When a Friend Steps Up.

"A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother." (Proverbs 18:24)

"A friend loves at all times . . ." (Proverbs 17:17)

"Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)

"In prosperity our friends know us; in adversity, we know our friends." John Churton Collins

 I have such a friend. I've known him a long time. He's a Jesus-follower of great heart. My friend is a unique man who's had more than his share of suffering and sorrow . . . way more. He stills goes through it and sometimes feels beyond what he can bear, but bear it he does. This friend of mine is also generous of heart, wisdom and wallet. His giving is borne of compassion, and I think, joy. In the midst of his trials, he gives.

He's also a man who loves and serves the least of God's children: the throw-aways and cast-offs who offend our culture's delicate sensibilities. I've not known anyone who lives such a fierce love for the severely broken and disfigured. They are "his kids." He is Jesus to them, even though I suspect, some are utterly unaware. 

I'm writing in profound gratitude because a few days ago this friend stepped up and walked into the middle of our pain bringing relief. He offered it in response to questions about persistent financial struggles and the strain it put on us in the midst of trying to do ministry here in Northampton. He felt compassion and as is his way of living his faith, he responded by lifting a substantial burden from our backs.

When he told me, I was speechless and overwhelmed by what he'd just done. Some stumbling words came from my mouth in response. I'm sure they were inane. He was matter-of-fact when he told me, not wanting accolades or drippy words of appreciation. He's not of that ilk. He wasn't helping to play the hero; he was helping because that's his way in response to his love for God and his friends. He showed genuine concern and acted to do something about it.

Curiously, his phone call (we'd talked earlier and I let him know our need), came at the lowest emotional point of the day for me. I was disoriented and numb, beaten really. I think I'd been so ground down to emptiness in this fight over the last few months, as had Tricia for that matter, that I couldn't leap for joy when my friend told me the good news. I wanted to, but it just wasn't there. Later that evening, I lie on the floor in our worship space. The lights were off and I needed to have a heart-to-heart with my Abba. I poured out all I was feeling, confessing my fear, sadness and sense of abandonment. I needed to be real in crying out to him. I'm not sure it helped anything, but I had to do it. I was grateful and told him so, but I was just spent. I gave him what I had in me to give.

The long and short of it is because of my friend's stepping up, we get to fight another day. While we aren't out of the woods by any means, I still have hope because people like my friend respond when we're in the slough of despond. And I'm repeatedly taken by the reality that in this often bewildering journey, there are other friends who stand with us in support of all kinds (and have since we arrived here. You don't realize how much we appreciate your care and service!), including the marvelous wild-at-hearts on the imagine/Northampton Team. They've all voted with their lives and families, leaving the familiar for this crazy missional adventure we are shouldering together. I'm so proud to be associated with people of their stripe.

Real friends are pearls of inestimable price. They reveal the heart of  their friendship when the bottom drops out and your life becomes tenuous, sometimes frighteningly so. I hope I can be that kind of true friend someday.  In the meantime, I'll continue learning from the friends God has put in my life to show me the way by their beneficent, selfless actions. He taught me huge lesson just 2 days ago through a man who exemplifies true friendship more than he is really aware.












 

Can Art Be Kingdom Missional and Remain Art?

I grew up around and have been involved in art since I was 15, as a drummer/musician and writer. My grandmother was a big band singer and grandfather, a maker of weird wall collages. My first cousin was a painter (until he was mugged and murdered in NYC). My dad was a mechanical designer, jazz guitarist, singer and furniture maker; my mom painted icons and furniture. My brother is a guitarist and singer/songwriter. My wife, Tricia, is an illustrator, designer and chef. Her older brother is a painter and her younger brother, a film director, writer and photographer. My son is a drummer; my oldest daughter is a singer, artist, writer and chef. My youngest daughter is a singer. Almost all my nieces and nephews are artists in one way, shape and form as well. It's in the blood, stitched into the fabric of my family's life.

