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Retro Post #3: A Tendency to Glamorize

*This post originally appeared on October 20, 2008

I think we often tend to glamorize the past and think America was a Christian nation, where everyone loved God, was very upright and moral and that our society didn't have the major problems that it does today. We believe that America is worse off, but is that really true? 

When you really look into it you find that is not the case. Take for example this little tidbit from a book I picked up from Garry Wills called Head and Heart: A History of Christianity in America. Check this out.

"In 1909 there was one saloon for every 500 hundred people. There were more saloons in the United States than there were schools, libraries, hospitals, theaters, or parks, and more certainly than churches."

Go Figure! You have any thoughts on this?

*Just to clarify I don't think drinking alcohol is bad but this little stat does say something about the priorities when America was supposedly  "CHRISTIAN". Saloons back then also often had dancing girls and prostitutes. Of course you could also mention racism, womens rights and a host of other things as signs of a culture that was rotten even back then.

When Harry Met Dolores

(Harry Stamps pictured above rocking the black socks and shorts)

On Memorial Day I gave a message in our "Be Different" series. I used  two real obituaries to start the message. The first is for Harry Stamps and the second is Dolores Aguilar. They are quiet the contrast. I have posted here abbreviated versions of both with a link to where you can read the first one in it's entirety. Both obits are written by their respective daughters.

Harry Weathersby Stamps, ladies’ man, foodie, natty dresser, and accomplished traveler, died on Saturday, March 9, 2013.

He married his main squeeze Ann Moore, a home economics teacher, almost 50 years ago, with whom they had two girls Amanda Lewis of Dallas, and Alison of Starkville. He taught them to fish, to select a quality hammer, to love nature, and to just be thankful...

He had a life-long love affair with deviled eggs, Lane cakes, boiled peanuts, Vienna sausages on saltines, his homemade canned fig preserves, pork chops, turnip greens, and buttermilk served in martini glasses garnished with cornbread.  As a point of pride, he purported to remember every meal he had eaten in his 80 years of life, and he was a member of the Bacon-of-the-Month Club.

 He excelled at growing camellias, rebuilding houses after hurricanes, rocking, eradicating mole crickets from his front yard, composting pine needles, living within his means, outsmarting squirrels, and reading any history book he could get his hands on. He loved to use his oversized “old man” remote control, which thankfully survived Hurricane Katrina, to flip between watching The Barefoot Contessa and anything on The History Channel.

He took extreme pride in his two grandchildren Harper Lewis (8) and William Stamps Lewis (6) of Dallas for whom he would crow like a rooster on their phone calls. As a former government and sociology professor for Gulf Coast Community College, Harry was thoroughly interested in politics and religion and enjoyed watching politicians act like preachers and preachers act like politicians. 

Harry took fashion cues from no one. His signature every day look was all his: a plain pocketed T-shirt designed by the fashion house Fruit of the Loom, his black-label elastic waist shorts worn above the navel and sold exclusively at the Sam’s on Highway 49, and a pair of old school Wallabees (who can even remember where he got those?) that were always paired with a grass-stained MSU baseball cap.

 Harry traveled extensively. He only stayed in the finest quality AAA-rated campgrounds. He always spent the extra money to upgrade to a creek view for his tent. 

He despised phonies, his 1969 Volvo (which he also loved), know-it-all Yankees, eating grape leaves, Law and Order (all franchises), cats, and Martha Stewart. He particularly hated Day Light Saving Time, which he referred to as The Devil’s Time. It is not lost on his family that he died the very day that he would have had to spring his clock forward. This can only be viewed as his final protest.

Because of his irrational fear that his family would throw him a golf-themed funeral despite his hatred for the sport, his family will hold a private, family only service free of any type of “theme.” 

 Finally, the family asks that in honor of Harry that you write your Congressman and ask for the repeal of Day Light Saving Time. Harry wanted everyone to get back on the Lord’s Time.

You can read the rest Here.

Dolores Aguilar, born in 1929 in New Mexico, left us on August 7, 2008. 

Dolores had no hobbies, made no contribution to society and rarely shared a kind word or deed in her life. I speak for the majority of her family when I say her presence will not be missed by many, very few tears will be shed and there will be no lamenting over her passing.

Her family will remember Dolores and amongst ourselves we will remember her in our own way, which were mostly sad and troubling times throughout the years. I truly believe at the end of the day ALL of us will really only miss what we never had, a good and kind mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. I hope she is finally at peace with herself. As for the rest of us left behind, I hope this is the beginning of a time of healing and learning to be a family again.

There will be no service, no prayers and no closure for the family she spent a lifetime tearing apart. We cannot come together in the end to see to it that her grandchildren and great-grandchildren can say their goodbyes. So I say here for all of us, GOOD BYE, MOM.

Two lives, two very different endings. 

