Epic stories remind me of the EPIC STORY

I've spent the past few days watching Epic stories.  Two very different stories, and yet really quit the same when all is said and done.  First I watched Lonesome Dove with Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Duvall.  I think by far the best western I've ever seen, with two of my favorite cowboy actors.  Then tonight gathered with some friends watching the extended edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.  I must admit I fell asleep during part of it... but I did stick out most of it.  It's just Sunday night and I dozed off.  I plan to watch the extended version trilogy of LOTR over the next couple weeks.  It's been a while. 

Those stories move me because they are filled with struggle, victory, loss, evil, overcoming, and friendship.  Most of our stories are less dramatic, but every story seems to involve the same elements and so I'm reminded of the importance of perseverance in trial, the sweetness of overcoming, and the blessing of friendship along the way.

One of my favorite sequences in the Fellowship of the Ring is the dialogue between Gandalf and Frodo in the Mines of Moria when Frodo says, "I wish the ring had never come to me."  Gandalf's response is profound on the one hand, and so simple on the other.  No one wishes for these times, but in the end all we can do is what is before us.  I am encouraged to be faithful for the moment with the task before me... whether is seems big or small, significant or not.  All we have is this moment, and how we live it.  It seems like we miss a lot either hoping for this moment to pass... or expecting the next one to come.  I want to live present to the moment and faithful to the task at hand.

Faithful yet lacking...

I am always astonished when I read Hebrews Chapter 11 of the faithfulness of the people of God as they awaited the Messiah.  As anyone who has read the chapter knows it's called the faith chapter, but I want to remember what is really astonishing about the text.  The writer details the lives of so many men and women who lived by faith... but then in the final two verses we're reminded... "They all lived by faith without receiving the promise."

They worked hard and well... and never got a paycheck...

They did the right thing... and it never paid off in any material, practical terms in the here and now of their lives...

They stayed the course... and never reached the destination...

Personality styles have been likened to the parts of a sailboat... keel, tiller, sail... ballast.  In this picture my personality is a sail.  It's a critical piece of the sailboat, without which the boat will never catch the wind and get anywhere... however... without a keel and rudder it will go whichever way the wind blows it.  Though there is a sense in which I feel directed, and I have those around me who are the tillers, keels, and... should I say it, anchors, I still  live by the vision of the moment at times.  What is capturing my attention right now is what tends to give me energy and focus.  It makes me appreciate the people who lived faithful lives for their whole lives thinking they might see the promised reward, but never did.  The text says they were persecuted in horrible ways... but stayed the course.  Give me that heart and spirit, and stamina!

It's such an interesting list of people... God is not squeamish about those who are faithful.  I think my favorite in the text is Rahab... she shows up in Jesus genealogy too... amazing who He uses when they are focused on His purpose and plan, even when they never see the reward.

The destination is the journey!

For Chris...

 How about these Chris!  Pictures of your co-teacher, partner in crime and his microwave "Loaded Potato Soup!"  His life skills class is doing a section on cooking, which the boys love anyway!

Geometry is a struggle to get done as homework... but he was fired up to do this homework.  Maybe he has a career ahead of him!

It was quite good! 

All the world's a stage?

The question surging through my mind for the past few days has been, "If all the world's the a stage, and history, in contrast to a string of random events, is a play that God is writing and directing, then what role is He asking me to play?"

I've been enjoying the book by Robert Webber, Ancient-Future Worship, and he makes the following statement, "I once understood the gospel as God asking me to let him into my narrative, to find room for him in my heart and life. But now I realize that God bids me to find my place in his narrative." This is challenging me in at least two ways. First, this concept takes me out of my self-centered view of the world and gives me a theocentric world view. Second, it reminds me that God isn't asking me to be somebody else for Him... He's just asking me to be me for Him.

The first concept had been resonating with me before I picked up the book, and is repeated in other books that I've read, and seems to be on the hearts of others with whom I have community. Rick Warren says in his book, The Purpose Driven Church, that Saddleback (the church he founded) isn't the only thing that God is doing, but what God is doing at Saddleback, others shouldn't work to copy it. He likens it to surfing. You can teach someone to surf, and you can teach them to catch a wave, but you can't teach someone to make a wave, only God is in that business. Therefore we need to be watching for the waves he's making and then ride them. Henry Blackaby in Experiencing God suggests that we need to stop taking up great causes and then asking God to bless them, rather we need to see what God is doing and join Him! Both those ideas caught my attention five years ago or more. Webber is just reminding me again. It seems important to get hold of this idea because, frankly, if I view myself as the one directing the project then I get to take credit for it... I get the pats on the back. There is a significant degree of arrogance in Christianity, and I wonder if some of, or maybe a lot of, it isn't based in our own sense of the "great things we're doing for God" when we ought to be simply giving him glory for what he continues to do in and through us, frail and broken as we are - though made in His image and deeply valued by Him. Paul (the apostle that is) says, "And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong." (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 NASB).

