Obama

I've been looking for a really good article on the faith of Barack Obama for a while. I've seen a couple that were either too generic or too clearly slanted to be of much use. I don't have time to read his books (my reading pile is so large I won't be finished it by next year's elections), but I was interested in the faith that he mentions. Is it "of course I'm a Christian" cultural faith? Is it "I'm running for office and therefore need to go to church" political faith? Is it the real deal?

This article in the New York Times is the most balanced thing I've seen so far. It's still hard to know what's going on in his heart, but at least this article pulls together different snippets from other articles and addresses some of the issues.

I highly recommend reading it.

In reading the article I thought of the article in Newsweek last fall that traced the relationship between the evangelical church and politics. The pattern of groups gaining favor with the evangelical church, getting in bed with politicians to advance their agenda and then having a harsh fall is pretty well documented in the article.

Now we see Obama moving towards power and preaching at Saddleback Church, working with Jim Wallis and speaking at his own super church. I'm all for a truly dedicated man of God being in power, but I think we have to look long and hard at the man, determining if this is really "of God" and then look at what the costs are of getting that close to power. History indicates that those who get close to power get burned.

If you haven't read the NYT or Newsweek articles, I strongly encourage you to take a look. I'm interested in hearing other people's thoughts on the faith of the 2008 candidates.

What to do...

While I'm feeling slightly better, it seems as soon as I have any energy, something comes up to take all that extra energy. It feels like a losing battle.

In the midst of this, something has come up that would be an amazing opportunity for this summer. I know I should be excited and jump at it. However, it's hard to be excited when I don't know where I'm going to get the energy to get through the day. Is it a matter of faith that I will be healthy by the summer?

There's also the issue of money. Not exactly sure where the money to do this will come from, but I guess it's a matter of taking the leap knowing that the details will work out.

Keeper of Hearts

I'm continuing to read (and take copious notes on) Ministries of Mercy by Timothy Keller. It's an outstanding book and I can't even tell you how much I've learned from this book.

I came upon this quote last night:

The person should remember that God is the keeper of hearts. If you have a burden, then God put it there; it is not the result of your innate goodness and love.

This really speaks to something that's been bothering me for some time. Is this interest in Africa just a passing thing with me? Is this just something that caught my eye? How do I know that this is just from God and not just a good idea?

Then I read this quote and got hit with some perspective. It's hard to accept that nothing good could be coming just from me. It's just a matter of my motivation in approaching the good things that are from God. God is the keeper of my heart.

The Day After

I was off yesterday and so I managed to miss what was happening until mid-afternoon. It was hard to take in and hit close to home. I was still grappling with everything when I found something that helped make some sense of the display of evil I was seeing on my television:

Though the darkness closes in, I believe that God is on His throne, and that He is good beyond our wildest dreams. He is the Savior of the whole wide world. Yet we are living in shattered days, a faint image of what He hoped and dreamed for us all. And today, the weight of our fallen race seems too heavy to bear.

There's so much in the world that I don't understand. Days like today I'm afraid that I do understand, and it becomes hard to handle living in the world.

Sheep Stealing

Lately I've been thinking a lot about how different church would look if we really thought we were working for the Kingdom of God, rather than the Small Principality of __________ (insert the name of your church here). What if we gave to missionaries that weren't just our denomination if they were undertaking strategic work that we felt called to be a part of? What if we supported other Bible-believing/Bible-preaching/Bible-living churches in our area as brothers and sisters?

This came up in a church meeting a few weeks ago when we were talking about stewardship and the radical idea came up to send a chunk of our young families to the church up the road that is doing great things with college students, but is struggling because it doesn't have families as a foundation for the church. What if we did that? What if we blessed people that left our churches because they were called to other ministries (instead of cursing them)? What if we were committed to church planting, rather than growing mega churches?

