Nonabel

Hey Everyone, I'm back in blog world. Won't waste my time or yours with excuses, just been re-evaluating the honor inherent in blogging.

Here's the parable I shared on Sunday during the teaching time -- a lot of folks asked to hear it again. Enjoy!


The land of Nonabel was beautiful place of lush green mountains ruled by majestic trees and valleys with fish-filled streams running through them. Every day the sun rose and every night the sun would set, and the time in between was filled with wonder and delight for all the inhabitants of the happy land.

Then one day, some people from another land happened upon this choice peace of beauty and decided to make it their home. Because the land of Nonabel was large and expansive, it was declared a kingdom that was divided into four provinces ruled by four governors.

The first governor ruled the Land of Business.

The second governor ruled the Land of Politics.

The third governor ruled the Land of Family.

The fourth governor ruled the Land of Church.

Each citizen paid taxes annually to the government to ensure the efficient and healthy growth of the kingdom. The governors distributed the funds to the each province as was seen fit by a selected group of leaders that no one knew personally but that everyone was sure they did not like and could not trust.

The citizens of Nonabel would live their lives in the various provinces, moving from one to another through the course of a day as fit their needs. When it was time to work and make money, they would catch the tram to the Land of Business. Important decisions were made in the Land of Politics, while love, peace and harmony were sought out in the Land of Family. No one was truly sure what the Land of Church was for, although an archaic manuscript was discovered that seemed to speak authoritatively to the matter. But the manuscript was strangely worded and understanding it would require reading it and discussing it, and reading it and discussing it would mean lots of work and possible conflict and things were going so well in the other three provinces that the citizens really wanted to concentrate their time there. So at a regular Tuesday night meeting of The Discussion Of Important Things in the Land of Politics, a decision was unanimously passed to simply divide the province of Church into a thousand tiny provinces. The governors of the lands of Business, Politics and Family simply passed a resolution that required the small provinces of the Land of Church get along as well as they could and not stir up too much trouble. In fact, as a measure of safety and peace, an amendment was added that everyone should simply reserve their time in the province of Church to one morning per week – Sunday as it turned out -- except for some select rebellious splinter groups who chose to meet Sunday evening as well (mostly people who called themselves Baptist and Pentecostal). This decision was wonderfully received and everyone loved the way it made them feel. Nonabelians even began dressing up for the occasion.

No one really knew what happened to the governor of Land of Church. As it turned out, He was asked by the citizens of the kingdom to remain in hiding except for Sunday mornings. He could be a pretty demanding fellow and the people didn’t want Him stirring things up when affairs in the other provinces were going so well. The governor of the Land of Church was pretty offended by this request and decided that, for the most part, He wasn’t going to show up where He wasn’t invited. Very few people in the kingdom of Nonabel could hardly find the time to issue such an invitation or pursue such a relationship. He even went so far as to suggest that He be allowed to run the whole Kingdom. That was a bit too much for the Nonabelians. As stated before, He could be demanding.

These arrangements were put into effect immediately and the people enjoyed overall happiness and prosperity. Concentrating all their efforts on three provinces instead of four provided a streamlined form of capitalistic bliss that put money in the Nonabelians’ pockets and stuff in their lives. There were the occasional disputes here and there, but a firm hand from the governors of the Lands of Politics and Business kept things moving very smoothly.

Then something began to go terribly wrong in the kingdom of Nonabel.

In the Land of Family, the fathers and mothers began to leave. Eventually, a search party would be formed, and they were almost always located in the Land of Business or Politics with him passed out in a gutter, or her at the office late at night, or with his arm around a woman who was not his wife, or with her at another endless meeting of The Discussion Of Important Things. This absence of fathers and mothers caused a massive disconnect in the homes of the Land of Family. Overworked and undervalued, the mothers and fathers became control freaks who, according to the fathers, “won’t stop nagging” and according to the mothers, “won’t see me”. This tension between mother and father drove peace and harmony out of the Land of Family altogether. And the children felt like orphans.

This concern was taken up by the governors of the Kingdom of Nonabel. They called for a joint meeting of the governors at the next Discussion Of Important Things to talk about this issue at work in the Land of Family. Of course, no one knew where the governor of the Land of Church was. A letter of invitation was sent to His last known address, but secretly, the other governors hoped He wouldn’t show. After all, He could be a demanding fellow.

The next Discussion Of Important Things was the most well attended meeting in the kingdom’s history. It seemed like every Nonabelian in the land had come out for this Discussion Of Important Things. As the meeting opened, it was noted that the governor of the Land of Church had indeed received His invitation. He was standing outside the door of the meeting hall but, for some crazy reason, would not enter unless personally invited to come in and granted permission to run the Kingdom. He said He had brought Kentucky Fried Chicken for everyone and He could break more if there were more people than there were biscuits and chicken. The governors declined His invitation stating that they just weren’t comfortable with the demands of such a governor. KFC would be nice, but His presence was not worth the cost of their power. The people unanimously agreed. They suggested He disperse the chicken and biscuits to the tiny provinces of the Land of Church for the Sunday morning time that week. He agreed, stating His desire to not run them over, and that He would simply stand outside the door for the duration of the meeting and knock. The first resolution passed that evening was to cover all the doors of the meeting hall with foam padding.

