Have you seen them?

“Joseph, a Levite and a Cypriot by birth, whom the apostles named Barnabas, which is translated Son of Encouragement, sold a field he owned, brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet.” [Act 4:36-37 HCSB]

Some people say to follow the fruit back to see what spiritual gifts you have been given by the Spirit to use for the sake of the Kingdom and the mission of all of those in the family of God. It is in the evidence of what has been done that what can be done is visible to expand upon and grow into an orchard of fruitful trees. They often use that in justification of the mega-church or multi-church phenomenon that has overtaken the Western Christian faith in the postmodern world.

We love successful things, tangible and concrete metrics to measure the effectiveness of our God’s investment in our lives. And it makes great business sense as well, which is the typical ‘structural’ integrity of our church system, whether it is fundamentalist Baptist, nondenominational bible-believing, missional Protestant or Roman Catholic. What chaos would ensue if we didn’t follow a successful model?

We want it in our leaders as well, that unblemished and unaltered image of success; pews or seating filled to capacity, a worship style that has them swaying in their seats and clapping out loud and a sermon that fits the needs of everyone without offending anyone. It’s a condition of the American dream; success. We don’t want those who aren’t successful by the standards set or at all to ever be in charge of something as important as the church we’ve worked so hard to establish. We fracture, angrily lash out or are heartbroken when one of the “leaders” of the universal church falls or goes off into unbiblical grounds.

We defend those who preach a gospel absent of total, absolute truth like Rob Bell and Joel Osteen "because its not hurting anyone" while crucifying those who have been isolated to the accountability of brothers and sisters around them to the point of falling into sin "because they've fallen from grace". We cheer and clap as those who have committed sin daringly stand in defiance of Scripture and proclaim themselves healed and yet keep underfoot those who openly struggle with worldly things……for they aren’t allowed to speak God’s word.

Makes me wonder if there are any Barnabas’ left in the postmodern Westernized Church of Christianity.

I know there are, because I have seen them. They aren’t the ones who grace the leadership team, spending 65% of the church’s budget to pay for their salaries and those of the rest of the team. They aren’t the ones who typically lead the ministries that are customized by the leadership to reach the ‘maximum’ people. They aren’t the ones who are visible in the church social functions or outreach events or tithing accountability.

They aren’t the ones who sit in the pews, nod at the appropriate times and dutifully clap when a worship song is done particularly well. They aren’t vocal in church dissension and don’t usually argue their cases before the authorities that be. They are silent, unassuming and dedicated to a cause that defies church walls and is unrealized by social circles.

They are the ones who are always there in the church, always doing something within its walls to encourage those who are in power positions to thrive, to do the job right that God has graced them to have and to make the mission of primary and utmost importance. They are the ones who never say no, even when they would rather take a break from volunteering and maybe be served for some time instead. They are the ones who step up when stepping up gives them nothing except a heartfelt thanks.

They are the ones who encourage those who are in better positions than they to keep on when the going gets rough and who impart the knowledge gained from their own failures for the sake of someone else’s triumphs. They very seldom sit down in a meeting or silent during discussions.

They wear their hearts on their sleeves and their lives on their shoulders. They take slights and insults, bear misery and denials and grudgingly give up on God inspired dreams when faced with opposition. They allow the lives they themselves would rather have to be lived through those who are in better positions to live them and yet they never say a word to anyone. They struggle in their weaknesses and acknowledge them for the benefits of others to avoid or draw comfort from them while encouraging those who struggle with things that aren't as bad (on the human scale).


Barnabas, the Encourager, was still active in the Lord’s work in 55 A.D., though we are not told what or where he is. Church tradition says that both Barnabas and John Mark “continued their missionary work and Barnabas became the first Bishop of Salamis, his native city, where he is said to have been martyred and secretly buried by his cousin Mark” (Meinardus 1973: 11; Acts of Barnabas). Barnabas was active in ministry in Rome, Alexandria in Egypt and Caesarea in Judea, according to The Recognitions of Clement (1994: 78-80; Zahn 1907: 459, footnote 2).

To the west of the ancient ruins of Salamis there is a Greek Orthodox monastery dedicated to Barnabas and a tomb in the surrounding area that is said to be his.

Dr. D. Edmond Hiebert notes this about this man, “Barnabas stands out as one of the choicest saints of the early Christian Church. He had a gracious personality, characterized by a generous disposition, and possessed a gift of insight concerning the spiritual potential of others. He excelled in building bridges of sympathy and understanding across the chasms of difference which divided individuals, classes, and [ethnic groups]. He lived apart from petty narrowness and suspicion and had a largeness of heart that enabled him to encourage those who failed and to succor the friendless and needy. He did have his faults and shortcomings, but those faults arose out of the very traits that made him such a kind and generous man – his ready sympathy for others’ feelings and his eagerness to think the best of everyone” (1992: 52).

Do you know someone in your church fellowship who is like that? Who stands firmly in the shadows of those who need or have to shine brighter for the sake of all those who stand in the darkness? Can you see the weaknesses that they have being a part of who they are valued as?

I know a few Barnabas’……

They don’t grace the stage on Sunday, power the glorious worship in the beginning or even drive the ministries in the Church walls or without. They are there, they are unseen mostly but always sought out when things need to be supported with prayer, with time/money tithing or even physically. They never quit even when they long to be encouraged.

They are our safety net in a world that would abuse us.

They are a reflection of God's desire for us.

And that is more valuable than any success we could have.

God....so much more than that

"He stretches out his heavens over empty space. He hangs the earth on nothing whatsoever. He holds the water in his thick clouds, and the clouds don't even split under its weight. He covers his throne by spreading his cloud over it. He marks the horizon on the surface of the water at the boundary where light meets dark. The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished when he yells at them. With his power he calmed the sea. With his insight he killed Rahab the sea monster. With his wind the sky was cleared. With his hand he stabbed the fleeing snake. These are only glimpses of what he does. We only hear a whisper of him! Who can understand the thunder of his power?" (Job 26:7-14)

