Bob Hamp

It is our own misunderstanding of Jesus’ mission and message that has us continually needing to release the next update of “church”.  Cultural relevance, whether it is an adjustment to the Reformation or to Post-Modernism should never be the target.  If cultural relevance must be the target then let’s define the culture rightly.  To what culture should we be conforming?  The edgy new culture that is arriving on the scene? The traditional culture which many find difficult to release?  Here is how Jesus would answer this question.

“When you pray, pray like this;  Our Father (Source, Origin) in Heaven (Whose culture is the Spiritual realm) hallowed be Your Name (You belong at the center of all things).  Your Kingdom come (may the culture of the Heavenly Realm, the Presence of your Nature, be the thing that we conform to) your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven (please be the shaping and transforming power that restores to earth and all its’ inhabitants, the original design of creation).

Because the Knowledge of Good and Evil has shaped our understanding and perceptual pathways we associate God with the Traditions from which we are trying to extricate ourselves, instead of associating Him with the Life-Giving encounters the whole world is starved for.

God heartily invites us to spend our day moving in His life-soaked presence.  We fear He wants us to give up fun stuff.  God urges us to let go of the things which choke our soul. We fear He wants to control us.  God offers us a connection to the very Force that brought all things into existence.  We fear He wants us to be slaves.

Listen again this week to the teachings of Jesus.  Though He occasionally instructed us about navigating the Earth-realm; overwhelmingly, the bulk of His teaching had much more to do with the Nature and Availability of the Heavenly Realm.  “The Kingdom of Heaven is like...” is not a statement which introduces institutional principles.  It is the beginning of a description of a place that He has been and we have not.  It is the description of a place that is available to us in our day to day lives.

Let’s not change what the church does again.  Let’s change instead, the realm and the Source from which we operate.

I wanted to interrupt this current series to let everyone know that “Think Differently Live Differently” is now available as an ebook on the sweet new iBookstore. iPhone and iPad users can download immediately from the bookstore.
In order to get the word out I am starting this out at an introductory price of only $7.99. If you have friends or family for whom you were planning to get this book, this is a perfect way to get it to them.
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Thanks for your ongoing encouragement and for continuing to share how this book has impacted your life.

Keep ‘em coming!

If I read one more article about a pastor who had a “moral failure” I think I will cry.   Sad as this phenomena is, it is the constantly inadequate advice of the christian community that makes me much more sad.  We give advice to others to help prevent such failures in the future.  We often suggest a variety of strategies (knowledge of good?), implying that these steps would help men and women “win the spiritual battle.”  Amazingly, it is the same advice that has been offered for decades with little discernible impact.  Often those who fall have themselves given others these strategies.  Expertise in human effort is not sufficient to win a spiritual battle.  I fear that our propensity to offer these steps to men and women is one of the most significant things we must address in this cultural shift which is the modern church culture.  We must learn to stop calling things that are flesh, spirit, and stop calling things that are spirit, flesh.

Jesus had a phrase He used to uproot faulty religious thinking.  “You have heard it said do not commit adultery, but I say to you don’t even look on a woman with lust.  When you look at another with lust in your heart, you have committed adultery already.  This pattern was used throughout His sermon on the mount to help the people of His day think differently.  Many heard this and only thought different, not differently (See the entry from March 26, 2009; Adjective or Adverb…).  Jesus was not making a new and harder set of laws, He was trying to shift the understanding of His audience as to where the actual problems resided.  The problems were not simply outward behaviors which must be managed, by changing behavior, they were conditions of the heart which desperately needed to be acknowledged and transformed.

I would like to address the false sense of security we derive and pass on, from offering a few common“solutions” to winning the war in our hearts.  We must help one another so that Jesus would not say to us what He said to Nicodemus in John chapter 3. “You are a teacher of Israel, and you do not understand these things”.  Jesus made this statement when Nicodemus was clearly confused by Jesus distinction between flesh and Spirit.  It is crucial for our ability to truly turn the tide that we become people who can see and know the difference between flesh, and spirit.

1. You have heard it said memorize more scripture but I say to you learn to let the living and active word of God renew your mind.  The first implies that if you somehow exert more memory power, and retain more scriptural data you will be able to act differently.  This actually seemed to backfire for the Pharisees, who had the entire Bible memorized but were the number one enemy of the Abundant Life that Jesus offered.

