When tragedy strikes

It is like no other thing in life to me. Tragedy just strikes. It is like a blow from a fist that you did not see coming. At first, you are stunned. You know something just happened. You know you didn't see it coming. You're trying to process it. What just happened? Then the pain starts. Ouch...that really hurts...no, that REALLY hurts. There's nothing you could have done to prevent it, there's no time for regrets. There's just that pain.

That's what death of a friend is like. That's what death is like at all when you are experiencing it as one who is left behind.

On Friday morning Angel Cuevas Hernandez passed away from us. We can no longer touch the soul that was his, we can no longer make him laugh, or wonder what will Angel do next. We just know that he has drifted away...quietly and almost peacefully.

But it still hits the rest of us like a punch in the face. I love you Angel...I miss you Angel. I feel so much pain at your passing.

Jesus didn't get the memo...

Jesus once said, "Do you think I have come to bring peace on this earth?" Well, duh...of course. unless this is a trick question...as most of them are. I'm going to say, yes. Yes, you did come to bring peace on the earth. All that beating spears into plowshares, loving your neighbor, good Samaritan stuff... Did Jesus not get the memo?

"No, I have come to bring division." Ahh crap...it was a trick question.

I read this and I am confused. Aren't you? After all what is the point of the message of reconciliation to God through Christ? What is the message of love that Jesus brought. Didn't all the miracles, all the healings, all of the stuff about seeing the father by seeing him...didn't all that intend to bring about the "kingdom on earth?" And isn't the kingdom on earth all green pastures, country songs, and lemonade on a warm afternoon? Peace, right?

It seems like it should be so, but just for one moment, try to step out and respond to what you think is the voice of God. For just one moment try to stand up and say...I think God is calling me to do ____________. Now, the crap starts flying...trust me. Following the way of Christ inevitably puts us in contradiction to 99.9% of the rest of the world. But it doesn't entitle us to scream at the world, to belittle the world, or to shove our ideas down the throats of the world. Our calling is to simply walk down the new path and follow the way of Christ. Sometimes, this quiet and humble way can put us in the way of of some pretty powerful forces. Sometimes, our path takes us into on-coming traffic. At that point, there is division...there is conflict...there is not "peace" in the external, feel good, not going to bother no-body kind of way. In fact, sometimes just following the path puts us in a place of such contradiction that others might feel threatened, judged, and alienated by us. I'm not saying we intend to do those things...but it happens.

Example...an entire wealthy family in the Atlanta area decides that they have too much, their lifestyle is too wasteful, they have to make a change. They don't ask anyone else to do it. They don't say the world of McMansions and car payments, and credit cards, and perpetual shopping sprees is bad...they just say, "we're going to try another way." They decided cut all their expenses in half and use the savings to do some really stupid things. Things like put wells in remote villages in Africa, build schools, and teach people how to make things that will lift their families out of poverty.

They didn't go around to their neighbors, family, and friends and tell them how selfish and wrong they were. They just decided that they had to do this. It was their calling, it was their responsibility. The reaction they got from their friends and from their family members outside the home was surprising...or maybe not. Many friends felt judged, even though they weren't judged. Many friends cut off communication with them or wouldn't visit them in their new, smaller, and "dangerous" neighborhood home. Many family thought they were crazy and felt like they couldn't maintain a relationship with them.

I have not come to bring peace... I don't think Jesus is really saying he sets out to bring division in the same sense that we understand these thing in our secular world. I think he is saying that we are called by Him to follow Him, and that His path for us is different. Yes, it is divided from the path of 99.9% of the rest of the world. If we choose to follow that path, it does not make us special, it does not entitle us to anything above anyone else. All it means is that we have chosen a different way. We are not on the same road...we are on the road to follow Christ. Peace will come... It will be in our hearts. It will be a peaceful and satisfied mind. It will be a peaceful soul. Why peace in the midst of confusion and division? It will come because Christ shows us that what the world cares about the most, is the stuff that matters the least. Through Christ we will know true love. We will know honest relationships. We will know that the things of this world will continue to pass away, and that as long as we continue to seek satisfaction in them, we will be hungry and thirsty. We will know that when we drink of the true cup and eat the true bread, we will never again hunger, and never again thirst.

