Important News

One year ago today I started out on a personal journey hoping to instill in myself some discipline in writing. What started as a 'self-help' project has turned into a vehicle through which to dialogue, be sharpened, and encourage.

I'm pleased to announce that we're taking the next step today. I've been hard at work redesigning a new page, and I'd be so pleased for you to make the jump to see what's over there. You'll find all the older posts archived there as well as some new things. I'd ask two favors of you...

1. Would you become a subscriber at the new site?
2. Would you leave a comment about the blog? It would be a great encouragement.

See you on the other side!!!

www.echoesofthemyth.com

Come awake

A great song with an accompanying video. Hope it prepares your heart and mind for Easter.

Good Friday Meditation

I'm not going to write a whole lot about Good Friday. My friend, Dane Ortlund sums it up best in his blog.

Strawberry-Rhubarb Theology: Good Friday: ". . . when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end." John 13:1

TO THE END.

No benedictory comments today. Come to the cross.

On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ

A number of years ago, I stumbled upon an interesting article from the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). The article detailed the physiology of crucifixion - what it may have looked like, what it would have entailed, and how death would have occurred from an anatomical and physiological perspective. I believe that the article has been disputed and attacked since its publication, but I still found that the drawings and the explanations make Jesus' death the real, historical event that it was.

Here's an abstract of the article.

Jesus of Nazareth underwent Jewish and Roman trials, was flogged, and was sentenced to death by crucifixion. The scourging produced deep stripelike lacerations and appreciable blood loss, and it probably set the stage for hypovolemic shock, as evidenced by the fact that Jesus was too weakened to carry the crossbar (patibulum) to Golgotha. At the site of crucifixion, his wrists were nailed to the patibulum and, after the patibulum was lifted onto the upright post (stipes), his feet were nailed to the stipes. The major pathophysiologic effect of crucifixion was an interference with normal respirations. Accordingly, death resulted primarily from hypovolemic shock and exhaustion asphyxia. Jesus' death was ensured by the thrust of a soldier's spear into his side. Modern medical interpretation of the historical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead when taken down from the cross.

I've scanned a few of the illustrations from the article for your consideration (the copyrights for these belong to the JAMA).

Proposed illustration of what flogging would look like

Carrying the cross and the different types of crosses

How Jesus may have been nailed to the cross.

How Jesus may have hung and the physiological effects

How a spear may have pierced Jesus' side

I don't want to sensationalize the crucifixion of Jesus. Nor do I want to horrify or guilt you into remembering his death. My purpose is to remind you that his death was historical, and it was real. He died a real death in a most imaginable way. His pain was real. His body was literally pierced.

Who has believed what he has heard from us?

And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? 

For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. 

He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. 

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. 

By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth. 

Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. 

Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. 

Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.  - Isaiah 53

Christians and Celebrity

A while back I did a post on pastors and celebrity. Carl Trueman offers an interesting assessment of how Christian conferences could express this infatuation of celebrity within Christian circles. The VIP thing particularly bothers me. What are your thoughts? Is Trueman being overly skeptical?

What hath Jerusalem to do with Hollywood? - Reformation21 Blog

Maundy Thursday Meditation

First off, let's answer the question that I know everyone has but is afraid to ask. What does 'maundy' mean? I remember the first time I heard the term, it took me a while to get images of moldy bread out of my mind. 'Maundy' refers to the Latin term, 'mandatum' meaning command - we get the word 'mandate' from this root. Before his betrayal, Jesus sat with his disciples and observed the Passover feast. It was during that meal that Jesus issued two commands - two observe the Lord's supper in remembrance of him; and to love one another as Jesus had loved them. Thus, the night is remembered as a night of commands - Maundy Thursday.

Now onto today's meditation - the glory of Christ in his union with the Church.

"Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish." Ephesians 5:24-27

This passage is normally spoken of in terms of the marriage relationship between man and wife. We usually speak of its practice and what headship and submission should look like in the marriage relationship. Let's take a moment though to think about the model, the deeper relationship that such headship/submission is designed to represent - the relationship between Christ and the church.

