Archive - June, 2008

Marriage: What I’ve Learned at 30 Years (Part 3)

June 30, 2008 in Family/Marriage, My Family, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation, Spiritual Life with 6 Comments

coffee33.jpgWe had two small children.  My wife, Charlotte, stayed at home with them.  I was working with a church that was a wonderful place to be but in many ways was consuming me.  (I don’t mean for this statement to be a reflection on that church.  Rather, it had more to do with my inexperience and the expectations that I had for myself in ministry.  Some of these expectations were completely unrealistic.)

 
Money was tight.  I felt incredibly behind in my work.  Our children, being small children, needed a lot of time and energy.  These were exhausting times in many ways.  I say this not complaining but just recognizing that this was a time of life that took much energy and time.  Looking back, I can see that I really underestimated just how hard and demanding this time of life was for my wife.

 
Later, we moved to Kansas City, Missouri, and then Waco, Texas.  Our children would spend most of their "growing up" years in Waco.  

 
During those years of being a family and being a married person, I probably tended to think that marriage was primarily about personal happiness.  In particular, I wanted to make sure my spouse was happy.  It would be many years before I realized that God was using our marriage to shape us into a certain kind of people.  (Gary Thomas’ book Sacred Marriage was very influential in my thinking on this point.)  Yes, marriage brought joy, friendship, companionship, etc.  However, it brought a purpose much larger than ourselves.  It is that purpose that makes all the difference in how we live as married people.     

New Video

June 28, 2008 in Spiritual Life with 0 Comments

Be sure to check out the newest video on God-Hungry Live featuring Ruth Haley Barton.  In the video, she reflects on her new book, Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership.

 
(You can subscribe to updates to this site by clicking on the yellow "subscribe" button and inserting your e-mail address.)  Thanks! 

Savoring Every Bite

June 27, 2008 in Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation with 2 Comments

coffee34_1.jpgLast night my younger daughter, Jamie, prepared dinner at our house.  The entire dinner was Japanese.  (She spent over a month in Japan as a part of a study abroad semester.  During this month, she lived with a wonderful Japanese family.)  She wanted to prepare the kind of food that she might eat at her Japanese family’s home.  It was wonderful!  Every dish had meaning and purpose.  After tutoring me on the art of using chopsticks (I probably got a C- on that one.), she told about each dish and what she remembered about eating that dish in Japan.  It was not a dinner to be eaten hastily.

 
This morning I have been reading from the Spiritual Disciplines Handbook by Adele Ahlberg Calhoun regarding "Contemplation."  I love what she writes in the first two paragraphs of that chapter (p. 49):

We are hasty people bent on experiencing as much of life as we can.  The faster we move, the more we can see, do and produce.  The more we network, the more options will be ours.  The more options, the more living we can do.  For many of us the very notion of slowing down or saying no to an option is repugnant.  We crowd our schedules and run late, but at least we are getting our money’s worth.  No wonder contemplation has fallen on hard times.  In a world where people anchor their identity on the shifting seas of performance and accomplishments, contemplation seems inefficient and too unproductive for the daily grind.

 
But it is contemplation, not just having experiences, that truly opens us wide to life.  Experiences can be lost to us in the mad rush to simply accumulate more.  Contemplation invites us to enter in to the moment with a heart alive to whatever might happen.  It is not just thinking about or analyzing an event or person.  Contemplation asks us to see with faith, hope and love.  It asks us to seek God and the "meanings" threaded through our days and years, so that our experience of being embedded in the triune life of God deepens and grows. 

Waiting

June 24, 2008 in Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation with 12 Comments

coffee32.jpgRichard Foster, who for many years has worked with Renovare, has written about waiting.  Foster is the author of several good works related to spiritual formation including Spiritual Disciplines, Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home, and Life with God. 

 
Foster writes:

 
Waiting!  It is among the most universal of human experiences.
 

  • Waiting to begin school.
  • Waiting to get our braces off.
  • Waiting for our first date.
  • Waiting to graduate.
  • Waiting to marry.
  • Waiting for our first job.
  • Waiting for our first baby.
  • Waiting for our first house.
  • Waiting to retire.
  • Waiting . . . waiting to die.

