reflections

for lack of anything else meaningful to write, allow me to digress back to something that i wrote a few months back:

through the paper thin walls,
i can hear the murmur of their conversation...

not words, not syllables,
just the faint and distant rumblings.

do they speak of things meaningful,
or just the foosball men as they strike the tiny ball?

is the rumbling reflective of my insides.
paradoxes, not least of these, a period.
inside, my heart seems to be echoing
differently than it speaks.
which is truth, tried,
and which is empty reverberation?

my neighbors quiet their loud chatter.
that within me will soon too silence.
from the heart, the mouth speaks--
but what will it utter?
rumble, syllable?

too many questions, too little time.
i am not resigned.

i just don't yet
know where
i am going.

at times, silence rumbles like no other.
punctuation matters.

champs.

UNC wins ACC tournament for the second consecutive year (!)

'nuff said.

Reflections...

In my quiet times, as of late, I've been spending some quality time in Acts...

A few months ago, I attended National Staff Conference with Intervarsity, in St. Louis, MO. We were talking through Romans, with the theme (Romans 1:16) of "I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes." One of the speakers, Chris Nichols, regional director for New England, posed the question, "If we are not ashamed of the gospel, why aren't there more conversions in our chapters or on our campuses?"

He spoke about the New England region's vision, seeing a continuum of transformation, where cynics become seekers, seekers become believers, believers become followers of Jesus, followers become leaders, and leaders become world changers... This continuum really resonated with me, and made me excited; I would love to see this on our campuses! But, the question that stayed with me was, "OK, that's great! But how do we make it happen?"

As I was reading Acts 2, this morning, I couldn't help but notice, that the paradigm that Chris proposed is exactly what we see in chapter 2 of Acts. The apostles receive the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the beginning of chapter 2... and then they turn outwards to the crowd. As the apostles begin to speak, and members of the crowd from 15 different nations and languages hear the words in their own tongues, we see these stages of faith:

Action: The apostles begin to speak in tongues. This amazes the crowds-- it causes them to take notice. The crowds literally hear the apostles speaking "in their language."

Response: the cynics in the crowd respond to the apostles (2:13) making fun of them, saying "They have had too much wine." Yet at the same time, there is something about the apostles presentation that makes people stop and say "What does this mean?" (2:12) In other words, cynics become seekers when they are faced with a question, something that perplexes them, amazes them, that their preexisting paradigm does not allow them to explain away.

Action: Peter speaks directly to the concerns of the crowd, "These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It's only nine in the morning!" (2:15) and then proceeds to answer their questions with the first real presentation of the Gospel, spoken in a manner that they will understand (highly based on Old Testament prophecy), in their own languages.

Response: Acts 2:37 tells us that when the people heard this message they were "cut to the heart" and asked their own question in response "Brothers, what shall we do?" Seekers become believers when they hear and understand the Gospel in their own lives, contexts, and language. They become believers when the message of the Gospel hits their hearts, and they have to ask the question "What do I do with this?"

Action: When the people (all 3000 of them) hear and understand the Gospel, they respond by accepting the message and being baptized. They receive the Holy Spirit, they enter into community, and they pray (2:42).

Response: As the new believers take the first steps of faith, they remain in community with one another, they remain teachable (2:42), and they pray, they begin to grow as believers so that their lives reflect the change in belief. In other words, believers become followers of Jesus when the Holy Spirit comes, and they enter into Christian community as a lifestyle choice reflecting their belief. Without the Holy Spirit, without community, and without life-style choices, believers have a shallow faith which, when faced with adversity, all too often causes them to fall away.

Action: As the followers of Jesus fellowship together, they begin to act out of their abundance (2:45) "Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need."

Response: Followers of Jesus become leaders as they live in the Holy Spirit, in prayer, and in community. Pattern of lifestyle, continual awe, and community accountability lead the followers to act out of their belief, by turning outwards to bless the community around them.

Action: The people live out their faith, in the Holy Spirit, devoted to others and one another, praising God, and blessing the community (2:46)... they lead out of what they have been taught... they give freely of themselves... they enjoy the Lord and his abundance.

Response: "... praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved." (2:47) As the people live in obedience and joy to the Lord, God blesses their work and their joy and transforms them from leaders to world changers. World changers are developed when believers fully live out their calling, whatever that might be, to the glory of God, and the blessing of the nations.

Cynics become seekers, seekers become believers, believers become followers, followers become leaders, leaders become world changers. Acts 2. Do we believe this is possible for our campuses?

• What does it look like to speak to the heart of the secular culture, in a way that people are forced to ask the question: "What does this mean?"
• How do we answer the questions of our culture? our campus? our friends?
  
• What does it look like to present the gospel in a language that our campus understands, and must respond: "What do we do with this?"
• What does it mean to actually follow Jesus with our lives?
• What does it mean to lead out of the gospel practiced in our lives?
• How do we "live out our calling to the glory of God and the blessing of the nations" in a way that transforms our campuses, even the world?

