Advent Resources

This past Sunday, November 27th, was the first Sunday of Advent.  Advent is the season on the Church Calendar that precedes Christmas, like Lent precedes Easter.  The focus of Advent is the eager expectation of God's intervention, of God bringing the promised Messiah to set things right.

The season leading up to Christmas can be really stressful, and many times I find myself sitting there the day after Christmas and thinking I wish I'd actually enjoyed the season.  I'd told myself that THIS YEAR would be the year I actually made Christmas about Jesus instead of parties and presents and stress.  Maybe you can relate.

In the last few years I've tried to find ways to celebrate Advent with my family, to give greater depth and meaning to Christmas.  

I wanted to pass along some resources to you, in case you want to do it too.  This is an especially great thing to do with your family - a way to come together as a family and spend some time focusing on God and the hope we have in Jesus.  Here's how we celebrate Advent:

HOW WE CELEBRATE ADVENT

An Advent Wreath: We have a small wreath, with spots for four candles on the perimeter and space for one big candle in the middle.  Each candle represents a different theme related to Advent.  I've found different meanings for each of the candles.  I'd say you should have the candle represent whatever the theme of the week is for the Advent Devotional Resource (the next item on this list) you're using.  That way it's coherent.

Every Sunday marks the beginning of the new week of Advent.  On that Sunday we add the next candle and light it as we go through the devotional materials, pray, have dinner, etc.  The rest of the week we have the wreath as the centerpiece of the table, light the candle(s), and when we pray for dinner we keep that week's theme (love, or peace, or expectancy, for example) in mind.

The missing candles help drive home the general theme of Advent, which is expectancy, looking forward to God's intervention...the missing candles and empty spaces remind us that there is more to come.

Advent Devotional: I've found a couple of devotional resources published by other churches.  These give you help in figuring out how to sit with your family (or yourself, or your significant other, or your friends, or whoever), and worship/pray together.  They guide you through scripture passages, prayers, some have questions, songs, etc.  

Here's one from Christ the King church in South Carolina.  I can't remember how I found it but this is the one we've used the last couple years.  Or tried to use, I should say.  We haven't been the most consistent.

Today I came across this Advent Devotional Guide, from the Village Church in Texas.  This one has more interactive questions than the other one.  I haven't looked all the way through it yet.

You can download one, print it out, and use it.  Both of them are set for you to use weekly - on Sundays - with whoever you want to do it with.

Personal Devotional: There's this personal Advent Devotional you can buy for $1.99 from Amazon that is pretty nice, and has some great things to guide you through.

 

IT’S NOT TOO LATE TO START

Don't let the fact that this past Sunday was the first Sunday of Advent stop you.  You can start right now with your family, yourself, some friends, neighbors, whatever - to take the time to focus on Jesus during these next sure-to-be-crazy several weeks.

Do you have some Advent resources you've found useful?  Let me know about them.

What should Christians believe about how people get to heaven?

This summer I’ve had the pleasure of leading a small group through the Reason for God small group curriculum.  Last night was our final night of the curriculum and the topic was Hell – how could a loving God be full of wrath, and how could God send people to Hell?  It’s a question that has definitely been brought to the forefront lately with the release of Rob Bell’s book Love Wins, which occasioned several book-length responses, including Francis Chan’s Erasing Hell, which I intend to read but haven’t yet purchased.

During our discussion the question came up – how can we be sure we’re saved?  Are the people who think they’re going to heaven that in fact aren’t going to heaven?  (According to Jesus in Matthew 7.21-24 there are.)  How can we be sure we’re not one of those people? 

Here are a few links I passed along to my group on the topic and I hope you will take the time to read them too.  If you’re a Christian I hope they encourage you and give you hope, that they remind you where the burden of your sins lies.  If you’re not Christian, reading them could help you understand just what it is the Bible teachers about salvation and forgiveness after all.

Michael McKinley, author of a book called "Am I Really A Christian?": How Can I Have Assurance of Salvation?, Is it wrong to look inward for Assurance?,  The Basis of Our Assurance, How Can I Be Sure That I'm Not a Christian?

Tim Challies: 3 Statements on Assurance of Salvation, The Basis of the Christian's Assurance

Tullian Tchvidjian's blog: Where To Look When You're in Trouble, The Subjective Power of an Objective Gospel, Christ Died for the sins of Christians too
The Gospel Coalition's Review of "Am I Really A Christian?"

Book Review: Enemies of the Heart

I tend not to be a fan of books that claim to tell you how to get a grip on your emotions or change how you feel about things.  I’m too cynical for stuff like that.  I do, however, like most of what I’ve heard from Andy Stanley so I was eager to read Enemies of the Heart when it showed up on my doorstep.

This book is split into four parts and is super easy to read.  Stanley writes in a very conversational style so it’s easy to understand and you don’t have to spend too much time figuring out what he’s saying.  Throughout the book he lays out why we have negative emotions and behaviors that we don’t want to have, analyzes them a bit, and then suggests habits we can develop to help us break free from their control.

Stanley’s diagnosis for why we experience these negative emotions and behaviors falls right in line with a lot of what I’ve been reading and realizing lately.  That is, we do the things we don’t want to do because deep down we do want to do them.  The problem isn’t the behavior, the problem is our heart, because our heart is the root of our actions.  Jesus himself said all kinds of vile stuff comes out of our hearts.  We can’t blame others or society or our parents for our sins.  We sin because we have sinful hearts.  So Stanley says the best thing to do is focus not so much on our specific behaviors but to aim for the root of the problem – the grip these negative emotions have on our hearts.  Only if we uproot them will we be able to experience any real freedom.

What emotions do we need to be free from?  According to Stanley, our negative emotions and sins pretty much always fall under one of these four: guilt, anger, greed, and jealousy.  These are all a problem because they create a debt-debtor dynamic in our relationships, like this:

Guilt says I owe you.

Anger says you owe me.

Greed says I owe me.

Jealousy says God owes me.

Each of these emotions gets a chapter or two of treatment and as I read through it I found myself recognizing the truth in so much of what he said.  This debt-debtor perspective is really helpful and rings true.  I don’t particularly feel like I struggle with any of these but throughout the book I realized I struggle with all of them.

Books have the great luxury of being able to be brutally honest.  There are things in this book that you probably need to hear but you won’t hear them from anybody you know.  Maybe you can hear them from Andy Stanley. 

What is exceptional about this book is that after discussing the nature and harm of each of these emotions and their implications, Stanley offers specific habits we can develop to combat them at a heart level.  These aren’t just behaviors; they’re habits we can develop that over time will effect change in our hearts.

Of course, the Biblical perspective says that we cannot change ourselves.  That is, we need the Holy Spirit to work in us to change our hearts.  All of the stuff Stanley writes about is grounded in a good, holistic understanding of Scripture and he does a great job grounding everything in the grace of God and the ultimate truth that all of our debts were paid on the cross in Jesus.

I think this is going to be a go-to book for me over the years because of its immense honesty and practicality.  When I find myself looking at my life and wondering what the heck my problem is, I think I’ll be pulling this one off the shelf.  It is so not a “just be a better person” kind of book.  It points you back to the only real solution to your heart problems – God’s grace through Jesus.  And it gives you helpful ways to avail yourself of God’s grace, the remind yourself of it, and try to live in it.  Great book.  You should read it.

What God is teaching me through Belle

This summer marks the end of an era of Belle’s life.  She’s done with pre-school and in August will begin her journey through the educational system with Kindergarten.  From there on out a rhythm will be established involving school years, Christmas breaks, Spring breaks, summers, and eventually me sitting on hot bleachers waiting to see her walk across the stage at her high school graduation.