"And live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God." -Ephesians 5:2

When The Office Has Great Theology

I fell in love with The Office years ago when I was speaking on a High School retreat in Oklahoma. I would go back to my cabin after the evening service and watch episodes back to back that I had downloaded from Itunes. It was like finding a brand new best friend. A very funny new friend.

A couple of weeks ago I watched the final episode which I thought was about as good as a finale can get. Instead of making brand new friends it felt as if I was losing some old friends. I had my heart tugged more than a few times and I have to admit I shed some tears.

What I want to draw your attention to though is the last line of the show, which is spoken by Pam as everyone is leaving the office following Dwight's wedding, many leaving the building for the last time.

She said,

" I thought it was weird when you picked us to make a documentary, but all in all I think an ordinary paper company like Dunder Mifflin was a great subject for a documentary. There is a lot of beauty in ordinary things, isn't that kind of the point."

What a beautiful line. What great theology. A theology of place, a theology of the ordinary, a theology of work and how God has made ordinary places, ordinary people, ordinary work and ordinary life to be filled with beauty, holiness and sacredness.

So often people have a sacred and secular division of everything in their life. Church on Sunday equals sacred, work Monday to Friday secular. Devotions equal sacred, changing diapers or cleaning the garage equals secular. Working full-time in ministry sacred, having any other job secular. It is an unholy dichotomy. One I held for a long time. This is not the view of The Bible and it is not Jesus's view. All things are spiritual and filled with God's glory and for God's glory. That view changes everything.

The Office nailed it. It captured the sacred in the ordinary. I know it was unintentional but they stumbled across God's common grace and His purposes. The Office could teach the church and Christians a thing or too. To see the sacred all around us, to experience God not just in the sanctuary but also at the copier. I know I'm not saying anything new but the line from the show was poignant. It was powerful. What if you went to work each day and realized how holy that time really is? Would it change things for you? Would you see the people that you work with and the time you have been given there differently?

Tim Keller in his book Every Good Endeavor which is about work writes,

“Everyone will be forgotten, nothing we do will make any difference, and all good endeavours, even the best, will come to naught. Unless there is God. If the God of the Bible exists, and there is a True Reality beneath and behind this one, and this life is not the only life, then every good endeavour, even the simplest ones, pursued in response to God's calling, can matter forever. All work has dignity because it reflects God’s image in us, and also because the material creation we are called to care for is good." 

So thanks Dwight, Michael, Pam, Andy, Jim and the rest of the gang for a great reminder! Goodbye, you will be missed.

Experiencing The Impossible

I recently watched the movie The Impossible. It is a powerful film that follows the incredible true story of a family of five swept up in the Thailand Tsunami of 2004. It stars Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor and Tom Holland (whose performance is amazing) as the oldest son in the family. The Tsunami scenes are chilling, overwhelming and devestating. Most of the people describe the tsunami not as a wave but as a wall and you really get that feel in the movie. You sense the helplessness of a family ripped apart by the waves and desperately searching for each other in the midst of chaos.

The scenes with both parents at different points in the movie willing to do anything to get to their children, even when badly hurt themsleves is moving. Relentlessly searching, simply with fragile hope that there is still life. I found my self with tears in my eyes over and over again.

Equally as powerful are the multiple scenes of reunions between people, once thought lost forever and dead but now found.

Reminds me of another story.

One about two sons. One son caught up in a tsunami of selfishness. Destruction.

A story about a broken-hearted Father.Willing to do anything to get to his son.

A Father who would suffer anything for love. A Father wounded deeply.

A story of coming Home. The lost being found. An unexpected reunion. A long embrace. Tears of joy. 

A raging party

The words, "Come celebrate for your brother who was once dead is now alive!"

It's our story, It's God's story, it's our story with God and it's beautiful.

It's the Impossible made possible. 

It's Grace.

 

Retro Post #2: A Youth Pastor Goes to Comic-Con

This Post originally appeared July 29, 2008

Over the last couple of days I have been getting my thoughts together about my day at San Diego Comic-Con. Comic-Con is the largest pop-culture,super-hero, fantasy, gaming, comics, freak-show extravaganza in the USA. This year I believe it attracted over 175,000 people. All of the major movie studios, video game companies, comic companies and basically anyone who creates media in America use this as a platform to push their product. It is unbelievable.

If you have never been to this event, you should go at least once in your life if just to people watch. As I walked around on the last day of the convention I continued to ask myself, "Who is going to reach these people for Jesus, and more importantly how?" Now, I'm not talking about people like me who are just fans of a lot of this stuff, but about the people who LIVE for this stuff. The people deeply immersed in this world of make believe and fantasy. How do you get to them with the gospel? I don't think the traditional church is going to quite do it. Do you think wolverine guy at the top of this post would relate to that? I don't know the answer to this question maybe you do and I would love to hear it.

