The Search

More Judas than Jesus

2011-09-14T14:45:00.000-05:00

I was reading Luke 22 for an email Bible study that I just started and as I was reading the verses about Satan entering into Judas before he betrayed Jesus, a rather frightening realization hit me. As much as I like to claim that I am a Christ follower and fully seeking to be Christlike in my life, attitude, service, relationships,etc..... I realized that I have a lot more parallels to Judas than Jesus. Judas is well vilified in Christian circles for his heinous act of betrayal in turning over Jesus to his accusers for money. The truth of the matter is though that Judas was one of Jesus’ core twelve for years. He presumably was not a slime bag traitor throughout his time traveling with Jesus. In fact, he was trusted to handle all the money for the group. When Jesus suggested that someone of the twelve was going to betray him, the group didn’t all look at Judas with accusation on their face and run him out of the room on a rail. They all looked at each other in confusion. It simply didn’t make any sense to them that anyone in that room might do something like that. This is pretty scary to me because truthfully, I wonder if I’m even close to half the Christ follower that Judas was. Judas traveled with and served along side Jesus faithfully every day throughout his ministry. I’m lucky if Jesus averages out to a few minutes a day. Judas was present and active in most if not all of the miracles that Jesus did and also in the mundane moments of walking from town to town talking and listening to Jesus, learning from the great teacher. He saw so many things that were impossible to explain and yet, somehow, he managed to turn on this man who had loved, mentored, chosen, and invested in him every day for years. If someone who was a close and loyal to Jesus as Judas could betray him, what kind of a cautionary tale is this for the rest of us? How many of us can claim the kind of closeness that Judas had to Jesus or even get in the neighborhood? What can be done to protect ourselves from betraying Christ? What can be done to protect Jesus from a horrible betrayal at the hands of a trusted friend.

The truth is that sadly, we all will betray Christ. The even greater truth though is that Christ doesn’t need our protection. He knew Judas would fail just as he knows we will. The greatest tragedy of all is not the story of betrayal. The greatest tragedy is that while Jesus forgave Judas before he ever betrayed him, Judas was so overcome by grief and shame, that he didn’t ever get to experience that forgiveness. I may not be half the Christ follower in life that Judas was, but I’m thankful that I know about and experience daily, the forgiveness that Jesus provided.

My Letter of Lament

2011-03-27T15:35:00.000-05:00

We are talking through the Psalms of Lament during our season of Lent in church. It's been pretty thought provoking stuff and it's made me assess my own lament's. I chose to write a letter since I'm no poet. Here you have it.

Dear God,

I don’t always want you around. It’s nothing personal, I just want my space. I’m not really comfortable with the idea of somebody knowing me completely. I’ve been thinking about how to convince you of this. It’s just not practical for you to be with me every second, of every day. I’m sure you have much more important things to do with your time than hang out with me. You are supposed to be a pretty big deal after all. It’s great to know you are around when I’m having a good time and things seem to be perfectly in their place but is it so wrong to want and even demand a bit of privacy when things aren’t? Especially when it seems that you could do so much to improve those situations but I can’t really tell what you are doing. It can seem, if I’m not being too presumptuous, that sometimes you just sit and watch things happen to me rather than doing something to help. You say that you know what’s happening and that you are concerned with my life and you claim to know ridiculously small details about me that frankly, even I don’t know. If that’s the case, why don’t you just fix me. Why do you let me go through some of the stuff that you have. I think I would be happier sometimes with some completely random, superficial, dare I say, empty relationships than I am with you and your constant presence. When I see you as I hang out with those “other friends”, it scares me. I know you aren’t happy about it. You tell me all the time that they are nothing but bad news and I should leave them. Truth is that I’ve tried to walk away, sometimes from them, and sometimes from you. I’ve tried to sneak out. I’ve gone places that I “know” you wouldn’t go, only to see you there. I’ve confronted you, I’ve lashed out physically and emotionally. I’ve screamed obscenities at you, just to drive you away only to see you stay. Sometimes, I don’t see you right away, and I “hope” that somehow it worked and you missed what just happened. Then, of course, I get mad that you left. Whenever I look closer though, I see that I was wrong and you were there the whole time. You say you won’t ever leave me because you love me and if you left, you would be abandoning me. You try to hold me to some “higher standard” and tell me that you value me more than anything. Maybe I’m beginning to believe you. While your actions don’t make a lot of sense to me, I also don’t see you wasting your time on empty things. Maybe you somehow know that your point gets proven when you don’t stop me from my stupidity. After all, it’s never more clear than after I run, that I am a whore, but you are faithful. You really are faithful and I am thankful for that. Forgive my arrogance, my anger, and my doubt.