One of the things that I have been reflecting on this Holy Week is what Christ died for. I tend to vacillate between two extremes - the vague/abstract body of sin and the detailed personal sins of my life. On one end, I think about Jesus hanging on the cross for the sins of the world. It's vague, but weighty, like a cloud or haze of evil that Jesus is taking upon his shoulders. On the other, I think about a detailed laundry list of rebellion, lust, lies, pride, and idolatry with my name at the top. I hadn't really thought that the two lists actually overlapped and that there was a corporate dimension to the laundry list. What I mean is that I'm realizing that there are patterns, systems even, that embody and characterize a world that is in rebellion to God. There are political, economic, social, and even religious systems that represent the 'old order' - the dehumanizing of individuals either through corruption and greed or oppression and poverty. Jesus took the whole of brokenness in our world - relationships, societies, individuals, morality, you name it - and he was crucified for them. This is both abstract and very specific.

Here's what it has to do with today's theme. Just as Christ took on the whole of sin, both abstract and tangible, Christ died to redeem a people for himself, the Church. He gave himself up for her with a specific goal in mind - to sanctify her. Here we see the glory of Christ in his union with the church. Jesus' death didn't just abolish the old systems and the vestiges of a broken world. It also established a new community with new rules of engagement, and even the power to live by them. Jesus' death made possible the beauty of a new order in which individuals can become genuinely human by bringing the pain and disappointment of their lives to the foot of the cross. It's a new way of life such that forgiveness and reconciliation are offered as real possibilities. It's a way of interaction, doing life together, that reflects the bright hope and power of what Christ has done, and the crazy thing is, it's exactly what Jesus intended. Jesus didn't die solely for my own personal conscience. He came to set the world right, and I am part of that world.

The glory of Christ is that he didn't just save us and leave us to figure it out on our own. He established a bride in waiting, the Church, and as committed as he was in giving himself up for her, he is committed to continuing to wash her in order to present her blameless on the day of his return. Now think about marriage in that light. My relationship with my spouse is supposed to mirror that. Do my kids, my neighbors, my friends, and my family see within the contours of my marriage this deeper relationship?

Perhaps today is the opportunity to think about how the cross of Christ not only applied to me, but to my marriage and to my church.

Melchize-what?

If you've ever wondered why Melchizedek is so important to the NT even though he only appears in the OT twice, then check out this talk by D.A. Carson. It's also a very good example of canonical biblical interpretation - how to understand the NT writers' use of the OT.

Wednesday of Holy Week 2011 Meditation

The Glory of Christ in His Obedience

"Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered." - Hebrews 5:8. This verse raises so many Christological questions. If Jesus was perfect, why would have have to learn obedience? How is that suffering teaches obedience? What does this mean for his moral perfection? Could he have gone to the cross without learning obedience? Looking at the following verse raises even more questions about his perfection as the God-man.

It's easy to get lost in a myriad of questions like these and miss the point of Christ's passion - his sufferings. John Owen unpacks a key idea of what it means for Christ to have learned obedience through suffering.

"It is however possible to say that the Lord Christ learned obedience when he experienced it in practice. In the sense that a person knows the taste of meat by eating it, it may be said of our Savior that he 'tasted death' when he experienced death. One special kind of obedience is intended here, namely, a submission to great, hard, and terrible things, accompanied by patience and quiet endurance, and faith for deliverance from them. This Christ could have not experience of, except by suffering the things he had to pass through, exercising God's grace in them all."

I'm indebted to this 17th C. Puritan for highlighting a most important truth - Christ's suffering provided the context for him to existentially learn obedience. I love this, and here's why. Jesus wasn't born into the world as a Savior-in-a-box. Yes, he was morally perfect. Yes, he remained sinless. But he had to learn to endure. He had to learn patience. He had to learn how to obey even as he was fully able to obey and ready to do so.

Golf is my sport of choice, and lately professional golf has had its share of young up-and-comers who are taking the game by storm. It's a landscaping altering youth movement. These 17-year old kids possess phenomenal ability both natural and groomed. They are flexible and coordinated. In some sense, they have been endowed in their essence with the ability to hit a ball. However, they still need to learn to hit the ball. Even if it could be imagined that a child had the ability to hit a golf ball and never mess up, that child would still have to learn how to hit a ball, how to execute a shot, and it would still be hard work.

