It’s Almost Naptime

In its earlier incarnation with another host, Thinking Out Loud was drawing a comfortable fifty readers per day.    I was happy that anybody was reading, but I think it’s a male trait to want to see the growth of any enterprise to which you’re giving oversight.

I put a blog counter on, and then joined Alltop Christianity, and later Alltop Church, and then more recently added Christian Blogs, whose icon is always in the sidebar of this blog.   (My first connection to this Christian website aggregator was David Fisher’s Pilgrim Scribblings blog, also listed in the sidebar.)

As this blog started to grow, and approach page one of Christian Blogs, and then the top ten, and then the top three, I started to feel bad about the idea of beating The Persecution Blog, the official blog of Voice of the Martyrs.   My idle ramblings somewhat pale next to people who are giving their lives for their faith.

But I also became aware of It’s Almost Naptime.   Missy and Walker have had four kids in four years.   That’s a lot of laundry, and Missy doesn’t hesitate to photograph the pile of clothing next to the washer.

This is blogging at its most grassroots basic.   A true ‘web log’ of what it’s like having all those children underfoot.  No wonder Missy has hundreds of daily readers — over 900 one day last week.

But it’s also about the lessons that children teach us about ourselves and our Heavenly Father.      It’s raw, and it’s transparent and it’s sometimes like this:

I knew God loved me, he officially had to, the Bible tells me so, yeah yeah. But how could God possibly really love me, unconditionally, me being so stinky and sticky and such a flop at being a “good Christian”??

That’s a paragraph from a special page on It’s Almost Naptime tabbed “What I Really Want You To Know” and titled God Thinks You Rock The Casbah.    I want you to click on the link and read the whole article.   Especially if you’re looking at the whole Christ-following deal as someone looking inside the window of a house from the outside on a cold day.

It’s gonna bump her stats today, and she’ll definitely beat me again today in the readership race, but at least the guilt about beating The Persecution Blog will be her problem.

Anyway

Wayne Jacobsen posted this on his Lifestream blog, back on June 24th.   I was going to just reprint the poem, but I wanted to include Wayne’s introduction also.

Do It Anyway

Someone reminded me of this sign today posted on the way of Shishu Bhavan, a children’s home in Calcutta. I quoted it in the front of Authentic Relationships, a book I wrote with my brother, Clay a few years back.

I really needed to hear these words again today. Maybe the will re-inspire some of you as well. Our actions are not about the outcomes we desire. Someone can completely destroy or repudiate a gift of kindness or an attempt to serve. This poem is about living with love and grace in a world filled with self-interest, that can easily treat our love with contempt. Love anyway!

Anyway

People are unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered.
Love them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.

The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Be good anyway.

Honesty and frankness will make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.

People need help but may attack you if you try to help them.
Help them anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God.
It was never between you and them anyway.

Forced Evangelism: Enough Already!

It’s contrived, it’s forced, it’s usually too simple, and it’s definitely formulaic.   But there are certain methodologies being taught that are extremely popular with some Christians.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s important that we look for opportunities to plant seeds, to be “salt” in our world, and to share a verbal witness.   And I believe that every Christian should always be ready to give an answer to explain or describe the hope that lies within them.   I believe every Christian should experience what it’s like to be talking with someone and not worrying about what they should say, knowing that the Holy Spirit is providing the words.   I believe that every Christian should bear fruit, reproduce after their own kind, and know (and perhaps be in ‘follow up’ mode with) people they have introduced to Jesus.

But I believe these things should happen organically.  There is no other way.   When Jesus reached out to people it was natural and authentic and unique to every individual.

So I kind of resonate with a post written by Jon Reid last week entitled, 14 Reasons to Stop Evangelizing Your Friends.    Is the title an overstatement?  Definitely.    Are his points well taken?   Absolutely.   Read it.

Don’t strive to be an evangelist.    In fact, don’t strive at all.

