A small rock

I memorized this verse when I was a kid and it stuck:

“His divine power has given us everything we need for lifeand godliness” (2 Peter 1:3).

The other day, someone told me that my life was like a smallrock that was chipped off a bigger one. They said that the smaller rock contained everything that the bigger onedid.  They said that the smaller rock mayseem insignificant or small on its own, but it isn’t, because of what it is apart of. 

Did you ever feel like a small rock?

When we feel insignificant or weak, we need to realize thatGod grafted us into his family and has given us everything we need to succeedin our spiritual lives.  He’s given useverything we need for life and godliness! By his grace we are not destined to fail, we are destined to succeed!

Absurd Christmas commercials

Ok, am I the only one that thinks it’s strange that everyother car commercial this season is a person buying a car for his/her spouse?  I just saw this Lexus commercial where thewife gives her husband a Christmas present. It’s a small box, and he opens it to find a state of the art smartphone.  I think, “wow, nice gift!”  But then you realize that the smart phone isreally there to operate the $70,000 Lexus that is waiting for him in thedriveway.

Usually the ads are the husband buying his wife a car, whichalways leave me wondering what would really happen after the commercialends.  Like, the husband hands over thekeys, she smiles and looks amazed.  Thegratuitous car shot appears with the black BMW gleaming in the sunlight…andthen cut.  In my mind she then slaps himacross the face.  She starts yellingabout how could he dare spend that much of their hard-earned money withoutconsulting her.  She makes him return thecar and she puts the money in a CD for their children’s college fund.  He ends up being a donkey.

It also makes me wonder what women who see these commercialsthink.  Do they think, “what a jerk”?  Or is it more like, “I obviously married the wrong guy!”  I have to admit, I feel a little insecurewhen I compare what I can buy my wife to what that guy in the commercial can buy.  I feel the same way when I see the diamond commercialsevery Valentine’s day.  Apparently forjust $20,000 worth of jewelry I can secure my wife’s heart forever!

What do you think? How much is too much to spend for a Christmas present?

The missing ingredient

The other day my wife was away in the afternoon so I thoughtI would make spaghetti and meatballs.  Ihad never made meatballs before, but I thought: how hard could it be?  There was this nice little recipe right onthe side of the spaghetti noodle box that seemed to be written with me inmind. 

The problem was I didn’t have all of the ingredients.  It said I needed bread crumbs, for instance,but we didn’t have any.  After scanningthe house I decided that Lipton onion soup mix would certainly do the trick.  It said to add some freshly chopped parsley.  I found some interestingingredients from our spice rack that I figured would do for an amplesubstitute.  (I wonder what this nutmegwill taste like?)  The recipe called foreggs, so I added water. 

As I mashed the ingredients together with the ground beef, Iwas immediately realizing that it wasn’t going to work.  I ended up cooking it all together andcalling it a “meat sauce.”  When my kidstried to eat it they were polite, but ultimately unimpressed.  My oldest took a few bites before sayingkindly, “I really had a big lunch today. I’m just not very hungry.”  Theplates started to scrape their way into the garbage can.  My feelings were not hurt; I thought it was funny.

It occurred to me later that each of us is trying to followa “recipe” in life.  The problem is wedon’t have all of the right ingredients to make it work.  We try all kinds of substitutes and mash themall together hoping that our life’s concoction will be palatable.  But it isn’t. We try sex or relationships or money or success or power to fill thevoid.  But Jesus comes along and declareshimself to be the missing ingredient.  Hesays that he completes the recipe that we cannot complete on our own.  And boy does he ever produce a wonderfulfeast. 

Hey, pass me another one of those meatballs.

Forgiveness

After giving a talk last week about honoring your parents, afew people approached me about the unthinkable: how can I respect my fatherwhen he has abused me?

Tough question.

There is no pat or easy answer for this of course.  There is only the hope that God’s grace willprevail in our human hearts—that he will give us the ability to broach theunthinkable--that he will enable us toforgive someone who doesn't deserve it—someone who has even hurt usdeeply. 

Talking to the people who were abused, it became evidentthat the desire to forgive was fully there. God had put it there.  Moreproperly, Jesus had put it there by modeling it on the cross.