Where is my heart?

It is easy to be angry in this world. It is easy to think that what is going on is personally directed at me. It is easy for me to think that I am the center of my world. It is what I have been taught since birth. When I cried, my mommy came to me. When I complained, something changed. When I acted up, I was quickly disciplined. My world responds to me. Therefore, I must be the most important thing in it.

Then I sit quietly for a minute, and I realize that there are a lot of things going on in the world that happen irregardless of me. For a moment I catch a glimpse of how off base my natural thinking and assumed perspective must be. I, the center of my world? The politicos, musicians, customer service representatives, all waiting for my response, my engagement, my opinion, my blessing? It sounds so absurd, but it is exactly the natural state of mind for most of us. The world is reacting to me. The world is waiting for me. The world is designed to screw me. The world is designed to support me.


I even bring this paradigm to my perceptions of God. I filter my readings of the Bible, my beliefs about Christ and what salvation and liberation are to this. I elevate myself to the very center of my universe. But not only my universe. I actually must think that I am the center of my spirituality, as well as my physical world. How lonely a place this leaves me in.

Luke, 12:34 contains the statement from Jesus "Where your treasure is, there your heart be, also." Regardless of all the treasures of this life, I think the most corrupting, the most obvious, and most likely the one at the foundation of it all for us...is the treasure of thinking it is all about me, first and foremost. I can be the grandest fighter for human rights, the greatest general on the battlefield fighting for the cause of freedom, or the nastiest criminal, or the worst human being to walk the planet...and I can still be thinking that it is all about me. I can still be of the perspective that it is all centered around me... My treasure is me.


Now imagine a world where you and I are not the center of it. Where God actually created all these things and we are but a one little part of it. It was not exactly just created for your personal enjoyment. The experience you just had in the drive through at McDonalds was not just because of you and for you. The way you were treated was not just good because you are good, or bad because the world is out to screw you...because the world is composed of human beings just like you, created by God, just like you...who have husbands and kids and worries, and joys, and thoughts about life and death, just like you.

So there's really no difference between me and you and everyone else in this world. Irregardless of socio-economic condition, our race, our religion, or the country of our birth and residence, it doesn't matter...it doesn't make us any better or worse than anyone else. We are all children of God, we are all a part of the same family of God. We are all one. Even the divisions that we emphasize like legal/illegal, rich/poor, black/white/Hispanic /Jew/gentile/Arab/Shiite/Sunni...who cares? The true treasure that our heart should be longing for is a heart that loves everyone. I don't mean the feel good, gushy, mushy love that actually has no action that comes from it. I am talking about the good Samaritan, serving and loving one another with a love that could only come from God kind of Love. The kind of Love that we have to capitalize. The kind of Love that we can't even understand or really describe very well. The kind of Love that continues to amaze us and teach us as it extends us and forces us to do things for people in the name of the God that gives us that Love.

eating with the "unclean," drinking the real Koolaid

Peter was living on the edge in Acts 11. He was eating with the enemy...the gentiles. What a travesty. There are a lot of unclean folks here amongst us. The homeless, the poor, the minimum wagers, the drug addicts, alcoholics, undocumented, and unemployed. There are probably more to add to that list, but most of these groups are somehow alienated from our churches and our communities of faith. In many ways they are alienated from community in general and are forced to form their own. Then we fault them for having "bad" influences or not "mainstreaming" by having their own counter culture. But didn't we force them into that culture to begin with?

Peter was shown in a series of visions that there is no such thing as "unclean" when it comes to people. No one we should stay away from. No one who deserves to be on the outside. These definitions, these lines in the sand are human constructs of human kingdoms designed to hoard resources and protect power. These things get in the way of God's kingdom and His purposes. How can we love our neighbor if we can't reach him/her for our own possessions, our own fences, our own borders? What is getting in the way of this most basic and central command...to love one another as God loves us?

