heaven

I went to the park today, to run a bit in preparation for Tuesday and our running and swimming triathalon training. (mini triathalon, that is). It's been SUCH a gorgeous day, and it was perfect weather for being outside, so the park was packed. Sometimes that annoys me, but as I ran/walked/sprinted around the track, something hit me.

What if this is what heaven is like?

I honestly don't like to think about heaven much. I mean, it's not that I don't like to think about it, but I have to admit that I'm lightly judgmental towards all the folks that go on and on about streets of gold and what not. And I really don't like singing songs about when we all get there and how great it's going to be and whatnot.

Don't get me wrong. I'm all about going to heaven. I just think, why focus on that now? I mean, maybe, why obsess about it and let it become a bigger focus than the reality of all the people around us who are NOT going to be there, at least not unless we do something?

Ok, sorry, that's a whole other soapbox…

But anyway, I just started thinking as I was running around, what if heaven is more like this, this beautiful and full park, than this big mansion filled, gold coated city? What if the reality is more the people there, the community, the conversations, the fun, the beauty, the worship, the sense of life and life to the full?

Now that's something I could think about more often.

I really can't describe how awesome everything looked in the park today. Clear skies. Cool breeze. A large Muslim family/families. Buddhist monk and a white guy walking the track. People with dogs and puppies and feeding ducks. Kids. Teenagers. Couples. Adults. People reading. People laughing. Kids playing on the playground. People exercising. People sleeping, playing Frisbee golf, setting up tents, listening to music, riding bikes, cooking out, laughing, talking, walking on a tight rope thing.

Everything. Pretty much everything you could imagine. Ok, well, not everything, but so much going on. So many different races and ages, all mixed together, all enjoying themselves and each other and the weather.

So what if heaven is more like a perfect version of that?

Like the end of the last book of CS Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, where they all end up back in Narnia, but it's not the same. It's new. More real and more Narnia than they could ever have imagined. Perfect. Beautiful, and yet still the same Narnia they knew and loved.

It makes me think of those Claritin commercials where you see everything clearly, you think, and then BAM, they remove this film from the screen and say something about Claritin clear, and everything looks AMAZINLY brighter. You can't even comprehend the way it looked before as being clear.

So what if heaven is more like that?

I love days in the park like today, but they're not perfect. But what if they were? Perfect air, trees, grass, earth, people, smells, tastes, conversations, games, etc.

Totally beyond what I can really imagine, and yet something I think I want. Something beautiful and perfect and alive. Much more alive to me than streets of gold, you know?

I don't know. this is by no means theological or anything like that. I really have no clue, but I think heaven will have more to do with relationships with God and each other than anything about where we are or what it looks like.

Just something to think about…

seminary

Since the spring semester started a few days ago, I've been working on reading for school and thinking about the whole seminary thing. I have a bunch of friends who are in seminary now, or who've just finished. I'd say that, overall, most of us have enjoyed the experience (for the most part). I know it's been awesome for me. there are definitely those classes and teachers and subjects and days that just, well, stink, but overall, I'm so glad that this is where I am right now. I love what I'm learning and what God's doing in me through it.

However, I know there are others who are not big fans of seminary. I don't really know why—I haven't really spoken to someone of this persuasion in a while. And I know some people have very valid reasons for feeling this way, so I'm going to address one of them now.

Seminary is great for learning a TON of information, more than you could possibly ever use or retain. Monday, as one of my classmates was telling us about a workshop he'd just finished, he described it as "drinking from a fire hydrant." Pretty accurate, I'd say. And knowledge is definitely a great thing. but I think the danger, and what people see as a problem with seminary, is getting puffed up with a lot of knowledge and yet no real application of it—all talk and no action. Or too much talk at least. Knowing the answers, but now really KNOWING them, you know?

I don't like people like that. problem is, I can be one of them sometimes. And that's why I've been praying that God will not only expand my knowledge during seminary, but really take me deep with Him. One of my professors mentioned that just the other day—that we can know a whole lot, but still be spiritual babies. Probably goes along with the whole "easy to understand, hard to apply" thing of so much of scripture.

But this is the other thought I've had lately: is it ok to not work on gaining knowledge?

No, of course not. So is it ok to gain it only on your own, to make opinions and form doctrine solely based on your own experiences?

Um, again, no. but how often do we do this? In our super individualized society, this is totally becoming common place. We don't need to know what someone else says about scripture, what centuries of history support or what proper interpretation would lead us to believe. No, we just know what we've experienced. That's enough, right?

The way I see it, it's kind of like going in for surgery, meeting the doctor, and asking him about his background. He doesn't tell you where he studied or what field he specializes in—he just says, "well, I've been a human my whole life, and I've been sick before, so I think I can help you out."

Hello.

