Read Like a Gospel

Cindi and I, Joe and Heidi Keller and their son Sam, and Lisa LaGeorge walked around Newhall a bit tonight and then went to a very cheap dinner at Mi Casa.  Then Lisa LaGeorge gave us a tour of her half of a duplex and we fellowshipped in her living room for an hour or so (she lives right across the street from Oak Manor).

It is wonderful to be in the Newhall community.  Perhaps a bit incarnational, if we don’t get lazy.  Every road except the narrow one leads to hell, so God help us to jump into this part of town and get our hands dirty.  I desperately look forward to building relationships with our neighbors and the shopkeepers and the Mexicans and the residents of the convalescent homes and hospitals and the kids running around in the parks and skating down the sidewalks… evangelism isn’t an event or a schedulable entity.  It’s a lifestyle.  I don’t recall Jesus setting dates and posting flyers for His healings.  Not that it would have been wrong to.  But He just flat-out lived.  And I want to live.  Not just dream, not just talk, not just have good intentions, not just post the record of particularly meaningful days on xanga, not just compartmentalize aspects of my life into blocks of time like “Bible reading,” “evangelism,” “discipleship meeting,” “go running” – not just eat, drink, sleep, and be merry — I want to live.

I want my life to read like a Gospel.  Love… faith… pain… sacrifices… hope… darkness… light… joy… sorrow… shouting “Hosanna!”… weeping over the city… helping the sick… attracting the outcasts… standing toe-to-toe with the hypocrites and heretics… firm… tender… bold… soft… gentle… tenacious… just like Jesus.  Yeah… I want my life to read like a Gospel.

Back from Northern California: Reflections

Cindi and I got back today from a 10-day trip to Northern California.  I spoke at a 6th-8th grade camp on the Beatitudes, we saw some great college friends, we stayed with Kent and Julie Dresdow and visited their new church and heard Kent preach, hung out in San Francisco for a night and a day, and spent two nights with Ben and Abby Borders (formerly Abby Hegg) in San Jose.

The camp was very refreshing and encouraging.  Very needed after a profitable but wearying summer.  The kids were receptive to the voice of God speaking in His Word, and they were well-behaved.  Kids (or anyone, for that matter) who are not old enough to be “too cool” for the people and circumstances around them are a pure joy to be around.  And the beatitudes are amazing.  May I learn to live them, and may the world be turned upside down.

It was heavenly being at the Dresdow’s church.  To see the happiness of the people, their receptivity to the Word and their conviction in response to God-centered preaching, their exuberance in song and fellowship, their freedom and joy as they adorned the house of God with delight — I’m overjoyed that Kent and Julie are there.  Kent preached on Ephesians 6:18-20 — prayer — and it was a stirring message.  I desperately want to pray more and deeper and better…. pick your adverb.

Sunday afternoon we went to an Oakland A’s game.  Oakland is a pretty old and dirty city (quite noticeably).  Which usually means lots of inner city.  Which means the Good News looks really, really good.  I hope some Good Samaritans are down there.  I’m sure they are — God is faithful.  Gives you a burden to see one big city out of the thousands in the world and to know that it’s only *one* city.  And that’s just the cities.  God, help us.

It’s expensive to stay in San Francisco.  It’s embarrassing how much we paid just to stay one night in a Travelodge.  The Bay Area is ridiculously rich in general (despite the previous comments about Oakland).  A good area to pray for, because it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.  How hard?  Harder than it is for a camel to mosey through the eye of a needle.  So faith says, “With God all things are possible.”  That’ll give you hope.

On Monday morning on the way down to San Jose to see Ben and Abby, we stopped at a beach where there was a concrete barrier a ways away from the water.  It had a ton of graffiti on it, some of it quite artistic.  We took a bunch of pictures with various ‘taggings’ (I may have just made that word up), a practice that may become a tradition for us while on trips.  Those guys are very skilled.  We can only pray that someday they will be called out of darkness and into God’s marvelous light so as to use their abilities to proclaim His glory, just like the heavens do — without even having to use words (Ps. 19).  Beauty is a powerful thing.