As a Jesus-follower immersed in Kingdom mission, art shapes my sensibilities to a degree nearly equal in depth and passion to my Christian worldview. They've walked hand-in-hand for decades. Over the years, I've had scores conversations about what art is, and how the contemporary church used it in its life. Often they've been tough conversations about the scandalously poor quality of much "art" done by Christians over the decades. There are many notable exceptions today, and artists who are Jesus-followers have had the benefit 40-year dialogue over the issue. Believe me, in the 70's when I was in ELAN, a touring Christian band, the topic was a hot one around the country. Ours' was an innovative group, ahead of its time, and in our travels we ran into all sorts of aspiring Christian writers, dancers, artists and actors who could find no place in Christendom for their work. People like Frank(y) Schaeffer, Hans Rookmaker, Calvin Seerveld and Bill Edgar were at the forefront of learned discussions over Christ, art and the Church during those days. People were asking very important questions about faith and art.



Thank God much headway has been made.

Given the fact that imagine/Northampton, the church I am helping to plant in Northampton, has as part of its mission to engage and serve the artistic community here, it follows we are deeply interested in the intersection between being authentically Kingdom missional and making art. We think much about whether the two can coexist beneficially without adulterating one or both? We want to be faithful to our missional call to bring the Kingdom through loving and serving, and we want to make or support great art if it is in us to do so. We desire neither mediocrity nor artifice.


Before I get any further I need to say the art I will refer to is never deliberately formulaic, cheesy, kitschy, propagandist, corny, mediocre, contrived, simplistic, maudlin, commercially-driven or "the Emperor's new clothes." Kingdom missional art will be able to stand on its own merit as art: thoughtful, well-executed, perhaps as good as anyone's art in the world. It will be a product of skill, even mastery, careful thought and hard work. It will be of substance, even if it makes you laugh. 



So here are a few thoughts on the matter:

1.  Art is Kingdom missional when it hints at or points to the transcendent STORY of the Creator/Redeemer God who became one of us - the STORY beyond everyone's stories, and in which our deepest meaning resides. Whether music, visual art, poetry, theater, or dance are the media through which the STORY is revealed, God's STORY of creation and redemption is brought into view, evoking or provoking engagement beyond mere entertainment. People can peer into the revelation of God With Us. God's STORY becomes the context in which we can frame and fill in our stories to get our surest bearings.


2.  Art is Kingdom missional when it tells the truth about the human story/condition against the backdrop of the design of life God is creating, and the Trinitarian culture of love he summons people to embrace. Art which uncovers horrors crushing the human spirit, which unsentimentally portrays human inhumanity and obdurate selfishness against the cross of Christ serves to marry the reality of death to the reality of LIFE overcoming death. If art never pulls the mask off the reality of pandemic sin infecting each person in the world, causing untold misery, it's in danger of misleading, or ends up being merely whistling in the dark while dancing on the head of a cobra.

When art arouses in people a deep empathy causing them to feel the pain and horrors of human cruelty or indifference, and moves them to do something, it reflects the essence of the Kingdom. Art which motivates people to action fulfills a major facet of God's purpose for art. Sure, art can be sheer celebration; it can be whimsy; it can be pure expression in abstraction; it can even be gesture reflecting creative impulse. God gave artists complete freedom to express what they think, dream, hear, see, taste, touch, and feel without alluding to his STORY. Nevertheless, I think when artistic expression creatively aligns with Kingdom values, however directly or indirectly, it fulfills the redemptive Kingdom mission right near the heart of God. 


3. Art is Kingdom missional when it elevates forgotten and despised humanity and offers the forsaken dignity borne of hope. Because art has a unique power to move the heart toward compassion and the mind toward justice, it can unlock people toward action or change. The missional Kingdom of God has a special place for the "least of these" of Christ's brethren so when art elevates the lowly around the world it reflects God's heart toward them. Art can courageously confront unjust power and undermine evil by bringing to the fore hidden corruption crippling entire people's. Propaganda distorts for selfish ends; Kingdom missional art exposes to free the crushed in spirit.

4.  Art is Kingdom missional when it ignites wonder because of sheer brilliance and excellence, exquisite design, intelligent innovation, breath-taking beauty which opens people to notice glimmers and whispers of the UNSEEN REAL animating all of creation. Such art captivates people because they are taken a step beyond what they thought possible. It can be exquisitely simple or dazzlingly complex, but its meaning deliciously points to something/SOMEONE infinitely greater. Wonder turns the heart to the transcendent and ineffable. Kingdom missional art so well executed can bring people to recognize the Author or Wonder even if they don't know his name just yet. Such art delights, provokes, unsettles, intrigues, refreshes and moves people to look past what they've been able spiritually to apprehend before. It beckons them to the Mysterium Tremendum where they can be undone and reborn.


