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Ashes & Dust

February 16, 2021 / / 0 Comments

Tomorrow is a day in the church known as Ash Wednesday. It marks the beginning of the season of the church known as Lent. This season of Lent is about reflection and focus on getting ourselves ready for Easter. As followers of Jesus prepare for Easter they take time for a penitential (reflective) walk through the life of Jesus. This season is marked by confessing (admitting) sins, prayer, often fasting, and meditation.

I know that a lot of that might sound a tad too deep for many people or almost impossible for others, so we need not make this a hard and fast rule to follow. The idea behind the fasting and the prayer, the confession and the meditation is to draw us closer to Jesus. These actions serve as intentional ways in which we put off a little bit of ourselves and put on a little bit of Jesus in return.

Take for instance the fasting portion, which we’ll hit on more in a future post. The purpose of fasting in its simplest explanation is to replace a craving for one thing with a fulfillment in a relationship with Jesus. So in a sense it means we need to lose the sugar to help focus on the savior. The same can be true for the other things mentioned above. We use them as ways to more intentionally focus on who we are in this relationship with Jesus.

But what about the ashes and dust thing on Ash Wednesday? I mean that’s kind of odd if you really think about it.

What we may not realize is that Ash Wednesday and the pomp and circumstance that goes along with it didn’t really start until around the 11th century and wasn’t widely accepted among Christian traditions until the early 1970s. The Bible never talks about having ashes marked on our foreheads. There is no real rule saying that we have to do it this way. So if it’s not specifically Biblical (mandated by God) why do we do it and what does it mean?

Why ashes?

There is great symbolism in the ashes on Ash Wednesday of which many may not be aware. The ashes used to mark a cross on your forehead are made by burning the palm branches from the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebration. This means we’re taking the victorious welcome of Jesus as King and combining it with our humble approach to him as sinners.

Additionally, ashes in the Old Testament were a sign of humility and mourning. So when we receive the ashes on our heads formed in the shape of a cross, we’re essentially saying that we humble ourselves before the one is King of kings. Since Ash Wednesday marks the start of Lent, they also serve as a mark that we are mourning what this seasons brings – namely the suffering and death of Jesus.

The words spoken on Ash Wednesday are another reminder of why we do them. You are dust and to dust you shall return. This connects the ashes of victory with the dust of our beginnings. Where we have erred from God and wondered from His ways, the ashes are our humble journey back. We are reminded of our simple beginnings. Dust. Dirt clods formed in the hands of God. Breathed into with the very breath of the Father. The ashes connect us with Adam who is the symbol of our sinfulness. The cross connects us with the new man, Jesus who is the symbol of our forgiveness.

In a year that has been wrought with so much upheaval and turmoil and confusion, the normal Ash Wednesday might not be possible. So do we have to have ashes on Ash Wednesday? Simple answer is no. We don’t need ashes or fasting or any of the outward signs to connect us to the meaning and intent and purpose of this season as Christians. Whether you receive ashes or not this year, humble your heart and spirit. Remember your beginning as part of creation formed in the hands of the creator. Ponder the death and resurrection of Christ that promises bring new beginning to the old ways within us.

Whether you got ashes or you didn’t, if it wasn’t about Jesus you just got dirty.

I Wanna Go Back

February 15, 2021 / / 0 Comments

I remember my grandpa always saying that life when he was a child was more simple. He said the best times were behind us. He used to think that all of this new technology was making life harder and preventing us from living real lives. In some cases he’s probably right. The times were easier once upon a time I will admit that, but I won’t go so far as to say the best times are behind us.

Today’s Music Monday is about going back, but going back doesn’t mean worshiping the past. It simply means that some things in life need the simplicity of the past. Think of it this way…

When we were children, we’d come to Sunday School and sing simple songs. We didn’t care if we were singing in the right key or even on pitch. We’d sing louder and faster than we do as we grow older. We didn’t care what others thought of our dress or how we did our hair. It was enough to sing with the simplicity of Jesus loves me. Our bedtime prayers were really about having a good night sleep and Jesus being near us.

But as we age, we feel our prayers need more words and our songs need more complicated rhythms. Why? Why is it that when we get older things have to be more complicated? Why can’t we relish the simplicity of grace without complicating things with our intellectual baggage?

I wanna go back. I wanna go back to simple faith. I wanna go back to Jesus being enough. I wanna go back to all the simplicity of what it means to follow Jesus, but remember simple doesn’t always mean easy. Faith is simple but not always easy. It’s time to go back to simple faith in a complex world.

