Doctoral Reading

This summer I am scheduled to take my next two classes toward my doctoral degree.  This year, my time for reading is going to be a little shorter than before, as Carrie and I are expecting our first child in early May.  My classes are the last two weeks in June, so I want to have everything done prior to that birth.  Believe me, it will mean some good time reading in the next few months.

Think about the many books that you have seen about faith matters.  Have you had some that have been more inspirational than others?  How about some that have simply been informative?  I typically get at least one or two things out of every book I read, even if I disagree with the author. 

The thing that I always strive to keep in mind is that the reading of all these books will never take the place of the simple message of God's Good News.  Only the book which conveys God's Word to people can make true changes to people's life and faith.  All these other books, no matter how helpful, simply are not God's Gospel message.

This isn't to say that reading is a bad thing.  On the contrary, I believe in being well-read simply because it makes you clarify your thoughts and beliefs more than if you never encountered those other things.  The danger, of course, is that we start to slip because of a persuasive argument on the part of an author, or when we start putting knowledge ahead of God.

So go ahead and read.  In fact, I would love to hear about the many books that you all are reading.  From time to time, I'll ever share some on here with you (in summary fashion, of course), and whether or not I recommend them.

What Really Happened? Sunday School Endings

For those of us who grew up in Christian churches, it's very likely that we attended Sunday School.  In those classes, we probably learned a lot about a number of Bible stories.  However, as I have grown up and looked over those same stories, I've noticed that our Sunday School lessons tended to end with a happy ending.  However, the actual Bible stories often didn't end so nice and neat.

So today, I'm just going to put a few Sunday School stories up here.  Your task is to see if you know the true, grisly ending of these.  (If you need to consult your Bible, that's okay!)

Elijah and Mt. Carmel: Elijah challenges the Ba'al prophets to a showdown.  While they wail around for their god all day, Elijah taunts them.  Then he dumps a lot of water on his altar, and fire from heaven consumes the sacrifice.  What is the next interaction between Elijah and those false prophets?

Jonah: Jonah refuses to go to Ninevah.  Instead, he gets on a ship going the other way.  When a storm arises, Jonah is thrown overboard, to be swallowed up by a big fish.  He's then vomited out on the beach, and this time goes to Ninevah.  He preaches, and the people repent.  How does Jonah feel about this?

Daniel and the lion's den: Daniel ignores a command to only pray to the king.  He gets caught and spends the night in the lion's pit.  The next morning, he's still alive, and the king is overjoyed because he cares for Daniel.  What happens next, especially to the people who caused Daniel to be thrown in the lion's pit?  What about their families?

As you look at these answers, you'll probably find out that the Bible isn't the cute little story that we learned as children!

Reaction to the News: The Powell Story

By now most of you have probably seen at least one or two news stories about the recent house explosion in Washington state, bringing something of an end to the two year old story of a missing woman in Utah.  (Yes, the story really won't 'end' until they find her body, but a lot of the mystery of what happened to her seems to have come to light with the events of the weekend.)  Living in Utah, this story has frequently cropped back into our news from time to time.

First of all, I have to say that my thoughts and prayers are with so many different people in this story.  Grandparents, relatives, family, friends, but also people such as all the law enforcement officers who have worked so diligently on this story, as well as all of those who had to make legal decisions that were, undoubtedly, not so easy to make.

One thought I have had since the house explosion story came out on Sunday is just how unfair many people may be toward people such as the judge(s) who allowed home visitation, or the officers who seemed to know what happened, but didn't have enough evidence to secure an arrest warrant.  It's very easy to look back and ask why they didn't see all the signs and take steps to prevent such a tragedy.

Yet, I would also like to say this.  If the authorities had stepped in and prevented a father from seeing his children without enough evidence to go to trial, those same people would likely be crying out about the miscarriage of justice in not having enough proof to prevent the man from seeing his kids.  Basically, I believe our expectations can sometimes put those in authority in a no-win situation.

It's refreshing to read the meaning of the fourth commandment in its brief explanation in my church's catechism.  The commandment says to "honor your father and mother."  The explanation goes on to say that we should fear and love God so that we do not despise or anger our parents and other authorities, but honor them, serve and obey them, love and cherish them. 

In a big way, that means that we understand that the authorities have a difficult job to do, and what we may think is black and white often is grey in their eyes.  With the level of the burden of proof that we insist upon as a nation in order to arrest and imprison someone, their jobs are not always easy.  Often they probably know things that we don't, but cannot prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.  That's usually when we get upset that they didn't take action, when the reality is, we have placed such a high level of proof on them that they simply cannot take action.

I watched the reactions of several law enforcement officers to the explosion.  At least two called this action "evil", to which I agree.  The presence of evil, not to mention the presence of sin, can cause practically anyone to do things that we seem to be shocked by.  In this case, I believe that there was a good deal of evil at work in many different ways.