5. Art is Kingdom missional when it motivates people to think beyond simplistic cultural assumptions and sacred cows, or the political propaganda of the day. We live in a hypersaturated media Babel where ideas, images, opinions and perspectives come at us relentlessly, 24/7, skillfully manipulating our shifting attention and allegiance repeatedly. Art tied to the STORY helps ground our attention and get our bearings focused on eternal verities which can guide us through the flood of new information and ideas. The mission of the Kingdom is redemption, vivifying relationship with the Living God, and existential freedom, now and forever. Art which creatively points in those directions, however subtly (and subtly can be astonishingly powerful), fulfills the deepest meaning for artistic expression, without ever looking or sounding "religious." It doesn't need to.

6.  Art is Kingdom missional when it evokes exuberant celebration of Creation and the astounding genius of its Creator. When delight in God and what he has made fills the heart of the artist with such delight that he or she cannot but express wonder on canvas or in a poem or through food design, that artist celebrates the Kingdom and the exquisite architecture of what God has made. Such art is wild applause and joyful shouts of "yes" to the God of New Mexican sunsets and Cape Cod sunrises. Gazing in silent awe at earth and sky is worship joining heaven's eternal celebration.

Celebration and tears are both sides of Kingdom missional life.

Art must speak each, and all the time.

PRAYER

"Lord Jesus, Brilliant Creator of the heavens and the earth, Magnificent Savior and Redeemer, Humble Friend of the friendless and forlorn, Supreme Artist of all that has been made, inspire artists all over the world this day to creatively reveal overwhelming beauty and convicting truth. Whisper your ideas into their souls and guide their minds and imaginations, eyes, and ears, voices, hands and feet to artistic expressing which will unlock hearts to wonder and celebration.  Lead them to the place of tears where people's cries will help them tell stories that unleash healing and freedom from oppression and slavery of every kind. Open us all this day, to the STORY you began telling before the foundation of the world and continue to tell humankind, and lead us to lives of deep, abiding WORSHIP such that your mission on our watch is fulfilled once and for all."

Make it so, Lord. Amen.

When You Can't Pay the Rent.

 "Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him."

          James 1:12



I have to say I've wrestled for a number of weeks over writing about this. I don't want to sound smarmy or whiny. I am not writing a "please feel sorry for us" post. I would be horrified if people felt that way. Nor am I writing in some underhanded, manipulative manner to get people to give us money out of sympathy. I abhor such writing. I know I am taking the risk of sounding like I'm feeling sorry for myself. I'm not . . . really. I am angry and resolved to hang in as long as I can. I've dug in to the idea that "God will make a way where these appears to be no way."

In reality, when I decided to write this blog a couple of years back, it was for the sole purpose of exploring and documenting what it's like for me, at my age, to be planting a church, no holds barred. I'd never planted a church before, so I wanted to think and report about the experience. Seemed like a good thing to do.

Therefore, it will mean sometimes writing about uncomfortable, even embarrassing things. I see little point in candy-coating the reality of what we're experiencing in the imagine mission, even if I'm the problem. While I hope I do it always in humility and with sensible good taste, telling the truth has to be paramount or I'm merely blowing smoke, as they say.

Because I'm going to write about what many people are going through in these trying, uncertain times, I hope it will encourage them in what can feel terrifying and crushing to their spirits. Hope flows from sharing familiar suffering.

I must say too: Tricia and I have never experienced the extreme financial pressures we've faced since being here in the Pioneer Valley. In over our 37 years of married and family life we've had our share of lean times, but never to this severity. For example: the last three months we have been late on our rent, last month by three and a half weeks. We are having to pick and choose which bills to pay every month. The experience is new to us and very stressful. We've always taken the responsibility of paying our bills seriously.

I'm also writing in the context of someone whose faith is strengthening concerning the goodwill of my Father toward us in this tough place. The end of our struggle appears not in sight. Stress over this is never far away. In reality, while our struggle may get worse, I'm learning to hold fast to the truth that God is our Help and Provider no matter. He loves us with a deep affection, knows our need, and can lead us through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. But even if we lose everything, (I realize it would be a heart-breaking horror), even our lives (Jesus-followers can, you know), I will trust his will for us. There is no merit in me for doing so; God has given me grace to experience it.


