Waiting

All throughout the written Word we find psalmists, prophets, and ordinary Joes and Janes declaring that they will wait on God, wait on His salvation, on His help to come and rescue them. The Exodus is characterized by 400 freaking years of waiting, entire generations being born into, living through, and dying in slavery—with no word from God. We sang a song a couple Sundays ago in church that says, “Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord.” This got me thinking and meditating on the concept of waiting, specifically as it relates to overcoming temptations. All of us get caught in moments of temptation. During these times we have two possible responses: 1) give in, or 2) cry out to God for help. Admittedly there are times I choose option one simply because it’s easier than fighting against it. I’ve come to realize something though about option two and, at first, it bothered me until I realized what God might be doing. Have you ever cried out for help, sometimes repeatedly, and after a short while simply given up and returned to option one? Did it feel like no help came, like God was on a smoke break, leaving you to flounder and fail? What if, on the other hand, help was coming, the Spirit revving up to come to our aid, to rescue us with a renewed strength? What if we just didn’t wait long enough? I think that in the waiting God is looking into our hearts, assessing, as it were, our commitment, our passion for holiness. God is asking, so it seems, “Do you really want to overcome? Are you willing to allow Me to wait, to grow you through the temptation? Will you hold on long enough for me to arrive? Or will you give up, never realizing I was preparing to knock on your door?” Like the song says, I think strength starts to rise, to gain strength in us, as we wait. Are we willing to wait for God to show up? Scripture time and again points to a God who shows up in the nick of time, when all hope seems lost, when we are grasping the very last strands of rope, as we wait for one more second (and one more and one more and one more…)

Will you and I wait?

shalom, matt

Darkness

It is crucial that Jesus is led by the Spirit [into the desert to be tempted]. There are two wildernesses, two darknesses in the spiritual journey. One you go into by your own stupidity, by your sin, blindness, ignorance and mistakes. We all do that. But there’s another darkness that God leads us into, through and beyond. This is a necessary darkness for the journey. In a certain sense, God’s darkness is a much better teacher than light. There  comes a time when you have to either go deeper into faith or you will turn back, when you have to live without knowing or you lose faith altogether. So we have the Spirit leading Jesus into the wilderness, to face the essential darkness.  __From Jesus’ Plan for a New World by Richard Rohr__

shalom, matt

Fashion 101

This may be the greatest thing to ever hit a fashion show runway. 

Come on, females, you know that you want to rush out to Macy's and buy this for your next dinner party. Am I right? Who's with me?

 

And the Apocalypse is Just Around the Corner...

This could be the most disturbing thing I've read in awhile. 

(I hope Jimmy is reading this.)

shalom, matt

Lazy, Good-For-Nothing...

The world is full of lazy people who do just enough not to get fired and to give off the appearance of being a diligent worker. You can be fairly certain that you work with one of these species of human being when you find yourself, day in and day out, not only doing your share of the work but also their share as well. We in the manufacturing industry call this "wiping their butt for them." It goes without much saying that this is patently unfair given that your paychecks still come out equal. While this is certainly not the most heinous of injustices perpetrated upon mankind, it is, nonetheless, annoying as crap if you are the one pulling the extra weight.

It puts the disciple in an interesting (read "awkward") position by forcing him to chose between "screwing the screwer" (also known as taking revenge) and working himself to exhaustion in an effort to make sure the essential tasks are accomplished, even when it means "wiping someone's butt." Every ounce of you wants to exact revenge on them, to leave them hanging out to dry in the hopes they'll get blown away, like a kite in a hurricane. But then your heart conjures up images of Jesus washing dirty feet eighteen hours before his death for something(s) he never did. And as much as you try to shoo those inconvenient images away in order to exact your revenge--they persist. And you relent. And you carry a heavier load that somehow seems lighter when weighed against the load of Jesus. You realize "this too shall pass," that it's only a 12-hour shift. You start to wonder if maybe you're stuck (read "put") in this factory to make someone's day easier, make their load lighter. You sigh because you realize that God is teaching you something about the way of the kingdom. and underneath the sweat and aches you find another emotion rising up--contentment.

shalom, matt

Sigh

I hope they all lose their tax exempt status. I also wish the church would show a little bit of humility and not think that it is right all the time. Apparently it's okay for the church to break the law now. Guess I missed that memo.  

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/07/AR2008090702460_pf.html

Poor Diddy

Diddy: Lower oil prices so I can fly on private jet

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Fuel prices have grounded an unexpected frequent-flyer: Diddy.

Sean "Diddy" Combs complained about the "... too high" price of gas and pleaded for free oil from his "Saudi Arabia brothers and sisters" in a YouTube video posted Wednesday.

The hip-hop mogul said he is now flying on commercial airlines instead of in private jets, which Combs said had previously cost him $200,000 and up for a roundtrip between New York and Los Angeles.

"I'm actually flying commercial," Diddy said before walking onto an airplane, sitting in a first-class seat and flashing his boarding pass to the camera. "That's how high gas prices are. I'm at the gate right now. This is really happening, proof gas prices are too high. Tell whoever the next president is we need to bring gas prices down."