Press Thru

Many would long for the standard, Americanized type of life that we picture as kids.  It involved big houses, standard size families, enjoyable 9-5 jobs and all a whole scattering of other things we think we want or deserve.  It is a life of Status, that shows we are successful.

I don’t think I ever thought I really wanted that.  I am not sure that knew exactly what I wanted, but I am pretty sure it wasn’t that.  That is too popular, too overdone, and lets face it – too empty.  Most people have to decide whether they want to pursue the life of Status or the life of Meaning.  Very few people (these days) think they want the life of Status.  Maybe they want it in small subtle ways, but with our words we declare that we have rejected that empty dream, and are pursuing a life of Meaning.  We can decide to chase after a life and lifestyle that has deep meaning, but few of us understand the implications of our choice.

A life of Meaning is a life that is leveraged to bless others, to find out what you can give – not what you can get.  Meaning is found in the pouring out of ourselves, not the building up of ourselves.  This is the most costly choice you can make.  To pick the life of Meaning is to make daily decisions that put yourself in the path of pain, frustration and heart-ache.  Suffering will enter, and you will be forced to have some face-to-face conversations with God about the purpose of your pain.  Through experience and story, I have learned that to choose the life of Meaning is to choose a life that will bring you pain, and that pain has deep purpose.  It allows you to remember the human condition, and gives you new avenues to relate, connect and bless those around you.  Perhaps God will allow deep wounds to come, so that you could understand deep healing, and in the future speak of true redemption and restoration with something of experience and authority.

The life of Meaning doesn’t give too much room for you to ache for what you lack, but to celebrate in what you have been given.  This life doesn’t allow you to sit in hurt for too long, but pushes you to ask, “how is this hurt going to help me serve others in the future?” 

The great news about this life of Meaning is that you can jump into it at any time.  Whether you are 18, 30 or 60…you can decide that the measure of your life will be what you give, not what you get.  It is the life we have always wanted, but every day you will freshly discover that it is not at all what you thought it would be.  It is different, it is harder, and it is so much better.

Playing with a Rubber-band

Wow, it is crazy how easy it is to go months without posting on here!  The truth is life has been crazy, and I guess it doesn’t really show signs of slowing down.  When you get right down to it, who actually has a life that slows down in you mid twenties?  Life only keeps going and growing and getting more complicated.  In the growing complication, one of the things that fell in the past few months was my creativity.  Original thought (or God prompted thoughts) were what drove me to this blog to get ideas out.  When I look back over the last half of 2008 (and specifically look at where blog posts should be) I realize that creativity gets choked out when the pressure is on.  A lot of things can get choked out when there is high pressure, which brings me to my thought today:

I think adulthood is like a rubber-band.

Playing with a rubber-band is all about tension.  The fun of a rubber-band is managing the tension in your hand.  If you try to use the rubber-band without allowing any tension, it is actually kind of useless.  If you try exerting too much tension and pull too far, it will break.  The usefulness of a rubber-band has to do with its ability to work with tension.

As a person grows up, I think our joy and our work, our fun and productivity (both of which are important) are actually just the managing of tensions all around us.  The life we actually want exists with a push and pull of:

-Wants vs. Needs
-Safety vs. Danger
-Fun vs. Work
-Rest vs. Just a little more
-Hope vs. Reality
-Life vs. Death

The lesson I am learning today (Thanks to Jesus and a good book from a mentor) is that tensions are not problems to be solved.  It is easy for me to feel the tension of the rubber-band and think that I need to do something about it.  There are problems to solve, but there are also tensions to live with…and maybe the life of an adult is learning to manage those tensions well.

Gun’s Don’t Kill People

Do you remember the bumper stickers and slogan that was going around a few years ago?  “Gun’s don’t kill people; people kill people.”  I don’t know why that was brought back to mind this week.  I was walking around in a neighborhood delivering bags for the Hallows Eve Diversion (shameless plug!) and it came back to me.  I loved the controversy people made around the phrase.  I mean think about it, truly a gun in itself doesn’t kill a person.  It takes the intent or heart of one person to pick up the instrument, pick a target and pull the trigger.  To shoot a person, it takes a person.  Now gun’s have been known to randomly go off on their own…but even then it is because someone first messed with it.  To harm someone with a gun, first there must be a person who has decided to pick up and use the gun.  (Whether in a fit of passion or in a pre-meditated condition)

The gun itself is just a tool.  HOWEVER, the gun is THE tool.  The reason people fight so hard for gun control is because to kill someone with a gun is a whole lot easier than to kill with any other instrument.  People kill people…but often the instrument of choice is a gun.