So here are my observations borne from the pain we are experiencing:

FEAR

As you begin to experience falling behind in your financial obligations, anxiety steals into your thoughts. The peace that accompanies being able to consistently pay your bills erodes gradually. You wonder if this is the way it's going to be. You begin to think about being evicted, having your car repossessed, defaulting on loans, and losing your health insurance. The unthinkable becomes a possibility. Sometimes you awaken at night with stabs of terror, like "This is really happening! What are we going to do?" The fears subsides if the rent or an overdue bill gets paid, but it has taken up residence in a way new to your experience. The only way to kill it is to get back on track financially.

I have felt the stabs of terror in the night, and very real anxiety as each day adds to our lateness. It persists, as does faith. I do not let anxiety get a foothold however. I will not. I hate anxiety because I have seen what it does to people, even people I love. It's a cruel taskmaster, and I will not let it rule over me. Only Christ has that place in my life.

CONFUSION:

In the midst of things going awry, you wonder how you got here. It's confusing. You ask questions like: has God abandoned us? Did we do something to offend him, so he is punishing us? Did we hear him wrong about coming up to Northampton in the first place? Is this problem just a part of planting a church in a tough place? Things just don't seem to add up. It's not like you've been sitting around drinking beer and watching TV for months. It's not like you don't want to work or haven't been working. It's just that what you're used to, i.e., paying your bills has changed because there is not enough money and some of the mainstays of your ministry have dried up. The question is: Why?

I have wrestled with this confusion, asking all the questions I listed above and then some. Nothings making  sense. We know we were called here. Many others have confirmed it since we arrived. I don't let myself wander too long in what seems like imponderables these days. I try to do what the day gives and hope for relief and I try to follow Jesus. My prayer is that of Augustine: "Ask what you will and give what you command." If I need to substantially change what I am doing, I will, as long as I know God is requiring it of me, and gives me the grace/ability to do it.

GUILT/SELF-CONDEMNATION:

As a man, although not exclusive to men in this harrowing predicament, you feel enormous guilt and self-condemnation because you're causing suffering for those you love and are responsible for. In my case, it is Tricia, my family and the church. It feels largely my fault for getting us into this terrible shape. What kind of man am I to allow what is happening?  Not fulfilling your obligations cuts deep into a man's sense of integrity and authenticity. It is our job to provide what is needed. Anything less is abject failure. In our minds there is no excuse for this. We've been tested and are found wanting. We don't have what it takes. I don't have what it takes . . . apparently.

I feel very guilty about not making enough money, but I resist submitting to self-condemnation. I know the harm it causes. My guilt is that of most men in my predicament: "I got us here and I could be doing more to get us out." Sometimes that's true, but for the most part, it's not. I do need to make more money and will work long days to do so.

SHAME:

Shame is the evil twin of guilt/self-condemnation. Shame says. "you are a joke." Shame says there is something fundamentally wrong with who you are, and you're not fit to be here. Shames makes a person feel small, useless, inadequate at the core, and worthy of the garbage heap. It stings cruelly as one of the most spiritually devastating responses to life experience one can have. It crushes a person's spirit, sometimes terminally. For a man, shame convinces him he is an impotent boy and he disappears. Shame causes a man or woman to hide because if anyone knew how worthless they are, the rejection would be harsh and instantaneous.  It creates ghost-people.

I do feel shame sometimes around folks who have the blessing of meeting their obligations. There is a kind of "if they only knew how hard we're struggling and I can 't seem to turn it around" feeling pervading my experience around them. I'm don't feel one of them and I feel small and impotent sometimes. I don't like that feeling, but it's hard to fight when you're not making financial headway.

DISCOURAGEMENT:

When you can't pay the rent and everything else for a period of time, people can become habitually discouraged and give up trying. They lose faith believing there is nothing they (or God will) can do to change their lot. They medicate and exist. I see folks like this all the time on the streets of Northampton, and they are everywhere in this world. All people need to feel they have the ability to meet their basic needs and those of their families. When that is frustrated repeatedly or stolen they fall into despair, a much more dangerous state of being. When that happens the game is over and only God can restore them.

