What's He Really Mean?

I am constantly amazed at what I read from friends and acquaintances across the internet, equally troublesome is what I read and hear professional christians say or write or tweet. 

It's no secret if you know me, or read my blog that I have some pretty serious issues with the christianity of my youth.  (By the way at 40 I put the christianity of my youth between the ages of 16 and 26.) Anyway, growing up in that tradition was easy in some ways, I am right and you are wrong, is a simpler faith to have and makes it easy to pass judgement on people of power who fell, easy to say those rules aply to others but I'm different.  It's equally easy for people like me on the other side now to lump everyone from that particular branch of christianity into one big boat full of un-caring, un-loving bigots.  Neither side is right.

Still as usually happens on both sides of this fight the idiots are the most vocal.  I figured I may as well add my voice to the mix, and possibly come out as a much more moderate person than some would think.

There is a disturbing trend in the church today, the need to advertise how welcoming they are.  This makes no sense to me. A church having to tell people that they are welcome no matter what is sad! Of course there is a reason for this predicament especially in the churches and christianity I grew up in, it is sadly still in those churches today, the idea that the only way people can really belong in the congregation is if they dress,  talk,  look like and believe like they should,  the kicker being who gets to choose what they should means. 

Jesus didn't opperate that way,  at least not that I can tell.

The real issue,  as I see it,  is who gets to make the rules.  Who dictates what sin is,  what being a Christ Follower looks like?  I think most of the people in authority in churches would be shocked,  angry, bitter and resentful of who Jesus would hang out with,  who he would let in the doors, who he would say made it,  and who he  would say see ya later too.

Jn 8:7
They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!”
(NLTse)

This coupled with other pictures of Jesus eating with sinners,  calling the least likely to be his closest disciples and friends,  and a rather constant rebuke of the religious leaders of the day,  points to a very different type of christianity than is evidenced in any number of churches on any given Sunday,  or Saturday,  or whatever day that church chooses to worship.

Why does the evangelical church take it upon themselves to bring the sinner to the crowd. To tell people how to act,  to want them to dress, talk, and act a certain way to prove they are worthy of Jesus,  love, grace, and mercy?

If Jesus was constantly questioning the motives of the religious leaders of his day,  what makes us think he would pat us on the back and say hey,  you're doing great,  keep being exclusive,  keep judging others,  keep telling people they have to be more like you before they can have a prayer of being anything like me. 

I don't know,  I guess I want a church that is open and inclusive of all,  because if I read it right its His desire that all come to repentance,  that all have a relationship with him.  My job as I see it is to tell people the truth of God's word and let him do the rest.

Jesus didn't tell the leaders they were wrong,  he didn't change the deffinition of sin,  he simply loved and wept and then gave all…

Hey Four Oh

28 years ago give or take a year or two in either direction, my mom turned 40. I remember my friends Dan and Steve Tickerhoof and I really having fun with this. For some reason it struck us as something to really pick on her for. When we wanted her we would say "Hey Four Oh." We would say "What do you need Four Oh?" It was all sorts of fun to pick on my my mom for turning 40. She took it all in stride, I mean sure there were times that she would respond, just the way we wanted her too, but the bottom line is she was a good sport.

So here I sit, having turned 40 myself, started down this path of healthy eating, and exercise, and having three daughters between the ages of 11 and 2, and well I am realizing more and more that 40 doesn't look the same on this side of the number as it did back then. I don't feel 40, not that I really know what 40 feels like, I know that I thought I would be in a different place at 40 than I am, and that may still happen. Things have a way of changing and moving and morphing all around you, especially when you are really looking for what God wants in your life. The funny thing is as I sit typing this and Jo watches one episode of this kitty show she watches, I can't help but think about what I do.

Most of my days find me out in Leisure world, I sometimes call it OldsVille. The thing that amazes me about the people out there that I work with is that breath of age that is there, also the differences in activity level. Some of the customers don't do much of anything, some of them are extremely active, some of them run 5 K's at 80 plus and play in tennis tournaments, others can barely move. They very in age from 50 something to 94. They all have one thing in common. They are trying to stay current, even if the technology they have is older than Amberly (my oldest daughter.) Which brings me to the final piece of this coming of age story...