I want to submit to you that at the heart of the fight against poverty and injustice, this same concept is true.  You see, I believe that there is a God who looks at poverty and injustice and says “This should not be.”  I think He cares for all who suffer in this world.  Truly, I think where any person sits in suffering, the God of Heaven sees and is filled with compassion.  When He sees brokenness in our world, He desires to create wholeness. 

In the gun situation, it is true…people kill people.  In the same regard, when it comes to poverty and injustice, God is the one who fights hardest and desires to end these social ills.  What many people fail to realize is we are like the gun.  A person may have it in their heart to kill, but the action doesn’t take place until the instrument is in use, serving the purpose of the person holding it.  Our God has it in His heart to fight against poverty, to fight against human trafficking, to not allow injustice to continue.  While that is true, there is a chosen instrument that God likes to use to fight these things.  We, the people on this earth, are the chosen instruments God wants to use. 

Gun’s don’t kill people, people kill people.

Poverty and Injustice don’t just stop because God wants it to, God stirs us to action, and we become His chosen tool for change.

26 and counting

I am attempting, as best I can, to have a relaxing day…an ideal day for me.  I guess that is kind of funny, cause I am still trying to figure out what an ideal day is for me.  I am trying to debate if cleaning my bathroom on my birthday is an okay thing to do.  (Before you answer, you should see the bathroom…I might just be giving myself a birthday gift by cleaning that thing).

I am extremely introspective, so like most birthdays, I am taking time today to look back over the past year, and look towards the years to come.  This past year has been the hardest of my life.  The hard part of life isn’t over, but I think things are hitting a turning point.  God placed this year in my life for very intentional reasons, His pursuit of my heart is so intentional.  He has spent this year crucifying many things within me, and forming me to be the man He created me to be.  A few things stand out to me…

1) Because of my role in Cause and Affect, October 31st (and the 5-6 weeks leading up to it) will always be a high intensity marathon in my life.  God, in all His wisdom, knowing the pieces of my future, allowed me to be born in the middle of October.  This birthday in the middle of my crazy season will always force me to slow, rest and breathe.  He created me to be a driver, and He put a speed-bump in the middle of this season to make sure I know how to pace myself and enjoy the life around me.  My God is so intentional.

2) I think today is a meeting of 2 seasons in my life.  What was and what is to come.  It has been kind of known to me for the past few weeks that this would be the case.  I think for the next few weeks (or however long), I will be like Jacob.  There is much that I believe God has for me, and this is kind of a “grabbing onto Him and not letting Him go until He gives me my blessing” sort of thing.  If He does not go with me, I would rather not go.  There is no reason to stand out to the people around me if it is not because of your Spirit’s work in me.  So we are starting a wrestling match.  I already I know I will win, but it is only because He is going to let me win, but I don’t know how many rounds He will want to go.  What a loving Father.

3) If the best is yet to come (and I believe it is) then I cannot imagine how great it will be.  The years I have experienced so far have been so amazing, I cannot imagine what greater things will look like.

Futuristic

I consistantly look towards the future.  I love thinking about what is to come.  It isn’t that I don’t try to live fully right now, but for me, part of “being” in every moment is knowing that this moment leads to the next…and so on.  I am getting ready to turn 26.  That is the most insane thing in the world.  I should not be 26, and even as I write that, I am convinced these words must be someone elses.  I am a 15 year old kid playing baseball every night with my friends…I am an 18 year old going to GA State and loving the city…I am a 20 year old looking forward to potential, possibilities and a whole lot of promise.  Maybe I am somewhere in the middle of all of that, but there is no way I am almost 26. 

I automatically date myself by saying this, but I feel like I am in Quantum Leap and I just jumped into the life of someone so much older.  I have the life experience and wisdom of a 26 year old, but somewhere the math has to be wrong.  The reality is, the math is not wrong, and I will soon be another year older.  Adding another year has, once again, made me step back and evaluate life and what I have done with my life so far.

I really have a great life.  I look at the things I get to be a part of, and between Water’s Edge and 12Stone and Cause and Affect…I can’t imagine anything better.  I wake up each day with passion and with a desire to go to work.  I love the things that I do with my days.  When I go to bed, I can generally (not always) look back at my day and feel like I was a part of something worth while.  My investment and time was worth it.

With that thought in mind, I look to the future.  I have this sense that the years to come will hold even greater things than these.  Greater purpose, greater use of my time, just greater things.  As I survey all that I believe God has for me in the future, I still sit and think my greatest legacy, my greatest investment on this earth will be my family…the one that is to come.  Ministry will continue to grow, and there will be many stories of life-change and hope that come from those efforts.  I am trusting and believing God to do major works of compassion thru initiatives that He births in me.  None the less, it is unmistakable the impression on me that the family He has for me will be my greatest legacy. 

