Inside the Sojourn

These are the good old days.

Carly Simon got it right when she penned the words.  Sarah, 20, just moved to Tulsa to enter ORU as a junior.  Leah, 24, just moved to Ok City to start her teaching career with 8th grade English (she will have treasure in heaven).

It's quiet around the house.

We use less toilet paper, generate less laundry, fix less food, hear less noise...

It's bittersweet inside the house.

I'm not one to look back much, but lately I've allowed myself the luxury of a little reminiscing.  The perspective gives me new resolve to dig into my purpose and make the coming years meaningful.

These are the good old days.

Time to let go

There's nothing like selling a house you've lived in for 15 years to show you whether you've grown too attached to the things of this world.  I have great memories of our kids growing up in our house.  We've had many friends grace our place and had lots of fun.  The setting is idyllic (6 acres at the edge of town less than 10 minutes from most places we go).  It's quiet and peaceful.  We have lots of room (too much, now). 

I love it here.  But, sometimes you have to move on to what's next.   Too much nostalgia isn't healthy.  I'd rather live for today and look forward to the adventure ahead.  I'd rather value the things of God's kingdom about the things of this life.  Not in some pie in the sky hyper-spiritual way - but in a practical way.  A way that acknowledges the angst of having to make choices that involve sacrifice while embracing the joy of what's to come.

It's also an opportunity for friends to prove their love.  Wow, are we loved!

So... the time has come to let go of some things so we can lay hold of some new things.  It will be difficult and exciting.

Addendum: Don't read more into this than it says.  We're not leaving our church or our city until God calls us away!

What does 400 points have to do with eternity?

A couple of days ago, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped almost 400 points.  In technical terms: that's a whole bunch in one day.  Until about 6 months ago, I had no idea exactly why anyone would care specifically about a stock index.  It seemed like something of vague interest to people who owned a lot of stock in an IRA or 401k.  I recently came to understand it's significance and it's not what I thought, but that's not the point.

For anyone who cares enough to understand why it matters (the Dow, etc) there's a risk of putting your heart into what happens in the markets.  It reminds me of the teaching of Jesus that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle (a certain type of gate that was low and narrow) than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.  Likewise, the parable of the seed (Mark 4) teaches that thorns (cares of this life) can choke out God's word (his call/work in our lives) and make it unfruitful.

So here's the challenge - what do you pay attention to?  What do you worry about?  What captures your heart?  That's where your treasure is.  Make sure it's in the right place.

summer

Summer has clearly arrived. 

It's all vacations and baseball, the lake and grilling food... 

We scatter to the four winds... 

We go to interesting places and do fun things... 

It's great to get away and rest/refocus/get inspired or reconnect.

It's great to live life.

It's great to remember why we're here in the middle of it all.

Living a (bad) dream

Had lunch today with an old friend from our days in Tulsa.  He was in town and called unexpectedly so we had some Chinese food.  I'd heard third hand about what he'd been through.  His wife inexplicably left him and his two (grown) kids for another man - a guy he had trusted and helped after several years in prison.  It was a little over 2 years ago and still bewildering even when he put together what happened.

The bizarre part is that I had an extremely vivid dream 2 days before that his ex-wife had shown up at our door to visit.  The dream itself was nothing extraordinary except for how crisp the image is in my mind and his phone call within 48 hours.  I can't explain the timing, but I don't believe in coincidence.

He was certainly not perfect as a husband - too quick to get angry, perhaps not empathetic enough.  Our close circle of friends could see it, but it never looked unmanagable.  In the end, only God knows the what really led to her decision.  Everyone around them was taken by surprise at her leaving everything behind.

This isn't the first time I've seen this type of behavior.  A number of years ago, my stepmother left her entire life behind.  I've only seen her twice since and she is not the same person I used to know.  I have no idea what makes a person snap like that, but it clearly happens.  My friend has contemplated killing himself and the guy that took his wife.  Fortunately, he's got enough sense to know that neither would solve anything.  So he soldiers on, feelng like he's living in a bad dream, knowing that he has a wall built against trusting again.  I am praying for my old friend.

Exhilaration and terrification all at the same time

It's both exhilarating  and terrifying to speak about God from a platform to "the faithful".  Yesterday I had the privilege and responsibility of speaking to hundreds of people about "how to have a good fight".  It was a conversation about the value of properly managing the process of working out differences, especially in the context of marriage - of an intentionality in conflict that leads to strength and maturity rather than the destruction of trust. 
I mostly said the things I wanted to say and only chased one small rabbit that I can recall - not that anyone would even realize it when listening.  If only I could measure success that easily.  Afterwards was a mix of exhaustion and gratitude (that I got through it).

After lunch we went to Wallyworld to buy burgers and fixins for our home group on Sunday night.  In the parking lot as we were leaving, an energetic women who had obviously heard me speak that morning came seemingly out of the blue and said with great enthusiasm "we had conflict at Chili's ordering our food!"  All I could think to do was ask "Did you manage it well?".  She said something to the effect of "we got stronger!". 

I was grateful for the impromptu interaction.  It was fun and encouraging.  It gave me something to reflect on as the inevitable struggle ensued later that night.  As I prepared for bed, the enormity of God hit me like a ton of bricks.  I was overcome with the desire to fold up and rock, nursing the fear of having said something not quite right; grappling with the impact words have for good or bad; hoping I was faithful and effective.

In a way, I hope I never get over the slight nausea that follows when I speak publicly about God.  I never want to lose sight of the fact that God is too big and too powerful and wise for me to grasp.  That I am more dependent on him that I will ever understand.  That his mercy and forgiveness will prevail.  That the conflict inside makes me stronger and more mature when I submit to God.

A miracle you can watch unfold

A couple of friends have decided to adpot a child from Ethiopia.  This grew out of a mission trip there last year in which the wife, Rande, fell in love with the place and the people.  It takes a lot of prayer, time, paperwork and money to pull off a miracle like this.  And make no mistake, this adoption will be a miracle for everyone involved.  It's a picture of God adopting us into his family.

I recommend you check out their blog - while you're at it, consider helping them out; there are a number of ways to do it...  You can link to their blog here.

how to have a good fight - any ideas?

The blog is about to suffer neglect for a few weeks.  I've been drafted to speak a Sunday morning message on May 25 - "how to have a good fight".  If you have any thoughts on this subject, I'd love to hear from you!

today

Today:

what concerns you?
what occupies your thoughts?
what occupies your time?
who will you see?

Pray about it all...

Apologies to Ockham

Occam's razor (sometimes spelled Ockham's razor) is a principle attributed to the 14th-century English logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. The principle states that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory. The principle is often expressed in Latin as the lex parsimoniae ("law of parsimony" or "law of succinctness"): "entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem", or "entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity".  [Exerpt from Wikipedia.]

With apologies to William, my experience shows that this "law" does not always hold true in human behavior unless you embrace extreme reductionism (e.g. humans are selfish, thus all selfish behavior is explained).  Human behavior, perhaps simple at the deepest core, is complicated by time and circumstance.  Assuming the simplest explanation for puzzling behavior is rarely adequate. 

It helps me to remember that there are at least three sides to every story - yours, mine and what really happened.  We should not be so convinced of our incomplete perceptions that we make judgments before we've pursued the facts directly from the source.  In other words, if someone does something you don't understand, ask them about it.

The only thing worth being convinced of so deeply that our conviction is unshakable is that Jesus is who he (and the scriptures) says he was.  Everything else flows from that...