I don’t write like I used to.
I find myself being sidelined or even pushed out of the way, it seems. Everyone tired of the same old weary repeat of my life being a struggle or a fight to even breathe sometimes. No one wants to listen to a story that is crawling along, seemingly without merit, in the drearily pre-morning gloom before the dawning of the sun. The Christian life is supposed to be one of salvation, struggle and then achievement…..the overcoming of the many strongholds that complicate our lives.
When someone brings up the fact that Christ struggled, many times in His ministry time on this planet, they are shooed quickly out of the picture. God doesn’t want us to suffer, He doesn’t want us to feel the bitter pain of abuse or neglect or hatred, and no, no, no--- He doesn’t send things our way that seem usually harsh and full of sorrows. He is a gracious God, a good God and would never deliver upon us difficulties that we, as our bodies are lashed to the main mast of our ship, are not sure we will survive. That would be evil, and our God cannot do evil.
Funny thing is, no one said God does.
We struggle with who this God is, what He is about and how we can fit Him into our understanding. So we come up with highlighters and go through the Bible marking each and every love phrase that we can possibly contrive such feeling from……and when we hit the hard ones, the ones that bring us face to face with the realistic image of God….a complete image of Wrath, Anger, Love and Compassion, when we hit those we stumble and twist them around to try and fit our image of who God is. We try to bring God back down to earth on our terms.
And we fail.
Once upon a time, when this was all new and fresh to me……you know the time I’m talking about, when God’s voice remained fresh in your ear as if He had just whispered “I love you” in them. Where you can still feel His hand upon your shoulder as He displays all of His glory for you……in that time, I believed the powerful, magnificence and beautiful authority of my God when He spoke those words that sent me into a wild frenzy of denial and hysterical laughter. I believed when, as I finally surrendered before Him yet again, that He would do what He had planned free from the constraints of my past and my future even as He walked in my present. Believed that, in Him (not through, because or even for Him) that I would do what He wanted because it was His plan, His ideal and His life to do with what He would do. I gave it to Him that February day, because I thought anything less was not showing my gratitude for the gift of mercy that He gave me.
Me. Chief of all sinners (as Paul would say).
Even as I started on the systematic journey of demolition to my life, (you see even the joists in the floor were rotten) I was still walking on the proverbial cloud nine….God would, God could and therefore God was going to do what He wanted in my life to prepare me for the purpose that He had presented to me that October day. Oh, there were plenty of moments in the midst of the pain, in the heartache of the disbelief and the discouraging, that I would wonder why, why this God would even bother with this mess called humanity. Why He wouldn’t simply just erase and repeat with a better design. I questioned even as He presented the next part of the journey, the next desert experience and those late night campfires in the wilderness of despair. I wondered why me and pondered the divinity behind the call, the purposing behind the purpose.
I have been uncomfortable since that day in February and completely lost without a clue of my direction since that October day even as I’ve grown comfortable in His provisions and focused only where He would have me go rather than the journey to get there. I have argued, cried and begged just as many times as I have calmly thanked Him for the limitations, healing and discipline that He has introduced into my life. Even as I’ve realized how far I’ve come, I realize how far I yet to go with the likelihood I will never get there this side of the White Throne.
But in everything, even this journey towards the Home I’ve never known, I guess the ‘honeymoon’ phase has to come to an end and the mundane of just the daily walk come to a collision point and the mundane takes over. Like an ‘old’ married couple, the Christian settles into an easy kind of life where things turn into blessings on a dime and your steps become a graceful gliding sweep through chandeliered ceiling halls and beautiful ordained gardens. Struggles become those moments at ‘tea time’ when the cupcakes aren’t perfect and the tea a bit tart.
God becomes this great guy who wants nothing but love and is willing to do anything for us to get us to love Him. Why wouldn’t He want to ‘bless’ us with more money than we can spend in one lifetime? Our tithe of 10% would be so much more if we had more money to take care of everything else too. Why wouldn’t He want to fix our wounds, binding them tight with His healing mercies? He doesn’t want to have us experience pain or sorrow.
What we fail to realize, what we don’t want to understand and what we dare not think is that God is not us. And He ‘owes’ us a lot less than we think we are due, even if we are simply grateful for His gift of Salvation. And He is God, unlike us in every way.
His own Son, three-in-one/Fully God-Fully Man/Messiah, felt the struggle of despair and sorrow. He experienced the harshness of death and the silence of hatred. In the Garden, the night before His death, He wept tears of blood and was broken in the despair of what was to come. But He did it, not because of love but because of the commitment He made to His Father’s will……He doesn’t say in the night before that He was doing it because of love, though love was surely one of the motivations He felt. He did it because it was His Father’s plan, because He had to.
And God, in His way, turned His back upon His only Begotten Son as He was draped with the sinfulness of the whole of mankind in disgust and shame as He died. He despaired for this lost Son even as He waited for the plan to go forth to its conclusion for this part……
That sounds like a Father of Love to me.
He owes us nothing more than the penalty for the sinfulness that we have, even these ‘crystal-clean’ Christians. He is more than justified to reach out and strike us all dead as He did the generation in the desert who made the Golden Calf idol rather than redeem any one of us. The greatest of us, the ones without many sins, are just as guilty of the punishment we deserve as those like me who have more than a lifetime full of penal labor to try to start paying for the price of our admission in Heaven. He has more than a right to demand our lives in servitude and withhold judgment on whether we are getting into His mansions or even the grounds of His kingdom. Just because He desires that all would be saved, He doesn’t force everyone to be saved.
He doesn’t have to remove the penalties of this world upon our lives or instantly change all the imperfections that we develop over the life spent in the darkness; the bruised knees and shins, the bleeding cuts and scrapes or the bumps rising on our heads from the collisions in the night.
We have but a whisper of who He is and what He is capable of.
It would take an eternity to understand who God is and what He thinks about the struggles in our lives or the sorrows that come our way. Part of our Heavenly eternity is going to be the eternal opening of our eyes to His wonders anew and the deep awe of how far off we were of His grace in view of His power, His wrath and His righteous anger towards our sinfulness.
But the church isn’t all bad, as Pastor Will from the church plant group I attend every other Sunday was pointing out today. Far from being understanding of our lack of perfection and highlighting what is good and right in this warfare that is taking place on this world. We aren’t prone to divorce more than non-Christians nor are we lacking in charity or other works. We are not perfect and it is that lack of perfection that hazes the image of God. We are told we’re constantly screwing up when it is not us who do the real work anyway. But we become complacent in our worship, bored in our walk and fade away from the fellowship…a fellowship we vitally need, if the stats that Pastor Will showed us tonight are truthfully as best they can be.
Connection with church and the fellowship helps us be better followers and the fruits that come from our faith are exponentially greater in the community of believers. But I digress…..
As we grow closer and closer to this God we cannot get a ‘full picture’ of because of our humanity, our humanity is more conformed to what God intended us to be in the first place and we become less combative about ideologies that are wrong and more interested in enticing them to grow in those ideologies to the point where they realize the emptiness of the religious movements by humans. We become less bitter about the deliberate wounding by the world, those who are in league with the enemy and those within the family who stumble along as much as we do. We seek as a community, as a family, to gather our understanding of God together and dialogue about the mysteries that are revealed in the discussions about our Father and His Son and His Holy Spirit. Then we become a even great force for the glory of the Kingdom’s King and less marked by the world’s culture because we are the ‘dominant culture’ by our effectiveness at love with accounting, mercy and grace.
And when the stories of struggles, trials and pain come into the repeat mode of life, when a brother or a sister struggle with an addiction, disease or mental fatigue yet again or a once-dedicated and effective warrior for the Kingdom is tricked and swayed by the enemy’s lies when they shouldn’t have been, we don’t hesitate to step into those lives and see the glory of God working itself even in those places and by our rejoicing in the struggling well of our family member they are empowered once again to rise back into God’s grace and be repurposed in His plan for them.
And it no longer becomes a game of ‘when are you going to be ready’ but a life of dedicated ‘we will get you ready’ for what God has in store for His people.
So, if your beliefs are so fragile that you cannot dedicate the time to a family member in the body who has been struggling well, but struggling long or you look with painful sorrow upon a brother or sister who was once of prominence in the body but has fallen from the isolation of leadership or the whispered lies of the enemy that have opened those old wounds……then I would ask God to strengthen you for the primary duty of this Body, to love one another and strengthen one another, accountable in love. Because when we focus on what God calls family with what God tells us the characteristics of that family, we live that life as undeniably God’s. We stop worrying about a 'definable' progress, check marks on a list of things that we cannot control in a general sense and become more specific in our personal dealings with someone else.....we seek God's will not our own definition.....we worry less about our agenda and more about His.
This is why I don’t write so much anymore…….I really don’t know if anyone is listening anymore. And this is why part of the adore of the call has faded into the background of the din of battle……
God is so much more than what we can even imagine and as Job says, we have glimpsed but a whisper of His thunderous power…….He is so much more than the simplicity of love and more wrathful than our worse and darkest anger……
He is our God and jealous for us…….
With just the glimpse of His power and character, I’ll stand steady for Him on the mysteries I have yet to become revealed on….
Because of what I’ve already seen, He is worthy of my praise and justified in His plans for me, whether sorrow or joy, peace or chaos, pain or peace……
God is god, and I am not, and He is not limited by my lack of understanding.