The meeting continued with each of the governors voicing their profound concern over this absence of fathers and mothers in the Land of Family. Therefore, three other resolutions were passed that night to curb the lack of peace and harmony in the Land of Family:

1. A time of freedom was established that would coincide with time spent in the Land of Church. This declared time of peace was to be known as “weekend”. Things were declared to be peaceful during this time and parents were to cater to the needs of their children for this two day period. “Being a taxi service is no shame”, the governors would say. “You don’t have to talk to the other parents during this time” they would declare. Just be peaceful. Engagement in the affairs of the Lands of Business and Politics during this weekend was encouraged, but not mandatory.

2. A longer time of freedom was established. This two week period was to be known as “vacation”. Families were to live for this judicious experience together – the ultimate in peace and harmony. It was reasoned that the obvious lack of peace and harmony (some even used the word “love”) could easily be rectified with this extended time of concentration on said virtues. The governors also assured the fathers and mothers that this “vacation” would curb the complaints of children that they were tired of being forgotten. How could a kid feel bad about his home life while having his feelings anesthetized in the indulging of extreme excess at Disney Land?

3. Every citizen in the land of Nonabel received part of their yearly income tax, as well as part of next year’s income tax refund, direct deposited into their checking account. The governor of the Land of Politics put it this way: “A good bit of money that looks like a gift even though it was their money to begin with will shut the mouth of even the most virtuous of people.” He wasn’t far from wrong.

The citizens of Nonabel in attendance at that Discussion of Important Things left the meeting hall extremely pleased with the outcome of their time together. No one actually believed that peace and harmony would be restored, but they were very satisfied to have something to live for in the form of “weekend” and “vacation” and very pleased with a gesture of monetary generosity from the governors of the kingdom. The incessant thumping on the door of the meeting hall was a bit distracting. But after the meeting concluded He had set up a table with the chicken and biscuits and a note attached to it that read:

“I’ll keep knocking, and whenever you want to open the door and let me in, I will show up with chicken and biscuits and sit down and hang out with you while we eat. Bloody knuckles are worth it for you.”

Everyone was deeply touched by this gesture of affection from governor of the Land of Church. A resolution was quickly passed on the lawn of the meeting hall to increase the amount of foam padding on the doors so as to alleviate the bloody knuckles of the governor.

The children of the land of Nonabel were tired of the lack of peace and harmony, not just at home, but in the whole kingdom. To them, Sunday mornings were terrible because they hated getting dressed up and the Land of Church was horrifically inauthentic because it was a bunch of fathers and mothers who were doing their duty of being peaceful and harmonious while being hateful and selfish at home. All the tiny provinces of the Land of Church were trying not to upset or offend any other provinces, so Sunday mornings became this putridly boring time of inoffensiveness. Furthermore, they could not understand why in the world no one was inviting the governor of the Land of Church to rule His own province. The children knew exactly where the governor lived and they loved to go play on His playground and sit on His lap and eat His chicken and watch Him make something out of nothing.

In the wake of this situation, some of the children of the Land of Nonabel decided to start their own province and they invited the governor to rule the province. This proved to be a wonderful situation. They didn’t have to dress up anymore, they could be real with the hurt they felt from their parents and the governors and they could really have fun with Him when they got together. More and more people started coming to this province and things started to get a little crazy. The children in the province had a lot of fun and enjoyed their relationship with the governor, but the governor kept asking this annoying question, “Why are you here?” No one had an answer, so they just ignored the question. He would keep asking, “Why are you here?” and still, no answer.

Finally the children got tired of the question, so they said, “Why don’t You tell us why we are here?” And the governor pointed to the archaic manuscript that had been discovered centuries before.

As the children read the book, they loved the wonder of the stories of the governor in all his majestic exploits, especially the ones where He healed people or made the winds and waves be still or made the governors of the other provinces drop their stones. They especially loved the one where He conquered death. As they got to the end of the book, they started reading about their very own province. It was like He had seen it in advance, maybe even planned for it or made it happen Himself. They could see themselves in His story and they could see the insanity that was taking over their very own province. The governor was right! The answer to their confusion was in the Book. But the answer caused them to pause in fear.

“You must trust Me,” He said.

“We do trust You,” the children declared.

“Then you must trust one another,” He replied.

So the children called the governor of the Land of Business to place an order for their own bulk shipment of foam padding.

Obedience As Identity - Key Principles Pt3

For years and years, I obeyed and followed Jesus because I was afraid of Him. Looking back on it, I’m not sure what I was afraid of because I could tell you what grace and mercy were and I could quote a lot of the Bible and I had a great family that showed me Jesus’ love in really deep ways. My past is not marked by physical or sexual abuse causing spiritual amnesia a split soul like some of my friends have experienced. I’ve been immersed in all things Jesus and church for what seems like forever.

But about five years ago, I began to come to the realization that I was terrified of God. What if he found out the kinds of things I was doing in secret? What if people at my church saw how I talked to my wife when it was just the two of us? How would I keep God on my side if He ever found out how often I didn’t follow Him? And to make it worse, I was a pastor. If anyone should have had it together, it should have been me.

I can remember sitting in a dark hospital room while Christy slept one night and wondering if God felt what was going on. I knew that God knew what was going on and He had everything under control and He was still on His throne and He is sovereign and all that jazz, but I wanted to know if He actually felt anything.