A common refrain around our house, one Janelle and I heard first from Stacie Wood and keep telling ourselves to stay sane, is that “God intends children for our character, not our comfort.”  That is to say, children are not just another avenue for us to make ourselves happy.  There have been lots of studies and articles lately to show that parents are less happy than non-parents, and many use that to justify why they don’t have kids.  Children do bring us joy but ultimately if we are seeking our own happiness through our kids we’re on the wrong track and it will end up messing them and us up.  Children are a crucible through which God can form us in a number of ways.  Here are some of the things God is using my role as Belle’s father to teach me.

I am unconditionally loved.

This is probably the biggest one and I got it right from the start.  All my life I’ve heard that I’m unconditionally loved by God but that’s pretty difficult to believe.  In the 4 1/2 years I’ve been a father I’ve come to understand on a deeper level the love God has for me.  I’m a massively flawed human being but my love for Belle will always be there, no matter what she does, because she’s my daughter.  Her actions may bring me joy or disappointment, but she will always have my love.

I am like Belle.

I’m impatient and fitful at times.  I mess up when I should know better.  I’m selfish and short-sighted.  All the crazy things a little kid does are things we adults often do, but we know how to do it in more respectable ways.  I don’t scream and cry about not getting my ice cream, but I get grumpy when I have to wait on someone who I think should have their stuff together already.  I don’t rip toys out of my little sister’s hands, but I so often spend my time and money on myself instead of others.  And my sin and selfishness has a way bigger impact than hers.

I am not as wise as I thought.

In parenting more than in any other arena I’ve experienced a feeling of helplessness and a sense that “I really have no idea what the best thing to do is.”  When you only have yourself to take care of, or it’s just you and your spouse, it’s easier to arrange life so you have most things handled and most things make sense.  Not so with kids.  I also recall making some bold proclamations before I had kids regarding what I would and would not do as a parent.  Any parent knows those bold proclamations go out the window.  As with the old adage, every battle plan survives until you meet the enemy. 

Fatherhood is leadership.

Belle really follows my example.  Juliette and Fiona will as well.  As my kids get a little older I’m realizing this more and more.  I want my girls to live incredible, gospel-drenched, love-saturated, Jesus-following lives. It is so apparent to me that unless I am showing them love, modeling a submitted life, and leading them well, the chances of that happening go way down.  Every day at work I see the results of all different kinds of parenting – and I’m reminded of the importance of a father.  It is a tremendous responsibility and one I am not up to, honestly, without God’s help.

I desperately need God.

My real-life faith in God has grown significantly since Belle joined our family.  That is, I believe more strongly than ever that God works in the every day.  I believe more strongly than ever that without God’s grace working in me I’d be a pretty awful Dad.  And if the most important thing for me to do is to be a father that raises Jesus-loving daughters, rather than nice or polite citizens of society, I absolutely need God to do it.

Those are a few of the things I’m learning through fatherhood, and Belle specifically.  She changed my life forever on October 4, 2006, and God is using her to mold me in significant ways.  I hope and pray every day that God uses me to mold her into the woman He made her to be.  I want her to grow up with the analogy of God the Father being a good one.  And I never want to make the mistake of thinking the purpose of Belle’s life is to make me happy.  What a tragic way to look at parenthood.

Sun Stand Still by Steven Furtick–The Review I Didn’t Expect

I wanted to hate this book.  Okay, hate is a bit strong.  I was prepared to dislike this book.  In this Blogging for Books program, I’m allowed to pick from a list of five or six books.  The last book I got was Radical Together, which I loved, but the list after that was less appealing.  I’d heard a bit about Steven Furtick, a young pastor of an exploding church in North Carolina.  My impression of him based on what I’d seen, read, and a few videos, was that this would be another shallow, ra-ra, God-wants-to-empower-you-to-achieve-your-dreams-and-help-you-get-what-you-want-out-of-life books.  So I figured I’d order the book so I could re-whet the blades of my mind that slice up the prosperity gospel. 

Once I got the book and started reading, I realized I’d been wrong.  I didn’t fully admit it until I reached the end of the book.  I even sat there for a few minutes after I closed the book searching my mind for reasons to dismiss this book as vapid and shallow and a waste of paper. 

But I couldn’t.  I would actually recommend Sun Stand Still.  Let me take you through my journey with this book.

Why I thought it would be stupid

I thought this book would be stupid for a few reasons:

The cover and title.  I know you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover but this one looks like just another “name it and claim it” book.  SUN STAND STILL is there in big bold letters.  The subtitle is “What Happens When You Dare to Ask God for the Impossible.”  It sounds like empty jargon.

The author – Furtick did not impress me with some of the videos of his I saw on YouTube.  He struck me as a pastor with a lot of personality and an ability to speak well but without much depth.  I’d dismissed him as yet another guy who had faith a mile wide but an inch deep.  Also, he has a faux-hawk, soul patch, and smarmy expression on his press picture. Just look at him!

The endorsements.  Without getting specific a few of the names I saw endorsing the book made me think I knew what I was getting into.  A couple names made me give it a chance – like Andy Stanley and…okay, nevermind, just one name impressed me.

I have a strong antipathy for stuff I think is jivey.  For reasons that are almost certainly explicable by my nerdy background and pride I don’t like it when people coin terms like “Sun Stand Still Prayers” or “Page 23 Vision” or whatever else. 

The described purpose of the book, as described by Furtick on the back cover and first chapter: “In short, I’m out to activate your audacious faith.  To inspire you to ask God for the impossible.  And in the process, to reconnect you with your God-sized purpose and potential.”  When I read that, all I see is “blah, blah, blah, God wants you to achieve your dreams, blah, blah, blah.”

When it comes down to it I am a pretty prideful person and my natural tendency if I don’t like something is to assume it is because that thing is flawed in some major way.

What I thought the book would be about (I was wrong)

The title of the book comes from a story in the book of Joshua about God making the sun stand still, extending the day so the Israelites could win a victory.  Furtick rightly points out that to even pray such a thing is a bit ridiculous, audacious, and requires a huge amount of faith in God.  I thought the book was going to be about how God wants us to accomplish big things and we want to accomplish big things and if we just have enough faith God will bless our faith and we’ll get what we want our of life.  Typical prosperity claptrap. 

Claptrap seriously just came to my mind first when I wrote that sentence.  I need to buy a rocking chair and sit on my front porch yelling at little kids.

What the book ended up being about

As I read through the book it became clear this was not what I was expecting, or even looking for it to be.  I don’t like being wrong so I kept trying to find things not to like about the book.  I kept looking for holes in his shallow theology.  But in the end, this is not a book about God helping you fulfill your dreams. 

It’s a book meant to show us that if we really believed the things we say about God (we meaning Christians) that our prayers would sound different and our lives would look different.  If I really believed what the Bible has to say, I would be a man of much greater faith.  Not faith in God’s ability to accomplish my dreams, but God’s ability to do stuff, period.  God’s ability to do major things in the world.  And His desire to do them.  And His desire to give us a role in what He’s doing. 

This book is a part of something bigger going on in my life: a realization that too often I do not live as if the theology I teach and believe and study is true.  I teach and preach with conviction that God can do anything and loves us and is involved in our lives, but more often than not my life has been marked by a lack of action that you’d think would follow if those things were true.  When it comes down to it, the actions in my life historically demonstrate, from where I stand, a lack of real faith in God for ridiculous things.  This is another post – but in this book Furtick most certainly does not build another shallow rah-rah-God wants you to accomplish your dreams book.  Instead he tries to bridge the gap that exists for many of us between our theology and our action.

One thing I wanted to cling to

So while there’s a lot I ended up liking despite myself, there was one part of the book that I still am a bit wary of.  At one point, Furtick writes that speaking the Word “activates” faith.  This is the same terminology used by Word-Faith preachers.  Those are people who basically teach that words are “containers” of faith, and if we “speak” something enough, it will come to be.  It’s a terrible perversion of what the Bible teaches that gives people a warped perspective on God, themselves, and their role in the world.  Furtick’s use of the same terminology got my spider sense tingling a bit but really the rest of the book is so on the right page with this stuff that in and of itself I can’t find fault with what Furtick wrote.  Beneath the surface, that section of the book has more in common with Tim Keller’s call for us to preach the gospel to ourselves than it does with Word-Faith’s call to use God as our genie.  So Furtick gets a pass from me.  I’m sure he’ll be relieved to hear it. 

