what makes serving so hard?

it's been a question of mine for years. it's not like I'm trying to point a finger at any one person; the Lord knows it could easily point back at me. but I'm just wondering why, even as saved and being saved people, redeemed and being redeemed, filled with the Holy Spirit, we, you and me, more often than not, struggle with the idea of serving? one thing I don't believe is something someone once said, or at least I thought I heard, "it's not serving if you enjoy doing it." I don't believe that. at the same time, I don't think whether you enjoy "it" (whatever "it" is) or not matters as to whether or not you do it or not. but why do we find it so hard to serve? it's not like I really enjoyed emptying the sink of dessert plates, utensils, and coffee mugs last night after our small group left our house. but it's not like I felt like I was dying because of it either. I did it because, a) [as my wife often says] it was there and needed to be done, and, b) I didn't want my wife to think I was leaving it there for her to clear out. yet I have to say, my natural inclination is not to serve. maybe I'm way off. maybe this is just my issue. maybe this is the area of the "old" man in me that is awaiting and undergoing sanctification and transformation. I don't know. I just find that sometimes I don't want to serve. what about you? what do you think?

life just happens

there's a part of me that wakes up every day and wonders, "how did I get here?" it's like I'm this person who finds themself in an alternate reality. you see, I'm married to this great woman, we live in a nice house, and we have three good, beautiful kids. and I wonder, "what's up with this?" I look at my three kids (yes, that's them in the pic), and I think, "hey, I'm too young to have kids." but then I realize that I'm not the young kid myself anymore. when did that happen? when did I grow up? the reality is far more strange than the (you might think strange) ponderings in my mind: simply that life happens. you see, while I'm still not sure how I got here, or what's up with this, I do know that behind it all, and actually infront of it and beside it, too, for that matter, is God. and His grace has been and is at work in my life. what a comfort. what an awesome truth. no matter what else is going on; no matter how terrible things get, God is there. you see, one thing I realized a long time ago, is that I never did anything to deserve all the "good", all the "cool", or all the "wonderful" that God has either given me directly, or just allowed me to be blessed with. and that's a comfort, too. there's nothing I have to do to get God's blessings. life is just like that. or more importantly, God is just like that.

discipleship recovery

how are we supposed to live as a community of disciples when most of the people in the community only seem to be feigning disicpleship?

what pain are they hiding (or hiding from) that they won't give all of who they are?

how can we move forward together, to be the Church that Jesus talks about in John's upper room discourse?

how can we speak into each other's lives prophetically and not be judgmental?

how do we recover discipleship in our day and age?

Greek to me

I find it hard to believe that just three plus months ago, I couldn't have told you the difference between a greek verb and a greek noun, let alone declension, case, gender, or number. But as of last night, I made it through my NT Greek final exam. And it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought.

It turned out to be shorter than I thought it would be (no complaints there). Just a pericope out of John 15, verses 8 through 15. If this blog allowed for the font, I'd reprint the passage in greek, but alas, it doesn't. Needless to say, it was a good challenge. And it reminded me how good God is. I'm looking forward to using what I know, and learning more, as eventually take Greek Exegesis at some point. One thing I will say is that studying the New Testament in its original language has reminded me of the power of the words that I experienced the first time I opened a Bible to read for myself. Wow, is all I can say.

But I also want to share some thanks. First, thanks to my wife and kids for being so understanding when I had to study. I also want to thank my instructor, Lois Wilson, whose gentle spirit made learning Greek almost easy. Then I have to thank Debbie Watson, whom I was desperately hoping I would be studying Greek under, but alas and alack, didn't - Debbie was still incredibly encouraging for me. And I want to thank my students for putting up with me bringing in little nuggets of Greek into our weekly bible studies here and there.

Now I can honestly say, "it's Greek to me" and mean it.

understanding ourselves - understanding myself

Life is full of ups and downs. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to be able to observe that reality. I think when you work in the church that truth becomes a weekly if not daily occurance. Just over a week ago (from this entry), I was given a heads up that apparently two or more people had gone to my pastor to complain about me in some way, shape, or form. While none of those people has come to me directly to talk or confront me about how I've "sinned" against them (see Matthew 18), it was decided that there would be meetings with these people and others about perceptions of my performance, my attitude, my style of ministry.

I have to say, my gut reaction was not good. It's been a real sad experience, as I feel hurt, betrayed, and deeply saddened that anyone (someone from within the church) who had something against me would rather go and rip against me behind my back rather than come to me. The long and short of it is it's left me feeling really defensive, and even persecuted.

Yet, at the same time, I've also felt like my inner emotions have been way out of whack, too. While I'm obviously not happy about all of this, I was also feeling that the deeper, inner feelings were too strong. Why was this so? Yesterday, during my day off, in between translating greek sentences and making up study notes for new greek verb tenses, I made a simple and short prayer: "Lord, show me my heart, that I may understand myself."

If you know me, or you pray with any regularity, you know that prayers uttered are not always, and honestly from my experience, rarely answered within a few moments of praying. Yet, that is what happened. Within a few minutes of praying this, while it was still fresh in my mind, I felt the Lord had given me the answer.

What came to mind were images from my middle school and high school years. While I was in 6th grade, my mom remarried, to a fellow my friends came to "lovingly" refer to as Jabba the Hutt. Jabba was, as his "name" implies, an extremely obese fellow with a penchant for unlawful activities. The summer before my senior year in high school he was arrested for imbezelment, and then again arrested while I was in college. Again while I was in college he violated his parole, went "underground", and was later picked up on the other side of the country by the police after bouncing checks to a number of different people and places. You can imagine from all of this that he wasn't a kind person. He was not. And not a day went by that he and I didn't have some sort of clash, whereby he would find something about me, something I had done, or something he perceived I had done or should've done, and laid into me with a verbal assault to rival any drill sergeant's.

As I received the answer to my prayer, I realized that the root of my anxious and defensive feelings sank all the way to those memories, those moments of being blamed and accused of things that were of little importance or nonexistent. And I realized that my frustrations and resentment toward what's going on now is so strong because deep in my mind, I feel unjustly accused, and once more under assault from a critical spirit.

In coming to understand my self, I have come to a better place. I realize I don't have to listen to those old voices. I don't have to feel so vulnerable as I did when I was a young teenager. And I don't have to fear. People will say what they want about you, and they will believe what they want about you. I'm not going to fear because I know that God is in control, and that I have a clean conscience. There may be misunderstandings about something I've done or even said. Perhaps someone caught me on an off day and have been harboring ill feelings ever since. It's possible. At the same time, I don't have to buy into their perceptions of me.

I trust God. And I trust that the people who are listening to these accusations want the best for everyone, especially for God to be glorified. I pray that out of all of this, we all may be reconciled in Christ. That's something I feel good about. That's something I've come to understand about myself. Praise God!