Last night I was reading Dave Sliker's blog and was surprised to hear him hitting on a lot of these topics. I was especially struck by the following paragraph:

If seeker-sensitive churches are content to play their role on the “team” rather than build the biggest, most successful ode to their giftedness on the block, then everyone wins in the end. If other pastors can come to terms with the fact that “sheep stealing” is a farcical notion birthed from insecurity and sinful ambition rather than the word of God, they would then be fine with people shifting to different expressions of the the body reflected in the different corporate gatherings throughout their cities. Different seasons of growth, maturity, and development demand that believers run with different groups that best fit those seasons. Pastors that are willing to serve, launch, and recognize their limitations can be free of heart and pleased to have played a role in loving a member of the broader body of Christ that is valuable to Jesus. Pastors that seek to be “all things to all men” in a vain effort to gather all peoples to themselves will be sorely disillusioned and frustrated with the passage of time.

If we saw different churches having different roles in the community, things would look quite different. If we stopped trying to create the perfect mega-church on every corner and learned how to be a really good hand or a really good foot (in the body of Christ), how awesome would that be.

Anyhow, I was very excited to hear someone from IHOP saying this as it directly addresses some of my recent concerns about them vacuuming up all the "serious" Christians and holding them in the only "true" church. Kudos Dave. Good points and a good message. I think IHOP has a really important role to play in the North American church. I'm looking forward to seeing them engage more with other churches in the "team ministry" that Dave talks about.

Life in the Center

Growing up in Canada I always felt a little outside the center. It was always clear that the US was the center of Western culture. From a global view all of the US, Canada and Western Europe are the center.

I read a great article the other night. I was going through my old magazines as part of spring cleaning and stumbled on this article in a Christianity Today from last summer. It's exactly what I've been looking for.

Rt. Rev. Dr. David Zac Niringiye talks about the dangers of being at the center. He explains that throughout scripture God was always outside the center. Jesus came to earth far out of the center.

As North American Christians he says we are at a disadvantage in understanding Jesus because we don't have that experience of being at the margins. His suggestion is that all North American Christians spend time globally at the margins - not to "fix" the rest of the world or to "bring God" to the rest of the world, but to realize that the margin is where God is and if we want to be with God, that's where we need to be.

I've been trying to explain to my church that sending people to Africa isn't to try to evangelize Africa (the church there is growing much faster than the church in my area), it's to transform our people by stepping outside our comfortable world and seeing God working in other parts of the world.

"One of the gravest threats to the North American church is the deception of power - the deception of power - the deception of being at the center. Those at the center tend to think, 'The future belongs to us. We are the shapers of tomorrow. The process of gospel transmission, the process of mission - all of it is on our terms, because we are powerful, because we are established. We have a track record of success, after all.'"

How often do we the US as shaping the world? How often do we say things like "the future belongs to us"?

If God is working far from the center, let's go be with Him.

Sugar Sweet Sugar

Is sugar really worthy of it's own blog entry? YES.

I'm sitting here at Panera working (okay - taking a break) and munching on a caramel pecan brownie. Totally yummy. These things have mocked me from the counter when I went up to order my sugarless food. Now the brownie is mine. Mine I say!

So, what's with the sugar? Well, I was thinking on what I learned over Lent (aka - those horrible weeks when I had no sugar).

1. I'm a little too dependent on sugar. I use it as a stimulant. I use it as a pick-me-up. I use it as a reward. Not a good thing

2. This year I went with the tradition of taking the Sabbath off from giving things up for Lent. More simply stated, I ate sugar on Sundays. I didn't run out and eat 3 candy bars each Sunday, but I also didn't avoid sugar like I did for the rest of the week. This had the result of making me look forward to Sundays and be a little sad when the sun started going down on Sunday. It's a really cool thing to anticipate the Sabbath.

3. Giving up something for Lent isn't nearly as effective if you just substitute something else just as bad. As in "okay I won't eat that cookie because it's Lent - I'll have some potato chips instead".

4. Giving up something for Lent isn't as effective as fasting.

5. Fruit is yummy and very sweet. Perhaps I should eat more of it.

One of my favorite memories from Lent will be me and my friend Trish (who had also given up sugar) at her window on Saturday asking each other if we thought the sun had officially set yet (making it the Sabbath). Too funny!