Related post on this blog:  Deborah Drapper – 13 Year Old Evangelist (May 15/09)

Related post on this blog:  Evangelism in a Box (June 12/09)

Related post on this blog:  Religion versus Spirituality (February 27/08)

Our Day (15 minutes) at the Casino

Today we dropped by one of our local casinos, mostly to see what the restaurant was like.   No money changed hands.    I’m always struck by the blinking lights that lure in the customers, but it was something on the auditory side of things that struck my wife.   I’ll let her describe it:

The room was huge, I don’t know how many square feet, but we figured that it contained 6 or 7 hundred machines.  Just a few green baize tables in the centre, surrounded by slanted rows of blinking, shining machines.  Each one a variation on slots, with different colour schemes, different images, but the same configuration.

The volume of sound, the pleasant sounds generated by the machines – of dinging and pinging and chirping and ringing – in the casino seemed almost deliberately modulated.  Just loud enough to be engaging, but not loud enough to distract or interfere with conversation.

But the further we went into the room, the more it became apparent that every one of those 6 or 7 hundred machines was pinging and dinging in the same key.  The same musical key.  No discord, no clash, no change as you walked through.  Exactly the same.  It surrounded us like a warm pool.  You could hum along with it.

And the more you listened – the more you swam through it – the more you became aware that most of the pinging and ringing and chiming was the same note.  An octave or two apart, but the same sound, the same tone over and over and over, following you through, or propelling you.  At just the right volume, with no irritating edges.  Soft, round, mellow.

Hypnotic?  Maybe.  Deliberate?  No doubt.

Words You Wish You Could Take Back

The morning of February 19th had started out very quietly.   I was taking it easy after a hectic day before.

At 12:56 PM, I got an e-mail from my pastor.   Earlier in the week I had used something that happened at our church as a springboard for a blog post.   He was not pleased.   But he made it clear he wasn’t just pleased with what I’d written, he wasn’t pleased with me either.   If a pastor could write a parishioner a letter of divorce, I suddenly knew what one would look like.

By 3:05 PM, I was calm and composed enough to draft a reply.   I was engaging ideas, not debating his leadership, and decided to defend the ideology of blogging in general, and lament that on a personal level, my friendship with this man was obviously fading.

By 4:25, he had seen my reply and was already in damage control mode.   But it was too late.   The words in the first e-mail had to have come from somewhere, and I knew that my time at that church was over.    It was sad really, because I had been stepping up my commitment to that particular assembly over the ten weeks that preceded this unexpected development.

I counted them.   There were ten words in his first e-mail to me that were extremely negative.   But it was the tenth one I couldn’t forget.    And no matter how much I wanted to pick up the phone and say, “Okay, I got your second e-mail; let’s move forward…” I couldn’t get past that one word.   And I can’t to this day.

Pastors often meet with me and unburden themselves of situations in their congregational life that leave them worn out.   It’s a vocation that leaves people very vulnerable, and they often speak of that “one person” who exhausts all their human resources.   I just never considered the possibility that any pastor, in any church I ever attended, would consider me that “one person.”    I mean, for one thing, I think you have to take up a lot of a pastor’s time — in the office or on the telephone — to even qualify.

And I don’t think he meant it fully.   I think that either he wrote it in haste; had some other situation that was already eating away at him that day; or someone was running some third party interference.

But that one word simply cut too deeply. I knew we were done.   I miss some of the people there.   But I don’t have the energy to try to make another start.     Too bad, really.

So today’s question is:   What words have you spoken or written that you wish you could take back?

And its reciprocal question:  What words that others have spoken have you found it hard to forgive and forget; or in what situations were you successful at forgiving and forgetting?

Forgetting is often considered a human failing; but with God, it’s a Divine attribute.   And yes, I know what you’re thinking…

Is The Person You Married The Same Person You’re Now Married To?

• When she married him, D. was a party animal.   The first year of their married life, a quarter of their budget was concert tickets.   But now he sits in the recliner reading John Grisham novels.
• S. made it quite clear about seven years into the marriage that she was no longer into church.   Just stopped going.   Her husband is a bit perplexed, and ends up taking the kids himself, which leaves the people there asking questions.
  
• M. said she was a dog lover, and J. didn’t like cats, so it seemed perfect; but now M. says she doesn’t want a dog in the house.
  
