Posts Tagged ‘Faith’

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Debating Society or Living in Love

January 24, 2014

A teacher recently explained something of the difference between the Reformed view of Scripture and the Dispensationalist view. I found it interesting to learn that I was closer to the Reformed view than I’d have expected.

The Reformed strain begins with Luther, then Calvin and others of the 16th and 17th Century. The Dispensationalists (precursors of much of today’s “fundamentalists”) originated in the 19th Century.

By the way, these are Protestant strains of thought. There are other theologies alive in the Catholic and Orthodox traditions. I say that lest we think that we’ve discovered the one true way through some philosopher.

I’ve always found it instructive to read the earliest sources and tend to find writings that seek to explain the “secrets” of the Bible to be less than instructive.

To me, the Bible exists to show us how to live our lives in relationship with God. What would our lives look like if we did so.

I thought about this in relationship to theology and organized religion. I realized that over the course of the past 35 years or so, I’ve spent very little time thinking about religion. I used to subscribe to theology journals, but found the playing of mind games merely entertaining–not instructive.

There was a song that appeared in the mid-late 60s I think co-written by Paul Stookey of the folk music group Peter, Paul and Mary (and I’ve forgotten the title), that starts “Sunday morning very bright, I read your book by colored light that came in through the pretty window picture.” It’s about a person who shows up in church at times but finds it not nourishing. In one verse, he says they passed a plate and I just had time to write note that said “I believe in You.”

Jesus said we’d know his followers by their love. Sometimes I wonder if we’ve forgotten that simple description in our quest for theological purity (of a philosophy developed 1600 or 1900 years after Jesus) or doctrinal argument or unlocking the “secrets” of the Bible.

What have we done to show love today? It’s just that simple. And that hard.

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The Power of Prayer Plus Work

January 15, 2014

I am in Tijuana, Mexico this week visiting the Tijuana Christian Mission. Begun 50 years ago by an energetic young pastor, the mission now incorporates an orphanage in Tijuana, another in Rosarita, a shelter for abused women (mostly rescued from the sex trade), and a hospice hospital.

The founder (I’m probably not spelling it correctly) Sergio Gomez told us about his life and the ministry he has built. Rather God and he have built. I have written before about praying with intention. Well, he is the best example I’ve ever heard of prayers answered while praying specifically and with intention. As well as starting the path even when waiting on God to provide.

His family and the other staff are doing a great work (hearkening back to my Nehemiah discussions), and they “will not come down.” They keep the faith even when cheated and when promised support withers away.

I’m sitting in the courtyard typing this post listening to the boys playing basketball, a young girl rollerblading, the girls talking, a guitar lesson has just ended. Amazing.

Everything I’ve learned from my daughter about running a group home and dealing with troubled kids–they are living out. Most of the kids are victims of some sort of tragedy, and most are doing well. They’ve even had a college graduate recently.

If you are interested in learning more, just contact me.

[oh, sorry about the double post–I’m still learning how to use the WordPress app on my iPad]

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Experience God or Believe in God

January 14, 2014

Belief? Or experience?

I was brought up to believe in God. This word, belief, has long puzzled me. It means something like having confidence that something is true or something exists even though there is no empirical evidence that it is, indeed, true.

Faith also seems to me to be similar to belief.

I struggle with these words. They seem lacking. Not descriptive enough. What do you mean that you don’t know that God exists?

Do you ever wonder about this? Or wonder if God is real?

There is a group or community of people who have ecstatic experiences of the Spirit. We call them pentacostal or maybe other terms. I am not one, quite, but I know many. This is experiential worship. But many people are just not the right personality type for ecstatic worship.

I could say that I believe that people can experience God. But that sounds like a contradiction.

So, I’ve thought about all this for many years.

Then about 30 years ago, when I discovered that people really exist (as a science/engineering personality type, I was lost in a world of ideas for most of my early life), I started reading psychology. A lot. Freud. James, John Climacus. Jung.

Finally, an observation that seemed to fit my thinking as well as my experiences. Carl Jung, toward the end of his life of deep exploration of the psyche, was asked if he believed in God. “Believe?” he answered, “no, I don’t believe. I know.”

Pondering visionary experiences of God while contemplating John’s Revelation, brought back memories of my experiences. Yes, I know. God’s beyond belief. God is real.

Modern psychologists or English professors or the like would say that I am merely delusional. But they say that because they do not know! It’s not belief. I know God is with me.

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Set Your Path For the New Year

January 2, 2014

New Year’s Day coming on Wednesday really screws up a week. Normally there are several days strung together where I do year-end analysis (of myself and my businesses), prepare for tax season, and think about my direction for the new year.

This year, I worked on Monday and most of Tuesday. Here it is Thursday morning, and I’m going to spend most of the day on normal work.