New Life

One of the great thing about this justice project has been the new authors I've been reading and seeing the questions they are asking.

One of these new authors is Timothy Keller. His Ministries of Mercy has this great quote that is perfect for Easter:

"The kingdom of God is the means for the renewal of the entire world and all the dimensions of life. From the throne of Jesus Christ flows new life and power such that no disease, decay, poverty, blemish, or pain can stand before it."

Mark Your Calendars

The official leak (is that an oxymoron?) on the 268 blog this morning is that Passion is coming to Boston October 12-13th (Chicago October 19-20). A Passion conference within driving distace of me - I can't wait.

So, mark your calendars now. Great preaching and worship is coming to New England.

Maundy Thursday

No, not Monday Thursday. Maundy Thursday. It's an event I had never heard of until I went to Park Street Church in Boston. A celebration of the Last Supper and the beginning of the final events leading to the Crucifixion. I've always thought it's a great way to prepare for Good Friday.

For all the people who have been asking me what Maundy means, this description from wikipedia:

The word Maundy is derived through Middle English, and Old French mandé, from the Latin mandatum, the first word of the phrase "Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos" (A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another as I have loved you), the statement by Jesus in the Gospel of John(13:34) by which Jesus explained to the Apostles the significance of his action of washing their feet. The phrase is used as the antiphon sung during the "Mandatum" ceremony of the washing of the feet, which may be held during Mass or at another time as a separate event, during which a priest or bishop (representing Christ) ceremonially washes the feet of others, typically 12 persons chosen as a cross-section of the community.

Beauty

CCM magazine has an interesting article on beauty and image in the Christian music industry. She interviewed many top artists on how they feel about the push for beauty in a sector that claims that beauty is on the inside. It's a worthwhile read.

When I got home last night the hard copy of the magazine was waiting for me and the article had an extra sidebar that wasn't available in the online edition. The title was "Made to Worship Who?" and the subject was, of course, Chris Tomlin. He tells the story of flying to his first photo shoot and the letter Louie Giglio gave him to read on the plane. It read, in part:

"Everyone was coming to John the Baptist in John 3 and saying, 'You're it. You're the deal... You're getting quite popular here.' And he responded, 'I am not... there's One that's coming. I can't even tie His shoes. That's the One you need to go to. And when you see Him, you're going to know that He must increase and I must decrease.' And as they're taking your pictures today, I just want you to hold that in your heart.... 'you don't even tie this guy's shoes'."

Just one more reason to love John the Baptist and to apply him to a modern context.

White Almost Pink

Whatever you think of Bono's methods, you can't help but be inspired by the last minute of his speech at the NAACP last month. Clearly he was born to preach.

His truth IS marching on.

Physically versus Spiritually Tired

Here's a great quote from Louie Giglio's blog last night:

We are officially wiped...but God has never been intimidated by our weakness, rather He relishes in the opportunity to breathe through weary vessels. And, as though there was ever any question, once a night like tonight is done it is clear that anything of power that was left behind is of God and not of man.

It was the second to last night of their tour (Chris Tomlin, Louie Giglio, Matt Redman).

Having been so wiped out this week after the Caregiver Kit project, this quote really hit home. There's a lot in there about being physically tired, but still being willing. I had been feeling weird this week about being so tired out by serving. Shouldn't I have unending energy for serving God if I'm doing it for the right reasons? What about Isaiah 40 ("run and not grow weary"). This quote was a good reminder that of course we're going to get physically tired at times, that's just human weakness. It's a matter of not letting that get in the way of God using you.

Truth by Committee

Have you had one of those experiences when you read the title of a blog entry and you do a little dance of joy? I had one of those last night when I checked David Sliker's blog. The entry was The Dangers of Consensus and it pulled together a lot of thoughts that have been running through my head.

