More on the Imago Dei....

David said, "When I look at the heavens, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man, that you care for him." (Psalm 8)

Just what is it about humankind that is so special to God? Man, made on the sixth day, was the crowning glory of God's creation. Many women love to say that God made man, then He improved on the model! Actually, there is some real truth in that. However, male and female were given qualities as distinct from the animals, and are listed in Genesis 1:26-28: "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, care for the earth." So, it makes good sense to limit our carbon footprints, huh?

God spoke the creation into being, while God formed the man and breathed His Spirit into him.
So there is something transcendent in each of us, as the spirit of man is the candle of the Lord (Proverbs 20:27)
We are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which he purposed beforehand that we should do. (Ephesians 2:10) "Workmanship" is poiema in the Greek, which is where we get the English word "poem." We are God's love sonnet, the connecting of a divine rhyme: our DNA made up of the logoi spoken over us by the Almighty, each couplet of the song sung over us in joy and delight. The song of all songs, breathed into you by Yahweh Elohim has inspired a living being.

The great wisdom teacher Solomon told us that God has put eternity in the hearts of men (Eccl. 3:11). From your inception, you were created for greatness. There is greatness inside of each of us. There is greatness inside of you.

God's intention was that we would live and move and have our being with God living the creational mandate. God has designed the places where each of us live and dwell (Acts 17).

He has your best intentions at heart. If God had a refrigerator, He would have your picture on it.

Think about His love/think about His goodness/think about His grace that brought us through
For as high as the heavens above / so great is the measure of our Father's love / Great is the measure of our Father's love.

pax Christi,

sp

The Wonder of Creation

Reading: Psalm 8
For the choir director; on the Gittith.
A Psalm of David.

O LORD, our Lord, How majestic is Your name in all the earth,
Who have displayed Your splendor above the heavens!
From the mouth of infants and nursing babes You have established strength
Because of Your adversaries, To make the enemy and the revengeful cease.
When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,
The moon and the stars, which You have ordained;
What is man that You take thought of him,
And the son of man that You care for him?
Yet You have made him a little lower than God, (elohim)
And You crown him with glory and majesty!
You make him to rule over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet,
All sheep and oxen,
And also the beasts of the field,
The birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea,
Whatever passes through the paths of the seas.
O LORD, our Lord, How majestic is Your name in all the earth!

For the past two weeks, I have been contemplating the beauty, wonder and intricacy of creation, and been asking myself a few questions?

How would Jesus reduce His carbon footprint?
Would Jesus drive an SUV?
How would Jesus, CEO deal with His company's industrial waste?
Would Jesus recycle?
Would Jesus sponsor Live Earth? Earth Day celebration??

Wanna weigh in? Meanwhile I'll be spinning out some speaks on creation, and what being the crowning glory of God's creation does for us. Peace out!

sp

is it just another manic Monday for you?

...when Jesus is alive and well, and you are the recipient of the gifts and offices of Christ, left in His ascension?

...when you are filed with the Holy Spirit and fire?

...when you are blessed in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ?

...when you are born of imperishable seed, and into an inheritance, kept in heaven for you, which can never perish, spoil and fade?

...when you are part of an unshakable kingdom that is rapidly advancing?

...you are the treasured possession of a Heavenly Father Who loves to hear you call Him by Name?

...you are part of a nation of kings and priests, offering spiritual sacrifices to God Most High?

...because of Jesus, you can reach behind the veil, and obtain mercy and grace for whatever you need.

in pax Christi,

sp

Pray, pray, pray for leaders - men and women with bulls-eyes on their backs!

Do not keep seeking and crying for more power; but rather seek by prayer and watchfulness and study of your Bible and the honest improvement of every opportunity to be a perfectly free channel for the power of the Holy Ghost, who is now in you. Believe God, and do not obstruct the way of the Holy Ghost, that He may work through you. As Him to teach and guide you, that you may not hinder Him in His work. Seek to think His thoughts, to speak His words, to feel His love, and exercise His faith. Seek to be so guided by Him that you will pray when He wants you to pray, sing when He wants you to sing, and last, but not least, be silent when He wants you to be silent. ’Live in the Spirit,’ ’Walk in the Spirit,’ (Gal v. 25), ’Be filled with the Spirit’ (Eph v. 18)
~Samuel Logan Brengle


“Satan has always attacked leaders. He has grabbed hold of Zech. 13:7, which states, “Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.” In congregation after congregation, the accuser has come against a pastor (shepherd), and the result has been a scattered flock. The Apostle Paul recommended that we stand up by praying: ‘I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone - for kings and all those in authority’ (1 Tim. 2:1-2). This means all authorities, in the church as well as the government. Are they not in much greater need of our intercession than our accusation? No pastor or church leader is perfect. We can always find fault if we look. But God is calling us not to look for their faults, but to pray for their effectiveness, ‘that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness’ (1 Tim. 2:2). When we follow the example of the great Intercessor, we defeat the accuser in a basic and practical way in our own congregation. A prayed-for shepherd or church leader is a loved, respected and protected leader who can lead the flock into great things for God’s kingdom.”