But I think we don't realize how often we sound like this. We have no real basis in scripture or doctrine or anything other than our personal experiences from years of being Christians. Now, there is GREAT value to a long and deep walk with Christ, but I guess what I'm saying is, balance it out.

Learn. Grow. Study. AND go deep.

I think they have to go hand in hand. HAVE TO.

So…

You can get a seminary degree and not really know a thing about walking with the Lord.

You can be a Christian who's been through a lot, but maybe still has a messed up perspective on God and theology.

You can probably be somewhere in between.

Or you can go deep and wide. Know all about Him, and let that deepen your knowledge of Him as well. That's my prayer for seminary. That, and for my sanity to stay somewhat intact in the process!

Romans 12, Msg

So, for my spiritual formations class, we're about to start working through Romans 12-16, meditating on scripture. Today, I read the first half of Romans 12 in the Message. Very good stuff:

Romans 12 (The Message)

Place Your Life Before God

 1-2 So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

 3I'm speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it's important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.

 4-6In this way we are like the various parts of a human body. Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around. The body we're talking about is Christ's body of chosen people. Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body. But as a chopped-off finger or cut-off toe we wouldn't amount to much, would we? So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ's body, let's just go ahead and be what we were made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves with each other, or trying to be something we aren't.

 6-8If you preach, just preach God's Message, nothing else; if you help, just help, don't take over; if you teach, stick to your teaching; if you give encouraging guidance, be careful that you don't get bossy; if you're put in charge, don't manipulate; if you're called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don't let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face.

So many things about this passage really jumped out at me, but probably one overall theme in particular: together. Individually, together with God, and as a whole, together with each other and God. But either way, together.

I think this gets me because I find myself just wanting to do everything, well, myself. I want God to equip me and let me go. Wind me up and let me spin, or whatever. But depending on Him? Ugh. That's too difficult. Too unpredictable. Too not about me and what I want, really.

But, as something I read yesterday pointed out (Beth Moore, Breaking Free), it's not about what He enables us to do, or what He gives us, but about Him.

KNOWing Him.

That's the point. The reason. Etc. And this passage is all about that—knowing, believing, trusting Him and letting Him change us, and then being a part of community through that. We were made to be, work, live TOGETHER—with Him and with others. And that's why independence (ie, self-centeredness) is so ugly.

Here it really rears its ugly head:

 6-8If you preach, just preach God's Message, nothing else; if you help, just help, don't take over; if you teach, stick to your teaching; if you give encouraging guidance, be careful that you don't get bossy; if you're put in charge, don't manipulate; if you're called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don't let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face.

How many times have I done just the opposite though? Come in with my plan, my way, my ideas—me, me me…But that's not the way it's supposed to be. We each have a part to play, an important part too—but we are not THE point. We are a part of an amazing story, but not the central key hero of the story. There was something else I read recently as well, in Galatians or 1 Timothy that had a similar tone—the idea of serving without coming with an agenda.

Somehow, we've gotten lost in all that. we want everyone to have fun, everyone to be happy, everyone to win, everyone to be in charge. La de da.

What does that look like? Chaos, that's my guess. A bunch of messy, self centered people who are constantly huffing and puffing and picking up their toys and heading home because they can't have their way. or pushing and fighting and manipulating until others give in.

Very ugly.

Very good stuff. Wow, I could go on about this for a while! Anyway, definitely something to pray about!

know and KNOW

So, as I was working on something else in Word 2007, I just rediscovered the blog feature. Ah, I love not having to capitalize and spell check! We'll see how well it actually works.

Started back to school yesterday, and it was actually a pretty good day. I'm taking 3 classes on campus, and one online class. Definitely going to be a lot of work, but also pretty interesting. I'm taking Hermeneutics, Spiritual Formations 2 and intro to the philosophy of religion on campus in Alexandria (extension center technically), and then new testament online. Lots of reading. And writing papers, but from what I saw yesterday, good professors and lots of potential to learn AND go deeper.

I separate out those 2, learning and going deeper, because of something one of our professors said yesterday. I really like Dr Dickerson a lot—really, I respect him and his walk with Christ. He's very sincere and real and passionate and knowledgeable and caring—you don't often see all of those together!

Anyway, this is what he said yesterday that got me: you can know a lot about God, the Bible, etc, and still be spiritually shallow. How painful, and yet how true!

I saw this first with professors who knew so much about God's word and yet didn't know Him at all. And I see it even more now, with myself and others, in the vast amount that we know and the little that we KNOW.

Usually, when I use those two versions of know, I point to my head for know and my heart for KNOW—KNOW implies knowing in a deep and real way, applying and living what you know. that's where I think we tend to fall short all too often today. Where we've somehow totally dropped the ball and started just doing and acting and not being transformed, made new.

