Not Your Average Meal

“Then he turned to the host. “The next time you put on a dinner, don’t just invite your friends and family and rich neighbors, the kind of people who will return the favor. Invite some people who never get invited out, the misfits from the wrong side of the tracks. You’ll be—and experience—a blessing. They won’t be able to return the favor, but the favor will be returned—oh, how it will be returned!—at the resurrection of God’s people." - Luke 14:12-14

To say that Jesus was the “atypical” dinner guest is an understatement of the first magnitude.  Recently, I was reading through Luke chapter fourteen in preparation for a lesson and was again reminded of how "social" Jesus was throughout his ministry. He was tagged a "glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners" (Luke 7:34).  In the Gospel of Luke Jesus is either going to a meal, at a meal or leaving a meal! 

The meal scene in Luke 14 is bizarre and awkward.  It begins with a spontaneous healing that offended most of the guests which in turn leads to Jesus telling the guests how to seat themselves at the next party (go low before you go high!) to instructing the host to invite a different crowd the next time he throws a party.  Talk about rude.  But Jesus' only interest was in expanding their minds about the kingdom - not winning the congeniality award!  

As a child I regarded the parables of Jesus as simple stories.  Light, innocent, informative stories that gave us insight into Jesus’ ministry.  The more I meditate on these brief stories, especially the one in Luke 14, the more I realize they are heavy, challenging and educational bombshells that show us what the kingdom of God should look like. 

Occasionally, we get into conversations with each other about the “”identifying marks of the church.”  Been in one of those recently?  The “marks”, as we call them, usually materialize into things like baptism, the assembly (how it’s done), certain doctrinal points, acapella singing and so on.  As best I can remember, I can’t recall a single conversation about our “marks” that eventually referred to the above text in Luke 14.   

In their book The Tangible Kingdom Hugh Halter and Matt Smay ask the following questions:  “Do people take us Christians seriously?  Do they respect us and our way of life?  Do the spiritually hungry look to the average evangelical church for help, or would they rather go buy a self-help book at Barnes & Noble?”

Later in the book they point out some stats from The Barna Group remarking that almost every statistical reference to the church indicates that we not only can’t draw people, but we can’t even keep the ones we have.  Between 2004 and 2007 they discovered the following statistics about the American population.

1. 1/3 of the adult population has not attended any type of church service or activity other than a special event such as a funeral or a wedding during the year.
2. One out of three adults is classified as “unchurched” meaning that they do not attend a church service of any kind.  When you project these statistics across the aggregate population, the numbers are staggering.  An estimated 73 million adults are presently unchurched.  When teens and children are added, the total swells to roughly 100 million Americans.
3. Roughly half of all churches in America did not add one new person through conversion growth last year.
4. In America it takes the combined effort of eighty-five Christians working over an entire year to produce one convert.

Walter and Smay conclude with this stirring comment:

“The inescapable conclusion is that we must throw out any notion that God is truly at the center of the church’s heart in North America.  The shift in society’s view of the church has resulted in the marginalization of the church and the secularization of society.  Christianity has lost its place at the center of American life.  Christians must learn how to live the gospel as a distinct people who not longer occupy the center of society.  We must learn to build relational bridges that win a hearing.” 

 

A handful of counseling conversations and spontaneous chats with people in the streets over the past three weeks have again awakened me to some realities:

1.  Luke 14 needs to be “a mark”.

2.  The way we do church right now in most places isn’t calibrated to fit Luke 14 into the system in a way that will allow it to do much more than stir our minds much less our imaginations.

3.  It is imperative that we put the blessing of people with the good news of the gospel over our traditionalism.  I think the Head of the church is paying attention to what we do with this one…big time!

4.  We need to examine our hearts and take a hard look at our capability and willingness to interface with people in genuine ways outside of our conventional gatherings.  Jesus said, “Go…” but what does going “look like…today?” 

5.  Whatever stands between us and serious conversation about this “simple episode” in Luke 14 needs to be kicked to the curb while we can still kick. 

