Appropriate Worship...

[Listening to: Fall On Me - Student Life Praise & Worship - I Will Exalt]

Last week I went to Houston for a few days. I met with a couple of the pastors our overseas work is partnered with. Both of the churches I visited are house church models. They have the majority of their focus on the small group events and life together that happens in houses of members and everyday life activities.


One of the churches has a weekly celebration service. They are moving locations in about a month. A new Christian in the church is opening a coffee shop. The shop is closed on Sundays and the church is going to move their celebration from Saturday night to Sunday and meet in the coffee shop.


The majority of their church members are pretty new Christians. They love that; in fact that is their target. The pastor did mention that they deal with one struggle that they are more concerned about with the new location.


I have been thinking through the idea since he mentioned it. their concern is how they will keep celebration (worship) from becoming so relaxed that it is irreverent. Of course I understand the question; I have heard it a million times. In another time and place I would have asked the question.


Today I struggle deciding what would be too irreverent. Long ago I began to get frustrated with rules about hats, and appropriate Sunday dress, and drinks/food in sanctuaries. If the worship of Christ is going on around people is it even possible for others not to catch the spirit. I'm still trying to figure out where I stand with this.


I imagine the day when many have come to Christ and several house churches come together for a celebration service. I imagine that all will be poor, many will smell bad, and most will have been wearing the same clothes they have had on for a week. Some will be there with their goat. Some will be talking with others, some will be doing nothing more than trying to be in the midst of something new and growing. This is what Africa looks like. Is worship supposed to look different that life does? I'm not sure about it.

[Listening to: Where The Angels Sleep - Bebo Norman - Ten Thousand Days]

#4...

[Listening to: Only Wanna Be With You - Hootie & The Blowfish - The Best Of Hootie & The Blowfish (1993 Thru 2003)]

He wore brown denim pants and an ugly dress shirt with big paisleys on it. He had a pair of brown nubuc Eastland's on. I remember the shoes well. Not because they were the cool dress shoes to have when I was a freshmen (although they were), but because we were in the gym playing volleyball.


For some reason I can't recall, finals for the fall were happening in January. With high enough grades and attendance some students didn't have to take finals. Several of us were in that group. Instead we would spend the day in the gym playing cards, talking, playing volleyball, playing basketball, etc.


We were in the bleachers on the left side of the stage. Volleyball games were going on right in front of us. We decided to play and he borrowed Jason's tennis shoes. It was a cold Friday afternoon.


That is my last memory of Shane.


Monday morning it snowed. I woke up early and remember that it is even brighter outside before the sun comes when there is snow on the ground. I walked from my bedroom down the hardwood floor through the kitchen and into the den. I sat down in Dad's recliner and turned on NBC. I watched for the local weather report. I "knew" we weren't going to school. (In Paducah they cancel school if the chances of snow are great.) I was right. School was canceled. I quickly returned to bed.


Several hours later my mom came in and woke me up. "What are you doing, school is canceled," I commented. Once I could force my eyes open (the glaring sun off the snow made my room brighter than normal) I looked up at my mom. Something was wrong; I could see it on her face.


"What happened?"


"Jon's mom just called. Shane Pearson died last night."


"What happened? Why Shane?"


Shane called his girlfriend Tonya before leaving work. He told her he would call her when he got home. He never called. He never made it home. They searched for him throughout the night and finally found him. Shane had been shot and bled to death in a snow covered front yard.


A few days later they found the shooters. According to their story they stopped Shane on the highway as he was headed home. Knowing Shane he would have helped anyone. He likely stopped thinking they needed help. Instead, having been encouraged by a movie the three young men had decided to drive around town and see how many people they could shoot before getting caught. Shane was number two.


They drove him around in his own car. After a few hours they let him out of the car and he began to walk toward a light in the distance. They called him back. He turned to look at them and they shot, again, and again, and again.


Shane and I weren't close friends. We were teammates. I respected Shane. He was number four. For the rest of our careers we retired that number. I never desire to wear number 4. That's Shane's number. He was the lone upperclassman who was good to us little guys. I remember that every year Shane was the only one who showed up to the first practice in shape. He would run laps around us at the track. He punted a ball once and completely unintentionally nailed Nick in the face. You could tell he felt terrible. Nick was pissed. The rest of us laughed.