~David Butts (PRAY! Magazine - Nov/Dec 2004 NavPress)

I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone-- for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.
1 Timothy 2:1

"We do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered."

sp

Archive: A Walk in the Woods

A Walk in the Woods
Somewhere near Choate Circle
Charlotte, NC

8:18 am……class at 9:00….I’ve got plenty of time. Stuart told me that the seminary was just down the back road, cross the creek, and I would be on the seminary property. So, books in hand and computer in my shoulder bag, I set out through the back door, along the back way in search of the seminary. I cross the bridge, hopeful for a quick journey.

Alas, not so. At the first fork in the road, I take the right turn. But is it the right right turn? The seminary is in that direction…..I think. I glance at my watch, 8:35, plenty of time to get to class, just cross the creek, and I will be there.

I get to the creek; because of all the rain, the creek is flowing and full. To my left I see some logs. I pick up one, and toss it in the creek. It submerges. I think to myself, there’s more creek here than meets the eye. So I begin to double back. Back. And, back. And, back. Soon, I lose all my bearings, and I begin to panic. What about my class? What will the teacher think of me, late for my first day? I’m “Mister On-Time,” what will they think of me now? As these thoughts rushed through my head, I slipped! Everything: books, computer, me--all in the mud!

The mud was so deep; it almost took my shoes off. Oh, so this is what muck and mire does, my gospel-shoes were just about suctioned off my feet.

Now I’m thinking: Now that I’m all muddy, I’ll find the road that leads right to the seminary, so I’ve got to act either embarrassed or prophetic, as I see myself speaking to the throngs of seminarians about the need for the Church to accept those who aren’t as clean as others of us are. Just to absolve myself from self-imposed guilt? Forget that!

I’m just plain lost. Before, I just needed a little direction, but now…I’m lost! I’ve been following the trails that have been recently traveled, that have withstood the previous days’ rains. I found a trail that led to another dirt (red clay) road that I had traveled before, or so I thought. As I stopped to consider which way to go, I heard a Voice. The Voice said, “BE WITH ME.”

I was arrested by the Voice, stopping me dead in my tracks, and I opened my eyes for what seemed to be the first time to sights and smells and sounds of the woods; it was as if a grey film had been removed from my eyes and the woods were colorized in an instant!

I heard the birds afresh, and the sound of trees bending in the wind for the first time. I was led to a honeysuckle tree, and I inhaled its sweet smell. I touched a branch to see a young bud close up, and it was as if the tree was moving toward me. In the distance I saw a trail not taken; the drops of water on the ground cover glistened like diamonds in the golden sunlight. I heard the Voice again, which said, “BEHOLD MY GLORY!” The wind caressed my frame, beckoning me closer to the honeysuckle. I took a deep draught of the honeysuckle’s aroma, filling my nostrils with its sweetness and my mind with euphoria. There was another glorious sunlight behind my eyelids, as I closed my eyes and meditated on the Glory of God, how His creation speaks His goodness. I was intoxicated by the beauty of the canopy of trees. I staggered down the path, only to see a wild rose bush, and to consider how beautiful its delicate linen leaves are. There was a young rose bud about to bloom; how the bud strained against its leafy captors. What of the thorns, gruesome reminders of the cruel beauty of the cross? I was constrained by the Glory!

My pace, once quickened by the pace of the daily grind, was ground to a halt. I could only take the tiniest of steps. I moved a few inches, my eyes slowly surveying the ground cover, the variety of mosses, the black pine cones and hickory nuts everywhere amidst the brown of decaying leaves. There, in the all dark mossy and leafy cover was a flash of green! Hello, Mister Turtle…I can see your pale green head sticking out from beneath that multicolored shell. Now, there’s a pace I need in the woods: a turtle’s pace. Ah, I can sense my breathing now, taking in the lush smell of a cedar split by lightening. God is slowing me down, what a gift.

Remembering the quote of William Booth: “The depth of a man is determined by the quality of his surrender,” I have to give up the ghost; I just have to….you know that’s a process

It just takes time to arrive.

