Audios

New Creation

So, I have this very great friend who got married on New Years Eve. We’ve known each other for 20ish years and in those 20ish years, we’ve been through everything. She was married to a guy who turned out to be a, well, he turned out to be a guy NOT to be married to. We cried together, the 3 of us, The Angel, her, and I, in our rented apartment. I stayed in relationship with him for her, until I couldn’t, because as it turned out, he was also a guy NOT to be in relationship with. We drove together to pick up her things. We watched movies, ate ice cream, wept, laughed. We followed Jesus together, we mourned the loss of our church together. We fell apart, then returned. We hurt each other, picked each other up, carried the other, said things we can never take back, and said and did things that cemented our lives to the other. She prayed for God to bring her a good man, a man more after God’s heart than hers. She wondered if the prayer was unanswered or if the answer was a gentle, soft, “no.”

But, of course, there would be a man (I spoiled the ending with my first sentence) with such a beautiful heart, the kind of man that could/would be her husband. It’s not always that the best people get the best things, but when it happens, it must be savored.

As they enjoyed their first dance, the only 2 people in the world, I thought of this passage in Isaiah: “…The Lord, who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, who brings forth chariot and horse, army and warrior; they lie down, they cannot rise, they are extinguished, quenched like a wick: “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?” (Is. 43:16-19) This was truly a New Thing. The “former things,” the “things of old,” we would not remember. That guy is forgotten. The years and years of patient waiting on the Lord, wondering if this moment would ever happen, are forgotten. In His timing, He had made a “path in the mighty waters.” Her mourning had turned to dancing before our eyes, and our only duty (our honor, our privilege) was to perceive it.

Earlier in the day, we discussed the new year, and our preparation for it. These 2 weren’t passively waiting for a miracle, and they weren’t restlessly trying to manufacture that miracle. They didn’t settle for less 10 years in. They simply stayed on the path, listening, wide-eyed and open-hearted, becoming the woman & man they are today. To paraphrase the verse in Proverbs 21:31, their horses were prepared for battle – they had prepared well, faithfully – but this victory was the Lord’s. This victory was always the Lord’s.

What are we doing to prepare for this beautiful gift of our lives? And how? Are we patiently faithful, or are we still choking the wheel, trying desperately to force what we want, when we want it. Are we frustrated & confused at the perception that God isn’t listening, or isn’t going to show up? When will it be me, my turn? Why isn’t He answering? Where is the victory?

I stood in the front as she walked down the aisle, I wondered how many of these questions she asked, and how hard it must have been to not settle for just another warm body. I have a great job, and I got to stand in front of everyone, look at them both, and say, “you both deserve this.”

I don’t know what this year will look like for us. I know it’s not off to the greatest start, as I sit here with a box of tissues on my lap waiting for the sinus medicine to work, but it’s only the 4th. I do know last year ended with a Big Win. We have questions to answer, horses to prepare, moments to craft, and people to love. So many people to love. He’s doing a new thing, for us, in us, around us, through us, and maybe we have 20 years of waiting to do, maybe we have ex-husbands to forget, maybe we have colds & flu’s to suffer, pain and loss to endure, but it’s springing forth, even then, even if we can’t yet see it.

Congratulations to the Mr & Mrs. And to all of us, a very happy New Thing!

Last Post of The Year, with an Important Announcement

The Important Announcement: Christmas Eve service is Sunday 12/24/23 at 7pm. They’re will be NO Sunday morning 10:30am service.

I pray for you, that you experience God’s love & grace in every way, having the wisdom to choose Him and the strength to follow through on that choice, carried by the Spirit living in all of us. I am honored to walk this path, together. You are so great, I hope & pray that you know that. We jumped into so many things, one day at a time, holding your hand as you hold mine, never alone, discovering our worth and place as loved children of the Living God.

I am thankful at the grace you’ve given me, more thankful for the love you’ve shown. I hope you have felt the same from me. If you haven’t, I’ll do better to show you what’s in my heart.

At the end of every year, I sit down and consider what I’d experienced over the last 12 months, where I’ve come from, where I’m going to, what I’ve learned, who I am now, and with whom I’ve shared everything. I make peace with who I was, hold him gently, praise some things, forgive others, tell him how proud of him I am (after releasing what I have not been proud of, thankful of what those things have taught me), then say good bye. I pick a new focus for the upcoming year. I can tell you I am very grateful, overwhelmed at God’s grace.

This is the last post of the year – at least, I think it will be. Everyone will be home in this house and I’m thinking I’ll take those precious moments to breathe. I don’t know if I’ve ever told you one of my favorite passages, Genesis 28:16. You see, this guy Jacob finds himself in the middle of the wilderness (code for where God is NOT) and drifts off to sleep. As he sleeps, he has a dream, and in the morning wakes up and says, “surely God was in this place, and I was unaware.”

I don’t think any of us should be unaware, anymore. God was in the wilderness then, and He’s here now, if only we have eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to feel. We can wake up, to God, to each other, to ourselves. We can love, and we can do that any- and everytime we want.

It’s Christmas, The Savior is coming as a baby, to be “with us,” so we can be with Him. What could be more wonderful? I’ll see you Sunday night (there is NO morning service;). Have an awesome Christmas, everybody.