I just read Andy Stanley’s book, “The Principle of the Path,” and my small group is studying the letter of James. As I contemplated these this morning, I found some parallels as I often do.

The principle of the path, to unjustly summarize, basically builds from the idea that you do something (consciously or re-actively chosen) and that starts you down a path of life. It may guide future decisions.

James follows a lineage of thought that is sort of, “to be is to do.” That is, the word “faith” does not mean a principle to which I agree with in my head (logically) or feel is write in my heart (emotionally). Faith is more of an action verb than it is a noun.

Back in my days of singing folk songs and campfire songs with my beat-up classical guitar, there was a song we sang called “Love is Something You Do.” Same idea.

Jon Swanson asked his readers for goals or words for the year. I don’t really choose goals in the usual sense or have a theme word for the year. But thinking about his question, I decided this year should be one of focus and energy. I got too diverted into too many things in 2013 and my energy sapped at times.

But as a disciple of Jesus, I feel more like it’s a “put one foot in front of the other” sort of thing. Where faith is choosing the path and assuring that each decision and action continue me on the path this year. Living consciously and intentionally.

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Copy The Right Master

December 27, 2013

Yesterday, I wrote about human development. How we learn from copying the master and then incorporate those learnings into our lives so that we can then create within our own personality.

What about choosing the right masters to copy from? That is important for art, but even more so in spiritual development.

Jesus is such a hard model to follow. He was so perfect. He could do things that we’ll never do. On the other hand, he taught in the tradition of creating disciples. These are people who follow the master and try to emulate him. In certain Jewish religious circles even today you will see men wearing clothing of a certain style. This is the style of clothing that their master (teacher) wears.

What do we do to look like our teacher–Jesus? I am more and more convinced that the main point of the Bible story is to teach us how to live your lives. Jesus spends very little time talking about heaven. He spends almost all of his instruction time on how to live.

He’ll answer such things as how we treat other people, upon whom do we focus when faced with decisions (hint: God), how we manage our resources, how to teach, what to teach, how to bring healing to people.

People will say, “I believe.” Maybe they will even say, “I believe in my heart.” Jesus would say, “Fine, but what about that decision to spend money on another new TV rather than provide help to the homeless?” Or, “How about the way you treated the people you met today?”

It boils down to whether we focus on what God would have us do or whether we settled for satisfying our own pleasures or wants. It’s whether we model our lives on the way Jesus lived or on a rock star.

Choose your master consciously with discernment.

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It’s Just the Beginning of the Journey

December 25, 2013

The culmination of a month or longer of anticipation and build-up to the moment. I’m awake and downstairs before the kids. Soon, they’ll be up, tearing wrapping from presents and reveling in what Santa brought. Then it’s over.

Mary and Joseph had about a 9-month build up. Then a birth. Then visitors. Then fleeing for their lives to Egypt. Then back home to Nazareth. With them it was not 30 days of hype and then poof it was over. They had to live with results.

Birth really isn’t the climax–the end of the story. It’s actually the beginning of the journey.

For each of us, a reminder of a beginning. Perhaps an invitation into a new beginning.

Last year I had a new beginning even at my advanced age. New beginnings can happen.

Merry Christmas. And here’s to a beginning of a wonderful new journey for you.

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Anticipation and Stress

December 10, 2013

Advent. Anticipation. Anxiety.

Were you ever about to do something, and then the thought hits “how did I ever get myself into this situation?”

Maybe it was when you were about to get into the car to attempt the world’s largest roller coaster? Or making a big speech in front of a large crowd? Or getting into your car in anticipation of a family Christmas gathering with weather coming in?

Often anticipation and anxiety go together. Maybe that is one reasons psychologists always talk about the weeks leading up to Christmas as one of the most stressful times of the year.

Maybe it’s not so much about celebrating Jesus’ coming into the world as much as all the family stuff, office parties, buying presents, sending cards, other gatherings, need to be cheerful, and so on. We certainly know how to stress ourselves at this time of year.

There are practices that humans have developed to counter these stresses. Mindfulness means paying attention to only the present moment–what’s around you, what your state is, your task at hand. Consciously regulating your breathing whether lying, seated or walking helps bring you into a conscious state of mind.

I don’t teach Yoga as a religion, but as a physical practice and for developing the state of mind of being in the present moment.

Another practice is one that Bill Hybels teaches at Willow Creek Community Church–15 minutes in your chair every morning reading the Bible and contemplating. Gets your day off to a more focused start.

Two more practices are complementary. One is to practice gratitude thanking God for all the things you are grateful for. The other is to practice forgiveness–forgiving others for perceived slights and recognizing your own need for forgiveness for the things you have done to others.

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His Heart Is Bigger Than His Brain

December 4, 2013

“Forgive him. His heart is bigger than his brain.”

That was supposed to be a funny put-down of cousin Eddie by Clark Griswald in Christmas Vacation. It implies that he wasn’t the brightest bulb in the candleabra, so to speak.

