so, it's another christmas come and gone. our church had a successful christmas eve service and sunday morning. i was in charge so of course it was amazing.
i think i am going to move from reading james to romans now. james is all about real faith being shown in how we act - what we do. romans delves more into the realm of grace and faith and free gifts and whatnot. that is what i am struggling to learn and understand right now, so maybe romans will be helpful.
for sunday morning past i was studying isaiah 7 - the passage dealing with king ahaz and the sign of immanuel. i believe that this passage shows how stubborn we humans can be to try to save ourselves in our own way. ahaz insisted on bringing the assyrians to help him out instead of trusting God to take care of them. and the result was that he screwed his country over big time - it didn't work. in all this muddling i am trying to do through grace-realm, i am thinking more and more strongly every day that i will never appreciate grace until i realize how i am completely lost and hopelessly incapable of saving myself. if i do not realize that then grace means nothing. why would i need grace if i don't need saving? i have to know i am lost.
i don't think i do all the time - at least, i struggle with it. i've been a good boy. santa has never brought me coal. what have i ever done that would condemn me? i mean, other than my pride and selfishness and... but really, i've never killed anyone. i've never done drugs. i've never slapped around innocent children in a drunken stupor. why would i need a saviour? why would i need a messiah?
unless i know i am hopelessly lost i will never want grace. i will never appreciate grace. understanding my lost-ness first and foremost is the beginning step to real life with Christ. i think that it is when i learn this lesson that i will be able to understand the freedom that grace gives me. being completely unable to save myself and finding myself suddenly saved - for free - i think would be a revolutionary and transformational experience. there is nothing i can do to make God like me more. there is nothing i can do to make myself more saved than i already am. i'm free. completely and gloriously free - for free. i can't even begin to get my head around it. i am only just now starting to peek around the corner and it makes me wondrously excited.
12.30.2004
stuff and nonsense
12.22.2004
grace
today as i was driving into kingston i listened to part of "haven now" - or "haven today" or whatever it's called - on the christian radio station. i usually don't listen to it cause the guys voice is kindof annoying and i'm not a big fan of listening to sermons on the radio, or of christian radio for that matter. but anyway, today the topic caught my attention. he was giving his christmas message and was talking about how our biggest problem is actually God. what he was saying is that because of God's holy standard for our lives that he described through the law in the OT, we're all screwed. none of us will ever, ever measure up to God's standard. so our biggest problem isn't the disaster we're facing, or the broken relationship we have with our friend, or even our sin. our biggest problem is that because of God's standard we're screwed, lost, hopeless. but God sent Jesus... we will never fully understand grace until we understand how lost we are - how unable we are to ever please God on our own.
that thought really stuck out at me. it's not completely new or anything, but it ties in perfectly with what i am preaching about on sunday and what i am struggling with in my own life. i have difficulty understanding grace some days because i don't fully realize how completely unable i am to do anything to please God on my own.
i am beginning to think that maybe it is in giving up trying to make God happy that i will find real grace. maybe only when i quit trying to do the things that i think God wants me to do will i understand that he still loves me - not because of what i do, but because that's just what he's like. he loves me no matter what.
12.20.2004
the desert
i found a great poem by garry harris. check out his stuff here.
The Desert
Reduced to essence,The desert reveals our core.
Stripping away our veneer of religion
Till we stand naked before God and ourselves,
And are forced to own our shadow
Whose existence we had previously denied.
Wilderness is a great teacher.
Moses; David; the Master; and we
Must eventually face its ravages,
Emerging from it different; whole; prepared;
To be God's people in the world.
Do not flee these torments.
Welcome them as life's great tutorial,
Integrating light and darkness; virtue and vanity; good and evil;
That we may present ourselves in all our propensity
To the Eternal One, who is still the God of the mountain;
the valley; and the desert.
12.18.2004
muddlesome faith
i understand what my good friend lynn was saying, but i wanted to ramble out some more thoughts in response. (see comment on 'works and faith') i understand the relationship with works being the result of a genuine faith, a life changed by the presence of God. what i find confusing is where it all begins... the whole chicken and egg scenario. as a person raised in the church, i find that sometimes my works become just works, devoid of real faith. as such they have no value. yet james says my faith is valueless when not resulting in real works. presently i am struggling through a spiritual desert of sorts, where i have no feeling, no motivation to do good works other than that i know i ought to. it sucks, big time. so in this place of dryness it feels most of the time like my works are devoid of faith. i am just going through the motions.
here's my issue. in this place, is the best thing for me to keep on 'working' in hope that the reality of grace will return, or should i wait to understand more of the depths of faith before i return to 'works'? see, the more i think and ponder and write, the more i see this as a battle over feelings. my feelings are gone right now. so what will i do in this desert? will i lay down and die, or will i keep stumbling along after the mirage before me until i reach the real spring and feelings return? how do i know i'm working out of a grace based faith when i feel no grace? how do i live a grace filled life - a life full of freedom from guilt - when i feel only obligation? do i misunderstand how this all works? do i truly understand the freedom of grace? do i truly understand how i can be obligated to obey Christ as a free response to his grace in my life? i don't think i do. right now it just feels like stuff i have to do and if i don't i go around feeling guilty for not doing it.
example: if i want to grow in my relationship with Christ, i need to spend time with him daily. this i have been taught and this i believe to be true. as i stumble through this desert, however, i have no desire to spend time with God regularly. when i do, it is more because i know i should, or need to, than because i want to. this desert was birthed out of a journey and struggle to free myself from this very thing. now it seems the direction God is taking me is leading right back to where i began. to be honest this scares the crap out of me and makes me a little bit frustrated. i am having a really hard time trusting God because i don't know where he is taking me and i really don't want to end up back where i began.