This is why my Lutheran church body has always had prayers asking for God to thwart the working of the evil one.  Over the past couple of days, I have been reminded of why we are encouraged to pray such prayers.  I hope that you will join with me in asking God to do His good and gracious will of overcoming Satan and his companions.

Grace that Spills Over

...my cup overflows...  King David, written in Psalm 23

...the water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life... Jesus in John chapter 4

Near where I live, there used to be a natural spring that you could see from the road.  In fact, that spring was literally within about 30 feet of the road.  It was a natural spring, which means that it couldn't be capped.  Every day when my wife and I would drive by it, we'd see it bubbling out.  At one point, the property owners had even put a hose on it, and had it spraying over this tree.  I have to say, it looked pretty cool in the winter when the water would freeze up all around the tree.

The thing with that spring is that you could never stop the water from flowing out of it.  If you were to dig a pool around it, the pool would fill up, and then would overflow.  The water from the pool would spill over all around the pool.  Anything near that pool would be touched or drenched by the water from that living spring.

I picture God's grace in a very similar kind of way.  King David noted that God would fill his cup so full that it would overflow, even in the presence of his enemies.  In the other saying above, Jesus spoke to a woman by a well, telling her that He would give water that would spring up inside and lead to eternal life.  In both of those instances, we are hearing, in some form or fashion, about God's grace.

We may have a tendency to think about God's grace simply filling up our cups.  We recognize that God does great things for us, and that these cover us completely.  God's forgiveness covers our sins.  God's compassion and healing covers our wounds.  And yet, it seems that there is even more to God and His grace.

Just imagine that you are His cup which is overflowing with grace.  Just like that natural spring I described earlier, you are leaking grace everywhere you go.  That's the kind of picture that God seems to paint of us, His people.  Our cups overflow with His grace, and that grace then spills out from us to everyone that we encounter.  We are, in a sense, God's fountain of grace to others.

I think that's a rather neat picture, and something that I need to constantly keep in mind as I encounter others.  There is never a time in my life where God's grace will not be overflowing into my life, which means that there is never a time where I cannot share that same grace with others around me.  My hope and prayer is that I remember that daily, and that I go forth as God's cup of overflowing grace toward others.

Being Right and Showing Compassion

Every once in a while, I find myself in an argument with my wife or other important people in my life.  I have come to realize that I have a very strong desire to show that I am right in what I'm thinking when these kinds of situations arise.  This is, perhaps, even more pronounced when I know that I'm right about something.

The thing is, I often find that it seems to be more important to prove that I am right to the other person than it is to help them know things rightly.  Now, I realize that this seems to be a confusing statement, so please allow me a moment to explain.

Let's say that I'm right about something, and you are wrong.  From a purely selfish motivation, I want to prove that I am right because that also proves that you are wrong.  In a way, that puts me a step above you, and I really like having that 'high road', so to speak.  So my intention can be to prove that I'm right and you are wrong simply because it exalts me over you in some way.

Now, let's contrast that with this.  Let's say that I'm right about cigarettes being harmful to your health, but you are insisting that it's okay for you to smoke.  Instead of proving that I'm right and on a 'higher road' than you, what if I were trying to show you the problems with smoking because you are so special, and because I don't want you to lose out on the impediments that smoking will likely bring on your life.  I want you to get the most out of life, and to be around to see your grandkids, and not to have to go through challenges that could arise with lung cancer.  I don't want you to have to feel short of breath all the time, and I want you to be able to do everything you want in life, and the best way to do that is to show you that smoking will keep you from those things.

Do you see a major difference in those two approaches?  One is primarily focused on me and my need to be correct.  The other is looking to your good and benefit.  Even though I'm right in both cases, you're probably going to be much more receptive to the second approach than to the first.

Sadly, I think that there is a lot of that first approach by Christians toward one another, and especially toward those who aren't Christian.  In many respects, we want to show that we are smarter, or more faithful, or some other ego-feeding trait.  We want to exalt our knowledge, or our faith, or our way of life, and want nothing more than for others to see that we're right, they're wrong, and then to change so that they are more like us.

I can imagine that this approach probably won't win a lot of points with others.  But when we change that approach to one of compassion and care for the other person rather than for our own benefit, it would stand to reason that we could bear more fruit.  I'm not saying that it will suddenly change everything, but suggest that such a compassionate approach is more likely to have others hear us and listen to us, which then gives the Holy Spirit a greater occasion to do His work of changing and converting hearts and souls.

As I say this, I recognize that I'm also including myself in what I'm saying.  I don't have this down pat, by any stretch of the imagination.  But as that awareness grows within me, I know that I hope to change.  I don't want to be that person who is always trying to be right to feed my own ego.  I want to be that person that others say is so compassionate and really does seem to want what is best for them in their life.  In my eyes, that seems to open far more doors to the message of God's grace than if I'm simply trying to feed my own need to be right.

Thoughts?  Comments?  Arguments?  I'd love to hear them!