Metamorphosis

February 15, 2021 / / 0 Comments

The process of a caterpillar changing to a butterfly is pretty fantastic. We call that process a metamorphosis. It’s the undoing of one thing and the starting of a brand new thing. Well this word is actually used in the bible a few times. The most notable for many is when it is used of Jesus at the time called the transfiguration. But what we call transfiguration is really the word metamorphosis.

This metamorphosis happened at a time when his closest followers didn’t really understand who he was. They had seen him do some cool things. They were there when he was able to manipulate the physical world and walk on water. They even watched sick people completely healed. But they really didn’t get who he was or why he was there.

So he took these close followers with him up a high mountain and changed, transformed – metamorphosed in front of them. It’s like the cracking open of an egg and what’s inside that was hidden behind the shell is exposed. Behind the human exterior of Jesus’ body and clothing, buried inside him was the real and complete presence of God. At the transfiguration, it’s like Jesus’ human shell was cracked open and the Godness burst out of him for a small moment in time.

Take a listen to the following to see how this happened and better yet why it’s important to us today.

A Balanced Approach To Learning

February 12, 2021 / / 0 Comments

I’ve recently had the chance to dive back into a little continued learning with a group of colleagues and it’s been super refreshing. I’m not a school classroom kind of guy so the style of this learning is really effective for me. While I’d much rather the interactions be in person we all have to make the most of these moments no matter how they come.

In a recent session with this group we discussed in general terms a variety of learning styles and growth strategies. While this may be scary for some and boring for others, to me it was wonderfully applicable. The three approaches are information, imitation and innovation. This goes along with the whole nursing adage of see one, do one, teach one. It’s really nothing new but I feel we’ve gotten away from it a bit in our technologically comfortable world.

Information

The concept we called information is very much a classroom lecture type of approach. Our schools by and large use this approach to teaching. We spit out information and the students are responsible for soaking it up. This is also how lectures, business programs, and even many churches approach their task. They have set information and they see their role as merely data dumping, puking up facts, pushing papers, communicating truths.

But if we only dump facts we’re left with a take it or leave it situation. And given our post modern views of all truth being relative that information you just spent time dumping on the learner, they can determine for themselves if they want to listen to it or if it’s just junk to them. Information is critical but it’s one part of a three phase approach.

Imitation

Another element of the teaching/learning model is that of imitation. Do we give our learners the time and space to put their learning into practice with specific guidelines and even some direction and personal guidance. It’s said that imitation is the greatest form of flattery. So are we giving the learners in our setting something worth imitating? Or are we just throwing facts at them like pasta at a wall and seeing what sticks?

Imitation is how many trade professions learn their task. They get the head knowledge from classes and books then they’re paired up with a mentor who they are to shadow. This mentor will guide them and direct them on how to do the job properly. Little by little you take on new tasks that apply the information you learned in real life scenarios and situations.

Innovation

The third portion here is innovation. This is giving someone the ability and the space and permission and even encouragement to start something new and then taking your hands off. The last part of that is the hard part. Giving something over to someone else isn’t easy because they aren’t going to do it your way. Then taking your hands off and walking away to let them make it their own is really challenging.

In my world as a pastor the past year has been about innovation of approach while keeping the information constant and trying to find space for imitation to still happen when we can’t even be in the same room at times. When we find our identity tied to one of these approaches we’ll quickly grow weary and eventually hit the wall of depression and exhaustion when our approach doesn’t seem to be working like it used to work.

Some practical questions:

  • Which of these three is most comfortable for you?
  • Which is the most difficult?
  • Which of these, if implemented, could bring the greatest impact on your life, family, organization?
  • How does your approach need to change to better serve the people

Prison Lessons

February 11, 2021 / / 0 Comments

So there are certainly a few jokes we could throw around with this one but I’ll leave that up to another time and place. The point of this post is to take an unfortunate experience and see what might the learning moment be in a bad time such as imprisonment.

The audio clip below is from a message on the imprisonment of Peter in the book of Acts. While it would be great if you’d read Acts 12 and listen to the below podcast, I have the highlights below. There are three main principles we’ll cover.

The promises of the past give us peace in the present.

This first principle is a reminder that not all things that are bad in the moment really are all that bad when we step back and reevaluate. Peter is in prison after watching a friend an colleague killed in public. Kind of awful I know! But he’s in prison and the same thing is threatened of him. Instead of freaking out though, he remembers a promise Jesus gave him. Jesus told him that he would die as an old man and since he wasn’t old this moment was not going to be his end. So instead of freaking out, he slept!

God will do God’s work, but you have to do yours.