How Furtick really won me over

Many of the issues I thought I’d have with the book centered around the expectation I had that I’d find a name-it-and-claim-it theology.  A theology that declares God wants good things for your life, and if you have enough faith and pray big enough prayers, God will give you what you want.  The focus is on you and what God can do for you.  The focus there is not on God.  This is what I expected to find with Sun Stand Still but it wasn’t there.  Instead, I found things like…

• A genuine focus on God.  One chapter is devoted to the idea that sacrifice is required.  God will cut away our selfish dreams and call us to give up things that we want now in order to fulfill His purposes later.  And this wasn’t lip service – Furtick really encourages people to pray prayers to pursue God, not our own selfish desires.  That’s not a small thing, that’s a big deal.
• The foundation of faith is God’s character.  Furtick spent time pointing out that the foundation we should have for our dreams and faith and prayers is God’s faithfulness.  He discusses a quote from A.W. Tozer, that “What comes to our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us…”  Our faith (or lack of it) is largely about our beliefs regarding God. 
• We don’t deserve anything. So much bad teaching is wrapped up in a belief that we really deserve awesome things!  Furtick devotes time to saying – you don’t want what you deserve.  We don’t deserve greatness; we deserve condemnation for our sins.  It is only by God’s grace that He lovingly interacts with us.
• Bad things still happen.  Chapter 13 is probably my favorite and the one that really convinced me Furtick was on a solid, Biblical track.  He acknowledges that sometimes “you pray your best, most honest, heartfelt prayers – and there is no answer.  Or the answer is no. Sometimes, even though your motives are pure, your desire is good, and your need is urgent, the breakthrough doesn’t come. The turnaround moment doesn’t occur.  The cancer spreads.  The finances get tighter.  The marriage feels more lonely.  The kids grow more distant” (p. 137).  That kind of honesty is really refreshing and gives Furtick so much more credibility as he talks about audacious faith.
• The process is the point.  Furtick ends the book with a few chapters pointing out the fact that we should “push while we pray” and that this faith is not about the end result of us getting what we want, it’s part of God’s process for refining us.

If you’re like me, reading this book might be a good thing.

So in the end – I think this could be a good book.  It’s not the best book in the world.  But I liked it much more than I thought it would, and it really was a message I needed it hear.  First, because it helped me realize that I need to be careful about dismissing people as shallow (or deep) based on my impressions of them or their ministry or whatever.  I need to really see what they say.  Second, the experience of reading the book and liking it anyway revealed there are depths to my pride I haven’t begun to plumb.  And finally, it is a Biblically sound book that encourages big faith for the right reasons.  I need more of that in my life.  You probably do too.

I was provided with an advance copy of this book by Multnomah Press in order to review it.  But everything I just said is still true.  The book is like nine bucks.  My integrity costs at least triple that.

4 Reasons Why Being a One-Upper is Bad for You

You know what a one-upper is.  It’s the guy who’s already done what you had so much fun doing yesterday.  It’s the girl who got three hours of sleep to your four hours of sleep.  It’s the person you’ve never surprised because they already knew that.  It’s the kid from elementary school who always told you about awesome things his parents did.  It’s the guy with stories of his amazing exploits that put yours to shame.  It’s the obnoxious twerp who criticizes your love of the salsa at a restaurant because he’s had real salsa.

We all know one-uppers.  Truth be told, we all catch ourselves doing it sometimes.

Penelope from SNL is the perfect example of a one-upper.  See her at traffic school, a dinner party with Peyton Manning, or at a tenant meeting. 

One of my favorite TV characters of all time – who is in fact not a character – is Ben “Coach” Wade from recent Survivor seasons, who dubbed himself “The Dragon Slayer.”  The dude was a classic one-upper.  He told all kinds of stories about how awesome he was.  He claimed to know “Chong-Ra,” a martial art so mysterious and rare you can’t Google it and you can only learn it straight from the practitioners in their secret location.  The best story was about the time he got caught in the Amazon by a tribe of murderous pygmies.  Every part of the story is awesome.  It begins with him being dropped off by a military helicopter and it gets better from there.  Just when you think it’s as outrageous as it’s going to get, he takes it up a notch.  You owe it to yourself to watch it.  Really, watch it.  You won’t be sorry.

Right now I’m tempted to make this an entire post about why Coach is awesome but I can’t get lost here. 

I’m teaching a communication class this summer and am currently working on a communication unit with my sophomores.  One of the first series of lessons has to do with being a good listener.  As I put together a list of listening tips, it occurred to me that aside from the things we usually associate with good listening, not one-upping is important.  In fact, I’ve come up with a few reasons why being a one-upper is bad for you.

1. Nobody will want to talk to you.

If, every time somebody says something, you’ve got something better or more important to say, they’re going to stop talking to you.  Or they’ll just tolerate talking to you because they don’t want to be a jerk.  If you always bring the topic of conversation back to you – whether it’s something you know, something you’ve done, how you feel – people will stop wanting to involve you in their conversations.  And if there’s one thing a one-upper wants, it’s the attention of others.  One-upping is a sure way to minimize the good attention you get.

2.  Nobody will believe you.

When you do get attention, people will have to wonder if what you’re saying is true.  Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that all the one-ups you have are legitimately true.  That is, every time you claim you knew something, or that you got less sleep, or that you’ve been there and done that – it’s true.  That doesn’t matter.  Nobody will believe you.  Consider it your burden to carry.  You have to live one of the most amazing lives ever, a life so simultaneously terrible and amazing, that nobody will believe it.  You’re like a real-life Cassandra, cursed to know the future but never believed.

3.  You won’t learn much.

When you one-up, you forego the opportunity to learn from others.  You either shut them down with your one-up so they stop talking, or you are so focused on yourself you can’t listen to what they have to say.  You may be wrong.  You may not have heard what they’re going to say.  You certainly haven’t heard it from their perspective.  You can learn so much from listening to what others have to say, even if you think you don’t need to.  One-upping lets your pride get in the way of learning.

4.  You’ll be miserable (or completely out of touch with reality).

When I think about the times I’ve one-upped (and there are plenty of examples in my life), it’s always been in an attempt to get approval or admiration.  It’s a prideful thing.  I want people to respect and admire me so I want to appear “in the know” or like I’m some kind of fount of knowledge.  So I one-up.  The problem is, one-upping has the opposite effect one-uppers intend.  Their goal is increased respect and admiration but all they get is eye-rolls and people distancing themselves.  This will either make the one-upper miserable because nobody respects them, or they will be out of touch with reality and believe people really do respect them.  Either way it’s a loss.

Think you have a one-upping problem?

You may be convinced that one-upping is bad but aren’t sure how to stop.  The key is to just pay attention to what you’re saying.  When you speak up and share something about yourself, or you compare your bad/good experiences to someone else’s – ask yourself “why did I just say that?”  Consider where your comment puts the focus on the conversation.  If it puts the focus on you chances are your contribution to the conversation was not appreciated. 

For most of my life I earned a reputation as a one-upper with regards to grammar and spelling. Whenever someone made an error in my presence they would know about it.  Of course I felt I was being gracious and saving them from embarrassing themselves – but in reality, nobody cared but pedantic nitpickers like me.  I finally realized it had earned me a reputation I didn’t want, and started to correct it by catching myself before I said things.  I now think before I speak.  Sometimes I don’t catch myself until it’s too late, and I still one-up in other ways, but I’m working on it.   

Where do you one-up?

If you want to consider the ways you might be a one-upper, consider the things you find vital to your identity.  Do you think you’re the funny one?  The smart one?  The adventurous one?  The technical one?  Whatever you base your identity on you will defend, and one-upping is one way to defend that. 