Jesus learned obedience, and he learned it through what he suffered. The grace and humility of Christ cannot come to unique expression except through his sufferings. But that's not all. In yet another example of how unique our God is, Jesus experiences the sufferings and learns obedience in the real-life classroom of life. He learns how to endure, to suffer, and to die. You might object and say that he was going through formalities of it, but the truth still remains that he went through them, and actually chose to go through them, nonetheless. He may have been perfect, but he still learned obedience in much the same way you and I do.

How does this make him glorious? Jesus validates the human experience by learning obedience in the midst of it. He really is a high priest who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses because he came close to the edge, being tempted in every way, yet didn't go off the cliff like we often do. He endured temptation and suffering, and he learned obedience even when that obedience led him to death on an undeserved cross. In fact, the suffering that paved the way to the cross was the teacher.

Today, as you fight for obedience, remember Jesus. That he knows and understands. He learned obedience the way you and I will be called to today, and he came out victorious.

Galatians 2:20...literally

I found this slideshow quite disturbing. While I can appreciate the desire to share in the sufferings of Christ, the idea of being literally crucified if only for a moment has the danger of thinking that partaking in such a ceremony somehow offers penance, a penance that only the Son of God could pay. Christ's suffering was enough. It is finished. At the same time, it makes me think about the fact that literally I am crucified with Christ, not in place of Christ, mind you. I died with Jesus on that cross as he was being crucified, and by his blood I have his righteousness. I am a new creation. So save the nails, I think I'd rather choose the harder way - learning to die to myself in the mundane trivialities of the rest of the year, not just on Good Friday.

Video Recap of our DC Spring Break Trip

One of my college students put together this short video about the things we've learned from our time in DC. Another student, Sean, compiled the testimonies together. I think it's a poignant message that sometimes 'mission' trips aren't about all the things we can do for 'the poor', but rather what they can teach us about our lives back home.

Tuesday of Holy Week 2011 Meditation

Today's Theme: The Glory of Christ in His Love

"For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, so that whoever should believe in him may not perish, but have everlasting life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but so that the world might be saved through him." John 3:16-17.

Love. Is it possible for a word so powerful to be any more overused? In one conversation we can talk about how much we loved that meal last night and conclude it by saying how much we love that person. We can love the weather (actually, more like hate out here in Chicagoland lately) and we can love our children. To be sure, context is the determiner, but I wonder if by overusing the word, we cheapen it? If love can be used for any object and any circumstance, what about God's love for us? Do we subtly misbelieve that God loves us the same way he would love a hot dog or a really good movie? Furthermore, as Brennan Manning asks, has the idea of God's love been so overplayed that while we know that God has to love us (theologically), we're not convinced that he even really likes us? When push comes to shove and it's just you and him, do you believe that he loves you with all the tenacity and fierceness of a lover who refuses to let anything get in between you?

This is how John seems to portray it. Even the most famous verse of the entire Bible is predicated on the idea that God loved. When we lose the power of the word love, the entire verse crumbles. God sends his Son because He loved, and this love set off an entire sequence of events that led to the salvation of the world. You lose love, and everything becomes transactional, functional - "I do for you, so you better do for me." In essence, you lose the love of God and you lose the Gospel.

So in the interest of remembering the Gospel today, let's remember a few things about love.

The love of God says more about the Lover than the object of love.
It's easy to become self-centered when we think about the love of God. We could imagine a God who's pining away in the heavens, wishing that his "too-cool" creation would pay attention to him. Like a love-sick puppy dog, God just wants us to give him the time of day. John doesn't seem to agree though. We see a God who loves rebellious, broken, stubborn people because that's who he is - a lover of souls. He loves us not because we're so love-able, but in spite of our unlove-able-ness. In fact, Jesus takes on that un-love-ability such that he becomes "like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we esteemed him not." (Is. 53:3) The fact that God loves us in our ugliness makes it all the more remarkable.