We have worked hard and continue to work hard to exclude and define one another. We like definitions and boundaries. In the health care debate is the haves versus the have nots. In commerce it is frequently the business owners versus the employees. In immigration it is the "illegals" versus the "legals." It Alabama's gubernatorial election it is the Spanish versus English. It is our way versus their way. The problem is there will always be an us and a them until we follow God's call to Love. Love doesn't enforce boundaries and differences...it breaks them down. Our worth is not in what we own or what others don't own. It's not in how much power "we" have and how much power "they" don't have. Our worth is only measured by how much God loves us...and he doesn't love any one of us any more than anyone else...or another way...he loves us so much, that any distinction just doesn't matter.

So how do we know what we love and what we are actually worshiping? How do we know if we have "drunk the Koolaid of this world's message, or bought the true message of faith of our God?" From Revelation 21: "It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life."

Drinking from the water of this world is like drinking from a mirage, because that's all it is. The water of this world is the stuff we are taught is important from birth to death by the institutions of this world...not God. We learn from the earliest age that we are supposed to please everyone. Please our parents, please our teachers, live up to standards that we aren't supposed to question. We aren't supposed to question, just to obey and live up to someone else's standards. Where the hell did these standards come from? Not from love...not from God! We have to throw all that crap to the wind because it's not real. Approval from others isn't worth anything. We have to follow the path of love, build the real kingdom of love...nothing more...nothing less. The real water that quenches our thirst isn't worldly...it's heavenly. It's real life...real living to live a life of Love...called by God...called by Christ to live a life like Him. It is a life of asking, seeking, searching and loving...but it is not a life that checks in with everyone else before stepping out in faith and adventure.

We have to throw out our politics and replace it with the politics of Love. We have to throw out our economics and replace it with an economic system based on loving God and loving one another. We have to throw out all our selfish motives and rules in our relationships and adopt only the rule of Love.

It's not about what we put first. It's not even about priorities. It's about context and perspective. Ours has to change. If we have priorities, then we put something first, then move onto something else second, etc... That kind of hierarchy doesn't fit in when we talk about the Kingdom of God. You don't put the Kingdom on a priority list. You don't put love on a priority list. Love is not Job 1...it is the ONLY job, the only priority on the list, it is an either/or. That's what Jesus was saying when he said you can't serve two masters. We only have an either/or choice. We choose to serve Him...to serve the embodiment of Love...follow the path of Love in every case, in every part of our lives...or we choose to follow something else. No priorities...just a choice...a life long choice that has eternal and forever implications for you, for your family, for your money, your politics, your religion, for everything. If what you think you have done up until now doesn't have that kind of far reaching effect, then you haven't realized that you are only giving lip service to the idea of following a path of Love, the path of God. This choice is pervasive. This choice is eternal. This choice is fundamental.

That's why some of us have to completely start over. A house built on the wrong foundation won't stand. No matter what you do to it, unless you rebuild the foundation, you cannot strengthen the house. It will fall. That's why it's not a sad thing to tear down everything and start over. Like a surgeon going in and cutting you open...it's going to hurt, there will be pain...but there is life in that pain...there is love in all that temporary destruction...there is healing in those hands that wield such a seemingly dangerous instrument. Let God cut away, dissect us, strip us down, and build us back up the right way. Let us lay down our lives and yield to His hand. That is the only way we will truly live.

And I feel fine...

I do feel fine. Not great, not bad...but fine. There is a certain goodness to fine. A certain place where you can mourn your mom, your college friend, and your work buddy...all who died to soon...in Chattanooga, in Africa, and in Haiti...living a good life. I still miss them...but yet, I feel fine for having loved them and danced with them for a while.

I'm selfish and thank you very much.

1 Corinthians 13 is a chapter that describes what love is and what love is not. It seems so obvious that our response should be to just love the right way and get on with life. It seems so obvious that I must be missing a few steps. Nothing that really produces results is that easy. Just try P90X for a few weeks and you'll know what I mean.

So if what is the hard part? I think the hardest part is actually recognizing how I actually act towards other people. I go throughout my day treating people the way I think they should be treated in the moment. Occasionally, I recognize that I'm a little short or angry in my response to someone. But, for the most part, I'm a pretty good guy...at least I think I am. I think of others first, don't I? I do good things for people and that's o.k. isn't it?

