I'm back... is anyone there?

I suppose I'm not even sure how many people followed my blog before, I only knew of a couple, but I spose they've all moved on to greener pastures in my absence. Cha, I act like I have some sort of a following here. Anywho, whether you checked this baby out before, or you stumbled upon it, I'm back... I hope.

It's hard for me to write when I'm emotionally dysfunctional, or at least more dysfunctional than usual. I was on the road for Rosedale Bible College for a few months, travelling all over the place. I think I put about 15,000+ miles on since I went home to Oregon for Christmas back in December. Host families' living rooms & rooms of 20 somethings off at college are not good environments to write in. I need either something familiar, or exotic and extraordinary. 

For my triumphant return I would like to humble myself by talking about a topic I know very little about. Gardening. Courtney and I planted a garden, we're sort of flying blind. I think we both expect that sometime next week our weed free garden will produce perfect plants, including some we didn't even expect. I'm enjoying the utopian delusion for now.

Whether or not our wildest gardening dreams come to pass, I already consider this garden a success. It has produced relationships that have enriched my life and hopefully spreads the kingdom of God.  Forgive me for throwing out aspects of my dating relationship all over the web, but a couple of weeks ago Courtney and I were having a little misunderstanding. She went to work on the garden a bit while I stayed on my porch and thought about life. While she was there, the neighbor brought by some chicken wire for us to put around our garden to fend off the millions of illegitimate children of bugs bunny. He invited the two of us over that night to sit around the fire and catch some fish out of the millrace. 

After settling our little dispute we took them up on the offer. There was a small crowd gathered when we arrived. There was Steve, an electrician in his fifties with a deep love of good southern moonshine, his daughter Carrie and her boyfriend Aaron, the neighbor Jeremy and his wife Nicole, and their daughter Stevie (yes their daughter Stevie). For the last few years they have spend their weekends with each other, laughing, drinking cheap beer, fishing, swapping stories, and enjoying more community than many Christians have.

We haven't talked about anything serious, but after showing up two weeks in a row, I feel like I'm one of the gang. Courtney and I were out working on the garden yesterday. Steve came up and started chatting with us, he let me use his shovel, gave me some gardening tips, we talked about his apple trees. After a bit, Nicole and Stevie came over and started chatting as well, they gave us some tomato plant starts and some cups to transplant them in. They have accepted us. 

The first thing Steve said to us (after having a few Milwaukee's Bests) was "Make yourself at home, if someone ever needs to sleep something off underneath the apple tree, it wouldn't be the first time, and no one will ask any questions." Sure it wasn't exactly a Christian greeting of hospitality, but I liked it. If you need to puke in my yard, it's ok I still accept you. 

We'll see how things go in the future, I hope and pray for opportunities to love them like Christ loved them, and hopefully I'll have opportunity to share the message of the good news that the maker of the universe loves us all immensely, even if we're sleeping something off under an apple tree.

Back to School

It feels good to start school again. Exercising the brain, exploring new ideas, growing in various skills. I like school. I know that's somewhat odd; but if it were free I'd be a lifer. It feels good not only because I'm back into education, but also because I'm in an environment I've never encountered before.

I admittedly fall in the demographic of "first time out of a Christian Education Environment." Really, that shouldn't be a reluctant admission, Christian Education did me a lot of good, I'm thankful for it. Going to Rosedale Bible College did me even more good. I'm just glad I'm finally 'in the world but not of it' (educationally in this case). Needless to say, this new environment brings a lot of new experiences and evaluations of what I have been taught already.

My gut reaction is a "me vs. them" mentality. I was really shocked and sort of disgusted that my gut reaction in class was this tense combat situation feeling. I felt like my role here as an ambassador of Christ was to make sure they knew that I was right and they were wrong. You know, uphold the truths of strong theology and all that. We'll come back to that one.

Jesus and Christianity come up pretty much daily. For better or for worse Jesus (or at least his historical existence) is everywhere. Every time I hear something about Christians, or Christian influence -just about anything that Christianity had a part in- I pretty much want to disappear. My heart beats a bit, I race for answers to questions that will probably never be asked of me. I feel like if I don't stand up and defend Christianity every time it's backed into the corner, I'm failing. We'll come back to that one as well.

I think I know everything. Don't worry, I know that's not a good thing. I have some loving patient friends who remind me of that. I'm going to have a hard time just loving people while being in an educational environment. I can get so caught up on the discussion or the idea and what I think is right that I ignore where the other person is coming from and how I can better show them Jesus (not just what I think about the Sumerian writing's impact [or lack thereof] on the Old Testament). I'd joyously just ask for humility, but I know getting there sucks; so I usually just offhandedly mention it once and a while.