We all one-up at times because we all share the human condition of wanting to be loved and accepted.  If you try to find the things you base your sense of self-worth on, chances are you’ll find your area of greatest one-ups-manship and you can start to work on it.

How much do I need to be happy?

I’m sure this is a question we all ask ourselves.  How much money, how much stuff, do we need to be happy?  How nice does my car need to be?  My house?  How many extracurriculars do I need to be able to pay for?  How new does my phone need to be?  How nice do my clothes need to be?   In my case – how good can my computer be?  What kind of lifestyle do I need to live in order to be happy?

You may have heard that the answer of most of us is “a little bit more.”  That is, wherever we find ourselves we think that just a little bit more would make us happy.  If I just had a little more I could do X, Y, or Z that would enable me to get what I really want out of life.  X, Y, and Z could be good things – they could even be things you get for other people, or your kids.  But if I don’t get them, can I still be content?

The last time I read through Proverbs I noticed a couple verses I never had before.  They resonated with me and I honestly prayed they would be my own prayer:

“Two things I ask of you, O LORD;

do not refuse me before I die:

Keep falsehood and lies far from me;

give me neither poverty nor riches,

but give me only my daily bread.

Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you

and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’

Or I may become poor and steal,

and so dishonor the name of my God.”  - Prov. 30.7-9 (ESV)

I think I rather recklessly prayed that prayer a few months ago.  I read that and it sounded great.  The greatest tragedy in my life would not be having a crappy car.  It would be forgetting my Creator, forgetting why I’m here, living for myself and my satisfaction instead of spending my life for God’s kingdom. 

I want my daughters to grow up having more than I did as a kid.  That’s everyone’s dream.  I want them to grow up and not worry about whether or not Mommy and Daddy can pay the bills, to not think “I’d like to play that sport but we can’t afford it.”  But maybe there are worse things.

Those were the kinds of thoughts running through my head as I prayed the prayer found in these verses.  I’m finding the affirmative answer to that prayer more frightening and unsettling than I’d expected.  I’m not sure why – it’s pretty plain right there – just give me what I need for the day.  But as I consider my little girls who count on me to put food on the table, a roof over their head, clothes on their backs…it’s a much more unsettling proposition. 

How much do I need to be happy?  The answer must be “I only need God.”  The journey to getting there from where we are – or at least where I am – is a scary journey.  But it’s also the journey I must take.  The grip of consumerism and materialism is strong and they will not easily let us go.  And we will not easily let them go.  Our hearts need to change and that is a painful process.

A student’s view of my school

Teaching can often be a frustrating, thankless job.  Stuff like this is what keeps me coming back; here’s an excerpt from something a student wrote today about the impact our school has had on him (I’ve corrected spelling errors):

I have enjoyed these three months I have spent at [school].  I think this place is truly where I belong.  I understand I have motivation issues but I believe that these three months I have learned and grown more than I have at any other of my two high schools I attended.  I promise next year to overachieve and be that person.  I thought I was such a loser just a year ago.  Now I understand the importance of school and the great things that can come out of it.

This kid’s story is not unique.  I love being part of a place where we can help students to see themselves in new ways.  It can change everything for them. 

A person’s identity and self-concept have so much to do with what they decide to do with their lives and the choices they make.  If you can help someone to see themselves in a different light, to develop a new identity – you can change their world.  You can destroy it or you can help them realize it’s brighter than they ever imagined.

Why I didn’t mind spending two hours on something that’s “not my job”

This week we’ve been doing STAR testing at my school.  It is the battery of standardized tests used to measure how good a school and its teachers are.  I will eventually post a tirade of sorts on the many reasons STAR tests don’t really do what they're supposed to but that’s for another time.  This is a story about me realizing how much the old adage, “leadership is service,” is true.

Administering these tests is a bit of a bureaucratic nightmare.  Every student takes between two and five tests on different subjects.  Each subject has a number of different tests the student may take (different kinds of math, science, and history, for example).  You have to figure out who’s taking what test, where they’re taking it, get the right booklets and answer documents in the right spots, make sure the correct bubbles are filled in…there’s a lot to it. 

Tuesday was day two of the testing and most of our students had finished all their tests but we still had about sixty left.  Some had just one part of one test to do, others had three full tests.  Other students had no tests left.  We had to figure out how to schedule the next day.  What teachers would give tests?  What tests did students still have to take?  What was the best way to schedule the test takers?  What if they finished the tests before our brunch break – where do they go then?  What about the kids who don’t have any tests?  How can we schedule them so they are able to do fruitful work?  These questions and more presented themselves, and I found myself working with Wendy, the teacher who runs point on these things, to sort it all out.

We spent a little over two hours, along with one other teacher, sorting all this out.  Wendy is a real live teacher.  She has all the responsibilities a real live teacher does, but she’s taken it upon herself to organize the standardized testing process at our school.  This is a crazy amount of work that is usually done by administrators like Vice Principals – but we don’t have those at our school.  So Wendy volunteers to do it, and she does a great job.

There was no command or directive given to me and the other teacher that helped Wendy sort that stuff out.  We all had other things to do that weren’t getting done.  We were all frustrated and flummoxed (it is so awesome that I just used that word) by the process as we tried to sort through the spreadsheets, schedules, and test booklets.  But we did it – even though our boss never “told us to do it” and it wasn’t in our job description.  And I realized, somewhere towards the end, that a few things were true about this situation:

At no point in the process was I frustrated at other people for not doing it.

When I do things out of a sense of obligation or “I have to” or even frustration that “well someone has to do it,” that experience is almost always accompanied by some measure of frustration and annoyance.  I spend my time wondering what important things other people have to attend to that keeps them from helping.  I think of how awesome I am that I’m doing it and they’re not, and I hope they realize what a favor I’m doing them by bearing this burden for them.  None of these thoughts occurred to me. This is not because I’m a moral exemplar.  I noticed it because it's out of the ordinary. 

I was following a leader without her even asking me to.

A big part of the reason I wasn’t bugged was because I had the distinct sense that I was helping take some of the load off of Wendy – and it was my pleasure to do so.  But it wasn’t a charity thing.  She was leading the way – it was going to be done whether or not I helped – and I wanted to be a part of it.  She had cast no vision, she had recruited no volunteers – but I wanted to help because of who she is.  This helped me internalize something I’ve heard for years:

Leadership is influence and servanthood, not position and organizational power.

Wendy’s job title is “teacher,” just like most of us.  Ask anybody at our school and they will tell you Wendy loves them.  How do they know?  Not because she says it (although that is true).  It’s because she takes a genuine interest in people.  She asks about their life.  She shares her own.  She asks for ways to help.  She offers suggestions in a tactful way that makes it clear she only wants to be a blessing if you want her to.  She asks for your suggestions and input, making it clear that no matter where you land on the organizational power spectrum that she can learn something from you.  She volunteers to take work on her shoulders and happily does it.  She doesn’t guilt people into helping – she just makes it happen.

These are all the things a leader does.  Wendy would probably balk a little at being described as such, but I’m learning a lot about leadership by watching her example.  She could benefit from being more willing to ask others for help, but here’s the thing: if they don’t help she’s not bitter about it.

She’s built influence unconsciously through the way she shows care for others on a daily basis, and the way she pushes forward to get the job done.  This isn’t a deliberate effort on her part to build influence and be a leader – it’s just who she is.   

Leadership is the fruit of who you are.

Too often I think of leadership as a set of skills that allows me to build influence and accomplish goals.  That leads to insincere relationships and frustration when others don’t do what you want them to.  I see in Wendy something I aspire to: genuine care and investment in others.  She doesn’t do it thinking it makes her a good leader.  She never read a book that says the real way to gain influence with people is to show that you care.  It’s just who she is.  The fruit of that is people sacrificing to serve with her – and honestly to serve her a little bit.  I think STAR tests are stupid and I don’t believe in them, but because I believe in Wendy I was willing to do it.

