Turning 30...

I turned 30 last month. That's right, the beginning of the end, it's all down hill, I'll never be young again right? As much as I want to believe that isn't true, my world is telling me otherwise.

I am a father of an 8 year old girl, which means shows like Hannah Montana, Phinneas and Pherb, Kid vs. Kat, and many others are staples in my house. Especially on snow days.

Today is a snow day, and though it's been almost a month since that dark, end of the world day, a day I thought I had moved on from, one of these shows made me realize maybe I'm not as, "Ok," with this whole turning 30 thing as I thought.

The show is Wizards of Waverly place. It's a show about a family of Wizards that are trying to assimilate into normal western society by putting aside magic so as to, fit in. The star of the show, Alex, the fast talking, often disrespectful, and always sassy teenage girl that I am allowing my 8 year old to idolize, is sitting on the the stoop of her parents restaurant, talking. It is the end of the show, and as always, the writers are half heartedly attempting to redeem the show by making tagging a generic, "Moral of the story," lesson to excuse the flurry of value-less dialogue that has just flooded the minds of our future.

I still have no idea what the show was about, but I remember them Alex saying to her friend something like this, "That won't happen until we are really old, like 30!"

Thanks Alex, I thought I was over this 30 thing, and you re-exposed the wound that I had covered up with a band-aid. I began to reflect once more on what it means to turn 30.

I had a 30th birthday party this year with lots of friends, good food, drinks, and conversation. They sang happy birthday to me, and I ate lots of my favorite dessert, banana cream pie.

It was a great time, all except one glaring problem. At least it was glaring to me, and this glaring problem will always characterize for me, my 30th birthday. It is in fact the exposure of a fairly enormous failure in my life. That's right, my birthday party exposed to me, I huge problem with the way I am living my life.

I am a pastor... I am a pastor of a church plant... I am a pastor of a church plant that claims to be a gospel teaching, gospel living, outward focused ministry, and as I looked around the room at all the good friends that surrounded me, I was struck by a very problematic reality. They were all... Christians.

All of my good friends are christians. Now, I know what you are thinking, what's wrong with that? Isn't that natural? You gravitate toward people like you right?

All those things are true, but the reality for me, at this stage of my life, is that I want to believe God is using me to impact the kingdom. How is that even possible if all I do is surround myself with people who are already part of it? Maybe more problematic is the fact that I am attempting to lead others into a lifestyle of living the gospel in our world, and apparently, I am not doing it myself?

I guess what this fateful day really brings to light is the reality that as the "Church," we have really missed the mark, we have allowed our focus to move from what matters most. We have become so selfish in our understanding of evangelism, that we have actually convinced ourselves that we are being effective at spreading the gospel, without actually befriending people.

The gospel is to be lived, not preached. My life is a walking vessel for the love and grace of God, how can that vessel be effective in the world from a distance?

The biggest crime is that this empathetic, from a distance, throw some money, and maybe a prayer or two at it approach to the gospel has left the world believing that's who God is, when in fact, Jesus was, "The Friend of sinners."

I am thankful for this wake up call, and pray that the next time I have a birthday party, this revelation from God will show as life change, and be evident in the crowd that is there to celebrate with me.

Christmas...

I have some very scattered thoughts tonight, so this might not come out in any sort of readable form, but i am going to write anyway...

It's been a long couple of days, and yet it seems as though it went by in an instant. It seems like 10 minutes ago that I was counting down the days to Christmas, and now I sit in a leather arm chair at my in-laws, kids in bed, mom and dad winding down, glass of New Castle on the coffee table and Christmas is just an hour and half away from simply being another memory in my ever dwindling vault of Christmas memories.

I am 30 this year, and that in and of itself makes a guy start to think, and take stock of his life. Sure, if you are an over 30 reader you are smirking right now, but venture back for a moment and try to remember what it felt like for you.

I ask myself questions like, have I done enough? Am I who I want to be? Has my existence made a mark on the landscape of humanity?

That last question is really my big one. I realize tonight that I am small, very small, almost meaningless on the grand canvas of the creative timeline of humanity. At the same time, really all I want to know in this moment is that my life will make a mark, something larger than the but print, and moisture ring I am currently leaving. Isn't that what we all want? To know that our lives meant something, changed someone, made a mark?