The phrase sort of stuck in my brain, so I meditated on it for a while.

It occurred to me that this has practical implications. I am by nature an analytical person. I tend to think about things a lot. My university education reinforced that tendency. But as I got deeper into spiritual practices and I discovered that other people really do exist, my attitude toward the message in the Bible changed.

John Ortberg captured the idea with a sentence in a message he gave a few years ago–“You see, Jesus is most interested in the condition of your heart.”

Paul reinforced that a few times in his writing where he would tell his story about being an intellectual and then having a life-changing transformation.

Jesus and Paul were not anti-intellectual (the “brain” part). Indeed, they were both scholars. I think that there is nothing in the New Testament that does not emphasize the condition of your heart. Perhaps summed up succinctly by James who emphsized that if your heart is right, then your actions will be right. One follows the other as day follows night.

Exercising our brain is good. We need to study in order to have background and depth for faith.

Our hearts need to be bigger than our brains. It is not enough to study and gain knowledge. We need to have our hearts fixed on Jesus and let our actions flow from that. Indeed, our study will also flow from that posture.

We develop our brains through study and thinking. We develop our hearts through trusting Jesus as our guide and saviour, living a life of putting others ahead of ourselves, practicing prayer, meditation, service, worship, celebration.

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From Gratitude To Advent

December 2, 2013

I pretty much took the Thanksgiving weekend off. At least off from thinking and writing. Not off from all physical activity, though. About 90 minutes in the backyard teaching my grandson how to beat a defender one-v-one (soccer) led to a little stiffness in muscles too little used for three days.

Last weekend in America is all about gratitude–at least in theory. The reality is that while some of us may pause and reflect upon the many things we are or should be grateful for, all the news and hype of the weekend point toward self-gratification (Black Friday–the day when retail outlets determine their profitability for the year).

Sometimes I think that even when buying for others, people generally are thinking about themselves–how they will be perceived or how they will be reciprocated.

Advent

We immediately transition from gratitude to advent–the coming of Jesus. An event for which we should have ultimate gratitude.

But once again we have turned the season from reliving the anticipation of the coming of Jesus into a season of self-indulgence. From marketing messages through mass media, you’d think that all that mattered was what to buy. Then there’s all the “secular Christmas” music that’s all about Santa Claus, nostalgia, what I want for Christmas.

I don’t want to sound like Scrooge, or the Grinch. I love being generous. Christmas trees and lights are fun. (By the way, we found where the Griswalds moved to–my daughter’s neighborhood. Reference to the classic Christmas Vacation–my favorite Christmas movie. See I can have fun, too.)

Where these thoughts were coalescing this morning was around what I see as a major factor in interpersonal dysfunction–why we can’t get along together. That would be narcissism. “It’s all about me.” It’s hard to consider others when it’s all about me. An excellent book on the subject (in addition to Proverbs and the Gospels) is “The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement” by Jean M. Twenge and W. Keith Campbell.

Jesus had every reason to be “full of himself.” Aside from the “I am” statements in the Gospel of John, he was pretty much focused on other people–their needs, fears, hearts, direction, lives.

The writer of the book of Hebrews calls Jesus the “pioneer of the faith.” As a follower, I’m trying to emulate his focus on others. This is a good season to remind ourselves to practice this.

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Those Who Love To Tell Others What To Do

November 12, 2013

There are two types of people–there are always two types of people, I guess. The two I thought I’d talk about today are those who love to tell other people what to do and those who do not like to be told what to do.

I’m proudly in the second camp.

I don’t know how that came about. Maybe I was born that way. Or maybe because neither of my parents were self-confident enough to order us around. I’m not positive about my brothers, but I think they are not the ordering around type either.

When I teach, I prefer to guide. When my kids were growing up, I preferred to guide and suggest rather than order them around (after that early stage of discipline where you have to set the limits and provide strict guidance).

That is some of the problems that Jesus initiated with his message. Since the time of Moses, the Jewish religion was primarily a religion of laws–people ordering other people to do certain things in order to be right with God. There were exceptions, of course, but this passing on of strict laws was the norm.

Jesus came along and said the important thing is not simply obeying a set of laws made up by other people who loved telling others what to do. Jesus said what matters is what is in your heart–that is, what matters is your own attitude and motivation.

Paul tried to explain this, but his explanations often became a little complicated. Then other people came later who tried the first method of developing laws out of Paul’s words and then ordering people around. The whole process started again–this time under the guise of being Christ-followers.

Let’s just go back to where Jesus was. If your attitude and motivation are to live with God, then you will naturally live a good life (allowing for the sins that come through the fallibility of being human). Jesus came to redeem us from a life of being bossed around, and from a life of guilt and shame from our shortcomings (sins), and to release us with love to live with-God and for others.

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