Natural Revelation

I cannot fathom how people can not believe in some sort of higher power. Especially scientists. It seems like the overwhelming majority of scientists are, or at least pretend to be, atheist. I don’t get it. I’m no scientist, but the more I learn about the complexity of life the more convinced I am that this world we live in could not have been an accident or lucky circumstance. Sunday morning it snowed. It was gorgeous- the snow was thick and heavy and coated every single tree branch with a layer of untarnished white. The world outside my window looked like a winter wonderland. I sat staring at the limited amount of nature outside my window mesmerized by the beauty. Then, I had to go outside, and slosh through this cold, wet matter on the ground, and I got to thinking why on earth would something so cold and irritating be so beautiful?

The snow melted that afternoon as the sun came out. Monday morning with the sun shining bright I was amazed at the greenness of everything. If I had just been covered with icky cold stuff I would certainly not be bright green, I would stay ugly brown out of spite.

I’m not a nature lover, I do enjoy nature, but I’m not too likely to get out of my comfortable apartment to go strolling through unblemished nature carrying a 50 pound bag of everything I need to survive and nothing more. That said, nature convinces me there has to be a God. The complexity and beauty is beyond human ability to comprehend. The fact that necessary functions for survival can be beautiful is even more amazing to me. When I hear about the compexity of a single cell, or read about how this organism survives because of what that organism does because of what that other thing needs I am in awe. There is no way this just happened to become how things work. There is no way that the world can possibly be a lucky occurrence. Something had to have made a grand scheme, a plan to create this amazingly complex system.

I think of Pharoh when Moses was pleading for the deliverance of the Isralites from Egypt. God blinded Pharoh making it so he did not see what was so obvious- that God’s hand was at work in it all. I think this must be the case for all these people who can look at nature, be so knowledgeable when it comes to science, and yet not believe in some sort of deity creating it all. I don’t know how to get them to see what they already see so much and yet are completely blinded to.

Working

When I was in college I enjoyed the social aspects and even enjoyed most of my classes. By by my junior year I was itching to be done. I wanted to get out and start doing what I was learning about. My internship only made this desire even greater. I worked two jobs in addition to my internship in an attempt to lessen my debt. And I wanted to stop working jobs that I didn’t like and just start doing that which I wanted to do. Whenever I said something about just wanting to be done I would get the same response, something along the lines of when you leave college you’ll keep wishing you could go back. Two years isn’t a very long time to be out of college and working full time. But I can say without a doubt that there is no part of me that wants to go back. Yeah, I miss my friends from college, but not enough to want to do it over again. I love my job. I find it incredibly sad to think about people who seem to honestly want to go back to college- to live in college.

My sister is an accountant. I would be miserable doing what she does all day- crunching numbers, figuring out where businesses messed up, and whatever else it means to be an accountant. She loves it.

All I know is that while everyone will have days where they dislike their job, I hope that I’m not in the minority of people working a job that I love. This is what you are going to spend the majority of your life doing. Do something you love, no other motivation is worth it.

Loving our Neighbor

“Time” had an article about the “soft revolution” of Islam. As I read the article I thought about how so much of that could have been written about Christianity about a decade ago, or perhaps even more recently. The younger generation is seeking to modernize the faith, without compromising on their beliefs. They are looking for peace instead of war, they want to incorporate technology and justice, they are seeking to better understand the original intent of Muhammad and correct the places where Islamic tradition has gone astray. They are typically quite conservative in their beliefs, despite their attempts to revolutionize their faith. And they sound shockingly like me and my fellow 20-something Americans.

All this lead me to wonder, why is it that as Christians we so often look at other faiths and people of other faiths as the enemy? Why can’t we look at these people and what they believe and look for common ground? The more I look for the differences and errors of their belief, the more I am distancing myself from them, distancing myself from caring about what happens to them, distancing myself from wanting to see them treated justly.

Last night I was watching the new NBC show, “Kings”. They were working to establish peace between two warring countries. The solution ended up being that the wealthier, seemingly better off country had to give up something that had great value to them, but they also didn’t simply give their culture. I wonder if the solution for America and the Middle East might not be the same thing- perhaps we need to be willing to give up something- perhaps our pride, perhaps oil, perhaps the need to control the activities of those countries…I don’t know. But what I think is that we need to realize that these other countries, these other people groups are different than us, but they are certainly not less than us. They are not any less human, any less civilized. They are not less intelligent nor are the stuck in ancient history. They are seeking peace and prosperity and freedom. Their idea of prosperity and freedom  isn’t necessarily the same as the American idea of prosperity and freedom. We cannot force our ideas upon them, but must step aside. provide them with the tools to move forward, and watch as they forge their own future.