Why I love my job: my students

I love my job.  I tell my students every day that I love it and they know I mean it.  I’m not just talking about being a teacher here – I’m talking about my particular teaching position at my particular school.  I’m not just grateful to have a job that pays the bills – although if I did I would be.  I don’t have to drag myself to work every day knowing that I’m sacrificing for my family.  Last week I had Spring Break and I was out sick the last three days of the previous week; today is my first day back and I was happy to get up early this morning and head to work.

Why? 

I love my students.

I teach English and History at a continuation high school.  This is the school where students get sent when they fall behind in credits.  That happens for all kinds of reasons, from the death of a parent to spending their time engaging in gang activity to just cutting school because they’d rather smoke weed all day.  Usually the “presenting” problem (whatever the apparent issue that led to them falling behind in credits) isn’t the real problem either.

These kids arrive at our school in very real danger of not graduating.  They often have very little academic resilience – that is, they have become accustomed to failing in school so when they hit bumps or face challenges their first response is often to give up.  They have very little confidence in their abilities, and they’re used to being told how much they suck at school and at life.  This makes it a challenge to get many of them to produce work in the first place (especially writing!) or to listen to constructive criticism of their work (a teacher’s job).  But I love it.

I love seeing a student realize they are more capable than they realize.  I love seeing a student overcome the internal hurdles and give themselves a chance to succeed.  So much of my job comes down to helping my students reshape their identity; to stop seeing themselves as failures or “bad students” or people who just won’t graduate into students that can be free to choose to do what they want, people who can succeed.  It’s a difficult process – but I do it with such an amazing team.  But that’s another post.

I wish I could tell you some of the specifics of these kids.  The obstacles so many of these kids face – from families that get them into gangs to the unexpected death of a parent to neglectful parents to having to work to pay the family’s bills and more – would blow your mind.  Continuation schools have a reputation as the schools where the “bad kids” go.  Honestly, though, after spending time here and at a traditional school site, I hope I get to work at this school for the rest of my teaching career. 

I want a room full of kids who are in danger of not graduating.  I want a room full of kids who have never had a positive interaction with a male authority figure.  I want a room full of kids who have been beaten down by their education so they no longer believe in themselves or that education matters.  I want a room full of kids who don’t know how to write a paragraph even though they’re about to graduate high school.  I want these kids because all the things I believe about education and teaching – that it can reshape your self-concept in amazing ways, that it can make you free, that it’s about awakening you and allowing you to express who you are – I see these things every day with my students.

Yes I deal with kids texting and being high and I’ve learned more about gang culture than I ever thought I would – but I love my job and I love my kids.  I get the opportunity every day to make a real difference, both relationally and educationally, in the lives of the students who walk into my classroom.  Some of them I only get to know for a couple of weeks before they’re moved out, others I’ve known the entire (almost) two years I’ve been there.  There are many reasons I love where I work but the kids are the biggest.   

I feel absolutely blessed to be in the position I’m in.  I get to serve students that really need it, I get to be a part of reshaping their identities and giving them a real shot at an education.  Every day when I go to work I don’t have to wonder if I’m doing something meaningful with my life.  I get to work in a public school, get paid enough to pay the bills, and spend my time and energy helping students see more in themselves and the world than they did before. 

Ode to the Cone

The McDonald’s Vanilla Cone is a thing of beauty.  I spent most of my life blind to its glory but in the last few years I have come to see the creamy light.  You’ve got to understand how amazing this thing is.

First, it’s cheap.  Around a buck.  Most places it’s crept up to $1.09 but it’s still good. 

Second, it’s tasty.  There are plenty of cheap things that taste like crap.  But the McDonald’s Vanilla Cone is different.  They are consistently delicious and refreshing.  What’s better than a soft serve cone on a hot day?  Or a warm day?  Or a cold day?

Third, it’s relatively low calorie, clocking in somewhere around 150.  That will of course be higher or lower depending on how generous the staff are but that’s not bad.

Fourth, you can get it really fast.  They’ve usually got the cone waiting for you by the time you roll up to the second window.

Fifth, it’s small enough to where you can finish it before you get home and you don’t have to explain to the kids why Daddy gets ice cream and they don’t.

Yes, the McDonald’s Vanilla Cone is a wonderful thing.  You should get one.

This post was not sponsored by McDonald’s, but it should have been.

Book Review: Radical Together

I was fortunate enough to get an early review copy of Radical Together, a sequel of sorts to Radical.  I offered my thoughts on Radical just a few days ago and many of my thoughts apply to both of these books.  As with the first I absolutely recommend this book.  Platt is a young pastor at 32 and hopefully has many years ahead of him as a prolific writer, because I love what he has to write.  Radical Together avoids many of the sins of typical Christian books and has many strengths.  In this review I’ll hit a few of the things that stuck out to me.

The book is short – coming in at 120 pages from Introduction to Conclusion.  The end has a lot of great discussion material and questions for small groups based on each of the six chapters.  The book is very readable.  I read it this afternoon between taking care of kids and straightening the house.  Don’t mistake its easy readability for a lack of depth; in fact I believe that’s one of this book’s strengths.

Depth and great delivery

This book has theological and biblical depth.  It’s not shallow and is clearly informed by a broad understanding and application of Scripture.  Whereas some books take one verse and twist and torture it until they get a book’s worth of their vapid thoughts down flimsily masquerading as Biblical truth, it’s clear Platt’s reflections are the result of much study, prayer, and living as a Christ-follower.  He isn’t interested in easy answers or asking questions just to sound profound.  Platt is on the journey of trying to follow Jesus for real in America.  That carries some questions and difficulties with it – and he addresses them not with a simple sense of guilt or emotional volunteerism.  He understands that the gospel is at the core of what it means to be a Christian – and that needs to show up in all we do.  Radical focused on the lives of individuals, and Radical Together explores how the gospel can and should impact the life of the local church.

Questions every church should be asking

Platt’s purpose for this book is to get every church asking “How can we in the church best unleash the people of God in the Spirit of God with the Word of God for the glory of God in the world?” (p.3)  In working through this question Platt offers six ideas – the topics of each chapter.  They are:

1. One of the worst enemies of Christians can be good things in the church.
2. The gospel that saves us from work saves us to work.
3. The Word does the work.
4. Building the right church depends on using all the wrong people.
5. We are living – and longing – for the end of the world.
6. We are selfless followers of a self-centered God.

Some of those ideas are worded provocatively but I assure you there’s actual meaning to them.  As he explores these ideas Platt builds a biblical case for challenging the church and he does it with equal measures of irenic grace and brutal honesty.

A simple church, focused on the right thing

Platt questions many of the things that are taken for granted in American Evangelicalism.  He doesn’t do it in a pot-stirring, rabble-rousing, I’m-just-asking-questions-and-being-contrary-but-don’t-really-have-anything-to-offer kind of way.  Instead Platt shares his own journey as someone asked by a rich megachurch to be the pastor:

To be honest, I hate budget season.  As a pastor, I believe that is when the church comes face to face with how prone we are to give our resources to good things while ignoring great need.  Christians in North America give, on average, 2.5 percent of their income to their church.  Out of that 2.5 percent, churches in North America will give 2 percent of their budgeted monies to needs overseas.  In other words, for every hundred dollars a North American Christian earns, he will give five cents through the church to a world with urgent spiritual and physical needs.  This does not make sense. (p.16)

As a result of that process, Platt’s church actually downsized its ministry budgets, cancelled some planned property improvements, and drained a large savings account to provide money for ministries around the world.   This isn’t shared in a self-aggrandizing way – Platt is simply sharing how this journey has played out at his church. 

As I read this book I was reminded of a book I read a few years ago, Simple Church.  The general idea was that for churches to really build disciples they need to focus on disciple-making and cut out a lot of programs that may be “good” but ultimately distract from the main purpose of the church.  Platt takes the idea a bit farther, though, and I think in the right direction.

