...a bunch of thoughts on evangelism. Stay tuned.
My Wife is Married to Eeyore: a Confession
Ever seen the movie Walk the Line, the biopic about Johnny Cash and his rise from Arkansas Farm-boy to music legend? Remember the series of scenes with Johnny as an appliance salesman going door-to-door? Now, remember how everybody kept slamming their door in Johnny's face? Remember all of that? Johnny was on the cusp of breaking through as a musician, looking for that one break that would hurtle him star-wards, only selling appliances because he had to in order to make ends meet. Johnny was a failure of a salesman, knowing deep down that he was destined for something more.
Now, pretend Johnny was a car salesman.
Now, pretend it's me instead of Johnny.
This is my life right now.
I'm the airplane in the holding pattern, waiting for the storm to clear so it can land; I'm the dolphin waiting on the trainer's whistle, so I can leap out of the water, hit the dangly ball and go get my fresh cuttle fish; I'm the squirrel waiting breathlessly for the mother of all acorns to fall to the ground under the oak tree. In other words, It's a waiting game for me. And it sucks. I couldn't sell a winter coat and thermal underwear to a naked mountain climber at 15,000 feet. He'd convince me he's "just looking," or he'll "come back later." So sales obviously isn't my forte. I could have guessed it wouldn't be from the outset, but I thought I could make enough money to get by and pay my bills. Apparently not. So I'm in the hunt for something else, perhaps a factory job where I can go work my shift, collect my paycheck, and come home. Is that too much to ask? I don't want to make a million bucks (though I wouldn't turn it down). I don't want to be rich, just able to pay my bills. I don't even know what to pray for anymore. I try, but my mind goes ape and I can't seem to focus on any one of the million things I'd like to say to God. So most of my attempts dissolve into incoherent mind-babble and half-hearted, half-finished utterances for some general help from God.
(Heavy sigh of exhausted resignation.)
My spiritual life (whatever that means) is in great shape (read that again and lace it with bitter sarcasm). I've only blamed God, like, 10 million times, which probably has a direct impact on the fiasco that is my prayer life. I've thought about calling Oprah for help...
Just kidding.
What I wish I were kidding about is how this is affecting my family. I come home after a 12-hour shift, overflowing with failure, and suck all the joy out of the room, like giant emotional Electrolux. I ruined my anniversary, a very tactful move on my part, because I couldn't stop being Eeyore. It's affecting my wife, who generally is a bright, positive, cheerful person, a joy to be around and simply a blessing to be hitched to in marriage. I feel bad about this. I don't want to be Eeyore, emo, or emotionally jacked-up. I can't seem to get past my circumstances. It's round two of a twelve-round bout and I'm already bleeding badly (cut me, Mick, cut me!) from being unable to dodge life's blows. Depressed yet? Well that's not my intent. I realized that I've been a mess for awhile and it isn't getting better. Seems like every time I fix one part of my life another part falls off and I'm scrambling for the duct tape, superglue and Bond-o. (Uplifting moment coming...sort of.) I'll survive. I know it. I always do. I'm not dead yet. Somehow, someway, all of me will pull through. I hope I don't burn my family out in the process. I hope God does whatever he is going to do with soon.
I hope I get my big break with Sun Records and Sam Phillips tomorrow.
shalom, matt
Kind of Like Syrup
You know what I don't understand (I know...there are so many things: hairless cats, people who have ferrets as pets, 70-year-old people with Bluetooth receivers stuck in their ear, and dogs with silent barks)? I don't understand, truly fail to grasp, how anyone can have a stagnant, unyielding theology. It's as if God has stopped illuminating humanity with new insight into the understanding of the mystery of the gospel. Okay, so I understand that it's just easier to think that you have everything you need to know. And, I suppose, that for some Christians this way works for them.
I can't do it.