Cool thoughts for the future.

Cowboys

Ever wondered what you missed as a kid?  Have you ever looked back and thought there were seasons of life that you just were not present, or didn’t get to fully experience?  I am sure I am not the only one who has walked thru this.  Many of us have…complications in our history that made life not exactly picture perfect.  We as kids are fairly resilient, so we bounce back, deal with complications, pain or heartache, and move on.  It is years later, if ever we discover that we missed something crucial in our development.

The essential thing for us to do is actually take time to look back and find what we missed.  We have made it this far in life, and probably could go the rest of our lives without finding these missing pieces of life…but why would you want to?  I don’t want to settle for anything less than every blessing God has decided to give me.

So, with that being said, I went dirt-biking for the first time on Sunday.  I am in tremendous pain, and for the next day or two will be walking like an 80 year old, and I loved every minute of it.  My friend Johnny invited me to come up to where he lives, show me how to ride, and show me some different trails.  I got the hang of riding pretty quickly…which is probably why I didn’t have enough hesitation about trying to do a mini-jump. =) Switching gears, keeping the throttle going, leaning correctly up the hill, trying to land on the back tire…these are too many things for me to try and master at once.  Unfortunately, they are all kind of essential to doing a jump and not actually looking like a funny highlight reel.  I have an awesome bruise over one of my ribs, my hip is killing me, and my shoulder and shin are kind of swollen, and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Sunday wasn’t about dirt-biking.  It was about finding a missing piece of childhood that seems pretty important to me.  My teen years required me to grow up quickly, and there was this stage of my life, which i’ll refer to as the Cowboy stage, that I had to kind of glaze over.  It probably doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it is huge.  The cowboy stage for me would be when I learned how to take good risks under the banner of the Father’s love.  It is where I would play and learn that life is a combination of play and work, and both are essential for the soul.

Día de los Muertos

We are most aware of life and mortality at the cliffs overlooking the valley of death.  It is in light of death that we are able to appreciate life and understand the fullness of it.  In one of his letters to an early church, Paul stated that, “Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.”  In experiencing a closeness to death, we are freed up to experience fullness in life.  As we toe the thin line between life and death, we can look into the valley of death, and still understand and embrace the power of life.  Perhaps we arrive at our greatest appreciation of life when we see our lives in the contrast with death.

With that in mind, a few interesting pieces of information to fuel conversation and thought.  Every year, in the middle of the fall season in North America is a little known holiday.  Depending on your belief system or culture, you may know of November 1st by a few different names.  All Saint’s Day is a holiday recognized in Christianity.  Eastern Christianity puts this holiday on the first Sunday after Pentecost, but Western Christianity puts this holiday on November 1st.  Commonly referred to as All Hallows, this holy day is meant to be a time to celebrate the saints of the faith who have died.  In North America, November first has also been celebrated as the Day of the Dead – a holy day with the purpose of focused prayer for those family and friends who have passed from life to death.  Whichever name you chose to use for November 1st, the point is that November 1st has been established as a day built around the reality of Death.

Now the day before a holiday is treated just as special in many cultures, making October 31st just as important as November 1st.  The ancient Gaels had this strange belief that on October 31st, the boundary line between life and death was basically dissolved.  While many cultures choose not to indulge on this belief, Hallows Eve (or Halloween) brings traditions of its own.  Lodged right up against the Day of the Dead (a celebration of Death) is Hallows Eve, where family and friends join together for a celebration of Life.

October 31st – Hallows Eve – A Celebration of Life

November 1st – All Hallows Day – A Celebration of Death

Now that is enough information and tradition.  I want to know what has been, but I don’t believe we are bound to it.  We can pave a new way.  We can inaugurate a new tradition.  The night of Hallows Eve is a night where the celebration of Life and Death meet.  Life and Death butt heads in a lot of places.  They come together in more places than you would think.  You see Life or Death is not just a question of breathing.  It is not just a question of heartbeat.  Life and Death are concepts.  More than concepts, they are social realities.  I can walk down a city street and look into the eyes of another, and meet life or death in their eyes.  I have observed people on their death-bed, full of life.  I have also seen strong, healthy individuals that were socially, emotionally or spiritually dead.  The truth is, we have a God-given ability to bring “life” into this world, and an ability to initiate or allow “death.”  What we do with this, that makes all the difference.  In any situation, are you bringing life to the table, or holding the door for death.