Something that's run through my mind lately with this is the idea that seems to be so prevalent (though not verbalized necessarily) that we can not only come to Christ/church just as we are, but that it's ok to also stay that way. like an extended version of "just as I am" or something.

We know and know and know and can quote and do and pretend, but are we really being transformed? Changed? Made new? Are we living what we know?

No, I don't think so. Not overall.

I don't know how we lost this. I don't know how I continue to struggle with it so much. Being so satisfied with head knowledge when my heart is so full of junk. It's like Paul said to the Corinthians—my head gets totally puffed up with knowledge, but it's not balanced with love that would make me able to build others up.

Ugh.

Honestly, it's not something I really want to deal with personally, but I'd love for others to figure it out. To stop being dumb and really live like Christians. Stop planning events and programs and bible studies and start just chewing on and living out what's true. I'd love for everybody else to just get it already.

But, I don't like to face the fact that, really, I have so far to go as well. So much I know and yet don't KNOW. don't really want to KNOW, because that would mean letting go and changing, and it's just so much more comfortable to stay stuck where I am. Most of the time.

So I guess I do know why we stay so stuck, or at least part of it. it's easier to follow rules and guidelines than to really seek change and transformation. Or, at least, it's easier to do that for ourselves, but it sure seems easy enough for everyone else to change. I am the expert on others and their issues and an idiot when it comes to myself and my junk.

But what I really want is to not stay stuck. To grow. To be a spiritual giant. And not out of bragging rights, because really, that defeats the point. But to know and KNOW Him in a way that changes ME and how I interact with others and the world in general. To know a lot about Him, and only have that outweighed by how well I actually KNOW Him.

I think it's going to be a good semester. Lots to chew on, and hopefully some solid steps to take forwards.

know and KNOW

So, as I was working on something else in Word 2007, I just rediscovered the blog feature. Ah, I love not having to capitalize and spell check! We'll see how well it actually works.

Started back to school yesterday, and it was actually a pretty good day. I'm taking 3 classes on campus, and one online class. Definitely going to be a lot of work, but also pretty interesting. I'm taking Hermeneutics, Spiritual Formations 2 and intro to the philosophy of religion on campus in Alexandria (extension center technically), and then new testament online. Lots of reading. And writing papers, but from what I saw yesterday, good professors and lots of potential to learn AND go deeper.

I separate out those 2, learning and going deeper, because of something one of our professors said yesterday. I really like Dr Dickerson a lot—really, I respect him and his walk with Christ. He's very sincere and real and passionate and knowledgeable and caring—you don't often see all of those together!

Anyway, this is what he said yesterday that got me: you can know a lot about God, the Bible, etc, and still be spiritually shallow. How painful, and yet how true!

I saw this first with professors who knew so much about God's word and yet didn't know Him at all. And I see it even more now, with myself and others, in the vast amount that we know and the little that we KNOW.

Usually, when I use those two versions of know, I point to my head for know and my heart for KNOW—KNOW implies knowing in a deep and real way, applying and living what you know. that's where I think we tend to fall short all too often today. Where we've somehow totally dropped the ball and started just doing and acting and not being transformed, made new.

Something that's run through my mind lately with this is the idea that seems to be so prevalent (though not verbalized necessarily) that we can not only come to Christ/church just as we are, but that it's ok to also stay that way. like an extended version of "just as I am" or something.

We know and know and know and can quote and do and pretend, but are we really being transformed? Changed? Made new? Are we living what we know?

No, I don't think so. Not overall.

I don't know how we lost this. I don't know how I continue to struggle with it so much. Being so satisfied with head knowledge when my heart is so full of junk. It's like Paul said to the Corinthians—my head gets totally puffed up with knowledge, but it's not balanced with love that would make me able to build others up.

Ugh.

Honestly, it's not something I really want to deal with personally, but I'd love for others to figure it out. To stop being dumb and really live like Christians. Stop planning events and programs and bible studies and start just chewing on and living out what's true. I'd love for everybody else to just get it already.

But, I don't like to face the fact that, really, I have so far to go as well. So much I know and yet don't KNOW. don't really want to KNOW, because that would mean letting go and changing, and it's just so much more comfortable to stay stuck where I am. Most of the time.

So I guess I do know why we stay so stuck, or at least part of it. it's easier to follow rules and guidelines than to really seek change and transformation. Or, at least, it's easier to do that for ourselves, but it sure seems easy enough for everyone else to change. I am the expert on others and their issues and an idiot when it comes to myself and my junk.

But what I really want is to not stay stuck. To grow. To be a spiritual giant. And not out of bragging rights, because really, that defeats the point. But to know and KNOW Him in a way that changes ME and how I interact with others and the world in general. To know a lot about Him, and only have that outweighed by how well I actually KNOW Him.

