Lent’s agenda is to be honest about brokenness. So the season has historically incorporated habits that remove the walls we use to conceal our broken parts. Walk the season of Lent by removing these walls through specific practices and habits. “Break stuff” with these practices.
Break Crutches: What’s your crutch? Caffeine? Candy? Impulsive spending? Do without it for this season. Break Noise: Declare specific times of silence in your day by setting certain moments to be “Electronic Free.” Three nights a week - no TV, computer, tablet, ipod . . . phone? Break Distance: Are you distant from someone because of a dispute, fight, or past event? Go to them and be reconciled. Break Bad Habits: We often develop bad habits as coping mechanisms – over-eating, abusing drugs or alcohol, smoking, procrastinating, gossiping, etc. Identify a bad habit and break it. Break Silence with God: God wants you to call on him. Has it been awhile? Have your prayers faltered? For these 40 days, wake up an hour earlier than normal and pray.
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Sometimes we don’t choose to change, but rather change is thrust upon us. It comes to us when we have no say in the matter. And often that change can be a negative change; a turn for the worst. A divorce. An illness. A death. A job loss. A family feud. Psalm 77 begins with, “I cry aloud to God.” A change has come. A turn for the worst. How do we respond? Allow me to lift up four things from Psalm 77– four ways to face negative change. In a recent Twitter Q&A, Pastor Tim Keller was asked, "Why do you think young Christian adults struggle most deeply with God as a personal reality in their lives?" Keller responded, "It is easier to Tweet than pray." There is only slight irony in the fact that he tweeted this response.
In 2014, I'm giving renewed focus to my prayer life. Not as a duty or obligation, but out of a desire to trust God more fully. I find it so hard to focus. My life is filled with inordinate amounts of noise and distraction. Even in a quiet moment, the nuerons in my brain are scheming. Technology appears to have shortened our attention span and ability to focus. With social media, we're always thinking about what to say instead of listening to what's being said. Guiding my prayer life at this time is I Samuel 3:10 when young Samuel is awoken by a mysterious voice he thinks is his mentor, Eli. "Speak, O Lord, for your servant is listening." He surrenders. He opens his eardrums and heart. The older I get, the harder my hearing is. I'm weary of meaningless words. Speak, Lord. I'm listening. I was given an old Corona typewriter a few months ago. It's a reminder to me that all things change. Do you remember the typewriter? Each key triggering a typeset letter to strike the ribbon. Ink imprinted on the piece of paper. This is a very unforgiving machine. If you make a mistake, you can’t just hit backspace and make it go away. And get this: when you’re done with a document, you can't just hit send. You have remove the paper, fold it, put it an in envelope, put a stamp on it, address it to a physical location, drop it in a mail slot, and give it a couple days to reach the recipient! Can you imagine? All things change.
Our bodies change. If you’re a child, you drink your milk and watch yourself catch up to mom or dad. If you’re an adult, you see the aches and pains of your body set in. Our families change. Children are added, children grow, children move out. Parents or grandparents are lost. Our communities change. New neighbors move in. A business closes. A new one comes in. the demographic gets more diverse. In Psalm 102, there is a sobering realization that all things change. The Psalmist says, “My days are like an evening shadow; I wither away like grass” (11). One minute, you can be lush and green. The next minute you’re dried up grass clippings blown into oblivion by a gust of wind. One of the reasons that change is so difficult for us is because it means a loss of control. Change proves to us that we lack ultimate control over our lives. My children are growing so quickly and I say, “Stop growing!” Because their changing means that I have less and less control. They are becoming more and more independent. Pastor Ed Dubberke has taught me much about this. He says that the hardest thing about older adulthood is an increasing loss of control. You lose control when your body won’t do what it used to. When you can’t see well enough to drive. When you live on a fixed income. When your pace slows down. When you begin to lose friends. We fear change because it means a loss of control. All things change, “But,” the Psalmist says, “you, O LORD, are enthroned forever; you are remembered throughout all generations” (12). In the face of change, God is enthroned – powerful and in control. When is he in control? Only in one time or place? No, “throughout all generations.” The Psalmist uses the perspective of generations to express the reality that God spans all time and every change. He says, “you whose years endure throughout all generations” (24). It’s as if we are trapped in a thick forest and can’t see a way out while he stands on the mountain, able to see the whole land. We are stuck in a moment of time. He is above it, able to look backward and forward. We are limited. He is limitless. All things change, but the Psalmist says, “You will remain” (26). All things change, “but you are the same, and your years have no end” (27). God spans all time and every change. This is an important reality to live with because it affects how you meet change. If change only means a loss of control, then you will meet every change with fear. You will live scared, worried, and defensive, angry, and bitter. But if you trust the reality that God spans all time and every change, then instead of fear, you live with confidence. Psalm 102 concludes, “The children of your servants shall dwell secure” (28). It’s a future tense. He’s confident of the future because he knows that God is God of every time and season. He’s confident that God is in control through every change. His mercy is not a one time event, it’s for all times and every change. His sacrifice is not for one era. The cross is transcendent. It spans generations. It supersedes all limits. No matter what change you see, his mercy is still good. No matter what the transition you go through, his will is still done. All things change, but ours is the God who spans all time and every change. Let’s go into 2014 with no fear. Only confidence. When you play the game Twister, you can pull a muscle trying to put an appendage on every dot. Right hand yellow. Left foot blue. Left hand green. Right foot red. Being a Pleaser is like a game of Twister. You bend over backwards in the impossible task of making everyone happy.