Renewing our mind does not mean replacing wrong data with right data, the knowledge of evil, with the knowledge of good.  Paul tells us that the problem with law is that it does not have the power to transform us.  Memorizing scripture alone can simply become law, and still leaves the power of transformation in human hands, and therefore human limitations.

When God speaks He is creating.  Engage the Voice not just the letter.  Don’t just learn the data of scripture, learn to think and see like the Author.  Let the words on the pages connect you to the Person of the Kingdom.  Allow Him to point out core lies, deception in the deep places of your heart.  Deception about Him and deception about you, and about the nature of reality.   More important allow Him to tell you truth.  Even identifying lies is not sufficient to change our behavior without the corresponding truth coming in to replace the lies.

2. You have heard it said have more consistent time alone with God but I say to you when you are alone with Him practice internal surrender.  What happens during your time with God matters more than how  much time you spend.  Jesus compared two guys, both of whom were praying.  One was telling God how glad he was that he was not a bad guy, and sharing his moral resume.  Certain that God was impressed, he prayed and spent time with God.   The other stood before God, and languished in his need.  He unashamedly told God he deserved nothing, and knew that his spritual resume was a declaration of his need for help. Both were spending time with God.

Jesus came to set the captives free, not to advise us about His moral preferences.  The restoration of our hearts, not the disciplnes of our flesh, will transform our outward experience.  Let Him heal the wounds of our lives, let Him exchange our heart of stone for His heart of flesh.  Let Him do His work, instead of telling Him how well you have done yours.

3.  You have heard it said practice accountability but I say to you the Holy Spirit comes to convict us of sin and righteousness and judgment, let Him do His job in you. While it is true that Jesus tells us that in God’s economy the opposite of evil is truth not good, (John 3: 20-21) truth sometimes eludes us in our limited sight.  Even when we are trying to be ruthlessly accountable we cannot confess to another the things hidden deeply in our hearts that we ourselves have yet to see.

Simply being able to tell another when we mess up is not sufficient to stop us from messing up.  And even if it prevents us from behaving badly, it is unlikely to transform the content and processes of our heart.  Fear or respect of another’s probing eyes may hold the beast at bay, but it does not have the power to crucify it.  When the Holy Spirit brings to light darkness in us, and shows us that this darkness is no longer compatible with our new nature the darkness is put to death, and the Holy Spirit ignites the righteousness of Christ in me.

4.  You have heard it said maintain your integrity but I say to you learn how to take dominion, and practice your authority as a son or daughter of the Living God.  Somehow in our recomendations to one another we leave out one of the most siginificant aspects of Jesus framework of thought.  He clearly recognized and engaged a whole realm of reality that I will call “the invisible world”.  This is part of the creation that Adam was tasked with taking dominion over.  This is still our assignement to this day.

I remind us again Jesus came to set captives free.  If a man or woman is under the influence of another kingdom and has no idea what Jesus has done to grant us authority in this life, and how to practice this authority we remain under the influence.

In Jesus teachings on the sermon on the mount He was not discarding the first part of the “you have heard it said” statements, He was trying to reveal the hidden traps behind the statements.  I am in no way suggesting that we throw out Bible study, time with God, accountability and integrity.  I am, however strongly urging us that salvation and freedom are the acts of God in our lives, not the result of arm-wrestling behavior, thoughts and emotions into submission.  Behavior management has never been the objective, transformation of the inner man, and the restoration of God’s created design in our souls is the objective.  To offer the four solutions mentioned above as if they are sufficient for living the life we are called to, is like urging a man to swing on a trapeze, telling him the nets below will catch him if he falls, but neglecting to tell him that the nets are not anchored to their support and therefore will not hold his weight.

God did not send His Son to command us to behave like someone we are not, He sent Him to restore our factory settings so we might behave and think and feel like who He is in us.

So when most people think of Christians what do they think of?  How is it that God’s offer of hope to the world has become known by so many satirical images?  Rigid, judgmental, simple, one dimensional closed minded;  all pictures that much of the world conjures up when picturing those who profess Christianity.  How did this happen?  I think we must consider two factors;  the war against truth, and the knowledge of good and evil.  All the other factors, such as culture and politics, media and education, are simply tools in the war.  The real war takes place beyond the veil…let’s not fool ourselves.

If we want to examine the state of flux in the church today, most conversations will attempt to answer the question, how has the church lost relevance, and what must be done to regain it?  The sad irony is that the most likely answers are modern resurrections of the very reasons that the church becomes irrelevant.