At 40 we are on the edge of something new, sure it has some of the same things we have done, but this time the buck would stop with us as it were. I'm excited at the prospect but at the same time the waiting is annoying, and the prospect is daunting. We are also keeping details away from everyone except ourselves, mainly because we are going to wait to see what happens. Still standing on the edge of this and realizing the potential, and the work involved I can't help but think about being 40 and starting something new.

I guess it's almost like there has been this great preparing going in our lives. Recently we have been reading the story of Joseph in our family time. J has said before that sometimes she wishes I could look at things like Joseph did. I usually tend to identify with people who screwed up but God still was able to use them. She sees me as something and someone more, which in and of itself is pretty cool. We both are somewhat fascinated with Joseph, mainly because of the attitude he had throughout all the things that happened to him. Sure he made mistakes, dreamers usually do, and it usually ends up with other people not understanding them, or they come off as arrogant or un-interested in the people around them, but Joseph gets that worked out of his system. Sure it takes being thrown in a pit, sold as a slave, accusations of rape, time in prison, and being forgotten by the guy who promised he would help Joseph out, but those things did more for Joseph than any doting father could do.

The part of the narrative that strikes me the most is this one;

"Then he kissed all of his brothers one by one, cried on their shoulders as well, and after that they talked for a time together. Gen 45:15 (The Voice)

I would love to have this attitude. I pray that God will work it into my life, of course that may or may not work out all the time. I mean Hey I'm forty and an argument could be made that all the stuff that was happening to Joseph was happening when he was in is 20's and 30's. Younger you know, easier to mold and shape...Nah I don't really think that way. I think that Joseph had tons of times when he was angry, bitter, and wanted revenge. I think that there were days sitting in his cell that he thought of all the ways he could get back at his brothers. I'm pretty sure there were days when he yelled at God, decided to not follow him any more, cried, and then came back weeping wanting to feel that closeness that he thought was gone, because let's face it when we humans decide to be angry and bitter, and to walk away from God we make the mistake of placing God in the same category that we are in and we assume that he has either stayed right where we left him, or he has walked away too...

I think some of the little tests that Joseph put to his brothers were not just tests to see if they really had changed, I think in the back of his mind he was enjoying watching them squirm. It's a human thing and there's no way that he didn't sort of enjoy the process of the whole thing, and yet he still loved them, and he still hugged all of them, even though they had treated him so porly. I believe that the reason that he was able to do that is because of not in spite of the hardships he suffered. I think that there were things God had to work into Josephs life and those things would not be able to be added to the mix as long as he lived the of the favorite, privileged son

So here we sit at 40, three awesome kids, likely about to embark on a new and different adventure, that may not be seem new to you, but that to us is a whole new place of living and moving and having our being in Christ.

More to come...

Chiming In

I would have to say about a week or so ago, a friend of mine posted a question on Facebook. It had to do with kids and how you handle them when you are married.

The comments were varied, and sounded great. I even heartily agreed with some of them..but. Of course there is always a but when I write but this time I have to say but because while many of the ideas and ways to handle your children were exactly what you should do. Reality must be acknowledged.

I like the idea of telling kids that there are boundaries, I agree with the principle of putting your spouse first. It's true that a healthy family is one that has love, nurturing, discipline. Kids need to know that they are not the only person in the world, that there are times when they have to not get what they want. Kids should understand that mommy and daddy need time together too. Telling a child no should be the end of it.

All of the things that people wrote and commented were true...in theory.

Any real study of this issue, has to have a few things at it's core. Before we can answer the question of how a family maintains balance, how a husband and wife keep things fresh, and all that stuff.

The first thing to figure out...Why did you have the kids anyway. I know that this seems like a strange place to start when it comes to figuring out how to keep the balance right in all family relationships, but lets sit down and be honest here. We have children because we are selfish, full of ourselves or a mixture of both. We are looking for someone who has to love us that can provide more than a puppy, we want the world to have more of us, we are looking for a bit of immortality. We also think we have something to give a child, we have so much love, so much intelligence so much to offer a child we would be denying the world our progeny and we would be denying someone the opportunity to benefit from our vast knowledge, love, and expertise.

