Question One!

Part of my "official training" as a spiritual director had my path cross the path of Rev. Dr. Frederick Schmidt. Dr. Fred has done and continues to do so much for the Kingdom of God. On top of everything else, he is an Episcopal Priest. Dr Fred lost his brother in January to a brain tumor. His brother's name is Dave. 

Dave asked the hard questions about spirituality and the church. While Dr. Fred was one of my professors, he talked about writing a book called The Dave Test. It is now out and his blog is taking some time, in the next 10 weeks, to ask some question to see if it passes The Dave Test. So if I feel like it, I'm going to ask us to think about those questions too.

Taking the Dave Test during the Holidays

Question One: "Can I say life sucks?"

Illness, job loss, divorce, anniversary of the death of a loved one, these are a small showing for things that can and do happen around the holidays. Suffering doesn't take a holiday. These experiences are, by nature, isolating. They cut us off from what and who we have known. I mean think about it, how many people are going through a divorce in your church? Do you know? They usually stop going to church. 

During the holiday's we assume that everyone should be sweep along in the holly jolliness of it all. How many times have you heard someone say "Oh, get over it, it's Christmas!" "Can't you just get in the spirit of the season?" Hang on a minute…let me think about it…."Can I just say life sucks?"

Sometimes I think we forget Jesus was born in the shadow of Herod's raging paranoia! Children, baby boys, were being killed by huge numbers. But God...

Holiday celebrations that pass the Dave test are honest about those realities and people who can say, “life sucks” they are among the best to celebrate with on those holidays. Why? Well, why not? When we acknowledge that life can be hard, we open ourselves up to possibilities of seeing hope. Hope in the people who have suffered before you and lived through it. We might need to celebrate the holidays without ignoring life's realities. We might want to share our story with someone who needs to hear some hope.

So, can I say that life sucks? Well friends, right now it does. But God….. 

       

Day 1

Well, today is the day that Preacher man becomes Senior Pastor at Sylvan Hills UMC. I guess it happened last night at midnight. I can tell you I did not hear anything "going off" as I didn't sleep worth a pooh. Preacher man, likewise did not sleep much, but who can blame us, we have never been this way before. We had everything in the world to worry about and at this minute I can't seem to think of any of them. One of the cool things for me was a gentleman came up to me after the service and said Your the first Pastor's spouse we have had in...well a long time! I love the fact that I'm not following a beloved Pastor's Wife! Thank you Lord!


Preacher man and I served communion together this morning. Now, this wasn't our first time serving together, but it was the first time we severed this church. We had our little name tags on so everyone would know what to call us. Preacher man had asked that everyone wear their name tags, however we found out this isn't a name tag wearing church! BUT, they all had stick-on name tags and we were able to call each one by name as they came up for communion. 


That's when it started for me, I was overcome with pure joy. It has been a long 6 years getting to this point. Not all of it was easy, but not all of it was hard either. But 6 years is a long time to be working towards something. To keep pushing on. Muscling by. Praying your heart out. To look into the eyes of every single person that came through that line and to love them without even knowing them. I started tearing up. It was an awesome moment, that's for sure.


I'm not saying that everything is going to be rainbows and sunshine from here on out. In fact, I bet you a dime to a dollar that the battle lines are being drawn right now. I do know that the Gospel offends. I'm ok with that! The way I see it, if your doing something right, it will be tuff. When it's easy, that's when you should be worrying. I mean God open's the doors but He doesn't force us to walk through them. We still have to show up and do our part, and that ends up being work. I think a lot of churches have forgotten that. They are looking for easy, they have gotten soft. I think that's one of the reason's the UM church is in the mess it's in right now. We haven't done the hard work that is required of Kingdom work. Have you ever been on a easy mission trip? If it's easy, they call that a vacation! OMP, that's a hard working mission group of people right there. Our youth just got back and they are wiped out. Jesus work isn't for the wimpy at heart. Just listen to the news, we are under attack! So you might as well get ready people. It's time to get real, or stay home. Me, I'm rolling up my sleeves, putting on a ball cap and leaning in big time! Anybody with me?        

Jump!

Why don't we just step out there and do it? Why are we eat up with failing? What got programed into us that made us so stickin' scared? 


I mean, when we're young and all of our brain cells aren't hitting the mark, and our friend says, "Let's jump!" and we do and don't die, why are we so afraid to do it again when we're older? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should all climb a tree, or onto the house and jump off. I'm wanting to know when was the last time you jumped?


I feel like I'm making a life of jumping! Ever so often, I get the opportunity to do something that most folks thinks is crazy and I jump. In fact, ever since I really stated following Jesus, I've been a jumper. I grew up thinking I was going to be a company girl. You know, get a job, keep the job...forever. Folks older than me did that. Get a job and keep it, grow in it (or not) but stay in the same job and retire from that job with your gold plated watch, if your lucky.