I can comment on some of the things I saw there, things that the church needs to plug into to reach teens, kids and adults who are living in this world.

Passion- People at Comic-Con are passionate about what they are into. Passionate enough to spend hours and hundreds of dollars making their own costumes. Many even dress up their little babies! They drop some major bank on merchandise and collectors items and will wait in line forever to catch the latest buzz about a new movie or a game. It is a yearly "religious" pilgrimage and their level of commitment is amazing. They prepare all year for this, and this event is just an extension of who they are the rest of the year. Are we this passionate about our faith, Jesus and the church?

Community- You can write some of these people off as socially awkward (you might be right) but I can tell you that I felt a genuine sense of community and friendliness amongst most of these people. They spoke a common language, they shared heroes, there were smiles everywhere and people seemed very genuine. If you asked a question about a particular movie or comic someone always jumped in and answered you and tried to help. It was refreshing. Maybe these people aren't afraid to be themselves with each other? Do we share these things as a church?

Imagination- The creativity was amazing and not just from the media makers but from the crowd. From art, to film, graphics, design, costumes, figures, and fantastical worlds it is a tribute to the creative spirit. Do we make our teaching creative? Do we give students chances to be creative?

Hunger for Story & Heroes- People are dying for good stories. For new worlds full of risk, adventure, courage, redemption, struggle and victory. They look for heroes they can connect with, heroes who inspire them to be better than they are. People want compelling narratives, and larger than life heroes. This is where we have failed so miserably as a church but where we have so much potential. We follow the ultimate hero and have such a great story to tell, one that can be told in so many creative ways.

Emptiness and Loneliness- As I walked around I couldn't help hearing and seeing people that had in many ways failed relationally or socially in this world and so were drawn to fantasy worlds where they could be someone else or live vicariously through a character. This is not unique to the "nerds", for there are plenty of popular people at a bar somewhere doing the same thing through alcohol instead of star wars, or another "hook-up" instead of another comic book. It is all the same song, just a different tune. There is a deep pit of loneliness in our culture, of emptiness brought on by losing ourselves in things that will never truly quench our thirst. Does the church offer significance? Significance for the here and now not just salvation for someday? I wonder.

Maybe the geeks have something to teach! Listen up church.

With great power comes great responsibility.

Jonah and A Big Boat

I just wrapped up a preaching series called The Runaway: Story of a man named Jonah. I love the story of Jonah but it is definately not a kids story, which many have sadly turned it into. If you read through the book you realize that Jonah's attitude is horrible throughout the entire story. Count how many times he says he wants to die, it is ridiculous!

In Chapter four of Jonah he goes outside the city and sits and waits to see if God will destroy the city. He is hopeful God will wipe out the Ninevites. While he is waiting, God causes a plant to grow to give Jonah shade against the hot middle eastern sun. Yet during the night God causes the plant to wither and during the day sends a hot east wind to blow into Jonah's world.

Jonah is furious, so furious that of course HE WANTS TO DIE! He doesn't care about what is happening in Ninevah, he just cares about his own comfort. He is complaining because his little "Destruction of Ninevah" one man party isn't comfortable enough.

Jonah has totally lost perspective! People in Ninevah have been spared. Jonah is mad because he is too hot????

Reminds me of a story I read about a Carnival Cruise that went bad a few years ago.

The ship with nearly 5,000 people on board became stranded off of the coast of California and it took 3 days to tow it back to San Diego. Once the regular food ran out Spam, pop-tarts and crab meat was airlifted in.

The worst hardships people had to endure were brushing their teeth with bottled water, showering in the dark, and waiting in line for food. Not too bad. I spent malmost 19 years as a youth pastor doing all those on a regular basis. Ha, Ha.

If you listened to the interviews passengers gave when they arrived at port you would have thought they were on a ship, filled with zombies, that had struck an iceberg and the band was on the deck playing “stairway to heaven” as the ship was going down!

All the passengers also knew Carnival was going to reimburse them for that cruise, all travel costs getting to and from the ship, nullified all expenses they had incurred on ship before fire, including casino losses and gift shop purchases. Free Hotel rooms and food if they wanted to stay a week in San Diego and give them an additional cruise on top of all that!!!

Ryan Harlan a little kid was interviewed and he said, “A lot of things went wrong, but it was really fun and I made some new friends.”

I don't know about you but I think I would have taken the small inconveniances, and all those perks, even the SPAM.

I hope I would have had the same PERSPECTIVE as Ryan Harlan instead of that boat full of Jonahs!

 

Retro Post #1: Jesus and Hot Dogs

This post originally posted on The Jesters Pub on October 4, 2005

Last night was one of the most memorable of my life and once again a reminder of the blessings in my life and the blessings that God pours out on us when we simply give of ourselves. I was invited by Mary Rude one of my high school volunteers to join her and her family in downtown tampa where they feed homeless people each Monday night. I was eagerly looking forward to finally joining them downtown and being a part of their incredible ministry.

