Thanksgiving

First of all let me say that I never thought I would get into blogging, but let me also tell you it is a great opportunity for me to clear my head before I attempt to write a sermon. It is a way for me to spill my proverbial guts before wrestling with the serious, sometimes troubling truths of scripture. I want to reflect on Thanksgiving because that is what this time of year has been set apart to do at least in the American culture. First of all let me say that I have lots of reasons to give thanks. God has blessed me in ways that I could never have imagined. God has called me to serve a church that loves me. I serve a God that loves me. I have the pleasure of serving with a wife that loves me. Those are the most important things, but God has given me a great family. It is somewhat rare to have parents and in-laws that are still together and still seeking God with their lives. Alice and I are so blessed because we each have parents and Grandmothers that love us, support us, and pray for us. Next of all I am thankful for the reminder that God has put in my life. God has been constantly reminding that life is a gift. It is a gift to be given away. Our highest good does not exist in ourselves, our possessions, or even our personality, but the most good seems to me to be in relationships. This starts with our relationship with God. I have found that in my life that it is very hard to love certain people if I am not able to view them as God views them.
This brings me to the real reason for this post. I am trying to eliminate complaining from my life. We all do it, but I am making it a personal challenge to be a more thankful person. This is not to say that I can eliminate things like grief and other such emotions. I have already said how I believe those are healthy things, but to look at the God who made us and admit that He knows what He is doing is such an important thing. God places difficult situations and people in our lives, not in order to change them, but to change us. My prayer is that I am an individual who has been changed by the life giving freedom that is available in Christ Jesus. In many ways I feel like I am only beginning my Christian walk because God has opened up the door of His amazing love in a way that I no longer have to feel the weight of guilt and shame that I did in the past. So my prayer is that in all things people who know and love Christ would no longer complain and criticize but encourage and exalt. I know this starts with me. So if you are reading this, please feel free to call me on my shortcomings because I hope God can use these thoughts to mold me into the person God would have me be.

Reconciliation, I am sorry.

Well it has been about a week or more since my last post and I want to say how blessed I was by the response of people to the post. It is amazing to see how the internet can connect people who have for so long been disconnected. This has got me to thinking about how amazing it is that I am coming up on ten years out of high school. It is amazing how through different stages in life you connect with those who are close (geographically) or doing the same things as you. The internet has become a great tool in connecting people that have drifted away from you. It is a natural but sad thing sometimes that you cannot stay in touch with all the people that you once deemed friends. I know my heart is sometimes heavy because I really can't or choose not to remember what I was like in high school. I would like to think that I was a nice, kind, and sort of quiet guy, but I am afraid others may have another perception of me. I guess in the interest of reconciliation I want everyone who may take time in their day to read this to know that if I have ever hurt you in any way that I am sincerely sorry. That is one thing that I have learned in life is that their is no reason to live at emnity with other people. Even this morning I read a note about how Christians were writing hate mail to yet another author. What does this solve? Has the cause of Christ ever been pushed forward through hate or violence? This does not mean that as Christians we can not take a stand, but it does mean that Jesus taught us to take that stand in non-violence and at the risk of our selves. I watched an amazing video yesterday entitled the gods aren't angry. It is by Rob Bell. One of his main points is that the amazing thing about Jesus is that his death and resurrection are the first example of a god doing something for people. Jesus came and said it is finished. It is not about us doing for God any more but instead about what God has done for us. I guess this has put on my heart to be reconciled with people because God has brought reconciliation for my many offenses against Him. So if there are any people who have been hurt by me, please let me know if I can make it right. Please know that my prayer is that God will continue to use me as a tool for reconciliation in the world.

emotional pain (In loving memory of William James Knechtel)

Emotions are hard for me to deal with. I would say by most standards people as well as myself would not label me an emotional man. Most of my life I have not had a terrible amount of emotional baggage to deal with. I come from a family that loves and supports me, I have a terrific wife, and for the most part God has blessed me greatly in my life. So my question is this? How does a 27 year old deal with death? I had never been confronted with the pain that follows the death of a loved one because it had been largely absent from my life. I had lost grandparents, but that is part of a natural life cycle. Grandparents get old and they die, not to be harsh and callous, but I believe this is a reality we have all come to terms with. My grandparents lived long lives and for that I am thankful. I am desperately seeking to know how I deal with the death of a son all while being called by God to deal with death on a regular basis in the life of my congregation. I know that life as a country pastor will not always be like this, but to watch two people be completely robbed of life by cancer, to officiate a funeral for a 28 year old, and to do this all while losing our son. I am not trying to write this to earn sympathy points. I am probably writing this mostly because I find it therapeutic, but what do you do with the flood of emotions? How do you handle the fact that most days I would prefer to lay in the fetal position and cry because I don't have to answers to the emotions I am feeling? What do I do when I am at walmart and I see terrible parenting that makes me cry for the world we are living in?I think the only answer lies in Jesus Christ, but at the same time it is not that Jesus is some great consumer product that fixes me. It is more like the process of building a great piece of art. Not that I am any Sistene Chapel, but the fact is that God's greatest work is never immediate. This is why it is so perplexing to me that people believe that emotional healing should somehow be immediate. I believe this must be somehow influenced by a cultural belief that the avoidance of pain is somehow the highest good. The Bible and Jesus Christ blast this as nothing but a load of crap. Jesus makes it clear that in order to follow Him that each person must take up their cross in order to follow Him. This is a radical dying to self, dying to the strong human desire to avoid pain. It is not a matter of us avoiding pain, but it is a matter of us finding a way for our pain and emotions to be God glorifying. So my prayer is not God fix me, but God help to dwell in this state of brokeness, pain, and emotionalism as long as you see fit that I might be most effective at glorifying you. That's what life comes down to. If God uses my emotions and my pain in order to see a hurting world through His eyes then is it not all worth it? If God helps me see bad parenting the way He sees it, what if God gives me such a heart for this lost and broken world that I no longer accept the normal paradigms of pastor but instead become the man that He has created me to be, then what then. What if God uses each of these painful experiences, each of these emotionals journeys through the valley of death to show me that it is not only my heart that breaks, but also His heart. I don't want to pretend to be okay just because people can point out promises in the Bible. I know the Bible is the truth, but at the same time you don't point a suicidal person to the fact that Judas hung himself. I think the most comforting passages I have found are in Job when his friends came and sat with him and said nothing. The other most comforting passage that exists is "Jesus wept." This speaks volumes about greiving, death, sadness, and mourning. Jesus did not pretend to be something He was not. Jesus cried when Lazarus died. God cried. God has felt the pain of death in every way we experience that pain. God does not tell people to pull themselves up by their bootstraps or that all things work for the good of those who love God. God the creator of the universe wept. That is more powerful than anything anyone could ever say or do. Perhaps, all I want is someone to validate my tears. Maybe I want to validate my tears. I cry for a stillborn son, a mother's life cut short by cancer, and a friend that had his humor robbed by disease, but most of all my prayer is that I cry because God cries. Jesus wept and I believe Jesus weeps with me today.