Understand if you've made it this far in this blog, I am not saying that God is capable or even willfully involved in the evil works of the enemy. I am saying that in the definition we use of what bad and good is, we must realize that we are using our definition and not necessarily God's. For if what we once thought was a bad thing (mislabeled as evil) actually brought us closer to God or disciplined us to be effective warriors for the Kingdom, isn't that a good thing?

Just my thoughts.

Movement

"The Lord is Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." 1 Corinthians 3:17

It is something that escapes the attentions of most people that travel to the downtown area of the biggest city (or what was once so) of the region, Detroit. It is known, especially when we win a hockey championship or a baseball championship or if we ever will win a football championship because we drap it with the jersey of that team. It is in the news when we have to pay for the restoration of its visage or when the newies are outside the Coleman J Young building (City of Detroit offices)and use it as a backdrop to whatever they are covering.

No one knows, or at least I believe they don't (due to lack of complaints by atheists and other religions), what the symbology is or what is inscribed on the wall behind the Spirit of Detroit. My friend was surprised by the fact that there is a Christian biblical verse behind the statue....a powerful and direct verse that speaks of the God, I AM, and cannot be transposed to 'substitute' for any other religion's god. It is what the city once stood for and what it wanted its spirit to be.

And it was what 20,000-30,000 Christians came to Comerica Park in the rainy early morning hours yesterday to reclaim.

The Spirit of Detroit is a city monument, created by Marshall Fredericks for the cost of 58,000 back in 1955. It was dedicated in 1958 and is 26-foot tall. It held the status of being the largest bronze sculpture cast since the Renaissance. It was restored in 2006 by private and foundation funds.

In its left hand, the large seated figure holds a gilt bronze sphere emanating rays to symbolize God. In its right hand, is a family group symbolizing all human relationships. A plaque in front of the sculpture bears the inscription, "The artist expresses the concept that God, through the spirit of man, is manifested in the family, the noblest human relationship."

As one of Detroit's most identifiable landmarks, a sketch of the statue is the central element of most of the logos of Detroit's city departments and services and is used as an image on the "Spirit Of Detroit Award" that is issued to a person, event or organization being honored for an outstanding achievement or service to the citizens of Detroit.

One of the most important aspects of the event that gathered Christians downtown yesterday wasn't the 1 million hours of community service that the E.A.C.H. movement wants to achieve with this collalition of churches, para-church and individuals (though it is a very important part of it) or the fact that the faithful gathered to pray for Detroit. It was simply said....

Where God is, where God would come and do His work and miracles and restoration; such a place has to believe in Him for it to happen. The Christians of Southeast Michigan gathered in Comerica Park to declare a moblization of the faithful to fight that disbelief and bring the Gospel message...THE GOOD NEWS....in an impactful way, through the investment of their lives into the city and surrounding suburbs. To join with the family that lives and worships in Detroit and join the toils of their hands with efforts to live the faith among those who do not believe, not for the sake of forcing the Gospel upon them but to show the faithful execution of a life given to Jesus Christ.

To beckon the Spirit of the Lord to come to the city of Detroit, a city where the world is watching what happens, to bring LIBERTY!

And that is something worthy of our efforts. And what the most noblest of all human relationships, the family, is for.

Let's do this!

The Ultimate Gift

“We understand what love is when we realize that Christ gave His life for us. That means we must give our lives for other believers.” 1 John 3:16(GW)

We often dramatize this verse…..giving our physical life into death for another believer. We pat ourselves on the back and think we’re doing something wonderful if we have that moment in which our life becomes forfeit for another….in that situation. Then we continue on about our day, ignoring the brothers and sisters struggling to make ends meet and having disasters visit their doorstep. We will help so long as it doesn’t create for us any inconvenience or trouble. We will do outreach with our churches only if several conditions are met; our funds have covered our building and salary expenses and it fits into our ‘free’ time. We will do anything and everything so long as it is in our best interests and meets our desires.

Look at the verse again.

Christ gave His life. This life did not start at the age of thirty, when most theologians believe He started His earth-bound ministry. It didn’t start in the height of royalty or wealth. We look at the end of Christ’s life (and reasonably so) and forget that He lived a life from birth to death that spanned thirty-three years. Now read that verse again. His life, not just the end of His life or a moment or two. He gave His entire life to the love that He holds for each of us. Before we were even born.

The Ultimate Gift, we call it.

Now how does that reflect in your life?

Two people recently stepped up to me and blessed me with some things that were needed in my life, both of them were inconvenienced somewhat by their blessings. They gave a part of their lives so that I would be blessed. They stepped out of their world and into mine, with the intentionality of making a difference for me. It would’ve been easier to just let the moment pass by. They are still alive, living life on this broken world…….but I would say they’ve exemplified this verse.

How have you reflected your love in this way to those around you?

How have you been an ultimate gift to those who believe like you?

purposed? Purposed!

“May He give you what your heart desires and fulfill your whole purpose.” Psalm 20:4 HCSB

I realized, as I was giving my testimony to a group of “Gideon-like” men, that I have come to a point in my story where the focus has shifted from where it was….mired in the details of reliving it all and has become freed of the muck and grime of that living into a place where I am glad for its adventurous tales, whether of woe or joy.
My story defines me. It is who I am, who I was and who I was never allowed being and who I never let myself become. It is a cherished thing, growing in detail and purpose at each retelling; never embellishing or stretching the tales to be told but bringing life to the deaths that occurred in its long and winding road.
Someone once told me that I have to ‘get beyond’ my past to realize my future. I have to heal the pains, close the wounds and release the past in order to be able to embrace the wonders of the future. It’s part of the Christian experience, I’ve been told, a part of ‘becoming that new creature.”
I think the message has gotten confused and it’s the main reason why we ‘lose’ the children as they grow up into the college-aged people who have left the church or redefined it tossing out the biblical text in favor of a more postmodern ‘peace’ that reflects an unfocused, ‘get-along’ attitude of a worldly nature. It is what is necessary to counterbalance the pain of this world…..for that is the ultimate goal of many of us. A respite from the pain.
Christ never promised exemption from the pain, but rather seems to tell us that it will get worse before it gets better. We are comfortable in our homes, so comfortable that the homeless that wander the streets of our downtowns are a nuisance and eyesore that we face confused at ‘how to handle the problem.’ We refuse to release our holds on funds to simply be the Church and Christians, rather following a ‘practical’ model of business that negates challenging the status quo. We refuse to risk, even with the ultimate risk-backer Jesus.
He faced death for us, coming to the point where He asked…no begged…for the reasoning behind His Father’s rejection as He died. He stood where we do, He did what we can do, and He challenges us to do ‘greater things’ than He did on this world.
It takes us rejecting our comfort and ‘bottom line’ and dealing honestly and lovingly with those struggling in the darkness and lost in the woods. It takes those who have been broken in those places to return with a vivid memory of the dangers and the pains so they will not fall and they can love even when love hurts.
I don’t wish for the events of my life to disappear. If I had a time machine, I would give it away or destroy it because I do not wish to go back and change my life. For each sorrow, each pain, each heartache and loss, each mistake, each sinful disobedience that I did….they have a part in the story that God started before I was born and watched with loving sorrow and joyful redemption as I’ve walked this world. It is a story of disobedience and loving purpose and it is part of my Father’s story for those still lost in the dark woods of this world.
I am a bard in my Father’s court, telling the tales of a life redeemed.
I have the desire of my heart: release from the mire of my past and the purpose of my life: to testify of the life restored and a life lived.