It was then that I realized that He wondered the same thing about me.

He knew that I knew that I loved Him and obeyed Him (usually, anyway) and that I was a pastor…but did I ever feel anything.

I had always equated submission and obedience to God with a need to separate me from myself, to step outside of the ugliness of who I was in order to do what He wanted. Why should I do what He wanted? Because He’s God and if I don’t do what He says, He’ll smite me.

Now don’t get me wrong, a deep part of that is true. Why obey? Because He’s God and what He says goes. At the end of all things, falling back on that is OK. The only thing is, that as a person grows up in Jesus, there comes a longing to know the Father more deeply than that, just like a child who is growing up. I have three kids, ages six, five and three. Because of their lack of growth and maturity – an inability to think and process abstractly – they must obey and I must ensure that they obey because my posture toward them is good, or at least it should be, and usually is – and their obedience to my will as it lines up with God’s will is the greatest highway they have to the face of Jesus.

And that’s the key to this whole obedience and following thing…that the heart of the Father toward His children is good. As my kids grow and mature in life, they will begin to experience me on new levels. Their questions of “Why?” are actually places that my heart and their heart can connect. A pre-teen or teenager initially pushes against her parents because they are the only standard by which she has to judge herself and her ability to be who her parents are forming her to be…a young lady on a road to her own destiny.

Submission and obedience to God is not about His control over your life.
The question of who is in control has an obvious answer.
God does not need to prove His ability to dominate you,
His sacrificial love is His domination.
God does not need your obedience to validate His existence.
He created and sustains everything.
God does not need your submission to love you.
His grace initiates this relationship.

God’s identity is so rooted in Himself and His Trinitarian nature that He is able to stand completely outside of His creation and be at joyful peace and rest in His own glory.

When your identity is rooted in Jesus and His loving nature, you can stand outside of yourself and be at joyful peace and rest in submission and obedience to His will, because it is His will that brings Him most glory, and God’s rest in His own glory is the most loving thing He can do for His children and the world.

The most freeing thing about all that stuff is that obedience comes as a fruit of being in Christ rather than a system of earning His love and favor. God’s love and favor rests on You because You are His child. He desires submission and obedience because it’s the only way He can love you to the depth that you were created to feel His love.

The more you submit and obey out of identity rather than fear, the more you feel the Father’s love. The more you feel the Father’s love, the more you feel the joy of obedience because obedience is who you are in Him.

33 Days Later: The Choice Has Been Made, This Battle Is Finished

"Suffering Servant" by Marcella Paliekara


Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.
O death, where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?”

For sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power. But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.

So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and immovable. Always work enthusiastically for the Lord, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless.

33 days, 172 dead

"So fear the Lord and serve him wholeheartedly. Put away forever the idols your ancestors worshiped when they lived beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt. Serve the Lord alone. But if you refuse to serve the Lord, then choose today whom you will serve. Would you prefer the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates? Or will it be the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now live? But as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord.”

The people replied, “We would never abandon the Lord and serve other gods. For the Lord our God is the one who rescued us and our ancestors from slavery in the land of Egypt. He performed mighty miracles before our very eyes. As we traveled through the wilderness among our enemies, he preserved us. It was the Lord who drove out the Amorites and the other nations living here in the land. So we, too, will serve the Lord, for he alone is our God.”

Then Joshua warned the people, “You are not able to serve the Lord, for he is a holy and jealous God. He will not forgive your rebellion and your sins. If you abandon the Lord and serve other gods, he will turn against you and destroy you, even though he has been so good to you.”

But the people answered Joshua, “No, we will serve the Lord!”

“You are a witness to your own decision,” Joshua said. “You have chosen to serve the Lord.”

“Yes,” they replied, “we are witnesses to what we have said.”

“All right then,” Joshua said, “destroy the idols among you, and turn your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.”

The people said to Joshua, “We will serve the Lord our God. We will obey him alone.”

So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day at Shechem, committing them to follow the decrees and regulations of the Lord. Joshua recorded these things in the Book of God’s Instructions. As a reminder of their agreement, he took a huge stone and rolled it beneath the terebinth tree beside the Tabernacle of the Lord.

Joshua said to all the people, “This stone has heard everything the Lord said to us. It will be a witness to testify against you if you go back on your word to God.”

Then Joshua sent all the people away to their own homelands.

Key Principles Part Two

Obedience may be the doorway to intimacy, but it's not intimacy. Jesus says in John 14, if you love me, obey my commandments. He does not say, "if you love me keep my commandments and then you will be loved." Our relationship with Jesus is based in His work on the cross and through His resurrection. We obey because it's who we are, not in order to be loved.

If I bring my wife flowers and she asks me, "Why did you get these for me?", and if I respond, "Because I know you expect me to do that for you from time to time," that's a quick road to no intimacy. I get her flowers because I love her. I get her flowers because it's who I am -- I am her lover and flowers are the "obedience" that I live in because I love her. The flowers are an extension of my identity and open the doorway for intimacy which I define as spirit to spirit connection. Intimacy is primarily spiritual. Certainly there are emotional and physical outgrowths of that, but if we try to connect through either emotion or physicality first, it will always fall short of what it was meant to be.