The overwhelming majority of Muslims are seeking the same thing the overwhelming majority of Americans want (and are already enjoying)- peace instead of war.

Living Biblically

A while ago I finished “The Year of Living Biblically” by A.J. Jacobs. I loved this book because it wasn’t trying to be something predetermined- as in, Jacobs approached the book with the opinion that he was going to try to learn as much as he could from religion and living biblically. He admits to wanting to show how absurd it is, but he also admits to finding beauty in much of the things he practices. He talks about going from total agnostic to believing in a higher power to almost fully Jewish- sometimes all in a day. I think part of what I loved about this book was that instead of it being a Christian- or even a Jew- trying to live biblically to deepen their relationship with God and/or prove how great a thing it is, he was doing it because he wanted to see where it lead. Now, the evangelical part of me wanted him to end by becoming a Christian and some hard to explain part of me wanted to see the book end with no conversion but the desire to continue many of the practices.

What I enjoyed most was that this critical guy went into these absurd (even by Christian standards) situations with an open mind- expecting the worst, but not limiting himself to this. He visited a snake-handling church and a crazy uncle who acted like he believed himself to be the messiah and left with the opinion these people were crazy but he always seemed to find something worth walking away with. I wish that we could do the same as Christians- whenever we go into a situation being aware that there is something worth taking away even if everything at first glance seems insanely crazy.

I think pastors and church members alike should read this book because there are little gleanings throughout that hint at what those people who are not part of the church are looking for- and their impressions when they come through the church doors. Of course, the book is quite humorous and honest and worth reading on it’s own simply for the enjoyment of it.

Better Late…

I meant to post this earlier, but got sidetracked. So, a little late, but oh well.

I have this prayer posted on my board at work as a reminder throughout the day. Since it is St. Patrick’s day and the prayer is from him, I thought I would share it with you.

Christ be with me, Christ within me,
         Christ behind me, Christ before me,
      Christ beside me, Christ to win me,
         Christ to comfort and restore me,
      Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
         Christ in quiet, Christ in danger,
      Christ in hearts of all that love me,
         Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.

Worship and Religiosity

My pastor gave me an article from “Reformed Worship” about what keeps youth in the church- actually, that was the survey the article was based on, the article itself is more about the result. The strongest idicator of youth’s religiosity was their involvement in leading worship. This was determined based on a survey of nearly 200 youth- 118 of these having attended church at some point in the past year. Now, forgive me as I evaluate this based on some basic psychology rules. The article runs with this indicator of worship leading as the cause of greater religiosity. However, there is no evidence for a causal relationship. In fact, I would say that if one causes the other it would be religiosity causes greater participation in worship leading. Now, I say this with my psychology knowledge being limited to the classes required to complete a psych major, and the article is written by a psychology professor, but it just seems like by saying getting youth more involved in worship will make them more religious is backwards.

Perhaps what the study and article both show us is that by providing opportunities and placing a certain expectation on youth we are laying the foundation for their ability to connect with and be involved with church post-high. I would love to see more youth involved in our services- I would like to see the bar raised not just for youth, but for all members of the church. Because it is when we come to see ourselves as the church instead of attending a church that the greatest transformation and Christ-like living can occur.

Alienating People

From before I was 3 until the summer I came here I belonged to the same church. The church, like the majority of reformed churches was unbalanced by age- there were a lot more people with gray hair than without. When I graduated high school I was the only high school graduate still attending the church. My Sunday School class from kindergarten through middle school was 5 people- 3 girls, 2 guys.

Despite all this, my freshmen year of high school I was part of a decent size youth group. There were over 30 people in the group- fewer than 10 actually attended the church. My fellow youth would sometimes swear, they talked about partying and they showed little respect for the church building. I often felt uncomfortable with the way they would act in church, although the actual behavior wasn’t so odd to me since I had always gone to a public school.

My sophomore year I was part of a youth group of fewer than 10 people. This is not because more than 20 people graduated. This is because the parents of the youth from the church said they didn’t like the negative influence the kids from outside the church were having. In college, perhaps before college even, I decided that when I was youth leader I was going to make sure kids from the church and outside the church were equally welcome at youth group.