You cannot set people free from the knowledge of good and evil by modernizing your knowledge of good. The war the church has fought historically has not been our failure to maintain a culturally relevant presentation.  It has always been the same war.  Are we turning desperately needy people back to a real and meaningful answer, or are we looking for ways to present the knowledge of good in a better more relevant package, hoping people will finally “get it right.”

More exciting knowledge of good.  More technologically savvy knowledge of good.  More edgy knowledge of good.  More flashy knowledge of good.  More doctrinally accurate knowledge of good.  What is the common theme?

No matter what the method or presentation, human capability, and the clever or persuasive urging for men to use their own resources to please God, is still returning to the foundational problem that Adam and Eve carried out of the Garden.  They left us all to live out of the powerless, death-filled, man centered knowledge of good and evil.  My knowledge, and your knowledge no matter how it is presented, communicated and motivated is simply an insufficient answer.  Once the new package fades, the answer is still insufficient and the ever-present Hope of the world hangs in the air, still and always available to those who come to know that in and of themselves they are stuck.

Relevance is not a cultural issue.  It is a human issue.  Respond to the real need of the human race with an open door to the Creator of the universe, and the Source of all Life and you will be relevant in any culture.  Re-package religion and you will simply take the next step in an ongoing cycle.

More to come…

The response to last weeks post has been encouraging.  The appetite for change, the desire and expectation of “turning the tide” is high.  In a season like this we need a strong balance of two things; passion to fuel a lasting change, and focus to be sure we are aiming our passions at the right target.  Many of you have been stirred by that post and asked the question, “so what do we do now?” I want to answer that question with a series of posts to help us with the “focus” part of the equation.  Get stirred up, but let us all aim at the right target.  Let’s change the thing that needs to be changed.

Change is accelerating in every arena of existence and at an unprecedented rate.  Today, regardless of what arena you operate in massive shift is happening.  It is not just the United States, and it is not just human society.  It’s even more than just the natural world.  Politics, economy, human perversion, human achievement, natural phenomena, and the world religious climate, all these and many other arenas are in a state of upheaval.  I am fairly sure we need not fear, but I am equally sure we should tune in and be wise.

It is especially important to really understand what is going on in the religious climate.  I am not referring here to the thrust of Islam into multiple societies and the impact of the Muslim culture in those societies.   I do think this is an impactful change, and one we should not ignore, but not the one  I think we should most draw our attention to.

It is the Christian church that I think we need to attend to.  In many of the major Christian groups, change is happening, and it should happen on purpose.  Not just on purpose but on target.

People are leaving church. Church is changing.  It is difficult to miss this exodus.  In many instances, churches are leaving church.  Institutionalized Christianity is in a shake up.  One of my good friends declares, and I think rightly, “people are not leaving God, they are just leaving church.”  In fact, I would go a step further.  I think many are searching for God, and this search is part of the exodus.

As a result of this departure, as traditional forms of church lose people in large numbers, other churches are growing rapidly.  People who see this shift are trying to answer the question, “what do we need to do differently?”  “How can we attract these people to our church?” Churches and church leaders are also searching for answers.  It is this search that has me intrigued, excited and more than a little concerned.

As a counselor, I am familiar with change.  I am familiar with the kind of change that brings about problems, and the kind of change that solves problems.  I am particularly familiar with the kind of change people seek to implement when they become aware of problems.  It is this kind of change that can easily escalate disintegration, and precedes an individual or family seeking professional help.

It looks like this;  the problem(s) become evident.  Someone, or several someones define the problem whether consciously or unconsciously.  Sometimes they define it intentionally, sometimes they define it reactively.   Either way, this is a very important step.  The way the problem is defined directly affects the nature of the solutions that will be applied.  If the problem is defined incorrectly, every subsequent step will increase the intensity and complexity of the problems.

We are now at the stage on these changes in institutional Christianity where we can begin to examine the important questions.  Have the problems been defined rightly, and are these defintions leading to solutions that will bring about the desired change?

I see that most groups have tried to define the problem as this; the church as it was, had become irrelevant to the culture as it is.  Now the answers begin to flow.  We need to adjust the message, we are seen as too judgmental.  We need to adjust our services, people are not interested, or tittilated.   We need to adjust our technology, our strategy, or our look.  You name it, we should change it.  Whatever it is that people believe has made us irrelevant, can be adjusted.

This is the other thing I know about change.  As a counselor, I was more often helping people solve bad solutions.  By the time they were ready to pay my bill, the solutions they had been attempting had become far worse than the problem they had begun with.  The husband who was dissatisfied with his wife, decided to criticize her into changing, or the man who was unhappy with his life, decided to drink to deal with his unhappiness.  These and countless other “solutions”  can turn fairly simple problems into complex, systemic disintegration.