I think it's going to be a good semester. Lots to chew on, and hopefully some solid steps to take forwards.

desire

our pastor's sermon today was really excellent. he's doing a series on the sermon on the mount, as we make our focus for these first few months of 2009 "wisdom" (overall theme for the year: luke 2:52--growing in wisdom, stature/health, favor with God and favor with man, like Christ did).

anyway, there were several things that jumped out to me as he discussed having a maximum devotion to Christ. first, a Heart that DESIRES to be right with God. specifically, he said: "very little comes to those who do not desire it."

it seems at first like a "duh" statement, but the more i think about it, the more i realize how true this is. i mean, there are a lot of things that i say that i want. i want to be more healthy. i want to make better choices, to have a better schedule, to stop making excuses, to stop cursing, etc etc

but do i really, REALLY desire these things? i mean, in a way that drives me? compels me?

i think that's the difference. we all want the best life we can have. but, are we willing to do what it takes to get there? do we desire the best, specifically God's best so much that it changes the way we live, the way we interact with Him? or do we just settle for good enough? for being good, basically content people, when we could be spiritually ALIVE?

hello. i think i know where i fall all too often...

he also said that, especially when it comes to our walk with God, the more you have, the more you want. and, the less you have, the less you're interested in Him.

i definitely can see that in my life. that's why i think psalm 34:8 is so powerful: "TASTE and see that the Lord is GOOD." it implies that we have to get up close and personal, take a bite, see for ourselves. don't just take someone else's word for it! don't just sit on the sidelines and watch someone else live out life with Him! taste and see!

what an incredible invitation! to KNOW God so intimately, to draw near, to taste His very goodness. and yet, how easy i find it to totally ignore Him. to fill up on junk food, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and physically, and to miss out on the goodness of drawing near to Him.

it fits--it's not something we can explain or describe, but only experience through moving in His direction, through taking that first bite, that first step towards Him. maybe at first moving without any desire at all, but believing that to move towards Him will bring about desire, will fuel the want for Him that will change us forever. awaken us. quicken us.

hmm...good stuff...

conviction

ooh, two blogs in one day! well, this one doesn't really count because it's actually an article i just read at boundless.org (a site i HIGHLY recommend you check out!):

hmm, on second thought, i don't know how all that works with reposting an article, so i'll just put up a link and some quotes:

this article is called "Conviction Life," by Rachel Starr Thomson, and is about living by conviction, not just default or reacting. hello. that's so something i've been wrestling with lately.

"Every day, I'm faced with choices that will put me in one of three streams: life by default, in reaction, or by conviction. And though living by default is easy and reaction feels good in the heat of the moment, I realize more and more that only a life of conviction is consistent with my faith. It is the life God is calling me to embrace."

i think this hits the nail on the head--how easy it is to simply go through the motions of life, to waste time just doing what's immediate, and ignoring the greater things that are at stake! how often do i do that (everyday, really), because i don't want to plan to do something else and somehow miss out on something "better" that comes along. i default, i react, but i don't live like i'm standing on something solid and firm, something that matters more than what i can see and know around me.

"Both streams are very human — both may even be necessary for growth into adulthood. But neither was meant to be a permanent way of life. The more I grow, the more I live with the uncomfortable realization that God wants me to step out of the flow, to lay down my reactions, and to live by conviction.

Merriam-Webster defines conviction as "the state of being convinced of error or compelled to admit the truth; a strong persuasion or belief; the state of being convinced." Conviction is not based on stimulus, rebellion, or going with the flow. It requires thorough exploration of a matter, concentrated thought, and committed practice. Living by conviction means living in accordance with what I believe to be true — according to what I've been convinced is true."

discipline...commitment...action...hello...

"To live by conviction requires several things of me.

First, it requires a recognition of authority. My personal preferences and opinions are not convictions. To live by conviction requires that I recognize objective truth as God defines it. If I want to live by conviction, I must regularly seek out the ultimate authority on all of life's issues — I must learn Scripture and apply it soundly to my life. If I wish to be fully persuaded in anything, I must put time and effort into studying the Bible."

this is exactly what i've been wrestling with so much lately--authority, and how quickly we totally abandon it, at a huge expense to ourselves and others. hello! the other 2 things she says are equally important: commitment to thought--asking questions and thinking things through: "And, I remind myself as I begin to be carried away by the grandness of it all, I should ask questions not out of rebellion, pride or love of debate, but out of a sincere desire for truth — especially when it challenges me."

and then finally, acting on our convictions--application. i like this comment on conviction and action, because it is so easily to separate the two, and so deceive ourselves: "Bringing my convictions into the realm of action also provides me with a good litmus test: If I find that my convictions cannot be practiced, I may need to reexamine my thinking. God's truth corresponds to reality — if my convictions do not, they may not correspond to God's truth!"

good stuff. go read the whole article, and check out the other amazing stuff at boundless.org--you won't be disappointed.