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It was a new day at Grace Church. A new pastor was coming, and this would be his first weekend. People were excited, and they needed to be. Grace had gone through an ugly split that had left a lot of angry, hurt, and confused people in its wake. A pretty solid plug of people had started Faith Church down the road and had contacted the outgoing pastor from Grace to help them get started. Some people had left for other churches. Some people had quit attending anywhere.
One of the walking wounded was a former associate pastor – Chris Naylor. Chris had received “the right foot of fellowship” from the previous administration. Though he had found other opportunities for Kingdom service, Chris was still a member – at least on paper – at Grace.
That’s why I was a little surprised when I asked Chris and his wife Rachael if they were going to hear the new guy that weekend, and both immediately, categorically said, “No.”
Ooh. Sorry I asked.
“My friends think I’m bitter,” Chris added.
“Are you?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied honesty. “How do you balance the fact that on the one hand I love the church and wish nothing but the best for them, but on the other hand, have absolutely no respect for their system of leadership or the choices they have made?”
“I don’t know.”
Chris was just getting warmed up as Rachael was tearing up. [click to continue…]
I can take you to the spot.
I can point to where I was standing.
The old, worn gold carpet is long gone, I’m sure. The house on Watson Road has likely been redecorated many times since we lived there.
But there’s no mistaking that spot where I made one of the most life-altering decisions of my life. And get this: I never told a soul about it. In fact, I never uttered a word. But in a silent transaction of the mind, will, and emotions, with three simple words I began a process of sowing to the wind… and reaping a whirlwind.
The words?
I.
Give.
Up. [click to continue…]
“Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible.” (Carl Jung)
In an eastern hospital years ago, a group of medical students were doing a pediatric rotation. As they worked with these hospitalized kids each day, they noticed that the patients responded with great joy to one particular med student. Nobody could figure out why. So they talked one of their cohort members into doing a little spying.
The observer followed him around all day and discovered nothing. Finally that night, the mystery was solved when the young doctor made his last round. [click to continue…]
I went to the Fred Flintstone School of Golf. Simple philosophy: when in doubt, hit the ball really hard. When not in doubt, hit the ball really hard.
Maybe you’ve heard that old saying about golf – “You drive for show, and putt for dough.” Suffice it to say, I’ve never made any money hitting a ball in a hole with a stick. I have, however, put on a show or two by hitting a ball off a stick.
All of that is fine and fun, so long as you’re dealing with woods and wedges. Life, however, is a different story. A mere proverb in the Gentleman’s Game is brutal reality in the real world:
It’s not how you drive, but how you arrive.
Not how you start, but how you finish. Magilla Gorilla and Fred Flintstone need not apply.
Life is filled with real and proverbial stories of people who started well, but finished poorly. Rather than leaving a heritage, with inspiring and ennobling footsteps to follow, their names and stories are relegated to footnotes and questions that begin with, “Whatever happened to…”?
It’s up to you. Will you be a driver, or an arriver? I must warn you, if you decide to go the distance, the deck is stacked against you. This is a marathon, not a dash, and you’re surrounded by gloriously mediocre runners and a grandstand full of fat critics. But you do have a Coach – the Lord Jesus, Author and Finisher of your faith. Under His direction, you’ll learn to identify these six fool makers and finish breakers: [click to continue…]
Interested in getting a head start on your firewood for next winter? I once heard of a unique way to drop a tree. It seems some villagers in the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific have learned how to conquer the really big ones. If a tree is too large to be felled with an ax, the natives cut it down by yelling at it. (I’m not making this up. I read it in a book, so it must be true.) Just at dawn these woodsmen with special powers sneak up on a tree and suddenly scream at it at the top of their lungs. They do this every day for 30 days, and the tree dies and falls over. The theory is that yelling kills the spirit of the tree. According to the villagers, it always works.
Felling by yelling. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Crazy enough to be true.
I’ll have to admit, though, I’ve never seen it happen. I’ve never yelled at a tree (and I wouldn’t tell you if I had). Not for thirty days. Not for one day. Furthermore, I’ve never seen anyone else yell at a tree. So I can’t say by experience that hollering works on trees.
But it does work on kids. I have seen that happen.
Works on spouses, too.
Some people yell at their cars or their washing machine, and it doesn’t seem to do much good. But I’ve seen it drop a few pastors. And I’ve seen it kill the spirit of a friend or two as well. [click to continue…]
Bringing Hope to the Land of Nod (Part 3)
1. Reconnect the spiritual with the interpersonal.
2. Expose anger for what it is, and provide a model for forgiveness.
3. Respond to Victimhood by Redefining Responsibility
4. Reopen doors of trust and acceptance.
Every vibrant relationship is a dance with trust. As the relationship deepens, so does the trust. As the trust grows, the relationship deepens even more.
That said, it’s easy to see why the citizens of Nod have an itty bitty trust issue. “Fool me once,” and all that.
Do people trust you? The challenge we face in being instruments of healing is that trust, once broken, is incredibly difficult to restore. Yet without it, hearts remain crippled and closed off.
Our goal for the citizens of Nod is to lead them to do more than survive. We believe God wants them to thrive. [click to continue…]
Tense truth: We are individually accountable to God for what we have done with the death and resurrection of His Son and with the life He has given us. However, we are completely dependent on a community of relationships, and cannot survive or thrive in isolation. Our community won’t be there when we stand before the Lord, but they must be connected to us until we get there.
+++++++++++++++++++
From the genius of David Hayward comes this funny/sad characterization of a lot of people I have known (and one or two I have been).
No coincidence that David posted this on the same day I made this statement: There is not enough of you available to live all your life. You’re a fool to try…
Ever see a sequoia tree? Fantastic piece of God’s creation. An awesome living structure that can reach as high as 300 feet.
Ever see a sequoia tree standing by itself?
Chances are, you won’t. Strange thing, this tree – to be so tall, it has a very shallow root system. If it stood alone, it couldn’t make it; when the wind grew strong, it wouldn’t take it. So the sequoias build a network of root systems and together they flourish, side by side.
You and I were designed to function like the sequoia tree. [click to continue…]
It was a new day at Grace Church. A new pastor was coming, and this would be his first weekend. People were excited, and they needed to be. Grace had gone through an ugly split that had left a lot of angry, hurt, and confused people in its wake. A pretty solid plug of people had started Faith Church down the road and had contacted the outgoing pastor from Grace to help them get started. Some people had left for other churches. Some people had quit attending anywhere.
