The Gift of Giving

Heather and I had the chance to go to the Reds game last night by ourselves. There were no diapers to change, no little mouth to feed, and no dealing with "hurricane time" (the time from when Corinne wakes up from her afternoon nap until the time she goes to bed where she literally tears through the house, getting into anything she can find, and making as big a mess of it as possible). It was just her and me, and great weather, and baseball.....and it was awesome.
Parenting changes everything. Your schedule changes (crazier), your free time changes (much less), the activities you're involved in change, places you hang out change, everything changes. You have to live a life of serving. You put their needs before yours, they become more important than you.
So when were offered free tickets (Thanks Ryan and Beth!) and free babysitting (Thanks Jim and Terri!) we jumped at the chance. And so Heather and I had the chance to go the game, and relax, and enjoy the awesome weather, and eat nachos with jalapenos (they were glorious), and we got to just enjoy each other. I've been to over 50 Reds games in my life, and I've never appreciated one as much as I did last night.
When you do something enough, and when you can do it whenever you want, on your schedule, when only what you want matters, you begin to feel a sense of entitlement. That you deserve things, that it's your right to have them. And then we get angry when we don't get them. But when you live to serve, you expect to give things up, you expect to not have as much, you come to realize that things that were once in your control aren't anymore. And the gift of giving is that you no longer believe you're owed anything, but when you receive, it's something that you really appreciate.

You don't have to have kids to live a life of serving by the way, this is way bigger than that. This is about everything you do, pouring yourself into others, putting them in front of yourself.

So as Heather and I sat together watching the Reds win (they're 2-0 on games that I've been to this year....I'm just saying), there was an overwhelming sense that we are so blessed. It was a liberating feeling, to feel blessed about something that you've experienced so many times. Maybe the greatest gift isn't what you have, it's in what you give.

Good Conversations

I love talking about Jesus. I suppose that's a good thing since it's part of my job. But the times that I really love talking about him is when it's unscripted. When you're sitting at certain restaurant, as I was yesterday with some friends of mine. After lunch, we walked outside and we were standing around our cars. One of my friends asked the other one, "How are you doing?" It wasn't the kind of how are you question that you ask someone in passing but you really don't want to or care to hear the answer. It was the kind of how are you question where the person knows that I'm willing to stand here as long as it takes for you to tell me how you're really doing.
The askee (I'm pretty sure that's not a word) of the question began talking about how at college he's tried out some small groups and Bible studies, and he hasn't found one where he fit in. Actually, they made it clear to him that he didn't fit in. And he didn't fit in because he has a lot of questions. Tough questions about who God is, what He's doing, and things in Scripture that just don't make sense to us. Anytime he would ask these kind of questions, they would give a pat answer, one that doesn't really answer the question but instead tries to make it go away. They want a tame God (or should I say "god"). They want a god that they can put in a box. A god who never stretches them or moves them from where they are. A god they can explain away.
For some reason, we're afraid of people asking the tough questions about God. I'm not sure where this comes from, except that I guess we're afraid of what people will do if they ask a question and don't get the answer that they're expecting. But I think God is okay with the tough questions. Actually, I think he wants them.
In the Jewish tradition, it was the rabbi's job to know about God. They spent nearly their whole life, from the time they're only a few years old, learning about God, studying the Scriptures, and pouring over the texts. Their life's pursuit was learning about who God is. But one of the most important things that they did was ask questions. They asked questions about they things that they read. And sometimes, when they asked those questions, there was no easy answer. So they'd ask other rabbi's, and if they weren't able to answer that question, do you know what they did? They threw a party. They couldn't find an answer so they celebrated. They celebrated the fact they weren't on the same level as God, that they didn't have all the answers.
I think God likes tough questions. Just asking the question implies that we don't know and we believe, or at least hope, that he does. We're going to deal with a tough passage of Scripture on Sunday that doesn't have easy answers. At first, I wanted to skip this story, to glaze over it, but I think we'd miss out on so much of who God is if we did that. So we're going to ask some tough questions about God.
As we were standing around the cars talking, my heart broke for this friend. At school, he hasn't found the kind of friends that he could have these kind of conversations with. The kind of unscripted, from the heart Jesus conversations that draw us closer to Him. I hope he finds some soon. I can't do without them.

First Blog

Hey all,
This is officially the first Connection blog. I'll be writing from time to time, sometimes once a week, sometimes several times a week. It will give you a chance to see how I experience God during the week and hopefully, will give you some things to think/talk about.

As you know, we're working through the Book of Acts right now, and as I'm wrestling with the text I'm wondering, there are all kinds of supernatural things happening. People being healed, the blind can see, people communicating to others in their own language without ever having learned it. At one point, a guy literally disappears from where he is and shows up somewhere else. Crazy! But I wonder, was all that stuff something that needed to happen then and not so much now? I'm not asking does God still interact and do things in his people and Creation, but why don't those things happen now? Should they? Are we missing out on things we should be seeing and experiencing? I don't know. The more I study Acts the more I'm confused by it. Maybe that's true about a relationship with God. Maybe the more we get to know him, the more we learn that there is so much we still have to learn. So as you grow closer to God you realize the capacity for relationship with Him is so much bigger than it was before. I love that about Him.

I'm sure there were some interesting conversations about the talk on Sunday from Luke. I think that's good. Here's what I want to happen. When someone from outside of the culture of Connection comes in to talk, I want you to wrestle with what they're saying, to think about it, to play with it in your head. And at the end of that you can land where ever you want, but I hope you land where you do because that's where you believe God is, and not just where you're comfortable. Feel free to post questions or comments about the talk on the wall on our Facebook page.

On another note I received something in the mail last week that I can't wait to tell you about on Sunday!