I gotta go to class. I'll touch more on those other paragraphs individually at a later date.

P.S. I'm not sure I'll ever be cured of procrastination.

Finding What I'm not Looking For.

Colossians 3:1-3

So if you're serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don't shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that's where the action is. See things from his perspective.

It seems sometimes -much of the time- that ministry happens when we aren't even looking for it.

The last few days have been rather ordinary and yet complete. I have found myself stopping continually and focusing on the moment. Each moment has not simply been a moment where I need God to get through it; each moment has been in itself opportunity to connect with the creator, a moment to spend with Him, a moment in itself equally as important as any other.

Yesterday I was blessed to be used in one of the most meaningful ministry opportunities I have ever experienced. After lunch I took off from work and was going to run some errands when I received a phone call. Long story short, I had the opportunity to help a son open up his heart to his father. I was blessed to see a son forgive his father, tell him he loved him, and give him a hug. I feel ridiculously blessed to be a part of what my Father is doing.

Funny thing is this blessing came when I really wasn't looking for it, just as with the seeming explosion of ministry opportunities that have happened in the past three months. I have tried to make myself preoccupied with God, obsessed with connecting with Him. Even at the expense of 'ministry' I just want to commune with Him. I have given up trying to find what the heck God wants me to do and have just tried to find God. The result, I finally am learning to contently continually commune with Him; and I have found more ministry than I have ever experienced at any other period of time.

I pray that I won't start to look at this as a 'method for ministry.' The point of my existence is not to 'do ministry' it is to know and follow Jesus wherever He goes, it is to be in communion with God. Out of this flows peace, joy, compassion, love, righteousness.... and ministry. When we walk with Him He points out things that He sees and tells us how He feels about it, it is then that we can respond to God's heart and be genuine kingdom workers.

Should I expect anything different?

I was scanning radio stations on my drive through Goshen a couple days ago. A radio station rush hour talk show was commenting on the whole Govenor Spitzer fiasco. I must say I was sort of, but not really shocked. The summary of their commentary was: "If Spitzer's wife wasn't freaky enough for him in bed then I can understand why he hired a hooker." They continued to go on about how you need to make sure and have a wife who was as equally freaky (or prude) as yourself so that you can be happy in marriage.

Now before you call up James Dobson to get some legislation passed on what people can say about marriage, I ask the question: Should I expect anything different from a world without Jesus Christ? I've noticed the Christian response to conversations like that is usually disgust at how anyone could think in such a distorted way. Admittedly that was my first response. My second response -or should I say the second response which was incited by conviction- was one of disgust.... with me. Of course what they are saying is twisted, of course it's off base, of course that's a pretty screwed up litmus test for a good wife; but how should they know any different?

Paul tells us not to walk in gratifying lustful desires as we did in our 'former ignorance' (I Peter 1:14). That implies that though we are now in Christ, we were at one point (as many still are) in ignorance. These shock jocks are in ignorance (in my opinion, obviously).

To bring it back to Dobson. What is our obsession with making ignorant people act like Christians? What if the Moral Majority passed every little law they wanted to? What if this really became a "Christian Nation" what if marriage were preserved (at least on paper) and homosexuality was illegal? What if porn industries were shut down and bars were closed (not that alchohol in itself is sin to begin with)? Well, we would probably have a nation full of ignorant 'moral' people. People with all the trappings of your typical evangelical, minus a significant relationship with Jesus. I guess if that's the aim we're setting a good example.

Down to a personal level. My disgust with myself came as I listened to the radio because I realized I was investing time feeling disdain for people I should be praying for. Why am I expecting people to be 'moral' when they don't know the one who is the source of morals? Did Jesus even do this? I understand he spoke truth, he told the Samaritan woman to go and sin no more and in forgiving other people's sins he was mentioning the fact that they were sinful; but I can't think of a time where he told somone to change their life without first coming to Him. He said, follow me. He gave a description of what it meant to follow him; he made that pretty clear. He spoke the message, he lived the message, he made clear the benefits and consequences (benefits and consequences of following, consequences of not following); but he left it to the individual to decide whether or not to follow that standard, that lifestyle. Meanwhile his heart burned with compassion as he saw his people marring themselves with sin. There is a drastic difference between my disgust and Jesus Compassion.

Ok maybe I shouldn't hammer Dobson, the guy has a lot of amazing insights to families and child development. All I'm trying to say is that our role in spreading the kingdom is not done by force. We show people there IS a better way to live, and at times we point out that the way the world does things is destructive. Our mission is not to change people, that's God's job. Ours is to show them that there is hope, that there is one who can change them and save them from what they were ignorant of.