Olympic Frenzy

So I am completely addicted to the Olympics. It's funny - when I was younger I would get bored and tired of the Olympics. Now, I can't get enough. I watched all 4.5 hours Monday and Tuesday night THEN stayed up a little later watching the late night stuff. Wow. I cannot get enough of Michael Phelps, Shawn Johnson, and Nastia Liukin (no idea if that is spelled right.) I am enjoying watching people from other countries just as much - that Chinese men's gymnastics team is something else. I'm glad there is still a week left to absorb everything, but it will be nice when it's over because I will get more sleep - haha.

Wounded World

My pastor has been doing this amazing series entitled Hiking the Trail: Matthew Fits Our Feet for Discipleship. His message today was called "The Harvest is Plentiful." He gave us some challenges as to what it means to follow Christ. My favorite one of the morning was "To follow Christ is to recognize and eventually claim his gut-level ache (compassion) for people, especially those in danger." The ache of compassion that God has for his people truly is an ache that comes from deep within. The compassion of God does not say "oh wow that's terrible - let me help you so long as it's convenient for me." It instead says "I not only see and reconize that you are hurting, I feel your pain and am choosing to live life beside you, no matter the cost." God aches deep within for his people and has called us to do the same. "If mercy and compassion aren't a part of your make-up of following Christ, then you haven't been following Christ." To follow Christ is to love. To love as Christ is to live. To live as Christ is to give. We have been singing a song entiteld Wounded World - the lyrics are below:

Wounded world that cries for healing
Here we hold each other’s pain,
Wounded systems, bruised and bleeding
Bear the load, the scars of strain;

Dollars ration our compassion,
Hard decisions rule the day,
Jesus of the healing Spirit,
Free us to another way!

Through our nation’s spent frustration,
Through the corridors of stress
May there move a kindlier wisdom
All may feel, and all may bless;

Tax and tithe are for a purpose
Shared to shield the poor and weak;
Past the symptoms of our sickness
Let the voice of justice speak.

Honor those whose loving spirit
Nurses hope, restores and heals,
Towel and basin used in service
Like the Christ who comes and kneels;

In the tending, in the mending
May we see the right and fair,
In our common quest for wholeness
Heal each other by our care.

This song really speaks to my heart because this topic is so near to my heart. My heart beats for the ministry to the broken. It is my prayer that God will shape and form me into a person who has claimed his gut-level ache and lives life the way He has called me to live. I want to feel the pain of those who are broken and hurting and live life alongside them. To follow Christ is to do just that - follow in his footsteps. I pray that He will give me eyes that see the world as He does, arms to embrace others with His love, and hands to reach out to those in need, but most of all I pray He gives me a heart that beats with the same ache and compassion He has.

Pray

Please pray for Carl and Cara - things are pretty rough for them right now. Read about it here.

A letter to Spencer

Spencer,
Congratulations - you earned your degree Saturday! Dr. Gresham presented it to your family - there were so many of them there to see it happen. Your friends in Europe are building coffee shops and naming them after your songs - I know you would love that and you would love to play there. I'm not even gonna lie, I miss you buddy. I miss your smile and your music and your passion for life. You were always an inspiration to me, especially at the end. How you kept that positive attitude and outlook when the rest of us were beginning to lose hope I will never know. Thanks for being you and thanks for touching my life. I love you Spencer.

My favorite Spencer song:

I Trust

This hope that sometimes I don't feel
This hope that sometimes I don't see
I trust will carry me
I trust will carry me
This hope that I don't see

This love that I could never earn
This love that I just don't deserve
I trust will carry me
I trust will carry me
This love that I can't earn

This grace that's somehow kept me here
This grace that's somehow kept me here
I trust will carry me
I trust will carry me
This grace that's kept me here