I have been working hard not to let that happen because the results are too horrifying to even think about. I know what it means to be depressed - another form of despair - and I will not return. I've been discouraged by this, but I am comforted by the fact that God calls me to be faithful each day and the results are his. I have nothing I have not been given. Hope lingers in this notion of just working to be faithful. 

HAVING TO THINK DIFFERENTLY:

This frightening financial battle causes me to think differently about my relationship with God and how I need to persevere . . . a good thing. I'm forced to look for different ways of making a living including going back to things I did before we moved up here such as doing Playmaker Profiles and Listening in Christ retreats, speaking in churches, and playing music. I may find a part-time job, or I may switch careers if disaster happens and we have to leave here.

With God, I'm having to trust him for longer periods of time without seeing an answer to our financial state. God has always met our needs, but he's never taken us past deadlines where we are late with payments on more than one front. When we were younger, my work dried up for a period as I was in a major transition I wasn't aware I was in. Perhaps such is happening again. Whatever God is up to, we're being summoned to believe in his good care for us way beyond any other time in our lives, especially for such a long duration. I can't say I'm enjoying the ride, however, the pain is real and I seem caught in forces bigger than me.

The good in all of this is we've put it all on the line for the redemptive Kingdom mission of Christ. It feels we are trying to walk the walk in a way for more substantial than ever. Will God lead us to relief or the "hard way" of losing everything? We don't know, but we're in this struggle. It's all on the line. I hold fast to God's faithfulness even if his mercy turns out to be severe. Many Jesus-followers over the centuries lost everything for his sake. If that is to be our lot, I hope it has been for his sake and not because of human failure.

We will see.

I'm still betting the ranch on the goodness of my Abba and my Lord. He will be with us no matter what happens. When it's all said and done, may we be found faithful in trusting and serving him regardless of the difficulty of our circumstances, self-imposed or sent from above.

Spending the Day With InterServe

 http://www.interserve.org

I don't know if you've noticed this in your life with God, but I have noticed that periodically God opens me to people and spiritual or theological experiences that deepen my understand of him, his people and the way I come at life with him. Sometimes they are disturbing and convicting; other times they are inspiring and catalyzing.

A week ago Saturday I had one of those remarkable days.

I was invited by my friend, Dave Teague, a pastor who's also been a missionary with his wife, Sally, to speak with him on the theme of Spiritual Formation and Prayer. He was doing the keynote sessions, I would do a workshop on Spiritual Formation, and then we'd collaborate on a Panel Discussion at the end of the day.

I had never been to Toah Nipi and I looked forward to working with Dave and spending time with folks who bring the love of Christ and the Gospel to people who live in very hard places like Afghanistan and Pakistan. Truth be told, missionaries have always been heroes of the faith to me, so hanging out with them looked to be a gift.

It was . . .

Perhaps the most clear conviction I settled into after spending the day with these folks was the necessity of all Christ-followers having to be global Christ-followers in some manner. Perhaps all of us shouldn't spend long periods of time away doing Kingdom work in foreign lands, but all of us must be closely aware of what God is doing in the world for the sake of the Gospel. While writing a check is an important way to fund God's work around the globe, we must see the global Church of equal importance to our local churches. We are all of one tribe as someone said to me recently. When we don't, our vision gradually narrows and ends in a sad spiritual myopia. The missionaries I was with a week ago have just such an expanse of perspective, and while it's refreshing I think it's close to where God wants all of us to be.

Second to the first conviction, and a close second, is the critical importance of praying for global missions and missionaries. Doing so should be a vital part of our prayer life. Because so many of these folks' challenges and hardships fall outside the norm they need our prayer. Because so many go to very tough and dangerous places they need our calling out to heaven on their behalf for protection and provision.We become connected to them through praying for them. And shouldn't we want to see God's Kingdom come all across the earth? Prayer opens holes in the darkness and establishes the ways and means for God's redemptive work to take hold. God makes it all happen, but we have a peculiar influence in that regard. So we need to be praying for peoples, countries, missions organizations and missionaries. If you're not already so engaged, ask God to direct your steps to the people and places he wants you to fight for on your knees.

