community...

This weekend at church we talked about community. Pretty standard subject matter for the beginning of fall since most churches are kicking off a new year of small groups right about now. I have to admit, I’ve heard A LOT of talks on community (even given a few!)… and most of them have been good… but this time around it settled differently in me. Hearing about community had this fresh relevance, rather than being just words and theories about a topic. It was more personal this time around.

An old C.S. Lewis quote comes to mind- “For what you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing: it also depends on what sort of person you are.” What a wise soul. I think the difference in my receptiveness absolutely has to do with where I am currently standing and the person I am at this point in my life and faith…

This time I’m not standing in the role of church staff trying to create environments that foster community; I’m just a regular attender wanting to participate.

This time I’m not the person who knows everyone and feels responsible to connect and include them; I’m the one in the back who only knows a few people but desperately desires to be more connected.

And my heart is different, I am different… I’ve grown and changed a lot this past year… and I am at a place of rawness and honesty with others and with the Lord that I’ve been too scared and too prideful to let myself go to in the past.

So… community. The scripture used seemed random to me initially, but as we looked at it, it became beautiful and perfect to describe the essence of true community. Psalm 133 … just three short verses. Verse 1 begins with, “How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity.” John 17 comes to my mind. Jesus’ prayer for me and for you that we would be united in heart and purpose. Verse 2 compares this unity to oil poured on the head dripping down… see what I mean- weird and random and kind of gross! This analogy is foreign to most of us but it actually speaks of blessing and anointing- ancient priests would use oil to symbolize God’s Spirit over something or someone. Verse 3 gives another comparison- this time it’s the dew on Mt. Hermon and Mt. Zion. Seriously… what?! This analogy speaks of rare refreshment in a dry and thirsty region. Basically, this little Psalm says that true community is a place where there is connection, a sense of blessing and refreshing, and it has God’s life and Spirit all over it.

What a beautiful picture. We were made for this. So why do so few experience this type of community? Quite often, it’s because we mess it up for ourselves. Community is made up of people… broken, imperfect, saved by grace people… it gets messy and vulnerable and won’t ever meet the idealistic picture we have in our minds. When we find ourselves in an imperfect community, we either build walls or we bail. Here’s what we need to remember though- imperfect community is the means Jesus uses to make us more like Himself. It’s through these imperfect relationships we learn love, humility, peace, and compassion.

So I’m praying for this kind of community for me and M… not just the perfect small group where we can be BFF’s with the other people in it… but awkward, uncomfortable, imperfect community where we can grow as children of God and learn more of what it means to live a life of worship, a life like Christ.

May you get to a place of experiencing this kind of community too…

be still...

Go go go… do do do… cross one thing off my list before adding three more… this is the rhythm of my life. I’m awful at keeping boundaries for myself because the overachiever, perfectionist in me won’t settle for anything less than doing it all and doing it well. Some might speculate that I have a subconscious desire to earn love… effort based grace… but that’s not it at all. I honestly think it’s more along the lines of the opposite… I deeply desire to give love… and to give grace… which is why I don’t say no, and I get excited about being a part of everything! The problem with this rhythm of life, though, is that it doesn’t allow for quietness or rest because there’s always “one more thing”… and Jesus sometimes gets lost in the jumble of it all…

So, a reminder for myself today… to be still… to be present in this moment…

I’m reminded that God is called the great I AM… it speaks of his current presence, meeting us here… whispering to our souls strength and encouragement for right now…

I love the NASB version of Psalm 46:10, “Cease striving and know that I am God…” Give yourself permission to stop, to breathe, to not have it all under control… and to be okay with it, because God is here with you now and He is quite capable. Lean into His presence.

redefining humility...



Humility… it’s a hard line to walk… lean too much on one side and it comes across as pride, but lean too much on the other side and it’s self-loathing. Neither of which are desirable. I’ve always heard “humility” defined in terms of meekness, selflessness, gentleness… very passive adjectives that always seem to elude me the more I try to possess them. So how do we develop a humble spirit? I can tell you what the answer ISN’T better than I can tell you what the answer IS… like most spiritual growth questions, the answer is not simply to “try harder.” Sigh of relief?... yes, I think so…

I recently came across a new definition of humility that caught my eye. In the amplified version of Prov. 11:2 there’s an expanded explanation of “humble” which includes “those who have been pruned.” Pruning is, in my mind, a universal analogy because everybody can relate on one level or another to feeling the loss of something in their life. In John we’re told that God cuts off dead branches- the things in our life where there’s no redeeming value, draining us without providing anything good in return. It also says that He prunes the fruitful branches- even the things full of life and growth are susceptible to God’s pruning for the purpose of producing even more fruit. Either way, we’ve all felt the pain of being “cut.” It got me thinking, though, what does this have to do with being humble?

I think the experience of being pruned challenges our false perception that we are in control, that we are the one determining growth and outcomes. It reminds us that we are the creation, not the creator… that the One with the shears knows far better and has a far loftier vision of what could be. Being pruned not only makes us more sensitive to the presence of God, but it also makes us more sensitive and compassionate towards the world around us. It evens out the playing field between the lowly and the elite because we all have pain, brokenness, loss, frustration, and sadness in common.

So let’s redefine humility… it’s the result of allowing God into our lives to grow us and prune us… it’s being vulnerable in exposing our dead branches and our fruitful ones to let Jesus have His way… it’s realizing that it’s not about us- our comfort, our success, our thriving- that there’s a bigger picture out there than just our little cameo in this world. I think John the Baptist said it best when he stated his heart and mission in life was for Jesus to become greater and for himself to become less… that's the heartbeat of the humble.

cornerstone...