• Y. knew when she married F. that he had smoked a cigarette or two, but never expected all these years later to be married to a confirmed smoker; especially in view of all the scientific data we now have.
• T. was the picture of health when they got married, so V. never expected he’d be spending his life playing both husband and nurse.
• R. had never spent a lot of time around kids; was never a babysitter; and made it clear to B. she wanted a small family.   That was five kids ago.

A lot of people wake up one morning and realize that they’re not married to the person they walked down the church aisle with.   (A strange expression, since most brides walk down the aisle with their father, to whom they had better not be married.)

Much of the tension in marriage is due to a crisis of expectations.    It reminds me of the book title, This Isn’t The Trip I Signed Up For. Judging it from Day One, it didn’t look like it would be like it is today.

Today’s question is, do you think this is the norm or the exception?   Is it better that “people change” than if they don’t change at all?    Does it matter how long a couple dated or were engaged, or do the “surprises” in marriage happen regardless?

And of course:   What changed in your partner after the wedding?   Did you change?    Did the marriage survive?

And yes, you’re allowed to say, “My marriage is fine, but I have this friend…”

Random Items

First of all, today is the day the story went national.   The CTV Television Network, The CBC TV and Radio Network and The Toronto Star finally picked up the story of the removal from television of Ronald and Reynold Mainse, formerly hosts of Canada’s national Christian television program, 100 Huntley Street. There’s also a report today from CanadianChristianity.com.  This is all a full month after you read it here and here (sort of) and everywhere here in the blogosphere.    Today’s publishing flurry seems to have been precipitated by a news release from Crossroads Christian Communications, Inc. itself.    Why bother now?

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Meanwhile, I was just wrapping up yesterday’s post when I decided to pose a small-print, trivia question concerning Jehovah’s Witnesses in the U.S.    Do they stand for the national anthem?   Some here in Canada don’t.   I couldn’t picture anyone getting away with that in the U.S.    A couple of people wrote in right away to explain the JW position.   This link takes you directly to the post with the comments, and you’re still free to jump in.    Should any Christian — in the broadest sense of the word — pledge allegiance to a political entity such as a state, republic, or any other kind of country?    Leave your comments on that post from yesterday (July 1).

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When I was baptized — along with 107 other people at The Peoples’ Church in Toronto, Canada’s one and only megachurch at the time — my ‘testimony verse’ was Proverbs 3: 5, 6.   Trust in the Lord with all your heart and don’t lean on your own understanding.   Acknowledge Him in all your ways and he will direct your paths.    At least that’s what it was then.   We’ve since learned that ‘he will make your paths straight’ might be a more accurate translation.   Some would interpret this as, ‘he will make your paths smooth.’    But ’smooth’ is just not reality for some people.   The last few days for me have been anything but smooth.    I really think I need to quit my job.   I’ve typed my letter of resignation, but there’s nobody to give it to, since I own the company.

We all want to increase our blog readership, but please note that posting comments to a half-dozen items in one day won’t work here.    In most cases, the system will limit you to three comments per update period.    If the comments aren’t really productive to the discussion, it’s assumed your really only promoting your own blog.   For the rest of you regulars, it’s blog community as usual.

Celebrating Patriotism and Nationalism: Ugh!

So there we were in Vermont, almost two years ago, on July 4th, thinking we would take in a local fireworks display on Independance Day.   No such luck.

“Well…” the man began, “They do one over at [name of town] on the 4th, but we already had ours, [name of town] did theirs on the 2nd… let me see… I think [name of town] has one coming up on the 7th… the one on the 3rd got rained out… but there’s always fireworks at the big county fair over at [name of town]…”

Anyway, you get the idea.    We went back to the motel and watched “A Capital Fourth” on PBS, with the Macy’s fireworks display.

Canada marches to the beat of a different drummer.   Today is Canada Day, what we called Dominion Day growing up.   Every town, far and wide has their food fair, their festival, their fireworks and anything else that starts with “F” on the same day, July 1st.    Unless it rains.    Which it still might.

Our patriotism and nationalism runs quite cold compared to our U.S. neighbours (there…I spelled it Canadian in honour of the day… also the word honour).    Despite this, we will not be moved from celebrating our holiday on the right day.