But then I started reading a book by Anthony De Mello who says hey...you may be doing good things...but have you ever looked at WHY you are doing them? What? WHY I AM DOING GOOD THINGS? It's not enough to just do these things? Now I have to worry about WHY I am doing them?

Well De Mello has a point. He thinks that we are all basically selfish...even the "good" people, and that if we really took a good look at ourselves we would see that even our "good" and "holy" actions have some selfish motivations behind them. So I took him up on his challenge, and I started to reflect about nearly every little thing that I did. I kind of got outside of myself to think about the WHY behind even my supposedly good actions. And what did I find? To my amazement, I found that I had selfish reasons for doing even good things for people. Maybe it was because I didn't want to disappoint someone and cause myself bad feelings. Maybe it was because I wanted to look good in front of someone or I wanted to procure someones favor. But nearly every time, I could look at my actions and deep down find a selfish reason for them. Now, I had to ask myself...is that love? I mean...at least I was doing something good right? But, if it wasn't done out of love, was it really good FOR ME, I mean...for my spiritual growth...for me. Now doesn't that sound even more selfish? Maybe so, maybe not.

Now what came next is what was really...really surprising to me. I found that if I just became aware of my motivations...IF I just examined myself...not JUDGED myself...but just became aware of my motivations...somehow, almost magically I changed. I didn't try to change. I didn't say to myself..."you're a bad person because you have these motivations..." I just said..."aha...look at that...how interesting..." AND WAh-LAh, like David Copperfield waving a wand, I no longer wanted to please someone, I just wanted to do what was good. I no longer was trapped by this desire to be needed by someone else...I just wanted to love other people and do things for them. BY simply becoming aware of what was going on inside of me...I became free of my selfishness and somehow filled with love for others.

It wasn't a formula, and exercise, or anything that I did...I think it was God working though His Holy Spirit to change me and to make me aware of His Love. I can't describe WHY this spiritual change happened...I just know that it did, and I know that it can happen for you if you only become aware of what you are doing. I never felt like God was trying to make me feel bad about my motivations...If I felt like that, I would probably try to hide from them and never be free of them. Only by facing them...recognizing them...and just becoming AWARE of them...did they change. I recognized that God knows who I am...but when I faced it...when I saw it...then change in me came...I knew at that moment that God loved me just as I was and will always love me just as I am. BUT...I know that He sees who I can become when I drop all the stuff that is not LOVE...that is not HIM. When that happens, I know that I will be truly free and forever changed.

Of course, this experience wasn't a one time thing that I can now walk away from and be forever different...It was a lesson that I must always be AWARE of my motivations. It's like I need to always be looking at myself from an objective point of view to ask what is behind my actions, my thoughts, my decisions, my motivations. AWARENESS is a full time job...but the rewards and the benefits are divine.

Freedom!

In Luke 4:14-21, we have Jesus who has just returned to his home town after becoming quite famous throughout the region. He has already started his ministry and has actually performed some miracles. He has started teaching in the synagogues and has impressed everyone with his knowledge and his style. People who hear him are amazed because they haven’t heard anyone teach like he does. It’s like his words are coming alive to them and making sense. They don’t just hear the same old blah, blah, blah from the Pharisees about being clean or obeying all the rules. Suddenly…the scriptures mean something and they start to see God as THEIR God…interested in THEM…Loving them…caring about THEM both as a nation and as individuals. In the midst of extreme poverty, persecution, and living as under the power of foreign invaders, they started to have hope that they were not insignificant…their lives were not meaningless…these people were NOT worthless.

So what was so powerful about Jesus’ message? I mean, he hardly says anything…just one sentence after reading the passage from Isaiah. What was it he read?

“El Espíritu de Señor esta sobre mi,

Por cuanto me ha ungido

Para anunciar buenas nuevas a los pobres.

Me ha enviado a proclamar libertad a los cautivos

Y dar vista a los ciegos,

A poner en libertad a los oprimidos,

A pregonar el ano del favor del Señor.”

