Dogs and Cats and Life

Well, it's been a fairly intense couple of months blogging. My cousin Linda's death, followed by my week in England, and the ongoing spiritual journey through Lent and on to Easter.

I'm still excited by the idea vested in Rebekah's Eighth Day message this past Sunday, because it fits so well with my "Live as if we mean it" commitment and the "Gourmet Initiative."

RANDOM: But the next few weeks will feature posts that are more random, and less specifically coordinated (other than the foundational premise of Eighth Day). They may also be lighter in tone... although that is very much dependent on what God is up to in my life that particular morning.

This morning it's the promise of another amazingly splendid Spring day! Scout Labradoodle is very excited about the house being open, and she's continually walking out onto the porch (to breathe in a little extra pollen!), sniffing the air, and strutting around the house like this time of the year is the best idea ever. "Spring - my favorite thing!"

I love the constant sense of gratitude Scout brings to our home. "Thanks for waking me up!" "Thanks for taking me for a walk!" "Thanks for my bowl of food!" "Thanks for petting me!" "Thanks for looking at me - I think I'll wag my tail!" "Thanks for being my family!"

Sometimes our cat, Darth - lying peacefully, motionless for five or six hours - looks up when Scout's tail is beating the floor mercilessly, and raises one eyebrow appraisingly. "Poor simple fool," he seems to be saying; "If you understood the deep irony of life, like I do, and the tragic extent of your ignorance - you wouldn't be so irritatingly happy all the time... yawn...."

There's a purity in Scout's approach to life that is disarmingly profound. Why not celebrate every little detail as if it were designed for our pleasure and our care? Why not simply enjoy the blessings we have rather than always wanting stuff that's out of reach? Why not embrace what's right there in front of us and be grateful? Why not live as if the faithfulness of God - something we love to sing about - was actually true and had some relevance to our day-to-day lives?

Jesus was very clear about the spiritual efficacy of such a posture when he was wrapping up his "Sermon on the Mount."

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. “So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today. Matthew 6:25-34

I'm not trivializing the cares and the concerns that are so much front and center in our lives. I'm just suggesting that, maybe, they don't always need to be front and center.

Woof.

Derek

Eighth Day Believers

When Rebekah and I got home from church yesterday I grabbed my camera and said, "Let's get an Easter picture." So I balanced my camera in a plant, set the automatic timer thingy, and ran over to where she was standing with Scout Labradoodle.

Scout jumped up (you can see she's eating my tie), the camera clicked, and the battery died - all at the same instant. It turns out we had one shot at an Easter photo.

Today's a little like that. We have one shot at living the day after Easter like Easter People, like "Eighth Day Believers." No rehearsals, no posing, no re-do. This is it. What you see is what you get....

Of course, we have the same opportunity again tomorrow. But I'm more interested in today. It may well be all we have.

MEDITATION: It’s the day after Easter… Or is it? “After” is such an unsatisfactory word when talking about everything Jesus intended and accomplished via his heroic journey.

So I’m going to discard “after” in favor of the thrust of my wife Rebekah’s Easter message in church, yesterday. “Easter is the Eighth Day of Creation.”

Fact is I’ve never bought in to the idea that God has ever stopped creating. Creation limited to six days followed by “I’m done” simply doesn’t work. Rebekah’s concept of “We’re participants in Eighth Day re-creation – it’s part of what it means to be truly alive as Jesus followers” dovetails nicely in terms of where I think the observance of Lent has been taking us.

INSIDE KNOWLEDGE: I’ll let you in on some inside knowledge… I’ve spent a lot of time during the last forty-plus days outlining and writing my new book. It’s an Easter book (no cover design or title as yet) a series of essays/devotions designed to read between Ash Wednesday and Easter. It will be available before Christmas of 2011 – targeted for Lent, 2012.

It was never my intention to have the book wrap up on Easter Day, a nice, tidy ending with no loose ends. I’m more interested in where our Easter momentum is going to take us.

Easter Sunday has the potential to be supercharged and electric; a life-saturated experience. But I’m concerned that the "charge" might be more static than empowering.

Last year Rebekah talked about how easily we consign Jesus back to the tomb come Monday morning. He’s a little safer there and he doesn’t bother us so much - especially if we roll the stone back. Then, later, we open the tomb up, just a crack, to take a peek at the Christ-life – but only every week or so.