Hope wins

For those of you who have been watching the news, you know that things have been rather eventful in Chapel Hill. Early Wednesday morning, a woman was found dead near the edge of campus, shot several times. On Thursday morning, the body was identified as Eve Marie Carson, a senior from Georgia, outgoing Student Body President for UNC-Chapel Hill.

The campus has been pretty much in shock, as the news is just starting to settle in... Eve was well-beloved on campus, and the shock of her death is painful and raw. Campus has been filled with grief, shock, anger, questions, fear, and sadness...

And I must admit, it makes me angry as well.

- It makes me angry that a 22-year old with so much promise could fall victim to a senseless crime.

- It makes me angry that Eve will not be able to graduate with her class in 2 months.

- It makes me angry that her murderer had the power to commit such a crime.

But these events also makes me sad...

Sad because the majority of the campus is forced to deal with this tragedy without hope. All of us together, Christians and non alike, can look at a situation like this and see that something is wrong. This is not how things were meant to be; death is a stark reminder of that fact.

We live in a world which is fundamentally broken. Broken because death has free reign. Broken because sin dominates. Broken.

But as Christians, we have the hope that this brokenness is not the final word. While sin and death might have power now, they do not have eternal longevity. Our God is a God who redeems that which is broken. Jesus was sent to the world for the very pains that we are feeling now. The good news, the gospel hope, which we as Christians have is this: Hope wins. Brokenness, death, and sin, are limited in their longevity.

Eve's death was wrong. It is not good in any way, shape, or form. But our God is a God who redeems what is broken... who offers hope that this is not the end...who proclaims the good news to all who can hear... The very first sermon that Jesus preached when He came to earth was from Isaiah 61:1-3... it is the good news that was true then, and is true now. This is our reason for hope:

"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.... to comfort all who mourn, to provide for those who grieve in Zion, to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair."

Jesus, the fulfillment of these words, who is redeeming that which is broken, promises that in the last day, this work will be completed "... There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." (Revelations 21:4).

This is our hope. In other words, that which is broken will be broken no more. Sin loses its power. Death will be no more. Crimes like this will be no more. This is the good news, friends! This is the hope that we have to offer.

This is the good news: there is hope and hope wins!

Overachievers...

So you think you know your Bible...

A friend of mine is in seminary right now, and had to pass the 2008 version of this test.

Bible Exam

Me, being an overachiever, thought, hey, I'll try it out. If you too feel like an overachiever...

Give it a shot... you need a 70% to pass.

And God Said No.

What do you do when God says no?

In September 2007, I posted on a passage in Jeremiah 29 where God promises "I know the plans I have for you." I spoke a little bit about what it means to trust God that he has good plans for us... plans to prosper us and not to harm us... even when it takes 70 years for God to give us what we think is good...

Ironically, now I find myself in a similar situation, not pondering "wait," but wrestling with God's "no" to my beautifully structured and well-thought-out plans... and as I wrestle with God's "no," I think perhaps I understand Jeremiah's Israelites a little bit better.

You see, while God's answer was "wait," and a promise of better things, it was also a "no" to the plans that the Israelites had for themselves, including Hananiah's promises that they would be out of captivity soon, the temple items would be returned, the yoke of their oppressors would be broken, etc (things which initially sounded really good!). And God said, "No. My way is better. My timing is better." And I'm willing to bet that the Israelites did not necessarily respond particularly well.

My responses to my "no" have varied from anger to frustration, to denial, to apathy, to excitement, to grief.

And as I share my frustrations with others, often times, they remind me that "God knows" that "God has a plan" that "God has something better in store." And I believe that those things are true. 100%. I believe in a good God. I believe that he has plans to prosper me and not to harm me. And I believe that His "no" is because He has something better in store for me.

But that does not change the fact that right now, that "no" really hurts.

I think sometimes we are too fast to want to emphasize that everything will be okay. We want to smooth things over. We want to take verse 11 of chapter 29 out of context of chapter 28 and verses 1-10 of chapter 29 in Jeremiah. But, until we understand the context of the passage, the reason for grief for the Israelites, we cannot truly grasp the ridiculous hope in verse 11 "'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.'"

In other words, it's okay to grieve when God says no to something that seems good. In fact, I would even go as far as to say, it is necessary to grieve....

... you have dreamed of going to medical school since you were twelve, and now, 23 applications down, and 23 rejections later, grin and bear it?

... your biggest dream has been to have children, and now the doctor is telling you that will never be able to, just get over it?

... you've been dreaming of release from captivity for 11 years, and God says "No, actually, you need to stay here for another 59 years."

When God says "no" to something that seems good, it is right, healthy and good to grieve. That does not mean that we do not trust that God has something better. In fact, grieving is part of letting go of what we wanted, and taking hold of what God has instead.

Grief is a natural process of letting go.

And we do step forward in faith, knowing, trusting, that God has something better. To say yes, I do believe that God has plans to prosper me and not to harm me. I do believe that He has something better in store for me than my wildest dreams. But sometimes, in order to take that step forward in faith, we need to be able to let go fully of what we were dreaming of.

And that process of letting go, is called grieving. It is not antithetical to faith. Rather, when practiced well, it is simply part of choosing to let go and step forward in faith that God knows better than we do.