Scarecrow

Worry is like a scarecrow in that it is an empty threat designed to scare you away from something valuable. Just behind the scarecrow lies rows and rows of fresh delicious corn. But crows are frightened by something that isn't even real. They generally ask a lot of 'what if' questions of the scarecrow.

"What if it shoots us?" "What if it grabs us from mid air and pummels us slowly to death?" "What if..." "What if..." "What if..."

The scarecrow has been placed perfectly to divert the crows from the very best.

Just beyond our worry is God's greatest plans for us. But worry frightens us. My worry, something completely empty and unfounded, keeps me asking paralyzing 'what if' questions.

"What if said bad thing ends up happening?" "What if said bad thing happens...again?" "What if some ridiculous growing unreasonable fear happens to me?" "What if..." What if..." "What if..."

The worry is placed in my heart to divert my attention from God's very best for me.

There are so many good things I could go after and experience in my life, but I'm terrified of the straw man named 'Worry'. I may never experience those good things that lay just beyond.

But...

What if the crows only had a brain and each time they saw a scarecrow, they started to say, "there must be something good right there."

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Benediction for my Graduates!

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May God bless you with discomfort at easy answershalf truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.

*ancient franciscan benediction

Don't Focus On Spiritual Growth

There is something in each of us, which wants to 'grow' and 'mature' and 'develop' spiritually. We think all the methods and practices will make us reach the goal. We get focused.

But we focus in the wrong direction.

Growing in our spiritual lives does not happen by focusing directly on it.

Spiritual growth and maturity happens from concentrating on and entangling with the Father.

The Artist

Within myself is another person; a much younger person with an imagination and an anxiety to express that imagination in endless ways.  It has no name. Perhaps I should give him a name, but it really doesn't need one. It is me. It is only me within me. It is the layer of me I've left behind the present me. No! It is all present me, only this person within me, that is still me, is the person I have left stifled by all the other me I deem more important and serious or responsible.

That younger me within is the artist, the creator, the child. The artist has been forgotten without use or engagement. The artist was once the primary voice and motivator. Then my chronological age overtook my artist. Artistry did not pay the bills or......they didn't....pay...the bills. Could that REALLY be the only thing keeping that part of me quiet? Have I stifled and nearly snuffed the artist because he didn't pay the bills?

Had I forgotten that he brought me joy, rest, love, and intimacy with God and people?  All those things begin to get lost, and it has a lot to do with my broken connection with the dreamer, the artist. All of the other things, many of them which DO pay the bills, lack creativity and forward thinking because they have not engaged the younger artist in the discussion, the work, the planning.

The younger part of me, the artist, is growing weary of being ignored and pushed down. It is time that he is not only engaged again, but that he begins to lead and direct again. The artist may not be the primary bread-winner, but without him all the others who make the money are losing joy, dreams, excitement, creativity, and passion.

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Startled Poor

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How startling would it have been to be poor and hear Jesus say, "Blessed are you"? What if you were mourning? Something that brings such hardship and is seen as a curse in some (most) cultures is now being told to you is really a blessing. It is really an interesting question because I have never really read that blessing from the standpoint of the poor or the mourning, or for that matter, from the standpoint of the humble or meek. I have generally always read it from the standpoint of the comparatively rich and the non-mourning.

I typically read the blessings from the standpoint of the selfish and prideful.

I typically read those beatitudes and blessings and speak of the direct challenge to changes it would mean for me, but I stay rich, selfish, and prideful because those changes seem so hard to make.

But what of the poor hearing that they are blessed?

What of the humble, meek, and mourning?

Would it be freeing?

Would it be confusing as it doesn't FEEL like a blessing?

How would that have felt to be told that? I honestly cannot imagine because I am rarely ever any of those things.

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Open Letter to My Students

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To my students,

I am for you.

I am for you in life and faith when it may seem no one is for you. Be reminded that I.am.for.you.

When it seems that even I am not for you, let me help you trust that I am for you. I hope for so much for you in life and faith.

In your life, I hope for your growth as a person. I am for you determining what you are truly meant to be and become. I am for you discovering and going after what will make you know joy and love; even if that has nothing to do with what your parents or your culture expects of you.