Love = Live = Give

I'm fired up, so get ready for this. Last week was Idol Gives Back on American Idol. I taped it and watched it tonight. I watched as images of poverty-stricken people flashed before my eyes and I became angry. There are children who don't know what it means to live in a safe neighborhood. There are children who are raising their brothers and sisters ALONE because all of their family has died. There are children who have a disease that could easily be prevented by a net and pill but don't have that option because their family can't afford it. There are families being torn apart by disease and lack of resources. It makes me absolutely SICK to see these images and hear the stories of these people and know that I live in a country where we pay professional athletes millions and millions of dollars a year to play a sport while there is a mother across the world who sits anxiously next to her malaria-stricken 18 month old baby girl as she fights for her life because the mother cannot afford the $10 net and $2 pill it would take to keep her family safe. There is something EXTREMELY wrong with this picture. The ridiculousness of this situation really hit me tonight. I want to do something. I NEED to do something. I need to get involved and help these people. Nothing gets under my skin more than seeing people in despair. There is so much that can be done to help these people and it goes beyond just loving them. Christ called us to love, but He also called us to live. He called us to live as He lived, and if I recall, that means living life with those on the margins on society. Living is an action. Living involves meeting the needs of those around us and giving of what we have to make sure that happens. I am so tired of those who say they want to see the Kingdom of God being lived out here and now and in the same breath say "oh that's too bad - how horrible" to the images and stories of those who are in desperate need of a dose of life and turn and walk away. I am challenging myself to love, live, and give. I want to love those around me and see them as the people they are, not the problems they have. I want to live life alongside those who are desperately crying out. I want to give of myself and my possessions to help those in need. I challenge you to do the same - I want to see the Kingdom come to life. "Be the change you want to see in the world."

Life and Church, not to be confused with LifeChurch

Life. Life is full of experiences. These experiences help make us who we are. Today I ate lunch with a couple of older ladies from work. I got to spend 30 minutes listening to them tell stories from their life experiences and I loved it. One of them told me that when she was in about 5th or 6th grade she was eating dinner at a friend's house and Martin Luther King, Jr. came to dinner and ate with them. My mouth hung open when she said that. I cannot even imagine how cool it must be to be able to tell people you ate dinner with MLK as a child. It was that story that made me realize what an awesome thing life is. Every day life is filled with experiences. I want to soak up life in every possible way and experience everything that I can. I want to be able to tell stories one day of the experiences I have had. Life really is short and I want to be able to look back on my life and see that I have soaked up as many experiences as possible.

Church. What defines church? Is it a building with a steeple that people enter to attend worship services weekly, monthly, or yearly? Or is it a group of people living out the Kingdom in community? I like to think of it as the latter. I don't think it's up to a building to define a church - it's up to the people. Too often people allow 'church' to be bound to the definition of a building with a steeple used for worship services. To me, 'church' is much more than that. Church happens when the Kingdom is lived out, whether that is through showing love to a deprived child, feeding those who are hungry, or worshipping freely with people who look different than you. The church building may be the place where worship services occur, but 'the church' is the people living out the Kingdom and portraying the Gospel. My heart, passion, and desire is to see more of 'the church' occuring outside of Church.

Grace

Grace. Dictionary.com defines it as "the freely given, unmerited favor and love of God." Unmerited - it wasn't earned and it isn't deserved, yet it exists - freely. Tonight was our Tenebrae (or Good Friday) service at church. This service never fails to impact me deeply and tonight was no different. We spent an hour in the darkness, the only light being the slight lights on the platform and the candles along the wall. The cross stood before us, draped in black cloth and holding the Christ candle. The choir sang and we sang and the narrators read to us. We were reminded of the beauty of the gift of love and grace of Jesus. We were guided through the Scriptures that narrated Holy Week to us and two things in particular stood out to me tonight. The first was that the Temple was being used for acts other than its purpose. Those acts stood in the way of what Jesus intended for the Temple. Have I allowed myself to be used for purposes other than those He has in mind for me and do I allow myself or those things to stand in the way of His will for me? The second was a statement made in the narration that went something along the lines of "Christians need to live a faith that isn't afraid of the dark - a faith that isn't afraid to doubt and fear." That concept just hit me fast and hard. Is my faith afraid of the dark or does it avoid it? I like to think I live a faith that is afraid of the dark but I know sometimes I don't. Another concept hit me fast and hard this week. When I was a young child, I used to be so upset around Easter and wonder how in the world the people back then could have possibly seen Jesus as someone to be crucified and how they could hurt him. It hit me fast and hard this week that had I been in the crowd when Jesus walked the earth, I too would more than likely screamed "crucify him!" You see, Jesus was different. Jesus brought this whole new concept that people weren't used to - loving those deemed unworthy. Jesus shows up and people begin to see how he lived and they didn't like it. It was different, strange, and to some - wrong. Do I do well with people telling me the way they think I should live? Absolutely not - therefore I have no doubt I too would have been among the mockers. This realization hit me fast and hard again tonight in the service and I cried. It breaks my heart to know that I am just a breath away from being among those who mocked and beat Him. Grace. Do I deserve it? Did I earn it? Absolutely not. Do I still receive it? Somehow, I do. How deep the Father's love for us indeed.