Shane loved people. I remember talking with the Hudson twins after he died. None of us knew if Shane was a Christian. Back then I was a leader in my church and my FCA. People knew I was a Christian, but probably thought of me more as a goody, goody. I didn't go out, didn't hang out with friends. I went to church and hung out with my family.


Yet I had spent everyday with Shane for several months a year. I was supposed to be a Christian and everyone knew it. Why did I have no idea if Shane knew Christ? Why had I never shared it? Sure I mean some step-by-step plan or tract. But more importantly why had I never shared it with my life? Whether or not Shane knew Christ, I could take no credit for fulfilling what I was called to do.


This reality has bothered me all of my life. Most of my life I have probably cause more people to run from Christ than follow him. I have grown fascinated recently with the way the secular world describes and illustrates Christians. As a kid I always claimed they just didn't know what they were talking about. Now that I am older and willing to look more critically at my self and my faith, I realize they should be able to describe my faith as well as I can. They should see it. Daily, these peers, strangers, and friends should be watching Christ live life in front of them. Sure this time his name is Chad and he has a lot more flaws.


Soon I will leave the states to live Christ before others. I wonder if it will be easier on the other side of the world. I wonder if I will ever figure out how to do it in a way that result in the words all Christians long to hear - "Well done my good and faithful servant."

[Listening to: Away From The Sun - 3 Doors Down - Away From The Sun]

Silly Me...

One thing I am well known for in my family is losing stuff (or just breaking it) out of the back end of the truck. I was catering a dinner with my dad when I was young. There was a four-foot food warmer in the back of my truck. It was some type of chicken, wrapped in bacon, in some kind of sauce. I was about half a block from the restaurant on the way to the event. I turned a corner and the entire warmer flipped over. The food was all over the warmer and the truck. It was a mess.


A couple years later, I went to pick up a new gas grill for my parents. No problem, right? Wrong! I put the grill in the truck, up against the cab, and strapped it in. As soon as I got on the interstate, I heard a crash.


I had put the grill in with the lid opening toward the back. The hinges of the grill were broken off and the lid went flying down the interstate. For several years my parents used the broken grill. For me it was a constant reminder of stupid mistakes.


Tuesday my mom and I went to Lowe's to pick up some barstools. I knew they weren't going to go in the truck quite like I wish they could. I strapped them into the bed all standing up in their boxes. We got on the highway and they all blew over. No problem, we stopped and rearranged. Two were lying down and two were standing up. Again they blew over. Again we stopped to rearrange. We laid all four down. One was stacked on top of the other three. It was strapped in every way possible.


We were driving down the highway again and suddenly a loud thump. A strap had broken. The top barstool was flying through the air and then somersaulting down the highway. Luckily it didn't hit anyone, but we knew the stool was shattered. We stopped and put it back in the truck. After we got home we found the only problem was a nick on one leg. We colored it in with a marker and you can't even tell now.


I'm reading What's So Amazing About Grace right now. And it is pretty good. It's challenging me regarding both granting forgiveness and asking for it. I thought about the book after the stool incident.


I don't like to apologize. I'm not sure why. I don't know if it is because I am afraid I won't be forgiven. I don't know if it is because I don't forgive others well so I don't believe anyone else could forgive me either. I don't know if I am afraid that apologizing admits failure. I don't like failure much. I don't like failure at all.


For the last few months I have been spending time thinking about the ideas of grace. I am amazed by the story of the prodigal. How could the father be so forgiving? How could he be so filled with compassion for his young son that he is willing to break all "rules" for the sake of love? How do I become a person that loves that way? How do I become a person willing to offer grace? How do I live in the grace that God has offered?


The young son wanted to work his way back into his father's world. The father would think nothing of it. He was a son, fully; no matter what he had done to disturb that. That is love beyond explanation. I can't fathom it; He loves me that much.

Thanks Sarah...

I drove home from Waco today. I was so tired driving. Several times I almost stopped to take a nap. One thing that kept me awake through some of it was thinking over things.


At one point I began to think about friends. I thought about old friends and new friends. I thought about graduations - high school, college, seminary. How were they different? How were they the same?