I don't know, I guess I am just struck by the reality that the things our world and culture tell us are worth pursuing, just might be the very things that are keeping me from really living. I guess what I am most saddened by on this Christmas night is the fact that the pursuits my Christian culture have placed in front of me and so many others are at best simply distracting me from living a life full of real impact and lasting influence.

Things like knowledge, degrees and experience are the things that most people in my position are measure by.

Instead, I would like to be measured by relationships, love, character, passion, heart, grace, justice, mercy, and all of the things that my savior, Jesus Christ measures me on.

If God really valued those things, would he have room in His heart for something as meaningless as a diploma?

All I know is that on this night some 3000 years ago, God decided to place the hope of the world on some very tiny shoulders. The God of the universe in the flesh did not come as a giant, king, or debutant. He came as a small, humble, yet loving, merciful, meek, and sacrificial man. That is who I want to be, That is what I want the next decade of my life to be measured by.

Thank you Jesus for being my living example. I want to imitate you and be the grace of God lived out in flesh as I walk with those who so desperately seek that hope

Influence flows from intentionality

I want to have influence in this world. People ask me all the time why I decided to plant a church, and most of the time my answer is the same... "I'm not sure." You might wonder how a guy can get into something as exhausting as church planting not knowing why. Well, it's not that I don't have my reasons for church planting, it's that church planting, like anything in life is full of challenges that almost daily cause me to question why I do what I do. That is why I have to boil it down the the simplest, most clearly defined reason for my existence.

I want to have influence

I want to have the kind of influence that lasts past today, past my life, past the existence of this world. I want my influence to have some form impact hat last for eternity. That is why I do what I do.

More and more I have been thinking about how to make that happen. Is it about having the right church programs, going to the right place, or being with the right people? Some would say all of those things are important, I however have decided that the extent of my influence will be connected to the extent of my intentionality.

Things don't happen by themselves, they don't happen organically when it comes to real life influence, they come out of intentional living. If I want to be the kind of person that has lasting impact, I have to be intentional about the way I live. for example...

If my goal in life is to be the best guitar player in the world, it will not happen by thinking positive thoughts, or talking to lots of great guitar players, it won't even happen by listening to a lot of great music. It will happen by me deciding what it takes to achieve my goal, and intentionally pursing those things for the balance of my life. I need to know what I am after, and I need to sacrifice everything for the sake of becoming the kind of person that will be that objective.

I have grown weary of church movements that have come to the conclusion that we will have an eternal impact simply by relating with people. If we set out with our ultimate end being relating with people we will become what? Really good networkers, with lots of friends who have lots of great conversation. We will not have eternal kingdom impact unless we decide to be intentional about it.

So what are your core values? What are you living for? Do they support the mission you have for your life? If not, that's where it begins. So many of us live life by accident. Life with Christ is about being intentional about the things God cares most about. When we look at the life of Christ we see the kind of singular focus that we are called to in pursuit of a life worth living.

So what you ask is worth living for....

Intimacy with Jesus, and passion for the Kingdom of God.

It begins and ends there.

Rebellion vs. Conviction

I like to think I have made a habit in my life of swimming up stream, going against the grain, living for something different. When I look at my life, and it's pursuits, I see that to be true in some ways, and not so true in others. Certainly my career choice, and devotion to Christ sets me apart as a person who is swimming up stream at least in the context of American secular culture.

This week I was thinking about the motives for choosing to be different, and had an epiphany. Here is what I came up with...

"If you are going to swim up stream, do it with conviction, not rebellion. Conviction is intentional, rebellion is reactionary."

For most of my life I have been a go with the flow, fit in, don't ruffle any feathers kind of guy. I avoided conflict, wanted to be liked and didn't want to offend. About 3 years ago, in the process of making a significant life change, I decided not to value fitting in anymore. I wanted to be different, I wanted to, "rebel," against everything I thought was wrong with the world, the church, and all of the people involved who I believed were wrong in there pursuits. In doing so, I created rebellion as a value of my life. I wanted to be seen as different, bucking the system, or sticking it to the man, so to speak. This was especially true in the context of church. I saw things in the church that I didn't like, in fact I hated them, and that caused me to react with rebellion. It was anger that was driving my desire for change.

