messy things

So, pretty funny how much attention gets paid to numerous issues. In fact, it is sometimes rather surprising what people notice and what people do not notice. There are times when I have often have thought something was absolutely obvious and turns out no one noticed. Other times, I thought something was inconspicuous and it turns out that everybody noticed.

For example, I have allowed my facial hair to grow basically every year during the winter. It is a family tradition I recall from childhood. Men in the family were hunters and fishermen. The beards began in October and stayed through ice fishing until March/April. I usually wear a goatee anyways. The beard would often be kept closely cropped, but was there none-the-less. I thought it was obvious....until this past year.

This past year, I decided to give it freedom to grow without limits. The purpose to this was prophetic, basically. With many things, certain issues come out of my childhood. One of those things, that relates to this, is my need for close cut, very neat, items. For example, I once allowed my hair to grow and was able to get it to a point of a pony tail. Yet, as I look back, those days of having a ponytail included always pulling back all my hair as tight as possible. I used multiple levels of hair product in order to keep it from having any "fly aways" or extraneous curls. There is one picture I have of my hair being loose. It was wild, out there, completely untamed. I thought back on that day and if I recall correctly, my mood was similar to that; untamed, wild, a bit out there. Eventually, I had to cut my hair short. The amount of product combined with the tension I was putting on it in order to make sure it complied was causing breakage and balding.

I, being who I am, had to take it to the other extreme. So, for a time, I intentionally shaved my head. I liked to cleanness to the look. It was easy maintenance. With urging from others, though, I eventually grew it back and now maintain a closer cropped head of hair.

The Beard:

Many seemed to notice the beard more so this year. As I thought about it, I think I know why. The closeness of the cut I normally keep was less outstanding given normal men's fashion. I would go a couple of days between shaving even with the goatee--sensitive skin plus dulling razor equals breakouts. So, in the end it is far more reasonable that it is so noticed.

It is even more noticeable to me. As noted earlier, I have an issue with things not being in place. You wouldn't know it by my office, especially my desk, but lack of organization plays havoc on me. Yet, this year, the beard was allowed to grow as it would. I resisted the temptation to get it under control. I outlined the "flyers" to grow periodically grooming with comb or brush to bring them into something resembling unison. This would never last of course. Beards are beards. They grow without any sense of care for each other, the individual whiskers only caring for their self development and sustainability on the field of "face".  Talk about messy! The discord on my face was amazing.

Yet, let it grow I did. It continued to gain size and shape. Colors came through. Flyers grew out. Some whiskers came in straight. Others had varying degrees and directions of curl. Looking at it, I was going crazy. It was course. It was messy. It was a distraction. Until the day I allowed my perspective to be changed. I took a step back from a mirror and looked. The mess was less noticeable. I took another step backwards and another and another. Eventually, as I got a newer perspective, I was able to see that the mess was not as messy as I thought. There was shape to it. There was a sense of the way that it now had a purpose. Suddenly, the messiness wasn't gone, it was now purposeful. A whole new sense.

I continued to let it grow, and will do so until the end of March. I am now looking forward to next fall already when I reengage in the same "experiment".

So, what's the purpose?

The Church.

Yes, the Church. As I looked. As I pondered. I prayed. I sought what it might be that God might be saying. Though, not audibly, I know now what I heard. The Church looks messy when you put it under the microscope. There are places where it is "colored wrong". There are other places wherein the twists and turns fight against each other. It appears unruly as you compare one to another and expectations are in conflict with each other.

All too often, it seems that we approach the Church in the way that I too often approached my beard/hair. We label, have expectations, a desire to control and harsh reactions to that which we do not approve of. Yet, if we allow the quilt work of the church to be seen from our heavenly Father's perspective, this would all change. He does not see all the mess, or should I say, he is far less concerned with the mess, than he is with the overall effect. He sees the beauty of the widow putting the mite in the temple box. He also sees the beauty of the many streams of the church coming together for varied purposes. He sees the beauty of all those inconsistent hairs coming together to form one whole. This is the bride. This is his hope.

Conclusion: I need to back off from judging the messiness and allow myself to see through His eyes the beauty He sees. I have to let my sense of judgment be altered. I have to allow for a dramatic shift in perception. I have to allow my heart to become the same heart that Jesus has....please join me in doing the same

Our Calling?

Yes, been a while......

This is a basic challenge to my priestly peers as well as a general shout out to the Priesthood of All Believers. Are you a shepherd or a pharisee?