To each I reminded that it takes time.  You can’t expect it to happen overnight.  And also that we must choose to forgive.  It is not primarily an act of emotion, but ofour will.  You may not feel like doingit, but that does not mean that you cannot do it, or that the forgiveness isn’treal.  Emotion is a tricky obstacle whenit comes to forgiving a painful past.

But in one story, the person is ready to go for it—to forgivea horrifying past.  She is ready to offeran olive branch to someone who did not ask for it, and does not deserveit. 

And in this is the mystery of divine grace.

Holidays

My kids are making Christmas lists.  Oh yes they are.  And they want really big things…things thatcost a lot of money.  So I told them allto get a job. 

Our adopted son Matthew has only lived in the country forabout 9 weeks.  But he already knows whatChristmas is all about. 

Presents. 

That’s right I said it. 

We all know that Christmas is not about presents.  It’s about the birth of Jesus.  It’s about the incarnational message of hopethat came to earth some 2,000 years ago, born of a virgin, born in amanger.  It’s about the love of God shownthrough the sending of his son…sent on a mission.  He was sent to die for us and also to breakthe power of sin and death.  Andthanksgiving is a great time to prepare our hearts for that season, to reallybe thankful for all that God has given us.

Or then again, maybe it’s just about buying stuff.

One Day at a Time

I remember my mother putting a bumper sticker on her car whenI was a kid that said “One Day at a Time.” Of course this is one of the popular slogans of AlcoholicsAnonymous.  At the time, I didn't reallythink of it as anything helpful for my own life, but I could see it washelpful for her.  It wasn't until later that I realized the slogan came from the words of Jesus in Matthew6:34 when he says “don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry aboutitself.”  

In other words, one day at a time.

Jesus was talking about battling worry, but hiswords can be used to battle just about any human frailty.  It’s really hard to defeat a struggle whenyou think of having to defeat it every single day, all the time, for the restof your life.  It’s a big relief to realize that you don’t have to beat your struggles everyday.  You just have to beat them this day.

So try it.  Strugglingin a particular area?  Add Jesus’ wordsto your arsenal against that struggle.  Only pray that God will carry you through yourstruggle this day.  You will see, like so many others, thattaking things one day at a time is the way to go.

Respecting your parents

bad parenting?

I gave a talk the other night to twenty-somethings about avery popular topic—how to respect your parents. Actually, it wasn’t at all a popular topic.  Still, I was surprised at the response.  It seemed to strike a nerve.  One guy said he called his parents up in themiddle of the message just to tell them he respected them.  I never had that happen before.

There’s something intrinsic in the 5^thcommandment to honor your father and mother—something tied to our relationshipto God as Father. It seems that if we cannot get that commandment right, thanit is difficult to respect God himself. Many have said that the first four commandments are about ourrelationship to God and the latter are about our relationship to eachother.   If that’s true, then the 5^thcommandment is the first instruction on how to relate well to others.

But you may object: how can I respect my parents when theyhave hurt me?  How do I respect a parentwho has abandoned me?  How do I respect aparental relationship that was abusive? I am sometimes surprised that God doesn’t qualify the 5^th commandment.  He never says: respect your father and motherif they were good parents.  We are not asked to like what they have done,or even obey them as adults, but simply to respect them.

So maybe you have some relationships to mend.  Maybe you have an apology to give.  Or maybe you simply need to offer forgiveness.  The holidays are coming up.  What better time to start on a new journey ofrespecting your parents?

Are you satisfied?

I know that Snickers really satisfies.  I know this, because we bought about 5 bigbags of them for Halloween, and then our neighborhood got pounded with snow andeveryone lost power.  Now there are dozensof “fun size” snickers lying around my house, just begging to be consumed. 

Of course, they only satisfy my hunger, not my soul.

What I don’t always know is how to spiritually satisfy myself.  Yes, yes, I know the biblicalanswers.  And they are true.  But unfortunately, I don’t always utilizethem.  At least not at first.  Sometimes I try other ways to findsatisfaction in my life.  Like eatinganother Snickers or watching television.

There are so many ways to try to find a quick happinessfix.  But we all know they don't work.  I heard Arthur Brooks debate JimWallis the other night at Messiah college. He said that so many Americans are unhappy because they still think thatmoney buys them happiness.  Aftersurveying dozens of lottery winners, he realized they have the same thing incommon.  They were more unhappy afterthey won than before.  Plus, now many of theirlives are in shambles from the unintended consequences of unearned income.