Lego Gospel

Here's that link I mentioned this morning about the Bible story told through Legos. It's even better than I remember!

www.thebricktestament.com

10 Years Deep...Only Going Deeper

Today is our tenth anniversary. We're on our tenth anniversary trip in Denver. Sweet place for an anniversary trip. The pic is from our trip to the Denver Art Museum yesterday at a very cool bubble art project.

I could go on and on about all the things I love about my wife, and I guess this would be an appropriate venue to do that, but we've had those conversations over the last few days and that's not where we ended up in our thought process...with how great the other person is.

Rather, we marvel at the depth of ten years as opposed to the starting point. We did our pre-marital counseling with the pastor I grew up under, Pastor Shirey, and he told us that this is how it would be. "You love each other deeply now, but you will realize that it is nothing compared to what it will be five, ten, twenty, fifty years from now," he said.

And he was so right.

Deeper...that's the best word for it. Other words and phrases are fitting: stronger, tougher, sexier, sacrificing, more complete, more solid, more trusting. But deeper was the consensus. The deeper I plunge the depths of Sheri's being, the more beauty I see, the more light there is, the more Jesus is present, the more oneness we experience. And the same is true for her.

One-flesh-ness is about so much more than sex. It's about the depths of the other person's body, soul and spirit and finding and calling out their design in those places. For as much light as we have found in one another, we have found comparable darkness -- but that's part of the depth. Our goal is not to comprise a list of expectations for the other to conform to and then guage the health of our marriage based around those expectations -- although that's what I see in so many couples today in the worlds in which I live. Our goal is to seek out the depth of the other's design and calling in Jesus and love them for who they are becoming so much more than loving them for who they now are, because who they now are may suck. It might be a point of some ugly darkness, but that is part of the depth, and Jesus has light to shine on that area and that light will primarily be released in the other party of the one-flesh-ness.

We love each other so much more deeply now than before and we can't believe that the future together holds even more depth of love. But we can't wait to go that deep.

What a journey it's been...
What a journey it will be.
It is easier to sail across the sea than down into it,
But now that the world is mapped --
Where's the risk in that?
And if love is not risk,
Then it is love that is dead.
We choose to plunge the depths of the deep.

Top Five Favorite Fictional Characters -- Literature

I haven't made a list in a while and I'm on a trip with my wife, so no ministry posts for a while. I did make a statement on Sunday that sparked a need for a list though. I said that in my opinion, Aslan, from the Chronicles of Narnia series, was the finest literary fictional character. Here's a list of the top five.

1. Aslan -- The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
Anthropomorphism (giving human characteristics to any animal or object) isn't the right niche for Aslan. He goes way beyond that -- it's actually the other way around. The lion speaks to the humanity in this regard. In the obvious allegory of the Narnia series, Aslan is Jesus and the ferocity, anger, resolve and wrath of the Aslan is perfecly balanced by his gentleness, kindness and meekness. He is the picture of the marriage between the Jesus seen in Revelation and the Jesus seen in John.

"'Safe?' said Mr. Beaver...'Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe, but he's good. He's the King, I tell you.'" -- Mr. Beaver, speaking of Aslan

2. Kerbouchard -- The Walking Drum by Louis L'Amour
"The name has a ring to it!" Scoff if you will at this creator of wild west tales of chilvalry and justice, The Walking Drum is quality literature. Set in middle ages Europe and the Middle East, Kerbouchard, a Celt by birth, wanderer of the world and seeker of his father's justice lives an adventure that takes him from slave on a ship to adviser to kings. War, intrigue, romance, betrayal, friendship -- all are inherent in the Kerbouchard's DNA and story. But more than anything, he is a learner, a seeker of truth, always learning and never arriving. It was Kerbouchard who sparked my interest in classic literature and sold me on reading and adventure. A man's man.

"It has seemed to me that each year one should pause to take stock of himself, to ask: Where am I going? What am I becoming? What do I wish to do and become? Most people whom I have encountered were without purpose, people who had given themselves no goal. The first goal need not be the final one, for a sailing ship sails first by one wind, then another. The point is that it is always going somewhere, proceeding towards a final destination." -- Kerbouchard

3. Billy Colman -- Where The Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls
I first read this book when I was ten or eleven. I think it was the first classic piece of literature I ever read and the first book I ever cried about. Billy is a the main character of the story -- a complex yet simple boy with an insatiable desire for adventure growing up in the Ozark mountains. He wants to be a coon hunter, so he works and saves for two years to buy two hound dogs, Old Dan and Little Ann and they become a champion coon hunting team. Living all kinds of adventures together, the story ends with the death of the Old Dan and Little Ann protecting Billy from a mountain lion ("devil cat of the Ozarks"). Billy had heart and guts. He chopped down a huge tree in order to get a coon out of it and win his dogs' trust. So I got my grandad's axe, headed out into the woods and began chopping down a ridiculous tree. Took me five days to fell it -- but I wasn't about to not be like Billy. Heart and guts.