I figure no gradual lead in. Let's just jump right in. After all, this speaks to so much of what we in the church are truly dealing with--a dangerous realization that faith levels have plummeted. Why? Maybe you don't care. Maybe you do care that your average Sunday attendance (ASA and the 'gold standard idol' of the Episcopal Church) is dropping. Maybe you don't.

Many years ago now I was sitting in Deacon's School on a Saturday afternoon. The teacher for the day was Arch Deacon Harvey Huth. He was expanding upon the understanding of shepherd as it related to the pastoral duties of our callings. He shared about growing up on a sheep farm. He talked about how you could always tell those who took care of sheep. How? Was it some convenient name tag with titles? Was it on their driver's licenses or non-driver's license id's? No....the way you could tell was a little more simple than that.

You could smell it.

He noted how, true shepherds, the ones who truly care for the flock, smell of that flock because of the time spent with them.  It did not matter the number of showers they took or how the clothes were washed or what they were washed in. There was always a certain smell that permeated everything. As a result, you can know the shepherds. And, as a result, you could tell the ones that were in it for show or only "part timers". They didn't carry the same level of scent to them.

This story has always stuck with me. Since the first time I heard it, it has sunk in and occasionally bubbles up to the surface again.

This morning, was one of the times.

You see, if we are truly called to be pastors, the same word in Greek also being shepherd, we are then probably going to smell like the sheep we tend. Does this frighten you? What might get in the way of this? How might others react?

To truly step up, as both a pastor and as part of the priesthood-of-all-believers, is going to require something of us that we may or may not be able to be overcome in a singular moment--we have to stop being afraid of hell.

Yes, I'm going there.

We need to stop being afraid of hell, the devil and the world.

When Jesus offered up his "high priestly prayer" in John 17, he asked that we not be taken out of the world, but that we no longer be a part of the world. He also, when Peter offered his confession of faith, Jesus said this (the confession of Jesus as the Christ and Son of God) would be the rock upon which he would build the church and, here's the kicker/gut punch/whatever you care to call it, the gates of Hell would not prevail against it.

Do gates move? Not that I'm aware of. Last I knew, gates are stationary. They sit and guard a stationary locale of a physical place. Even as a city might expand, the original gates still remain and new gates are merely added as the walls are expanded further and further out.

So, why would Jesus make these kind of statements regarding the gates of hell? Perhaps he had lost his mind for a moment? Or, perhaps, just maybe, Jesus was expecting the kingdom/the church, to move in such a way as to push against those gates? Ponder this for a moment. What does that mean for how we are to pastor our flocks? Behind closed walls in sanitized buildings with beautiful decorations? How does that push against the gates of hell? If anything, that allows hell even more building room.

I was trying to come up with some fancy way of articulating this. I am currently unable to. So, here it is in plain speak:

Our churches are failing because faith has been replaced with fear and pastors have been replaced with pharisees.

We fear the world and all that it has to offer. We fear pastoring those who may not be like minded or may struggle with numerous challenges that are "offensive" or maybe they are young and raw in their faith and this is something that feels prickly and uncertain. It raises anxiety and that anxiety bleeds out into the congregation and the congregation becomes more and more anxious. Rather than our focus being on introducing and cultivating a relationship with God, we focus on trying to create good church goers who will help out at the bazaar and give a good image to the local grocery store.

We don't smell like sheep. We smell like myrrh and fabric softener.

We seek uniformity rather than unity and, like the early Jewish counter parts, we teach the precepts of men rather than the word of God. How could I be so bold to proclaim this? Where in the bible does it say that men have to have short hair and women have to have long hair? Where does it say that a man should not have an earring? Actually, to that, the bible says the opposite. The levitical law included a provision for piercing the ear of a slave that did not want to leave his master's home.

My challenge to us, myself included, is to become more fully open to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Paul was driven to the gentiles and preached to them a strange new belief. They were not circumsised, ate crabs and munched on bacon. They did not follow any of the rules. Yet, he went boldly to them in order to share the message of the good news of Christ and the restoration of the relationship between Creator and creation.

Patrick went back into the very place in which he endured slavery in order to bring the good news. He did not stop their practices. He did not stop their songs. He did not stop their prayers. He offered to them the opportunity to turn these over to God. Thanksgiving prayers were given each more at the kindling of the fire. Now, rather than offering up that thanks to some other deity, they offered up the thanks they already had to the new light in their lives, the light of Christ. Celtic Christianity is filled with this. Patrick worked side by side with them in the fields, hauling wood, tending flocks, getting water, preparing meals, mending fences and roofs and all of the other day to day chores that went into life. Only when they would go to worship would they separate out.

