When the Novelty Wears Off Part 2

Picking up where I left off last time, w/ a couple of thoughts on what to do if you find that the newness or the novelty of worship is gone...

1. Novelty is NEVER a good reason to do anything in the church. If we do what we do in worship simply because we are seeking some kind of new experience, than it is NOT God we are worshipping.

2. The novelty wears off so quickly w/ the church seasons because they lead you carefully along the road w/ Jesus. And Jesus takes you all kinds of places you would prefer not to go. When you begin the season of Lent w/ a cross of ash on your foreheads that reminds you that the goal of this journey is the CROSS.

When, on Ash Wed., we receive that cross many of us were also told to "repent and believe the Gospel." No one wants the cross, no one wants to "repent" -- admit their faults, sins, fears, selfishness and give those up for new ways of thinking, speaking, and living, no one wants to walk through the wilderness, no one wants the journey of lent!

And yet Jesus' words are pretty plain in this regard, "If anyone would come after me," if you want to be my disciple, if you want to follow me, "you must deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it." (Matthew 16:24-25)

Jesus' words are far more literal than we typically think. He is literally saying there is no way to follow him and keep your life the way you want it.

We become disciples of Jesus when we open ourselves up to God's transforming work through the practices of self-denial and cross bearing. This is precisely what these 40 days come to remind us.

If we skip over them in order to get to the happy ending of resurrection, than we will never really know what it means to share in Christ's victory over sin and death. The apostle Paul puts it this way, "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow to attain to the resurrection form the dead."

There is no resurrection but through the cross. There is no Great 50 days of Easter w/o first walking through the 40 days of wilderness we call Lent.

When the Novelty Wears Off Part 1

One of the things about letting the christian seasons guide how you follow Jesus is that often you have to walk through seasons you would never walk through if it was left up to you. The season of Lent is the perfect example.

For many of our youth this Lent is one of the first experiences they have in really getting into a season other than Advent or Christmas and letting it shape their worship of and walk w/ God.

I've been really proud of them. Many of them have been really creative and thoughtful in what they have decided to "give up" or "take on" during this season, they have also been really open to the way we have slowed down our time of worship on Wed. nights.

But here we are not even 1/2 way through the season and this week at the HUB I could sense that, for some, the novelty of this way of following Jesus was wearing off. And so a couple of thoughts on what to do when the novelty wears off...

Jesus' Words from the Cross

During Lent we're doing things a bit differently @ the HUB. We're meeting in the chapel, we've mellowed out the music a bit, we're spending some quiet time listening to God, praying, journaling, thinking, and we're doing all of this while hearing Jesus' words that He spoke to us from the cross.

This last week we heard the scripture read, then we sang about it w/ a song that our own Dave Phillips put together, then we saw it acted out in a really moving way w/ a group of our youth put together by our own Christine Spivey.

I'm so grateful for the work so many of you did to help lead us into a deep time of hearing Jesus' words from the cross when He spoke to His Father pleading for us saying, "Father forgive them, they don't know what they're doing."

To help me prepare for these times I am reading Will Willimon's book, Thank God It's Friday: Encountering the Seven Last Words from the Cross.

If you're looking for a book to help you make the journey through lent w/ your eyes fixed on Christ and His cross, this book is very helpful.

What do you use/read to help guide you through this season of Lent?

We LOVE Our Disorders!

I read a blog called "unclutterer." It gives lots of useful tips to help live/work in a simple and organized fashion, plus it has unitasker Wednesdays which are usually hilarious!

Last week I ran across their blog entitled, "Hoarding Disorder: A new disorder in the draft of the DMS-V."

In the blog they talk about "hoarding" (you know having too much stuff, not being able to throw things away, being scared about not having enough, always needing to accumulate MORE) as a disorder closely related to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).

It is my social commentary of western civilization in general and of Americans in particular that we ALL have this "disorder!"

The word "disorder" now-a-days usually denotes something that we get diagnosed as having by a Dr. or our shrink. Most often this diagnosis gets our hands on some medication that is to make us "better".