When solutions have become problems, it is time to go back and examine the definitions of the problems.  The longer people wait to redefine problems the more deeply entrenched the bad solutions become.  In my next several posts, I am going to ask the question…what is the target for the change we need?

I was hearing another horror story, but this time I was hearing two things at once.  And this time I ended with hope.  While I was hearing the story with my ears, a storm was brewing inside my heart, and I was not in charge of it.  Sometimes storms clear the air, and cleanse the countryside.  This one did.

After twenty years of counseling I have heard stories.  Any counselor that stays with it, and keeps their heart in the game has heard stories that break their heart.  Hard stories are one thing.  It is the horror stories that will turn your heart, send you running from the room, make you enraged, or crush you and whatever lame answers you think you might have.  But God.  But God, who isn’t done, and who will have the final word.  But God, who seems to have the ability to bring beauty from ashes.  It is no coincidence that God wrote the promise of beauty from ashes, to a people who lost a whole generation in the ovens of Hitler’s killing machine.  Ashes indeed.

My point is that the reality of human and spiritual evil results in real circumstances.  Real circumstances that are nothing short of atrocity.  And my second point is that God will have the last word.

This last week, as I listened to one more horror story, I believe in the midst of the horror, I heard God speak.  Here is what He said.

Bob, (He calls me that…) it is time to turn the tide in the battle against evil.  It is time that the influence of my people on the earth begin to overshadow and overtake the influence and actions of the kingdom of darkness.  You have listened and cared long enough, it is now time for Me (God) to respond to the cries of my people.

Now, I (Bob) am adding a lot of verbage to this, as God is short on words and long on meaning.  What I heard was laden with understanding more than words.  But here is what I understood.  Some of what I understood was just for me, and I may or may not share at a different time.  Some of what I understood was for me personally regarding this message, and I will write.  But much of what I heard, I believe was for us.  Lots of us.  The us who read these posts, and a bunch of us’s that don’t.

First He said, “Stop whining and clean up your act”.  This one was for me, but help yourself if it speaks to you.  His point was that I thought I was in some pain, until I heard the story.  My pain is a scratch, but I had made it big.  I had focused on it. I gave it authority in my life, and was using it as an excuse for laziness, and maybe even a little bitterness.  Clean up my act, was not about avoiding bad behavior, it was about getting into fighting shape.  No hindrances, no distractions.

Second, He said “Don’t coast now“.  I have gotten some things done in the past few years.  Much of it was far more than I had dared to dream.  I didn’t realize it, but in my self-pity, I was coasting.  The scoreboard looked pretty good, but I was acting like there were only thirty seconds left on the clock. The reality is,  Half-time is ending.  I felt that He said to play the second half smarter than the first.  Not harder, smarter.    Don’t coast, play to win, don’t play to “not lose”.

Third, He said, “it is time to turn up the heat in the spiritual battle.“  Herein lies the need to play smarter.  I am not referring to some fleshy, or soulish pep rally.  Too long we have tried to fight spiritual battles with human ideas.  God is not looking for us to “do” more now, He is looking for us to “abide” more.

I began to see a picture.  Like the end time battle in the valley of Armageddon, God’s presence will win the war.  In my twenty years of hearing stories I have been constantly frustrated by something.  The kingdom of darkness cheats.  It lies, it deceives, and it does not play fair.  It operates in individuals, families, and various groups.  Some groups are organized and intentionally evil.  Others are chaotic and just destructive.  Often these groups operate in secret.  Shadowy organizations kidnap children and sell them for slavery, or sexual profiteering.  Angry and cruel people meet in backrooms and alleys and plot destruction.  Secret and dark, this kingdom operates in shifting shadows.

We don’t.  We stand in the light.  We proclaim who we are.  We don’t lie, we refuse to cheat, heck we are cautious of even appearing to cheat. We hide nothing and we play with integrity, even when it seems like cheaters get ahead.

Can I tell you what I am tempted to do when I hear the stories?  I want to go buy weapons, do a little research and go kick a little butt.  I want to employ investigators and force, and pry open the lid they hide under and make them pay.  It is a great temptation to just go get ‘em.  But here is what I have learned.  In a spiritual war, you cannot fight fire with fire.  You cannot fight evil with evil’s favorite weapons.  Paul tells us, “do not be overcome by evil, instead, overcome evil with good.”