Our world decides truth by consensus. Whatever the most people think is what has to be true. For example, global warming. It's on all of our televisions, it must be the most important issue. If most people don't have a problem with abortion, why shouldn't we allow it? All of politics seems to revolve around influencing public opinion to allow politicians to do what they want.

The dangers of this are a whole other blog (how do you establish universal human rights in a moral vacuum? by majority opinion? by the rule of the world superpowers?).

My real concern is this as an issue in the church. The people who are supposed to believe in absolute truth now seem obsessed with the rule of the majority. Our meetings are by congregational vote. We make our decisions by consensus.

Now, I'm not advocating a human dictatorship (absolute power corrupts absolutely), but I don't see anywhere in the Bible where we have a right to air our opinions or that we each have a right to an equal voice in decisions. In fact, in the Beatitudes I see a lifestyle of walking away from your rights and letting God fight for you. Throughout Acts I see a community that valued God's guidance and followed the teachings of those annointed by God. I see no public opinion polls. And before the arrival of the Holy Spirit they used lots, believing that God would control the outcome of the lots.

The thing is that we have the truth. Why do we still stumble around in the dark as if we don't know how to find the truth? Why do we act as if God's leading is just one option in our decision making process? Why do we have to hurry along God's leading by deciding by consensus? If we aren't getting leading, why aren't why looking in to why not? Why are we working on back up plans for God?

I've got this on my brain this week after this week's class in the Omega study where we learned about the final 7 years of the earch and how as the anti-christ brings a false peace and prosperity to the earth. The church will take a stand that will be unpopular and even within the church, the stand against the anti-christ will be unpopular, to take tough stands. If we don't believe in the truth internally, how can we stand for it in the world? If we're more worried about our rights in the church, how can we demonstrate a Sermon on the Mount lifestyle to the outside world? If we don't stand for anything solid now, how will we stand when the heat is on?

Not For the Faint of Heart

So, today was the celebration Sunday for our Caregiver Kit project. 174 kits and counting. It's a pretty big pile of boxes. And exciting when you think of the 174 (at least) people that they will help.

Pretty simple - an exciting day to celebrate the end of a project that has exceeded all my expectations, right?

Not quite so easy. The problems started with a big snowstorm on Friday and the supplies for the boxes didn't come until we were well into the storm. After we got the truck unloaded, it took 2 hours to drive what would take 20 minutes on a clear day. Then I watched and waited to see if the storm would stop before our party to assemble the kits. It did and I dug out my car for a half hour only to find that instead of starting it made a nice clicking sound.

For some reason this threw me into a complete panic that I didn't really recover from all night. Add to that some smelly soap going into the kits and a party that went until pretty late (I was exhausted) and I wasn't in good shape by the time I got home (note, car is still dead at this point).

Overnight I couldn't sleep and whenever I'd snatch a moment of sleep I'd hear nasty things. And they were nasty things that built on the nightmares I've been having for the last couple of days. And the nasty things go something like "If you don't drop this Africa project, you won't be getting any more sleep" and "if you continue with the campus stuff we're going to kill you". Evidently spiritual warfare wasn't working, so we've switched over to spiritual terrorism.

Over the last few weeks I had started having some doubts and wondering if maybe consumerism was really so bad. Wondering if the sacrifices were worth it. Wondering if I was taking things to seriously.

This is not a joke. This is not a test. This is the real deal. This is a war and any weakness will be used. Pretending you can be a half-hearted Christian is a joke. Faith as a spiritual insurance policy is a joke. All this stuff happening is more than a coincidence. I realized this morning that I have to stop letting myself get isolated and just trying to deal with it on my own. This is serious stuff and I have to treat it seriously. I had some friends pray over me this morning. The good news is, I already know I have Victory on my side.

A New Theory

Here's my new theory formulated while walking back from a meeting. It's about fasting.

No food = hungry = cranky = tick off friends and co-workers = alienate friends = no one to hang out with or talk to = more time for God

I'm not entirely sure this is the ideal set up for getting closer to God, but it definitely does the trick.