Waiting is among the most common ventures in human life, and the more Christian spirituality touches common life redemptively the more it deepens in meaning.

 
Waiting is right at the heart of Christian spirituality.  Think of Moses waiting in the desert for silent year after silent year.  Think of Elijah, sequestered in his cave, keeping a lonely vigil over earthquake, wind, and fire.  Think of Mary waiting patiently for the fulfillment of the word of the Angel Gabriel.  Think of Saul — Saul who became Paul — being instructed by the Spirit in the deserts of Arabia for three solitary years.

 
Waiting is the hidden preparation through which God puts his ministers.  We neglect it to our peril.  I remember as a young, brash pastor waxing eloquent about Moses in the wilderness and telling the people that we need to learn all these lessons so that it won’t take us forty years like it did Moses.  Just then a wise and respected member of our fellowship spoke up calmly; "I doubt it!" he said.  Those three words took all the pompous air out of my sermon that day and taught us a valuable lesson.  Especially me.  Waiting is not something to be avoided at all costs.  In waiting we learn things that we learn in no other way.

 
(Read the remainder of the article here.) 

On Being a Jesus People — Together

June 23, 2008 in Jesus, Leadership, Spiritual Formation with 11 Comments

coffee36.jpgAre you a part of a Christian group?  Are you married?  Do you have children?  Do you work with a team of ministers?  Are you a part of a group of elders?  Are you in a leadership role in which you work with others who are also in leadership roles?  Are you a part of a small group ministry?

 
One of the most important questions we can ask is: "How are we functioning as a group?"  We may be great individuals, but how do we function as a team?  How do we function as a group?  A husband and wife may be great individuals but they might ask themselves how they function as a couple?  I have known many church leaders who were great people individually but did not function well as a part of a group.

 
Now I am not thinking about effectiveness.  Yes, there is a time to reflect upon how effective the group is in doing its task, carrying out its function, etc.   Rather, I want to reflect on how we are doing as Jesus-followers.  As a group, are we becoming more Jesus-like as we function together?

 
As a married person, not only am I called to be a Jesus-like man or woman but I am called to function together with my spouse in a Jesus-like manner also.  Together we are to grow in Jesus-likeness.

 
As a Christian leader, not only am I to be a person who is committed to serving in this capacity but I ought to be committed to function, along with the others, in a manner that is Jesus-like also.  Do we function in a manner so that Jesus is obviously the center of our group and not just our individual lives?

 
As a member of a small group in our church  (I am thinking small group ministry) not only am I to desire that we function well as a small group, but I also need to desire that this be a group that is growing in Jesus-likeness together.

 
The following are three challenges for those of us who work with other believers in these groups (again, this includes marriage and family):
 

  • Let us move from “I” to “we.”  Self-preoccupation has a way of pushing aside any sort of real growth toward the one who called us to deny self.
  • Let us consider that not only have we been called to
    be Jesus-like (individually) but we are called to have a     Jesus-like
    manner about us as we function as a     group     (or couple if thinking about marriage).
  • Let us realize that our presence and authenticity as Jesus-followers with one another, as a part of the church, must be prior
    to anything we might do or say to the church as a whole.          Far too often, ministers/church leaders are all too ready to want to do or say something to the church when in fact they are failing in the way they treat one another in their leadership group.  (Again, if you are thinking about marriage/family, this means that husbands/wives must  address their own Jesus-likeness as a priority and live out of that authenticity.)

What can a group do that might help keep this in focus as they function together?  What can a married couple do?

(Question) What Are You Looking For?

June 20, 2008 in Church with 19 Comments

coffee28.jpgHave you ever found it difficult to find a church?

 
I have talked with many, many people who have found this to be very difficult.  Single.  Married.  With kids.  Without kids.  Young.  Not so young.

 
Yes, I do realize that some people look for a church with a consumer mentality.  There are some people who seem to approach this issue like they would any other consumer need.

 
Yet, I am convinced that there are many, many sincere Christ-followers who, for a variety of reasons, have found it difficult to find a church in the town or city where they live.  Perhaps you have had such an experience.  Or, you may have been in conversation with a friend who has wrestled with this.