Jesus, we are told, went about doing good to all men, and undoing the works of the devil.

Oh, wait.  I’ve seen Him then.  He occupies a petite Indian woman in Mumbai, who gets down in the dirt to hug a child ravaged by the sex trade. In that girl, Jesus hugs children, embraces prostitutes and listens to the horror stories.  Then He does good to them and undoes the works of the devil.  He teaches them how to live free, financially and spiritually.  And after she allows Jesus to do this through her, the geography that she occupies is filled with God’s presence.

I’ve heard of His work in China.  He occupies a team of men and women who step into the lives of the confused and hurting and present God to them.  No, I don’t mean they tell people about Christianity.  I mean they are inhabited by God.  And they present Him.  Sickness runs away from them, and oppressed people are made free.  And after they allow Jesus to do this through them, the Geography they occupy is filled with God’s presence.

I’ve seen Him stand on a stage and declare to people without hope that hope has just arrived.  I’ve seen Him occupy a man who was once a slave to appetites that were destroying him.  I have seen Jesus demonstrate through this man, to hundreds who are still enslaved that they can be free.  And when he leaves the stage, the geography of that room is filled with God’s presence.

Get it?

Jesus declared to the people of ancient Israel that the presence of God had come back to the earth.  The Kingdom of God came to rule over things that had ruled over the people God made.  Jesus came and told sickness to go away. And it did.  He told demons to flee.  And they did.  He loved the unlovable.  And they received love.  Then those people gave to others what they had received.

The mistake made by the crusaders of the 12th century is still made today by some.  They thought God wanted us to conquer on His behalf.  God proposes rather that we be the conquered ones.  Not geography, but hearts.  One human at a time.  When we are conquered, the geography that we inhabit is filled with God’s presence in and through us.

Love that cannot be vanquished and sent running because of persecution.  Peace that cannot be dispersed by the chaos of darkness.  Like the Jews in the death camps who, speaking of their captors said “they can make us do a lot of things, but they cannot make us hate” we are called to allow Jesus to live through us.

Here is the picture.  There is a light in the darkness, and it is in you.  There are other lights out there.  Turn on your high beams.  Turn up your lumens.  Shine bright enough that your light begins to connect with the light nearby.  Leave no room for darkness.  Hope when it seems silly.  Love when no one else does.  Be radically inhabited.  I am glad for the number of social justice movements that exist and are growing.  Stand for right, and stand for the defenseless.  But always stand as a container.  Don’t go do something for God.  Do something from God.

Here is what I think I heard God say.  In our lifetime the tide can turn.  Not because we get smarter or even more determined, but because we connect to the source of life, power and love, and allow it to pour out of you in great measure. Now is the time.

Ready?

WARNING: Spoiler Alert.  Do not read yet if you are going to see the movie “Inception” and do not want to know the story.

I saw the movie “Inception” last week, and enjoyed the cinematic aspects of a cleverly thought out, well depicted story.  It is an amazingly well done movie.  It is the idea at the center of the movie that I would like to discuss a bit.

As simply as I can state it, the movie unfolds a plot to change a significant world circumstance, by hiring an expert to enter into the psyche of the man who had authority over this circumstance.  This expert was assigned to penetrate the mind of the man via his dream states.  The concept is that the “inception” of an idea must be planted so deeply in his mind that he considers the idea his own, and believes it with enough conviction to act on the idea, even when the implanted idea seems contrary to what he may have previously believed.  With the need to generate a “new” belief, the team of experts unfolds a highly complex plot to induce a 10 hour dream state, so that within the dream, another dream state can be induced, and then, within that, yet another. Penetrating three levels of his psyche, they hope to implant the idea in a very deep place of his mind.

The rest of the movie depicts the strategies and interplay of not just three but four layers of dream states, and the various confrontations of deep human mental projections, as they collide, while this team of experts negotiates the mental map of the subject, in order to deeply implant a life-shifting, world-changing idea.

It’s a great story line, and the complexity of it is played out and acted superbly.  Here is my problem with it.

You and I know how a belief changing, new idea can be generated and implanted in a moment while we are wide awake.

It’s called “revelation”.

The word “inception” in this movie refers to the generation and implanting of an idea that did not previously exist.  Obviously such an idea must come from the outside of the mind.  The only thing inside our mind, is…well…already there, hence, it cannot be new. If I make a suggestion to you, or give you information that you did not previously have, all you can really do is receive and integrate this information through channels that are…already there, and you guessed it, (maybe because you already knew?) it is not going to be transformational, only informative.