Living in love

“As the Father has loved Me, so have I loved you. Now remain in My love. If you obey My commands, you will remain in My love, just as I obeyed My Father’s commands and remain in His love. I have told you this so that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.” John 15:9-11 NIV

“We can beat our heads against the wall,” a friend wrote me in a little novella when I asked her for feedback, “Or be open to other directions...”

A pastor once told me to jump in to the volunteering in the community called church and let God lead you to where He would have you be what He has designed you to be, purposed you to become and equipped you to work. I am a j-o-t (jack of all trades) with enough knowledge to be dangerous in many things and good at a relatively few select ones.

February 14th, 2004 I surrendered to Christ. October of that same year, I was so involved in the community that was my ‘home’ church that they invited (and paid) for me to go to a conference for “Acts 2” churches at Willow Creek. I’ve told the story of my calling so many times and yet, I can still feel the energy in the air, hear the reverb of the microphone as Gene Appel spoke and the gentle, wave-like murmur of the conferencees talking in quiet tones around the sanctuary. Much like I can when God finally got my attention on that February day.

In the moments where God is revealed….even if it is His back we are able to glimpse (like Moses)….these stay with you forever, engrained upon your soul and picked apart in the darkness of isolation when it seems to be nothing more than just a dream that happened to someone else.

We pull them out in moments when we are afraid again……for comfort, for strength and for affirmation.

“Maybe God is taking you in a direction that may have never even considered,” my friend continued. (As I told you, she wrote a novella. Aspiring writer?)

My sweet spot, that place where I ‘pound my fists’ in passionate debate or fevered oratory, is and will always be preaching and ministry. What began as a simple, “This you’ll do for Me” picture of Gene Appel on-stage preaching about the neighborhood ministry he does has developed as I have been developed and discipled to be a Men’s pastor to the homeless, specifically Veterans (I am one). It is with this realization of why I’ve come to Ann Arbor, who has a larger-than-most concentration of homeless veterans who are men because of the location of the VA Hospital next to the University of Michigan’s hospital complex.

Of course, as seems to have been the case on all aspects of my “God moments,” it seems He’s only given the vision to me and hasn’t dissimulated it down the ‘chain-of-command’ of the organism called Church.

Its enough to make you want to throw it in and walk away from the whole mess. After all, why bother bloodying yourself upon the wall of disbelief for the purpose of nothing more than to be bloodied?

“The Enemy will whisper to you that you are not wanted...and having gone through some of the rejection you've endured in your life...” my friend writes, “it touches a wound for you.”

Part of my rejection of the whole corporate concept of the western church, far beyond its pretty modeling of how to ‘do church and succeed,’ is the uncomfortable feeling of isolation I have standing in the community that ebbs and flows within its brick and mortar walls. For some reason, I have never felt at home there surrounded by those who profess the same foundational beliefs as I do even as we stray from commonality with some doctrinal discussions. I crave this community and yet haven’t found a community that is ‘strong enough’ to endure my ‘integration’ into its life. I fear the rejection that has always come, and continues in some ways, in that community that I crave for the most.

Maybe the Hutterite or Mennonite communities would be a better choice for me to seek the aspect of community, or the strength of the same, that I crave for even as I realize the loneliness of being a loner. There, life is lived in community in all aspects and the health of the community is dependent on everyone who calls it home.

“You are a good man Jim...” my friend concludes her missive, “You are not your mistakes and failures... You are not your wounds...you are not your past. yes they are a part of you..but they are not you. Also you are not your expectations or the expectations of others...you are God's and His expectations are the ones that matter.”

And until God’s expectations are realized by those He’s equipped to send me where He would have me go, I’ll be chaffing at the bit. God continues to compel me to realize a life uncomfortable and as I remain uncomfortable, He moves further into the purpose He realized and set aside before I was born to be done in His strength, with His grace and through His mercy.

Learning to live with the rejection of those who can’t see it is something I’ll continue to learn how to deal with.

As I have all other things God has brought me through thus far.

I will never be a servant who hides the talents his Master has given him to be increased…..

I dare to dream impossible dreams, because I am loved.

Yes, I am worthless and fragile. I am destined to failure and prone to defeat. I am invaluable and useless. I am a broken piece of pottery and ugly. I am completely without merit and have rejected the wealth of my father's house. This the devil knows to be true, and in all honesty I cannot deny it. For I was all this and still am.

But through the grace of God and the love of His Only Begotten Son, I am not those things. I have been redeemed and strengthened by His sacrifice. I have a destiny to greater things than He Himself had done and the assurance of success. I am a King's son, adopted and inheritance-bound, and purposed to do the work of my Father's kingdom vision. I am valued beyond the wonders of His creation and looked for along the hills and valleys of the approaches to His home by He Himself. I have been restored to the wealth of my Father's lands and have found favor in His eyes. This the devil knows is true as well. This is what I am and what I was meant to be.

I will dream impossible dreams, because of who I was and who I was meant to be.

Courage begets honor

"‘Forward, the Light Brigade!’/Was there a man dismay’d?/Not tho’ the solider knew/Someone had blunder’d/Theirs not to make reply/Theirs not to reason why/Theirs but to do & die/Into the valley of Death/Rode the six hundred/Cannon to right of them/Cannon to left of them/Volley’d & thunder’d/Storm’d at with shot and shell/Boldly they rode and well/Into the jaws of Death/Into the mouth of Hell/Rode the six hundred."

Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote this poem to memorialize a suicidal charge of British light cavalry against Russian forces. It is the same war that propelled Florence Nightingale into renown for her battlefield nursing.

It is the poem that comes to mind when I read the devotional for the E.A.C.H. 33:3 preparation campaign.

“If you want favor with both God and man, and a reputation for good judgment and common sense, then trust the Lord completely; don’t ever trust yourself. In everything you do, put God first, and He will direct you and crown your efforts with success.” Proverbs 3:4-6 TLB

In the movie, “The Blind Side”, Michael Oher writes about the charge of the Light Brigade in the final essay of his senior year that drives his grade point average up to the point where he qualifies for a college sports scholarship and then into the fame of the NFL. He writes, “Sometimes it is best to shoot for courage and hope for honor.”

247 of the 637 British soldiers to charge the Russian position were killed or wounded, just over a third of the whole unit lay on the battlefield because of the mistake of someone who was in charge. Courage caused them to spur their steeds onward, honor kept them pushing forward. Honor, in that circumstance, is indeed something you find in the midst of the chaos and it is something that requires the courage to seek it within yourself.

A friend of mine told me that someone had once told her that one should take on the responsibilities of a desired role before actually attaining the title of that role. In the early church, there was a preacher, a teacher; proclaiming and confessing Christ as Lord.

Maybe that is why the Light Brigade and the verse have set off such a deep feeling for me. In all things, it is what you trust in (the men around you, your training, the leaders above you) that drives you to take courage and seek honor.