The love of God is rooted in action more than just emotion.
Because of our ugliness and brokenness, it's easy to imagine that God's love would wane depending on our daily ugliness meter. If we're particularly ugly that day, we think that God loves us less than the day before. But God's love is more than emotion. He doesn't fall in love. He loves. In fact, he is love, and this love is not just a state of being, it is intensely active, fierce even. God loved the world, so he gave. He had to give. He had to act! His love compels him just as the love of Christ compels us (2 Cor 5:14). He doesn't love from a distance. His love isn't sanitized and kempt. God's love always translates into action - sometimes it's pursuit, discipline, patience, jealousy, or redemption itself.

The love of God is actively displayed in the cross of Jesus Christ.
Along the line of redemption, the consummative act of God's love is in the cross. The giving of his Son was to someone, for something. He gave his son over to death. His son was given over to hands of sinners who crucified him. Jesus was given over for our sin and rebellion. The giving of the Son of God purchased the lives and souls of the undesirables of the world (1 Cor 1). His love was demonstrated in that act on the cross, fracturing the very fabric of the Godhead so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

I don't want to explain God's love as just a transaction, nor do I want to sentimentalize his love as just the fluttering of butterflies in a divine stomach. I suppose that's the tension - that something profound and deep was wrought through the love of God in the world I live in and in my tiny corner of it. That only the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is capable of sustaining such fierce love for such fierce enemies. I'm seeing today that that's what makes him glorious. Perhaps this is what Paul felt when he prayed for the Ephesians:

I pray that out of his glorious riches, he may strengthen you with power through his inner being. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints to grasp how wide and deep, high and long is the love of Christ - to know this love that surpasses all knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

A Father's Heart

This brought me to tears. How I long that God would keep me faithful, obedient, and humble such that my sons would come to love Jesus and others!

Monday of Holy Week 2011 Meditation

It's holy week, and I must say that this year's Lenten season has been a rich one for me. As I've wrestled with the question of discipleship, I've found myself in and out of a deep meditation on Jesus' call for me. At times, I'm frustrated - distracted one second, reflecting the next. Sometimes I can be so totally engrossed by Jesus' lordship over all of life, and then I can be acting as the god of my own life. In hindsight, maybe that's the most realistic picture of discipleship? In any case, I've been anticipating our church's annual holy week early morning services. This year, the focus is around the Glory of Christ. Today's particular theme is the Glory of Christ in his humility.

I find that to be the most ironic and surprising of ideas - Christ's glory as displayed in his humility. No less surprising than the snow that fell last night in this the third week of April! Yet in Philippians 2:5-11, Christ's humility is on display both as exemplar for our humility and a glory to be praised. The Puritans called the humility of Christ his condescension. I find this to be a very powerful word picture - Jesus is condescending towards me. At first, my heart reacts negatively. After all, condescension is usually a negative thing, isn't it? Why would condescension be a cause for glory? "Don't take that condescending tone with me," or, "I can't stand to be around him/her because he's always so condescending." However, there are occasions where condescending could be positive. Imagine a super famous celebrity or a figure coming to your house, giving you time not because they wanted something from you, but simply because they are interested in you. There's an act of condescension to give you attention, to experience your life. It gives value to your life and makes that figure glorious, and the greater the distance between you and the figure, the more glorious the condescension. What could be greater than the gap between God and man?

And in this, Jesus doesn't just come as he is, he takes up human form in all its frailty and weakness, limitations and finitude, and he becomes like us. He had all the glory, but he chose to be counted among criminals. He gave up his rights as God and didn't use it for his advantage, but made himself nothing. Contrast this to the quarreling saints who were rivaling each other based on empty glory (I love the play on words between Phil 2:3 and 2:7 - don't [you saints] do anything from empty glory, but have the mindset of the one who emptied his glory). 

Paul goes on to describe how he humbled himself, that is, how he condescended. By becoming obedient to the point of death. He died like a common criminal, treated worse than an animal. Took on the limitations of human form. His humiliation came as he was obedient to death. He let them pierce him, mock him, and accuse him. He let them think that they had the last laugh. That's what I call condescension.