Jon

Fight Club

2011-01-09T16:31:00.000-06:00

“I’m usually a lover not a fighter but in your case, I’ll make an exception.” Little Rascals

I get tired from time to time. Not a mild case of needing a nap, but as the old saying goes, weary to the bone. I wish this could be chalked up to my chronic overexercise, or the vast amounts of fun I have. The truth is, my exhaustion can be traced back to all the fights I get in. My fight club feels like it would make Chuck Palahniuk tired. Not to spoil the story, but ironically, like the book/movie, the opponent most likely to inflict serious bodily harm on me, is myself. I fight myself about everything. Money, relationships, work, parenting, addictions, priorities, time, sex, food, service, etc.... Just to be clear, I also fight with my wife about most of those too but this time around, my beef is with me. Sometimes, I find myself wishing to just stop fighting and just be who I am whatever that may be. I roll around on the ground clutching my groin and crying, (metaphorically of course) and as the immediate pain starts to fade I start to think about what it would look like to stop fighting. If I stopped fighting, I would be finally able to have peace. Right? I wouldn’t have conflict with my wife or kids, with my work, or my addiction, I would have plenty of time, and I could eat/do anything I wanted, whenever I wanted to. That sounds like bliss till I realized that the reason I wouldn’t have conflict is that all the things I fight with/about would be gone. The thing about all this conflict is, at the end of the day, I’m not fighting with these things as much as I’m fighting for these things. I’m fighting for my marriage, family and friends. I’m fighting for my job and my health. I’m fighting for my purity. I’m fighting for my faith and my response to it.

The other thing that I realize as I think about just being who I am, is that I’m not entirely sure I agree with whoever defines me as an alone, lazy, compulsive, selfish man and maybe I should rethink who I allow to set my identity. We sing this song at church and I really couldn't think of a better way to finish my pity party.

In Christ alone my hope is found
He is my light, my strength, my song
This Cornerstone, this solid ground
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm

What heights of love, what depths of peace
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease
My Comforter, my All in All
Here in the love of Christ I stand

In Christ alone, who took on flesh
Fullness of God in helpless Babe
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones He came to save

Till on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid
Here in the death of Christ I live, I live

There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave He rose again

And as He stands in victory
Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Bought with the precious blood of Christ

No guilt in life, no fear in death
From a life’s first cry to final breath

No power of hell, no scheme of man
Could ever pluck me from His hand
Till He returns or calls me home
Here in the power of Christ I stand

It doesn’t always feel like sins curse has lost its grip on me, but I think that grip can feel a lot like the wrong kind of freedom, and the less I fight for things, the tighter that grip gets. The truth is that no matter how tight that grip feels it’s not real. My true identity is set by Christ and as the song says, “no power of hell, no scheme of man, can ever pluck me from his hand”. I think I like the identity that Christ sets for me a lot more than the one I came up with for myself, even if it does mean that I’m going to spend a lot of time in the cage.

Christmas

2010-12-14T20:43:00.003-06:00

I have memory issues. I can’t remember too many presents that I’ve gotten for Christmas. I remember getting socks and underwear a lot. You might call that cliché, but since it really happened, you would be calling my life cliché, and while that in fact may be true in some; well ok most cases, I know no one that reads this would be so cruel.

