God's Word and Prayer

At the end of this year, my mind goes to the transformation that has happened in my own life in the course of one year. The list would be long indeed! Big statement here. Though mostly inside, God has changed me more this year than any other year since the life-changing transformation that happened while I was at Pine Cove as a boat driver in the summer of 1998.

As I look back on the year, what I see is God's word and prayer. Even though confusion, frustration, questioning, struggle, pain, and discernment could make their case to be what characterizes this year for me, I notice the sometimes subtle presence of God's word and prayer.

The nature of my job (to teach Bible classes) kept me going back to God's word. In my preparations God surprised me regularly with small things. As I reflect on this, it seems like God purified me little by little through it all with his word.

"Is not my word like fire, says the Lord..." Jeremiah 23:29a

Prayer was there too because of the nature of my job. At times I forced myself to ask others what I could pray for because I knew prayer changes things. It did. Even those small prayers said out of obligation, those prayers I'm supposed to pray because I'm the campus minister. Even more, I see those prayers said through silence, reflection, and tears from this year. Flash prayers like, "What is going on, Lord?" or "Give me patience, God!" opened up vistas of divine revelation.

"And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people." Ephesians 6:18

God's word and prayer. Commit to these in 2012 and reflect on what happened in your life at this time next year!

Go in peace! Serve the Lord!

Learn from God Himself

This is your first Saturday of Christmas break! Woo hoo! We are continuing the Christmas Break Exercise designed to help us stay focused each day during Christmas break. I explained it in more depth here. Here is the brief thought for today.

As an extension of yesterday's thought, take a look at what happens on the mountain of the Lord's house in Isaiah 2:3: "Many people shall come and say, 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.'..."

God teaches on the mountain! Spend a little bit of time reflecting on the things that God has taught you this last semester about his ways. How have you "gone to the mountain" and seen him at work in your life? How has he changed your life even in one semester?

Remember that God continues to teach us even now! He reveals himself to us in the most unlikely places. We can learn from him on a big beach in Hawaii or on a bean bag in our home. Be alert! Search and look for his teaching around you today.

[btw...where are you planning to assemble with a community of faith tomorrow? Who can you ask to go with you?]

Perfection or Maturity

It seems like this time of the year always brings about an energized propensity for focused campus ministry dreaming sessions for the coming academic year. It is a good thing for our work here in Huntsville! This is the exciting part of ministry.

Reflecting on how previous dreams have actually materialized in years past, I must say that I have lacked the ability to execute what is up in this bald head of mine. The semester brings with it a busyness that seems to choke out my good summer intentions. I get caught up in the details of maintaining a ministry somewhat solo. I haven't communicated well. I haven't empowered others well. I spent way too much time perfecting things that don't need perfection. The spacing between paragraphs on our weekly announcements doesn't HAVE to be uniform throughout! The page layout doesn't need to carry with it the golden ratio of design (1.62) before it goes to print.

As I return to my dreaming session, I have realized that something has to change at a core level especially dealing with things being perfect; my attitude needs a little adjustment. I have these perfectionist tendencies that don't want things done sloppy or incompletely; they can always be done better...and so I do them better. While this might be good at times, I think it prevents me from working on matters that really...matter.

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With that said, I wonder about Jesus' admonition to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect in Matthew 5:48. How far should we take that little phrase? It would be easy for me to take that one statement completely out of its context and place it on my announcement preparation. Maybe we should do that.

I am inclined, however, to have a little bit of textual restraint. The beginning of Jesus' sermon on the mount (specifically Matt 5:17ff.) calls to mind the shallowness of following rules verses the maturity of true righteousness. You can follow the rules without changing your attitude. You can refrain from murdering someone (the rule), but your anger has already murdered them (the attitude). The shallow righteousness of the Pharisees is surpassed by the mature righteousness of those who take Jesus' words seriously.

I use 'mature' here instead of 'perfect' intentionally because 'mature' gives the connotation of growth or completeness that 'perfection' doesn't. "Be mature as your heavenly Father is mature" is a plausible translation of this passage. It also does something more for me. I can strive for maturity more readily than I can strive for perfection. Perfection seems to be allusive whereas maturity is possible. Maybe it is a mental block of mine...I don't know.

Back to my perfectionist tendencies. The mature/perfect person (as I understand) would let some tasks go in an effort to get other (more important) tasks finished. In order to guide a larger process, the manager needs to step back from the details of the assembly line. In order for Kats for Christ to pursue being mature disciples of Jesus better, I need to let go of the margins in our announcements. I probably also need to let go of other tasks as well.

This summer will be a time for us to think about the maturity that Jesus desires of his disciples. Do you need to let go of some things in order for God's purposes to be completed?

God's Process

Yesterday I reconnected with two of my High School friends through facebook. Thinking back to those days draws me into reflection on how God has moved me in this journey toward full life with him. From golf to accounting to marriage to graduate school to ministry God has moved me closer to his heart slowly over these last 12 years. It is a process that takes time...a lifetime. God's patience truly does mean salvation.

Draw from the Waters

I ran across a proverb this morning that I want to process. Proverb 20:5 says, "The purposes of a man's heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draws them out."

When I have read this proverb in the past, I haven't spent too much time on it thinking about it. As I look at it I see a couple of things. First, all kinds of stuff passes through my brain every single day. Some things are worth talking about and other things are not (nor should I). When I start thinking about the things that are deep down, I know that there are some real meaningful things. I think about my relationship with God, my relationship with Tanya, with Kayla, with family, with friends, with students, with all kinds of people. If I go further, I begin thinking about my prayer life, times of meditations, and lessons that I learn that can only be from God. The longer I sit down, the better I begin to understand how deep into my heart I can go.

This leads to the second thing I notice: I need to be intentional about going through this process. While I understand why it happens, sometimes I don't know why I don't spend time every day reflecting on things in my life or going down to draw from the deep water. All I know is that my intentional efforts to reflect on things in my life lead me to a place where I can be more sensitive to the moving of God in my life.

That is what I noticed this morning as I read this section of the Proverbs.