So the question remains, Why does this make him glorious? Because our God doesn't sit in the heavens

and expect us to come to him once we've got our lives together. Our God doesn't wait at a distance telling us that because we made the mess, we've got to get it right. No, our God humbles himself by coming to us, even by becoming one of us. Our God purchased sinners with his blood. Our God let the same sinner he came to save spill it. Our God stooped down low to bring us up. Our God put himself in the place of man on the cross because man tried to put himself in the place of God! Our God is humble, he condescends to meet us, and that's what make him glorious!!!!

Today, he is present in the details of your life, so don't despair. When you think that you're alone, that your burden is yours alone to carry, remember that a glorious God sent his glorious Son in glorious humility to make us sons of glory.

Golf and a Lesson on Never Giving up

Kevin Na infamously set the PGA record for strokes on one hole. I'll let you count 'em. A couple things I appreciate about this video.

1. He calls a penalty on himself when the ball hits him. No one else saw it, just him. Golf is one of the only sports where your integrity is on the line, and you are your own judge. Character matters for the integrity of the game.
2. He never gives up even though he's super frustrated. He finishes the hole out albeit limping across the line.
3. I've been in that no-win situation on the course. It feels hopeless. Glad that PGA guys can get there too.

Enjoy.

The True Stumbling Block of Soul Surfer

CNN reported on the tension between the real-life family of Bethany Hamilton and Hollywood in the making of a movie based on her life. Apparently, the film's producers and directors wanted to sanitize the film by removing the explicit references to the Bible and Jesus. One part of the article evidenced this particularly:

“A lot of the producers didn’t want to go too overboard because they thought Christianity doesn’t always sell well,” Tom Hamilton said. Kevin Sorbo, who plays Holt Blanchard, the father of Hamilton's best friend, said, "Sony (Pictures, the film's producer) was afraid to throw in the word Jesus. They said you can have God but not Jesus. They were worried about that. "The studios, you can't really fight them," he said. "Hollywood screams for freedom of speech but only if you agree with them. It's a very two-faced industry."

I find Hollywood's passive resistance to Jesus interesting in light of the fact that the movie was mainly marketed to a faith-based audience. The pitch for the movie was how important faith was for Bethany's success and overcoming tragedy, but they wanted to present that faith without its engine. Like a shiny shell of a vehicle, they wanted to show the importance of faith, but a sanitized faith that would sell better. I guess it is still true that Jesus is a stumbling block.

Battles over how to portray religious themes in movies are becoming more common, as Hollywood becomes more open to addressing faith and marketing movies to religious audiences but worries about alienating nonreligious audiences or viewers from other traditions.

I'm encouraged for the way that the family and friends of Bethany fought for an accurate portrayal of the difference that faith IN JESUS makes. I've met plenty of people who have faith that their tragic circumstances will not be the end of them, but very few who anchor that faith in the redemptive power of Jesus Christ, who himself faced tragic circumstances for us.

As spiritual as our culture may be, and as open and tolerant as it may claim, the making of this movie reminds us that Jesus will never be loved by the world because he is not of the world. Jesus may be my Lord, but the minute I start to proclaim that Jesus is Lord of all, now I've offended people. It's a tension that I seen increasing - we want the benefits of faith without the demands of faith. The blessings of discipleship without the cost.

I'm glad that they were able to work out a compromise, and I pray that this piece of culture will not just affect Christian audiences, but also seekers who are looking for hope and strength amidst their own tragedies.

Killing Jesus

"A cross and nails are not always necessary. There are a thousand ways to kill him, some of them as obvious as choosing where you will stand when the showdown between the weak and the strong comes along, others of them as subtle as keeping your mouth shut when someone asks you if you know him."
- Barbara Brown Taylor, Truth to Tell

What do you talk about?