I think our churches also must to be supporting and sending churches. I know many are, but many are not beyond the yearly denominationally-driven "One Great Hour of Sharing" events. I'm not knocking those at all. But I think it more energizing and inspiring for a congregation to directly support individual missionaries or missions organizations so they enter into real-time relationships with flesh and blood people who depend on their generosity to continue the work. It is all our obligation in my mind. My deepest hope, though, is every local congregation would create an atmosphere where the missionary-mindset is established, people go on short-term missions as part of the church culture, and gifted people are identified and sent on behalf of a local church in full-time service. I know there are churches that do all of it, but I'd like to see every church do so, no matter how small. I know part of imagine/Northampton's vision is to create this missional culture. We'll get there.

Being with the Interserve people made me aware of the cost of following Christ full-bore and the heart it takes to do so. God opened me to lift my head to look to the horizon where my brothers and sisters are laboring with love and skill and courage because God called them to it. They are walking the walk, and with the news today about medical missionaries being murdered in Afghanistan, sometimes paying the ultimate price with their lives, it seems all the more compelling to take up the yoke with them in some way.

Curiously, one of the docs killed was the husband of someone who spoke to the group last Saturday. There was another family there who lost a son as well. This woman told her own harrowing story of almost dying recently because of a surgery infection she suffered while in country. She was within a few hours of dying. She planned to return soon to rejoin her husband. 

I hope what I experienced last Saturday will penetrate deep into my heart and permanently expand my vision for God's Kingdom well beyond Northampton. I think he had me at Toah Nipi to begin just that. Now I need to follow him in the direction he leads. I want to and will watch for how he continues to open me to his global work.

Why I Don't Call Myself a Christian Anymore.

 "We tend to think that if Jesus Christ compels us to do something and we are obedient to Him, He will lead us to great success. We should never have the thought that our dreams of success are God's purpose for us. In fact, His purpose may be exactly the opposite. We have the idea that God is leading us toward a particular end or a desired goal, but He is not. The question of whether or not we arrive at a particular goal is of little importance, and reaching it becomes merely an episode along the way. What we see as only the process of reaching a particular end, God sees as the goal itself."

"What is my vision of God's purpose for me? Whatever it may be, His purpose is for me to depend on Him and on His power now. If I can stay calm, faithful, and unconfused while in the middle of the turmoil of life, the goal of the purpose of God is being accomplished in me."

"God's training is for now, not later . . . We have nothing to do with what will follow our obedience, and we are wrong to concern ourselves with it. What people call preparation, God sees as the goal itself. "

                                        

      Excerpted from Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest (July 28th).



As many of you know, Tricia and I have been up in western Massachusetts since the summer of 2008. We followed Jesus and came to help plant imagine/Northampton, the creative missional church forming in our hearts and minds beginning in early 2007. We were all filled with dreams and ideas of what imagine/Northampton was supposed to become. We talked of it for hours upon hours. We prayed and studied. It took shape in us.

The day finally came when we moved. There were all sorts of unforeseen problems, setbacks and difficulties, but we were here and gradually became a part of the life of this city.

Over the course of the two years here, we weathered all manner the trials and tribulations, some expected and some not. In the midst of it all a subtle change took place. I stopped referring to myself as a Christian and not because people were antagonistic to me because I am one. The word gradually just felt too passive. I saw it similar to calling myself American, Irish, or a McDermott. It described something about me, but didn't capture the dynamic nature of actually following Christ, a dynamism I valued and wanted to characterize my life. A person can be baptized into Christianity and never follow Christ. I realized I wanted my primary identity to be that of a man actually following Christ in the redemptive work he's currently doing in my neck of the woods. Many of the other terms used to identify me are the roles and interests though which I should follow him. Everything I am and do is given to him for his use as his follower. The term Christian was just too pale for what he wants from me which is to step over the line, follow him and never look back.

So I've taken to using the term Jesus-follower. Sometimes I use Christ-follower - nothing wrong with that. However, I prefer Jesus-follower because it captures his becoming human, and I can identify with that: he became one of us that we might become like him. At the same time, I know his being Christ (the Messiah) is a source of great joy and hope to me. It's just that Jesus-follower feels the most intimate term, so I use it more.

With that in mind, I've also begun to come to grips with a simpler, but more true to the heart of God understanding of my following Jesus as a spiritual formation catalyst under imagine/Northampton. I see it as less about the mechanics of planting and growing a church, and more about opening people to the love of God through Jesus and his call on them to truly love others. I'm to obey God in this regardless of whether or not imagine/Northampton sticks. Therefore, the mission is less about growing an organization, and more about helping form an exuberantly loving community of viral Jesus-followers. It has nothing to do with hip programs or innovative artistic expression, and everything to do with being a faithful redemptive subversive in the Kingdom mission God is leading . . . one person at a time. Church for me is not a thing, event or a place, but a salvific stealth movement of unexpected healing, freeing and being included in the most miraculous revolution in the universe.