Today I have kids from outside my specific church building, but I have virtually no youth from outside the church. I highly doubt that anyone coming in from outside the church would feel welcome here. I would love to have the diversity, but I don’t know how to create a space for it. Too few of these kids have practical experience relating with other youth with no church background, I don’t know how to make our space friendly to those outside. But I do know that I never want to be party to alienating anyone from the church.

Just Add Water

I have this problem. I think a lot of us have this problem. We have come to think that things should happen instantly. I’m okay with waiting- but I also would never choose to wait. For example- I want to get married and have a family. I’m okay with waiting, but I certainly would prefer to have a guy in my life now. I want things now- I hate this longing period of waiting anxiously. And yet, somehow it’s okay.

It’s like coffee- despite Starbucks’ recent add campaign to the contrary, good coffee takes time. To get the best coffee you have to take whole beans and ground them up just the right amount, place them in the carefully positioned filter, add cold water, and wait several minutes while it brews. A lot of people skip the first step- the grinding- in favor of the simpler pre-ground coffee. It’s still quite good, but it’s not AS good as the stuff that takes longer to make. And then there are those totally insane people who like instant coffe. It’s like tea- you take a bag out of a box, add hot water, and drink. It’s ready in about a minute. No careful measuring and grinding, no patienty waiting as the smell of coffee fills the air.

I’m trying to remember this as I try not to expect immediate answers. I’m trying to remember that the best things take the longest. That in a year I might not be anywhere different than I am today, that in 5 years I still might be waiting. And I’m trying to believe my coffee metaphor (which is undoubtedly true for coffee) is true for my life. But it’s hard. Sometimes I want to just add water and enjoy. Of course, I’m also disappointed afterwords.

Exploding Gas Pumps

One of the ways I paid for college was by working in a small town gas station. This “gas station” was also a deli, video rental store, and beer store. The “regulars” were pretty much people who came every day to buy anywhere from a 6-pack of beer to a case. One night I was working and one of the regulars came in- he always bought two lottery tickets and a 6-pack. As he was waiting for his tickets to print he noticed the guy getting gas was smoking and sort of freaked out- nothing major, but he was going on and on about how stupid that was and how the guy was going to blow the entire place up. I kind of laughed it off- while smoking and pumping gas concerned me, I’d seen enough people do it to know the chances of the place blowing up couldn’t be that great. He then asked if I was afraid to die and like the good Christian I was (and am) I smiled and said I “no way- I’m excited for heaven”. This in all honesty was far from the truth.

It seems like if you are a Christian you shouldn’t be afraid of death- after death something wonderful comes, after death you don’t have to struggle with sin, after death it only gets better.

For a long time I would say that I was afraid of dying, but not afraid of what comes after dying- as in, I am terrified to drown or have any other sort of long drawn out death, but once the dying is over I’m super excited for what comes next. While it’s true that I am terrified of drowning (yes, specifically this as I spend/spent a fair amount of time in water) I can’t honestly say I’m excited or even ready for what comes after it.

I have felt that this was wrong. I felt like this made me a bad Christian, like I wasn’t really trusting God like I should. But today I read about another person’s struggle with this and their similar feelings- and so I thought I would admit it- I’m scared of death. Not just the dying, but death. And I am starting to think that’s okay. Dwelling on it, not so much. But living with the reality that the unknown is scary, that’s okay. Even when that unknown promises to be something amazingly wonderful.

Yes, sometimes I am excited for what comes after. Sometimes I am terrified. Most of the time I am somewhere in the middle- scared about the uncertainty but also aware that it will all be good once I’m there. I think anyone who says they are never scared of death is lying. Although, anyone who smokes while getting gas must not be too concerned about death and what comes after.

33 Years

Francesca Batistelli has a song called “The Time Inbetween” that mentions the time Jesus spent on earth as a man. As I listened to the song I was struck by something that occassionally gets me wondering. “Why did Jesus spend so much time here?” I mean, it seems like he could just as easily have come for 15 years and done the same things- he could still have been born a baby, he would still have grown up in that home, he would still have learned the trade, and he could still have spent time ministering while here. Why 33 years? And was it really necessary that he spend all those years growing up? I mean, for 33 years he had to work at having a relationship with his Father, for 33 years he gave up perfection for something far from it. For 33 years he lived in poverty (or near to it), for 33 years he had to deal with siblings and parents who didn’t “get him”. For God the Father it would be a blink of time, but for Jesus it had to have felt like the full 33 years it was.

Why did Jesus spend so much time here? What is the significance of such a lengthy time? What does it mean for us today?