I am for you never feeling or becoming isolated from a sense of community that goes beyond the connectedness of Facebook into the intimacy of truly knowing others and being known by others. I am for you being connected to many many people but not neglecting commitment to at least a few.

I am for you discovering and truly knowing your heart's expression enough to own that voice within you that hopes to never.stop.expressing. Art is never done.

I am for you finding true love not tainted by what your culture and media says love and romance looks like. I am for you loving another person who has the courage to be a foundation of integrity, faith, and respect in your life instead of someone who is simply attracted to your sexuality.

In your faith, I am for you when it is hard to hold on. I am for you never giving up on the trust in God you once had. I am for you not getting lazy when it is easy to.

I am for you entangling your heart, mind, soul, strength with Jesus Christ....MORE....and MORE. I am for you always wanting to know more of Jesus, and learning what it means to obey him each day of your life.

I am for you learning to trust that you are beautiful and that God is always making you NEW, not because of the things you are good at but because you are a child of God who is outrageously beautiful. I am for you learning to trust that.

I am for you knowing you are NOT the church of tomorrow. You are the church NOW. I am for you not comparing yourselves to a church you once knew or were once hurt by. I am for you BEING the church you wish it was. I am for you not letting anyone look down you because you are younger. I am for you setting an example for all the people who are older than you; those who would rather categorize and complain about you than to know and listen to you. I am for you setting an example of those who have not "given up on Church" but of those who desire to be the church we are intended to be.

I am with you and I am FOR YOU.

- Your Pastor

My Social Fantasies are

1. I want to have an unlimited insurance policy, and a car with ramming bars all the way around it. I want to be the first car in a line at a bunch of red lights. As soon as it turns green, just gun it and leave caution to the wind and consequences to anyone trying to make it through the red. 2. I want to sit in a coffee shop and ask someone to watch my stuff while I go to the restroom. Once I'm gone, I want to have a couple people come and pack up my stuff and walk away. I want to come back from the restroom pissed that the stranger didn't watch my stuff.

3. I want to sit down with popcorn and an oversized soda in front of a couple making out in a coffee shop or any public place, as this is quite obviously why they have chosen to do so HERE.

4. I want Rob Bell to preach a sermon written by John Piper and vice versa. I want to see if their followers notice the difference.

5. I want to pull out my dry-erase markers in the middle of a meeting with a student at a coffee shop and start teaching something on the window behind me.

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What are your social fantasies?

What Lies on the Other Side of Surrender

This week I was out of town. So I asked one of my students to speak in my place. He recorded it so I could listen yesterday. He has revealed something I keep thinking about. Surrender without obedience is just laziness.

I have heard so many sermons and talks about surrendering to God, but it seems all the talks commonly stop at a similar point.

Surrender does mean learning to let go of all your worries, anxieties, expectations, and develop a dependent posture toward God. The only way God is going to lead you and come near to you is when you truly surrender, throw your hands up, and become fully dependent on Him.

My student spoke last week about his decision to drop out of school to truly develop this sort of faith.

"I don't want my life to make sense. I want to lose all care and worry for the future in order to gain boldness and courage in the present, so I can love people and get to know God better TODAY."

As a college pastor, it is no new thing to hear a student say, "college just isn't for me" or "I'm just gonna quit". Most of the time these are poor excuses for laziness, but this is entirely different. My student was clear to state that this not just a lazy decision to give up, but that, in fact, it was going to be much more difficult for him. He realized that if was going to abandon everything to follow Christ, there would be obedience on the other side of that surrender.

We don't hear that often enough.

We like the sound of letting go of our worry and anxiety to surrender, but we do not often enough hear or understand that once we develop a dependent posture toward God and His will for us, there WILL be work to be done.

Surrender is not an aversion of responsibility. Surrender is not an excuse to bum your way through life.

Surrender to God is a relentless openness to Him and His leading. Surrender to God is a lifestyle and lifetime of entangling our hearts with His.

But there is obedience on the other side of surrender.

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Yield [poem]

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Love is a relentless preference. for one person over another. any other. over you. There is, in love, the surrender of entangled fingers behind the head. This is not an emotion. it is not a feeling. It is an arrest. You are to cease your insincerity. and prohibit whatever pride you contain and

give up

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*one of those poems that started strong and just could not get finished