Maybe that’s why mid-week worship services never caught on here the way things like Willow Creek’s “New Community” did there.    Church is a Sunday thing here; that is, if it’s even still that.

So Happy Birthday to us.   Canada turns 142 years old today.    Yippee!

Today’s trivia question:  In Canada Jehovah’s Witnesses often do not stand for the national anthem on religious grounds.   In the U.S., are J.W.’s afforded the same opportunity?

Persecution of Christians in China Continues Unchanged

I gotta be totally honest with you.   Stories like this one come across my e-mail every day.   Yet I’m not moved to a mixture of anger and prayer as I was when I saw this particular one.    Nothing has changed in China.   They put on a good face for the Olympics, but now it’s back to business as usual.    Religious persecution as usual.    This is so wrong.    Do they even know what “wrong” means?

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BEIJING, June 30 /Christian Newswire/ — ChinaAid calls on the international community to pray and act on behalf of imprisoned Christian house church leader Shi Weihan. On June 10 the Beijing Court found Shi Weihan, age 38, guilty of “illegal business operation” and sentenced him to three years in prison and 150,000 Yuan fine (about $22,000 USD) for printing and distributing Bibles at no cost.

Photo: Shi Weihan

Six others stood trial together with Shi Weihan, and also received criminal sentences for “illegal business operation.” Tian Hongxia, who worked for Shi Weihan, was fined three years in prison and 150,000 yuan. The other five sentenced were Li Fengshan, Zhou Xin, Cheng Xiaojing, Lű Yuequan and Li Zong, all shareholders and employees of Xinshu Printing Company Ltd. of Beijing, the printing company which printed the Bibles and Christian books. Their sentences range from one to two years with fines from 60,000 yuan to 120,000 yuan. ChinaAid recently received the Criminal Judgment from Haidian District People’s Court of Beijing Municipality for Shi Weihan and the other six who were sentenced. Click here to read.

ChinaAid president, Bob Fu stated, “Most of the books Shi Weihan published were Bibles and Christian books. He distributed them free of charge, because the Chinese government does not permit Bibles to be sold in public bookstores, and there is a great need for them. We call upon Christian book authors and those who placed orders for printing Bibles and Christian literature to speak out for Shi and his family.”

Shi Weihan’s wife Zhang Jing and their two daughters, 12-year-old Shi Jia and 8-year-old Shi En Mei, are under tremendous pressure from authorities. Shi’s wife has hired Christian lawyer Li Fangping to represent him and to appeal the verdict. The appeal process could take up to one year.

Contact the Chinese embassy and request that Shi Weihan and the other six sentenced be immediately released, and that government authorities allow Bibles and Christian literature to be printed and freely distributed in China.

In Canada: Mr. Lan Lijun, Ambassador to Canada; Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China; 240 St. George Street, Toronto, ON M5R 2N5. Tel: (416) 964 7260

In the United States: Ambassador Zhou Wenzhong; 3505 International Place, NW, Washington, D.C. 20008 Tel: (202) 495-2000
Fax: (202) 588-9760

ChinaAid grants permission to reproduce photos and/or information for non-fundraising purposes, with the provision that www.ChinaAid.org is credited. Please contact:Katherine@ChinaAid.org with questions or requests for further information.

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July 1 UPDATE — Additional coverage on this story.

You Think You Know Us, But You Don’t

• “I know what Dutch people are like”
• “I know what left-handed people are like”
• “I know what red-haired people are like”
• “I know what people from Arkansas are like”
• “I know what French people are like”
• “I know what lawyers are like”
• “I know what landlords are like”

No, you don’t; you know a few, not all.

• “I know what Christians are like”

No, you don’t; you know a few, not all.

We are a community of the broken.  We are fallen.  We are flawed.  So naturally you are going to see us at our worst as well as sometimes at our best.   You’re going to see us not living up to the standard we should.    You’re going to see us when we’re “moving toward the cross” and when we’re “moving away from the cross.”

Ideally, we are people of love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness…   Ideally, we are people of grace.     Ideally, we reflect the character of the Christ we follow.   That’s what we call “positional truth.”   In terms of “practical truth,” we miss the mark, often by kilometers; by miles.   Just as suddenly, we sometimes get it right.