We have sterilized our faith which has led to it losing all power and presence.

Brothers and sisters, it is time to begin walking by faith rather than hiding in fear. It is time for us to use our worship time as a time of refreshing only to empower us to more boldly spend the rest of the week in the world. How will they hear if no one is sent to them? How will they know that the love of Christ is available if the only thing they encounter in the world is our sneers and disdain for those who "are like we used to be"? How will they ever step foot into a church/worship service if all they know of it is how judged they already are on the outside of the building?

I have never ever seen one person successfully shamed into belief. I have never seen any one person sustain faith that is birthed in fear of hell (whether now or in the afterlife). I have seen time and time again that faith birthed out of desperation all too often fades when the pressure is taken off.

I have seen whereby someone comes to a different understanding of God as a result of my relationship with Him and with them.

Join me as I accept this challenge to live my faith boldly following the leading of the Holy Spirit unafraid of hell. After all, scripture says that He who is in me has overcome the world. The victory has been one. Time to stop living in fear of defeat.

God's peace and blessings to all.

Lost the tune

So long having been lost

Expectations down to nothing

Never having tasted of the tune

Thoughts distantly dreaming

Of dancing n swirling

Arms wide n head back in utter abandon

But didn't have the tune

Glimpses of others

Gifted with freedom able to soar

Instead of sour jealously guarding 

That seemingly secret tune

Till the day chance stumbling upon it

Perhaps destined or purposes didn't much matter

I'ld found the tune

Now my time to dance with abandon

Love in the freedom no burden could take

Revelling  in that sacred tune

Dreams now probables

Hopes aren't just possibles

They hold a reality within the tune

Never noticed the clouds moving in

Failed to detect the fog with its bone chilling burden

That brought the fading of the tune

Instead simply dumb founded 

Or maybe dumb

As silence slipped between the notes

Of the tune

Till I listened with dread

The old stuff now clanging

Cacophony of noise without a tune

Where did it go how do I get there

Back to the place

I lost the tune

Isolation

Isolation in crowded rooms

Self imposed rules 

With no origin or destination

Cut off from the crowd

Peering into empty black

Inky glistening off tear stained lashes

Knowing that no one

Or do they

Can they will they 

Questions best left unanswered

The twisting uncertainty of will over matter

The burdens magnified by their own substance

A quagmire of desperation leading only deeper

While crying so desperate with unheard whispers 

The matter doesn't nor ever did it

There is no real answer

Not now maybe ever

That point long since past

Searching for solid amongst 

Gelatin the illusion of substance

Only colored water that never freezes

Shifting and shimmering alluring 

Rainbows distracting 

Thoughts detracting 

And still sitting here all alone. 

The argument within

Wind in face, sun brightening the day

Freedom of rolling with the road

Yet you are hidden away

The roar too loud, no one will hear my cry

The rolling is shaking instability n insecurity

Join me as friend embracing freedom offered

Draw near in strength of fellowship n security of brotherhood

Friends leave and families are fake

Embracing is begging to be broken

The nearer I am drawn, the further away safety is found

I am still calling to you hand stretched out

We simply unite as one bound by blood

To move on n through no time no worries

Adoption isn't possible hugs are never free

Everything comes with a price n I've paid mine in spades

Never given reason to mistrust

Never given reason to trust

Can't earn what is gifted

Gifts are never given only earned

Free never been worth having

To you it's already been given through the bond offered

Come out of the shadows to a new freedom
Learn to dance on the wind

Only if you promise n never let go of my hand

spiritual family

Each year I make it a practice to read through the bible. It has been that way since I was first sitting under the teaching of my mentor and spiritual father, A. Wayne Bowers. He had been doing it since he first came to relationship with Christ. I thought, after so many years, what is left to re-read? Then, one morning early on in this part of my walk, I was listening to the radio. A pastor was talking about the bible and the accuracy of it, original documents and why we could/should trust it. During his talk, he quoted someone who had been one of his mentors. He said, "you should ruin a bible every year." At first, having been raised during a time when bibles were in court rooms and there was the fear of the hammer strike for misrepresenting when your hand was on one, I was terrified. He then quickly explained that you should be spending so much time in the word that your bible is marked up, pages bent, bindings loose and no room left for notes in margins. So, my journey began. 