"Lying back in the soft hay, I folded my hands behind my head, closed my eyes, and let my mind wander back over the two long years. I thought of the fishermen, the blackberry patches, and the huckleberry hills. I thought of the prayer I had said when I asked God to help me get two hound pups. I knew He had surely helped, for He had given me the heart, courage, and determination." -- Billy

4. Gandalf -- The Lord Of The Rings Series by J.R.R. Tolkien
Power. Wisdom. Humility. Shadowfax. Establisher of kings. Leadership. Sight. Forward-thinking. Glamdring. Stubborn. Re-born. All things I deeply long for. At this point in my life, Gandalf is who I long to be.

"I threw down my Enemy and he fell from his high place and broke the mountain-side where he smote it in his ruin." -- Gandalf

5. Josephine "Jo" March -- Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
Let me say right off the get-go here, that every movie made about this book is horrible. Do not watch the movies, read the books. It is not a primer on feminism, it is a primer on relationships, priorities and beauty. Alcott is a relational genius when it comes to writing. I loved the book Little Women when I had to read it for an English assignment in high school. I didn't have the guts to say so at the time, but I've read it three or four times. And in doing so, I developed a major crush on Jo. Without knowing it, Jo became my picture of the perfect girl, and eventually the perfect wife. She was not even close to perfect, but she embraced life, love, heart, and imagination with beauty and enthusiastic grace. And I definitely married a Jo. Sheri is all of those things, but obviously without the fictional twist. The confident beauty and grace with which she embraces life is a dream come true for me. I can't believe she's mine.

"Wouldn't it be fun if all the castles in the air which we make could come true and we could live in them?" -- Jo

The Abyss

I'm starting in on Revelation next week. These pics have everything to do with the abyss, which have everything to do with Revelation.

Key Principles Part One

At Cornerstone, we've been speaking lately of three key principles. The first is: Obedience is the doorway to intimacy.

What goes on between us and God is a relationship and there are certain things that are true in that relationship because of the parties involved. God is God and worthy of worship because He is God and He is capable and right in telling me to do whatever it is He would like to that is in line with His character. I am a receiver of unconditional, underserved love and grace and have been redeemed and placed in Christ and named a son of God and co-heir with Christ -- a prisoner set free indeed. My identity has been changed from an enemy of God to a friend of God, I am made completely new.

And God is still God. Never changing, unshakable, the same today that He has been since eternity past. I am His son. He is Father. What He says is motivated by Father-love I obey because I am His Son. It is my identity to obey.

Too many Christians obey God so that they may feel significance. The idea is that if I pick myself up by my bootstraps and obey God, then I feel good about myself -- and what's more -- I look good to those around me. This makes me feel important and more acceptable to God. And on the darkest but truest level, I believe I am worthy of God's love. I offer these steps of obedience to God and actually expect Him to step into a relational contract. I obey, He loves. It gets darker when the contract reads, I obey, He blesses.

The reason why this is so dark is because it robs God of the true depth of his goodness and love. On some level, my obedience is my offering to God and His return to me is love, blessing -- significance.

The point of John 15 is that an apple tree bears apples because it's an apple tree, not because it works hard. The tree's job is to be a tree, God bears fruit. I obey God because it's my identity, not because it buys me significance or standing with Him. He loves me, Billy Graham, Martin Luther, Britney Spears and Donovan McNabb with the same level of love and passion. A love and passion deep enough to sacrifice His Son. I am significant because God loves me and I am His, not because I obey well.


Next post: Obedience is the doorway to intimacy. Obedience is not intimacy.

I'm Back And I'm 30

It's been a while.

I turned 30 on February 27. To me, 30 was always the threshold of "old". Somewhere, probably in a box in my parent's basement is a list of things I would like have done before I turned 30. I wish I had that list. I made it when I was around 15 and I can remember a few things on it:

1. Get married (accomplished)
2. Travel to Europe (accomplished)
3. Play semi-pro soccer (not accomplished)
4. Be a missionary in a Muslim country (not accomplished, my wife was though)
5. Learn guitar (accomplished)
6. Skydive (not accomplished)
7. Run a business (accomplished)
8. Be published (accomplished)
9. I'm pretty sure that "Meet Alyssa Milano" was on there too (not accomplished)

I realize that the amount of change that has happened in the last fifteen years is hard to fathom. Heck, the amount of change in me in the last six months is hard to fathom. I think that the only thing I am going to put on my list of things to accomplish before I am 40 is to keep changing. One of the major things I've learned is that there is always more to press into, particularly in my relationship with Jesus, Sheri, my kids, my friends and my church. It's a constant changing, a constant moving. Satisfaction is not an option. Stagnation is unacceptable. Resting in Jesus is important, but even that produces significant change in me.

A lot of people say that they desire stability, something to be constant. I think there is only one unchanging thing: Jesus. Maybe there's another unchanging thing: Jesus' ability and desire to keep changing me. What I'm finding is that while the change often hurts and takes me places that I'd rather not be, I've never been more fully alive than I am right now. And I'm 30. I think that's saying a lot and it's all an act of His grace in my life. So far, I don't mind being 30 and 21 days because I know Jesus better now and have been changed more by Him than I was when I was 30 and 20 days. Getting old used to worry me, and I did pull my groin while playing basketball the day after I turned 30 which made me feel really old, but I don't think there's any better way to know and love Jesus than to just keep being changed by Him as I live my life everyday. And one day I won't be here anymore and I'll know and love Him better than I ever have.

Martin Luther King Jr

"Everybody can be great because anybody can serve...you only need a heart full of grace and a soul generated by love." -- Martin Luther King Jr.

"Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the ugly as beautiful and the beautiful as ugly and to describe the true with the false and the false with the true." -- Martin Luther King Jr.

I deeply respect people who are willing to put their back against a wall and not back down from what they believe. Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther, Susan B. Anthony, Nelson Mandela, Winston Churchill, Jim and Elizabeth Elliot, Martin Luther King Jr -- all people I admire because of their great courage and strength of heart.

Martin Luther King Jr, Rosa Parks, Frederick Douglas, Medgar Evers, Elizabeth Jennings...all the great civil rights leaders walked down a path that was very much like Jesus. They fought against hatred and bigotry for the cause of justice, love and equality. Situational ethics came very much into play as the question of "Who do I obey -- God or government?" was very real. And many of them died for their cause.

Martin Luther King Jr is a great holiday. We as a nation do well to stop and remember what it is he fought and died for, which in a word, is freedom. There's no more Jesus-like concept than freedom. "It is for freedom Christ set us free." I think MLK would have been great friends with George Washington, Patrick Henry, and Benjamin Franklin. They were all revolutionaries -- and, it seems to me -- he was great friends with Jesus, the greatest Revolutionary of all time.

A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr is a fantastic book.

Troop Surge

I'm not happy about the president's speech on Wednesday night. I think this it is a very unwise move to completely ignore the Iraq Study Group's report as well as the greater portion of the American public (62% at last check). There's a fine line between strong leadership/public servanthood and maniacal stubbornness (maybe it's not that fine at all). I think President Bush is approaching that line.

There is an Old Testament principle that applies here, I think. When a king did not know what to do, he would call for chief counsel: a prophet. It was the prophet's job to go to the Lord on behalf of the king and return with the Word of the Lord for the given situation. When this would go down, the king had better obey the word that the prophet received for him. To not follow it was to invite defeat. I hope that is not what is happening with this situation -- not that the Iraq Study Group is prophetic or anything -- just that the principle seems present.

I read a great quote today: "Mountains appear more lofty and majestic the nearer they are approached. Great leaders resemble this quality not at all." -- Meyers S. Cooper

Thank you for listening to a bit of political rambling on my behalf. I picked this pic up on the Web. It cracked me up. Check out the TV listings on the major networks immediately following Wednesday night's speech.

Thoughts For The New Year

In my estimation, two words are key for this coming year, both personally and corporately as Cornerstone.

Birth.

Beauty.

This Sunday is Vision Sunday, lots more about Birth then.

So, on to Beauty.

I'm colorblind. Have been my whole life. It makes for interesting situations, particularly in the realm of personal fashion. I can see all the colors a normal person can, I just get them mixed up. I think my parents first learned of my "condition" when I was in the first grade. Color-by-number was not my forte. So I was given one of those colorblind dot tests. If you've never seen one, you can check it out here. I only see a 25. The rest are just dots.

Here's the point: because I'm colorblind, I used to think that beauty on a visual level was something that I could not really get or create. Other vantage points like music, writing, and building stuff were all OK, but never anything like painting, photography or drawing.

There's a fundamental flaw in that mode of thinking into which even non-colorblind people step. It is an assumption that beauty is about anything other than a deeper revelation of who God is and that how I interact with beauty has something to do with whether or not something is beautiful.

Don't get me wrong, beauty is subjective -- but also objective. It is both at the same time.

Beauty is objective because God is the source of beauty. Sin, death and Satan are objectively responsible for ugly. Everything God makes is beautiful, and much of God's beauty is as terrifying and/or dark as it is comforting and/or light. For example: an animal sacrifice system, the ocean, fire, the sun, a lion, wind, dirt, caves, boulders, mountains, a Lion (repetition intended), the human brain, the human body, or His Son being tortured and murdered.

Beauty is subjective because how we interact with it is filtered through the lens of our life narrative. How we were raised, what our key temptations are, personal senses of taste, abuse we have suffered, addictions formed, people we like or dislike -- all of these things can tell us something about a beauty experience we are having.

Here's the thing I love about beauty: I don't believe it can be repressed. I believe that beauty is rooted in the character of God and everything He has made and is making bears His stamp, especially people.

About three weeks ago, I went to see Damien Rice in concert. He's one of my favorite artists. Damien is the most honestly real artist I've ever heard. He sings about torturous situations in his life, in deeply emotional, often dark ways. Every concert he releases himself to be re-tortured again. It was one of the most intense, beautiful concert experiences I've ever had. After his last song, he came out for a three song encore -- and I swear, I felt like he was trying to take the audience to a dark, depressing place and leave us there because he sang three of the darkest songs he's ever written. But he couldn't do it. God's beautiful image in Damien Rice was so strong and so real, that there was only beauty. There obviously was not a full release of the beauty that could be there because there was no Jesus in him, but Jesus was definitely there. And it was beautiful.

So, that was a long way of getting to the point that I think Jesus has a lot of beauty for us to learn and experience in 2007. I am praying God will show us more deeply what it means to worship Him "in the beauty of His holiness".

The picture at the top is the most beautiful thing in my life.

Into The Abyss

A stomach in knots reminds him that this is not normal experience for the average Jay. The abyss beneath is intimidating and with tears in his eyes, he willingly places himself in harm's way.