The second principle is found when Peter is told to get dressed and tie his shoes. This seems pretty unimportant at first glance, but there’s something powerful here. The angel will free Peter from the chains and from the prison but he won’t tie his shoes. Jesus will do all the work to save us and deliver us from evil and shower us with grace but he won’t believe for us. He still wants us to serve our neighbors. He still has stuff for us to do now that he’s done his work.

Pray expecting God’s answer.

This one is a pet peeve of mine but so often I hear so many prayers said as if we aren’t expecting God to answer them. I love the thy will be done section of the Lord’s Prayer to be sure! It reminds us that not all things happen the way we want. But it seems we like to hide behind this part of the prayer. We start our prayers bold and knowing exactly what we want then get to this part of the prayer and the wheels fall off. We use this phrase to erase our prayers altogether. Peter gets out of prison, exactly what his friends were praying would happen. Then he finds his friends and they didn’t even believe it was possible for Peter to be released! So why were they praying if they didn’t think God would answer?!

The long and short is we can learn from every situation in life, even the most challenging like wrongfully put in prison or insignificant like simply tying our shoes. God has a plan and that plan will happen. We just need to move forward in the faith of His past promises and in hopes of his future presence.

How Adaptable Are You?

February 10, 2021 / / 0 Comments

When you’re good at something, it’s a safe bet to just sit on that talent and do as much as you can that rests in your sweet spot. But what happens when you need to step out of that sweet spot and into a little less familiar or comfortable territory? How adaptable are you?

Learning new skills and doing new things is an important part of life and the maturity process. But often it seems the more we know the more we realize we really don’t know.

One of the challenges in life is determining how best to relate to people of different cultural, economic and traditional backgrounds effectively. We need to be willing and able to be flexible and adapt to different scenarios in life in an effort to better reach the people in our circle of influence. To do this we need to take a few key steps to ensure we’re doing this right.

First, we need to know who we are and what we believe. The better foundation you have in life, the more well informed your decisions will be. Having good intentions is one thing. But if our good intentions and adaptability aren’t built on a strong foundation of truth, then we’ll quickly go the wrong direction. So know who you are and what you believe.

The second part is to know who we’re trying to reach. I don’t mean to just know their name, although that’s important for sure! But we need to know who they are, what makes them tick, what are their passions, interests and desires. Don’t assume that just because we know their name we know what they’re thinking or what they want in life. The better we know the person and the stronger the relationship between us, the more we’ll know what they need not just what we think they want.

Finally, we need to ask ourselves what part of me needs to be put aside for the sake of this relationship growing in Christ. The idea is what personal ambition, liberty, desire do I need to sacrifice to better serve this person and help them encounter the love of Christ more fully.

I hope this short summary helps you better serve those around you. For more information on adaptability and becoming better suited to reach people effectively, check out this message.

Invitation & Challenge

February 10, 2021 / / 0 Comments

I’m currently cramming through a book to join a group that’s been together for a few months already and need to get caught up. And this dichotomy shows up in the first couple of chapters. It’s the dichotomy of invitation and challenge. Now that doesn’t mean a lot at face value but if you give me about 4 mins of your time and read this there’s stuff here that can apply to just about everyone’s life.

So the idea of invitation and challenge was brought up in the context of breaking a horse. I’m really not a big fan of here terminology of breaking something but I hope you know what that means. Simply put, it’s making a wild horse a little less wild. Some would do this by beating the horse and breaking their spirit. Some would do this by attempting to ride them in a body of water making it harder for the horse to kick and buck the off. But the book uses a different analogy and that’s how a horse is welcomed into a herd in the wild.

It’s something that the author calls invitation and challenge. The idea behind invitation and challenge is pretty simple, and it is super helpful in how we raise up leaders and even teach our children how to grow and mature. In what follows I will unpack the two sides of invitation and challenge and apply them to basic relationship and leadership settings.

There is a back and forth that needs to happen in every relationship. It is all about welcoming and getting to know the other person on their terms. And then offering up a challenge of sorts to show there are expectation and who ultimately has authority.

Invitation is welcoming someone in and drawing them close. In the illustration of the horses used above, the outsider horse is greeted by a female horse from the herd. The mare would turn sideways and in a show of vulnerability would bare her side. This is the weakest part of the horse if you didn’t know. By turning she was indicating that she came with no ill intention and is willing to let the outsider horse come closer. As the outsider draws in a little, the mare turns forward facing and enters into a stare down of sorts.

This is the challenge. This is a show of power and strength. While the outsider may be larger or stronger or faster, the mare carries with her the authority of the entire herd. She is not easily moved and if so she has the rest of the group behind her.

