I have been stuck on this idea of 'It's not how you start, it's how you finish" for a while now. I know I posted about this last week already but this idea seems to be hitting me over and over again. This happens to me from time to time: where a thought or a life-lesson comes at me repeatedly over a short period of time.
Years ago, I was sitting around a campfire, camping somewhere along the Oregon Coast with about a dozen other people and we were just talking about life and faith and stuff. I don't remember much of that camping trip, let alone the campfire, but the one thing I remember is an off-the-cuff comment made by someone.
He said, that it seems often, that God teaches us a lesson, He says, "Here's lesson one. Okay, you got that? Then let's move on to lesson one. Have you learned it yet? Great, then here's lesson one. We good? Awesome...lesson one!" That is so often the way God works in my life. It seems like He teaches me the same things over and over again.
What I've come to realize is that this probably says more about me than it does about God. It probably has more to do with my stubbornness than it does with God's failure to move along. It is probably more to do with my unwillingness to grasp what God is teaching me than with God's penchant for repetition.
If I would boil it all down, I could probably look back on my life and all the life-issues I face would really be rooted in a couple of areas where God continues to show me 'lesson one.'
Maybe one day, I'll graduate to lesson two (mind you, lesson two entails a lot of review from lesson one!).
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Winning
I have been struggling with this week's post. Not because I don't have anything to say but rather because I can't narrow down what I'd like to say. I have begun and deleted this post at least five times today. I began almost eight hours ago and then left it until now because nothing has captured the heart of what I'm feeling. That said, this probably won't either, but it's going to have to do.
In many ways, the Cowboys game on Monday night serves as an analogy for where I am. Okay, I admit, football-is-to-life analogies are way too cliche (Remember the Titans anyone?) but you'll have to deal with it. See, the Cowboys beat the Eagles not because they made fewer mistakes than the Eagles (they made more). Nor was their victory the result of the Cowboys' superior playing (even though the Cowboys are superior, they didn't necessarily play better than the Eagles!). Rather, the game was won on their refusal to let mistakes get the best of them.
And I think that's where I realize I need to be. Last week, I posted about the messed up marriages of people I know in ministry. Stuff like that can easily get to me. I'm no less angry this week over the pain that these people have caused themselves, their families and the people under their spiritual authority. However, these guys are on my (our) team. And, as in sports, if we're going to win, we can't let the of our teammates wear us down.
I feel like the reason I become so angry when the people who have earned my respect fall into sin is because I recognize that I can so easily be there, too. I recognize that, unless I am consistently checking my life and repenting of the areas where I am beginning to stray slightly off-course, I can become bogged down in the stuff that doesn't matter. See, it's not just the mistakes of our teammates, we can't let the mistakes (sin) that we commit wear us down either.
Following Jesus is about victory, but so many Christians are getting beaten badly. Either through sin that others have committed that they can't get over, or through their own sin (or a combination of both). And what happens is that they get frustrated with the way other Christians are living and it stunts the growth of their own faith; or they become frustrated with their own cycle of poor choices and feel like they can't get out from under it.
But, what is necessary is to turn their lives around. The word the Bible uses for this is repentance. We need to repent of our own poor choices and we need to repent of allowing the poor choices of others get the best of us. As we do that, we'll experience this 'victory' that we're supposed to see.
After the game on Monday night, wide receiver Terrell Owens said, "It's not how you start, it's how you finish." May we all finish well. May we all repent from our mistakes. May we, admit our failures and move forward from them so that we can see victory.
...and may the Cowboys win the Super Bowl.
In many ways, the Cowboys game on Monday night serves as an analogy for where I am. Okay, I admit, football-is-to-life analogies are way too cliche (Remember the Titans anyone?) but you'll have to deal with it. See, the Cowboys beat the Eagles not because they made fewer mistakes than the Eagles (they made more). Nor was their victory the result of the Cowboys' superior playing (even though the Cowboys are superior, they didn't necessarily play better than the Eagles!). Rather, the game was won on their refusal to let mistakes get the best of them.
And I think that's where I realize I need to be. Last week, I posted about the messed up marriages of people I know in ministry. Stuff like that can easily get to me. I'm no less angry this week over the pain that these people have caused themselves, their families and the people under their spiritual authority. However, these guys are on my (our) team. And, as in sports, if we're going to win, we can't let the of our teammates wear us down.
I feel like the reason I become so angry when the people who have earned my respect fall into sin is because I recognize that I can so easily be there, too. I recognize that, unless I am consistently checking my life and repenting of the areas where I am beginning to stray slightly off-course, I can become bogged down in the stuff that doesn't matter. See, it's not just the mistakes of our teammates, we can't let the mistakes (sin) that we commit wear us down either.
Following Jesus is about victory, but so many Christians are getting beaten badly. Either through sin that others have committed that they can't get over, or through their own sin (or a combination of both). And what happens is that they get frustrated with the way other Christians are living and it stunts the growth of their own faith; or they become frustrated with their own cycle of poor choices and feel like they can't get out from under it.
But, what is necessary is to turn their lives around. The word the Bible uses for this is repentance. We need to repent of our own poor choices and we need to repent of allowing the poor choices of others get the best of us. As we do that, we'll experience this 'victory' that we're supposed to see.