I've had more jobs than Carter has had liver pills! I thought I would work for Cargill for my whole life, in fact the longest I've ever worked for anybody was Cargill, 7 years. But deep inside of me, I'm a jumper! Not a job jumper, but a life jumper.


I am once again unemployed! The "normal" person inside is yelling at me, What do you think your doing!? In a time as this, how can you not have a job? How can you leave a job, that by the way, you were really good at? Do you know how much gas cost? Have you seem the price of banana's? AS a matter of fact, yes! 


I would like to add that there are a few things that are yelling at me a little softer, that are catching my attention a little bolder and are speaking to my heart in a way that the "normal" just doesn't understand. If you listen, you might hear it too.


Jesus is standing over there and he's holding out his hand to me, with that smile that comes so easy to his face. He knows I can do it! He's called me to it. To seek Him first and His kingdom. I'm one of the lucky ones who hears him. I know I've got responsibly, but it doesn't have anything to do with punching a time clock. I don't think I can do it, and that's right where he wants me to be. Dependent on him and detached from my attachments. I'm ready to jump into what I'm being called to do, not because of what I think I can or can't do. Not because you understand what I'm doing, but because I've been called into it.
    

Blessed are the Full!

Blessed are you who are full now, who are sleek and well-fed, because you are strong enough to feed the hungry, to touch empty stomachs with compassion. But blessed only if you have the mind of the hungry, the mind of Christ. Only if you do not take your food for granted. Only if you are uncomfortable as long as one brother or sister cries in vain for bread or juice or love. Only if you experience what hunger tastes like. Only if you experience your own profound emptiness - how desperately you need the hungry,how far you still are from God. Blessed re the full, if you are always hungry. ~ W.J. Burghardt, S.J. Sir, We would like to see Jesus, (Paulist Press, 1982)

My first homemade pizza from scratch!

I really learned a lot when I ran the soup kitchen in Durango. I thought I had some idea about what hunger was, about how to take care of people. I found out fast that dignity needs to be apart of the combination or it really doesn't matter what you have to offer.


When we learn more and more about Jesus and the way he was with people, it really should be touching us in a way that causes action to happen. It might start out physically, giving  food, money, your time. It should grow from there though. I got so tired of hearing, Can't I just give you the money and let you do the work? Well, yeah! But you miss out on the blessing that doing the work brings.


We grow when we're uncomfortable. If being around hungry, crying people makes you uncomfortable, you should try hanging around them for a while. What starts to happen is you begin to experience hunger for them, with them, and it strikes a cord inside of you that calls you to action. You go out and get some food and you say. Here! Take this food and don't be hungry! That's when it really happens! Heaven opens up and takes notice and look out! You've done it now! You start to see what emptiness is. You get into a conversation with a hungry person and you begin to see how empty you really are. In taking the time to share, you have opened up a spot inside of yourself that can only be filled by God. Cuz it's just too much for anyone person to do. We just can't get our head around how to feed all the hungry people, really, we can't! Then God comes along and shows you that sometimes the hunger is from a lack of spiritual food.


That's why we say, Blessed are the full, if you are always hungry!     

Nothingness!

I do the craziest things sometimes and wonder why I get riled up about it. Today is no exception, let me explain.


I subscribe to, well, I really don't know what it is, but it's called Stumbleupon. Every now and them I get some cool pictures, writing info, spiritual things and humor. Today I got something from them and my hackles are up about what they call spirituality. Spirituality equals whatever anyone thinks it should be. 


There is this person (Alan Watt) who wrote this, for lack of a better word, paragraph, about nothingness and how everything is nothing. We come from nothing, we go to nothing, it's all a dream and our minds are pure like the nothingness of space. HOG WASH! I don't know about you Alan Watts, Mr. nothingness guru, but I am the Beloved! It's his type of thinking that has crept into the church as spirituality and no one has stopped them and said, 
Hey buddy, your wrong!
We're all to afraid to hurt someone feelings, that we might run them off from the church or for goodness sakes, speak the truth!


Here's what I know, God made me, loves me, has an awesome plan for me, and I will be with Him when I die! I also have an idea about where Mr. Nothingness will be and I'm not sure it will equal nothing, or at least his idea of nothing. 


We, as the church, have got to start showing people what being a disciple of Christ is about. It's not a hour at "church" and 45 minutes at Sunday school for a total of almost 2 hours a week IN church. It's not about shuffling your kids into some organized mayhem once a week and thinking your teaching them about Christ. It's not about volunteering for everything anyone asks you to do, and thinking your doing your part to grow the kingdom. It's not about being comfortable, or only giving if you want to.


It's about surrender! Laying it all down and letting Christ do what He wants! It's about getting out of the way and letting the Holy Spirt run your service! It's about getting real with each other about our lives and walking through the muck and mire with each other. It's day in and day out time spent in the Word to hear what God wants to say to you! 


