this could get you fired

Sometimes I wonder if we worship a false God.

It seems that much of contemporary Christianity is aimed at keeping us safe. We should live in our vanilla worlds of peace, prosperity and shelter from the world. God will protect us from all evil and never expose us or our family to danger. We pull quotes from the Bible regardless of context to make us feel better.

Take one of the most famous embroidered, monogrammed and cheesy arted verses, Jeremiah 29:11-13. You know it. People quote it when going through a hard time or as a passage of reassurance and prosperity.

For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. In those days when you pray, I will listen. If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me.

Most people have no clue that the next verses roll this way:

This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies says: “I will send war, famine, and disease upon them and make them like bad figs, too rotten to eat. Yes, I will pursue them with war, famine, and disease, and I will scatter them around the world. In every nation where I send them, I will make them an object of damnation, horror, contempt, and mockery. For they refuse to listen to me, though I have spoken to them repeatedly through the prophets I sent. And you who are in exile have not listened either,” says the Lord.

Print that on your daughter’s graduation card….

Now, I’m not trying to be mean, but I am trying to make a point. Jeremiah was writing to God’s exiled people and his message was complex. God was going to bless them, but he was also punishing them and their relatives, and they weren’t listening well. Are we just pulling sound bites to make us sleep better at night?

What that sets up for most of us is false expectations – we believe everything’s gonna roll beautifully with God and we’ll never have coffee stains on our veneered teeth. Then, when plans don’t work out as well as we hoped, we blame God…claiming he didn’t come through for us.

I want to talk more about this, but I’d love to hear what passages you get stuck on. What bothers you about God’s character as revealed in the Bible? What specific passages make you think you might be dealing with a different God than you originally thought?

Gary Haugen

Last Sunday I referenced Gary Haugen as someone who was standing for hope in our world. Here is a great talk (click here)he gave last winter at Central Wesleyan Church in Holland, Michigan.

brevity

Thinking this morning about the power of brevity. The more people talk, the less they say… and less we listen. We really do waste a lot of words.

Earnest Hemingway was challenged to write a story using only six words. People doubted it could be done. Hemingway took up the challenge and here is the story he wrote:

“Baby shoes. For sale. Never worn.”

Think on it for a minute and you’ll see that those six words tell a big story.

The words are clear. They evoke emotion. They invite imagination.

Whenever you write or speak, remember: the words you include can make it good, but only the words you take out can make it great.

Can you write a story in six words?

maybe this is his secret

ummm…wow…

the cross

“The Cross is the blazing fire in our heart at which the flame of our love is kindled…
But we have to get near enough to it for its sparks to fall on us.” – John Stott

home run derby

I love baseball. I love the fact that there is a almost sleepy rhythm to the game. I love watching a pitcher “work” for a strikeout. I love watching a home run fly into the cheap seats.

Last night added another reason why I love baseball. Josh Hamilton.

All this kid did was to set a new single round record with 28 homers in the first round of Home Run Derby.

Check that.

All this kid did was hit 28 bombs deep into the stands at historic Yankee Stadium.

Even better is Josh Hamilton’s story of how God saved him from a life of drugs and alcohol that almost ruined him.

He said, “When I get the urge to have a drink or do something I’m not supposed to do, I think about what a hypocrite I would be to my Christianity and my sobriety.”

He continued, “My wife told me in the midst of my addiction that God was going to let me get back to baseball.”

Then Josh Hamilton added, “Being able to share my story, that’s what it’s all about.”

In the words of one of the ESPN announcers while Hamilton was clobbering homer after homer out of Yankee Stadium, “It’s not a good night to be an atheist.”

preaching 101

This morning a student taking classes in pastoral ministry interviewed me on my approach to preaching each week at Compass. Interesting conversation. For your reading pleasure here is my relationship with every message I teach:

Monday: I’m never preaching again!
Tuesday: I’m thinking about preaching again…maybe even next week.
Wednesday: 1000 good ideas about the topic…what is the one solid point that needs to be made?
Thursday: Is Sunday really just a few days away?
Friday: I can’t look at it anymore! I hate it. I wouldn’t teach this message at gunpoint!
Saturday: It might not be as bad as I originally thought. This might actually be preach-able.
Sunday: I think it went pretty well. I don’t know how, but God used it in some way to point someone in the way to go.

great quote from “crazy love”

this excerpt comes from Francis Chan’s book “Crazy Love.”

“The American church is a difficult place to fit in if you want to live out New Testament Christianity. The goals of American Christianity are often a nice marriage, children who don’t swear, and good church attendance. Taking the words of Christ literally and seriously is rarely considered. That’s for the “radicals” who are “unbalanced” and who go “overboard.” Most of us want a balanced life that we can control, that is safe, and that does not involve suffering.”

Wow. Just thought i’d share what smacked me in the face.

Hard Times in the Heartland

Mark Gorveatte serves as our District Supt. … some time ago he passed along pretty powerful article… I share it with you here for your reading pleasure…

“Recession, fleeing firms and the auto slump stagger Michigan.”

Does that sound like a headline from yesterday’s newspaper? It could be but it is actually the lead line from a report in Time Magazine back on December 7, 1981.

Here are a few excerpts from that article: “Of the troubled states in the industrial heartland of the Midwest, Michigan is by far the hardest hit. Beset by nationwide recession, the migration of business to the Sunbelt and the auto industry’s slump, Michigan had an unemployment rate of 12.7% in October …
Worse is to come …

“The auto, which transported Michigan’s economy to affluence, has helped to stall it … In the past three years almost 300,000 auto jobs have been lost nationwide. So have an
estimated 500,000 to 600,000 laborers for parts suppliers and steelmakers. Michigan’s
share of that loss: 250,000 or more … “Business and personal bankruptcies tripled in the past two years.” (Time, December 7, 1981)

For some of you, it doesn’t take much effort to recall those hard times. For those who can’t
remember those difficulties, we’re experiencing our own today.

Michigan was at its high-water mark in terms of employment just 8 years ago, but has since lost
more than 400,000 jobs. It has lost a third of its manufacturing jobs, a rate higher than any other
state, and nearly half of its automotive jobs.

According to a study released by United Van Lines, a staggering 67.8 percent of its Michigan client
traffic was outbound in 2007. That rate is an all-time record high, eclipsing the previous 1981
record of 66.9 percent.

Last month the U.S. Census Bureau reported that Michigan lost 30,500 citizens from July 2006 to
July 2007.

What lessons are here for us?

fathers day

just got off the phone with my dad…wishing him a happy father’s day…now for a quick rest before an appointment this afternoon…looking forward to watching tiger woods try to pull out a victory in the us open later today.