of being abandoned. Essentially, when someone you depended on, anyone you depended on, leaves, we are abandoned. And because what or who we had depended on has been removed, we have lost a sense of security or stability. There is nothing or no one there to rest on, stand on, depend on. This is the image of abandonment.

There is a sense of guilt that comes with this abandonment. When we are abandoned by someone we depended on, we will often conclude it was our fault. We start a lot of our phrases with, “If I had only…” There is this sense of responsibility we have, most of the time, put on ourselves. This generally creates two reactions to this abandonment in our lives. We might become really fearful and worry that other people are going to do the same thing; so we refuse to depend on anyone else. We refuse to trust other people. OR We do everything we can to impress that person who abandoned us. We think maybe, just maybe, if I’m good enough I can keep them around or make them come back.

Like all the other distorted images we have mentioned, we then project that image onto God. All the sudden I can’t trust God or depend on God, because if I trust God he’ll leave me, he’ll abandon me like everyone else. OR I do whatever I can to impress him so he won’t leave me. All the sudden, God becomes a God who abandons, but that is an incredibly distorted image of God.

So we have to see what scripture says about the true Biblical God to the contrast of this distorted image.

TURN TO LUKE 15

You will find that this text could more adequately be titled, “Seeking the Lost”, but we will need to determine what is really lost here. My grandfather was once lost in a bad part of Chicago, and a cop pulled him over. When the cop came to the window, my grandfather explained, “I’m sorry officer. I’m really lost.” The officer responded, “You’re not lost; I know right where you are.”

READ LUKE 15

Now notice that each of these stories has a character, which represents the Biblical God. Each story also has a character or an item representing us as humans. Take notice which character is constantly leaving or abandoning the other.

We expect God to leave these people. We expect God to reject the bad people and accept the good people. We expect it to tell us that the shepherd left the 99, loaded his shot gun, and he found that one dumb sheep, and they had gyros that night to celebrate the fact that the one stupid sheep was gone. We expect the lady to realize she had plenty of cash, and that she didn’t really care about that one coin. We expect the father to say, “What son? You mean the sun that flipped me off, wished he wasn’t my son, and left? I only have one son, the good one, out back working for me.”

We expect these reactions of God because we perceive this world as a good vs bad world. We simply see people as good or bad. We perceive this world on a good/bad matrix, and we are surprised that God does not see things as we do. God sees things on this lost/found or dead/alive matrix. There are none who are so worthless…there are no efforts He won’t use to find you when you are lost. He knows right where you are. He feels the same way you do when you lose something incredibly valuable to you.

Do you see in these stories that God wants a relationship with us? He is aware when this relationship is threatened by our own distorted images of him and his love. God never leaves or abandons us; people leave and abandon us. Not only will God never leaves us, but when WE leave, he will come looking for us until he finds us. God perceives this world and his people as lost or found, dead or alive, and the lost are considered precious.

But the reality is that divorce does happen. Separation does happen. Death does happen. Jobs are lost. Relationships end, and you have a real and present enemy who will do everything to convince and discourage you and make you believe you have been abandoned by God

TURN TO DEUTERONOMY 4

READ DEUTERONOMY 4:29-31

The purpose for us here is to realize that God takes initiative in seeking a relationship with us. God has not and will not abandon you, but again, this understanding will require us to replace the distorted image within our soul’s gallery and that will come with a certain level of healing.

These distorted images of God often represent wounds on our heart, which need time and attention in order to heal. There are no quick fixes here, and we cannot expect quick fixes. This is going to involve a recovery of sorts. The word “recovery” implies that something has gone wrong, and if you have this distorted image of God; if you have a difficult time believing and trusting a God you believe will only abandon you, something HAS gone very wrong. No pathway of recovery from these images is easy or quick. We will have to face some painful truths in order to heal and replace these images, but it IS possible.

Beginning the process will require you to be upfront with God and tell him if you are confused or feeling rejected. Explain to him the difficulties you have in feeling his presence with you or even talking to him at all. Understand this, God is personally invested in replacing those distorted images.

If you have been in the church for long enough, you have likely had Bible verses and Christian clichés thrown at you. It is typical for us to throw verses and clichés at your pain as quick fixes or simple solutions. When you aren’t engaging your heart and soul with these scriptures, they end up becoming barriers rather than resources. Scripture IS a practical and helpful resource when YOU approach it as such. And scripture reminds us of this: God has never left you, people have left you, and

Hosea 11:9 says, “For I am God, and not man.”
Hebrews 13:5 says, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

We are not going to heal these images by placing blame on different people either. It will only come by sorting out who God is and who God is not, but allowing scripture to impact those images in our gallery. You cannot do this alone either. Because our distorted images were formed in relationships, it will be in the context of relationships that distortions will heal.

