Here and Now

ARGH - I seem to use that word a lot with Blogger... Though, this time it's not Blogger's fault... I was working on a post the other day and had to leave it half done (did I "save as draft? heh, of course not) and while I was away from the computer (youth event, day off, busy day...) the power went down, my machine rebooted and I lost it...sigh... It was very profound and deep...connecting the our hopes and dreams and the meaning of life with our existential need to understand this material world and our spiritual nature and the ever-unchanging, never completely knowable God... Guess you'll have to settle for what's left in my brain today... The Kingdom of God is present right now. Right here (wherever your right here is, of course). The kingdom of God is the people of God being Christ-like here and now... Here's a start for today: “...and today there is a man in shepherd’s clothes, a hippie, all dirty, with a downed bike in the circle lawn across the s...

The kingdom is present with us - and is yet to come... What does that mean? Here's an idea... Have you ever heard someone talk about potential? You know, "That kid has the potential to be a great ." It's partly there - whatever "it" is. The great ability to hit the golf ball, the ease of reducing complex ideas, the mastery of the language, the proficiency on the instrument. When I was in high school I was on the track team (okay, I threw shot put and was a founding member of "the Big Belly Brothers" but that's another story, okay?) and I remember there was this girl named Amy Rudolph. She was like in 6th or 7th grade or something when I was in high school but the girl could run. As I remember it, she would routinely beat the high school girls in distance running and by the time I graduated (I think she was on the track team by then...) she was beating EVERYBODY - boys, girls, men, women... In middle school, she had potential. It was apparent....

Okay - I've danced around this one long enough. Would Jesus be a liberal today? Dunno. Don't care...at the moment. Jesus was the absolute definition of a liberal in His time. He stood AGAINST everything that was wrong with society, people, religion, culture. Jesus was counter-cultural, but not in a hippie way, he was a libertarian, but not in a Timothy Leary way (am I showing my age, how about Dennis Leary? Still showing my age? How about...oh, I give up), he was kind of hermit-ish, but not in a Unibomber way, he was certainly reformer, but not in a Martin Luther way... Jesus was liberal. He gave of himself, liberally. He loved liberally. He forgave liberally. He welcomed liberally. He RELATED liberally... But he wasn't content with anyone just making a show of being in relationship - with each other, or with God. Jesus' "rules" are way stricter - even though they are way less restricting. You see - it's much easier to be nice to somebody I hate th...

Okay - I pulled out my notes from the week I spent at Pittsburgh Project (well, the notes that I could FIND...ARGH!!) and I'll be putting in a couple of pretty long posts here and now... So, I'm reading these books at the Project: Brian McLaren's The Secret Message of Jesus and Christian Scharen's One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to Those Seeking God and there's a whole new idea of the Kingdom of Heaven forming in my brain - but I don't have it all down yet...some, but not all (and I might never) but I'm wrestling with it... It's not easy when your whole understanding of how things really are shifts... I mean I always BELIEVED what Steve Taylor (et.al.) was saying in Chagall Guerera: Escher's World Chagall Guerva Through the passing strange I fell to the wide-eyed opposite my agenda was hidden well now I don't know where I left it I woke up in Escher's World today my mother said it was ok Up's down, down is out, out is in stairways circl...

My friend Mike Airgood is having a crappy day (um, can I type crappy here? Oops, twice...um...) Talk about Grace and real life. Stuff that he can't do anything about (hurt his back - boy can I relate) and stuff he didn't even do that he's getting yelled at for... And (while I don't entirely fit in any category for his open "dear John" letter from the American church) his very next post ends up being about love... I know Mike's not feeling too much grace today...from people. I hope he knows that there are a few of us that will ALWAYS extend the open hand, that there are a few of us who will ALWAYS try to repent and forgive, whichever is necessary, because relationship is WAY more important than being right or wrong. I just read some posts by some people who see any formal gathering of "the church" as being anti-christ. What they say is that Jesus never wanted buildings and bands and organs and choirs and 1,000 people (or, presumably, 27 people...