Spend less time at church

Platt states gracefully, biblically, and effectively what I amateurishly fumbled at in an old blog post.  Many churches would be better off if more of their people spent less time attending and maintaining church programs, and more time bring the gospel into their contexts.  One thing they did was outsource their VBS to individual homes, so instead of inviting lots of people from the community to come to the church campus for a gigantic program, the church equipped families to host VBS-like programs in their communities.  These allowed them to build real relationships with the people in their neighborhoods, gave these individuals the responsibility and privilege of making disciples and spreading the gospel – and did it more effectively than yet another program at the church would have.  That’s not to say a VBS at the church would be bad per se – but Platt is happy his church “decided to stop planning, creating, and managing outreach programs and [started] unleashing people to maximize the ministry opportunities God had already planned and created for them” (p. 66).

You’ve got to read this book

As with Radical, I can’t recommend this book enough to anybody who considers themselves a follower of Christ.  It is a fantastic addendum to Radical and the logical followup  I am excited for my wife Janelle to read this so the two of us can discuss the implications for our own lives.  In it are many of the ideas she and I have spent so long talking about.  This book lays out clearly some of the very things that led me to leave a career in ministry. 

You owe it to yourself to read this book.  But be warned; it will force you to face some of the questions and doubts you try to avoid when you feel them bubbling up.  It will give a loud voice to that quiet one inside you that wonders if there’s something more to being a Christian than going to a great church, being a part of a Bible study, tithing, and sponsoring a Compassion Child.  And it may be the voice that takes your Christianity from a frustrating hobby to a radical lifestyle.

I was provided with an advance copy of this book by Multnomah Press in order to review it.  But everything I just said is still true.  The book is like nine bucks.  My integrity costs at least triple that.

Is honor really admirable?

I’ve always been one for the tragic hero.  As I grew up I enjoyed reading stories about the valiant man who bravely died due to this or that.  I remember reading the Dragonlance Chronicles novels (a rite of passage for any true gamer geek) as a kid and being drawn to Sturm Brightblade.  Sturm was a member of a disgraced order of knights; they were once respected but had fallen into shame and disrespect.  Sturm clung to his honor and the honor of this order, and eventually got himself killed by standing on the battlements of a castle challenging a dragon he really had no prayer at all of beating.  (According to the story, Sturm’s stand against the dragon allowed his friends to escape and defeat an enemy army but I was never sure how that worked…it would take the dragon two seconds to kill him.)  Honor was a huge part of Sturm’s character and it was an ideal I looked up to as a child.

My favorite heroes were always those who would do anything to preserve honor; as time went on this didn’t change but my view of honor began to.  Red Branch, one of my all-time favorite novels, is about Cuchulain, the Hound of Ulster in Irish myth.  There’s a portion near the end where Cuchulain is obligated by honor to engage in single combat to the death against his best friend.  Here’s part of it:

There is no way out for either of us, Cuchulain thought bitterly.  Sencha the brehon had once taught him, convinced him: Honor is the treasure no one can take from you; honor is the shield no one can penetrate unless you let him.  Now, honor had brought the two of them to an icy river on a bitterly cold day to try to kill each other for something neither could touch or taste or hold in his hands.  Honor has somehow failed us, Cuchulain thought, wishing he had time to puzzle it through.  But there was no time left.

What was the ideal of honor I was so admiring?  It was this sense of dignity that no one could take from you.  It was demanding respect from others.  It was others knowing if they insulted you, they would have to apologize or pay the price.  It was never letting weakness show.  

It was stupid.

I think I admired this so much in my heroes because I grew up getting made fun of and disrespected and never did much standing up for myself.  I was walked over all the time but never did anything about it.  My heroes had the strength I didn’t.  The strength to make someone pay if they impugned you or something you loved.  The strength to demand respect and homage from others.  As I grew up I realized my impression of honor was entirely immature and selfish.  Honor was about me (or the hero, me by extension) getting the respect and admiration of others.  It wasn’t about the defense of others, the upholding of something else that is truly noble – it was about getting people to like me.

In this sense of the word honor, the sense of the word I admired most of my life, honor is just another name for human pride and ego.  We build fortresses around our pet causes, construct monuments to ourselves, and call them honor.  True honor is something greater than a man refusing to be insulted.  It is a man being insulted and refusing to exact revenge.  It is too easy for us to use concepts like honor and justice to achieve whatever ends we want and try to increase our standing in the eyes of others.

The truly honorable man is the one who is able to move beyond the perception of others have of him and his honor, and do what is right.  I would be hard pressed to think of a situation where the right thing to do would be “demand satisfaction” (read that would a southern accent, please) from someone who has wounded my pride or made me look foolish in front of others.  I can’t praise the ending my life or someone else’s for the sake of admiration and respect.  Admiration, respect, and honor (for an individual) should be the byproduct of their taking admirable, respectable, and honorable actions.  Honor should not be the goal, or it is simple self-indulgence, ego, and pride.

I constantly have to check my motivations.  I get way too much validation from the compliments of others.  I pray regularly for God to rid me of the sin of pride, the desire to be liked and respected by others, and for the heart not concerned with my own honor or recognition.  It’s going to be a life long process.  But as someone way smarter than me has said, it’s more important to focus on being honorable than being honored.

Book Thoughts: Radical by David Platt

I bought Radical: Taking Back Your Faith From the American Dream as a birthday present for Janelle in February and have heard a few people mention how good of a book it is.  A couple days ago a friend e-mailed me specifically to recommend the book to me; that was the final push to get me to finally read it.  I’m glad I did.

Radical was a quick read – I read it in a few sittings over the course of a couple days, between taking care of kids.  That doesn’t mean it’s shallow; it’s just readable.  The title and subtitle do a pretty good job of explaining what the book is about: the tension between following Jesus and pursuing the American Dream.  It’s a tension that should be familiar to any Christian or anybody that tries to take Jesus’ words seriously.  Platt describes it like this:

We look back on slave-owning churchgoers of 150 years ago and ask, “How could they have treated their fellow human beings that way?”  I wonder if followers of Christ 150 years from now will look back at Christians in America today and ask, “How could they live in such big houses?  How could they drive such nice cars and wear such nice clothes?  How could they live in such affluence while thousands of children were dying because they didn’t have food and water?  How could they go on with their lives as though billions of poor didn’t even exist?”    (p. 111)

This isn’t simple hand-wringing and guilt.  It’s an honest reflection from someone trying to take Jesus’ commands seriously.  Someone trying to read the story of the Rich Young Ruler, or the Rich Man and Lazarus, or Jesus’ commands to care for the poor, and not just turn them into meaningless platitudes but honestly live them out.  How do we do it?

These are questions that have run through my mind for years.  When I read something like the Rich Young Ruler, where Jesus tells a man to sell all his possessions and give them to the poor, I wonder what I’m supposed to do with that.  I have looked at my life and seriously wondered if I am living out the commands of Jesus for real, or if I’m just picking the commands I’m comfortable following.  The area where this hits me the hardest is when I consider how I do or do not care for the poor, the orphans, the people on the fringes of society.  Platt sees this as well:

So what is the difference between someone who willfully indulges in sexual pleasures while ignoring the Bible on moral purity and someone who willfully indulges in the selfish pursuit of more material possessions while ignoring the Bible on caring for the poor?  The difference is that one involves a social taboo in the church and the other involves the social norm in the church. (p. 111)

I know Jesus didn’t just put those commands in there so I would feel guilty; He wants me to do something about it.  But what?

Radical is a good discussion of questions like that.  There are challenging stories from church history (a good reminder of what I first heard from John Piper – the importance of reading Christian biography), honest confessions from Platt’s own life, strikingly straight identification of many of the ways Christians today dismiss the commands of Christ – and perhaps best of all, a call to action at the end.