My theology--my understanding of the mystery of God, and my relationship to it--is constantly changing, always in a state of perpetual motion. It's viscous, like Log Cabin syrup, slow but always flowing and reforming. This isn't to say that I'm better than someone who prefers a more intransigent, chiseled, rigid theology, but it's what works for me. I always want to know something new, be challenged in some way, have my view stretched. And this certainly doesn't mean I'm wishy-washy, or soft in my faith, easily swayed by new trends and fads. I'm just willing to listen to other ideas in my relentless search for what is true and real. God, through Jeremiah, said, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of your heart. I will be found by you." That's why I seek. That's why I'm so fluid, because I want to believe that I will find God, or, perhaps to say, I'll find a deeper part of God, if I keep searching.
shalom, matt
A Realization 7/8 of the Way Through
Do you ever wonder if Jesus felt utter futility while he ministered here on Earth? Maybe a better question would be how often did he feel ineffectual and trivial, like he was spinning his wheels in the Palestinian dirt, trying to gain traction for the mission God had given him? How did he overcome the feelings of futility? Just prayer? How did he keep going when doors seemed to be slammed in his face? Did he ever wonder which way was up? Was he ever confused about his mission, especially on a day to day basis?
Here's where I'm going with this: I have no idea what I'm supposed to be doing with my life at this particular junction in the road. I've never been here before, at this spot on the map; it's foreign, like going to Europe with nothing but Mexican pesos, a backpack and a compass that doesn't point north. Things have never been this unclear, this muddled and turbulent. Thirteen summers ago I threw my life down in front of God and joyfully agreed to answer his call to ministry, to work as a missionary to the world of teenage confusion, angst, and frustration. Through four years of schooling and eight plus years of of experience I have never (rarely?) doubted that call on my life. I loved my work (mostly?) and was fiery and passionate about what I had given every ounce of my being towards. Now, I have no idea what I want anymore, much less discerning what God might want. Needless to say, my shrubbery isn't catching fire, nor are any disembodied hands writing on my wall's at home (though there are four year old-sized hand prints everywhere).
This conundrum has been thrown into sharp relief since I preached at my home church recently. I realized something while I was preaching, a thought that had "gone Osama" (into hiding...get it?...Osama...hiding...) on me in recent months: I love to teach and preach. I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed sharing with people the knowledge that was stoking my fires.
But this only adds to my confusion.
My dad made a comment after church to me: "We need to get you back into ministry." To which I responded, "Well, if you can find a ministry that doesn't involve working in a church, then sign me up." You see the last 6-8 months of my most recent ministry post was an absolute nightmare, a hell on earth in the one place that hell should not be. The following months have shown that, while I was certainly culpable to some degree in my resulting termination, there was also a large amount of lies, half-truths, deception and shady motives that played no small part in the decision to can me. All of it is neither here nor there; it's done for me now and I'm moving on. But you can understand my not wanting to jump back into a church-based ministry too soon. I need to heal; my wife needs to heal.
So that brings me back to where I started: now what? I hate my sales job, not necessarily the job, but the "big money" that I was told about--the money I need to support my family--hasn't materialized. Not even close. So, now I'm looking for another job, but decent paying ones are hard to come by for someone with so few usable job skills.
Like I said, I'm at a junction.
Couple all of this with the accompanying silence from God (or is it deafness on my part?) and you can see why I'm wondering if Jesus felt this way. The Garden of Gethsemane was an extreme example of doubting God's mission for him. I can't fathom that kind of agony-of-decision. But in the day to day comings and goings did he ever wonder,
"Is this what you want God?"
"What now God?"
"These guys? Really?"
But even more important to me is knowing how he dealt with it.
"Jesus went off by himself to a solitary place to pray."
Is that the key? Is that the missing factor, the "silver bullet?" It's with no small sense of guilt that I confess my unreliability when it comes to regular times of prayer. God knows I've tried to establish some sort of rhythm. Perhaps there is a bit of self-revelation in this for me, a realization of where I have to begin if I'm going to make any progress at the junction, deciding on the right route. (WARNING: Crappy Christian cliche ahead!) I have to turn the power back on, reconnect myself to the power source before the light will come on (that was for Michael B.). At any rate, without having more than a superfluous connection to God I can't hope to move on down the road. It has to begin there.
After that we'll see what happens.
shalom, matt
I Got Tagged By My Idiot Brother
10 random facts about me because my brother "tagged me" on his blog.
1. I haven't sold a car in 2.5 weeks. Big money in car sales, ya'll? Woo-hoo!
2. I'm almost 31 years old and I can't stop playing video games. Sad? Yes. Do I care what you think? No.
3. I just bought the new Wilco c.d. Sky Blue Sky. You should buy it, too, because it's really good and if you have any musical taste at all you'll listen to me. I have musical taste. You should have musical taste, too. So put away your Lily Allen c.d. and buy something with talent.