i know that there are times we do what is right because it is right rather than because we feel like it - feelings aren't everything. but for this poor wanderer who is struggling to recover from a works based faith devoid of a real understanding of grace it sometimes feels like doing what is right because it is right leads me back into the works based faith. where does the delicate knife edge lie? where is the narrow path i am to follow? as i read these passages in james it feels at times so clear and at times so foggy.
muddlesome faith. so ugly and so beautiful.
rage...taking....over...
i hate our computer. no...that's not strong enough. i loathe our computer. i want it to die. except i don't because then we would have no computer. i had just finished typing up a nice little entry when all of a sudden the computer froze up on me. and this is not the first time. it does it all the time, with no warning and no way to unfreeze it other than restarting it. oooooohhhhhh,....it is so frustrating.
anyway, what i was saying earlier was something about how i've noticed so many new blogs in the last two or three weeks starting up. i made up some thing about how it was all due to a conspiracy from google to control the world or some crap. anyway, enough about that. i just find it interesting that everyone and their brother (or sister) seems to be blogging now (including me). huh.
well, that's all for now i guess. if you're reading my blog and want me to link to your page, let me know.
may your toast be warm and your fingers nimble.
12.16.2004
htm freakin l
i figured out how to add a links column to my sidebar today. boy was that a pain. i have never taken any computer website type classes, so i'm learning completely from scratch. it's fun to see things working though. i even learned how to get the links to open in a new window. easy stuff for you experienced guru's of the web page, but for me it was exciting!
kudos to the google search engine and html tutorials.
wedding pics
tomorrow marks five months of marriage. time goes by so fast! i thought i would post some pics from the wedding. enjoy!
karen always points out her fingernails when she sees this picture. she was so proud of them! women... i'll never understand.
my wife is so beautiful!
the world is spinning around us!
running through the bubbles leaving the reception.
12.14.2004
vertigo
so u2's new album is out now. has been for a couple weeks. do i have it? no. karen wanted to get it for me for christmas, so i have to wait. what if she ends up getting a different cd? what if? what if? i sure hope it's under that tree! i can't wait to hear it. i bought the single of vertigo, so that has been satisfying my u2 hungry taste buds for now, but i am very excited to hear the full album. i appreciate the brutal honesty bono puts into the lyrics. i find the songs help me express in some way the frustrations with being a christian in our world that (to our shame) can't be expressed in church. or maybe it's just that for me it's a fresh way of expressing my relationship with God - i can't handle too many more church songs right now.
when will coldplay have another? i heard a rumour a while ago that they were working on one for 2005, but i have no idea when in the year it will appear. now that will be an album i will not miss out on. i'm there the day it comes out, baby.
lasagna
yesterday i tried my hand at making a lasagna. i had never made one before, but i read the recipe and thought to myself, "how hard can it be?" unfortunately i forgot to take into account my propensity to take about an hour longer than the recipe recommends whenever i am creating something in the kitchen. so karen and i finally got to eat our lasagna around 8:00pm. it tasted alright. i'd change a few things next time.
12.09.2004
works and faith
i've been reading James (in the bible) lately. i'm finding parts of it very challenging. right now i am struggling with understanding the role of right actions in relationship with faith and grace. paul says that we are saved by grace through faith...not of works so we can't brag about what we've done. james says we are saved by works, not through faith alone.
now i know the textbook answers, but i am struggling with how this really applies into my everyday life. paul emphasizes the importance of grace, of choosing to trust God completely and live a life of freedom from law - from having to measure up to a standard - because we never can. but james says that our acceptance of this grace is false and lifeless unless it transforms our life to the point of active relevance in the world and communities around us.
for so long i have measured my spiritual health by what i have done. have i had my devotions regularly, have i prayed lately, have i listened to the sermons or worshipped or memorized scripture...and on and on it goes. i am learning and experiencing a blessed, confusing freedom in realizing that my relationship with God is bigger than any of those things. if my relationship with God is genuine, then the everything i do ought to lead me toward God, not just the 'spiritual disciplines.'
so is james talking about these kinds of "spiritual activities" or is he talking about relationship with God being fleshed out in everyday life? helping the person who needs food, comforting the person who is hurting. i think that too often i think of my faith as something of a hermit nature - meaning that it is independent of those around me. the more i read james, however, the more i am challenged to realize that real faith is fleshed out in my actions toward the people in my family, community, country, and world.
"religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." james 1:27
christmas and stuffing
christmas. that time of year so full of joy, world junior hockey championships, and ...busyness. this christmas is the first christmas for karen and i as a married couple. it is also the first christmas for me to take charge of a church for a month. our pastor is leaving for a month on a mission trip, so yours truly is in charge for four weeks. not that this is a big deal. it is just that i now will have extra responsibilities on top of my regular ones through a major holiday season.
now, you might be thinking "whiner, get over it." that's what i would be thinking if i were you. see the thing is, holidays are supposed to be relaxing, refreshing, celebratory. i am fearful that this christmas season will not be that for me. sure there will be moments of peace crammed forcefully somewhere within the christmas eve service planning, christmas sunday sermon prep, gift shopping, family visiting, new year's eve party planning, etc...
it'll be a blast.
my question is this: why do we cram our holiday seasons so full of activity and bustling that we can no longer enjoy them to their fullest potential? at least i find that it is often this way for me around christmastime.