If I have one complaint (I have more than that) about most “Christian living” books, it’s that they’re mostly fluff that you feel good while reading (until you become black-hearted and cynical like me) but in the end don’t effect much change.  What I like about this book is that the final chapter provides a challenge in the form of the “Radical Experiment.”  Readers are encouraged to do five things.  These are not five prescriptive steps to turn you into a better Christian, or to make your life complete; they’re five things to help you along the journey as you work through what this stuff means for you.

Janelle and I have had some major stuff going on in our hearts and this book resonates with a lot of that.  As I read the book I didn’t really hear anything new per se, but it did help to hear some of the same questions I’ve been asking myself asked by someone else, and to see how they’re working through them.  So in the end I recommend if you’re a Christian you read this book.  If you’ve been dealing with some of the same questions, or even a vague uneasiness, as you read through some of the passages of Scripture I mentioned, this should help you along your journey.  And if you haven’t thought about or dealt with any of this stuff – you need to, and this book will help wake you up.

Blogs I read

A friend recently asked me to share some of the blogs I read.  I have a nice Google Reader setup with several RSS subscriptions.  I usually scan the headlines and read posts that stick out to me.  There are some blogs, however, that I read every post from. 

Usually the reason is that I actually know the person in real life and therefore care what they write.  Other times it’s because I’ve found what they write to be useful and/or interesting enough to start reading.  Anyway – I’ll share a few of the blogs that are currently in my RSS feed:

• I Will Teach You To Be Rich – Despite the title it’s a great blog by a really sharp guy.  The posts have a lot to do with personal finance but Ramit Sethi (the author) focuses a lot on psychology and behavior as well.  Usually really interesting and/or useful stuff.
• Matt Maiocco’s 49ers Blog – Not your typical sports reporter – Maiocco has top notch stuff on the 49ers and he’s the only beat writer I make it a point to read.
• Lifehacker – Several posts daily relating to all kinds of things that could make your life easier.
• Art of Manliness – Just what it sounds like.  Interesting articles that profile particular men, deal with skills associated with men, etc.  Useful for women too, of course.
• Consumerism Commentary – Personal Finance.
• Cake, Batter, and Bowl – Cooking/baking/recipes.
• Get Rich Slowly – Frugality, saving/investing, etc.
• GTD Times – Official blog of “Getting Things Done” guru David Allen.
• You Are Not So Smart – A blog about the foibles of our brains.

I also read pretty much every post from the blogs I have linked on my right sidebar – the blogs of friends of mine.

I would love to check out any recommendations you have for me on blogs you think I should be reading.

Lincoln's Fart Joke

It may surprise you to learn that Abraham Lincoln, widely regarded as one of the best, if not the best, Presidents in American History, was a big fan of crude humor. He was also apparently a good storyteller - it was said he "could make a cat laugh." I heard this joke of his re-told today and it brought me to tears. Apparently it's not close to the crudest he told (one contemporary referred to him as "possibly the most obscene individual ever"), but it is, in my estimation, gut-bustingly hilarious:

There was a party once, not far from Springfield, and among the crowd was one of those men who had audacity. Cheeky, quick-witted, never off guard on any occasion. The audacious man, chosen to be the carver of the turkey at the dinner table, whetted his great carving knife and got down to business carving the bird. The man of audacity expended too much force and let a fart, a loud fart, so that all the people heard it distinctly. It shocked all.

A deep silence reigned.

However, the audacious man was entirely self-possessed. He pulled off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, spat on his hands, whetted the carving knife again, never cracking a smile or moving a muscle on his face. It became a wonder in the minds of all the men and women how the fellow was to get out of his dilemma. He squared himself and said loudly and distinctly, “Now, by God, I’ll see if I can’t cut up this turkey without farting!”

If you don't think that's funny I really don't know what to tell you. And if you don't think I'm going to share this joke with every single history class I teach from now on you don't know me very well.

A missed opportunity

This past weekend at South Bay, Filipe preached on three perspective shifts regarding service and serving others that should come when we seek to follow Christ.  One of these shifts was that when we look at the need, see the opportunity.  That is, the existence of a need is an opportunity for us to do something about it and in so doing bring more glory to God. 

In making this point, Filipe shared about a time when he felt it very strongly impressed upon him that he should offer an obviously inebriated man a ride.  This man was ambling around in circles in a dark parking lot by himself.  At first Filipe drove past and tried to suppress the feeling for reasons that should be familiar to all of us.  Upon reaching the end of the street he couldn’t suppress it any more and turned around to go offer the man a ride.  It turned out the man was so lonely he’d gotten drunk so he could screw up the courage to kill himself, and as he walked in circles in that parking lot he was trying to figure out how to do it.  But because Filipe took the opportunity, that man’s night went very differently.

As Filipe told the story it clearly reminded me of a similar experience I had in college.  I’d stopped at a 7-11 to get a coffee (I was desperate for coffee) on my way up to campus, and outside there was what looked like a homeless woman.  I did my best to avoid eye contact as I went in and got my coffee, but as I served the coffee up for myself I had this strong sense that I should go ask the woman if I could get her anything. 

It’s hard to describe this “sense” I’m talking about or exactly what it felt like.  I’d say the thought entered my mind but that doesn’t capture it.  I’d say I felt a compulsion in my heart but it was more distinct than that.  Whatever it was exactly, it’s clear to me now and was even clear at the time that it was something God wanted me to do.  He wanted me to speak to that woman like a human being and offer her at least a cup of coffee – something that I could more than spare the dollar-fifty for.

I suppressed this feeling for two main reasons.  First, I didn’t know how she would react and I was scared of it.  Second, I convinced myself I needed to hurry to get to campus.  Both of those were crap but it’s how I justified my inaction.

I steeled my nerves against the compassionate impulses, paid for my coffee, and marched back to my car with my head down.  My heart was pounding at this point and it’s one of the few distinct times in my life I had the strong sense that I was directly choosing disobedience to a clear command of God.  I sin regularly but it doesn’t always hit my heart so strongly.  I sat in the car for a moment, started it up, and continued on my way up Harder Road to campus.

I hit a red light right away and sat there thinking about what I was (not) doing.  After a few blocks of driving I couldn’t stand it anymore and turned around to see if the woman was still there.  When I got back to the 7-11, not more than seven minutes after I left, the woman was nowhere to be seen.  I’d missed the opportunity.  I felt like a failure.  Probably because I was. 

Who knows what difference, if any, my interaction would’ve had on that woman’s life.  That wasn’t really the issue though.  The issue was: do I care more about my discomfort and time or do I care more about obeying God and extending His love and grace to others? 

At that point the answer was the former.  I hope and pray that as time goes by and I grow, the answer will more commonly be the latter.  Thank God that He works with me through my ridiculous selfishness.

Read this: Fahrenheit 451

I’m reading Fahrenheit 451 with my seniors and I think Ray Bradbury might be some kind of wizard.  This is one of those books you very well may have been assigned in high school but didn’t bother reading.  If that’s you, you did exactly what Bradbury thought you would.  You are who he thought you were.

Fahrenheit takes place in a dystopian future where firemen burn books and the houses that hold them.  The story follows a fireman, Guy Montag, as he begins to wake up to the reality around him.  He realizes his profound dissatisfaction with life after he meets a girl so strange so goes on hikes and has conversations with her family. 

Bradbury wrote this book in the early 1950’s and he meant it not as a warning about government censorship (books are outlawed) but rather as a warning against technology and the impact he feared it would have on society.  Here are just a few of the things that are true of Bradbury’s world:

• The prefer being entertained to paying attention to what’s going on.
• They are fat and happy so they don’t care about the world around them.
• Their government gets involved in wars but the people pay more attention to their TV shows.
• People are constantly plugged in to technology – TV, music, movies – so they don’t engage in real relationships or talk to one another.
• Suicide attempts are commonplace.
• The society is incredibly violent – young people kill each other and people smash things for fun.
• School is about filling students with facts and true thinking is discouraged.
• People make stupid statements about politics when they don’t really know what they’re talking about.
• People mask their unhappiness and dissatisfaction with sex, drugs, and having “fun.”
• People don’t want to read because they’d rather watch TV or be entertained.
• People don’t understand the point of learning something if you don’t need it to do your job.
• Headlines and sound bytes are more important than thoughtful analysis.