These words are incredibly powerful. They told the people that in the midst of all suffering…in the midst of all the pain…in the midst of their seemingly insignificant little lives God announces to them (and to us) that there is another way of looking at our lives. You think you are captive to your limitations? You think that being poor or uneducated or under someone else’s control keeps you from living your life to the Glory of God? Do you think that you are powerless to change this world because you don’t have equal status or because your only a woman or your only a child or your only an immigrant or your not rich or whatever? Jesus announces a new vision to the world. ¡Libertad! Freedom! Like Mel Gibson shouting in Braveheart… “Libertad a los cautivos!” You are not bound by anything. You are free…and God’s favor is upon us.

Repent!

When I was in high school, I was always invited by my Baptist friends to their revival services in the Fall and Spring. It was kind of fun, because you saw people in church that you never would have dreamed would have been interested. O.k...so I was a bit judgemental in the day too. The sermons were the same year after year no matter who was preaching them...we were going to hell and we needed to repent. It's a familiar theme when your growing up because preachers everywhere think they need to scare us straight. Sex, drugs, rock and roll...watch out youngsters...they will get your soul. I used to think that this message of "repent" meant "turn or burn." In other words, change your life now or you may die unexpectedly tomorrow and end up in hell...oooooohhhhhh....very scary stuff. And it was scary, especially if you were a hormonal teenager on the verge of committing sin every day with temptations out there trying to snag you. The devil lurked under every rock and behind every tree. Watch out!

We still think about sin and repentance in that way. But in Jesus' day there was a very different idea of repentance. Our focus is on gaining some future glory in heaven by quote "not enjoying" our life too much down here. In fact we glorify sin with our idea that we have to somehow "suffer for God" by doing right on this earth, so that we can gain treasure in heaven after we die. That idea of repentance is so limited that it completely misses the point of why we turn to God in the first place...relationship. If God is all about punishment for our screw-ups and catching us doing wrong...then what place is there for Love and Grace. If God is all about obeying the rules, then why did Jesus have such a hard time with the law abiding Pharisees? They were perfect according to the rules...but they completely missed the point.

So what is repentance if it is not turning away from whatever behaviors we have identified as the big "sins." Repentance is really waking up to a new reality. Before we wake up and realize that we live in a world where God is our Father and we are His children, we live our lives dependent on ourselves.

The prodigal son parable shows this to us so vividly. He tried so hard to "make it." We try to organize our lives and be in control. We try to save enough, earn enough, impress the right people, and acquire power and control. Left to our own devices, we will build a life that is isolated, lonely, and spiritually and emotionally poor. We become like walking corpses...in a spiritual sense. Our solutions to our most desperate problems can be things that really hurt us in the end...greed, jealousy, abuse of drugs and alcohol...these aren't behaviors that God wants us to avoid because he doesn't want us to have "fun" in this world. These are things that kill our joy and keep us from having good relationships with Him and each other. These are things that kill our soul and keep us from experiencing "heaven" on this earth.

In the parable of the prodigal son...Jesus is saying that living life dependent on yourself IS hell. You don't have to wait to go to heaven or hell... How you live your life today is either heaven or hell on this earth. The prodigal son had everything he needed at home, but he didn't realize it. It's as if his eyes were closed to the tremendous love, support, safety and community that he had. He was asleep. He just needed to wake up to his reality. His situation is no different from ours today. He thought he could do better. He thought that if only he could rely on himself, be free to follow his own path and seek his own desires, he would be so much better off than living in his father's house under his father's authority. Sometimes out of ignorance, sometimes out of pride, we think the same thing. We don't realize that the life we are wanting to live, the happiness that we are seeking, the satisfaction that eludes us, can only be found by living in relationship to our Heavenly Father and accepting the reality that He is the source of all good things.

When we accept this, and when we choose to "wake up" to this new reality, then our lives start to make sense. We begin to actually have purpose and understanding. We begin to understand our world and our place in it. The prodigal son finally got it. He tried so hard to live life under his own rules, based upon his own ideas. He tried so hard to prove that he was right...then one day...working and eating and sleeping amongst the pigs he was hired to tend to, he woke up. Suddenly, he remembered who he was:

"When he came to his senses, he said 'how many of my father's hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.' So he got up and went to his father."

He was the son of a wealthy father whose servants ate better and had better lodging than he did. All he had to do was go home. All he had to do was live as a son of his Father...all he had to do was turn around and go back home.