So I'm seeing I am to follow him and be of use as he invites people to trust and experience his healing love. Then, by his grace and through the leading of his Spirit, I am to help them open to his love so they can learn to love others who have no idea such love exists. It's that simple, I think. Adding to the imagine/Northampton membership rolls is not my prime directive. That's God's prerogative. Following Jesus wholeheartedly and loving what he loves is.

So I'm understanding being a Jesus-follower these days to mean continuing to find what it is to love God with all my heart, and soul, and mind, and strength (holding nothing back i.e., learning to surrender fully), and from the wellspring of his gracious, abundant response, give my days in Northampton to loving others as I would want to be loved. My key question every day has to be: Am I following Jesus today or am I wandering in the jangling confusion of my desires, wants and preferences thus giving myself to "much ado about nothing?" I've been quite good at the latter!

Oswald Chambers in the quote above reminds us that obeying him is the essence of being a Jesus-follower. Listening to his commands and instructions through the Spirit and then going (or sometimes waiting) fulfills his purpose in me, and maybe his purpose through me. I want to learn such obedience and the freedom attendant to it. I want to trust God to such a depth that outcomes do not determine how passionate I will be for obeying him. In other words, if I never see any fruit from my labors here, it will not seem a failure to me because I obeyed, stayed the course and did what was asked of me . . . I followed with all I had.

What about you?
















 

Who'da Thunk It! Playing in a Rock Band Again . . .

Some of you who've been keeping up with imagine/Northampton or this blog know one of our missional strategies is to connect with the artistic community in and around Northampton. Jim LaMontagne (a bass player) and I (a drummer) have been talking about playing with musicians in town. I and we have played with a number of Christian musicians in the area, but we really wanted to hang with players who'd not call themselves Jesus-followers.

Well, lo and behold, we are on our way! We've been  rehearsing together for about a month, learning the songs and getting used to playing with the other guys. The key players are brothers: Mike and Steve Dubuque. We're geezers and 30+ years older than they, but it works. They are veterans of the scene in the area and have been for a number of years. They play guitar and sing. Mike writes most of the songs, although we heard a new one by Steve the other night. Mike comes to imagine and I've known both him and Steve for awhile.

The experience has been copacetic so far. We get along and the music is coming together. We even have gigs lined up in August and beyond. I haven't played regularly in clubs in decades so it will be both a little weird, and interesting to do so again. We're even playing in Northampton at the Iron Horse, and NYC in the fall!

Our goal is to serve the music with skill in the style appropriate to the songs. We want to comport ourselves in the clubs with professionalism and integrity. We also want to get to know folks and let them get to know us. In the long run, we want to love and serve the people we meet, and maybe be able to share the hope that's in us because of Jesus. Doing the music is a platform for the mission (although very indirectly).

So the adventure begins and I'm excited. At 61, I didn't think I would be in a rock band, but here I am. I haven't been in one since my late 20's. God keeps life interesting. I honestly hope not only will it lead to making good music, but Kingdom relationships will result - the reason I am here in the first place.

I would be woefully remiss if I didn't add I'm profoundly grateful to still be playing, and with passion and intelligence. Playing the instrument at all has always been a joy and a privilege.

Thanks God.

Thoughts on Being Spiritually Formed and Transformed.

I will be giving a talk on this topic tomorrow at imagine/Northampton. Below is an expansion of what I will say.

"We always thank God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel which has come to you as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing-as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

And so from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins."