What if communication from God, was just like the same power that created the cosmos?  What if God speaking is a completely different process than human speech?  The book of Genesis (Genesis meaning the beginning of something that did not exist before…) contains the record of God making everything.  The beauty is, that He makes this everything out of nothing. Even more, He does this simply by speaking. The Genesis or Inception of all things and ideas came from the speech process of God.  You know, the same God who is still speaking today.  Follow this thought.

The same God who spoke all things into existence, breathed over His vocal chords and into the inanimate dirt and Adam became. Literally became a self.  A self that did not exist before.  That same Adam had the breath knocked out of him when he decided and committed to the idea that his knowledge could be sufficient to replace the life giving, Genesis inducing Breath of God.  No knowledge, no matter how good, or evil could reproduce the function of the Breath of Life.

God, seeing the trap that mankind was in, invites the nation of Israel to join him at the top of a mountain in the desert.  He tells Moses that if they will hear Him they will also believe. (Exodus 19:9) This is not simply because God is persuasive, it is because the voice of God generates new realities and can cause the inception of an idea that did not previously exist.  His voice can penetrate multiple layers of our psyche and create a new belief that did not previously exist.  And all of this while we are wide awake.

We read in Deuteronomy 8:3 that man shall live by “everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord”.  This tells us that what comes from God’s mouth is more that data and ideas, it is substance, and it is substantial.  That which comes from God’s mouth is enough to sustain every aspect of our lives.  Any biologist will tell you that this requires something new. Today’s life cannot be sustained by yesterdays oxygen and fuel.  It requires the inception of new fuels.

Finally, we see this most important of ideas in the book of Romans (10:17) .  Faith (the substance of things not seen before) comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ.  Another way to say this is that the kind of ideas that deeply implant, change a belief, and thereby change circumstances are generated anew when God speaks and humans hear.

Be careful how you hear this.  If you hear me meaning that you should always follow the advice given by God’s scriptures, you will have missed the difference between our knowledge of good, (or evil), and hearing afresh the breathed and spoken voice of God in your present moment.  When God speaks, He is always creating.  When you hear Him, you are being created again within.  New things are coming and old things are, well, passing away.

I have seen people walk away free from a history of pain or trauma, and I have seen people receive ideas or strategies that change not only themselves but the world around them.  In fact, I see all of these things on a regular basis.  No complex plots.  No negotiating of the human psyche.  No dream states.  I see this kind of deep and transformational changes every day when people ask a simple question.

God what are you saying to me right now.

I enjoyed the movie “Inception”.  This is not a criticism of a movie, or a religious rejection of some perceived “evil”.  This movie was an amazing display of multiple talents and ideas, and very well done.  At the core, this movie simply showed us, when cut off from revelation as an option, we are left with the need to amass knowledge and strategy and to work complex levels of thought processes, in order to attempt what God can do with a syllable.  And no matter how many layers deep the characters went, the best they could generate was still death.  The movie was a great portrayal of the inadequacy of man to be his own source.

The beauty of growing up is that our world gets bigger.  We see things we couldn’t see before, and we see old things in new ways.  I am interrupting the series on thinking like a child, because today….this is how I am thinking.

In the last five weeks, my wife and I have covered a lot of geography.  More than covering geography, our world has gotten bigger.

In the last five weeks, we have gone from Texas, to California to Michigan, to Colorado, and will soon head back to Texas.

In California we were a part of a conference with an international ministry reaching out to hurting people around the globe.  The vision and the people were captivating, and very God-like.  The Coastal highway was also captivating, and also very God-like.  It stretched on seemingly endlessly, and the beauty, though constant was never the same from one mile to the next.

Back to Michigan, we spent time at a big church in a small town.  I could quote numbers to you, but when I say big, I mean their hearts and vision, much more than seats filled on any given day.  Riverside Church in Three Rivers, Mich. is changing the world they inhabit, and in many ways, they are doing so, simply by inhabiting.  They allow God to inhabit them, and then they just leak everywhere they go.  Lives and neighborhoods are being transformed.  Because they are people about filling hearts, they fill seats.

God gave us a fun surprise connecting us for the Fourth of July with a friend from Texas, who also happened to be visiting family very near to where we were.  It was a meaningful time of connecting more deeply hearts that were already connected.  His family property consisted of acres of well tended nature.  A river ran through it.