4. I have a crush on Jodie Foster but I can't explain why. I also have a crush on Daphne from Scooby Doo.
5. I almost bought a Kelly Clarkson c.d. last week...I...I'm sorry...I almost couldn't help myself...
6. My wife inexplicably has a crush on Robert Redford. I'm thinking about buying her a leathery saddle bag and telling her it's him. Same thing really.
7. When someone recites the names of the planets I giggle when they get to Uranus.
8. I am Michael Baysinger's love child.
9. The next time my wife gets pregnant (by me, of course) I'm going to wear a t-shirt that says, "One in the Oven" and has an arrow pointing to my stomach.
10. I really want to go to the following places in the next two decades: Montana, Alaska, the U.K., Jodie Foster's house, Seattle, Boston, Niagara Falls, any place that isn't a car dealership, Israel, Rome, and Australia.
That's it. Now leave me alone.
I'm tagging the following people:
Kim Golden
Kim Golden
Kim Golden
Kim Golden
The Wiggles
Eternal Life and Whatnot: And In Conclusion, What You Do Matters
“For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person's work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.”
Paul says that one day our work in the here and now is going to be tested by fire, a Biblical symbol of purification and cleansing. Our earthly work for the kingdom is being built on the foundation of Christ (sing it with me: “The wise man builds his house upon the rock…”), giving it permanence, an eternal nature simply because it is built on THE Eternal. We work, according to Scripture, in Christ: he is eternal and therefore our work (and you and me) are eternal.
I want to know that what I do her on Earth matters, that it is meaningful and lasting. I want to know that the most quantitatively minute, miniscule things I do—the bowls soup dished out to the homeless, the mission trips taken to reservations, the cups of water given to a coworker, or the extra effort when no one is watching—are going to matter in the here and now and into forever and beyond. I don’t want Jesus’ prayer—Your kingdom COME, your will be done on EARTH as it is in heaven—to be a post-offering prayer or simply a meaningless part of our liturgy; I want to be a part of answering that prayer, of seeing it become a flesh-and-bone reality. I don’t want it to happen someday; I want it to happen today.
I truly believe, and Scripture points to, the kingdom as a present reality that we can bring to earth by how we live and work in Christ. Rev. 21:2-3 says,
“I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Look! God's dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.'”
I believe our work here on earth is, in some mysterious way, building this New Jerusalem that is to come down out of heaven. We are building the place where you and I will dwell with Him and with each other forever. Need further proof? Watch…
Notice in 1 Corinthians 3 the items, the “work,” that survives the testing are what? Gold, silver, and costly stones, right? These things cannot be burned up, they last, having been built on the foundation that lasts. Now read Revelation 21:18-19:
“The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone.”
What is the New Jerusalem built of? Gold. Costly stones. Do you see the obvious? Gentle readers, as citizens of “the new humanity,” firmly rooted in Christ, we are building right now the very place where we will dwell with God forever. God is restoring everything to Eden specifications and intents. And we are taking part, playing a significant role in that restoration with Him.
Does that give a bit of significance to what we do in this life?
Yeah, I agree!
shalom, matt
Eternal Life and Other Whatnot: How the Cross is Just Getting Started
Ask a child what they think of when you say "heaven" and you'll get a myriad of answers:
"Clouds."
"Sunshine."
"Angels."
"Jesus" (it is a Sunday School question, after all).
When you ask them (or anyone) where heaven is you'll hear something along the lines of "out there." Crappy Christian art hasn't helped the matter much with images of a golden city floating out among the stars ("It's out there past Pluto. I think you take a left past Jupiter, go for about 200 million miles, go straight past Uranus, right on 53rd (you'll see a Denny's on the left) and head west until you see the golden glow of Heaven!"). To the Jews of Jesus' day heaven was not a fixed, unchanging, geographical location somewhere other than this world (plot-able on a Rand McNally atlas, listed just after Hawaii). For them (and, hopefully, for us) heaven is the realm where things are as God intends them to be, where things are under the rule and reign of God. And that place can be anywhere, anytime, with anybody. When Jesus talks about heaven and hell, they are first and foremost present realities that have serious implications for the future. And consequently, either can be invited to earth, right here, right now, through our actions. Ever heard anyone say, "It was hell on earth"? That's not just a turn of phrase; it's a legitimate reality. Ask the rape or abuse victim, the family of the slain soldier, the cancer patient in hospice care if hell can come to earth. On the flip side of the coin, ask the new mother and father staring goggle eyed at their 2 day old infant, the newlyweds on their honeymoon, the new disciple of Jesus, the homeless family that now has a home if heaven can come to earth. And all of these moments aren't simply based on strong emotional outpourings, but preludes of a greater reality out beyond the vanishing point that point to a continuation of the life we are living right now. Richard Foster wrote,
Getting into heaven is a matter of genuine consequence (and it does, in fact, come as part of the total package), but the evangel (message) of the Gospel is that abundant life in Christ begins now, and death becomes only a minor transition from this life to greater life.