CLOSURE
So you may be honestly asking, “God, are you really faithful?” You may be trying to really believe that God is unchanging and constant, but our world isn’t. Our world can be flipped upside down in a moment. Understand this, when we read that God is faithful, we have to understand that God’s faithfulness is relational. He tells us never will he leave us, never will he abandon us. We can trust that our relationally distorted image is replaced by a relationally faithful God. We are only going to reconnect with God through a change of mind set; a replacement of the distorted image.

So can you picture a God that notices you have been forgotten and abandoned by others? Can you picture a God who is out looking for you? Can you picture him finding you with a face full of joy?

What difference would it make to you in your current struggles, your current loneliness, your current pain to remember that God will never leave you? What difference would it make if you TRULY believed that?

-------------

LISTENING TO: "Into The Blue Again" by Album Leaf
READING: "Own Your Faith" by Tabb

Music Post (feedback much appreciated)

I have two ongoing lists on my phone. Their contents ebb and flow. Some days I take items away and others I add many items. They are my music lists. Here are my two lists as they stand today. Give me your feedback as you wish.

MUSIC I WANT TO TRY:
Unwed Sailor
David Bazan (new album)
Dagha
Timmy Curran
The Drawing Room
Zach Williams
Josh Garrels
Paper Route (new album)
The Hello Sequence
Swell Season (new album)
Eric Peters
Sleeping At Last
Lesser Birds of Paradise
Shad
Pete Yorn & Scarlett Johansson
Telekinesis
Mayer Hawthorne
Thad Cockrell
Flight of the Conchords (new album)
Arctic Monkeys (I keep giving them a shot but they haven't impressed)
Parachute
Whitley
Mission to the Sea

MUSIC I INTEND TO BUY:
David Crowder Band (Church Music)
Heath McNease
David Bazan

Any artists I should add to the TRY list? Artists I should move to the BUY list? Any artists I may as well remove?

-------------

LISTENING TO: "Simple Times" by Joshua Radin
READING: "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald

PREACH!

Search for God and Guinness by Stephen Mansfield

Reading this review reveals you already have some interest in the topic of this book. To ask that you not write this book off too soon would be misguided at best. You are likely as interested as I was when I first saw the title. “God and Guinness? Two of my favorite things? Sign me up!”

Stephen Mansfield begins the book with a dazzling overview through the history of beer, and it does great justice to highlighting what lead to the stringent prohibition that extends into the mindset of so many Christians even today. The mindset came after years of beer seen not only as acceptable but beneficial.

With the first chapter precursor out the way, Mansfield dives into the history of the Guinness brand we all recognize beginning with Arthur Guinness 250 years ago. Revealed in these pages is a family line of brilliant brewers who continually changed the way things were always done. Through countless challenges, the brand would endure with more than, but still including a drive for excellence, innovation, expansion, and mastery.

More important than all these is the silver thread weaving its way throughout. Deep in the heart of its original founder, Arthur, is a heart for their God which would kindle each generation to follow. Mansfield reveals lines of Guinnesses you likely have never seen who were renowned men of faith.

This foundational faith of the Guinness family line necessarily created stories of benevolence, compassion, and social justice, which would be groundbreaking even today. You will find stories of revitalization of whole cities and countries brought about by the Guinness brand and family because they could not avoid the call of their God on their lives.

Mansfield is an able historian, and if you are like me the history will weigh on your attention from time to time. If you have a love for beer or God, you may have to challenge yourself to endure through your own judgments. But if you have a love for both God and beer, this book will leave you craving a world changing conversation with friends over a pint of the saintly stout.

Something new

I am trying a new blog editor for iPhone but I have yet to find one I like. So we will just have to see whether or not this will be one I keep. Do you have any you would recommend...particularly if you also use blogger? I finished reading "Search for God and Guinness" yesterday and I'm working on a review. I'll keep you posted. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Stavesacre Soothes

If one album were a salve for the hurting heart, I submit it might be "Speakeasy" by Stavesacre.

In preparing for FUSION this week, I have been spending the week in Psalm 13. At one moment, I was stricken with the comparison of one song by Stavesacre and its connection to Psalm 13. Take a look at the connection.

PSALM 13
How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and every day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me?

Look on me and answer, O LORD my God.
Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
my enemy will say, "I have overcome him,"
and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

But I trust in your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in your salvation.

I will sing to the LORD,
for he has been good to me.

FREEFALL (Hand to Hand) by Stavesacre

Sleepless eyes open wide. Before Heaven I stand again
If there's no winning this war tonight, I was wondering

If you could steady my spinning head.