"Reason is the natural order of truth; but imagination is the organ of meaning." May I be so bold as to edit a C.S. Lewis quote? I might insert wisdom for imagination.
In our modern world we have unparalleled access to information. The internet has made knowledge a democratic enterprise. Everyone has access to anything. What we lack in this era of information privilege is wisdom. What do you do with the information? What does it mean? How do we act on our knowledge? Not just act, but act well - justly, compassionately, joyfully? Wisdom is not just the right answer; it's doing right with the right answer. It couples meaning with the truth. Psalm 11:10; Proverbs 9:10; I Cor. 3:19 On your birthday, you wake up like any other day. It takes a few minutes to realize what day it is. You remember the days when you anticipated your birthday - pretty much every birthday till you were 21. You get a plethora of "Happy Birthday!" posts on your Facebook timeline. You get interrogated: "How old are you?" "Do you feel any older?"
As each year passes, I wonder if I should be getting depressed. Is there anything I should regret? Have I wasted any years? If so, can I change them? One of my favorite little books is Henry Nouwen's In the Name of Jesus. He writes, "I should not worry about tomorrow, next week, next year, or the next century . . . God is a God of the present and reveals to those who are willing to listen carefully to the moment in which they live the steps they are to take toward the future." We cannot change past years. We cannot control future years. We can live in the present, being managers of the current day. So that's what I'll do today. I will listen to the Giver of all time. And I will live within the day he has given. Matthew 6:34 On this day, the 11th of September, we remember the year 2001. Wicked men perpetrated a ruthless act. Today the world is focused on a wicked man from Damascus in Syria. A man willing to damn his own people. What shall we do with such a cruel man? How shall we respond to such ruthless brutality? The kings and rulers of the world debate.
There was once another wicked man who traveled to Damascus in Syria. He too would damn his own people. To that man, God inflicted a unilateral air strike. It disabled Saul, brought him to his knees and blinded his eyes. God meant this for more than just punitive action. His judgement had greater ends. Can God turn wickedness for some kind of good? Can a terrorist become a bearer of peace? Mercy confounds us. Only God could do such a strange thing with a wicked man. Wicked men are damned. "Their end will correspond to their deeds." Yet God can deliver the damned. And before the scandal of this thought agitates my inner justice, I must remember that I live by the same mercy that can redeem a wicked man. Acts 9; II Cor. 11:15; II Cor. 12:9 "Everything looks like a failure in the middle." Everything that's worthy of being done will encounter a moment of failure. Every significant task that God calls you to will be met with resistance and challenge. The prevalent reaction is flakiness. Many will choose to give up. But if God has called you to do it, the apparent failure is only in the middle. Every good work progresses toward an end. And in the end, we trust that God's will is done. (II Cor. 4:16-18). We all struggle against a human propensity to worry about the future. I know very few people who are completely content with the present and have no qualms about what is to come.
Will I have a job? Will I complete the project? Will my family be OK? Will I be successful? Will I have enough? Will I find a spouse? Will we have children? Will my dad get better? Will the pain ever go away? We worry because uncertainty exists. The past may be factual, but the future is always speculative. While it's prudent to prepare for the future, it's too easy for healthy planning to slip into worry. Then we find ourselves living in the future, consumed with what will be instead of what is. We miss life in the present tense because we're rushing ahead to live in the future. In his poem "A Prayer in Spring," Robert Frost writes: Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers today; And give us not to think so far away As the uncertain harvest; keep us here. There was a church in Roman Macedonia in the first century. A city called Thessalonica. They were concerned that maybe they missed the future already and Jesus had returned for the Last Day. Had they missed it? And they were so concerned with the Last Day (certainly a noble concern) that they began to release their present duties. Idleness and apathy set in. So Paul wrote a couple letters in which he exhorts them to present work. He says, "That our God may make you worthy of his calling and may fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power" (II Thess. 1:11-12). God is working in you presently, to do good things now. Worrying about the future strips us of the capacity to truly be attentive to our present calling. When we recognize this, we release the obession with "what could be," and we live where we are now. God will work the harvest. Now is the time for tilling and planting. Concern yourself with the present tasks and trust that future results fall within the governance of the Living God. What has God given you to do today? Take joy in the work set before you presently. |
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