Yesterday afternoon, I was in an online conversation, and somehow it moved to the subject of living life against the grain, swimming up stream. It was then that this concept became clear to me, for the first time really.

A person's desire to, "rebel," most often comes out of a desire to be different, change something, or make a statement of independence. The heart of rebellion however, is anger, and frustration. Rebellion is a reaction to a wrong, so a person living with a heart of rebellion is actually not in control or independent at all. Their desperate attempt to change things has them living a life enslaved to whatever it is they are rebelling against.

rebellion is not calculated, it is a reaction, and any time we react with un calculated emotion, we are being controlled by whatever or whoever we are reacting to. This stands in direct opposition to all that a "rebel," is trying to attain. Unless that person is a rebel simply because they want to be. The heart of rebellion is selfish, it is unkind, and lacks vision. It is most often not well thought out, or founded upon anything. There is no room for rebellion in the church. God is calling us to speak the truth in love, not in anger and frustration.

I don't want to live my life on un calculated emotion. I want to live my life, set my values, and interact with people based on conviction. Being different isn't at all about sticking it to someone, or standing in opposition. No, in our world today, the unique individual is the one who lives their life on purpose, with intentionality, with conviction.

Conviction is different than rebellion. Conviction says, this is the way I choose to live my life, and it is for these reasons, and it doesn't really matter what anyone else does, this is who I am. It is not angry, it is not based on emotion, it is based on a calculated, intentional values driven pursuit. It doesn't force anyone else to live the same way, it isn't even asking for that. It is a simple statement about values.

Ultimately rebellion comes from a desire to see things change, and in my anger and frustration I was unable to see that in that state, I would never change anyone, or anything. It is when we step back, humble ourselves, and let conviction rule that we become people that have potential for lasting impact.

Things kids say...

Yesterday when I woke my 6 year old son up for school I was greeted with a response that I have grown accustom to. You see my son has a part of his brain that I am convinced no one else has, or at least no one else uses. When he goes to sleep at night he logs a whole bunch of one phrase ideas in his brain that he heard from that day. He saves them like a hard drive, and for some reason when he wakes up in the morning they are right there waiting to be used with reckless abandon. This particular morning he woke up and said.

"Did you know that people can die with their eyes open."

I have no idea why he decided this was the right way to greet me on a Wednesday morning, but that was it, not hi daddy, not good morning, no he had been intentionally logging this phrase on his memories hard drive so that he could spout it to the first person he saw the next day.

It's pretty amazing how the human brain works. It can remember and re use things that we had no idea we were logging.

As we get older we learn how to control our brain, and it's functions, ultimately leading to a lifestyle that intentionally keeps people at bay. We use only parts of our brain that are safe, and we seem to learn how to keep at bay the parts that might open us up to public rejection. My son Neal still has not learned that skill yet. He says what he thinks, and does not filter a single word. I can't help but wonder what our world would be like if we never grew up and learned how to hide our emotions the way we do. What if we were all walking around saying the first thing that came to our mind.

For example, a man with a white beard walks by, everyone things, hey that guy looks like Santa! Our adult brains think it, and wouldn't dare say it out loud. Neal... well, he says it, and not only does he say it, but he says it at a volume that anyone in a three block radius could hear it (I wonder where he got that).

For the most part this skill is a good thing, if we said everything we thought it would likely create a whole lot of problems, but this important skill has also taught us that we can construct an image we want people to see, and present it weather it's who we are or not. We have learned how to live our lives completely void of any real relationships.

I think that when God compares us to children in how we should approach Him, this is at least partly what He means. We can pretend with people, we cannot pretend with God. Maybe the more important truth is that we don't have to. People cannot handle every thought in our brain, but God can. What if we lived life simply sharing every thought, emotion, and idea with our God. What if we didn't filter with Him. We would be giving God our anger, fear, insecurity, joy, pain, hopes and dreams on a moment by moment basis. God has the ability to see and know our hearts, and it's this kind of intimacy that He longs to share with us. It is in this context that we allow God access to alter the state of our heart.