Now that we realize why we have kids, and believe me those are, deep down the reason most people have kids oh wait I forgot to add the ever popular to see if I can, or to prove I am something, but those fall under selfish.

Now that we realize the reasons we can answer the how's of my buddies question. Sometimes you don't. Sometimes you don't balance things right, sometimes you don't put your spouse first, sometimes the kids win, and why shouldn't they. They are kids. They are by very nature going to suck up large sections of your time, energy and love. They should they are kids. I think it's unrealistic to expect a 2 year old or a 7 year old or even an 11 year old, to "give me mommy and daddy our space." They are kids. They have needs that far outweigh our own.

This doesn't mean that we neglect our spouse, it doesn't mean that we can have a pass to not communicate with them, and it doesn't mean that we can just decide that intimacy in any form will just have to take a back seat till the teen years, on the contrary the amount of time and attention that children require, and deserve makes those things all the more important, all the more precious, and all the more cherished. I know that I don't always get the time I want with my wife, I know she doesn't always get the time that she wants with me, we don't always get to have the deep conversations that we would like to. There are day's that we both fall into bed exhausted, look at each other and fall right to sleep. There are days that we have to remind each other why we had children in the first place...another selfish thing on our part because on those days we are thinking of all the time we used to have, the time we had no clue what to do with so we thought adding a child to the mix would be fun and of course all that other we have so much to give mess. There are days that we would like to just throw in the towel and let them fend for themselves...then one of them cries, or calls or needs and we get up and are there for them, even if we were in the middle of a conversation, even if we are in the middle of mommy and daddy time, no matter what they come first, but I digress. See the times that we do get together, the times we can sneak away, the nights when we are driving a long distance and the kids are asleep in the car and we can talk are awesome. The other night Jo was awake and making noise, I went over to get her to rock her to see she was okay, J had fallen asleep, it was one of those nights when the street light came through the window at just the right angle and I saw the most beautiful thing in my world covered by the sheet and I just smiled and looked at her for a while, (for the record she thinks it's creepy when I watch her sleep) I realized that I was blessed with a wife that would stick with me for all the reasons she should and through all the reasons she shouldn't. My wife is beautiful, and intelligent and always has my back. She thinks about me first even when she has to put the kids first. That is what counts.

I may not be first all the time, she may not be first all the time because reality dictates that with three children that's just not possible, but I am her first thought and she is mine. In the morning I think of how lucky I am to get to sleep next to this beautiful creature, how cool it is that she gets me, how awesome it is to feel her support, how much she gives to me even if she can't give me what she wants to. I hope she feels the same way when she thinks about me.

It comes down to this: When I was a child, I spoke, thought, and reasoned in childlike ways as we all do. But when I became a man, I left my childish ways behind. (1 Cor. 12:11 The Voice) Children haven't put away the needs, they still have to come into our bed at night, they still need to be held they still need to be hugged during the day, they will talk over you they will make noises that drive you pretty close to insanity, and that's all part of thinking and speaking and reasoning like a child. As parents it's our job to help them through those times, it's our job to mold them, to train them up and then let them go.

The thing is, we have them for 18 years. We've been married for 19, the time went so fast, one moment we were newlyweds, and the next moment we were not, and if what I am seeing is true, one moment we have kids and the next moment we won't, so yeah they get the majority of our attention, and yeah sometimes I get a little jealous, and sure we don't get as much sleep as we would like, but we chose this, and I can say without reservation, that it was the best choice of our lives.

So there's my 2 cents. Kids suck up all of your time, energy and love, but they give it back to you, and well I'm able to be content in being first in her thoughts, and even with all the selfish reasons for having them, I pray that they grow to share their light and life and love with the world, I want them to be Jesus to people. I want them to know that they are important and special, and that they can live and move and have their being in someone that made them for all the right reasons. We may have kids for selfish reasons, but he gives us kids for our good and his glory, after all how else are we supposed to learn how to approach God?