Henry Nouwen in Gracias writes:

More and more, the desire grows in me simply to walk around, greet people, enter their homes, sit on their doorsteps, play ball, throw water and be known as someone who wants to live with them.  It is a privilege to have the time to practice this simply ministry of presence.  Still, it is not as simple as it seems.

My own desire to be useful, to do something significant, or to be part of some impressive project is so strong that soon my time is taken up by meetings, conferences, study groups and workshops that prevent me from walking the streets.  It is difficult not to have plans, not to organize people around and urgent cause and not to feel that you are working directly for social progress.

But I wonder more and more if the first thing shouldn’t be to know people by name, to eat and drink with them, to listen to their stories and tell our own and to let them know with words, handshakes and hugs that you do not simply like them – but truly love them.

O Lord teach us to do just that.  Amen.

Randy Daugherty

Stephenville, Texas

Healing Our Hearts

I am a Registered Nurse and I work at a Wound Care Center. We take care of chronic wounds.  You might ask, what is a chronic wound?  It is a wound that has not shown the ability to heal over a two week period or longer. Some people come to us who have had a wound present for months, or even years. The longer the wound has been present the longer it takes to heal. Usually the body has accepted the wound as normal and the healing process has shut down. These wounds may not be very large, but they cause daily discomfort and disrupt the patient’s life.

The first thing the doctor will do to stimulate healing is to debride the wound, removing the dead tissue. The patient’s body realizes something has changed and that signals the release of an entire cascade of healing properties. Many people ask, “Can’t you just sew it up?” The answer is no. The tissues in a chronic wound will not “knit” together as they do when the wound is only hours old.  When a wound has been open for days, weeks or months it must heal from the inside out. The body will generate new tissue in the base and once that tissue has built up to skin level, the top layer of skin will grow across and close the wound. This process will only occur with adequate blood flow, absence of infection and the proper bandage.

“O Lord my God, I called to you for help and you healed me.” – Psalm 30:2

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” – Psalm 147:3

Spiritually, many of us walk around with chronic wounds. We have hurts and disappointments that plague us daily.  Although well intentioned, our “home remedies” can’t provide the desired healing.  For example, we may decide to ignore the wound and assume it will go away.  The spiritual wound becomes deeper and disrupts our daily walk with God and others.

Obedience to the scripture, “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry” (Ephesians 4:26), is much like going to the ER and getting stitches right away for quick healing.  When we don’t obey the scriptures, we allow our hearts to become infected with bitterness, envy, anger or jealousy.  Our hearts become similar to a chronic wound.  The only way we will heal is to ask for God’s help. We must allow God to cut away all the bitterness and resentment that has become attached to our heart. God will heal us from the inside out.  Just as a wound must have good blood flow to have a chance to heal, we must give ourselves to prayer to overcome sin’s deceitfulness. We do not expect a chronic wound to heal when it is simply left open to air. Likewise, we can’t expect our heart to heal if we leave it unprotected and open to Satan’s attacks. God’s holy word is the best protective bandage to be applied to our heart.

Is it time to heal a chronic wound in your heart? Make an appointment with the “Great Physician”.

Dear Father, come into our hearts and heal our brokenness.  We surrender ourselves to you and we place our hearts before you to cut away all those things that do not reflect your Spirit. We want to experience being alive in Christ and know the fullness of your love.  In the name of Jesus, Amen.

Terry Smith

Stephenville, Texas

I Want to be a Parent...I Think.

Our spiritual formation group meets every Sunday evening.  We are currently working through Philip Yancey’s book Reaching for the Invisible God.  It is a terrific read and has stimulated our thinking about what it means to be a person of faith.  

Last Sunday we discussed the idea of spiritual maturity as something akin to what life is like when we become parents.  We tossed around the differences between living like children and what life is like when we become parents.  The following comment made it to the floor more than once:  being “good parents” demands that we think ultimately in terms of what love really means and, mature love will often put us in situations in which we have to place the needs of others before our own needs.  