Moving north we spent time with my family in Kalamazoo.  These are the people who have known me the longest, and I suppose then, they are people that I have known longer than anyone else.  It was a sweet time of relaxation and laughter.  Oh, and hamburgers!!! The farm was beautiful.

From there, Jackee and I went north and spent two peaceful days on Mackinac Island.  No motor vehicles are allowed on the island, so bicycles, horse drawn carriages and feet were our method of travel  It was a bit like going back in time…somewhere, if you know what I mean.  We were surrounded by the Great Lakes, and a culture that was deeply familiar to my soul.

From there it was “cousins dinner” with my sister and her daughter, and my cousin and his family.  Again, these are people who have been in my life a long time. Two days with my mother and her man, Mark followed, and the time was relaxing and enjoyable.

And then, my thirty year High School Reunion.  This was an event I had looked forward to, and dreaded at the same time.  Who I was in High School and who I am today, seem to have so little in common, other than the fact that we inhabit the same body.  (of course even that looks a little different than it did thirty years ago.)  I wanted to go not so much to see specific people but to see this new version of me in an old context and discover just how new I am.  I ended up enjoying lots of people and not thinking very much about me.  I guess this is proof that I am different, because the old me was exceptionally self-conscious.  I had tons of fun, re-met lots of people and was reminded of lots of memories.

From there we jumped time zones again, passing through Albuquerque, New Mexico, and on to Colorado, where we are are staying with an amazing family in Lake City Colorado. (This, and Ouray, should be on your “I-should-see-this-before-I die” list.  And make sure you plan enough time to really “see”.  Here it is possible to look for an hour and still not see.)  The beauty is truly beyond description.  The family we are with and the connections we make through them are uniquely God-guided.  The places we have gone with them, stretch your visual perceptions beyond your ability to take it all in.

Yesterday I spent the day with a local pastor helping out at a nearby christian camp.

I know this sounds a bit more like a travel journal than a blog.  But, now for the blog part.  Here is what I have learned.

God is winning.  He is WAY further ahead than we might think.  If we only see our immediate circumstances, it is easy to think with David, “why are the unrighteous winning?”  Well, they aren’t.

First of all, the presence of God, in the geography we crossed was over-whelming.  You know how superlatives can begin to leak?  I really mean OVER-WHELMING.  It reminded me of my smallness, in a good way.  What I saw over-took me.  It helped me to know that the task at hand, (changing the world) is in very capable hands, and they are not mine.  The God who can craft with a breath, the California Coast, and the Rocky mountains is certainly capable of overcoming human damage, and restoring His Kingdom on this earth.  I like Him being so big.

More than all this amazing geography, the biggest thing I saw was that God has His people positioned exactly where He wants them.  From the President of an International ministry, to the local EMT, who doesn’t really know, yet, that she is really a pastor, God is up to something.  In every one of the above locations, I encountered God’s people.  Placed, positioned and prepared to be Him in the place and moments He intended.  These are people who are changing the geography they inhabit.  Loving and acting in the very real arenas of human existence and suffering, God moves through them, without them trying to sound like Christians.

God has leavened the world, and if I only see my little corner of it, I may think He is behind on His job.  I would be wrong.  I am encouraged.

In the early years of our marriage we took our children to Michigan where my brother-in-law took us water-skiing.  Without much thought to my kids in the boat, I took a few pretty lame turns around the lake.  It had been a while, and I never had been that good at water-skiing, but I was having fun.  I just was not very impressive.  Or so I thought.  When I got in the boat, all the kids were wide-eyed.  They told me that they did not know I could walk on water.

Children are amazed.

A visceral response to that which is unfolding in front of you, amazement is the state of seeing something new, something huge, something out of the ordinary, something that transports you out of the ordinary.  It is a response which removes your focus and thoughts from the mundane, and causes your pulse to speed up, because your mind has been shifted, or enlarged, or both.  Amazement is a response which imposes “thinking differently” on you.

The opposite of amazement is boredom.  I heard one teacher say that all boredom begins as spiritual boredom.  The person who is difficult to impress has lost touch with some of the most meaningful facets of reality.

Bigness.  Beauty.  Love. Sacrifice.  Generosity.  Vulnerability.  Joy.  Infants.

When one can view any of these works of art, and fail to be impressed, the meaning of life and your engagement with it has begun to fade.