Even when the leadership tells you that the direction you see God calling you isn't the direction He's calling you. Courage to seek God's vision even if there's those who don't see it. Risking the cannon fire of those who can't dream so large. Taking courage so God can forge honor in the fire of trials.

That is all the success I hope for in the battles for the Kingdom; to be honorable for my King.

Opportunity knocks.....

“And it happened, as Aaron was speaking to all the congregation of the sons of Israel, they turned toward the wilderness. And, behold! The glory of Jehovah appeared in the cloud!” (Exodus 16:10 LITV)

God presents us with opportunities, opportunities in which if we step into the unknown and follow that one small voice. We spend our ‘due diligence’ in preparation for the service that we’ve surrendered to God and it is our best presentation. But, if we bring our best to the table, it will never be enough. We are a broken, disbelieving people even as we trust in Christ to deliver upon the promise that He has made as His hands were stretched out and nailed to the Cross. Even then, as we walk into the life of disciples following Christ, growing in faith and obedience, we are at our best a broken and fallen people undeserving of the best of the Gospel promise but given it the same.

In those opportunities, God takes our best freely and fully given to Him and amplifies it to become something far beyond our abilities to deliver; something so special that we can recognize the presence of the Spirit wherever it occurs. It happened last year at the Bowery Mission and it happened again today at the Bowery Street home we share with the men of the Bowery.

Two weeks ago, I was prompted by God to go up to Joan Bernard and tell her, “You are going to preach one sermon at the Bowery.” No ‘please’, no ‘would you consider’ but rather a direct ‘command’ from God. She agreed and it has been a blessing to watch the transformation. When we got to the Bowery and I was given our ‘chapel responsibility’ schedule, I gave Joan the choice of when she wanted to do her sermon. She chose Wednesday afternoon.

But God had other plans.

Last night, after my sojourn of eight miles through the ‘wilds’ of New York, I came back with my cold in full effect to the point where I was losing my voice. And anyone who knows me knows there's not that stops me from talking….except losing my voice. I tried to get some good sleep and medicated myself as best I could. I even went to sleep earlier so that I’d get extra recovery time. And when I got up this morning, it was better but not good enough apparently for God’s work.

So I was given an opportunity to literally step out of the way of the work that God was doing and allow someone else He had selected to be the momentum to His glory; Joan.

And was able to sit back and watch God glorified.

As a daughter of the most High King and a son of the same walked into the leadership roles He had prepared for them to glorify His name. John stepped into a leadership role in the worship, singing the song “My God” and I knew my stepping back into a supportive role was God-designed rather than self-imposed, because as Joan stepped up to the pulpit and began her sermon…..God walked in the room and joined the Spirit which had come in during John’s presentation of worship.

And, as we well know, God rocks the house.

Once again, as I sat there praying over Joan’s service God showed His pleasure in His daughter by amplifying her best and making it the awesome and inspirational presentation of His word. And the glories that arose were all His.

Of course, He gave me an affirmation of what He had planned all along….for what Joan spoke of this morning, God’s given me the ‘closing’ statement on it for this afternoon.

Powerful indeed are the works of the Lord.

A lesson in humility though, first, before I can present God’s word this afternoon. The team, concerned for my voice, have imposed a ‘gag-rule’ on me until 12:15 when chapel starts. I cannot say a word, giving my voice a period of time to rest. I am not worried, though about being silent…….

God’s provided me with enough paper to ‘speak my peace’ well into the afternoon.

As they say here at the Bowery, “God is good!” All the time, everytime!!!

God's calling......

“Coastlands, listen to me; distant peoples, pay attention. The LORD called me before I was born. He named me while I was in my mother's womb.” (Isaiah 49:1 HCSB)

I can remember last year at this time, tossing and turning in my bed as I pondered the question presented to me, “Why do you have to go to New York to work with the homeless?” I can remember finding the answer to that question behind the Red Bowery Doors in lower Manhattan, near Ground Zero and the Statue of Liberty, in the land of the ‘no-eye-contact’ people and cast systems that defy even the logic of their own thinking; Upper East Side, Bronx and so on. I can remember that special someone who helped me stay the course and travel to a place I’d never would've gone on my own. I remember and am humbled by her strength.

Shannon helped God awaken in me a realization of a future where the work wasn’t quite what I had thought and is definitely more extreme and more challenging and more terrifying. By encouraging me to go into that place, far from where I could effectively and quietly escape, she helped God present me with His purpose, His challenge and His mercy. And as much as I’ll miss sharing that teammate feeling with her and will miss the energy that consumed her and all those around her while we worked in the Mission last year, I look forward to the new teammates that are undertaking this adventure to be a part of the work God’s doing in the Manhattan bough of New York City.

I have a charter to do for the University today, a short three hour shift and then its off to collect a donation to support this trip from my Pastor of the church plant I attend on Sunday night . After that, its off to see my children for a few hours since they’ve been gone visiting their mother during their spring break and I’ll not be seeing them for another week as I go off on this mission’s trip and they get an extra week off work because babysitting didn’t come through as expected. Then I’m going to explore the relationship that I left hanging with Vineyard Church by participating in their “Rotating Shelter” for the homeless of Washtenaw. After I get home, I’ll pack the borrowed bag I’m getting and get a few hours sleep before I go to Trinity to ‘catch the bus’ over to WCC to get the rest of the team with Dino and Joseph, the other two drivers and teammates for this journey.

In a little more than twenty-four hours, the Mosaic A2 team will depart the environs of Ann Arbor Michigan for the distant, coastal lands of New York State. Some are old hands; Joseph, the team leader and Dawn, a few others. The majority are ‘newbies’ who bring talents and skills to this year’s team that make it as unique and God-designed as last year’s was.

Keep us in your prayers, both for the trip there and the arrival.

I think I hear the faint call of God beckoning me to those Red Doors.

Team Mosaic Bowery bound

“Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and wondrous things you do not know.” (Jeremiah 33:3 HCSB)

It is three days and a wake up call before the Mosaic A2 group departs the Michigan boundaries for the great state of New York and the lower Manhattan bowers where the Bowery Mission is to serve for a week in the homeless program there. Last year, being the ‘naïve’ innocent I was, I wasn’t ready for the impact that God would deliver in that place…..where I was confronted with His love, grace and mercy in such ways that I was humbled and broken by the time I left. This year, knowing the power of God to transform lives and hearts makes me nervous and challenged.

“Be the change you want to see in the world” was nicely stickered on the back of a vehicle in front of me on the way from the VA. It’s a quote from Gandhi, that Indian Philosopher that is celebrated for his non-violence doctrine and is oft quoted in context to Christians about how he likes Christ but not Christians since they are so unlike Christ. I think most of the time we are more focused on the change that we don’t realize that we have to be an embodiment of that change before we can vocalize it to the world. I have spent most of my Christian life arguing against the establishment of the human church to be a voice in the work that God has called me to. There have been those who have heard my ‘cries’ and seen the anointing and there are those who look first for a piece of paper and then the ‘signs’. I have given up arguing, for there is plenty of work to be done even without that calling.

Lately, I’ve just been stepping out in confidence that whatever God wants me to do, He’ll provide the proper credentials to do it.

‎"Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." 2 Corinthians 3:4-6

I have written a few posts about the Bowery and the verses that God is laying upon my heart, knowing with anticipation that these are the things that He wants me to broach at the chapel sessions and totally clueless yet on how He wants me to do it. All in due time, my God is a God of last minutes because in the last minutes is where I tend to give up the reins and let Him do His work with my hands. After all, I am fully aware of how man can screw up even God’s handiwork. If you don’t believe me, look at His bride, the church.