The only thing that truly satisfies is a relationship withJesus Christ.  It is drinking deep fromthe wells of God’s love that leads to satisfaction and true joy (Is.12:3).  But remember, some dissatisfactionthis side of heaven is normal.  We will notbe really fully satisfied till we are in the immersive presence of God in heaven.  

Fear is a repellent to Jesus

So I was watching this movie called “The Green Lantern” theother night and noticed a cool biblical idea. The skinny is that the “green” part of the green lantern represents hiswill power.  The more will power, themore green.  The  more green, the more strength.  The opposite of his “will” is his fear.  The more fear, the less green.  You get the idea.

When the ultimatum of the movie is thrown down, the choiceis clear: will the hero succumb to fear or find the strength of his will?  I would substitute the word “will” for theword “faith” to make the biblical parallel more obvious. 

And herein lies our dilemma every single day of ourChristian lives.  Will we succumb to fearor grow in our belief?  The good news isthat we have a power source that is unlike any other.  The Holy Spirit promises to be with uswherever we go, no matter what we encounter. God does not expect us to draw from our own will power but gives us thestrength, through our faith, to overcome fear.

There is an interesting verse that depicts theopposite:
Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear.  So he got into the boat and left.  
(Luke 8:37)

Fear is a repellent to Jesus.

But faith draws him close.

My first mentor

I was fortunate to have a mentor early on in my life.  Pastor Phil took me under his wing when I wasstill only a high school student.  Hestarted teaching me biblical Greek one summer, and then theology, and generallyhow to live a good Christian life.  I soakedit all in.  His words affected me greatly.  At that age I was like a sponge.  I feel very blessed to have had a mentor likethat, and am deeply indebted to him.  Ourmentoring relationship continued throughout my  seminary years, and was formalized when he eventuallyhired me.  One day it came to an end, but I will always be the benefactor of its impact.

No matter how many great tools we have at our disposal,there will never be an invention to replace life on life mentoring.  Wikipedia is cool, but there are some thingsit can’t teach.  Google will answer manyquestions, but it will not guide us to the right conclusions. Reading books will give you a huge boost, but the influence of unmet persons has its limits.  Entering into a serious mentoringrelationship that spans the course of many years will change the trajectory ofyour life, and make you someone better thanyou would be capable of on your own.

Two questions that are helpful to ask every once in a while(despite your age!): who am I currently mentoring?  And, who is mentoring me?  If you can’t answer both of these questions,it’s time to give each an answer.  Youwon’t regret it!  The value is priceless.

OMG or the Tetragrammaton?

The ancient Hebrews had a name for God that was unpronounceable. They called it the “tetragrammaton” because it has 4 consonants in a row with no vowels. We would transliterate that name to Yahweh. The idea was, this name of God is so holy, so revered, so other, that it should not ever be uttered.

A little while back I wrote a post taking the stance that swearing is wrong for the Christ-follower. It was not a popular position, but I think it is a biblical idea. Words have power, and how we use words is more important than we realize. The two types of swearing are obscenities and profanities. They both sound like what they are. One is about using words that our current culture deems obscene, the other is about using the name of God in a way that is profane. Profanity is whenever we misuse the name of God. In all the words of our vocabulary, none are as sacred or important as the names of God.

I fear that the letters OMG have now replaced our reverence for the name of God. In a recent Nightline, a 14 year old girl said that OMG doesn’t even mean “Oh my God” anymore. She said that it now is simply understood as “Wow, really?” That’s probably true, as words will often drift. But it also tells us something about how far we are moving away from the reverence of God’s name. When we saturate the name of God with a texting acronym, it begins to lose its meaning.

Another girl in the Nightline interview, Meghan- 15, said: “I think originally the term ‘Oh My God’ was probably a really heavy term…but if you say a word enough times it will lose its meaning.” Also true. It’s called “semantic satiation.” (Thank you Wikipedia!) When you misuse or overuse a word, it starts to lose its meaning.

Of course all of this is really a matter of the heart. Jesus said that “out of the heart the mouth speaks.” How we speak God’s name comes from the posture of our heart towards him.

So how’s your heart?