After the game on Monday night, wide receiver Terrell Owens said, "It's not how you start, it's how you finish." May we all finish well. May we all repent from our mistakes. May we, admit our failures and move forward from them so that we can see victory.
...and may the Cowboys win the Super Bowl.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Ministry, Marriage, and Messiness
I was all set to go into a nice, long post about the big news about the world's biggest science experiment that was fired up yesterday about 300 feet below the Swiss-French border. About how the science world is all abuzz because this will tell us everything we need to know about how the earth began. Aside from the fact that they could have saved $5+ billion and read Genesis 1, its pretty amazing what the physicists are saying about this machine.
I was all set to post about it and I had a conversation that completely changed my thought pattern.
Last month, Todd Bentley made headlines because he had an "unhealthy relationship on an emotional level with a female member of his staff." I hate it when stuff like this happens. That wasn't the conversation I had this morning, but it leads up to it. See, I've got to be honest, lately it seems as though I'm consistently hearing about pastors with broken marriages. This is the substance of said conversation. Now two more marriages of Christian leaders with whom I'm acquainted have been added to that horrible statistic.
Honestly, I don't get it. It angers me. I have no words. I have no nice, little life-lesson to tack onto the end of this post. Other than, "I love my wife." Mind you, that's probably a bigger lesson than most.
I was all set to post about it and I had a conversation that completely changed my thought pattern.
Last month, Todd Bentley made headlines because he had an "unhealthy relationship on an emotional level with a female member of his staff." I hate it when stuff like this happens. That wasn't the conversation I had this morning, but it leads up to it. See, I've got to be honest, lately it seems as though I'm consistently hearing about pastors with broken marriages. This is the substance of said conversation. Now two more marriages of Christian leaders with whom I'm acquainted have been added to that horrible statistic.
Honestly, I don't get it. It angers me. I have no words. I have no nice, little life-lesson to tack onto the end of this post. Other than, "I love my wife." Mind you, that's probably a bigger lesson than most.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Eleven and a Half Hours
So my kids and I were standing by the finish line the other day, waiting for my beautiful bride to cross the finish line of her half-marathon (so proud of her!) and watching all the hard-core runners cross in ridiculously fast times. The race announcer knew all the top finishers and kept us in the loop of many of their previous feats as they came down the chute.
I was struck by the announcer's comment as one middle-aged man crossed. Apparently this particular man had recently completed the IronMan Canada in 11 1/2 hours which was great news because he then qualified for the IronMan World Championships in Kona, Hawaii. Aside from the sheer marvel of completing an IronMan Triathalon (3.8km swim; 180km bike; 42.2km run) and being able to endure that intense of a fitness work out for 11+ hours, I couldn't help but wonder how many hours he had spent to train for that one event. And what did he get as a result? The chance to do it all over again.
Now, I don't want to downplay the incredible achievement it is to complete an IronMan (let alone qualify for the world championships), but I was thinking about how, so often in our lives, we become passionately engaged in things that, a year from now, no one else will remember. And how much energy we invest in activities that will have little long-term return. And what happens is that we end up surrounding ourselves with equal passion around the same stuff we've allowed to distract us (just talk to someone whose passionate about running!).
Truth is, I can easily become that. It is so easy for me to become distracted with stuff that no one will care about a year, or a decade or a century from now. Don't hear me getting down on hobbies or exercise or any of that; I truly believe that there is a place for all of that. I enjoy running and exercise and hockey and stuff. But I think it's easy for us to allow those hobbies or those activities to distract us from the stuff that really matters. I hope and I pray that the things I do matter not just for a week or year or century, but for eternity.
It is my hope that, the things I do have more significance than having people look at me and go "Wow, that's crazy!" and have some random pastor blog about it later that week. It is my hope that the life I live impacts the life that others live forever. I want to live with an eye to eternity, not just to the next thing (whatever that next thing might be).
I was struck by the announcer's comment as one middle-aged man crossed. Apparently this particular man had recently completed the IronMan Canada in 11 1/2 hours which was great news because he then qualified for the IronMan World Championships in Kona, Hawaii. Aside from the sheer marvel of completing an IronMan Triathalon (3.8km swim; 180km bike; 42.2km run) and being able to endure that intense of a fitness work out for 11+ hours, I couldn't help but wonder how many hours he had spent to train for that one event. And what did he get as a result? The chance to do it all over again.
Now, I don't want to downplay the incredible achievement it is to complete an IronMan (let alone qualify for the world championships), but I was thinking about how, so often in our lives, we become passionately engaged in things that, a year from now, no one else will remember. And how much energy we invest in activities that will have little long-term return. And what happens is that we end up surrounding ourselves with equal passion around the same stuff we've allowed to distract us (just talk to someone whose passionate about running!).
Truth is, I can easily become that. It is so easy for me to become distracted with stuff that no one will care about a year, or a decade or a century from now. Don't hear me getting down on hobbies or exercise or any of that; I truly believe that there is a place for all of that. I enjoy running and exercise and hockey and stuff. But I think it's easy for us to allow those hobbies or those activities to distract us from the stuff that really matters. I hope and I pray that the things I do matter not just for a week or year or century, but for eternity.
It is my hope that, the things I do have more significance than having people look at me and go "Wow, that's crazy!" and have some random pastor blog about it later that week. It is my hope that the life I live impacts the life that others live forever. I want to live with an eye to eternity, not just to the next thing (whatever that next thing might be).
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