I could list specifics along with all those bullet points from the book, and I could link to stories from today’s news alone that show how those very same things are true of us, but I don’t think I need to.  You’d think I was simply railing against the world in 2011, but I’m describing the world of Fahrenheit. 

Here’s one quote, where Beatty, the fire captain, explains society’s descent:

If you don’t want a man unhappy politically, don’t give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, topheavy, and tax-mad, beter it be all those than that people worry over it.  Peace, Montag.  Give the people contests that they win by remembering capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year.  Cram them full of noncombustible data, chock them so damned full of ‘facts’ they feel stuffed, but absolutely ‘brilliant’ with information.  Then they’ll feel they’re thinking, they’ll get a sense of motion without moving.  And they’ll be happy, because facts of that sort don’t change. Don’t give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with.  That way lies melancholy.  Any man who can take a TV wall apart and put it back together again, and most men can, nowadays, is happier than any man who tries to slide-rule, measure, and equate the universe, which just won’t be measured or equated without making man feel bestial and lonely.  I know, I’ve tried it; to hell with it.  So bring on your clubs and parties, your acrobats and magicians, your daredevils, jet cars, motorcycle helicopters, your sex and heroin, more of everything to do with automatic reflex.  If the drama is bad, if the film says nothing, if the play is hollow, sting me with theremin, loudly. I’ll think I’m responding to the play, when it’s only a tactile reaction to vibration.  But I don’t care.  I just like solid entertainment.

I seriously just want to quote the whole book.  It’s fantastic.  You should read it.  And you should wonder, like me, if Ray Bradbury is some kind of magical wizard, because he seriously called it.

What does God want you to do?

How do you make decisions?  If you’re a Christian, chances are you want to make the decisions God wants you to make (or at least that’s what you want to want to do).  But how do you figure out what God wants you to do?

Toward the end of Acts, the Apostle Paul begins to be compelled by the Holy Spirit that he should go to Jerusalem (Acts 20.22).  He’s warned by others that he shouldn’t go because it will be dangerous.  One man even appears to have a prophetic vision on the issue:

[10] While we were staying for many days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. [11] And coming to us, he took Paul's belt and bound his own feet and hands and said, “Thus says the Holy Spirit, ‘This is how the Jews at Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.’” [12] When we heard this, we and the people there urged him not to go up to Jerusalem. (Acts 21:10-12 ESV)

I read this the other day and a few things occurred to me:

What God wants will not always make sense to others.

I don’t know about you but if I were trying to make a decision and every follower of Jesus I knew was trying to dissuade me, saying I’d get hurt, and another said they had a word directly from God saying I’d be tied up…aside from my natural skepticism and stubbornness, it’s probably a safe bet I’d take that as a way out. 

What God wants will not always line up with my comfort (or even safety).

God specifically wanted Paul to go to Jerusalem (and then Rome) to bring the gospel to the Gentiles.  It wasn’t Paul’s foolhardiness that got him there, it was God’s direction.  How often do I assume that if something is dangerous it must not be something God wants out of me?  Seriously – if someone were to tell me, and I actually believed them – that if I were to take Action X I would suffer imprisonment, I might very well take that as evidence it’s not what God wants me to do.  But here clearly in Scripture we see the opposite.

What God wants will not always give me a peaceful, easy feeling.

One common way Christians try to decipher God’s will for their life is to pray about something and if they “feel a peace” about it then it’s God giving them the go ahead.  It’s probably a safe bet that Paul has some wrestling going on inside himself over this decision.  Sometimes doing the right thing means moving forward despite an uneasy, uncertain feeling.  Relying on your feelings to dictate the will of God is a path that will probably more often than not lead you down a path of your own choosing.

Many Christians struggle mightily to decide whether God wants them to go to the left or to the right with regard to a certain decision.  Are they interpreting His will correctly?  Are they missing something He’s trying to tell them?  What happens if they make the wrong decision?  Are they then “out of God’s will” for their life?  It’s almost as if God hides His will for us like an Easter Egg and we have to jump through various hoops and learn various skills to properly “listen” to what God has to say, and if we don’t we’ll miss it.

I have much to say on this topic but here’s something to consider (not my idea, I first heard it from Greg Koukl and I’m sure he got it somewhere too): If God is speaking to you, you can’t miss it; if He isn’t, there’s nothing to miss.

Do the best you can with the decisions in front of you.  Paul clearly felt compelled by the Spirit to go to Jerusalem and did so despite the many spiritual-sounding outs he could have taken.  I hope to one day be at the point where I can say, like Paul did when he declared his intention to go to Jerusalem despite the danger, that “I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish the course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.” (Acts 20:24, ESV)

When I can say that with all my heart and mean it, I don’t think I’ll have to worry about missing out on what God wants to do with my life. 

Grades destroyed my physics teacher.

“What grade do you want?” he asked, obviously frustrated.  “An A?  How about an A?  Everybody gets an A!” At this point he was furiously scribbling in his gradebook as that deep shade of crimson we’d grown familiar with crept across his face.  We would smile and giggle to ourselves as he muttered to himself angrily for the next several minutes.

We students looked forward to Mr. H’s freakouts, so long as we weren’t the specific targets, because they were fun to watch.  It was like sitting front row at a Jerry Springer taping.  He’d storm back and forth, mutter under his breath, alternate between yelling and seething explanation, tear off his shirt in a rage…well, all but the last at least.  You were never quite sure what was going to set him off, but I eventually noticed a common theme.

Mr. H wanted nothing more than to awaken a love for science in his students.  He really seemed like a good guy to me.  He had a good sense of humor and while he was a bit unpredictable he always encouraged legitimate questions.  He had fun doing demonstrations for us and encouraged inquiry.  I once got in an argument with a friend over how many atoms there were in the universe total (more or less than a googol…do not judge me) and he gave us some guidance on the issue.  He possessed many of the qualities you’d like to see in a teacher.  Grades ruined him, however.  How?

Grades put the focus on the wrong thing.

Mr. H wanted us to do our experiments and accurately record the data we got, even if we ended up with messed up results.  He wanted us to really learn and understand the scientific method, not plug the correct answers into our notebooks so we could get points.  Most students, however, couldn’t give half a rip about the process.  We wanted our grades!  To get good grades we’d been taught you need to get the right answers, so that’s what we focused on.  Learning didn’t matter, grades did.

Now that I’m a teacher I ‘m able to more clearly see what Mr. H’s issue was.  I’m not in danger of freaking out on my students but I very quickly identified the focus students (and parents) have on grades.  In most cases all a student cares about is the grade they got.  If they write a paper all they want to do is look at the grade.  A high enough grade makes them happy and they ignore it, a low grade either makes them feel like a failure or get angry at the teacher for the injustice (usually both).

Students learn when they are able to focus on the work they did.  What did they do well?  What do they need to improve on?  What does a good piece of writing look like?  What broader understandings are there to glean from this assignment?  A student learns nothing from an A, B, C, D, or F on their paper.  But that’s what they so often want to see. 

One day Mr. H had a particularly magnificent meltdown and we never saw him again.  We had a sub the rest of the year – one who didn’t know physics.  So my honors physics class ended up trying to teach itself physics.  Many of us got good grades but I can guarantee there were plenty of kids that year who earned A’s in physics that didn’t really know squat about the science.  It sure would look good on our transcripts, though!

Focusing on grades as a student, teacher or parent is dangerous.  What matters more than GPA is that the student’s mind is being sharpened, they’re being awakened to things bigger than themselves, that their understanding of the content and skills is growing.  Sometimes grades reflect that, sometimes they don’t.  I know I will expect good grades from my kids – but when they bring home report cards I will understand what those grades do and do not represent.