I woke up today to see the sun climb over the mountains and touch the lake.  As we drove around the lake I found myself unsure of which way to look.  We stopped more than we drove.  I couldn’t stop staring at the mountains and the sun and the lake.  I couldn’t take it all in, yet was hungry to take in more.  It was amazing.  I saw some people drive by, just looking straight ahead.  Did they not see?  Or had they seen before and assumed then that they would see nothing new if they looked again this time?

Amazement is an overwhelming awareness.  This is HUGE.  This is BEAUTIFUL.  It’s not so much something you feel, as it is something you allow to invade you.  It is a way that the external climbs into your awareness, and moves you to be less self-aware. Or perhaps more aware of a healthy orientation of your self.  You are a part of a much larger truth.

Children allow the amazingness of the world to invade them on a regular basis.

“Look mom, I found a snake!”

This is the same kind of heart that responds with open-ness and allows God to invade.

“Look mom, God found me!”

Amazement is the root of reverence.  Not necessarily the silent stillness that we associate with reverence, but the mind-shifting awareness of God in all of His Bigness, Beauty and Love.  The awareness that moves us outside of our neurotic self-awareness, and into an orientation that allows us to open our hearts and be invaded.

We often find this description in the Gospels as people listen to the teaching of Jesus.

“They were amazed at His teaching.”

I think that made Jesus happy, not because He needed the validation, but because it meant that their hearts were open and being invaded.

I always remember the first time I went to church after receiving the new birth.  I walked into this place, so amazed at the people around me who had known and lived what I had just received.  How lucky they were!  How seasoned they must be at this kind of life.

Then one of my friends pointed out the deacons. I was in awe.  Until they told me this;

One of my friends said, “they have been saved so long, they’re not that excited about it.”

I was amazed!!

What I had just received the previous week, was the most amazing thing that had ever invaded me.  And these men were bored with it!?

I asked God right then.  “Please God, don’t ever let me get like that!”

Children are easily amazed.  They see bigness all around them, and know how they relate to it.  Their hearts are open to the excitement of finding a snake, or having another birthday.  Amazement keeps our hearts open, and an open heart is primed to receive.

Last night I watched a baby crawl across the dining room floor.  Behind her was her two year old sister.  Behind her was my friend, Mary.  I am not going to tell you Mary’s age, but let’s just say she is my age, whatever that might be.  In a room full of adults she crawled right in line with the other children.  I liked it.

Children are playful.

Playful is the quality that sees the world as something to engage, rather than simply observe.

Playful is the quality that sees joy in ordinary circumstances, and is eager to squeeze even more joy out of any given moment.

Playful is the quality that keeps children from taking themselves too seriously.

Sometimes it is the very quality that so tires out the adults around.  Children seem to have an insatiable appetite to play.  Adults seem satiated.  But I fear it is not play that has done this to them.

I was in a setting where some folks were hearing the Lord speak personal words for people, and then sharing them with the individuals in the room.  The words were intensely personal, and were so deeply true that it was clear God was speaking.  One of the people approached me and looked at me.  She kept looking at me and finally she just said, “Play!”

“Play, play, play, play play,” she kept repeating, “the Lord wants you to play.”

I thought I had gotten the message when she got to the punch line.

“Children don’t burn out when they are playing, that is something adults invent”, she said.

Play engages the heart as well as the mind.  It connects to other people.   It engages aliveness in a two way exchange.  It allows playmates to feed joy and life to one another.

A year or so ago our staff took a half a day to go play.  In a time of intensity and heaviness, I found myself playing air hockey.  And then shooting baskets in a row of other staff members, trying to outshoot one another.  Laser tag, bowling, the list grew.  By all standards I should have been getting tired.  Instead I was laughing, and found my energy level increasing.  In some cases I was laughing so hard that my head hurt.  I felt my heart beat again.  I felt a connection to people I seldom saw.  I felt the flow of life.

I think playfulness is at the root of joy.  It is the soil in our soul which allows joy to take root and grow.  It keeps us constantly aware that we are children and we have a Father.

Some people own games or toys and they work hard at them, while others seem to be able to play in the midst of a simple conversation.

Play is not about the activity nearly as much as it is about how we approach the activity.  Competition can be fun, or it can be mean-spirited.  Games can be about playfulness or they can be about insecurity.

I am certain fun is a fruit of the Spirit.  I have seen it in Galatians 5.  Love Fun Peace, patience…

John Wimber had a great way of describing the inclusiveness and engagement of the power of the Gospel on earth.  During times of intense ministry he would hand over the reigns to those nearby, give a few simple instructions and then remind us all.

“Everyone can play.”

I think he was on to something.