Eighth Day Believers: This year’s idea takes it a step further. Eighth Day Believers live in the life-changing truth of resurrection. There’s no tomb visitation any more. It’s not about merely listening to the story; now it’s about taking part.

It turns out that Easter Sunday wasn’t our destination during Lent; Easter Sunday is a staging area for what comes next. If we really left the church as confirmed Eighth Day Believers, then we’re signed up to join Jesus in the re-creation business.

God is up to something significant, and we get to be participants.

Christ's plan - Part II: Interestingly, the physically risen Jesus was only a temporary factor, coming and going with brief appearances for a few days and weeks once Eighth Day set in. Jesus then “Ascended”, and he was gone. Resurrection Day set the new order in place – then Jesus moved on because part two of the plan was – and remains – his followers.

We’d better be Eighth Day Believers, because unless we’re participants in the new creation then we don’t have a prayer of accomplishing anything significant. Easter Sunday opened up the door to the possible. The journey has only just begun.

Easter: We Don't Have to Make this Stuff Up!

Easter Morning!

Sometimes I wonder how and why it is that this morning continues to reach me on such a deep level? I know it's coming; I've been down this road over 50 times now; we just had Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday; yesterday morning a boatload of children swarmed the church looking for eggs - so we all knew that Easter morning was bound to come around again.

Yet here it is, confronting me once more with the amazing fact of resurrection, and I can feel the tingling all up and down my spine. I'm like a kid waking up on his birthday morning. I can't wait to get dressed and I can't wait to get to church.

Why? Why does it still get to me?

I think the answer resides in the truth about every other Sunday of the year. Let me explain: A few years ago, right after Easter services, I greeted a young couple who were visiting First Presbyterian. They lived in Brandon, only they didn't attend church anywhere.

Here's what they said:

• "This was great! If church was like this every Sunday we'd be here every week!"

Another young couple who were standing nearby overheard the comment and couldn't help but interject:

• "Oh, but it is like this every week," they said. "We really don't do anything special or different just because it's Easter Sunday."

BINGO! That pretty much sums up what makes Easter ring true for me. We don't have to make it up; we don't have to put on the razzmatazz and pretend that we're any more joyful than we naturally are; we don't have to paint on Easter faces, or fake a special smile for Easter photographs; we don't have to sing out any louder or pray with more conviction than we already do.

Why? Because Jesus is risen! The resurrection is a fact of faith. Every Sunday is Easter Sunday and every worship service is a celebration of new life.

This is my whole point about "Living like we mean it; because God most certainly does." What Jesus pulled off that first Easter Sunday opened the gate for all of us. Life - full, demanding, electric, loaded, dynamic with possibility - that's what Easter means.

Jesus walking out of the tomb is a metaphor for any one of us willing to take God at God's word. It's the challenge to emerge from low expectations, and the self-fulfilling prophesies of mediocrity. Easter is life, fully engaged. The tomb is the morass of defeat and disillusionment. Jesus is willing to reach in and pull the rest of us out with him.

So the real Easter question is this: Are we willing to take his hand and allow him to walk with us into the future?

Salvation is this: Taking Jesus up on his offer to participate in the ongoing work of God. It starts now: in this world, in this life, on this day, and into this week. It continues for eternity.

Eternity? That's nice. Today? That's a real "right now" invitation, offered in real time. I am a pilgrim on this path; I am a pilgrim in progress; I am continually and overwhelmingly animated and amazed and overjoyed when confronted by the liberating truth of resurrection. I plan to live that truth as if Jesus actually meant something by it - something for me and in me and via me....

I'm going to live Easter as if I mean it; God most certainly does.

Easter Saturday - the insistent urgency of new life

Today I'm using my devotional thought from this time, last year. I really enjoy Easter Saturday, and today is so marvelously full with Spring that I can feel the urge of life coming up through the ground, into the soles of my feet, and on into the core of my being.

But, at the same time, there is something of the resonance of sacrifice in the air. I can't forget Good Friday, and the powerful, moving message we shared at church yesterday evening.

God speaks to me through all of this.

- DEREK

What Good is a Kingdom Without a King?

This morning I woke up to an uncommon stillness. Yes, it's Saturday, so I didn't expect the rush of traffic and the general noise of a weekday; but this morning is heavy with a sense of everything being stopped...

The feeling is probably subjective on my part, a response to the powerful Good Friday service at church last night; I'm caught up in the stark fact of crucifixion...