The styrofoam encased in fiberglass becomes thinner and the bend in the board causes him to dig his toes deeper into the gritty sandpaper the closer he gets to the end. Looking down at the water is not the hard part. The hard part is looking around, for no horizon can be seen -- nor is there any support for the board. No pillar on an island with a diving board attached.

Just a board.
In the air.
Hovering high over the water.
In the middle of Nowhere.

He knows there is Somewhere. But to get there means abandoning the board, and to abandon the board means to embrace the abyss. The abyss is dark and scary, and God only knows what is in there waiting to consume him. He assumes he will swim to safety, even though it seems that safety is a figment of his imagination. But to stay on the board is not only to be in the middle of Nowhere, but to go Nowhere. And that is an alternative that is unacceptable.

And so he bends his knees, the board flexes under him and flings him high into the air. At the pinnacle of his extension, just before gravity proves its tenacity, he thinks he just may fly away and escape the abyss. Certainly, he thinks, flying enables one to go Somewhere.

And then he falls.

The watery floor beneath awaits his arrival with iron resolve. His feet hit first -- toes pointed and knees together parting the water without a splash. As he slips beneath the surface, he begins to kick. Surprisingly, he keeps falling further and further as if he is being pulled. Legs straining, fingers clawing, he reaches desperately for the light at the surface that is becoming smaller and smaller like the light at the end of the tunnel before the end of the tunnel can be seen.

The light slips away and he is sure that this is the end, or Nowhere again. The darkness is everywhere, and the abyss is still calling him and drawing him and clawing him. And there is no escape.

And now he must breathe.
And he realizes he can breathe.
And he knows he is in a new world.
And he is born again.
Again.

So this is Somewhere.

John Edward McCumber III

Today is Trey's sixth birthday.

This whole journey I've been on lately with understanding my identity in Jesus as being more than what I do for Him has been most intensely illustrated to me by my relationship with my kids -- especially Trey.

Trey is my namesake, and he is most like me in personality. When I watch him, his reactions, his struggles, his young values -- I see me. When he grows up, he wants to play soccer for the Italian or Irish national teams because the USA sucks at soccer. I swear I didn't put that thought in his head.

Trey and I sometimes butt heads, and when we do it can be rough. My mom has a saying for parenting: "Choose your battles wisely and win every battle you choose." The battles I choose with Trey are often really difficult.

No matter what though, he's my son. He's mine. I see me in him, and that's not pride at all. When Trey scores a goal, that's my boy. When Trey gets his name put on the board at school, that's my boy. While I will obviously react in two different ways in regard to training/discipline in those two situations, there's one thing that doesn't change: he's my son and I love him more than I can say or understand. Nothing he does or is ever changes that fact.

No matter what, I'm God's son. I am his. He has put His nature in me and seeking His own glory through me is not pride at all. When I preach a good sermon, I'm His boy. When I speak in anger to my wife, I'm His boy. While He obviously reacts in two different ways in regard to my training/discipline in those two situations, there's one thing that doesn't change: I'm His son and He loves me more than I can say or understand. Nothing I do or am ever changes that fact.

Happy birthday, Trey. Thank you for teaching me about who I am. You are my son, I am so pleased with you, and I love you more than you will ever know.

Doing As Result Of Being or Being Versus Doing Part Six

Being vs doing was a bad title...too misleading of a generalization.

Doing as result of being is key. To pit the two against one another can be dangerous because what I'm learning is that I do have something to do -- I think of it in terms of the word "calling". I do play a role, a really important role, as I believe every person does.

The problem arises when my calling supercedes my identity. Kept in the proper order and balance, I think Paul can say "I'm an apostle", because as his call, that is what he is doing but it's because of who he is in Jesus. Paul holed up in prison was not able to be very apostle-ish but he was still a son of God and some of his most powerful writings came from that time period.

For me, doing my calling can become an idol so easily as a result of how I learned to think about God and my relationship with Him, that it is almost "being vs doing". And I know that I am not alone in that struggle -- many Christians today deal with the same issue, especially American Christians. Some dark part of me wants to believe that there are things in me that merit the love of God, something to offer that will pay Jesus for what He did for me. And that's just a lie.

"But God demonstrated His own love toward us in that, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

Immersion Retreat - October 31

Traveled today from Kauai to Oahu to meet with the leadership at New Hope Fellowship in Honolulu, by far the church that I am most stoked about getting to visit. This morning, we had time to kill before we could check into our hotel, so we went to Pearl Harbor. It was a deeply sad place. The USS Arizona is the centerpiece of the memorial. It was bombed that morning of December 7, 1941 and sank in nine minutes after being hit, killing 1173 of its crew members, 900 of which are still underwater in the Arizona. It is a stark reminder of the sacrifice required for freedom. Freedom isn't free...socially, politically, or spiritually.

"You were bought with a price."

The USS Arizona Memorial in the harbor. To get there, you get on a naval ship from the main building.

The foundation for gun turret three, rusty and sticking out of the water.

A shrine listing all the names of the sailors and marines who were killed aboard the Arizona.

The USS Missouri, the last battleship the US decommissioned after the Gulf War, stationed now in Pearl Harbor as a museum/learning exhibit.