And trusting gets harder now
I wish you were here beside me
My failures, my fears and doubts have been haunting me
I'm just not who I thought I'd be

Freefall weightless and terrified
On I go crossing over from living to so alive
And purified I know weeping is cast for the night

And joy...

Thought I was a good man and fell short of my standards
Now what am I left with. All of nothing
And my first taste of freedom

Freefall weightless and terrified
On I go crossing over from living to so alive
And purified. I know weeping is cast for the night
And joy...

If I fall down
If I fail you
When I fall down
When I fail you
I hope to find you there
I hope to find you there
I know I'll find you there
I've always found you there

Freefall weightless and terrified
On I go crossing over from living to so alive
And purified I know weeping is cast for the night
But joy comes in the morning.

Coffee House Empires (Blog Archive)

* This was blog archive day for me. I may do this from time to time. I blogged for years at xanga before coming over here, and there are times I go back and read old entries. I twitter exchange I had today with @HopeNoelle12 reminded me of this old entry.

--------------

Two empires collided this day in a Sacramento coffee shop. It was the empire of the old meeting with that of the new, and it came and went in a matter of moments you may have missed if you had been here.

This aforementioned shop has always contained various characters behind its counter. Each is identified and nearly titled by his or her own various strong characteristics.

“Armpit-hair and Nose Ring Girl”

“Pretentious Man-prees Guy”

“Bushy Beard Guy”

“Looks Like A Guy I Know Girl”

“Roller Derby Girl”

Those are only the workers within. The patrons bring their own setting contribution.

“White Pants And Loafers Guy”

“Really Tall Guy”

“Ass-less Pants Guy”

“Sling” (A super hero in his own right, thus warranting his own one word name)

These are only those this writer can remember in this moment. There once was the most bazaar of all. The bazaar has a way of becoming the majority so that the normal becomes bazaar. This was the fate of Normal Girl who once worked behind the counters of this shop. Normal Girl stuck out among the bazaar only because she was normal. Her normality was as intriguing as it was refreshing among the normally bazaar. Not a hipster! Not an 80’s throwback! Not…nothing! Normal!

Normal girl has not been around these parts for many months. She left unannounced to many, never to return. Like a fast acting vacuum sucked the refreshing normality from the otherwise douche bag infestation, Normal Girl was gone! Forgotten lest in tall tales such as this.

Today, a revisit to the shop reveals something quite wonderful. They say history has a funny way of repeating itself. They say empires come and go, and it has been possible that they may also come again. What have your eyes beheld!? Could it possibly be…… Normal Girl Part 2!?

One can only sit concealed behind his coffee in wonder that the rise of Normal Girl may have come at last. Not the same Normal Girl; it is Normal Girl 2. What planets have aligned to bring this about? What great gods have shown their favor upon the bazaar little coffee shop in Sacramento? No one knows; nor do they need to.

But readers be braced! For this is not the collision originally spoken of.

As one did sit in amazement for nearly 2 hours at the arrival of Normal Girl 2, the door squealed open to usher in a light breeze and then an impending second time when everything seemed to be still and almost eerie. No way is this happening! The breeze was the precursor to the collision. It is Normal Girl….1!

It is the collision of the Normal Girl empires. Overtly familiar with her surroundings, Normal Girl 1 enters with greetings for the bazaar who have always been (today it is Looks Like A Guy I Know Girl). She is familiar with all but one element, but it is much larger than an element. It is a force! It is a cosmic coming of events! It is Normal Girl 2: the new empire of Normal Girl in the wake of the forgotten first empire now revealed once more.

The two empires meet at the counter, and this writer is strangely surprised everyone else can drink coffee, can work on a computer, can read a book, can sit slouched and indifferent on an old dirty couch…can do ANYTHING else but watch and wonder. What will happen? Will there be fallout? What danger awaits?

Turns out not much! Cordial greetings are exchanged, Normal Girl 1 leaves in a matter of moments, and the new empire remains. Normal Girl 2 is here to stay, and the original remains a tale of bygone days.

And NOW Sling arrives having missed it all…some super hero!



* Soundtrack to this event provided by Sigur Ros

-----------

READING: "The Search for God and Guinness" by Stephen Mansfield

Scenes of Hope: you choose

Two scenes: both rainy: Downpour!

Scene One:
Once the rain begins, the two characters look for shelter; for refuge from the storm. There has to be somewhere to take cover while it passes over. Though the rain continues; they seek out and find a dry spot to post up while the rain runs its course.

Scene Two:
One character, for reasons we do not understand, walks to the window-front but stands in the rain; deadpan and miserable. He seeks no refuge or dry spot, but sits in the rain complaining about how wet he continues to get.