The writer of Colossians 1 wrote, concerning Christ, "For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross." There is something going on through the Cross, something bigger and more universal than just personal salvation and our guarantee of life in the age to come. Through the shed blood of the slain Lamb God is reconciling--restoring, bring back together into relationship--everything that is "under the sun." God is bringing it back to himself. Yes, God wants to put you and me together, restoring us to himself, because he is restoring everything.
I'll close with a Talmudic story about a Rabbi Joseph, son of Rabbi Joshua ben Levi. Joseph dies and returns back to life and his father asks him, "What did you see?" He replies, "I beheld a world the reverse of this one; those who were on top here were below there, and vice-versa." Joshua ben Levi said to him, "My son you have seen a corrected world."
shalom, matt
Line Rider
Linerider.com is a very cool site with a number of quality productions based on this very simple concept: your mouse, lines, and a sled. Here are a couple of examples
Eternal Life and Other Whatnot: Beyond the Vanishing Point
Ever been on an airplane? I used to hate flying. It isn't bad now. I've done it enough that I've actually come to enjoy it some. One of the great parts about flying is the "endless" view out your side window. Unless, of course, you are in the aisle seat where you get to count the rows until the drink cart gets to you. And God forbid you end up in the middle seat, wedged unceremoniously between Jake and Fat Man or two Bolivians who don't speak English but insist on trying to communicate with you. But I digress...
As I was saying the view is amazing. It's the horizon that simply numbs the mind with its shear size. A million miles out beyond the wingtip is the place where earth and sky vanish into one another.
The word for this in Hebrew is olam and it means "to the vanishing point." The New Testament is full of examples of a particular phrase that we translate as "the world to come." In the Hebrew it is the phrase olam haba, which can also stand for eternal life. Olam haba was used as a descriptor for a quality of life lived with God in wholeness and completeness and peace. In Jesus' day jews did not presume to see beyond the horizon from our 30,000 foot vantage point, Jews did not presume to look past the "horizon" of life into the eternal. That was God's prerogative alone. Forever was too large a concept. This life is what mattered to God. The commands of Scripture were given to guide us in the way to live in harmony with God here and now, not get us into heaven. eternal life isn't simply something that happens to us down the road someday; it is happening right now. Since we cannot see beyond the vanishing point we concentrate our efforts on living in the here and now, living in the present moment with both God and humanity. Whatever is beyond the vanishing point is the sleeping dog we leave to lay inside the doghouse and will one day awaken.
shalom, matt
Eternal Life and Other Whatnot: So Much Baggage, So Little Time
The rabbis of Jesus' day would frequently have three requests made of them by their band of disciples:
1. What is the greatest commandment?
2. Teach us to pray.
3. What must I do to gain eternal life?Ever since forever there has been, found somewhere in our core reality as God-breathed, created beings, an innate desire to live forever, to escape the clutches of death and laugh in its face as it tucks its head between its legs and lumbers home. Our desire to live forever has bred a number of iffy theologies and assumptions that generally involve us dying and going somewhere else, a place with chubby, winged naked babies and clouds that smell like cotton candy. And there are mansions somewhere, too. Oh, and Jesus. No one can agree on how to get there exactly, who gets a map to find the place, and what you are supposed to do when you get there.
Growing up all I heard was how to "get to heaven." This was the goal of life. Survive here, be good, don't end up on Santa's bad list, eat your veggies, and get baptized (by immersion, please). If you did all of this you were rewarded with an invisible, but nonetheless, real ticket for a one way trip to the pearly gates, entering into a glorious place where all of your dreams come true and you get everything you ever wanted. And Jesus was there, too. It's a "pie-in-the-sky-when-you-die" theology. It's built on the idea that there is something much better than where we currently reside.