This goes back and forth between invitation and challenge as the outsider draws ever closer yet is kept in check by the mare’s direct stare from time to time. Eventually the outsider is “broken” into the herd and all is good.

Now as we translate that into our relationships with our children, coworkers, employees, neighbors, etc. The principles remain the same. We need to be gentle and open and welcoming. We need to be vulnerable and willing to let our guard down a little bit. We need to be more intentional about our sense of invitation when it comes to these and frankly all relationships.

But at the same time we need space to challenge one another. We need to set rules for our children to obey. We need to keep employees on task and coworkers need held accountable.

So as we go through life there needs to be a more intentional trade off between invitation and challenge. As Christians this is a great model for discipleship and growing in our faith development. We need to invite into a relationship with others. Jesus did this with the twelve disciples. But he didn’t let them get too comfy because soon he woudl send them out to do the stuff he was talking about. He told them that they would have to change. The old needs to go away and the new needs to be born into us.

This is the amazing and fantastic dichotomy of saint and sinner. We’re invited in through grace which is the good news of God. And because of that invitation our lives look different. It’s what James talked about in the bible. A faith without works is dead. There must be a life change that happens when we follow up on God’s invitation.

There’s a lot here so we’ll end at that. Invitation and challenge find a balance and strengthen relationships. Super simple just not always easy.

Famous For

February 8, 2021 / / 0 Comments
Image result for famous for tauren wells

So I’ve had a few days lately that made me wonder what in the world is going on! When life turns a corner that we’re not expecting and throws a wrench in the plans we start to wonder if things will ever get back to normal. But how do you get through when life is all upside down?

Today’s Music Monday is a reminder that we serve a God who kind of has a certain way of doing things. He has an approach and a character that really shouldn’t surprise us.

When life is upside down and inside out perhaps instead of shaking our fists at God wondering where he is and what he’s up to, perhaps we could pray for God to do what he’s famous for. Do the things that he normally does and give us the faith and trust to be able to sit back and watch it all unfold.

Character Attacks & More

February 4, 2021 / / 0 Comments

There is a method of arguing known by its latin name ad-hominem. I know it’s not a word we say all the time but we probably use this method of arguing and don’t even know it. The idea behind an ad-hominem is that you can’t win an argument on the basis of the content of the argument so you start slandering your opponent. You move from content discussion to character attacks.

When we are backed into a corner and realize our argument really doesn’t hold water, sometimes it’s tempting to stoop to attacking someone’s character instead. Character attacks are just not cool. Actually a character attack demonstrates how weak our argument really is.

The story of Stephen in the Bible is one that starts with an argument based on content, but it’s soon realized that Stephen’s content is rock solid. Then the attack moves to his character. They make up things about him just to make others think poorly of Stephen. But again he doesn’t budge. Finally, when nothing else works they resort to murderous threats and eventually killing him.

We may not go around stoning people, at least we better not! But we often find ourselves easily backing ourselves into a character attack scenario. When we don’t get our way, we lash out at our opposition. When we don’t hear what we want to hear, we attack the person instead of arguing the merits of our position. When our personal attacks fail to get through, all too often we just drop the person from our lives, delete them from social media, block their number on our phones, act as if they no longer exist.

There must be a better way. Check out last night’s message to see what that better way might be.

Jericho

February 1, 2021 / / 0 Comments
Jericho || Andrew Ripp | WGRC

What are you afraid of? What keeps you awake at night? What are the things that just make your pulse rise and your blood pressure skyrocket? What makes you freeze in your tracks and not be able to move? These things act like walls that keep us immobile at times. These walls need to come down.

Today in our Music Monday, we look at a song about walls that need to be tumbled, walls that isolate us and prevent us from living our lives to the fullest possible.

We spend so much time building these walls of fears and failures. We stack block after block on our foundation of unaccomplished tasks. We let our failures pile up to an insurmountable obstacle that we’ll never be able to escape. How do these walls come down?

The song Jericho is an echo of a Bible story about God’s people in the Old Testament. They had an enemy that was encamped in a well fortified city with massive walls. God’s people simply marched around this city and trusted in God’s ability and power and eventually those walls came down. They were persistent. They were faithful. They were trusting. And God did the work.

All too often when our walls keep us from living the lives we are called to live, we try to go it alone. Or we dig deeper for that extra measure of power deep inside ourselves. But the power needed to bring down these walls of fear and failure doesn’t come from inside us. It comes from God. He is our power. He is our wall breaker.

Happy Monday friends! Time to tumble those walls with humble, faithful obedience.

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