Once character chooses hope, the other despair.

Life will bring storms. It is a fact you can count on. It is a reality in which you have no choice. Your only choice is whether you choose refuge or misery.

Psalm 11:1 says God is our refuge; our shelter in the storm.

Though the storm is inevitable; our choices are not.

Will you choose hope or despair?



--------------

LISTENING TO: "Your Hands" by JJ Heller

Words to God

"Our thoughts are words to God."
-Matthew Henry

I once preached a sermon in a series about the various distorted images we have of God. It was intended to recognize the images we have of God that we create out of our experiences, relationships, and circumstances instead of the true images of God we see in Scripture. Once you recognize them, you can replace them with truth.

This particular night I was revealing the distorted image of the 'disinterested God'. We took a look at those distortions that make us doubt God, in his immense realities, could actually be interested in me personally, intimately, and truthfully.

We looked at the true image of God who knows me far more than I could imagine. This is a God who is Immanuel, God with us. This is the God who knows when I sit and when I rise. The true God is one who knows my deepest thoughts, desires, and imaginations. (Psalm 139)

At this point, a strong quote by Matthew Henry came to the forefront.

"Our thoughts are words to God."

It was a beautiful answer to those of us who may struggle from time to time with a distorted image in our heart of a God who is aloof or disinterested in my tiny individual life. To someone who struggles to pray to an immense God, this quote sooths the soul a bit and frees the heart a lot more to rest in prayer.

On the way home, Tonya shared with me the shadow of the quote. She was challenged to recognize how scary it can be when we really think about the thoughts we commonly have. There are a lot of thoughts we have in the course of a day we certainly would not want God to hear or know.

If our thoughts are words to God, there is a risk to that, of course, but I would say with risks included, it STILL means our God is close. Even if it must include all our thoughts, it still means God is interested in you personally and intimately.

----------------

LISTENING TO: Monsters of Folk "Self-titled"

Challenge

Few phrases make a pastor cringe and fight the urge to cup their hands over their ears in a childish I-can't-hear-you motion. Some of these include:
"I'm not being fed here."
"Where is MY tithe being used?"
"We've never done it that way before."
"How far is 'too far'?"
"Was that you at the pub Friday night?"

One statement which has not particularly made me cringe but has had me really searching and thinking lately is the idea of "being challenged".

We like to say there are churches we don't go to because we aren't challenged.

We go to churches because we are challenged.

We want to listen to podcasts from speakers who challenge us and avoid books by authors who don't challenge us.

We say that we want to be challenged, but that is not true.

We say we want to go to places and people who can challenge us, but we lie.

Granted, we lie because we have re-defined (falsely) what "challenge" actually means. When we say want to be challenged, we mean we want someone to blow our minds. We want someone to communicate something in a way we have never thought about it before. We want to think of things more loftily than we had before.

We want to read books that really make us think, and in so doing, make us learn a lot.

We want these things, and we call it challenge, but we have misunderstood and forgotten the primary element to challenge.

Action!
Movement!
Application!

Challenge is a call to engage and change.

We do not want to be challenged. We want to learn more, maybe. We want to know more information, perhaps. We want to answer more questions correctly than someone else, probably.

But very few really want to be challenged, because being challenged means being called to engage and change. Very few of us want to change anything as most of us are too comfortable to engage.

Challenge has to do with whether or not you want to engage something enough to enact change in the way you live, act, or do. Challenge has to do with whether or not what you are reading, hearing, studying, or interacting with engages you to act.

Will my life be different? Will I live differently or am I just waiting for you to blow my mind?

Do I really want to be challenged, or do I really want to know more information than you?

I think of books we commonly call 'challenging' by guys like C.S. Lewis, NT Wright, Bonhoeffer, and I wonder if any of them, as brilliant as they may be, actually engaged me enough to change, act, and live differently.

I think of books by people like Shane Claiborne, SD Gordon, and Francis Chan; books I could read in a day or two but I was engaged to see choices I needed to make to really be more like Jesus.

I think of podcasts I've listened to that I once thought were great challenging sermons, but I cannot remember many that really rocked my life in a way which made me say, "I need to change some things."

The most challenging speakers, writers, and pastors are not necessarily the most profound.

This is because it is not their role to be challenging. It is not up to THEM for YOU to be challenged.

Being challenged is up to YOU! When presented with something, no matter how simple the presentation, its up to YOU to determine whether you will engage and change.

----------------

READING: "The Search for God and Guinness" by Stephen Mansfield
LISTENING TO: "No One's First and You're Next" by Modest Mouse