This Hallows Eve, I think you should bring life to the table.  Let’s treat this night, October 31st, where the celebration of Life and Death kiss, as a chance for us to fight for life in areas where death is taking ground.  Let us divert from the traditions of old, and from neutral living.  May the wake that comes from our passion for life (and our willingness to fight for it) only grow and spur others on towards life.  All around us there are areas where death reigns…and this should not be. 

Join with me this October 31st, as a new holiday is inaugurated.  Join with me for this years Hallows Eve Diversion.

Another thought from Yesterday’s blog

As I was watching parts of the convention last night, Rudy Giuliani was speaking and tossed out a quote that was like a 2×4 to the gut…in a good way.  =)

“Change is not a destination

Hope is not a strategy”

Now he was referring to the buzz around the Obama campaign, but that is not what was intreguing to me.  This quote highlights a basic point I may have missed in yesterdays thought.  We are moving towards the future whether we like it or not.  As I said yesterday, we have to have something forming us for the future, or we will simply be shaped by our past. 

I love this quote because it reminds us that we get to where we want to go with intentionality of direction.  We don’t get to where we want to go just because we don’t want to stay where we are.  Change is a process, not a destination.  When you set your eyes on change, you have no bearings on where you are going.  In the same way, Hope is an internal belief in what is to come, but it doesn’t get you to your destination.  Hope is your countenance while a strategy for change is carried out.

From darkness or light?

A few weeks ago a friend made an observation about life that has been consistantly messing with me.  I figure if it is going to mess with me, it might as well mess with you also.  =)

How have we become the people we are today?  The man or woman you are currently, as you read these words, how is it that you got here.  It isn’t a complicated question, and perhaps that is what makes it so important.  How is it that you came to have the habits you have today?  What formed the desires within you?  What determined the jobs you take, the friends you choose to have or the lifestyle you live within?  I am not going to say that each of these things is 100% within your control.  There are so many internal and external factors that lead us to become the person we are today…and more importantly the person we will be tomorrow.

We are formed, guided and led by one of 2 things.  As humans, we are either shaped by our past experiences, or we are molded by the vision of who we can be.  Those are really our only two options.  Without intentionality, we will become just what the circumstances around us dictate.  If you will allow a bit of harshness, I will put meat to this concept…

For those of you who grew up with parents who divorced, how will you avoid the same future fate?  Experience abuse as a kid as a logical outlet for anger?  How do YOU deal with your anger?  Grow up around lots of money issues?  Are you setting your future family up for the same struggle?

When we grow up with less than perfect examples or experiences, we have to ask how that forms us!  I talk with one person after another who seeks restoration and wholeness, but does not ask the most basic question…what is it that is shaping my future? 

We are either pushed forward by past baggage and bad experiences, or we are pulled forward by visions and hope of who we can become.

Without intentionality in every area of our life, we will automatically be shaped by the past and be pushed in a direction we do not want to go.  There is a better way.  I have a great joy in life in getting to sit and talk with people who have major past struggles that do not show up at all in their life…because they have learned how to be pulled forward, by God, into light!  They have set their hearts towards what calls them forward, and they are shaped by vision, hope and love. 

We must consistantly ask ourselves what is shaping the future we are moving towards.  Does the darkness of past pain propel you forward at work?  At home?  In every close relationship you have?  Or is your lifestyle being formed by the hope of God doing great works within you? 

Is the Light pulling you forward, or Darkness pushing you forward?  Either way, tomorrow is coming, but we get to decide what force gets us there.

Moonlight Chasing

I find myself sitting in a large parking-lot at almost 11pm at night. Nothing weird going on, just compelled to stay out a little longer. The moon is hanging in an awesome spot where it is visible from just the right spots at the right altitudes.

I remember when I was in High School, I would go “Moonlight Chasing” where I would drive thru different neighborhoods trying to find where the best view of the moon was. Just a silly game, but it was fun to do when I had the time.

Funny thing about the moon, which I remember from school…the moon emits no light on its own. On nights like tonight when it is all bright and awesome to look at, it isn’t that the moon has any light of its own, it is coming from another source, from the sun. Somehow the light from the sun is bouncing off the moon and reflecting to us in the middle of the night. Pretty cool.

It is more than just a cool thought when you realize that some of us are sitting in the middle of a dark night, waiting for daylight. Sometimes it seems like it is almost pitch black, and you wonder if this is the night that will never end. In those dark moments of the soul, there is a beacon of hope. There is a moon that sits on high and reminds me of a promise. It reminds me that while night comes…it can only stay for a while, because it will eventually have to submit and give way to daylight.

The moon, and the light that it shares, is in effect a reminder of God’s faithfulness. Darkness does not reign, despair is not an end. There is a moon up above that reflects light and reminds us, “the light is coming.”

So tonight, I find myself Moonlight Chasing, trusting in a promise.