At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no-one had ever been laid. Because it was the Jewish day of preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there. (John 19:41-42)

Jesus was dead. There was no getting around it. Christ's life was over and yet there was no perceivable change in the state of things in Israel. My kingdom is not of this world.

So they dragged him down from the cross, wrapped his body with spices and strips of linen, and sealed it in a nearby tomb. My kingdom is not of this world.

Funerals always have this stunning air of finality about them. I can imagine the dark, empty emotions that Christ's friends must have felt through that Friday night and Saturday. Passover was being celebrated all around them, but instead of festivity, the angel of death had visited the disciples with devastation and finality.

My kingdom is not of this world.

All of the hopes and the dreams that had been kindled and nurtured through the past years had been wrenched from the cross and buried - in haste, before being sealed a a tomb; a burial that signified the end of everything they cared for. Jesus was not just their future - they loved him too; he was their best friend, and how his life had been snuffed out.

What was there to do? Where could they go? Would they be next? Or would they all be such obvious failures without their Master that no-one would need to even bother to track them down...

My kingdom is not of this world.

And what about Jesus' teachings? What about all the talk about The Kingdom of God is like this, or this? What good is a kingdom without a king? And how could they continue to follow with their leader cold in the grave?

Such a desperate day. Passover? Not likely. Would that this experience had simply passed them all by. It was left to Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus to take care of Christ's body, because his disciples had crumpled, drifting off in their depression and their fear.

This Saturday had to have been one of the darkest days in all of history...

This Saturday (April 3, 2010) is full with the promise of resurrection....

Promise-laden day

Today, around 7:30, I poured my coffee and stood out on the back porch, watching morning pour over the golf course and wash into our garden.What a peaceful, promise-laden day!

Up against the fence, I couldn't help but notice the natural cross the petals of the African Iris formed as they reached out in response to the light. So I tried it myself, reaching my arms up, and outward, inviting meaning into the coming hours.

There is an openness of spirit that comes when I stretch my arms out like that. I'm not a big arm-raiser in church - for me it always feels contrived whenever I try, and I'm thankful that playing the guitar keeps my hands busy - but sometimes, during private devotional moments, I will raise my hands and simply reach out to heaven.

I know that heaven is not necessarily "up", and I understand that God is not removed from me in terms of measurable physical space. But I'm also learning to understand that there is a relationship between spirit, mind and body that does not neatly compartmentalize. In fact, the word "neatness" is one of the last I'd ever employ, anymore, to describe the way that the Spirit is interacting with nowadays.

And so, on this good Good Friday morning, I just want to reach out to God. Especially when I consider the way that Jesus reached out, on my behalf.

Jesus stretched out his arms and allowed himself to be brutally killed. Jesus did this because the penetrating love God holds for me inhabited him in such a way that I meant everything to him. I believe that my life means that much to God today.

• Jesus could have walked away. He didn't.
• Jesus could have said, "You're on your own." He didn't.
• Jesus could have left his work incomplete. He didn't.

When Jesus had received the wine, he said, “It is finished.” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. (John)

Today is a good day: Good Friday. Jesus could have completed his work to the extent that I am now free to live in the sure knowledge that God loves me, and wants me to live in the light of that truth. That's exactly what he did.

Because of Good Friday, I am completely free to engage all the possibilities that come bundled with the life of a follower of the Jesus Way.

I will.

Communion around the table

I'm not sure if having a "favorite holy day" is the best way to put this, but - at least for the time being - Thursday of Holy Week ranks right up there for me; it's certainly as one of the most meaningful.

The official name for today is "Maundy Thursday"; and I can see right off that my spell check system has no clue about "Maundy", so it's going to continue to underline the word, in red, until I adjust the system protocol.

Unlike my computer's editing function, a lot of us don't even underline this day. Instead we let it slide by, unengaged. I believe that is a huge omission.

Maundy Thursday is wonderful, tragic, encouraging and difficult - all at the same time. It's wonderful because that's the day Jesus and his friends got together for one last meal. It's difficult because it's also the night Jesus was betrayed. Events had moved a long way from the high excitement of Palm Sunday and the big parade.

I like to think about Jesus and his friends reclining around the table. It's obvious that they all loved one-another. And my guess is that, despite restrictive social rules that invented inequities that God never would have imagined yet alone sanctioned, the gathering around that table included both men and women.