But we’re also not all the same.    We have good days and bad days.   We have people among us who are a real embarrassment to us, and people who truly model the life of Jesus in everything they do.

We are a community of faith.   You don’t have to be “pure” to get in.   You don’t have to “clean up real good” to join.    It’s a “come as you are” party.   And people do.

There’s no status, no seniority, no gender, no ethnicity; nobody can claim “spiritual dominance,” or “spiritual oneupsmanship” over any of the others.   It’s as long and wide and deep as any cross-section of the broader society.

In fact, there’s no generic portrait of a Christ-follower that captures us all.   There’s no homogeneity.    There’s no ‘Mecca’ to which we must travel.   No rites or rituals in which we must participate.   No prescribed term of missions service we must all complete.    No earthly head who speaks for all of us.   No secret mantra we all recite.

There is respect for elders, yet sometimes “a little child will lead them,” and truths are spoken “out of the mouths of babes.”   Younger brothers — even youngest brothers — are sometimes served by older brothers.   Newcomers can make as viable a contribution as seasoned veterans.     The next generation is free to reinvent the wheel.   The generation after that is free to rediscover the ancient practices and classic disciplines.

It’s an upsidedown kingdom.   An insideout kingdom.    It’s a family.   It’s “two or three gathered together” in a living room Bible study; it’s a multitude of people on a grassy hillside listening to a summer conference speaker.    It’s elegant cathedrals and small country chapels.  It’s quietness and solitude.   It’s the making of a joyful noise with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.

There’s the doctrine — what is believed.   There’s the ethics — how that belief is lived out.   There’s the experience — what happens to us when we believe the orthodoxy and live out the orthopraxy.  There’s the ‘macro,’ big picture version of Christ-following; and there are people hung up on the ‘micro’ issues, or a number of individual ‘micros.’

There are those who have locked in for life.   There are those who will leave and then return.   There are those who will leave.   There are those who will look in, but as one looking through a window from the outside.

Some will give tirelessly to this — in every waking hour.    Some attend services at Christmas and Easter.    Some give substantial parts of their income.    Some give the minimum required to stay on a membership list.    Some grew up with this faith.   Others came as adults.     Some nurture their children in their beliefs.   Others feel their kids need to choose, to ‘take ownership’ of their concepts about God.

Personalities are factored in:  While one person may be demonstrative about their faith, another might be reticent about their personal beliefs.    Whereas one person might be given to an emotional, relational kind of worship;  another might prefer a formal liturgy, a quiet, controlled worship environment.

So…

…do you still think you know what Christians are like?

I’m part of this, and I don’t.    I just know that I’ve joined myself to a company of people who are trying to live a new life in a new way; a group of people who I otherwise would have nothing in common with.

Now, we have everything in common.

Moments That Leave You Longing For Heaven

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, and also a regular reader of the comments, you already know Cynthia aka TwoFinches aka Girl in a Glass House.

Yesterday on her blog, she shared a story for the first time about a vision she experienced one night while a student in her Bible college dorm.

You can read “Standing at Heaven’s Door” here; and I hope you will.    Here’s a paragraph that struck me as a musician, but don’t forget to read the whole piece.

The music is what I remember. Even though thousands of people were playing different songs on different instruments and even though everyone was singing their own words of praise, it all blended into one harmonious melody that took my breath away. I sang too, making up the words to express how I longed to see Christ, and my song became part of that magnificent seamless chorus. But then something happened that hushed us all.

The enormous gates that were before us opened just a little. I strained to see what was in there, pressed on every side by others who were waiting just like me. I saw a multitude of people inside and felt a wave that felt like absolute joy come blowing from the opening. And then it was as if all the longing within me, the heart and the soul of me, went right through those gates into heaven and I was desperate to follow…

Affinity Fraud and Ponzi Schemes: Everything You Need to Get Started

With various reports coming in of different people in the Christian community being victimized by Ponzi schemes and Affinity Fraud, we figured, ‘hey, if you can’t beat them, join them.’    Here’s an inventory checklist of the kind of person you need to be and the devices that need to be in your toolkit:

Powerfully Persuasive – It helps if you can really ’sell’ people on your ideas; if you have a proven track record of being able to convince people to get on board a project or event.   Take good salesmanship and mix in a dash of charm.