I brought about five pairs of jeans and some shirts to give out and they were snatched up right away. Basically Mary's family brings hot meals and desserts and sack lunches, which they pay for themselves, every Monday night and there are literally about 60 to 80 people who line-up to receive the food each Monday. I became a server of the hot dogs. They were the most popular. It was amazing and heartbreaking all at the same time as I handed out hot dogs to young, old, black, white, oriental, male and female all who were homeless, all who would sleep that night on the hard Earth.

Each face represented some sad story, a story of a person who by all regards is now forgotten in our society, except on Monday nights @ 7pm. I got to sit and talk with Curtis who was forty one and had a warm and inviitng personality. He talked about his life and how he had quit in life so many times but he was tired of quitting, he also talked about how his family had never been there for him and how he could have made something of his life. He talked about God and how he knew that God loved him and he just wanted to do what the Lord wanted him to do, but he just hadn't been able to.

I am always amazed by the honesty of people like Curtis who have no images to uphold, no self-righteousness to protect and can be raw before people and God. Curtis may be considered to be in poverty but I have met so many people who make 150,000 a year in my life who live in poverty of the soul because of their lack of honesty before God. I met Jesus last night, I felt him near, I felt His pleasure and I knew he was close to all of us in that place. I left downtown last night thanking God for my time there, for the people that I met, and for the Kingdom of God I saw lived out through hot dogs and coconut cake. I will be back next week!

**UPDATE**

Since this posting Mary's family ministry has become known as Amazing Love Ministries. Go to their website or their Facebook page to read their newsletters, see pics and other info about how this awesome ministry has grown or to support them financially.

I recently spoke their on a Monday night and it was a huge blessing to me to see what God has done with this ministry.

Here is a video about the minstry:

 

The Boston Bombers: A Youth Ministry Story?

 As I have been watching the details about the Boston bombing suspects become public, I have been struck by how much their lives and story resemble(albeit in a very negative way) a successful youth ministry/mentoring story. Let me explain. All indications are that the older brother came to America as a pretty normal young man, a typical older teenager. Had friends, was very involved in an extracurricular activity (boxing), and was well liked by people. He was not a loner or a recluse at all. It was at some point in the last few years where all indications are that a older person(s), seemingly a person(s) of faith (Islam) took notice of the potential in this young man and decided to invest in his life.

 I would bet that it was through the influence of this (these) person/people that the older brother became "radical" about his faith. They put him in touch with resources, teachings and others who shared these destructive beliefs and the older brother found a cause worth giving himself to, worth dying for, sadly worth killing others for.

By all indications the older brother then traveled overseas, on a "mission trip" if you will to receive training, meet with others who were radical about the cause and who had paid a price for their faith. He met with people who encouraged him, legitimized his growing beliefs and ideas, and trained him how to take it to the next level. He then came back to America a changed person, ready to face anything and living life with newfound purpose. When he returned he shared this overwhelming passion with the person he loved the most, his younger brother. He had great influence on his younger brother who by all accounts would do anything for his big brother and with the lack of a father's presence in their lives that influence carried a lot of weight. A whole lot of weight, enough weight that he would be willing to kill and maim others.

We all know how the rest of the story goes.

Their story sounds so familiar to me. In many ways it is what I have spent my life doing with others and what others did for me. Follow me through this:

1.When I was a sixteen year old, an older man in the Christian faith took an interest in me. I was just an average American teenager going about my life. He saw potential in me, and encouraged me in how I could live a radical life for Jesus Christ. He mentored me. I along with many volunteers did the same for plenty of young men in the last twenty three years in the ministries I oversaw.

2. We provided resources and training to help teenagers grow in this new faith. We introduced them to a whole new world that in many ways they didn't know existed.

3. When I was twenty I found a cause worth living for, worth dying for, and worth sharing with others. It was the gospel of Jesus Christ. I saw hundreds of teens wake up to that reality in their heart.

4. I took kids on mission trips where they encountered people who had suffered for the faith, lived in different conditions then they did, people and experiences that gave them a whole new way of seeing the world. They were forever changed.

5. When I got serious about my faith I wanted my younger brother to know it, I wanted him to see what I was seeing. I wanted him to join me. I've watched kids get serious about their faith and share it with passion to whomever would listen. They become radical about their faith and where willing to do whatever they could for others to know.

What am I trying to say? Lots. Ideas are powerful. Young people are moldable. Mentors can change the whole direction of a person's life. Young people will look for something worth giving their life to.

It is a stark reminder you and I can influence a life for good or for evil. I'm sure you knew all this already but we all need reminded.

Lets pray for the victims families, healing for shattered lives and bodies, that the young people in our culture would meet Jesus, and yes even for our enemies that the Prince of Peace would change their hearts.