I recalled the conversation that I had had with Stuart on the way home from the airport. He told me the story of a missionary who was tired and burnt out, desperately needing rest. As she had arrived on a Saturday night, and as good Christians are bound to do, she was thinking what church she would attend on Sunday morning. Stuart said, “Don’t worry about church, just get a good meal, and sleep until you get up. And, when you wake up, do it again. If it was good enough for Elijah, it will prove good enough for you.” (see 1 Kings 17)

If that advice was good enough for that missionary, it was good enough for me. So, I decided to relish my walk in the woods. Taking on what I call “my retreat pace,” a slow, measured amble, I took another turn in the road. Suddenly, I smelled pancakes! How odd! In the midst of the woods, I caught the smell of pancakes! My mind envisioned the movie “Antwone Fisher,” who dreamed of a pancake dinner when thinking of reuniting with his family of origin. Pondering on my own deep need for connection, and the need to find a voice in this world, I wonder where my symbols that point to these connections with family and community are. Where are my pancakes? Where are the symbols that give voice to the struggles and vision and possibility to the redemption of oppressed people? I can never cross the Atlantic and find my family. I can hardly trace my roots in America...

I learned a bit about wilderness: I looked at my watch--10:10….Nearly 2 hours in the forest, attempting to make a 2 minute journey. I learned about the nature of sin out there, about the nature of deliverance, how the muck and mire of sinful experience can suck the life out of me, disabling my measured walk of enjoyment with God. Until I gained a clear break from the muck and mire, my walk was no longer enjoyable. Until I encountered God's Glory, the walk was drudgery, tedious and messy.

"Out there, " I learned a bit about contemplation. God had to arrest me on His terms. He had to get me on his home turf--creation, to confront me, so I could encounter Him--on His terms. He enabled my senses to encounter Him in His Glory. He had to knock me on my knees to get me to slow down. I had always encouraged my congregants “to stop long enough, to get quiet enough, to hear from God, to see that He is All-Enough." This day, after the rush of traveling, of packing, leaving home and office in one piece: flying down, flying in , I was forced to take my own advice.

As I later sifted through and meditated on this experience, one of the themes in this adventure was freedom. I needed freedom, as it were, from the wilderness. Also freedom into the wilderness. Man was created in the wilderness and then placed in the garden. There is a wildness in me that needs freedom in me. The freedom did not come from my witty inventions, or my sense of direction, but from my surrender.

I wonder in what woods are we lost as a movement, lost and disconnected from the people we “serve.” I was repulsed by the notion of “big church,” witnessed in all my doings, yet attracted to the simplicity and beauty of “Christ in the canopy” during my walk in the woods.

How do we simplify and beautify our movement that it again simply responds to the wind of the Spirit, as Jean-Pierre Caussade described the soul: “Light as a feather, innocent as a child, fluid like water, responding to every breath of God like an inflated balloon.”

But I also needed freedom from my forced rest; my modern being was crying for more frenetic activity, even though body and soul were begging for solace. This is the paradox of the modern life: there is this compulsion to keep moving at breakneck speed, even while ignoring the signposts and symptoms of excessive activity. This is the curse behind another statement attributed by the Founder, “That, and better will do.” The powers behind that statement keep us all on the never-ending treadmill of ceaseless activity, without time for reflection, or even rest. As I looked through the windows of the soul, hiding behind that activity I saw a gnawing sense of emptiness and unworthiness, that somehow we do enough to be made worthy to serve God. That is where I need my freedom; there is not enough that I can do to prove my love for Him, except what the Lord said that day during that forced wilderness retreat, “Be with Me.”

Teach me Lord, teach me how to abide. Teach me how to be still before You; even when I have to act, teach me how to keep my soul still in Your presence. Still my soul, O God. Keep the canopy of the woods within me as an indelible memory, so I can receive the shelter of Your Glory as a precious gift. Help me in these days of frenetic activity to learn again about Your balance and harmony: Assist me in inclining my ear to these words of Jesus: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Help me to walk in the “unforced rhythms of grace.” (Matthew 11:30, the Message)

P.S. It’s a good thing that that first class was scheduled to begin at 1:00 in the afternoon; otherwise I would just rushed in to class, and been a mere seminarian. Instead, I had the chance to be with the Father and experience His being His son. I became a worshipper.

enjoy, in pax Christi,

sp

Tonight is a quiet night with quiet thoughts

Sitting with the family dog, blogging by candlelight. How romantic. These are few of my favorite things:

Watching children in the park, the depth of a sunset, how a winding road disappears into the horizon, the bubbling of a spring. These are the things intrigue me now....seeing Chaz grow before my very eyes; I barely want him out of my sight, he is changing so much.

Walking along the boardwalk with the love of my life.....taking in the fresh sea breeze, her loving clasp of my hand. These are but some of the ways that God speaks on this side of heaven.

Every person in the world has the opportunity to hear God through these means. Thank God is fully spoken through His Son. Jesus is the last Word, the best Word and the enduring Word. For the joy set before Him, Jesus endured the cross. God has spoken in a crescendo, with the words, "It is finished." These are words that tell us that the heavenly transaction has been paid in full. These are the words of a marathoner, who has burst through the tape in victory and making his way to the victor's circle.