While doing this I realized I could be overseas and miss my ten year high school reunion (We are all getting old, you know?). Even if I am there it might be soon after returning, so I get to be the jobless guy trying to make a connection. I partnered this thinking with high school graduation and remembered one event that was both very painful and very redefining.


We were sitting on the hard wooden gym floor at Lone Oak High School (no snickers!). We were in alphabetical order practicing for senior night. (Senior night is something other than graduation but it is when they present a lot of awards and tell where people got scholarships, etc.) A row or two behind me was Sarah - she was in the W's.


Sarah and I and a couple others started talking about what we were going to do when we grew up. I mentioned that I was planning to go into ministry. After saying this I remember Sarah's words clearly. "I could never go to your church Chad." "Why is that?" "Because you would know how I was when I was a kid and I would feel guilty."


Sarah's intentions were probably not the same as the effect of those words. I recognized at that point and continually over the next year that I had an issue with being judgmental. I had never even realized that it was a reality.


I haven't reached where I should be yet but Sarah helped me realize that if I was ever going to be an effective minister than I would have to be a person that didn't make others feel guilty for the realities of who they are.


There was nothing wrong with Sarah. She was a teenager. Most of us (I was sort of a geek so maybe not me) did the same things. We hung out with our friends, we made silly mistakes we might regret in the future, we lived life and had fun doing it.


I am still guilty of being judgmental. I think poorly of people just by the company they keep or the places they go. I am the Pharisees with the woman caught in adultery. I am just as guilty as they are but I spend all of my time pointing out others rather than cleaning up my act. In fact I work hard to hide my blemishes so that others might not notice.


I am not sure I could ever be Sarah's pastor, because I know how I was when I was a kid, and I know how I am now, and I would feel guilty every time I saw her face.


I hope to see these words from Bonhoeffer next to the front door of my church one day:

"You are a sinner, a great, desperate sinner; now come, as the sinner that you are, to God who loves you. He wants you as you are; He does not want anything from you, a sacrifice, a work; He wants you alone."

The Tire Man...

I met a man today. I had to go and get new tires put on my car. I ended up at this little shack out in the middle of what seemed like nowhere. While Zack put the tires on my car I sat in side their air-conditioned office they sent me towards.


Inside was a very large old man in overalls. He was missing some teeth and liked to use cuss words in his sentences. He never told me his name but he shared with me his life. He is 60, retired, and the father of three. He has loved two women in his life. The first he got pregnant when they were "dumb teenagers." Sharon was 15 and 3 months when Shelly Ann was born. They went their separate ways and lost touch for a while. His daughter was in her 20's before he reconnected with her. It was real obvious this had been a regret of his. Not the daughter, he was very proud of her, but he was ashamed he was away so long. Sharon seems to have trouble with men, being she is on her sixth husband and has publicly voiced she would love to again be with my friend the tire man.


This kindof pisses my friend off because he loves his wife of 43 years very much. He and Ann have two children, Elizabeth Ann and a son in his forties whose name was never shared. At times I thought he was going to cry as he shared the joys of his life and the struggles of his life. I don't really know why he chose to share any of this with me. I know about his daughter getting beat up by her boyfriend and a father's revenge. I know that his wife and Shelly Ann's mom get along, and Shelly gets along with his wife Ann.


I know that this man enjoys telling the stories of his life. He doesn't care who he tells; he wants all to know he has loved and still loves. He wants the world to know that the women of his life - his daughters and their mothers - mean the world to him.


I wondered if it was gossip to listen to him talk about the others. I wondered if I was supposed to respond. I just listened and smiled and nodded and set "uh huh," and "I bet" a lot. I doubt I will ever see him again, but I wonder if I ministered to him in some way. I want to help shed the grace of Christ into the lives of others, I wonder if I was faithful today. I know that soon my friend will be with his wife camping in their RV and fishing, and while they sit on the boat I hope he will sit and reflect on the love of Christ and the blessings of family he has been afforded.


I don't know if he knows Christ. He mentioned that he usually leaves to camp on Thursday and returns home on Sunday, somedays he comes home early in the morning so that he can go to church. I don't have any idea if he loves Jesus, but I know that Jesus loves him and therefore I am called to love him too.


I love my new friend the tire man. I hope I was a blessing to him, because he sure was a blessing to me.