You don't have to go to the big city and pay huge amounts of money to be entertained by people who really don't need your money or know who you are. There are folks, right in your own church who have a story to share about what God has done for them. These are the stories we need to be hearing, from everyday, normal folks. 


But that would mean you'd have to take the time to get to know each other, and care and maybe see that there's more to people than nothingness.           

Dr Fred!

I do believe that Dr. Fred has done it again! I read his blog on why mainline church giving is down and I think he hit the nail on the head yet again! He mentions that giving to charitable organizations is up over this past year, yet giving to the church is down. Is it because there are organizations that do a better job at doing what the church was called to do? For example, I will use my time running the soup kitchen. We did a better job at feeding the hungry than the church did, however we were supported by the church and 98% of my volunteers were church goers. Did I try and take the giving dollars from the church? No, but I told the churches and their people that I was doing what the church was called to do, so support me! They did and as far as I know they still do. 

But tithing is something you really don't hear a lot about in the church anymore and I want to know why not. One of the coolest things to ever happen to Preacher man and I was when he started really tithing. We really couldn't afford it, with his business being so new and me just starting to work for the broke soup kitchen. Something that Rev. Rick said, seemed to have gotten into the core of my husband and it wasn't letting go. Rick said to test God on it. He also said, if you weren't tithing, you were stealing from God. Ouch!

This time of year is dedicated to what the mainline church calls "Stewardship". They sorta ask for pledges without really telling you why you should give. There is no meat to chew on or anything to prompted us to even think about giving. No one is telling us the blessings that happen when you give, or how God changes you and really starts rocking your world when you trust in Him. I'm pretty sure it says a tithe, a tenth of your income!

How much do you tip your server when you go out to eat? How much doyou blow on Starbucks cuz you can't make coffee? How much are you going to spend on useless gifts this Christmas? Check out what Dr Fred says and see if you agree!

http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional-Resources/Minting-the-Mainline-Frederick-Schmidt-11-14-2011.html#.TsLUHULkV4g.blogger 

Watered Down

Tuesday's are strange days for me and heres why. I don't have a large amount to read and ponder. It's my day seven for both of my studies and that's the day of rest. Now, day of rest for me looks like this today.


1. Laundry has got to be done before we start running around naked! Ok it's not that bad, but Preacher man did run out of socks last week!
2. I have Spiritual Exercise class from 10:30 to 12, which I am looking forward to. I have seen God work in my life this week in very restful ways. Which he's done before but it's been different somehow this week.
3. I have to be at the Creek from 12:00 to about 5:00 to help with 48 boxes of shipment coming in. Two things here are strange, I can't get across town that fast to be on time and we have the new fall stuff coming in! It is so strange that I get excited about God and clothes all in the same thought.
4. I leave for Fayetteville around 5:00 for my Voices and Choices class and should be home around 8:00.
Doesn't that sound restful? Shesh!


This is from E. Stanley Jones, The Christ of the Mount.
Years ago when I asked Mahatman Gandhi what we could do to naturalize Christianity in India so that it would cease to be a foreign thing, among other things he replied: "Practice your religion without adulterating it or toning it down" - and he had in mind the Sermon on the Mount. 


This speaks volumes to me and I have to add my AMEN! I am so tired of hearing Christians apologize for the Gospel or water it down. It isn't a book you need to add to or take away from, it's the Bible! It's the Word of God and for some reason, he didn't need our thoughts or suggestions about what needed to go into it when it was written. I will not say I'm sorry that the Bible says, if you don't forgive, God won't forgive you. (Paraphrasing by me) The reason behind this, I believe, is because God wants us to know about the power of forgiveness. It's HUGE people! I will admit, I don't forgive as I should and I want my own kind of vengeance, BUT GOD. It always comes down to but God! He shows up and speaks into our ear and if we listen, life becomes powerful. 


When we adulterate what the Bible says, we are taking the power of God away. We are softening the blow so we can all feel good about where we are in life and we can ride the happy train into hell! For real! 


People want truth, and you know what? They can handle it. I was talking to someone the other day and they said something should not have been done because it made that person uncomfortable! You know what I say to that? Good! Change comes when we get uncomfortable! This life is not about your comfort! It's about becoming more like Christ! It is about dying to self not exalting self! That would be the world talking. 


The world is speaking so loudly; If it feels good, do it. It's your money, do with it as you feel you should. Look out for number 1! There is no power in any of this. The power comes when you say "Here, take what I have God and use it however you need it." You know if the people in the church were to tithe we would not be in the situation we find our selves in today? But everyone thinks everyone else should do their part first and if it works for them, I might do it. There is no power in that. 


Dr Kalas said it best. "Kingdom people should be doing Kingdom work right now, not waiting for the Kingdom to come."