On pp. 245-46 Yancey writes: 

Christians best influence the world by sacrificial love, the most effective way truly to change a world.  Parents express love by staying up all night with sick children, working two jobs to pay school expenses, sacrificing their own desires for the sake of their children’s.  And every person who follows Jesus learns a similar pattern.  God’s kingdom gives itself away, in love, for that is precisely what God did for us. 

Some college students strike out for the wilderness or take up meditation in order to “discover themselves.”  Jesus suggests that we discover that self not by staring inward but by gazing outward, not through introspection but through acts of love.  No one can grasp how to be a parent by reading books before the birth of a child.  You learn the role by doing a thousand mundane acts; calling the doctor during illness, preparing for the first day of school, playing catch in the backyard, consoling hurts and defusing tantrums.  A spiritual parent goes through the same process.  In the end, Jesus’ prediction –“Whoever loses his life will preserve it” – proves true for downward surrender leads upward.   

Parenting has its share of joys.  But, it has its challenges, too.  Someone remarked, ”Some adults never become good parents because they can’t leave the “childhood” (selfish!) stage.”  Their point was simply that there is still too much selfishness in them to turn loose and focus on the needs of other people – even their own children.  What is true of biological families and parenting in particular can be true of believers with respect to our “stuckness” in faith growth.  

Diana West in her book The Death of the Grown-up:  How America's Arrested Development is Bringing Down Western Civilization (p. 2) says: 

“One third of the fifty-six million Americans sitting down to watch Sponge Bob Square Pants on Nickelodeon each month in 2002 were between the ages of eighteen and forty-nine.  (Nickelodeon's core demographic group is between the ages of six and eleven!)  These are grown-ups who haven't left childhood. Then again, why should they?  As movie producer and former Universal marketing executive Kathy Jones put it, "There isn't any clear demarcation of what's for parents and what's for kids.  We like the same music, we dress similarly."

Our comments strike at the heart of not only what is happening in our culture but the traffic circle of childish thinking that so many men and women are lost in.  Our culture provides every kind of stimulation for keeping us away from “parent-stage” spirituality.  

We concluded our discussion time by reflecting on Mark 10:32-45 and Matthew 5:1-16.  Jesus’ discussion with the disciples and his opening remarks in the Sermon on the Mount reminded us again that kingdom living is about leaving childhood and moving into parent-stage spirituality.   Jesus said this is what “greatness” looks like in the kingdom of God and it is what keeps salt salty and light shining.  

Father, help us grow up in the Spirit.  May we marry good intentions to actions that will take us away from childishness in its many forms and into a “grown-up” faith that looks more like you, our spiritual parent.  We are your offspring and we know that you rejoice to see us grow up in your likeness.  Amen.

Randy Daugherty

Stephenville, Texas

Shuffling through the Clutter

I went through a phase a few weeks ago, in which I couldn't sleep in my own bed. I live alone,

quite comfortably, in a female Residence Hall at Abilene Christian University. My little

apartment is just the right size for me. However, after I returned from Spring Break, I found that

I had developed a strong aversion to my bed. I didn't want to sleep in it. I didn't even want to go

in my bedroom. I just kept the door shut for two weeks, at least, only entering to change clothes

or grab needed items.

I made camp on my couch. It's cozy; I bought it at an antique store and it didn't put any pressure on my pocketbook. It's Depression-era, and I've never seen another couch that looks quite like it.  I moved all my pillows and blankets into the living room and stayed there for nights in a row. I couldn't figure out why I felt suspicious of my bedroom, but I knew I felt more at peace with sleeping on the couch. So I decided I'd just stay as long as I needed to. 

There were moments when my domestic changes were a little embarrassing. My friend, Bryson, came over for some coffee one afternoon and I'd forgotten to hide my bed clothes in the bedroom, their proper home. I noticed him eying the couch, probably wondering who'd been sleeping there, or why I was.  My quirk was exposed. I found myself wanting to rush an explanation, to say that I'd been  napping there, that a friend had needed a place to stay, that I was changing the sheets on the bed.  Finally, I just moved the pile of blankets and pillows and said that I'd been sleeping on my couch  because I couldn't sleep in my bed, for some unknown reason. His response was simple, "That  happens to me sometimes, too. And I'm never quite sure why, either."