Some insight into the mind of me… I don’t like fluffy answers. I like to know the insides and out of something before I am on board. I don’t want to be a “know-it-all”, but I really wish I knew it all. These especially come into play talking about spiritual things. My mind won’t let go of something until I at least look into it a little bit to appease my curiosity. So was the case after church this week…

We were looking at the different images used in 1 Peter 2:4-10. One of the central images is that of Christ being a cornerstone. The other images in this passage I get, but this one boggled me a bit. Probably because I’m not a contractor or builder or any sort… minus one house building trip to Mexico years ago! So the last couple days I’ve been trying to figure out the significance of a “cornerstone”… here’s what I’ve found…

Nowadays a cornerstone is merely decoration, a commemorative nameplate of sorts. Back when Peter wrote this, though, a cornerstone was extremely functional. It was the piece that structurally held the whole building together. It was the first stone laid and determined the position of every stone laid after. It provided support to the whole structure- if removed, the whole building would fall apart. Worse yet, if the cornerstone wasn’t trusty enough, the whole building would be weak and topple over. The implications are so tangible! Everyone is building their lives on something, whether they realize it or not. I have this picture in my mind of people building their lives without any acknowledgement of Jesus, but when what they’ve constructed comes crashing down around them they are so quick to blame God for their ruin. The fact is, if they had placed Jesus in His rightful place as the cornerstone of their lives, then they would have the strength and support needed to endure anything. And I don’t mean in the way cornerstones are used today, as merely a decoration or simple nameplate, but rather as the core of their being.

I came across a writer who bridged the gap between this analogy of a cornerstone and the idea of the cornerstone being rejected. He wrote:

“This is a wonderful image of the Lord Jesus, when you think about it. At one level, He appears to be just another stone in the building - made of the same stuff as the rest of us stones… He is like us, and yet he is different from us because He is more central to the building, and also because He looks different, which may explain why he would be rejected! Think about it from a brick-layers point of view. You take delivery of an enormous slab of bricks at your worksite, and you’re about to set the cement-mixer to start pouring, but then you realize that one of the bricks is a different shape from all the other bricks! What do you do? If you’re an inexperienced builder, you might assume that this odd-shaped stone has just been delivered to the wrong worksite, so you’d either throw it away or send it back! Why? Because it is different!”

The “religious” of Jesus’ time rejected him because he didn’t fit their mold or their expectations. They had a set idea in their mind of what it should look like for heaven to touch earth, and Jesus was not it. We are guilty of this today too, though. We try to fit Jesus into the holes and cracks of our minds and our lives, but when he doesn’t fit we toss him aside. Reality is, instead of adding Jesus, we need to start with Jesus. Everything else will align once we have this crucial cornerstone in place.

Ok nerd alert is over! For everyone old enough… I’m picturing the cheesy PSA’s that used to be on TV with the shooting star tagline: “The more you know!” :) It’s been a good reminder, though, of the importance of keeping Jesus my first love… the foundation of all I say and do… my cornerstone…

memories...

I don’t know if I’m the only one who feels this way, but… I love how every song I hear has a memory attached to it. Or a story. Or a person it reminds me of. Seriously, EVERY song. Who needs scrapbooks when you have a radio… it evokes the same nostalgic feelings and it’s cheaper. I’ve been realizing lately that somewhere along the way, scripture started doing the same thing. There are certain passages that have inconspicuously adopted to themselves memories of my past that I can’t help but be reminded of when I read them. Sometimes it’s something that happened, a season I went through, a conversation I had, or a person I’m reminded of. I love it though… in the vast sea of scripture, it creates a sense of belonging and settledness.

Today I experienced a moment like this… an instant trip down memory lane… when I came across the “don’t worry” passage of Matthew 6. As I was reading these familiar words, I was instantly brought back to the morning I arrived in Moscow… it was the summer of 2004… I had just graduated from college with a gold sticker on my diploma, but no clue what to do next in life. The only thing for certain was that I was spending the summer in Russia. I had been there many times before but it was always with groups... and an itinerary… and I only stayed for 2 weeks tops. That morning reality sank in that I was halfway around the world, alone, not really sure what I was supposed to be doing there and how to survive regular day to day life… so on my little apartment couch I had a minor freak out session.

God led me to this exact passage in Matthew 6. I know theologians often argue over whether to interpret scripture literally or figuratively… but let me tell you, in that moment I was claiming these words as literally as I could! Because one of my main concerns for myself was how on earth I was going to stay fed. I was living near a forest on the outskirts of Moscow, so I very well couldn’t take the metro into town to get a cheeseburger at McDonalds every time I was hungry! God met me on that couch that morning with his promises of provision and care. And here I am seven years later remembering that moment like it was yesterday.

Here’s the cool thing, though, about being on the other side of the experience now- the memory allows for sweet feelings and smiles rather than the fear and anxiety that swallowed me that morning. Because I know now how things turned out… how amazing that summer ended up being, the incredible ministry God allowed me to be a part of, and that there was absolutely no reason at all to fear the details of living during my summer there… looking back, my mini-freak out seems so unwarranted! That’s the beauty of having memories attached to scripture I suppose- it’s a personal reminder that God’s words are true, that we've lived them firsthand, and that we can rest in His promises. They’re not just empty words- they are meant for us!

I hope that you can have some of these sweet moments too… remembering times when God’s word came alive in a very real and memorable way. May we never forget where we’ve been and the lessons we’ve learned along the way… and may these memories encourage us when we need to be reminded of how good God is…