Over the years I have noticed often that Christians can have a tendency to pigeon-hole spiritual formation/transformation into a number of activities, unwittingly making the means the ends. Here are a few examples:

•  Living spiritually formed and transforming lives is mostly about not sinning, and trying to be good - not doing what God says is wrong. Certainly learning to live wholly unto God includes working on our sin, but it is a freeing dance of grace with God being in the lead that conforms us to the image of Christ over time.
• Living spiritually formed and transforming lives is mostly about going to church, reading our bibles, having quiet times to pray, being in a small group, writing a check, i.e., doing our religious "duties" faithfully. Again, all of these activities are means by which the Holy Spirit can teach us to know, love God, and walk in his ways, but they do not comprise the essence of our formation.
• Living spiritually formed and transforming lives is trying to be really spiritual or pious about the things of God: keeping a prayer journal, going on retreats, fasting, writing and observing a Rule of Life, doing Lectio Divina, or having a Spiritual Director. Any and all of them can be efficacious means of grace toward maturity, but they are not the essence.
• Living spiritually formed and transforming lives is about going on mission trips (now you're really serious about your faithwalk), attending Christian conferences, going to a Christian college, reading Christian books and attending Christian concerts. God shows up in those situations as well, but they only function as doors not the wellspring of our calling to love God with all we are and have.

The wonder and miracle of what Paul writes so exuberantly about in these Colossian opening passages is that living spiritually formed and transforming lives springs from a radical, existential change of the heart, the core of our being - an astonishing revolution in your fundamental nature takes place. You were a spiritual "corpse" and now you are a new creation in Christ: fully alive and loved in him. Your understanding of yourself must open to this new reality, and along with it, your core values and ultimate life choices have to come under your new identity. If you really get what's happened, you know something earth-shattering has occurred and you'll never be the same.

Paul puts it this way by writing the Father has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light, having delivered you from the domain of darkness and transferred you to the kingdom of his beloved Son (Jesus) in whom you have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Monumental change has overtaken you and God did it sovereignly by grace and mercy flowing from abounding love. He is its Beginning and End.

At the split second of this existential change, your primary identity and true nature are birthed and spiritual formation begins, however stumbling it may be at first. Your deepest identity can no longer be contained by your sex, race, country, family of origin, social status, class, politics or power. You've been given a place in an eternal, universal family. You have been summoned to become a Jesus-follower. Paul says it like this: we are to "be filled (fully immersed in), with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God." Our primary identity is to be immersed in relationship with him, knowing him, walking in his ways and working with him in the redemptive Kingdom mission he is completing. If we yield to the Spirit and respond to grace, our transformation deepens over a lifetime

And there are benefits to what has happened to you. Here are a few:

• The chance to be formed and transformed by having wounds of your heart healed so you are freed to live by faith and love because of the hope which stays and grows in you. It will be an iterative process. Through the Spirit and gifted people summoned to the work of inner healing, you can be gradually released from captivity and the sins of others against you. It can happen at different junctures of your life, but God extends his hand to you time and time again.
• As you surrender your heart to being formed and transformed by the grace of Christ, you'll notice a growing capacity to trust God and live by faith. It happens through testing and experiencing God's timely faithfulness repeatedly. His word of truth (the Scriptures), gradually helps you increase in the knowledge of him. As you do, you're slowly being strengthened by power to hold fast (endure) to what you believe no matter the adversity or trials you face in life. Acquiring patience with joy through the animating power of God lifts you from being ruled emotionally by your troubling circumstances. You learn to stay the course, regardless.
• You have the opportunity to be formed and transformed to embrace a life set apart to God (holiness), and his missional Kingdom ways. The incline of your heart can become "your will be done on earth as it is in heaven" through loving and serving people, and by so doing, helping them discover this God who is far more than they ever imagined, i.e., "bearing fruit in every good work." Your priorities and deepest desires turn toward the heart of God that it might be known through you.

Tomorrow afternoon, I will ask the following question of the folks gathered at imagine. Perhaps one relates to you or maybe there are others more apropos to your current walk with Jesus. Take a little time to reflect in a quiet place with him - have a conversation and invite him to help you answer:

"Where do you think spiritual formation and transformation still needs to continue in you?"

1. Your knowledge of who Christ is, what he has done for you, how he relates to you, or how the Kingdom of God works? How to surrender your heart more fully to him and follow more closely?
2. The wounds of your heart/life still need inner healing?
3. Learning to live the spiritual disciplines: prayer, worship, study, service, solitude, etc., as means of grace to be more fully formed in him?
4. Living your faith more transparently and publicly because you long for others to know him?

Perhaps the best way to close is something God said to my wife Tricia in prayer this week:

"To know my will is to know me,

To follow my will is to know my ways,

To be transformed is to know my ways,

To know who I am is to love me and let me love you."