Lent

My ever-humorous brother (who else sends Sarcasm Wednesday cards??) sent me a note today asking:

What are you giving up for Lent? Your New Year's Resolution? Your sobriety? Your good judgement and personal restraint?

which was a nice follow up to the suggestion at my small group last night to give up sin for Lent.

Nice!

I read a great blog the other day about Lent which points to the importance of fasting, prayer and acts of service during Lent. I'm pretty sure fasting from your sobriety wasn't what they were thinking about.

Anyhow, in answer to the question that's been weighing on all of your minds, I'm giving up refined sugar for Lent. Seems like a small thing, but to someone who appears to live on muffins, diet Coke, etc, it's a big thing. No sucralose. No asperatame. No sugar. No cane syrup. No high fructose corn syrup. Which makes having a bad sweet tooth a bit of a drag. So, kudos to all those companies who don't fill their products full of sugar. You're making my life a whole lot easier. Did you know dried fruit is full of sugar?? What's with that? It's fruit. Fruit has it's own sugar - why do you need to add more? Pasta sauce is full of sugar. Huh? Salad dressing? This is a conspiracy people!

Off to the Ash Wednesday service tonight. I'm thankful that the season of Lent is here. It's a good time to stop and focus again. I've been feeling a drift and it's time to get re-centered.

Worship at the Cathedral

So, I haven't been to a mall in a VERY LONG TIME. By very long time, I mean in Joy time, not necessarily in real person time. Like over a month. Probably not since Christmas.

I ducked into a local mall on the weekend because I needed to pick up my hair product at The Body Shop. I did duck into DSW for a minute, but for the most part I managed to avoid temptation.

Yesterday I went into the city to see an old friend. We met at THE MALL. That being, not just A MALL, but THE MALL. Hundreds of shops. Shops that we don't have near me. Shops full of all sorts of things I NEED to have. Seriously. How have I survived without that really cute top kind of need. Cute shoes need. Expensive kitchen appliances need. $20 cupcake mixes need.

And the place was packed. Full of people all carrying their many shopping bags, eating at the restaurants and generally worshipping consumerism.

In some ways it was fun. When I ducked in on the weekend I picked up a smoothie and thought about how going to the mall used to be fun. In the days before I had to go to the mall because shopping was the distraction in my life.

Yesterday at THE MALL I had a lot of fun because I was with my friend, but I was struck again with how easy it would be for me to go back to shopping every weekend or every evening. There's a lot of cute stuff out there and it's not buying itself.

It was quite a contrast to the weekend retreat with my small group when we talked about fair trade and the need to reduce how much we buy to what we need.

I managed to get out without too many purchases - 2 notebooks for work, 6 small bowls (to replace the ones Sir Mouse decided to defile with droppings), a travel knife and a business card holder (now that I actually have business cards). Perhaps there's some hope for my self-control yet, but I don't think it's a good idea to keep testing it.

The Plan (a Continuation of The Project)

So, now I have this great World Vision project idea in my head and can't get rid of it. So I prayed about it some more. Slowly it started taking shape in my head.

I already had a planned meeting with one of the church deacons that week and added the project at the end of the discussion. "Happened" that the deacons were meeting that weekend and would bring it up. That weekend I talked to the pastor (who, by chance is on sabbatical until March) and got his approval. Got the approval of one of the leaders willing to take it under their "umbrella" and got at least passing approval from a member of our African congregation.

And this thing is just over a week old.

Before I leave for Christmas I write a few more emails and contact the World Vision folks to let them know we're doing this. They ask what # of boxes is the goal. Without thinking I write down 100. Don't know why now, but it was definitely 100.

Fast forward to after Christmas. I ask my prayer group to start praying. This is when things start to speed up. I hear back from my friend who's a member of the African congregation and not only are they on board, but they want to be a big part of this happening. He asked what work could be done. This is a huge answer to prayer, since I need help and I also felt I needed visible support of the African congregation. When I talk to the whole African congregation they are very excited and ask me how what my goal of boxes filled for the church is. I'm a little afraid as I admit 100 boxes (which seemed ambitious to me). They laugh and say they will fill 100 boxes and will challenge the church to match that. Keep in mind each box costs about $25, so 100 boxes is a lot of money.