Ever heard this one: "I can't wait to die/for Jesus to come back so I can get out of here." In layman's terms: this place sucks and I want out. It's an escapist theology: "Let's make like Houdini, throw off these chains, and get out of this box before we run out of air. This world has nothing for us, no hope of being anything but corrupt and evil. Get me out of here." Escapist theology is rooted in despair and hopelessness, and, perhaps, spiritual laziness. "This world is hopeless and not worth working on, not worth my efforts."
Jesus talked more about hell than he did heaven, so we should do the same.
Even better than that is a line I found on a website called raptureready.com:
Hell is a prime motive for evangelism.
We need to be weary of any theology, sermon, or book that is rooted in the idea of escape. Can we honestly believe that God put us here, created us with his own breath, and called us "good" so that we could spend that life trying to escape? Is that the abundant life Jesus promised us in John 10:10? Is escaping our only task, our only goal for life?
shalom, matt
One Track Party
Good heavens, this is so scary I don't even have words for it. Politicians, particularly Republicans it seems, don't know any other way than to go to war.
shalom, matt
Eternal Life and Other Whatnot: An Introduction
I used to be absolutely, positively, 100%, beyond belief and comprehension terrified of Jesus' Second Coming. I loathed my teachers for talking about it in Sunday School. I remember sitting in junior high Sunday School class and hearing my teacher say that the Second Coming would most definitely happen in our lifetime (this was right around the time of the 1st Gulf War, so end times speculation was running rampant). I hated her for saying that, for I was sure that her vocalizing the words would speed the realization of the actual eschatological event. "Shut up! Shut up!" I remember screaming in my head, "I want to get married and have kids, get a job, grow old, build a white picket fence. I'm too young to go to heaven." I denied its possibility of happening, like my ever going to the dentist for a teeth cleaning; it wasn't going to happen, dang it, not if I had any say in the matter. Whenever preachers would mention it I would shut down, go into a self-induced neural coma (also known as a "cat-nap") and drift off into the faraway land of chimpanzees with wings, circus clowns named Boffo, and purple, pink-polka-dotted elephants who know how to make soup.
My mother is obsessed with the end. She may not know what eschatology is but she knows that Jesus is coming back soon because the world is full of war, hurricanes, earthquakes, and a Democrat-controlled Congress (all of theses apparently altogether new phenomenon in the course of human history). Needless to say, there is an endless stream of ridicule and derision that flows my mother's direction from my brother and I. We are the Mississippi River of ridicule.
True story. Awhile back bad storms were rumbling through Gosport and Ellettsville where my brother and mother reside, respectively. Mom, being mom, called my brother, Brad, to see if he knew about the storms, assuming that my brother doesn't realize that dark clouds, in Indiana, during May usually mean bad storms. Mom mistakenly made the comment that Jesus must be coming back soon because the inclement weather and current world events seem to be a barometer of the end times. After weathering (only only kid of intended) my brother's latent sarcasm they both hung up and waited for the storms to pass. Afterwards, when the storms had moved on, my brother called back. The conversation went thusly:
Mom: Hello?
Brad: Um, yeah, Jesus called and he said to tell you it was just a storm and he isn't coming back yet.
Mom: (Click)
Being 30 has brought with it a new perspective concerning eschatology and things related thereto. I avoid the book of Revelation, and have most of my life, due to my former fear of it (it has monsters in it!) and its constant reminder of Jesus coming back to beat bad people up (of whom I counted myself among). I avoid it now for different reasons, mostly because I don't understand it and I don't want to sit and fight about how Bill Clinton and Iraq are the Antichrist and Babylon with amateur theologians who watch John Hagee and read Left Behind.
My new perspective has brought with it a new attitude: I"m no longer afraid of Jesus coming back (whatever that may look like or mean).
Over the coming week or so I'm going to write a series of articles on eternal life and things related to it. I want to look at some of our old-fashioned, theologically inaccurate, and, frankly, dangerous views of eternal life itself. I'm going to break them down and unpack the danger they carry with them. Following hard on the heels of that we'll look at the world of Jesus and the Jewish concept of eternal life, which will drastically alter how we read eternal life passages in Scripture. Finally, we'll end up with how it affects us and our way of living in this world.
Stay tuned.
shalom, matt
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