We are leaving this year without a few of the dynamic personalities that made last year such an impacting trip but we carry with us new faces that have accepted the challenge of God to go into this place and be His ambassadors. We have no chance of repeating the major impact that the team had last year at the Bowery on that Thursday night chapel service where the walls were shook and the foundation quaked. Nor would I expect our team to do so. No, I expect that God will make a bigger and more personal impact on the lives and direction of those whom we come into contact at the Bowery and the team mates who are serving with me there. I am eagerly anticipating how God will shake a city block and rock the foundations of all who reside there.

Saturday night, I will be serving at the rotating shelter that is at Vineyard Church this week. Then its home to pack up and get a few hours shuteye before I go to pick up the bus that Trinity is letting us take to travel to New York to meet the team at the WCC for a departure of 7am. We’d love to have those who are so inclined either begin to pray for us or come to WCC to pray us off as we depart on this grand adventure for the Kingdom.

Maybe this time I’ll even come back with all my clothes……..

A canvas

“But you are our letter, and you are in our hearts for everyone to read and understand. You are like a letter written by Christ and delivered by us. But you are not written with pen and ink or on tablets made of stone. You are written in our hearts by the Spirit of the living God.” (2 Corinthians 3:2-3 CEV)

The time grows closer when I’ll be returning to New York’s lower Manhattan to be part of the continuing work led by Tom and the people of the Bowery Mission to reach out to the homeless community in the New York area. I grow alternately excited and nervous, joyful and fearful, as it approaches. There will be friends made from last year still in the program there and there will be new faces flushed with the acknowledgement of God’s hand upon them. Some of the community that is served at the Bowery will be the same, a year older and worn by their experiences on the streets and some will not be returning…..their time on this world having passed. That is why I experience such range of emotions and feelings.

When I am praying at my desk, pondering over the words that God has given me today or the thoughts of a mentor, a friend or the words of my children; I stare at the red apron displayed on the wall above it. Listed are the names of the workers and the men in the program and some of those in the community who were served during our time at the Bowery last year. Joshua, Martin, Marvin, Jose, Cuba and so many others. The apron, which only had “The Bowery Mission: Rebuilding Lives since 1879” on it, is covered now in black marker with very little space left to display only red cloth. It reminds me of the sins redeemed by the blood of Christ, it reminds me of the men and women of the Bowery community who have begun a journey towards home and it reminds me of one other thing……a canvas, a blank sheet of paper and a empty picture frame.

An artist friend of mine in Australia doesn’t see a blank, white canvas before her when she begins to transform it into a work of artistic expression (I hesitate to say “work of art” because she tends to disagree, but they are). The ‘emptiness’ that stares back at her isn’t something that needs to be filled with nonsense, it beckons her to bring its unique expression out for those of us ‘blind’ to the wonder of its art to see. It is the artist’s talent and passion that brings it out with clarity for us to appreciate. In much the same way, the photographer doesn’t look at the picture and select any old frame to put it in but rather looks for the unique and most complimentary frame to surround the picture to which it has been selected to hold. Not so that our eyes are drawn to the frame to express the appreciation of its borders but to draw our eyes inward to the picture and the story that it tells.

To a writer, the blank page (lined or unlined) is not simply something in which to write randomness on, to draw simplistic renderings of the world around them but to write a story…a letter to those whom they know of a beautiful story of events, people and places to take the reader upon a journey into that story so they may enjoy the beauty and splendor of it as well.

The beauty of the canvas, the blank sheet of paper and the empty picture frame is that once they are filled with the essence of what they were meant to convey, they can be viewed by anyone and the expression of the joyful story explained by the artist is open for everyone to enjoy.

I don’t go to the Bowery to write my own story of what is going on there in the boughs of Manhattan….I go to read the story of God’s redeeming love and grace as expressed on the canvases of the community there.

To be transformed, to be humbled and to be challenged by the writing hand of the Father.

God moment....

“God, Your faithful love is so valuable that people take refuge in the shadow of Your wings. They are filled from the abundance of Your house; You let them drink from Your refreshing stream, for with You is life's fountain. In Your light we will see light. Spread Your faithful love over those who know You, and Your righteousness over the upright in heart.” (Psalms 36:7-10 HCSB)

It is not that often, gathered with the immediate members of the vast family of God, that my mind wanders and my thoughts drift away from the course of the message being given or the lesson being taught. Because I so love to listen to the virtues of the Word and the imagery that He’s given to someone about a particular passage or thought that is being expounded upon. I used to be, in the earliest of my new life, particular about the whole ‘functionality’ of the pastorship and those who are put (or put themselves) into positions of leadership for a congregation simply because it was MY ears they were reaching and it was MY family in which they were ‘in charge.’ I’m probably not alone in that, and it is a sad state of affairs that the body is so fractured because of the human side of the equation…..we still tend to elevate those in pastoral, directorship and even elderships into extremely isolated pockets were only the godly can walk (or so we assume) and the righteous lounge without fear of eviction (or so we believe).

It is not that often even absent of the fellow believers that I know (even if they don’t know me) that I wander when approaching the manner of being in the Word. There have been only a few times, and a few choice places, where the ‘fortunate’ occurrence takes place….without my noticing, at least in the beginning…

I call them ‘God-moments’ because the clarity and profound peace that I feel during them can only mean He is very near……..molecules of air close…..

Worship was heightened for me today, I just couldn’t seem to stop smiling even as my heart was carried away by the essence of the songs…the words both meaningless and profoundly impacting, even though I’ve heard them before. The worship band, led by Marshall Mobley, performed both as they normally do (exceptional) and with an apparent brush of the divine whispering amongst the chords and strums, beats and depressions made on the musical instruments and interspersed among the amplified voices of the singers. It wasn’t that Nellie Fowles was helping or even that she gave a powerful reading from the Word, stepping boldly into a powerful song with a heart dripping with the passion brought on by the Holy Spirit…something I’ve seen her do, miles away behind some dark red doors in a environment called New York City.

Maybe it was her voice so burdened with a heart for God that tripped the ‘God moment’ for me, or at least started the turning of my world into the mystical, peaceful and charged place where God sits in the Holy of Holies. If so, I owe her a debt of thanks.

Maybe it was the heartfelt prayer before service, where I asked to be emptied of the blessings given before that moment so that all could be filled with an overwhelming, overfilling amount of the Spirit so that we were driven into the streets burning with the flame of the redeemed.

Maybe it was my son, as they read off the announcements today and the Bowery Street Mission trip was once again mentioned, who tugged on my arm and whispered as I leaned close, “You’re going there, Dad!”

Most likely, it was simply a matter of God’s success in getting and securing my attention beyond the realm of the physical and the mental. A firm grip on the hand of His son, a moment where the world was put on hold as we sat together and He displayed the wonders of the plans that He set aside for me even before the world I know began. A simple invitation to “Come, worship Me.”

I know it wasn’t Shannon Nielsen, the lead pastor for the church I go to called Mosaic A2, and his need today to expound upon the minutia of the story of Jacob, Leah and Rachel that is the central focus for the topic today from Tim Keller’s book, Counterfeit Gods….. how marrying your cousin and marrying more than one wife was not the ‘truth’ of the Bible but rather humanity’s customs at the time that bothered me to the point of drifting, though I was bothered by the necessity that seemed to overwhelm the meat of the topic today, “Love is not all you need”, by a defense of what was being read. A momentary thought of annoyance drifted in my mind and was gone, as was my centering on the voice coming from the stage.

