The God of the Long Haul

I took two classes in modules these past two weeks at NTS.  The morning module was Genesis and the evening module was Congregational Discipleship.

One of the assignments for Genesis was to read through it in one sitting.  That took a LONG time and it was well worth it.  Then we got to do it three times, each time we took more notes on the stories and characters.  Through this process I was reminded time and time again of the beauty, power, awesomeness and gracefulness of our God who created the universe with care and precision, gave humanity free will and when the first humans sinned in the Garden he did not leave them alone but graciously provided covering.  I was also struck by the brokenness of humanity, even those who had been chosen by God to be his people set apart.  I had forgotten that Abraham lied twice about who his wife was!  But even in the brokenness God pursued his people wherever they were.  One of the commentators called God the "mobile God" because there was no place that He could not be found (recalling the Psalmist's words "where can I go to flee from Your Spirit?" from Psalm 139).  God showed up time and time again on behalf of his people, giving direction, correction, safety, promises, interpretations and provisions.

It's always interesting to see how the content of my various classes interact with each other.  My other class was Congregational Discipleship, which focuses on how the church sees and structures itself so that it will effectively disciple all members of the congregation in the way of Jesus.  There was much in this class on spiritual development, teaching techniques and educational theory, and all of these combined pointed to one thing: EVERYTHING we do as the community of God plays a part in the formation of the people.  Everything says something about and reinforces what we believe.  Yet, because the structure of church is made up of people and relationships, there will always be an incompleteness and room for growth in God's grace.  


This is where Genesis swoops in.  God is the God of the Long-Haul.  As God bore with the people in Genesis and gave direction, correction, safety, promises, interpretations and provisions, so God bears with the church today.  Like Abraham we are called to be his people and sometimes failure happens.  Broken relationships, missed opportunities, gross misunderstandings, overlooked needs, etc...But God remains faithful.  Time and time again He proves himself and takes over where we mess up.


A friend just shared with me a story about her dad accepting Christ into his life just six weeks before he passed forward.  He had thumbed his nose at God throughout his life.  And it was largely in part because of hurt received from the church.  But in the end, God worked his way in, softening his heart so that he did open his heart to Jesus.  The God of the Long Haul.  Awesome!

taking Jesus to the darkest places

Challenging thoughts here.

"Can you imagine an anarchistic band ever saying, “We’re not an anarchistic band. We’re just a band of people who happen to be anarchists. We don’t want to push anarchy on people. We just want people to see anarchy in our lives”? If everyone else can speak clearly and give their ideas without restraint, how come Christians always feel like they have to keep silent, especially when there is so much authority in their message?

"Jesus is looking for artists who are willing to tell people the truth, for musicians who are willing to go into these dark places and not hide their message, for people who will live lives of power, not just talk."

Andrew Jones interviewed David Pierce a man with a heart of youth who are searching for meaning and ultimately for God.

David Pierce plays with No Longer Music.

Check out their videos.

Surprised by Sgt. Teddy Bear

In teaching our teens the importance of ecclesiology (community life), we seek to involve them in various ways in our youth services (and hopefully in the Sunday services). Sometimes this involves risk, like when you ask someone to lead the opening prayer time.

Tonight was one of those nights where we took the risk.

There are kids you ask and you know what they're going to pray/say is going to be right on the theological money, while there are other teens who you're sure they'll pray with sincerity and passion but not necessarily with informed theology, and there are other teens who pray without passion or informed God understanding. I think all of them need to be invited to pray.

The teen that was chosen tonight has courage and an incredibly deep understanding of God. But he can be goofy too. So when he stepped up to the microphone and declared that he was going to pray as "Sgt. Teddy Bear" my heart almost stopped.

Then the prayer that Sgt. Teddy Bear prayed was so selfish, so condemning, so painful. It was something like this, "Dear God, these people need help. You know how I can't stand these people. I don't know how you put up with them..." As this prayer is sent floating through the air my spirit is sinking with the dread of wondering how to follow this, pleading with God for divine intervention.

As my mind is scrambling, Sarge stops. Adam interupts. He tells Sarge that's not how we pray. Then Adam proceded to pray one of the most insightful, thoughtful, kind, loving, spirit-filled prayers I've ever heard from a teenager. I don't remember all the lines, but I do remember something like these: "God, fill us with the warmth of your holiness. You have brought us hear for a reason and we need to receive from you tonight. Your love is more than enough for us."

My spirit soared. God reminded me of a passage in Luke about a tax collector and Pharisee.

Community takes risks.

Christmas Images

So, sometimes I get images stuck in my head for a while until i get them out. thoughts that might be significant...here are two recent thoughts.

I just heard a story on the news (click on picture for complete story) about a baby Jesus figurine who was stolen last year from somebody's yard. The figurine was returned this year with a set of pictures of the figurine in places the perpetrators had traveled. The "thieves" went around with baby Jesus and kept record of their time with him. For some reason, I think this story can be mined for some significance...

And the other image came to me when Aubrey and I were walking the other night and a family had just unplugged their inflatable lawn ornaments. it was kinda creepy, like the polar bear and her two cubs were having the life sucked out of them. and then we passed a place where the ILO's were being inflated from limp, lifeless flatness. and this image has stuck with me too...

Why Middle School Ministry is so great

Even though I was hired to be a middle school pastor when I first came to my church, I sometimes have doubts about the ministry and my role in it. The doubts have mostly to do with my lack of patience at times, than anything else. But recently I've had an upsurge (if that's a word) of passion for that area of ministry...and two stories surfaced last night that add to why I think middle school ministry is so great.

Question #1
We have a student, who I will call "micheal", who has a bad family history. Used to live in Florida, now living with grandparents here. Sometimes he is a little hard to control. Dad's not reliable (hard to be when you're in jail). So, the other night, at the beginning of our regular time micheal comes in with a most serious look on his face and says, "Josh, I need to talk to you sometime tonight." Since we were getting ready to start, I said we'd need to chat afterwards. We did all the stuff middle school ministry is so great at, stupid games, praying for each other, object lesson and discussion. Afterward, I had forgotten about micheal, and he came up to me...

So, we went to the side of things where we wouldn't be interupted by bouncing balls or frolicking girls. He looks at me imploringly and then looks to his right and left and back to me. "Where did God come from, Josh?"

here this whole time I thought he was going to talk to me about something going on at home, something about him having to be with his dad or something. I have never been asked this question with such earnestness and honesty. it had always been posed to me as some smart aleck response or some theoretical question in philosophy class. But here it was, being posed to me by an honest scrawny middle schooler, like his life depended on it.

Question #2 and 3
This story comes from Aubrey's group, where they were discussing Romans 12:1, which talks about offering your life as a living sacrifice to God. We were trying to talk about how God changes us and how we have to offer ourselves to him in order for that to happen. But in the middle of the discussion the kid asks, "So, does this mean I am supposed to commit suicide for God?"

"Well, no..." says Aubrey. "that's not exactly what the writer is trying to say. but it's kind of that way. we must kill the old self in order for God to bring out his newness in us."

"Why was the Bible written so we can't understand it?"

Ah, how I love the earnestness of middle school students and how I love how they take things literally and ask honest and unguarded questions.

More pictures from AZ