This trip has been a great experience. I've been blogging about the travel aspects, but the spiritual ramifications of the research, learning and community experiences are by far the most intense things of this trip. I'm really thankful to be a part of it.

I really miss my family though. Tomorrow, we spend most of the day with New Hope and then we catch the red eye home! I can't wait to see my wife and kids.

Not wanting to end this post on a totally somber depressing note, here's a picture of Tim's foot.

Immersion Retreat -- October 28, 29, 30

October 28
Let me begin this post by again offering congratulations to my friends in St Louis. The World Series win was certainly a great thing, but now, how about achieving the #1 ranking for America's most dangerous city? St Louis beat out Detroit, Compton and Camden! Philly's not even on the list. So I don't want to hear it from any of you St Louis people any more. When I was a youth pastor at Hope, parents would always freak out about being really safe on the overseas mission trips. I always said the most dangerous mission trips we took were to our own city -- guess I was right.

I realized a lot of you that read this weren't at Cornerstone the Sunday before I left for this immersion retreat, so you have no idea why I'm in Texas or Hawaii. I was selected to be a member of a team of six pastors from south-central PA sponsored by a scholarly grant from the Lilly Foundation to research how to lead and perpetuate missional churches and church movements. It is a two-week research project called an "immersion retreat" where we travel across the country and interview leaders who are currently leading missional churches and movements and glean information and principles to formulate a deeper understanding of missional leadership in order to be missional and transformational leaders ourselves. It's a great opportunity with lots of learning and community, and it's obviously sweet being in Hawaii to interview leaders at Kauai Christian Fellowship and New Hope Fellowship.

So, like I said earlier, writing about the full content of all that's going on with the learning side of things would be very unprofitable because it's essentially information overload and I'm going to need to process for a while. But I wanted to include my friends and family on the travel side of things.

A few weeks ago at Cornerstone, I taught John 4 -- Jesus and the Samaritan soman -- had everything to do with living water. I started off that teaching by talking about people who love water and are part fish, like my buddy Tim, he's a surfer dude. I on the other hand, do not like water. It's not that I'm afraid of it cause I'm a relatively strong swimmer. Saturday I went body surfing. This is me before going body surfing.

This is me after going body surfing.

One of the most painful experiences of my life. I was in the water with my friend, Dave and we got wrecked by this huge wave -- 20 feet high! (actually, my buddy Tim on the shore said it was about five feet high, but what does he know?). I lost my body board and ended up getting pounded into the sharp, lava hewn rocks making a huge divot in my leg and depositing large amounts of sand into my bathing suit -- very uncomfortable. I remembered once again why I don't do water: too much work and lots of pain.

October 29
Today was a cool day. Went to Kauai Christian Fellowship and spent the afternoon with its pastor, Rick Bundschuch talking missional leadership and ministry.

Sunday evening consisted of some very cool community time with the guys on the team.
Spiritually invigorating and draining.

October 30
Have some down time today and tomorrow before getting to New Hope Fellowship in Honolulu. So we went hiking today in an incredible canyon in Kauai.



After driving through the canyon, we hiked about one and a half miles back into the canyon to Waipoo Falls. They were intensely beautiful, as is all of Kauai.

Immersion Retreat - October 25, 26, 27

Hey Everyone in blogland.

Let me begin this post by congratulating my St Louis friends on winning the World Series. It couldn't happen to a nicer city and you folks deserve it, especially the way the Rams and Blues have tanked in the last four or five years. St Louis is the greatest baseball town in America.


So, the immersion retreat is going well. On Wednesday morning, we traveled from Corpus Christi to Houston. We spent all Wednesday afternoon at Ecclesia, a church in Montrose -- metro Houston area. It was a really cool experience to talk ministry philosophy and purpose with the guys at Ecclesia. Their church reminds me so much of Cornerstone. Doing great kingdom work.

Wednesday I got a real treat. Mike Taylor is a former student from my youth group at Hope Church in St Louis. Mike went to Moody and is now a youth pastor in Sugar Land, a suburb of Houston. His wedding to his wife, Lacey, was one of the many I was privileged to do this summer. Anyway, I got to spend all night hanging out with Mike and Lacey at their crib. Literally all night -- didn't go to sleep at all. I loved it.

Thursday morning we flew from Houston to San Francisco. San Francisco is another city I love and another location of a wedding I performed this past summer. We had a six hour layover in SanFran, so we took off into the city to hang out in Union Square. Was very cool. Tried to hang out with another former student and intern -- actually, the girl from the SanFran wedding -- but she was working.

Here's a trolley from San Francisco, the home of Rice A Roni, the San Francisco treat, which is the product placement I think of when I think of San Francisco.


Thursday night we flew from San Francisco to Lihue (pronounced Luh-hoo-we), Hawaii on the island of Kauai. This place rules. I've been a lot of beautiful places in the world, and this place is right up there at the top. We are on Kauai to learn from Rick Bundschuh, pastor of Kauai Christian Fellowship a church that started as a youth ministry gone nuts. Kauai is where we'll spend the most solid time block in our trip which is nice cause all this traveling is really taxing, even in Hawaii. So today we were at KCF for a while and then spent the afternoon seeing some of the north shore. Here's some pics from the day.








Tomorrow, we're going on a three hour tour. I may or may not see you all again.