I spotted Shannon Carey sitting down in the seats on the main level (I have taken to sitting in the back upper level, off to the side) and I was filled with a happiness for her, a certain and expressed ‘knowing’ that whatever God was facing with her, whatever dealings He whispered in her ears as she swam the mighty oceans of His Word or whatever prompting He was gently prodding her with was a great and mighty thing that is leading her closer and closer to the ‘sweet spot’ He’s reserved for her even before her world was begun. I would’ve loved to be a part of that, just to watch it unfold in the life of such a special daughter of God, but that seems to be a momentary, selfish wish that isn’t going to happen. Maybe it was meant to be but was altered by the wounds of this world, but I think it wasn’t meant to unfold other than the way it did. Still, I know our paths will cross again someday as God draws us both into the paths He would have us walk as we journey towards home. And in the end of it all, that is what matters. Today, that was a moment glimpsed that God gave me to settle a part of this life.

There were others in the group, this band of members that I fellowship with silently among the borders of their community, where I felt a heightened sense of “blam, there He is” or “Hoooray, He walks there”….. some that I have known and been known by and others who, though part of the same family and community, have never crossed that invisible line between seen and being known. But each seemed to glow with a certain light or a different posture that whispered “God’s there” to me.

For me, I was ensnared by the picture I carry in my bible from the Bowery trip last year, one of many that are stuck in the zippered outer compartment of my bible pack……..one of the Red Bowery Doors and nothing else.

I want to go back to behind those doors, I realized today, with a very intense and powerful desire. Tim Keller tells us to think about what we daydream and what whispers in the darkness of our sleep, for there are what the gods of our lives reside and drawn their enslavement of our hearts from. Even good things, born of a desire that shadows out God and replaces our relationship with Him for the objects hidden behind our mind’s eye. It is not my desire to go to the Bowery Street Mission because it’s a week away from the kids, family responsibility and a chance to travel; nor because I want to be preaching again at the famous Bowery Chapel where Presidents and other notable figures have stood and given God’s Word to the community there. In the intensity of the God-moment today, it was simply one reason and one reason alone.

To be joyfully broken by my God.

To be used as an instrument after being crafted again at His hand, to embolden and incite a community and to be a piece of the work that is being overseen by the Holy Spirit and those God has emplaced in that city to be His eyes, ears, hands and feet to a people who would turn from His salvation for the lack of experience.

The money needed to go will come, the ‘babysitter’ for the kids will be identified and the experience of the Bowery will once again grow me further and farther than I have been in a week for in the midst of the desire to be an instrument for the caring of His people, both the lost and the found, there is the welcomed opportunity to be shaped and molded by walking alongside Him in the work He is doing.

As the service wound down and the moment that I was given to walk hand in hand, step to step with my God faded into the backdrop of this reality, all I could do is whisper;

“Wow, what a great and mighty God is He……”

The night He burned those idols down

"He knows what He is doing with me, and when He has tested me, I will come forth as pure gold" Francis I. Anderson "Job: An introduction and Commentary" Job 23:10

(as quoted from Timothy Keller’s book Counterfeit gods: The empty promises of money, sex, and power and the only hope that matters.)

It has been a long and difficult 2010, not because of the events that have happened along the way. No, the things that have made 2010 difficult haven’t been consequences, though they definitely were felt; haven’t been the deep disconnection that has come from the breakup with Shannon, though I must admit to being deeply wounded from that departure; hasn’t been the difficulties with the job search, one year and two months (and counting) or the opinions that surface as the time moves on and opportunities fail and chances are missed; hasn’t been the health aspect of my physical body (back in braces for the hands, taking high blood pressure medicine, high heart rate medicine, high cholesterol medicine) and increase in weight gain. It seems everything that has transpired has brought me to the place where I needed to be so that God’s sculpting could commence with purpose.

Keller speaks of the sin beneath the sin, the foundational cement upon which idols are set, unconsciously worshiped and pinned for, to the absence and rejection of God. It is that sin, the one I recognized in my life for the past year, especially the first six months of the relationship I was blessed to experience with Shannon, that drove the consequences and results into the mire of my despair and why God has brought me back to this place I thought I’d never see again. It is a place where I know I’ll have to come time and time again as I journey into the purpose He has set for me, however He decides to work it out and how it is envisioned by the Holy Spirit…..for even as I get closer to home, the danger of erecting similar idols will increase for I know where He would have me go is not for the faint hearted.

The cold bitter wind blows hard in this place, so hard I am surprised I can breathe. It is impossible to light the fire here; there is no fuel for it anyway. I can only shiver in the numbing cold and pour my broken, bitter and angry heart out to a God that I turn away from even as I call His name…. the idol of my sin blocking my sight of even His distant light.

As Paul says in Romans, God has ‘give[n me] over to the desires of [my] heart….” (Romans 1:24). It wasn’t a corrupt thing but it was a thing that was meant for something good and beautiful that became corrupted in my greed for it. My thoughts, my hopes and my dreams entangled by its thorns, my day dreams full of its ‘successfulness’ and my dreams at night enraptured by its enticements. It became, well before even Shannon entered into the picture, an idol I would build daily and wail before as the darkness loomed. It started well before Kristy, though the tale is woven with the same results and the others that I sought to be in a ‘intimate’ relationship with both before and after my salvation accepted. This idol has lived and breathed in the moments of my life with the sickly-sweet odor of its succulent petals and bled me upon the harsh prick of its thorns.

Keller breaks it down into three distinct ‘idols’, but I believe I wrapped them all up into the one called love.

The love of approval, comfort and control that would give me the desire of my heart; someone who would never reject me, chastise me or hurt me.

But it wasn’t something I believed, even in the dark days of my life, that this so-called God of Jacob, this great I AM, was capable of delivering. After all, I had the life to prove that god’s incapability in such matters and so I built that idol out of the gold in my life to worship as I controlled it, demanded of it and heaped condemnation upon even as I groveled for its favor. So God released me to its deaden worship, even as I faced the depravity of my sinful nature and begged His eternal mercy and grace.

This mighty God will not demand our worship, though it is His to do so. This God will not beg our worship, even as His heart breaks to allow us our freedom to idolatrize the desires of our hearts. No, He releases His hands ever so little as we struggle against Him and His loving grip.

That idol was ignored when I was in New York and doing the Bowery Mission work with Shannon… the happiness and joy felt there was far removed from the simple quest for its appearance in the life we would return to once the week was over. It is there that one of the truths Keller speaks of, that the removal of idols can only happen with the increased closeness to God was evident and true. Once New York was gone, the idol was re-erected and love corrupted by its worship.

Six months and three weeks to the day, Shannon told me that she didn’t want to be in the relationship anymore. The idol had failed, again.

I have been forced, in the last six months as I have sat here in the bitter dark cold of this place, to face this idol and look in disgust at its visage. Streaked with the dark stain of sin, it no longer glitters or entices or even attracts me anymore…..for if its existence is the one thing that God requires to take away in His demanded sacrifice of my desire, then I have journeyed to my Mount Moriah and laid the desire of a love that bleeds approval, gives comfort and controls only the beating of its life onto the altar I’ve built there. And offered it to the cleansing fire that comes from the only hope I have. I have gone from needing this, desperately wanting it and manipulating my world for it to seeking Him in all of its beauty and glorious honor it brings its Creator.