Two days with Ben and Abby was very refreshing, as well.  We played games, caught up on life and soon-to-be-made decisions, talked about the need for wisdom, difficult situations in life in which God is faithful, biblical responsibilities of husbands, and much more.  Some of the most amazing friendships are those where it doesn’t matter how long you’ve been away from each other — you just pick up where you left off.  Every David who has a Jonathan in this life should “enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.”

We also watched a couple movies on the trip, which made me ask the movie question again — i.e., should I watch them?  My conclusions aren’t set, but I have a lot to think about.  Much of what bothered me was the fact that one of the dominant themes in my mind as I pondered the movie question was, “If I decided not to watch almost any movies (except very obviously appropriate and healthy ones), what would I do when I was in a group of people that was about to watch one?”  This wicked, conniving, deceitful, monstrous heart…. The kind of question my flesh was asking is a direct frontal assault on biblical thinking and biblical choosing.  What my flesh was trying to tell me was, “If you decide not to watch a movie that the group is watching, that’s going to be awkward.  People might feel a bit ostracized or judged.  You might look ‘holier-than-thou’.  What are you going to do, go off and read your Bible while everyone else is watching the movie?  That’ll look a little arrogant.”  But since when was consequential awkwardness the determiner of biblical choices?  And since when did the way my decisions appear to a group of people become the ultimate determiner of what God has said about being set apart from the world?  Since never, that’s when.  Whether or not I decide to watch a movie or not, I cannot allow myself to think this way.  So much of spirituality is mental.  I win or lose in my mind.

So, let the silent shouting match begin.  Flesh vs. spirit, round 105,279,704,434,549.  Or something like that.  It’s easy to lose count in this kind of war.

God, give me the strength and wisdom and grace to know Your Word, to have and hold unshakeable convictions, to know the difference between black and white and all the shades of gray and all the circumstances that determine their grayness, to never judge others, and to always do what the Spirit wants me to do.  This is hard.  My goodness — Your Son lived an awesome life.

We had a safe drive the whole way, too — there, back, and in between.  It’s the ‘little’ things that really tug on your heart, and help you to taste and see that the Lord is good.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

“Hold Them Back!”

Deliver those who are being taken away to death,
And those who are staggering to slaughter, Oh hold them back.   – Proverbs 24:11

Shocking verse.  Like waking up at 3am in a cold sweat, sitting up ramrod straight, eyes darting around the room in the darkness, paralyzed as you realize the fate of the people who are ”staggering to slaughter” all around you while the bullhorn sits rusting in the closet and that warning message you memorized so long ago sits on the back porch of your mind on the porchswing.  Batteries are still good… imagine that.  When’s the last time we used this thing?  The warning message still seems appropriate to the situation, too.  I guess it never gets old, does it… even when it’s swingin’ away, out of use.

Startling.  “Oh hold them back!”

And the next verse is startling for other reasons:

If you say, “See, we did not know this,”
Does He not consider it who weighs the hearts?
And does He not know it who keeps your soul?
And will He not render to man according to his work?   – Proverbs 24:12

It sure is comfortable when you’re asleep… You don’t have to change the batteries… or get beat up for hollering the message.

Gotta hit the streets.

Man, this book will change my life.

Desperation and Dependance: A Wonderful and Frightening Rhythm

Just finished a large paper on the Sabbath about an hour ago.  God gave much strength throughout the process, especially here at the end.  Still have about 4 hours of Hebrew homework to do before seminary classes are completely done for the summer, both class and homework.  It is hard to believe that this part of the summer is almost done.  So much learned.  I don’t quite know how to make God’s faithfulness to me throughout the last months of constant seminary work look as beautiful as it is, which was my purpose for posting…

But suffice it to say that I think that I am often lulled to sleep by the constant rhythm of need and provision.  I need… God provides… I need….. God provides….. I need………. God provides………. God provides………………. provides………………..zzzzz………

I think that’s why I need the Lord to jar me awake with a massive need, and to make me shout for joy because of a great deliverance.  In between those “massive” and “great” times, may I see the small ones so much more clearly.

For now, although it’s late and I’m tired, joy is my strength, the Lord is my shepherd, gratitude fills my heart, and “remember” is my watchword.  And thoughts of my eternal Sabbath rest in Christ will drive away anxious thoughts as I pillow my head, as God is gracious.  Nothing profound tonight.  Just a tired, content joy that’s droopy (because it’s 2 am) but alive (because I have Jesus).  So alive.