My friend who's an IV leader on campus signs up to bring this to the campus.

I present the plan to my small group. One of my friends in the small group had previously commented that our group should commit in a big way and go for 50 boxes (our group has 12 people). Seems impossible. Group members start signing up and someone comes to this friend and offers a matching donation of up to $500. Um.... wow!

Then I go to visit the youth group. I blogged about this. They are a pretty terrifying lot - about 40 of them and most junior high boys. As I'm talking they're talking, throwing things, eating, etc. Yet, at the end of the night they commit to 40 boxes. The youth leader puts down a $100 bill and tells them it's only their's if they can match it. Then, during the week another $500 matching offer comes in to the youth group.

Seriously??

I'm not even announcing this to the church until February 18th and already we have $1100 in matching funds put up and almost twice my original goal commited.

It's a bit odd to be on such a runaway train. Exciting, but overwhelming. As the days pass since I first realized this was what I had to do I've learned more and more and felt the burden heavier and heavier on my heart. Each and every time there was something I needed and I prayed for it, the answer would be right there. "Coincidences" keep happening that can't just be coincidences. And through it all it's been so obvious that this has nothing at all to do with me. It's been a fun way to learn that lesson.

So, for those of you out there who have read the saga, care to join the runaway train? We still need money for shipping and I'm quite sure the youth group or my small group would be happy to take donations as well. All the money is going through my church, so it's tax deductable. I also really need people praying. Let me know know if you want to do either so I can fill you in with more details.

Something big is happening and I'm just so excited to be a witness to it all.

Revolution

Relevant magazine currently has an article up about the release of George Barna's Revolution in soft cover.

This book first came to my attention last November when I was looking for something that might grab my father's attention to buy him for Christmas. Barna is a well known Christian pollster and is always tracking trends in the church.

Here's Relevant's take on the key message of the book:
Barna’s research has identified an unsettling trend: Increasing numbers of Christians have become fed up with the Church and are not taking it anymore. This may not sound like news to some, except for the fact that these people do not seem to be your typical "bedside Baptists," but passionate followers of Christ. In fact, Barna sees them as the leaders of an entirely appropriate revolution, which he likens to the Reformation itself. He paints an urgent picture of the situation:

Existing churches have a historic decision to make: to ignore the revolution and continue business as usual, to invest energy in fighting the revolution as an unbiblical advance or to look for ways of retaining their identity while cooperating with the revolution as a mark of unity and genuine ministry. My current research suggests that the latter approach will be the least common.

Pollsters are very good at identifying trends, and often at putting their finger on the problem based on the data. I don't doubt that there are people pushing at the constraints of "church", but I think it's more helpful to ask why. And not in a sound bite. Comparing the current situation to the Reformation is pretty dramatic. If things are truly that extreme, why don't we see it more evident?

This is not to say that I don't agree that there is a growing group of people who aren't satisfied with how things have always been done. I know I am. I'm tired of prayer meetings where we don't pray and worship times when we don't worship. I'm tired of the expectation that church is a social obligation and nothing more. I'm tired of lowest common denominator small groups.

What I disagree on is that what's happening is a unified revolution. I think people are walking away for a variety of reasons and not one thing that everyone's getting wrong. I don't think one person can write one book that will sweep the nation and fix everything. Churches aren't responding well because (at least in my case) what's wrong is so fundamental they don't know how to address it and a radical response is out of the question.

I also don't agree with Barna's conclusion that the answer is to sit outside the church armchair quarterbacking and picking and choosing the small bits we agree with. Christianity isn't a hobby. You're not picking out the country club that best fits you. Christianity isn't something you do in isolation. We're called to be in community. If the North American church isn't working then we have to figure out what is a better response to the teaching of the Bible.

The Reformation? Probably not. A time to look what being a passionate follower of Christ looks like? Absolutely.