“And Abraham named that place The LORD Will Provide, so today it is said: "It will be provided on the LORD's mountain." (Genesis 22:14 HCSB)

There are many things that were damaged and destroyed by this idol. Shannon walked away from the relationship we shared six months ago because the idolatry of its existence in my life corrupted a beautiful wonderful and potentially dynamic thing that it would’ve been if I had sacrificed it upon the Mount Moriah altar even before we began. I used it to justify turning my back on the impossible things God called me to do, I used it as an excuse or a sheepskin upon the thrashing room floor as a test of God’s purpose. With the impossibility of the future dying upon its golden table, I begged cajoled and controlled this idol…..the altar upon which this idol sat burned day and night with the desires of my heart….for God had surrendered me to it.

In the end, the idol failed to deliver as it had failed to do so in the annuals of my life’s story. It hurt more this time for one simple fact; I learned to dress this idol up as a facsimile of what I thought was God. I fooled myself with its enticements and imagery and called it God. I sat as David upon the castle top and gazed upon this idol with lust instead of stepping back into a role of a godly man seeking God’s will in it and all things that my life was bringing.

I have sought her forgiveness and worked on my own. I pray for her and the marvelous things that God has given her to taste in this world, events that have lavished her in His love and tender mercies and prayed for myself, that I would even as I failed to be in the relationship a true friend even in the twilight of notice.

Now the Bowery Trip is coming back up and I hesitate to go; because God wants me to be part of His work there and I’ll be going with the full realization of what I’ve lost in the worship of the idol of my need to be loved by someone other than God. And I realize that He brought me here, by allowing me the desires of my heart, to this place where I am single and potentially will be for the rest of my life but where I am fully reliant upon His grace, mercy and love to do what He gives me to do.

As I sat here thinking of writing this, I opened my bible study program (E-Sword) and this was the verse that it opened to:

“I call for my servant, but he does not answer, even if I beg him with my own mouth.” (Job 19:16 HCSB)

Oh, there are many idols that I have erected in my life, some hidden in the shadows of this darkness among the trees and valleys of this place. The fire’s gone cold and the wood damp with the despair of this world….and yet…..and yet

He calls me to burn those idols down and come to Him empty, a vessel to be filled once more with His love, purpose, grace and mercy.

Overfilled, so that I may pour it out in service of others that I can empathize with.

‎"People who have never suffered in life have less empathy for others, little knowledge of their own shortcomings and limitations, no endurance in the face of hardship, and unrealistic expectations for life" Timothy Keller, Counterfeit Gods

"If I go east, He is not there, and if I go west, I cannot perceive Him. When He is at work to the north, I cannot see Him; when He turns south, I cannot find Him. Yet He knows the way I have taken; when He has tested me, I will emerge as pure gold. My feet have followed in His tracks; I have kept to His way and not turned aside. I have not departed from the commands of His lips; I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my daily food. But He is unchangeable; who can oppose Him? He does what He desires. He will certainly accomplish what He has decreed for me, and He has many more things like these in mind. Therefore I am terrified in His presence; when I consider this, I am afraid of Him. God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me. Yet I am not destroyed by the darkness, by the thick darkness that covers my face.” (Job 23:8-17 HCSB)

These verses are the essence of burning those idols from our lives......

My reason for my seasons

"I have become a fool; you forced it on me. I ought to have been recommended by you, since I am in no way inferior to the "super-apostles," even though I am nothing." (2Co 12:11 HCSB)

It just gave God’s word to the seasonal theme of this time; not just the unemployment or the move to a different city or even the loss of someone that I truly loved but also the events that have carried me from that moment in October 2004 until now……bits and pieces of the work that He began way back in February 2004 until today that I thought were seasonal changes of my journey. As I sit here and stir the campfire in the dark echoes of the night, listening to the nocturnal creatures of its inky blackness, I have realized that there has been only one season since the end of the cold winter that began that February day. It has been a long journey and there are some who would say that I am no closer to the ‘goal’ than I was that October day in Chicago. Others would say I’ve become a ‘burden’ to the cause. Some will say I’m about as ‘godly’ as a addict or as ‘saved’ as a person drowning. Others, that quiet majority, have said that God is amazing in what He has done in my life, to this point, and the direction they perceive Him to be taking me on.

It has not been easy; this journey in the deepest heat of the summer past. It would seem for the majority of the trip so far, it has been through swamp and murky bogs….attacked by mosquitoes and pursued by bears. Always on the defensive, always working on wounds and new hurts and old recurring nightmares, grasping at peace and running to try and capture joy. Pursuing what I perceived God to be only to find that He was nothing like what I had thought. Seeking that direction to achieve the purpose He has set within my bones, that desire that seems to ebb and flow with the beating of my heart only to feel mislead by the directions and opinions of those who have come into my life. I have proclaimed the purpose He has called me to and been laughed at…..told to stop being foolish and do the ‘responsible’ thing. In several ways, by several people, for several different reasons.

I have been defensive in some of this season; fighting the perception of those both right and wrong, those who are lovers and haters and those who truly want what God is doing in my life, around me and through each of us. I have been offensive; fighting for the development of the purpose, seeking the ‘in’ to the ‘inner sanctuary’ though all the doors seem locked. I have argued, cajoled and calmly interjected. I have written, I have preached and I have volunteered. I have experienced the fullness of many opportunities and shied away from others. It has been a long, tiring and unrealized journey through this season.

And it boils down to what a friend said to me that I believe these verses speak from God’s own mouth. “I should…be…act…think…” has to be replaced with “God is” and that is enough. No longer, from the moment of my salvation can I expect myself to achieve, but (and he said this was from a seminar he went to) I have to consistently put myself in situations where if God doesn’t show, He’ll look foolish. In the absence of our own abilities and skills, where there is no rhythm or reason to the success of the struggle, the goal or the dream….in that the only thought that can be given is that God has done the work. We are merely the putty in His hands, shaped and fired to meet the requirements of the vessel for the Holy Spirit to fill.

I presented myself to the Church as a candidate of calling; there are those who have seen it and those who have not. There are those who, checking off the list of ‘requirements’ have forgotten the one sole requirement God has given to them…to disciple and further God’s cause in the call. The rejection of the Church has been a damaging wound to my life, but I have realized there was never a ‘Church-requirement’ of approval in the things that God has purposed me to do. Only my obedience and movement towards Him.

There are those who say I’m foolish to still dream, to still question whether or not God has called me to go into fulltime ministry……. If I am foolish for the impossibilities of God, then so be it.

So, now as the unemployment runs out and still no job on the horizon…..as the last of the money is poured into my gas tank for fueling the car…..and I face the coming New Year without apparent prospects, I wonder and trust in the provision of God for me and my family. I am awed by the questioning of my heart to pursue His big, audacious and hairy dreams for me or to sulk into a job to ‘just get by’ if I can.

As a pastor challenged his readers in an blog he wrote about “Daring to pray this prayer,” I can only bow my head in supplication and raise my hands in adoration…….and pray this prayer for 2011. For this is what God has taught me in the theme of this season…..He will have me where He wants me to be.

"Two things I ask from you; do not refuse me before I die: Remove falsehood and lies far from me; do not give me poverty or riches, feed me with my allotted portion of bread, lest I become satisfied and act deceptively and say, "Who is the LORD?" Or lest I become poor and steal and demean the name of my God." Proverbs 30:7-9.

It is my only resolution for 2011. What is yours?