What a relief. And what a trivial thing to get so worked up about. I went in my room later and

looked around. And then I felt foolish, because the reason I was avoiding my room was strewn

all over the place. Piles of books sat haphazardly shoved against the wall. Clothes lay in piles all

over the floor. Emptied purses hung on door knobs. A suitcase I'd unpacked halfway from Spring

Break was in the middle of the bed. A few glasses of unfinished drinks sat in various places

around the room. In short, my room was a wreck.

I didn't want to face the mess. I couldn't be around it. I couldn't even live life the way that I

normally do because the mess stressed me out too much and I had no time to clean it up, anyway.

It isn't particularly profound, but it made me think of the way that I hide my internal messes, too.

When there is something going on deep inside of me, when I have secret sin, when I am sad,

lonely, angry, confused, jealous, hurting, experiencing negative thoughts, I shut down that part of

myself. I close the door and go sleep somewhere else. I avoid it as long as possible, because

figuring out how to fix it takes time that I don't have and energy that I'd rather spend on

something less painful. So I ignore it.

But there are always the friends who stumble upon the clues. There are always the people who

see the bed clothes that I accidentally left out in my hastiness. There are the people who notice

them, glance over at them occasionally, and usually try to be polite and either act like they didn't

notice, or ask about them in a roundabout way. But in the moments when I choose to

acknowledge the clues, too, and to be open and transparent about what they are pointing toward,

that friend almost always responds with, "That happens to me sometimes, too. And I'm never

quite sure why, either."

I eventually cleaned my room and started sleeping in my bed again last Thursday. While this is

easily the cheesiest analogy I've ever concocted, it's reflective of a simple truth. I can't let those

things, those cluttered messes inside of myself, collect dust and allow me to change who I am or

how I should live because I don't want to deal with them. I can't ignore them. And when

someone picks up on the clues that something is going on in there, I have to be open and honest.

I have to be confessional. If I don't, I'm avoiding true community with people I love and trust and

who have their eyes ultimately fixed on things above, too.

My way would be to keep the bedroom door shut and keep sleeping on the couch, because it's

easier. Psalm 119:59-61 says, "When I think on my ways, / I turn my feet to your testimonies; / I

hasten and do not delay to keep your commandments. / Though the cords of the wicked ensnare

me, / I do not forget your law." From now on when the clutter starts to build up, I'm going to

start cleaning it before it gets out of hand. In fact, I'm committing to giving it a little attention

everyday, so it doesn't gain control over my life. The Lord's ways are higher than mine, and I'll

willingly wade through the clutter if it means that I can walk peacefully in His testimonies at the

end of the day.

Father,

Teach us to open up the places within ourselves that are cluttered with things that we don't want

to see or fix or shed light on. Give us spirits of hope and perseverance, that we may come to our

senses and move beyond hiding away pains and pasts and things that we'd like to pretend never

existed. Walk with us as we wade through the clutter. Help us as we pick it up and put it in its

proper place. Help us to be disciplined and to work through the things that we need to work

through daily, instead of suppressing them and letting them build up. Thank you for being a God

who makes us clean and pure and who does not leave us to rely on our own ways and

understandings. We love you.

Amen

Erin Daugherty, Abilene Christian University

Stand or Kneel: Does it Matter?

Matthew 15:1-9
Then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, 2  “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.” 3 He answered them, “And why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 5 But you say, ‘If anyone tells his father or his mother, “What you would have gained from me is given to God,” 6 he need not honor his father.’ So for the sake of your tradition you have made void the word of God. 7  You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said:

8  “‘This people honors me with their lips,
    but their heart is far from me;
9 in vain do they worship me,
    teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’”

Jesus was for tradition.  We occasionally hear the apostle Paul comment about tradition.  Tradition is never a byword in scripture.  Tradition has always been a major component in giving shape to personal and corporate faith.  