The Lust, the Flesh, the Eyes and the Pride of Life The 77s Well, I feel Like I have to feel Something good all of the time With most of life I cannot deal But a good feeling I can feel Even though it may not be real And if a person, place or thing can deliver I will quiver with delight But will it last me for all my life Or just one more lonely night The lust, the flesh The eyes And the pride of life Drain the life Right out of me Well, I see something and I want it Bam! Right now! No questions asked Don't worry how much it costs me now or later I want it and I want it fast I'll go to any length Sacrifice all that I already have And all that I might get Just to get Something more that I don't need And Lord, please don't ask me what for The lust, the flesh The eyes And the pride of life Drain the life Right out of me And I love when folks Look right at me And what I'm doing Or have done And lay it on about How groovy I am And that I'm looking grand And every...

I'm so frustrated. I lost all of my notes from Pittsburgh Project. All of the morning quiet time sheets (ARGH I was going to USE some of them for worship...) and some quotes and some other notes... Okay - I'm getting over it. I still have the LONG handwritten stuff. I'll get that posted at some point... Lori was gone from Thursday night to Saturday night - so I was Mr. Mom this weekend. It was good. I started writing again (okay, so this is writing - but I mean fiction...). Not that it's any good, but it felt good to just create. I wonder if that's how God felt "in the beginning..." I mean, what I've written will never be published - but I made it. It's all from me. And I like it. And I realize that it was God who gave me the talent, the inspiration, the ability. Do you suppose that we have this drive toward creative expression because we imitate the God who created us? Wow - that didn't come out right. How about this. MAYBE, the ...

I spent the last week at the Pittsburgh Project. Didn't have a lot of free time, but I did manage to hand write 11 pages of, well, ranting about things - mostly the need for our church culture to be more inclusive and less restrictive... I'm having a strange zeitgeist-shift here (if I can mis-apply a term I never really came to terms with in seminary...). My friends would say I'm becoming more liberal... I'm inclined to think my friends might be right... and that's okay. Maybe Jesus is a liberal... So, though I don't have time today to deal with transcribing the 11 pages (plus the three or four I wrote last night waiting for my wife outside of the Milcreek Mall). I gotta get worship stuff together soon for Sunday night - not to mention Lori and I are singing Sunday morning for the 10 AM service (so she wants to practice this afternoon) and I have to pull stuff together for praise band practice in a couple of hours. So, why am I on my blog? Hmmm.... Later...

Post from: Thursday, January 26, 2006 Bono on Grace (with a little C.S. Lewis on top) I'm reading this book of interviews with Bono and here's his take on grace (I know it's all over the web, but this is good stuff): Assayas: I think I am beginning to understand religion because I have started acting and thinking like a father. What do you make of that? Bono: Yes, I think that's normal. It's a mind-blowing concept that the God who created the universe might be looking for company, a real relationship with people, but the thing that keeps me on my knees is the difference between Grace and Karma. Assayas: I haven't heard you talk about that. Bono: I really believe we've moved out of the realm of Karma into one of Grace. Assayas: Well, that doesn't make it clearer for me. Bono: You see, at the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics—in physical laws—eve...

Okay - the final installment in Grace series (though there will be an APPENDIX following this - it will be a repost of an entry about Grace I posted in January). Sanctifying Grace - the work of the Holy Spirit - Sustaining Grace... I was talking with the person who asked me to do these "Grace Talks" at our confirmation retreat and originally she had asked me to present "Sanctifying Grace." "But," she said with a look of concern on her face, "I think that's the hardest one to talk about." I don't know if that's the case. Maybe. We'll see. It SHOULD be the easiest to talk about out of our experience. After all, it is sanctifying grace that gets us through from day to day and leads us more and more toward the perfection that God wants for us. Hebrews 6:1a Therefore let us go on toward perfection Go toward Perfection - to Quote Hebrews. That's a Wesley thing, right out of our Book of Discipline - "Are you going on toward per...

Heh - little oxymoron for a Wed. morning... Anyway, I've been away for a week plus on a mission trip - a work camp in Pittsburgh, PA called "The Pittsburgh Project." http://www.pittsburghproject.org I got to re-roof two porches and build a deck extension on the back porch of a house, as well as do some painting. That was the physical labor we did that week. Spiritually, I finally had a homeowner who was open and appreciative and talked about her faith. Mrs. Gray was wonderful - and she, and the staff at the project, encouraged the work the kids did last week (even though we made some mistakes - and some were my fault and I knew better and yet I goofed up anyway...sigh...). The work wasn't perfect...but what is neat about the project is that if you get the right combination of kids, adult worksite leaders and homeonwer, the work becomes more than just a roof on a porch - it becomes an expression of love and faith. So, we had a good week. I've been reading B...