Outrageous Claims – If the banks are only offering 2-3% and the investment brokers are only suggesting returns of 4-8%, don’t offer 12% or 14%;  go big — around 20%.   What difference does it make if you’re not going to be paying anybody anyways?

Self Delusion – If you believe in the project enough, you can do more than just project a genuine sincerity, you can possibly even fool a polygraph machine.   This is where the eternal optimists have a distinct advantage over the rest of us.

Pathological Lying – You won’t get this gift overnight, so start soon.   My wife recently dealt with a couple who came up with four different stories in five minutes as to someone’s whereabouts; so I suppose it’s good to get your story straight ahead of time.

Criminal Intent – This is where it gets nasty.   You’ll need to start small and work up to what we’re describing here.    This might be a good day to start with a CD or some lipstick at WalMart and then if petty theivery works for you, set your sights on bigger game.

Spiritual Spin – Once you’ve arrived at your moment of triumph and you’re out selling the actual scheme, be sure to mention how this investment program is “God’s instrument,” how it will “benefit the Kingdom,” and if possible credit God with “revealing this method and opportunity” to you.

Critical Mass – The first few may be tougher sells, but once you’ve got a few people on board, the word will spread.    Be sure to allow some of your earlier investors to actually get their hands on some cash returns, so they can fully buy in to the self delusion; they may not be as good at this as you.

You’re now ready to begin. Come up with a good name for your project so that it sounds credible, and make sure your laptop computer has enough charts and graphs; they can be based on anything statistical since no one caught up in this is going to look that closely.

Personal Evangelism Versus Mass Evangelism

www.reverendfun.com

Sheila Schuller Coleman to Lead Crystal Cathedral

She won’t be given the title “senior pastor,” but Dr. Sheila Coleman, the daughter of Robert H. Schuller has been named to the top administrative post at the Garden Grove, CA Crystal Cathedral and its Hour of Power telecast.

Read the story at the USA Today Religion page here.

Celebrity, Fame and the Passing of Time

His death on November 22nd, 1963 was significant in many different ways, but the passing of British author and Christian apologist C. S. Lewis got pushed off the front pages by the assassination of U. S. President John F. Kennedy the same day.

Fast forward 46 years…

One national evening TV newscaster today clarified that the passing of actress Farrah Fawcett was to have been the lead news item, until, minutes before airtime, they learned of the sudden passing of pop music icon Michael Jackson.    At least Fawcett didn’t get bumped from the broadcast entirely.

We live in a celebrity-obsessed culture.    Tabloids are often the only contact some have with newsprint.   TMZ, Access Hollywood and Entertainment Tonight are often the only “news” shows that some people view on television.

The “fans” have an insatiable appetite for the latest gossip.   The “stars” love the spotlight.    The philosopher Tacitus said,

“Love of fame is the last thing even learned men can bear to be parted from.”

The Christian community is not immune to all of this.   What most astounds me is how preachers — not Christian athletes or Christian musicians — are the object of cult-like worship, even among people who should know better.   When some of them weigh in on an issue, You Tube embeds of their pronouncements are flying through the blogosphere faster than you can say ‘idol worship.’

We were downloading some sermon podcasts for an extended car trip on Monday, and my wife said, “I don’t want to hear anymore superstar sermons; I want to hear someone different.“   Good for her.

But our preoccupation with celebrity is not entirely limited to those of the ecclesiastical class.   We also have Jon and Kate Gosselin.    But maybe not for long.   With the announcement this week of a pending divorce, evangelicals will drop these two from their superstar ‘friends list’ like the proverbial hot potato.

That’s the price of fame.    Soon you’re forgotten.

I’m sorry everyone ignored Clive Staples Lewis’ passing on that November day in ‘63, but in some ways, it’s like he never died.    He certainly lives on through his writing, though in a celebrity saturated culture, he lives on for many because filmmakers made ‘Narnia’ into a ‘brand.’     Sigh!

Graphic:  USA Today online page
Topic Irony:  Post appearing above this one