Assured. Perfected. Freedom. Done. Jesus.

Happy Interdependence Day

Reading: Resurrecting Excellence: Shaping Faithful Christian Ministry, from the Pulpit and Pew Research Project, led by Duke Divinity School (2006)

Quote of the moment (p. 65)

"How do holy friends shape us in our discernment, and in our growth? Holy friends are those who, over time, get to know us well enough that they can challenge sins we have come to love, affirm gifts we are afraid to claim, and dream dreams about how we can bear witness to God's kingdom that we otherwise would not have dreamed."

I am thinking lately about relationships. Most of our time, in fact ALL of our time on earth is spent in relationship: with others, with ourselves, and with our Creator. Relationships can also be complex, but we cannot live without them. We are social beings, and we are created for relationship. Our very makeup of three parts: body - soul - spirit is a relationship. God Himself is a community: Father - Son - Spirit.

Last Sunday, Geoff, one of the elders of our church, said something really amazing in the morning's sermon. He said, "Do you have an 'almost-redeemed' relationship with God, where God has done some work, and you can take the rest from here?" Geoff is an incredible teacher of the Word, among many great servants at Church on the Sound.

Do you resemble that remark? I know that at times I do.

God does all the redeeming, from the uttermost to the uttermost. Closely related to "helping God out" is the "I can handle it" phenomenon.

I am a city kid. I still play stickball, and keep-away, and Chinese handball. (Glossary of bizarre outmoded terms to follow!) In the city, who drove? Cab drivers, that's who! Well, in the days before driving, I would carry everything, anything, on the subway. One day I carrying a guitar, and amp, a briefcase, and a small box to work. With detemination, I gathered it all up in my hands and arms and made my way to the bus stop, to the bus, to the subway stop, down the stairs, through the turnstile and onto the platform, only to squeeze a sardine-only rush hour train.

A stranger, albeit a potentially helpful and friendly stranger, came from along side to ask me, "Would you like some help?" And me, while juggling and dropping box and briefcase, answered in typical American fashion: "No thank you, I can do it myself." Now, just how nuts is that??

The reality is is that we need each other. The 60 "one another" phrases in the New Testament are there for a reason.

I think I'll learn the art of carrying objects on my head.

be blessed today,

pax Christi,

sp

Lions 1, Christians: first and goal to go!

Did you realize that there 23 uses of the word "death" in the Epistle of Paul to the Romans? I guess that makes sense, as the original readers faced the possibility of death all day long, in the capital city of an empire that raised the bar for killing to olympic proportions?

The possibility of death were all around these young Christians, who had the lions and gladiators on one side of them, and political accusers and emperor-cults on the other.

The last fear among them was the fear of death, but the good news: they were already dead - dead to sin, and alive in Christ.

While our brother and sisters being killed for the faith in the countries world-wide who are anti-Christ are in dire straits, I submit to you that so called first-worlders are in another set of sticky wickets - we are like frogs in the kettle, with the heat of cultural relativism and compromise rising slowly and steadily, and the Body barely reacting to it.
As long as Time-Life sells Christian music at 9.99, and we go for it, we are no longer a counter-culture but a market segment. WWJD is only just a bracelet.

Just recently I wrote to a state assemblyman about my opposition to a issue of grave importance. I got a reply from the politico's office thanking me for my support! How absurd! But not really: government officials who are anti-Christian have learned to simply ignore the rantings of "the Faithful," because soon the rantings will cease, as soon as the Page 2 issue moves to Page 4 or so.

We may be eaten by hatemongers, bamboozled by liberals, but for God's sake we face death all day long!

As it is written: "For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,
neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." --Romans 8:36-39

And it is His love that compels us to speak out.

It is His love that compels the family in the Sudan to speak out for Christ and be killed by firing squad.

It is His love that compels the witness on the street corner take a wad of spittle in the face, preferring humiliation to compromise.

It is His love that compels the 9-year old boy in the Southern town to stand in front of his school and preach the Gospel to old and young alike!

It is His love and a love for all humanity that compels the folks on The Relief Bus to help the poorest of the poor with a full salvation.

It is His love that compelled the early Christians to march into the arena singing the "Song of the Martyr:"

If we died with him, we will also live with him;
if we endure, we will also reign with him.
If we disown him, he will also disown us;
if we are faithless, he will remain faithful,
for he cannot disown himself. ---2 Timothy 2:12-13

What song do we sing? Into which arenas do we march? This is the hour to find an issue and shout God's will about it from the rafters! Otherwise we become the frog in the kettle, with the temperature all around us slowly rising to a fever pitch, and not even noticing!

Ranting for Jesus!

sp