 
Let me add one more concern here.  Here is a recent college graduate who moves to a new city because of a new job.  She thinks she has found a church, but her parents don’t feel comfortable with that church.  Or, her friends can’t figure out why she would consider being a part of that church. 

 
The question(s):  Why is it so often very difficult to find a church?  What are some of the factors at work here?

 

******

Did you know that you can subscribe to get updates of this blog by e-mail?  You can subscribe here.

 
Have you been to God-Hungry Live?  You can see a fine interview with Eugene Peterson here. 

Memphis Surprise

June 19, 2008 in My Family with 2 Comments

coffee34.jpgOn Sunday afternoon, I made a very quick trip to Memphis, Tennessee, to speak at the funeral of my second cousin.  Her name was Anna Maye Johnson.  She had lived in Memphis for many years.  She never married.  She was a librarian for thirty years for the City of Memphis Public Library System.   She also produced a children’s television show for a number of years that featured various puppets in action.  She was a pianist, a painter, and had a  Master’s degree in Library Science from George Peabody College, Nashville.

Something happened Monday at the funeral that I found interesting.

A few minutes before this funeral began (at Memphis Funeral Home), Dr. Jack Lewis walked in.  (Dr. Lewis is a longtime professor of Bible at Harding Graduate School of Religion, Memphis.  He has been retired for a number of years.)  I think he was there because he knows a cousin of mine who is a part of the same church as he.  Also, Anna Maye Johnson, the deceased, began attending this church about a year ago.

Just before the service began, Jack walked to the casket to view the body with some others who were standing around.  He realized that he knew her and that he shared an important time with her.  He then asked the family if he could tell a story about her during the service.

After the service began, Jack walked to the mic and spoke of his surprise.  He said that when he read the obituary in the newspaper and decided to come, he had no idea that he had once worked with her.  He said that in 1958, when Harding Graduate School began, he was asked by Dr. W. B. West (the dean of the new graduate school) to pull books from the Harding Library (Searcy, Arkansas) to be used at the graduate school.  He then met with “Miss Johnson,” the librarian for Harding Academy, to begin cataloging them and putting them on the shelves.  He said that when “Miss Johnson” looked at all those books she appeared to be overwhelmed.  He said that he would help her.  “I told her that I would put them on the shelves if she would show me where they needed to be placed.”  He went on to say that for some time she served as both the librarian for Harding Academy and Harding Graduate School.

He went on to say that he had never known her first name until he came to the funeral yesterday morning.   It was a nice moment.  I spoke with him afterward and he seemed both amazed and grateful that he had made the connection at the funeral.


I was also amazed.  I did not know any of this history until he told that story yesterday morning.   I was amazed that this quiet, simple woman was actually the first librarian at what is now one of the finest theological libraries in the mid-south.  Amazing!

Marriage: What I’ve Learned at 30 Years (Part 2)

June 18, 2008 in Spiritual Life with 7 Comments

coffee35.jpg(This is the second post in this series.  You can get to Part 1 here.)

 
We had been married several years and then began to have children.  We had two children, both girls.  (We were living in Alabama at the time.)  This particular time of our lives — when the children were both small — was fun, memorable, and exhausting.  I didn’t realize at the time just how exhausting it really was for both of us, particularly Charlotte as she was home with them during the day.  

 
Out of this experience, I probably realize more than ever the importance of nurturing the friendship between a husband and wife.  There are many ways the friendship can be enhanced and strengthened.  These probably vary for each couple.

 
You may be reading this and see this to be a real no-brainer.  ("Of course you have to nurture your friendship in marriage!")  Yet, let me suggest that very often husbands and wives will allow the center of gravity to shift from marriage to the children.  As a result, husbands and wives shift the focus of their attention away from their marriage and entirely toward their children.  As a result, the marriage is put on hold and simply idles.   The marriage receives very little attention, time, or energy.

 
Now this is very deceptive.  The relationship may appear to be OK — for a while.  After all, the kids are doing well and that is where their focus has been.  Yet, once this catches up with the couple, the results are often disastrous!  One person in this marriage may find the ache of an empty, hollow marriage just too painful.  This husband or wife may realize that his or her life is very empty.  Such people often find that they are very vulnerable to whatever appears to quench the loneliness.  