The word "disorder" used to be much more @ home in church. It used to be a theological word that described our tendency to live in a way that rejects God's good intentions and desire for us and all of creation. Part of God's redeeming work in Jesus was often described as "re-ordering our affections." That is to say that part of what God does in Jesus is to take that which is "disordered" and re-order it in such a way that when we see what God has done we say things like, "God saves!"

In this sense of the word I am really comfortable saying that hoarding is a disorder... just one example of the ways in which we are in need of God's saving work. My unquenchable desire for more stuff, my unreasonable fear that me and my family will not have "enough", the things I own that I will never use but can't seem to part w/... How exactly does God "re-order" these things?

The short answer is the Church! The group of people who get together and seek to live life simply and in the light of the fact that if God has not with held his own Son from us, how much more will he not fail to give us EVERYTHING we need! This is the story of Acts 4 and continues to be the story of God's work in the Church.

I wonder how your church community is helping to re-order your life into the likeness of Jesus. What are some ways in which your church helps you to not hoard, not fear scarcity, etc.?

An Invitation To Do Something "Crazy" During Lent

This post is most especially for the youth of Aldersgate.

As we continue through the 40 days of Lent, I know that many of you have decided to give things up for Lent. Some are giving up candy, caffeine, your favorite soda, favorite food, etc.

That's cool.

But I wonder, do you wanna do something crazy?

Unplug! Unplug yourself during Lent! Facebook, email, ipods, blogs (even this one!), texting (I told you it was crazy!!!), surfing the web, etc. I dare you! Try to do this even just one day a week during the rest of the season of Lent. One day a week were you are not available to those things that you so easily and thoughtlessly give yourself to nearly every hour of every day.

And then, use that time that you would normally be socially networking to connect with God or to serve those in need. I dare you!

It was mother Teresa who told us that if we are never quiet, if we never experience silence, than we will never hear God's small voice speaking to us. So unplug yourself during this season of learning to live sacrificially.

Any one out there crazy enough to take me up on it?

I dare you!!

Until We Meet Back in this Place...

I love winter retreat! We had a great time last weekend. But now look -- we're back home and things are a lot like they were before we left.

There are somethings that God spoke to each of us on winter retreat that we just shouldn't ever forget. And so between now and winter retreat 2011 here's a little video of the very last thing we did together this year. I hope these words remind you of God's nearness to you and of all that God is longing to do in and through you this year. And when we meet again next year at winter retreat we'll be able to share all the ways in which God has changed our lives, our youth group, our church, our city!

The next 40 days...

Today is Ash Wednesday. It marks the beginning of the season of Lent. Lent is the most difficult season for me. I think it is so difficult on purpose! I think that it's supposed to be a long and tough season -- like the journey the people of Israel were on for 40 YEARS and like the time Jesus spent at the outset of his "public ministry" where he was fasting for 40 days in the wilderness being tempted.

For me Lent is tough, not simply because its so long, but because I fail every time! I can't remember the last time I ended the season of Lent by breaking a fast I had kept faithfully the whole time or by celebrating the way that God had changed me. Instead I usually celebrate Easter by remembering that I'm regretfully the same person I was 40 days ago!

This year I'm seeking to fast in much the same way that I have the last two years. I want to get to bed a bit earlier and to rise significantly earlier each morning in order to spend time in prayer and reading Scripture and journaling. It is my hope that by doing this I will be letting God have that first part of the day before anyone else has access to me.

I can't explain all of the reasons why this is something I sense God longing to see happen in my life but the simplest way to say it is that I know that I can meet God uninterrupted from 5:30 to 6:30 AM each morning if I would only get my butt out of bed and keep that appointment.

I wonder what you sense God calling you to do in order that you might meet w/ the Lord who is so passionate about you that he ordered His whole life around being able to have the chance to meet w/ you.

What are you giving up or taking on in order to let God make you more and more into the person you see when you look into the life of Christ?

Who can help you keep this fast?