Just Thinking

'Till Death Do We Part

I’ve been married for 13 years to an absolutely amazing woman.  I definitely got the better end of the deal there, but I have a bad habit: I take her for granted.  Now, while it’s certainly not okay that I do it, I’m pretty sure I’m in good company.  In fact, most guys I know take their wives for granted everyday.  It’s something we’re all prone to do, and it doesn’t just stop with our relationships. Read more…

"Casting their nets..."

Sometimes I chuckle when I’m reading a passage of scripture.  I mean, there are some pretty funny parts in it.  For example, when Matthew is telling us about Jesus going into the desert to fast for forty days he says this, “After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.”  I always laugh at that.  Did Matthew really think he needed to add, “he was hungry”?  Did he honestly think we wouldn’t catch that? Read more…

So a few weeks ago I was down in the states for a friends wedding.  My buddy Aaron and his fiance, Joanna, were scheduled to exchange their vows, and commit themselves to each other for the rest of their lives and they felt that I should be present to witness this occasion.

Some people would have seen my role as a legal witness, others would have seen it as a spiritual witness, but I feel that my role was to look sexy in my tux (A role I feel I accomplished completely.) Read more…

To often we miss the purpose of the blessings in our lives and get myopic rather than outward focused.  Why is that?

Watch \”Blessed For Blessing\” on YouTube.

What if our view of the bible is getting in the way of what the bible was supposed to be and do?  I tackle this question in my latest vlog.

Watch my video diary on YouTube.

What cost are you willing to pay to develop virtue?

N.T. Wright at Fuller Theological Seminary, “Our culture prefers effortless spontaneity with occasional divine intervention in emergency, rather than working with God on developing the muscles which will meet those emergencies with a God given second nature which appears spontaneous, but is in fact the result of thinking, and choosing and practicing.”

How often do you slow down and reconnect?

I’ve been reading the book “The Wounded Healer” by Henri Nouwen lately and I came across an interesting quote that I had highlighted the last time I worked my way through it.   Nouwen says, “I am afraid that in a few decades the Church will be accused of having failed in its most basic task: to offer men creative ways to communicate with the source of human life.” What’s powerful about this quote is not just the assertion, but the fact that Nouwen made it in 1972 when he wrote the book.

I wonder if he was correct, or not?

Have we as a church failed in our task of providing opportunities and ways for people to communicate with the source of human life?   Have we missed the mark?  Have we got so caught up with teaching people about God, that we’ve failed in our role of connecting people to God?

Carrie bought me this figurine for my desk.

I walked outside to my car this morning and felt like yelling.  Now, that’s not really appropriate behavior for a guy my age in my neighborhood so I didn’t, but I felt like it.  If I had been my four year old son I would’ve thrown a temper tantrum right then and there in the driveway.  Can you imagine the neighbor’s faces if I had just thrown myself down on the driveway and started kicking and screaming?  At least, I would’ve given them all something to talk about.  The reason I was so angry was that it was cold out!  I am totally sick of winter, and we just got a beautiful taste of spring for a couple of days; it even got up to 16 Celsius for a little bit and I was loving it.  I don’t know if it’s the dark days, or the wet slushy roads, or the cold biting wind that I hate the most, but I know it’s been getting to me.  I just don’t feel like putting up with winter anymore.  It’s getting me bummed.

And it’s amazing how quick this type of feeling affects the spiritual life as well.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I’m doubting what I believe, or having any major faith crisis, it’s just that I’ve been feeling a little spiritually blah lately.  I’m not feeling as energized as I’ve felt in the past.  I’m feeling like I could really use a spiritual springtime.  And then today I came across a passage of scripture that always seems to catch me.

In Luke 11, Jesus is trying to get the disciples to understand what prayer is and what it can accomplish.  You can see why it was such a big deal to Jesus, because prayer played such a crucial role in his life.  He was always disappearing to be alone with God, to be re-energized, and to receive his instructions and guidance.  In this passage Jesus says:

Would you survive as Indiana Jones?

The definition of the word “Impossible” is “something that cannot be done.”   I’ve been thinking a little about this concept in the past couple of days.  We have a tendency to think that certain things are impossible.   We go there pretty quickly sometimes.   If something is difficult, or tough, we almost seem to approach it as if it’s impossible.  And the definition of “impossible” is pretty self-defeating.

Then comes Jesus and he has the audacity to say in Matthew 19:26: “Jesus looked at them intently and said, “Humanly speaking, it is impossible. But with God everything is possible.”  Have you ever thought about that statement?  That with God everything is possible?  I mean, Jesus doesn’t say that “some things are possible”, or that “really difficult things are possible”, but he says that “all things are possible.”  That’s a pretty crazy statement.

Here’s why this matters to me.   There are a couple of us here in Barrie that are feeling that God wants us to do something about the housing crunch that seems to be going on around us.  There are people that are trying as hard as they can, but they’re still not able to make the rent, and we think that shouldn’t be.   So what we’re thinking is that we’d like to buy up a few of the rougher streets in town and clean them up and provide housing for these people at decent and manageable rates.  The problem is that to us this dream seems a little impossible.  It’s the kind of dream that you think is a good idea, but it’s never going to fly, but then comes Jesus saying that with God, anything is possible!  What are you supposed to do with that?  How are you supposed to ignore the calling that God has put on your heart now?

When life feels grey.

Today is a dreary day.  The sky is that oppressively gray color that only the sky can really attain, and it is very damp.  Usually I’m happy for the warmer days in the winter time, but today I would trade the warmth for a little sun.  Why is it that the dreary days outside always seem to coincide with the dreary days in my heart?  It’s not that today is a bad day, or a horrible day, it’s just … dreary.

I suppose it didn’t help that when I opened my bible to read today, I ended up reading Psalm 69 which opens with these wondrously cheery words: “Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck.  I sink in the miry depths where there is no foothold.  I have come into the deep waters; the floods engulf me.  I am worn out calling for help; my throat is parched.”

I think that God put the Psalms like this in the bible just for days like this.  As a Christian, I’ve always felt that to be “down” at all was not the Jesus way to be: that feeling a little blue, or dreary, is to somehow betray all that God has done for us, but when I read these Psalms of David, I hear the pain, the loneliness, the frustration in his soul, and I am strangely comforted.  I mean, the guy was called “a man after God’s own heart” for crying out loud!  If David gets dreary sometimes, why shouldn’t we be allowed a few dreary days.

I guess the real issue is what we do with the dreariness.  Do we fight it?  Do we give in to it?  Do we spread it around a little?  Today I decided to visit Starbucks and spend a little time here listening to some good music, watching people interact (which is one of my favorite pass-times), and journalling through the dreariness.  I’m also getting my haircut this afternoon, which always cheers me up.  I’m also going to partake in a little revolutionary couch sitting this afternoon.  You see I think a big part of my dreariness is that I’ve been working a little too hard the past few weeks.  I had a trip up to Thunder Bay to speak at Redwood Park Church, and I was asked to speak at a youth retreat the weekend after that.  Now, while I absolutely love teaching, it still takes a lot out of me, so I think I need a little Sabbath time to recuperate.