Simplicity and Complexity

Up front, I have to admit one of my faults.  I'm one of those people who can take a very simple idea and make it complex.  Someone may say something like, "Let's go rake the leaves," and I'll try to come up with the most efficient plan for doing it, as well as figuring out how to rake the leaves to a particular position in the lawn where they won't be subjected to the wind, and where we have to carry the disposal bins the least distance.  I can overplan something simple as this.

Over the last few years, I have read a number of church related books dealing with making things simple.  The primary author whose books I have been reading is Thom Rainer, president (I believe) of Lifeway, a Christian bookstore chain.  He has written a number of books on simplifying things, like churches, life, and everything in between.  And I have really started to appreciate what he has been writing about.

When I think about the message that God shared with us through Jesus, one of the things I most enjoy about studying it is that it is such a simple message, but one with so much depth that we humans will never mine it to its depths.  That simple message is that God created the world perfectly, but that the very first man and woman disobeyed God, and that disobedience (the biblical word is sin) is now entangled in all of us, and is inseparable.    But God had compassion on the world, sending Jesus to take the sin and guilt of all of that, and kill it on the cross.  In God's grace, every single sin of this world has been conquered and destroyed, and God gives the promise of a new life where those things will never haunt us again.  We receive that grace through our faith in that action of God in Jesus and the cross and the resurrection.  Such a simple message.

But being humans, we have a tendency to take simple things like this and make them incredibly complicated.  Since we have such a hard time understanding how God could do all this by His grace, we want to find some way that we have a role in it.  Or, we start to say that people who are engaged in sinful activities (usually hand-picked ones that we like to get up on our soapboxes about) cannot receive that grace until they change their life.  (Think of the irony of that statement: you can't get God's undeserved love and favor until you show that you deserve it by changing your life.  Weird, eh?)  Or we try to discover some basic level of competence that you have to have in understanding the teachings of the church before you really have God's grace.  (Again, you can't receive God's undeserved love and favor until you "know" certain things, sounds almost like a gnostic heresy which was condemned way back in the life of St. John.) 

And what makes this even more incredible?  God still shows His grace to us in spite of our all too human efforts to make that simple message complex.  Even though we may try our best to show why we deserve God's grace the most, God still makes it clear that our faith in His loving action in Jesus, no matter how strong or how flickering it may be, is still enough to receive that gift.

So simple!  Only God, whose mind is truly far above ours, could come up with something so simple.

Memorization

We all probably had to do it at some point growing up.  We had to memorize something, whether it was the states and their capitals, some Bible verses for some program at our church, addition and multiplication tables, or something similar.  While some of us may have been better at memorizing than others, the reality is that we all had to do some kind of memory work at some point in our life.

Lately I have been awed by my wife.  She took a challenge last year of memorizing two Bible verses each month.  She would write them out on note cards and hang them on the mirror in our bathroom.  I can't tell you how many times I have read those Bible verses, and I know she worked hard to seal them all up in her mind.  Who knows, at this very moment, she might be able to recite them all!

One of the traditions of the church body that I belong to is memorizing some of the basic fundamentals of what we believe in the Christian faith.  These basics are outlined in a book called a catechism, which is from the Greek word which simply means something along the lines of instruction.  We spend time memorizing things like the Ten Commandments and some meanings to them, the Apostles' Creed and its meaning, the Lord's Prayer, and other significant things like the meaning of Baptism, the Lord's Supper, and Confession and Forgiveness (Absolution).

Each year, to hear the kids tell it, you'd think that this memorization was torture.  I hear it all the time.  "I can't do this."  "It's too long."  "Why do I need to memorize this?"  And yes, I have to admit that explaining the long term benefits of memorization to 7th and 8th grade students is pretty much a practice in futility.  For some reason, when we are that age, we have a hard time seeing the big picture.

Why do memorization work?  In part, I have come to believe that it really does give us a foundation for our faith, and somewhere to turn at any point during the day when we feel the need to call upon God's name for His help.  It's something like a piano player who learns his scales.  I've been told that many great players would spend time every day practicing scales, the very basics.  After all, practically everything they play is an extension of the basic scales that every first-time piano player learns and practices.

I don't know why we think of our faith in a different way than that.  Perhaps it's that we tend to think of God's saving action in Jesus as a one-time, 'it's all done' kind of thing, and so we don't have to worry about it.  However, the longer that I work in my career, the more I see that our faith really does have an impact on things that we do or experience every day. 

So as we come across those various points in our lives, having a foundation of what we believe helps us think about God's design and intention for what we do as His people in every situation.  Sure, not every situation in life will fit directly into the things we memorize and know.  However, when we think of what we have learned and memorized as the foundation, then we see that our life and experience merely builds on that foundation.

So what do you think you would benefit from knowing by heart as you live your Christian life?  What could you memorize to help build that foundation which gives you strength as you live your life?