My wife and I were having a conversation yesterday about the kinds of things that people talk about when they come together. Sports, food, clothes, other people (aka gossip), complaints, the latest Groupon deal, the funniest YouTube video, what happened on DWTS, etc. We both remarked that recently God has been putting on our hearts a desire to be much more intentional in our conversations with God's people. The conversation started as I shared about a sister in our college group who told me how much she appreciated my intentionality with people. It was one of the nicest compliments I'd received in a long time, but it got me thinking, Why aren't our conversations with each other more intentional? How should the way God's people talk to each other, and more relevant to this post, the things God's people talk about, be different from non-Christ followers? A couple things to consider:

• There's a place for small-talk. I'm not advocating going right to the heart or trying to get deep in every conversation. However, if all of our conversations only stay at the level of, "How are you?" "Fine, and you?" "Wow, how about them Bulls!?" then I think we need to reconsider.
• Ask meaningful questions. Make sure your questions are more than just pleasantries. Don't settle for the trite, "I'm fine" answers. Depending on the level of friendship you have with someone, you should be able to ask real questions about where someone is and how someone is doing. Don't just assume and hope for the best. For instance, one of the questions I like to ask my married friends is, "How is your marriage? What are you learning lately?" These kinds of questions might seem a little too forward, but I think over time, the habit of asking questions like this will make sharing much deeper.
• Remember details of previous conversations. If you've said that you would pray, you better have prayed. And if you have prayed, you should remember what you prayed for. I think that kind of remembrance with detail goes a long way, and it fosters deeper sharing and conversation.
• Every conversation is a chance to experience the Gospel together. The most important aspect of a conversation is one in which you give and receive hope to believe and remember the Lordship of Jesus. It takes savvy and sensitivity to do so in a non-trite manner - to really listen to one another, encourage one another, and engage one another such that when you part company, you have felt the presence of the living Jesus in your midst.
• Encourage. Encourage. Encourage. We live in a society that's constantly about performance, assessment, and critique. What if our conversations with other brothers and sisters were filled with observations of the beautiful, God-presence, things in each other's lives?

Our minds and hearts are bombarded from all sides by constant messages about identity, works-righteousness, and comparisons. I think it's urgent more than ever that Christians learn to speak to one another in ways that remind each other of the influence that Jesus has and ought to have in our lives. Let's begin that by learning to talk with each other in meaningful, significant ways so that we might truly give grace to all those who listen.

The Question of Unanswered Prayer

My wife and I have been grieving with our church family over a tragedy that's been developing for the last 31 days. We prayed and prayed for a healing, and a miracle, but it was just not to be. God prolonged life, but in the end chose to take it. In the eleventh hour, when the situation was at a critical stage, I found myself uttering over and over again, "Oh God, have mercy. Save this life." I wanted so badly for God to intervene, and for all intents and purposes, it made sense to me that he should. Alas, he didn't.

I've lately re-enrolled myself in the school of prayer, and God has been showing me new things about the way he wants me to come to him in prayer. To simply ask like a little child - repeatedly, unabashedly, boldly - and so I have been. It's been amazing to see the way God has answered my prayers for me and for others, but this time, I'm confused. Why didn't God answer? Why didn't he work? Didn't he say ask for anything in my name?

I'm left feeling disappointed and saddened, but not angry. I haven't given up on prayer. Last night, I was reading Alister McGrath's short book on the Apostle's Creed, and he said that God always will gives us what we ask or ought to ask for. He is a loving Father to us. I can't understand how taking this life is the more loving thing to do, but then I recognize my own limitations in being able to see every permutation and possibility. There are plenty of times where my son, Calvin, wants something that just isn't good for him at the time, and so I say no. I may even remove it from him. He doesn't understand. He gets downright upset, but in the end I know what is best for him (at least at this stage). He won't know the reasons, but he'll have to trust me.

In that sense, I've had to rework some of my own thoughts of God as a Father to me (and to my friends who are grieving). Perhaps it's best to say that God is fathering us in the present tense. His isn't just a fatherly role, it is an active presence, an intentional and deliberate course of conduct by which God is bringing what is best for us (namely Himself). God is fathering me in the midst of my own disappointment, calling me to trust him, to seek him, and to grieve over a world that is not as it should be. God is fathering my friends showing that no matter how deep the sorrow, his presence can bring steadfastness and peace. God is fathering my church showing us how to get along in real and tangible ways. He is teaching us what it means to be true siblings when the sun is shining or when the valley is too deep.

Perhaps this is the next class in the school of prayer, perhaps it's just part of the larger curriculum of life. Either way, I choose to grieve looking to my father who is present, and who always does what is best, not just when I want it.

The next wave of email

Mark this date, 4/1/11, as the next evolution of email hits the streets.