like a fire

I start my first teaching series for the church as a whole this Wednesday. It is some of the themes from John Eldredge’s Waking the Dead and some of my own thoughts mixed in as well. I really like what Eldredge says about the heart and what he points to in the Bible about the heart.

I wonder sometimes that I never saw it myself. It really is apparent that God wants us to have full lives. That’s not very surprising. The surprising thing is that He wants to do it through our hearts. I grew up in the church very suspicious of my heart. It was the source of all those things that were bad in my life (like emotions). The Bible shows something fairly contrary to that, though. Hopefully, I’ll post more about it as I prepare for the lessons.

I am officially a disciple of Marko. Recently I had the pleasure of meeting him and noticed his footwear. I am a little particular about what I put on my feet and aspire to foot model status one day. Anyway, Marko was wearing these lined Crocs and insisted that I give them a try. I was blown away. I have tried the unlined version and didn’t care for them much, but the lined ones are great. So yesterday, at one of my favorite Mexican restaurants, I was given a pair for my birthday. I haven’t really taken them off since. It’s amazing what the little things can do.

Thanks mentor of footwear.

I haven’t posted a lot lately due to spending lots of time with people. Given the choice, I will always take people over face-time on the internet. But this last week has been one of many ups and downs. Cathy grandmother (Nanny) died Sunday morning and we had services Wednesday. I was glad to hear the stories about the legacy he left her family, but there was a longing there for some of that. It started hitting my identity, though I didn’t know it at the time.

Wednesday night, we had our normal youth get together, but it was far from normal. There were some huge connections that I really loved. I had already planned on talking about the soul and how God gives us a soul with a distinct identity. When we don’t know that identity, it is like we are a coffee pot being used as a baseball bat. Not only do we not make coffee, we can’t hit a baseball very well either. Worse than that, we get damaged trying to hit a baseball if we are a coffee pot.

I was thinking of several things in discipleship that ought to drive our relationship with Christ. In Christ, we see more and more of our identity. I’m not talking about how we are like him, but rather in the transforming presence of God that awakens the inner part of our soul. John Eldredge calls it the heart. Maybe that is it, but what ever you call it, there is something hugely powerful in knowing who you are. I was trying to explain this when a story came back to me.

When I served at Westminster PCA in Pennsylvania, there was a guy there who was unashamedly known as a virgin. It wasn’t because he was unattractive. In fact, this guy had plenty of opportunity. He was on the basketball team and was quite popular. Many of his team-mates gave him a hard time about it. They told him that he was missing out and that he would never have an opportunity this good again to sleep with as may girls as he wanted. I guess it finally pushed him over the edge, because eventually he let them know what he thought about them. I’ll never forget it.

He said, “I can be like you in five minutes. You will never be like me.”

I think that kind of conviction comes from identity. I don’t know if it possible to stand up for what you believe without a strong sense of who you are, knowing that you are loved and accepted, actually making a choice that is better, and/or full of confidence in what you believe.

I think that points to a necessary component of discipleship. How are we helping this generation see who there are, know that they are loved, know their choices are better if they are centered in God or confident in what they believe? Is it possible to disciple apart from that?

I don’t care for raw tomatoes - at all. I don’t really mind them cooked in something like chili or spaghetti, but I just can’t stand a nice ripe raw tomato. So how is that good news? Stick with me.

I have been counseling more often than anything else lately. Not real counseling like Johnny or Grant or Trey, but what the church calls counseling. Mostly just listening and reflecting some things back. Maybe making some connections and, more often than not, trying to give a Biblical perspective on what I am hearing. So I find myself with a guy with some impulse problems who is saying he really wants to change, while continuing to act on his impulses. So I ask him if he likes tomatoes. He confirms my suspicions by replying in the negative. I ask him if he thinks he could learn to like tomatoes. He thinks about that one for a while and then admits that he couldn’t learn to like tomatoes. I then ask him if he could learn to like tomatoes if our friendship depended on it. He thought that was pretty superficial to base a relationship on that, but he still agreed that he probably couldn’t learn to like tomatoes then either.

I then asked him what desires he thought he could change. He is starting to get suspicious at this point. He through out a couple of half hearted attempts, but he knew that he that he was a long way up the creek by then. So I asked him why he thought he could change the things he loved acting out in. Long silence.

He then asks me if I am telling him that he should just continue following his impulses. I of course said no, but I did leave him knowing that only God could change his heart. I also made the connection of abuse in relationships. That is, how sometimes we follow our impulses and it hurts others. Our relationships, sometimes, are a lot like learning to like tomatoes. We can’t really do it, but we can eat them anyway, if the relationship is hard enough.

I asked if he could stop acting out even if he really wanted to if that would save a friendship. That was where it ended.

I told him that was the gospel. That the good news is that our relationship with God isn’t dependent on our desires or behavior. It does injure that relationship, but it doesn’t negate it.

Hope all is well in the land of impulse.

Well, it turns out I am still alive, though not very present in the blogosphere. I haven’t blogged in so long, my computer forgot my blog address. I wish that I could apologize, but I really have just been having too much fun and experiencing too much life to miss blogging. Having said that, here is what has been happening.

I am now happily ensconced in my role as youth pastor at St. Peter’s. I have been teaching on Sunday morning’s for a month now and have had a couple of events. I am reminded this morning about how it was for me just a little over a month ago. It was maybe the biggest test of faith I have ever had.

After being “asked to leave” from my last church, I had lots of doubts. I knew I still wanted to be in youth ministry, but I had no place to serve and was very discouraged in where I thought God was leading me. In my heart, I felt like youth ministry could be something so much more than what it has been for me. I believed believe that it could be a place where the kingdom is invested in teens through a specific plan that was laid out thousands of years ago. Basically, I thought think that discipleship is the best way to help teens, especially for the long haul. All the events and big gatherings, though great at the time, are just not enough to sustain teens when they eventually graduate. I was in the middle of wondering if I was crazy.

I think tests of faith are like that. My friend Johnny tells me in counseling that people often wonder things like that. Am I crazy? Are they lying? I knew God wasn’t lying, but I sincerely questioned where my heart was leading.

Through it all, my wife was a rock of support. She kept telling me about Jacob and him wrestling with God. Jacob held on until God gave him his blessing. She would say, “Hold on for the blessing.” Many times I wondered if I was being realistic in turning down opportunities and not even pursuing many others.

Then can St. Peter’s. In many ways, it is not at all what I would have picked for myself. Yet, in so many ways, I found it to be the place I have been longing for. How did God know all the things my heart has been craving that I didn’t even know? I am amazed at the depth of compassion that I have been shown.

And now, I am in the beginning of the blessing. It is great and awe inspiring. I can’t imagine a better place to be. I hope that this blog is a place for many more stories of God’s blessings.