But, Jesus did take issue with traditionalism.  In the spirit of Old Testament prophets like Amos, Jeremiah and Isaiah, Jesus shined the light on a traditionalism that was constructed out of the building blocks of skewed ideas and comfort zones of the flesh from which a sign hung that read:  the will of the Lord. 

Have you ever asked yourself how traditionalism goes-to-seed in a person?  We don’t study ourselves into it.  We observe it first and then bring texts alongside our perspective and practice.  In short, we practice our way into interpretation.  When a particular practice is based on healthy interpretation then faith is allowed to flourish offering a genuine and beautiful presentation of the gospel. The counterpart is unhealthy but wrapped in language and a passion that passes itself off as “the way of the Lord.”    

I noticed an example of this at a singing recently.  The chorus of a particular song says, “And I stand, I stand in awe of you.”  When we got to the “stand” part…you guessed it…we stood.  I have been in many congregational, group and retreat settings in which people traditionally stand when we get to that part of the song.  Do we stand “in awe” at that point or do we stand because the song says “I stand”?  That’s the $64,000 question, isn’t it?  But, something happened later that sets this in bold relief.  We sang a song that had the words, “I bend my knees in praise…” and “I raise my hands to you”.  The second song called for bodily expression – just like standing in the song a few minutes earlier – but...we sat still.  There was no “bending of knees” and no “raising of hands.”  Our comfort zone (familiarity zone, conditioning, practice) has allowed for – even encouraged – standing as THE appropriate expression.  Bending and raising are just as plain linguistically, but our social norms have conditioned us to put a premium on standing.   Why do we defer to one action and exclude the others?  Plainly, we are more comfortable with the one action than we are with the other two.  I suppose at stake here is what we are actually doing in song.  Are we singing out of nostalgia and a herd mentality or have we truly chosen to give physical expression to what is in our hearts?  Bending and raising can be dismissed as strange and perhaps “showy.”  Of greater concern here is how traditionalism has affected how we think about what we are “actually” doing when we are singing.  And…that’s just one example. 

Jesus’ words stand before us as much more than a blistering declaration against the aberrations within Judaism of his day.  They speak to us about how we reflect on and express faith today.  They summon us outside of ourselves.  They ask us to step outside of our congregational atmospheres and to breath a different kind of air.  They beckon us to take a long hard look at how we think about faith and what really matters.  Have the minors become majors and the majors minors in our way of thinking?  Do we passionately defend things that in our estimation are “of God” while missing the things that are truly “of God?”  Do we lean conveniently into socially engineered phrases like “comfort zone” and “that offends me” so we can maintain the wall between ourselves and critical thought?  I’ve done it on occasion.  Why?  My reasons are the same as anybody’s:  Fear of change, arrogance, ignorance masquerading as knowledge, trusting an environment instead of thinking…for myself…for a change.  Other things could be listed.  What’s on your list?

The aforementioned is a major baseline on which any group of Christians thinks, lives and serves.  Christians have always struggled with sorting this out.  The spiritual optimist in me says that if we can allow ourselves a more acute awareness of this baseline we increase our ability to think about faith and live with each other in a maturity that lives in the spirit of the message Jesus delivered in Matthew 15.  What is most important here is that we do our best to “think critically” about what we are doing, defending, and championing.  We might ask ourselves:  1.)  Who is the Lord? and, 2.) How does this honor Him?  To do otherwise, Jesus says, is to follow roads of thought and practice that lead to forms of worship that come short of what God intends for us as persons and as communities of faith.  

Father, give us eyes to see who we are and what we do the way you want us to see it.  May we be more interested in the heart of our faith than its trimmings.  Help us to glean from your word the shape of life that honors you in all that we do and say.  Amen.

Randy Daugherty

Stephenville, Texas

Pure Joy

Let this verse from James tumble around in your brain for a moment.  This is a hard teaching.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds” James 1:2.