And when he came back, how was he treated? Jesus tells it this way..."Quick bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found."

God doesn't want us to repent so that he can punish us. We are already punishing ourselves whenever and wherever in our lives we don't give to Him. If we aren't asking God to live through us and lead us...to show us what He wants in our lives...then we are missing the blessings that we would find by living a life in Him...in relationship with Him. He loves us, and He wants to shower us with blessings...with peace and love and understanding. Let's stop fighting Him and accept our place as His sons and daughters beloved and cared for. Let's accept that we can be alive again...once we were lost...now we can be found..."bring the fattened calf and kill it...let's have a feast and celebrate." May our lives be feasts shared with God and each other and may our celebration spill over to the entire world.

I question my baptsim

Do you know what baptism is? When I was a young baby, my parents carried me down the aisle of to a smiling and expectant pastor. He eagerly took me, said some words over me, and sprinkled water on my head. Then, just as happy as can be, he held me up for the congregation to see...like Simba in the movie, The Lion King. And the people cheered...or at least they smiled and oohed and ahhed. Another right of passage in an otherwise pretty dull and regular church service. It's a tradition complete with relatives from out of town, the choosing of God-parents, and sometimes fun parties and receptions. But, if you read the words that we recite during this otherwise cutesy little ceremony, you might get a little scarred about what we are actually committing to here.

I mean when is the last time you "renounced the spiritual forces of wickedness" or "rejected the evil powers of this world" or "resisted evil, injustice and oppression in whatever form they present themselves?" It's almost comical how serious all of this sounds. I mean, I was a baby for goodness sakes, and my parents...I mean they weren't like superheroes going around resiting evil and spiritual forces of wickedness...were they? And us today. When we renew our vows, are we going to do that? Are we going to seriously leave this place today and go fight some kind of holy spiritual war? What does all this really mean to us...today and in our every day lives? What does baptism really mean...and how does it change us or affect who we are?

When I was in middle school I started to notice certain brands. First came the alligator... If you didn't wear a shirt, a jacket, or a shoe with an alligator on it, then you just weren't cool. You weren't hip, you didn't fit in. Next came the polo player on a horse...Polo. Same thing. If you didn't wear those or didn't have a closet full of those clothes, then you just weren't right. You didn't fit in. Not only that...but we want to look like those models on TV who are so happy, so rich, so together...all because they not only wear the Polo clothes...but they live the Polo lifestyle...whatever that is. They sail yachts...they ride horses...they drive expensive cars...they are good looking... We want that and we think that if we put on that shirt...we can put on the Polo life.

We wear Crimson and white or blue and orange so we can brand ourselves as an Alabama or an Auburn fan. We are a citizen of BAMA nation...we have BAMA values... We shout WAR Eagle to perfect strangers...and they shout it back to us. We fit in...we're a part of a community! We want to fit in to a larger group. We crave acceptance. We need to know who we are...we are Alabama Fans...we are Auburn Fans.

Our kids need the latest cell phone, ipod touch, or PDA so that they can show they are indeed smart, hip, and a trend setter. We think that if we have whatever is new, whatever is cool, whatever is stylish...we will be looked up to, we will fit in, we will be accepted by the people who do the accepting in this society. But in fact, we're all just trying desperately to fit in, to be loved, and to follow whoever or whatever is making the rules up about who is cool/worthy/respected.

And here we are today...Baptism Sunday...remembering a day when we put on a Spiritual identity. Sure its not polo or Izod or the latest fashion...it's a 2000 year old tradition of taking on the Spiritual mark...the Spiritual brand of our creator, our Lord, and our Saviour. We are saying that we take on His values, His culture, His world view. But we are also accepting that God is putting His mark on us. He is accepting us as His children. We no longer have to worry about fitting in to some group and adopting someone else's values...we are a part of God's family, God's Kingdom, and we can know who we are by remembering who He says we are.

And who are we according to God? Adopted sons and daughters, loved and accepted. We are loved enough for Him to pursue us...not when we get our lives straight, or fix ourselves up to look presentable. We are acceptable and loved just as we are today. For "while we were yet sinners...Christ died for us..."