This year, I was reading through 2 Chronicles. It was like swimming in mud through the first 12 chapters. Why? The listings of names--genealogies. There is such a heavy emphasis in the Hebrew scriptures for who you come from. Everything is based upon the census and whose line you descend from. Chronicles isn't the only place. There are many listings throughout the Hebrew scriptures. Later, in Matthew, we get the same type of listings in order to demonstrate Jesus' descent through the Davidic line. There were even those in Nehemiah that were excluded from priestly office due to being unable to confirm their family line. 

Why does this catch my eye?

Jesus.

He was approached by his disciples saying that his mother and brothers were outside and wanted to see him. He asks, "who is my mother and brothers?" He goes on to explain that those who do the will of his father are his mother and brothers and sisters. In a singular moment, Jesus radically shifts the emphasis of inheritance from actual blood lines to the common relationship with his heavenly Father. No more does your relationship (inclusive of your role in worship) depend upon who your father's father's father was. It now, in that sentence, depended upon you and your personal relationship. 

And, this same relationship then draws you into a different relationship with those who are also in that relationship. They and you now becoming family, extending beyond, perhaps even more accurately excluding your blood lines. Bonds now exist as a result of your spiritual connection. Family takes on a whole new meaning. 

And a whole new value. After all, your Father is now a king, regardless of what state you were born into. This means that, by virtue of who your father is, you are now an heir to a kingdom--royalty. Your past, including your parents' pasts and their parents' pasts, no longer matters. Only the future. 

Think about the dynamic of this as a truth. Think about what this might mean for habitual behaviors that you seem to do simply because, "that's a family thing". Hey, that isn't your family's thing, because "we" don't do that. How do I know? Because, He doesn't do that and you and I are his kids.

You are a child of God. The family you are a member of is vast, compelled by his love and seeking to always adopt making new family members. Your past is no longer. 

Look towards your future.

A quick note on timing

I have often wondered about God's perfect timing. How much do we trust in it? How much do we rely on it? How much do we attempt to tweak it? I know I am particularly guilty of the last. Way too often, I know what I would like to have happen and when. Yet, it doesn't. I get frustrated. Even thoughts of why bother will sometimes come to mind (oh, that may have been too honest.....oh, well, what's been written cannot be unwritten). I seek Him out, whenever the struggle flairs up again. I have often asked him for encouragement. I've even gone so far as to ask Him to physically manifest himself in such a way that I cannot help but trust His presence. Again, my hands, my will, may way. Happily, He doesn't typically respond to my requests in exactly the manner that I would want Him to. Instead, being sovereign, my Father tends to answer me His way, in His timing, not respecting what I want, but focused on what I need. Thus, Jesus notes for us that even an earthly father who is worth anything would not give a stone when their child asks for a fish.

So, impatiently, I pace, day dream, pray, argue with myself and keep telling myself that I will trust until I actually begin to believe in the trust that I know I want to and should have. 

And then there is the enemy. We shouldn't necessarily trust in his "perfect timing" but we sure should trust in his predictable timing. After all, throughout my life, at times of what should be great moments of joy, along will come that one thing designed to derail my joy, take me off of my focus and get me back to a more pliable state of defocused faith, distraction, frustration and possibly even a sense of the "I Quits!". Why oh why do I let him get away with it? My God is so much bigger than him, yet, at times, I am so subject to him in the way I allow myself to get taken off of my focus. Like Peter, in the midst of a great miracle, I move my focus from my Savior, to the wavers. I lose sight of the fact that it is not the wavers who command my Savior. It is my Savior who commands the waves. 

Lesson to be learned: know this, that the enemy will not be happy with any victory you have in life, he will show up to distract you and pull your focus, D O  N O T  L E T  T H I S  H A P P E N. Keep your eyes fixed, trust in Him who brought you to that place of victory and do not be fooled by the crash and flash of some crow's squawking. 

And, the other lesson, maybe worth expanding on later down the line; Don't become the enemy's pawn in someone else's life. How does that happen? When you see them in their moment of victory/celebration, refuse to allow yourself to partake in anything that would take that away. Do not allow yourself to get caught up in such things, but keep your eyes fixed on what matters. In scripture, we are called to a culture of honor, not criticism. We are to be building each other up, not tearing each other down. Yes, constructive criticism can be helpful in order to correct what needs correction. However, the timing of that is crucial as to whether you will actually be speaking life changing truth to a person or death dealing victory crushing. 

Each of us has this choice.