The second concept just affirms the He has made me for something and will use me for that purpose if I'm willing. Many of us live in the shadows of others - I think wishing we could be like them, and do what they're doing. I suspect any one of us has been there, and perhaps will be again. This however challenges me to get back again to Him. He's made me for Himself, I'm His and He's purposeful. If all the actors on the stage play the same part not only is the story not compelling or enjoyable to watch... it just doesn't work.

Though there are times when the world, and its story, look like a random string of unrelated events, there are too many things in my own life, and in history in general, that point to a plot - there is a writer and director who knows all the parts and all the actors and how the plot turns out. I'm hoping to be attentive to my role which is not to be in charge, or play someone else's part.

"All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances..."
-Shakespeare

"... remember your baptism, pray in the spirit, flee to the Eucharist."

I've been reading a new book on Kindle of PC... Kindle for PC is an aside of course, but I have resisted the urge to get a Kindle. There's something about a book in your hands... touching it... smelling it... experiencing it with your physical senses as well as your mental faculties. In any case I thought to give it a try since I think it was free to download it from Amazon. I downloaded Ancient-Future Worship by Robert Webber. I'm nowhere near all the way through it, but so far it's been stimulating, challenging, and encouraging. It was the last book that Robert Webber penned before his death from pancreatic cancer. That alone, and the fact that he acknowledges that this will be "the last book before my death" make is worth the read. He died only a few weeks after the manuscript was finished.

I was struck by this ancient statement of worship in the book: "remember your baptism, pray in the Spirit, flee to the Eucharist." I cannot be sure why this trinity of thought so hit me in between the eyes like an ice pick to the brain, but it did, and it's been stirring me for a few days.

Remember your baptism... that moment at which by faith your old like passed away like so much chaff and the new life began. In the life of faith there are times when I forget that I've been made new; whether I feel like it or not. I think back to the fourth grade year, I guess I must have been 9 or 10. My grandma had been taking me to church - my parents didn't go to church in those days. When summer camp came up grandma encouraged me to go and so I did. It was a mixed bag at best - I loved it and hated it. Being away from home for a week for the first time I struggled with sleeping. Made a new friend, and got in trouble and got the privilege of cleaning the bathrooms. Tons of fun during the days, pretty girls, playing outside, swimming in the lake. When, inevitably, the end of the week came and the culmination of all the teaching and preaching and worshipping reached my soul I accepted the invitation to enter God's story... not that it was the first time my life intersected with its... but when I said I wanted to journey with Him. I knew so little of what that meant, and it seems at times I still remember little of it. And yet, it was for me an end and a beginning. The old had passed away - then new had come, and is still coming it seems sometimes in fits and jerks - but coming none the less. I have not taken much time to remember that time frankly, and Webber's words reminded me that at the right time and place I heard His invitation and took the fork in the road that has made all the difference. So whether life always works out in just the way I want - I can return to that moment in my mind and remember that God has made, and is making, me new. The job's not done... but it is well begun and he'll finish it!

Pray in the spirit... I find myself wanting to understand this statement. What does it mean? How does it work? I have done a bit of reading in the NT since reading this statement but realize that I may not knew exactly what it means, other than, as His Spirit is in me and I cry out to God His Spirit is leading me in that praying and drawing me near to the Father with the ancient cry of Abba. I doubt very seriously if this is some type of "charismatic" statement - though I'm sure some would like to put that spin on it. It's not that I run from that teaching... it's just unlikely to me. I want to recall the simplicity of the reality that when I call out to Him His Spirit is involved... needs more study... needs more experience. I'd love to hear your comments on it.

Flee to the Eucharist... I do not think that we have clearly understood in the evangelical church the importance of this, or other, sacraments. Outward and visible signs of inward and spiritual graces. To be sure the evangelical church is short on sacrament... but if only Marriage (which we've completely missed as sacrament), Baptism, and Eucharist then perhaps we're at least on some track of understanding. If a sacrament is an outward and visible sign of a real, not pretend, inward and spiritual grace, then something at Eucharist, Baptism, and Marriage, is actually happening on the inside when the rite is taking place on the outside. When we come to the Eucharist we experience afresh God's grace and presence in taking away our sin. It has been resolved once for all in Christ, but there is a need to return week in and week out to this experience of God's love and grace, and the one thing that keeps us connected to our Father, without regard to our ability to "measure up." We fight a continual battle to "measure up" in our daily experience with others - who for the most part only accept us as we act according to their, sometimes twisted, sense of what we should be up to. In the Eucharist we come again to the unconditional acceptance of our Father who embraces us as our hearts come pure - at least as pure as we can keep them - the sacrifice that He made for us in the person of His Son Jesus Christ... I really need that refreshing presence.

I need this constant reminder that the point of my journey with Him, the one who made me, is not that I have invited him "into my life" as a compartment, but that he has invited me to into His story with all my life. He's the one recreating me in Baptism... He's the one praying through and for me in the Spirit... He's the one who has done the work of saving me in the death of His son, who chose it fully, which comes to me powerfully in the Eucharist.

