Tagged by Justin February 4, 2008

Pick up the nearest book of at least 123 pages

Find page 123

Find the first 5 sentences

Post the next 3 sentences

Tag 5 people

I’m currently reading “Streams of Living Water” by Richard Foster.  I would highly recommend checking him out; I really love his book “Celebration of Discipline” as well.

 ”Needless to say, a sharp line of demarcation appeared between the vision of Seymour and that of Parham.  When it was clear that the majority of the Azusa Street Mission would not accept Parham’s leadership, Parham left with an estimated two to three hundred followers and opened a rival campaign at a nearby Women’s Christian Temperance Union building.  This repudiation of the Azusa work-and competition with it-undermined Seymour’s position and seriously weakened the movement.”

I tag Curt, Kelsey, Mindy, Craig, and Rick.

I’m back! February 4, 2008

Oh what to write, what to write?  Not only have I been dealing with the fact that I don’t have time to write at work anymore, and I don’t have internet at home, but I have also been having the slightest bit of writer’s block here recently.  I need to start carrying around a pad of paper with me, because while I’m out living life I come up with plenty to think about, but when I’ve sat down and stared at the keys nothing comes out. 

 

I guess I can just start by listing some of the things that have been on my mind lately.

 

Children.  No, not having children (although I guess this plays into how I will potentially someday raise mine), but I guess I’ve just been thinking a whole lot about how important it is to bring your children to church.  Yet not smother them with it.  Yet still bring them.  Yet not make them hate it.  Well, you get the picture.  You see, I’ve been talking to my boss, who I found out was raised in a church of Christ.  He said he hated being forced to go to church and that’s why he doesn’t now.  From what I can tell he tries to live a pretty moral, good life, but just doesn’t seem willing to sacrifice his time in order to go to church.  He said, “It’s not that I have a problem with what’s being taught when I go, it’s just going.” 

 

And then there’s Craig.  (I hope you don’t mind if I use you as an example.)  He’s gone his entire life.  He’s been in the same town as his parent’s his entire life.  He’s gone to Elmwood (practically) his entire life.  And I think he’s probably struggled in the past with working out his own faith.  And that’s fine…I’m not saying that’s a bad thing.  He’s probably stayed more devoted to the Father than I have over the course of my lifetime…but he admits that he felt “forced” to go to church from time to time.

 

And then, of course, there’s me.  I can very truly say to you I have never once felt forced to go to church…even when I was at Lipscomb.  (Now, I can tell you I’ve felt obligated to go at times,  but not because of my parents expectations or anyone else’s…more because I feel guilty from time to time that Christ gave us so much and yet we complain about spending a few measly hours of our lives in community with other believers.)  Nonetheless, I have always loved going to church.  I can remember when I was about 7 years old and we were getting ready to build our house; the guy that we were buying the property from kept talking and talking and we missed Wednesday night church because of it.  I took a swing at him.  I was not happy that I was not getting  to go to church and see my “family” and go to Bible class (which I loved at this age and still do love Bible class today; thirst for Biblical knowledge is definitely something I gleaned from my CoC upbringing).  Point being…I don’t know how my parents did it, but I never once felt like I had to go to church growing up.  I never felt like they would be mad at me if I didn’t want to go.  Even though I’ve spent the better half of my life trying to “please” them…my relationship with God was the one thing that I made my own; that no one else pressured me to have and it was always something I wanted.

 

And don’t get me wrong…I do not feel in the slightest that “going to church” is the be all end all of what it means to be “Christian.”  In fact, I think the view that it is has caused a lot of damage to the body of Christ.  But, being in community with other believers is an extremely important element of our faith.  No one can read the book of Acts and deny the need for Christian community.  And it makes me sad that we don’t see this importance. 

 

So, here’s what I’ve been realizing.  I think we’ve all gotten too tied up in the notion that to be Christian is to be moral or pure.  To not have sex.  To not steal or lie.  To not cheat on our taxes.  And if we can satisfy all these little things on our check list we can go to heaven, where it’s warm and fuzzy all the time.

 

And to that end I must first ask the question, do we really think heaven is all about sunshine and pearls and gold and material satisfaction?  Maybe the writer of the text was merely trying to explain a place where things are so perfect we can’t really fathom the perfection.  Being directly in the presence of God has to be better than streets of gold doesn’t it?   I’ve been to France once…and I can I tell you, as beautiful a place as Versailles was, the beauty of spending a week at Spring Mill Bible Camp is much more wholesome to my heart.  I think if it weren’t for the heat and the natural drama of being surrounded by hormone crazed teens for one week, bible camp would be as close to heaven as I can image earth being.  Why?  Because it’s one full week of worship and escape from the world.  I always leave feeling healed in some way…what if worship was as genuine in my life 365 days a year as it is that one little 5 day week?  I think I’m almost a little scared of living a life that sweet.

 

And then the ever fun idea of living life off of a check list.  There’s so much more to it than that in my experience.  It’s not enough to simply not be racist.  I think we’re called to overcome the injustice of this world on God’s terms.  Remember that whole tower of Babel thing when God confused the languages?  And then the whole Acts 2 thing when the apostles spoke in tongues and what was done at Babel was “undone” by God on His terms?  The Message overcame the social injustice and cultural separation, proclaiming that the gospel was and still is meant for all to hear it and accept it.  And then these communities of believers start springing up and they’re living life together, sharing the blessings of the kingdom and shedding light on the world via their kingdom.  I don’t really see American “Christians” living this way much.  It’s almost like we treat church as part of the checklist, or sometimes even worse, a networking opportunity or country club. 

 

All that to say this; how do you raise children in “The Church” and not in the church building?  How do you get them to experience Christian fellowship outside of the potluck dinner?  (Not that food is bad; food is very very good. J)

 

I slowly see our children’s ministries slipping farther and farther into “entertainment” rather than ministry.  They’re not getting much meat from what I can tell.  I think Bible class can be very entertaining and hold children’s attention…it just may take a little effort and creativity on out parts as teachers.  When I start seeing my kids get bored, I shift gears.  For instance, the same old songs in class were getting relentlessly old for them…so now I’m taking 15 minutes of class that I was using to sing with them, to read The Chronicles of Narnia to them.  (They still get to sing plenty on Wednesday nights, and believe me, they’re learning the Bible and its applications too.)  2 and 3 year olds are notoriously hard to control.  Their class time is slipping farther and farther into “Here, play with these toys.”  I’m just not down with that; 2s and 3s like to sing, they like to move around; why not sing songs with them and tell them stories instead or leaving them to their own accords?  “Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”  I love that scripture.  And the beauty of teaching that age is just when you think you’re ready to quit because you’re completely ineffective, they remember a song or question and you realize they really are paying attention to you. 

 

Well, I think that’s all I have for now.  This has been a little bit of a random post.  I planned on switching topics and only writing about a paragraph for each, but I kinda got on a rant about children’s ministry.  I tend to do that from time to time.  Let me know if you have any good tips on teaching children and not smothering them.  I’m not into creating mindless drones here.