I'd also like to imagine complete honesty, sharing from

the deepest places of their souls, humility and vulnerability. Yet I'm well aware that other restrictions, the ones that we continue to impose on ourselves, likely kept even this group of friends from allowing themselves to be known beyond the extent of their ability to manage the spin.

I hope I'm wrong about that. Because it's in the presence of Jesus that the most complete freedom we can experience is made possible. In fact, the presence of Jesus calls from us far more than we otherwise have the capacity to offer; maybe that's why we leave him out of the conversation so often...?

so, this evening our church will gather in the fellowship hall to not only commemorate the Last Supper, but to partake of it as well. We'll be meeting in small groups, eating together at round tables that seat eight people. And then we'll stay right where we are - an elder assigned to each table - for a service of communion and worship.

My experience has been consistent at these events. (Picture: "communion" with the Dave Andrews family) Communion starts in the conversations we enjoy around the tables during the meal. We break bread together; we share our lives; we talk about what is on our hearts; we laugh and sometimes we cry. Then, when the bread and the wine are passed, we simply formalize the deeply spiritual experience we're already sharing.

Tonight I have the privilege of speaking for a few minutes, along with three others who have been asked to let a little of what is on their hearts spill over, so the whole church can be encouraged by our stories.

So, what is your Easter story? Do you have a small group where you can share what God's up to in your life and receive the encouragement we all need? Are you part of a faith-community where your journey is affirmed and your relationship with God renewed? Do your joy, your struggle, your tears and your honest doubt have a spiritual home?

Or, to simplify the question, is there a table you can come to, hosted by a Savior who will welcome?

John 3:16

Once in a while I find that it's a useful exercise to paraphrase scripture.

The idea, for me, is to re-write verses from the Bible in my own words. It's so that I can listen more distinctly. I always learn something new, and several things happen when when I do this.

1. First, I have to read and re-read the selection very carefully - that's always a good thing.
2. Next, I find that I pray about what I'm doing, because I want to really hear the word. Prayer is the best context for Bible reading, and I can only hear the word if I involve God from the beginning.
3. I also end up reading the text immediately before and after my selection, putting it in perspective, and finding out some of the historical/cultural/physical context as well.
4. Then, I think about how God's word is currently interfacing with my life. I personalize the text. I imagine what relevance the ancient words have in my world at this particular moment.
5. Finally, I take great care with my interpretation, understanding that I have no skill in ancient languages and no formal training in biblical scholarship. So I proceed with caution.

John 3:16-17: And so I woke up this morning with one of the Bible's most oft-quoted verses on my mind. John 3:16 is a classic, but I've always felt it was an incomplete message without at least including verse 17.

Today, Wednesday of "Holy Week", this selection is resonating with special meaning for me. It worked its way into my head and into my heart. So I'm taking this risk and writing my own paraphrase. Remember, this is a personal devotional exercise. I'm thrilled that a handful of folk are "listening in", looking over my shoulder as I think out loud. But be reminded that I am not a scholar, just a thinker.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. (John 3:16-17) NIV

Now, my (amplified) paraphrase:

• John 3:16... The Creator - so infused with committed love for creation and for people (formed from both spirit and dust) - willingly gifted this world with Emmanuel (the fullness of God, resident in the frailty of human form). Why would God do something like this? Jesus was - and is - our solution for the cumulative weight and the toxic residue of every act, thought, condition, word, disposition and intention that has served (and still serves) to separate humanity from a dynamic relationship with the Divine, with light and life.
• 17... God's intervention is not designed to denounce the world, or to condemn its people. God's plan was not calibrated to discourage, castigate, reject, destroy, or pile on like a ton of bricks. Instead, Easter is an imperative born of love, a self-sacrificial gift initiated by the great compassion that under-girds God's purposeful, redemptive nature. Christ's action reveals the author of creation as both architect and sustainer; hope for reconciliation; the ground of all being; our clear pathway to salvation.

I understand that my written language is limited by my knowledge, my skill with words, and my personal experience. Regardless, this is as good a week as any to embrace the meaning of John's powerful rendition of what Jesus has to say about why he came.

So, to answer my question at the end of Monday's post: To some extent God's love for me is what sent Jesus to the cross. Jesus got himself killed by being the flesh and blood presence of God in the middle of a world that had no room for courageously redemptive love.

Our great opportunity is to take similar risks every day. The world today is no less dangerous a place for an authentic witness to God's embracing, non-condemning, welcoming love...

Peace - DEREK