In the bleak mid-winter... thinking about Jimmy Fraser

Woke up this morning thinking about my friend Jimmy Fraser... I miss him. Not sure why the snow makes me think about him, except it came to mind how a couple times when we were building the Fraser house we couldn't get down the driveway because of the drifting snow. One time we got the "Ol' red ford pickup" so stuck we had to borrow a tractor and get it out and then spend three hours plowing snow so we could get material a quarter mile down the drive and into the house to work.

I also had to smile at Jimmy this morning because when I got to the church parking lot the City of ML... thank you so much... had plowed about a two foot high burm of snow into our driveway. I wasn't quite sure what to do... I thought about going home, but then I had another idea. I backed up across the street (four lanes) and just hit the gas and plowed through! Snow washed up over the hood and windshield of the car so that I couldn't see a thing! It was so much fun I did if two more times each way. It made me smile and think of Jimmy because he always laughed at me having a "Volvo". I love Volvo's. I started wanting a Volvo station wagon because I saw so many in Europe - and I have a distant relative in Sweden who works for Volvo. I don't think Jimmy would ever have owned a Volvo, but I know he enjoyed giving me a hard time about having one. When I got my second Volvo station wagon I think he considered me a bit of lost cause. He never saw me driving it without giving me a hard time about it. I actually half got the second one so Jimmy could give me a hard time about it! I think he would have loved me plowing through the burm into our parking lot with it. I could have bragged about it and he would have smiled and not said much... but he would have said something - of that I'm sure. The thing is, I'm just not sure you can really plow snow with a Ford Taurus... or a Buick La Sabre... but all day long in the Volvo!! I might just buy a plow for the front!

The thing is, Jimmy can't give me a hard time now... at least not that I can hear because he"s gone on into the hands of our Father... mine and his. Knowing that he's there and not somewhere else is helpful and a comfort... but it doesn't end how I miss seeing and talking to him here. My mom's there too... and Bill Stout... and Stella and Myrtle and Patrick Knesek... and many others. Sometime I'll be there too, unless the end of all things comes before this frail body gets ultimately tired and expires. I don't know if our presence with the Father between death and resurrection will be a waking presence or a restful sleep - and I don't really care either way. If it's a waking presence then I'm sure Jimmy is smiling now... if it's a restful sleep then he deserved it... he was a hard worker.

Whenever the first snow comes and blankets my world with a white covering I turn to the James Taylor version of "In the Bleak Midwinter." It's my favorite arrangement of that old hymn. I think winter is a perfect picture of death in so many ways. Everything is dormant and waiting for the Spring. Nothing is growing, blooming, or bearing fruit - but all creation is waiting during winter, preparing, gathering strength, and getting ready for a new season of growing - getting ready to Spring to new life when the warmth of the sun breaks out and thaws the winter, warms the ground, and the snow melts watering the dormant seeds in the ground causing them to burst forth into new life. I just can't help but think that God gives us winter so that we can look forward to Spring and remember that there will be a new day when the sun will shine and life will burst forth again.

The sun's coming... and the Son too... and someday, who knows how far away, the Son will burst forth and winter and death will be forever ended... in contrast to the days of Narnia when it was always winter and never Christmas we will live when and where it is always Christmas and never winter. If Christmas and Advent reminds us of nothing else I hope it reminds us that HE IS COMING!!

Who's coming? The Messiah - coming for His people; What's His Name? Jesus, Messiah, Emmanuel, God with us, Prince of Peace! What'll he be like? Shining, love, grace, mercy, peace, judgment, King! What's he coming to do? Save his people, rescue, give life, take away pain, suffering, death, weeping, and sorrow.



In the bleak midwinter? What a delightful reminder of the coming Spring.

Jesus is____________.

Study break in Kirkland... sitting in a Starbucks alone surrounded by people. I sometimes think I can be most alone when surrounded by people, I like it. The sights, sounds, smells, uniqueness of people - God is so creative that sometimes it just catches me off guard. In the misdst of all this I look out the window and notice a bumper sticker on the back of a Kia sitting across the lot. Not sure why it intrigued me, except perhaps the simplicity of it. Solid black bumper sticker with these few stark white words...

Jesus is ___________.

It might also have caught my attention because I was just reading in my Solo NT the words of Jesus as Eugene Peterson paraphrases them...

Matthew 11:28-30, "Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me - watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly."

Tired? (Yep)
Worn out? (I don't know for sure... maybe)
Burned out on religion? (not very religious I'm afraid so I'm avoiding that one!)
Come to me... (so cool that he came to me so that I could come to him)
Get away with me and you'll recover your life... (why don't I do that more?)
I'll show you how to take a real rest... (this might be more important than prayer... not sure)
Walk with me and work with me - watch how I do it... (he was best at it)
Learn the unforced rhythms of grace... (I think I've lost time & rhythm lately)
I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you... (thank you... that is grace in essence perhaps!)
Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly... (deep breathing and deep laughter -why do we take ourselves so seriously)

Jesus is____________. Life, grace, rest, irreligious to the point of being hated by the religious, the way, shepherd, friend... I think he would like me even in the times when I am most unlikable... knowing that at this moment is even better than this cup of coffee.