Some things that I do remember about Christmas are the trips to visit family like the times we spent singing Christmas carols while grandpa played his guitar, or the trips to play basketball across the street in the frigid Nebraska temperatures with my cousin who was from Florida. That had to be my only competitive advantage. I remember my face and stomach hurting from laughing so much. I remember going to this small town diner every morning to get a cinnamon roll and get the mail and watching my grandpa talk to farmers. I actually have some great memories about Christmas now that I think about it. Here’s the thing that really interests me. I know I got presents. I know my grandparents especially bought a LOT of stuff for all of the grandkids but I just don’t remember it and I’m pretty sure unless something is hiding in a junk box somewhere, I don’t actually have anything that they gave me any more. That is, I don’t have any of the stuff they bought. I have a lot that they gave me as mentioned above.

We’ve been talking at church about how we celebrate Christmas a lot lately since it’s coming up pretty soon. My church does a pretty cool thing around this time of year by challenging anyone who might listen to be intentional about what they do to celebrate Christmas. To “worship fully, to spend less, to give more, and to love all.” The idea is to get people to be more creative about how they give gifts instead of just taking the easy way out and buying a gift card, and then taking the money that they might have saved and use it to do some good in the world. It’s way more than just encouraging a crafting revolution of epic proportions. A bad gift can be made by hand just as a good gift can be purchased.

As a newish parent who is trying hard to navigate how to raise my boys without screwing them up so much that they spend their entire inheritance on therapy (not much so not hard), I am taking this Christmas thing pretty seriously. My sons love Christmas. They love the tree, the decorations, the music, the cheesy Christmas cartoons, the food, everything gets them ridiculously excited. They ask for toys and stuff a lot. The thing that hangs me up about this is that aside from the fact that I don’t have any money, I want to teach them to be intentional about what we are celebrating. If in fact, we were celebrating Macy’s at Christmas and the wonderful things they have given us, the way most do it would make more sense. We spend hundreds of billions of dollars, giving gifts to each other or ourselves (be honest) to celebrate what? For me, I don’t much appreciate the place of department stores or retail therapy in my life. About the only lasting thing they have given me is a headache and an ulcer from the debt I have stupidly racked up. So I don’t want to celebrate them. Also, I believe in Jesus and this is the time of year that we celebrate his birth. The way most of us celebrate, you would think Jesus was not born in a barn while the donkey his mother rode on ate hay around him as he lay in the food trough. Jesus did not value “things”. He valued relationships. He spent time with people, he spoke encouragement and instruction into their lives. When he was down, he went looking for his father to lift him back up. He valued time. The whole reason he came in the first place was to restore a broken relationship. This makes a lot of sense to me because the memories I have are relational. I remember the time that was spent with me. I remember feeling loved and cared for, and I also remember when I didn’t feel those things. That’s where I’m at tonight. I want my boys to remember the time I spent and the things I did with them. I want them to be able to relate to what Jesus prioritized, not because of what they didn’t see and recieve but because they saw it lived well. This is a time of year to love and care for each other. To sit and talk with each other, to play games, to sing songs, to dance, to drink and eat together around a table. It’s a time to talk honestly about what Jesus really wants for his birthday. If I spent a bunch of money that I don’t have on stuff for them that distracted and distanced them from me and didn’t have any significance to them, I feel like I would be missing the point and if I miss it, then they will too. Don’t get me wrong, I will give them gifts this year and I’m sure they will love them but they will be given with the intention of connecting with them and not just something else for them to have.

Worn Well Till Well Worn

2010-08-10T00:45:00.002-05:00

So I have this pair of shoes. The kind that everybody hopefully has. They are special. These shoes have taken me to amazing places. They've carried me down the halls at work and through the doors to worship. They have stood in the rain and stuck to the floor of a grungy pub. I was thinking about my shoes today as I looked them over and realized that they are wearing out. They have a bit of a hole forming in the sole and I'm afraid I don't have much time left with them. Seems like a bit of a strange thing to feel sadness over although I would bet that more of you have been sad about shoes than care to admit it. Here's the strange thing though. When I think about these shoes, they mean something more to me than just footwear.