Consider it pure joy when Satan comes and assaults your life or the lives of those you love, consider it pure joy when troubles come shaking your very foundation, and consider it pure joy when success comes and threatens to steal your heart and faith or the heart and faith of those you love.  

Consider it pure joy when ____________.  You fill in the blank.  

Intellectually I get the concept.  Verse 3 gives the reason why “because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” Yet, as I consider viewing troubles and temptations with joy I find words coming to mind like “yes but” and “this is different”.   I see little joy in troubles and tests when they affect me negatively or restrict what I want.  I am focused on the temptation or trial and how it affects me, either in ways I like or ways I do not.  

Our culture has conditioned us to meet so many expectations that make us good, accepted, responsible, and successful.  You know the list.  Our religions have conditioned us to act, do, and achieve in certain ways that make us good Christians.  I bet you know that list as well.  Our focus in living becomes driven by the expectations of others and we live to please others or ourselves.  We pursue an endless list of futility trying to be happy and trying to meet the expectations placed on us by the world and by our religions.  We pursue what will never bring us joy and peace and we don’t even know it.  We have been duped and deceived.  We question God. We pray for His help, and though sincere often our prayers are misguided only asking Him to bring us what we think will make us happy.  Frankly, as human beings with the gift to choose, we are incredibly stubborn and self-centered.  Our tendency is to choose the Lord when He serves our purposes and when convenient.  We rely on ourselves and rationalize our choices keeping God in the wings.  And we struggle with James 1:2.   

Our Lord has not changed.  He offers incredible joy, great peace, and a wonderful life for those willing to seek Him.  But God will not share us.   He will not settle for anything less than our complete trust and allegiance to Him.  This is a sobering realization.  Viewing trials with joy requires our focus to shift.  Jesus calls us to “seek first His kingdom and His righteousness”. Reading James in the mindset of putting Christ first, throwing off all caution, trusting Him completely, with no reservations is exciting, liberating, and a cause for joy.  “How?” we ask.  Trials and temptations are avenues to the promise God gives to be there every time and to give us everything we need.   It is a promise, but how do we know it’s real?  Test Him, try Him, call on Him and let Him deliver you.

Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. James 1:12 The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. John 10:10.

Scotty Elston
Shallowater, Texas

Back to Basics

Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.

As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires

you had when you lived in ignorance.  But just as

he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do.

1 Peter 1:13-15

Physical health is a treasure to be protected and cared for.  Our appreciation for good physical health grows as we get older, when it becomes harder to maintain the strength and stamina we had at a younger age.

There are plenty of signs indicating a need to improve our physical health.  The number on the scale is too high.  The image in the mirror is too wide.  The clothes in our closet fit too tight.  The ease at which we lifted, or ran, or played, is replaced by aches and pains and strains.  Could it be time to make some changes?  Maybe, eat less and exercise more?  To improve physical health, it’s a good idea to get back to the basics.

Our spiritual health is worthy of the same discipline, effort and renewal.  We must not neglect the basics of our faith: belief in God and His Son, Jesus Christ; our need for forgiveness; the new birth of baptism; God’s offer of righteousness and salvation through the resurrected Son.  Even when we go on to study deeper truths, we must regularly remind ourselves about the fundamentals of our faith and how we came to believe in the first place.  Knowledge and confidence in the fundamentals of our faith is a solid foundation for spiritual health.

When we are spiritually healthy, our minds are prepared for action; we are self-controlled; our hope is confident and focused on the grace God has promised us through Jesus Christ.  A spiritually healthy child of God makes wise, holy choices.  We are no longer ignorant.  We know the difference between right and wrong.  The spiritually healthy person is aware of Satan’s schemes and chooses not to participate in his unholy behavior.  Now is a good time to remember the Good News of the gospel message.  Get back to the basics.

Prayer

Dear Heavenly Father, please give me the courage and strength I need to get back to the basics for the benefit of my spiritual health.  I want to be holy, as you are holy.  I look forward to the grace you have promised to give me when Jesus Christ is revealed.  In the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.

Carl Smith

Stephenville, Texas