 
Many other couples don’t really see how empty their friendship with one another has become until the kids are out of the house and away at college.   This couple may find that they have little to talk about and little in common with one another.  So often, the marriage eventually dissolves.

 
Marriages just don’t have to end this way.  Nurturing a friendship between husband/wife will take time, energy, and attention.  After these decades of marriage, I believe this is very important to anyone who is married.

 
What do you think? 

 

****

Be sure to see the featured video: an interview with Eugene Peterson at God-Hungry Live. 

In Desperate Need of Sabbath

June 13, 2008 in Renewal, Self-Care, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Formation with 11 Comments

coffee29.jpgI first heard Gordon MacDonald speak about the importance of "Sabbath" in his book Ordering Your Private World.  He spoke of the importance of Sabbath and rest.  Specifically, he spoke of the importance of having a "Sabbath," as a part of a rhythm to one’s life, where there is regular rest and reflection.


Many of us are very busy, very active, and very connected.  Blackberry. Twitter.  Facebook.   E-mail.  Instant message.  Yet, we may give little serious thought or reflection to our activity.  It is possible to live as a person who is "connected" but who is not practicing much reflection on what has happened, what is happening, or what might happen in our lives.  Without reflection, I may find myself moving rapidly through life while I spend little time contemplating the meaning of it all.  Your life and mine are being formed and shaped.  The question is: "What is shaping us?  What is forming us?  What are we becoming if we continue to live just as we are presently living?"

 
Do I have any space in my life in which I think about my day, my week, or my month?   Is there space in which I reflect on the meaning of these activities?  What about my personal behavior and my relationships?   Does my life this week reflect that I am serious about the matters that Jesus said are front and center?  Has my life this week expressed that I genuinely and deeply love God?  Has my life this week expressed "neighbor love"?

 
I have found it very, very helpful to stop each week and reflect on my words and actions and how those fit with what I profess to be very important. 

 
There is a sense in which my work is never finished — and yet maybe it is.  What I mean is this: I don’t think that I have ever come to the end of a workday and said, "You know, I just don’t have anything to do now.  I think I will go home."  Never.  There is always something that could be done.

 
Yet, there is another sense in which my work is finished.  I come to the end of a day, a week, a month.  There is not unlimited time.  In fact, everything has its limits.  My time.  My energy.  My body.  The idea is not to see how much I can get done, as if I were a machine.  Rather, I want to live and work with a view of my purpose before God.   

 
Loren Wilkinson, in a recent article in "The Regent World" (Spring 2008, Vol. 20, No. 2), has written an excellent piece on "Sabbath."  I liked this paragraph in particular:

 
It is good to be a pilgrim on the way, but that good is balanced by another, more elusive, good: the ability to be in a place at rest and at peace.  That good is the goal of the biblical discipline of Sabbath.  And people have never been in more desperate need of Sabbath than we are in the 21st century, in constant touch as we are (through cell phones, Internet, and e-mail) with every place on the planet, unable to be really at home and at peace in any place at all.

 

****

See the featured video this week at God-Hungry Live: an interview with Eugene Peterson.   

Question: What Do You Think?

June 11, 2008 in Spiritual Life with 12 Comments

coffee31.jpgI have a question.

 
First, let me tell you why I want to ask this question.  Every July, I am away from our church.  A couple of weeks of that is vacation.  I am always ready for those two weeks.  The other two weeks, I spend time thinking and praying about what I ought to teach/preach the next eleven months (August ’08 – June ’09).  As of today, I have some books I plan to read and a file of articles I plan to glance at, and I have in mind some concerns about which I am praying. 

 
At times, it feels like I am making some sort of stew over these two weeks.  Often I will add a few ingredients to the mix that may or may not seem to be important.  Nevertheless, I have learned to listen well and to read broadly.

 
So here is my question:

 
As you think about the conversations that you have been a part of lately, what stands out to you? 

 

  • What subject(s) seem to be a part of many of our conversations with others?
  • What do some of us seem to fear?
  • What "secrets" seem to be weighing heavily on some of us?

You will be helpful whether you respond to each of these or just one. 

 
Thanks so much for your help. 

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