I've been thinking lately and the issue of my role has weighed pretty heavily on my mind. Where do I fit and what does that look like at work, at church, at home, serving others and in relationship with my wife, kids, family, and friends. Those shoes, in large part reflect who I am or at least who I want to be. I don't want to be the fancy pair of dress shoes, pulled out only for special occasions and removed as quickly as possible due to the phenomenal blisters forming. I don't want to be the casual loafer that's good for semi important events but can just as easily be out of place and useless if something messy comes up. These shoes can go anywhere and even if they might look out of place in the spotlight, they are invaluable to the guy doing work in the background no matter how fancy the occasion.

One other thing about these shoes. They are made from junk. Someone took old pieces of recycled paper, recycled wool, and recycled carpet padding, and pieced these shoes together as a way of reusing the stuff. The soles are literally made of old bald tires. I feel a bit of kinship in this too. I feel like I've been gradually pieced together using some stuff that if left on it's own wouldn't really be of much use and probably thrown away, but pieced together can become something loved and useful. That seems to be the way God works usually in fact. He takes something that is profoundly broken and knits together something remarkable. I'm somewhere in the middle of the production line right now but I can't wait to see what the finished product will look like.

He's There

2010-03-01T09:50:00.002-06:00

He's there, hidden in plain sight. In the smile of a new bride as she walks with her new husband, in the face of a little boy dressed as a surgeon holding tightly to his mother as the music plays. He's in the lifted hands of the kindly old man four rows up and in the crystal clear sound of truth being spoken in the still air of a quiet chapel. He's in the flickering of a candle and in the piece of often dry bread, dipped in wine from a box. He's there when I hope he's not. He's there when my heart is hard and when it's broken. He's there in the mundane actions of life, and he's there for all the profound experiences. He's even there when I somehow can't find him. Where can I go to escape him? He's there. He's always there.

I think I hurt my hip while wrestling!

2010-02-20T11:47:00.002-06:00

Hurting, confused, frustrated, discouraged, all might be words to describe me today. I've been thrashing about trying to find that one thing that seems to be right. That place that I can go and just know with perfect peace that I'm in the right spot. I know people who have that place, allegedly anyway. I don't. I don't know what it would look like if I did and frankly I just might hate it once I found it. Maybe in some sadistic way I enjoy this feeling. Every time I think I might have found it, it gets yanked out from under me. I just know I hate the way life looks right now. Not everything in life. I have plenty about my life that I enjoy and that I'm thankful for. I wish I had some profound way to tie all this together but I don't. This just means that as much as I hate leaving things unresolved, that feeling is the truth right now and anything else would be a lie.

Viva Viagra!

2009-03-22T01:38:00.007-05:00

Parenting a three year old is an interesting experience. Life takes on a serious dichotomy of cute and troubling. For instance, hearing my son Ian quote the commercial that says the difference is drinkability is pretty cute. I know some people might be troubled by that but I think it's funny. What is troubling is hearing him quote other commercials that he has heard and suddenly you have a three year old talking about having an erection. From cute to troubling in .3 seconds. I realize, it's not such a huge thing, he doesn't know what he is saying but even so, the teachers in the nursery at church sure will. :-) It definitely makes me conscious though because he hears and imitates everything. Pretty much anything he says at this point is an imitation of something he has heard someone else say or do. Not even just words but the way things are said. He watches Amanda and me fight, laugh, talk, criticise, love, hate, not talk, curse, sing or whatever. This is a giant load of pressure. I want to help shape him into who he is meant to be, not into some angry, foul human. The key there is help because somehow, in spite of me and all my screw ups, Ian and Gavyn are not in my hands. I have to somehow give them every day to someone who has no flaws and I'm thankful that I am trusting Him to shape them in all the ways that I can't. May Christ guide my hands and guard my tongue and may he protect them when I won't let him guide me.