Deadlifts & Public Speaking

This is a 2nd post this week, and I don’t always like to do that. Added to that, it’s loooong. (I’m so excited I can barely stand myself – my books arrive today!!!) And I’m in the middle of a personal stretching, the me that was is not the me that is, and not the me that is going to be. Maybe we all are, and a looooong post on Jesus, basketball, deadlifts, Morrissey, and transformation will connect us today. My good friend calls it, “perfectly imperfect,” and that’s what we are. We are here and we are moving, always with Him. Here we go…

My favorite physical activity is a deadlift, and yes, I have given speeches and spoken on a stage. (These are my answers to the last 2 days of site prompts)

When asked, people are more afraid of public speaking than death. This seems strange at first, but I lost my house and everything in it in a flood in 2011. Many of us did. Others had inches or feet in their basements and first floors. The ones who lost everything put all of our ruined things on the front yard for dump trucks to pick up and haul away, and the house was bulldozed a year later. We didn’t have to deal with too much of the physical clean-up. The psychological, emotional and spiritual clean-up was a different story. Home can (and should) represent safety and security, and that was drowned with the carpets and doorknobs. You can buy a new end table, no stores sell peace. And watching your possessions scooped up onto industrial equipment as garbage is not a picture that quickly fades.

Anyway, the others with less water had to hire restoration companies, mold remediators, they had to replace their things, carefully watch weather reports… Yes, of course, no one’s house goes underwater, except ours did, and it certainly doesn’t twice, but try to sleep with statistical improbability when you’ve woken up to impossibility. In lots of ways, they had to deal with the catastrophic disaster in a much more present manner. Like public speaking. If you are terrible, you have to look at those faces again and again, they may remember and feel embarrassment for years.

Dying, like our flood experience, is walking away into a new blank space. We remember where we came from and what happened to our home, who knows if dying is like that? But we won’t have to look into the audience’s eyes and watch them struggle for comforting words. It’s why you don’t write a poem for your special lady and read it to her. You hand it to her on your way out the door after dinner and a goodnight kiss.

Love poems and death aren’t exactly the same, but the analogy holds up, I think. The vulnerability can feel like dying, and that’s what we’re afraid of, probably. Opening ourselves up to another, waiting in agony to see if we will be accepted or rejected. Will they like our speech and it’s content? Or will they like us, our personality, our way?

I quite like it now. Not everyone likes me, not everyone has to. That’s a new development, that I don’t have to be everyone’s favorite song. Some don’t like me at all. An old man left before the closing prayer like his hair was on fire after one Sunday sermon. I have some sharp edges and disagreeable positions, but that’s also why I might someday be somebody’s favorite song. Nobody cares too much about white bread, it’s nobody’s favorite, nobody’s worst. It just is fine. Like McDonald’s. It’s fine, kind of gross, but not gross enough to really matter.

Walking is great. Bicep curls and lateral raises are good enough, but nobody hates them, so nobody loves them, either. Deadlifts and squats, on the other hand… Mention Leg Day to your gym buddies and you will hear one of 2 responses. “I LOVE Leg Day,” or “I HATE Leg Day.” You either wake up early or look for any excuse to miss.

My brother can’t stand the sound of Morrissey’s voice. Nobody hates Coldplay. We all say we do, but that’s just for show. Coldplay is white bread. We don’t send sandwiches back because they’re on white bread, we don’t turn the radio station when “Yellow” comes on.

I don’t know what the point is. Maybe that we could be deadlifts and public speaking, if that’s what we are, instead of Coldplay and Applebee’s, manufactured to be sterile, inoffensive, and reach the widest audience. We can be exactly who we are, flaws, faults and rough spots, and many will love you just like that. Of course, many will not, and some people will even tell you that they don’t and why.

Perhaps the point IS absolutely to be deadlifts and public speaking, to open our hearts and souls and show vulnerability as whole, realized human beings, because to pretend to be anything else is just too much work. And lots of work in a meaningless pursuit is just plain silly. We have other things to do.

(That’s where the first post ended, but now I realize it was unfinished.)

At a particularly tense high school basketball game last night, emotions (including mine) ran high. And I wrote this last week: “On the way home, I expressed to the Angel that I can’t continue to get so worked up, that that isn’t who I am. But the thing is, I immediately realized, it is exactly who I am. I am a fiery, passionate man who loves sports and competition. I get excited easily at everything, highs and lows and everything in between.

Then, the next night, after committing to being even-keeled and calm, I pointed out that one boy was pushing another in the back with both hands over and over and over. It should have been helpful to the officials, because the 3 of them were obviously having a lot of trouble with the speed of the game and their responsibilities. It should also have been lost in the noise of the crowd, but everyone got dead quiet at that precise moment and my voice was the only one in the gym. So, I am that guy.

After the game, a family laughed at me – kindly, but still… And they wondered if I was like that on Sunday mornings. You have no idea. The answer is yes, of course.

A real problem (in every space, maybe especially the church) is hypocrisy, being different people in different spaces, pretending to be the image the situation wants. You can make a long list of my faults, but this is no longer one of them. I am just me. But like everything else, there’s no such thing as “just.” And like most everything else, the best thing about me is also the worst thing about me.

A wonderful development in my life is how I’m finally meeting the real, authentic me, and finding that I don’t hate that person at all. In fact, he’s alright. I just wish he’d calm down a little at high school games.”

Now, what you need to know is that I do not get confused; I am well aware that this is high school sports, and has no bearing on anyone’s worth or value, and has little consequence on a grander scale. Of course, that’s not to say they are meaningless. We could sing the praise of sports forever, detailing the endless positives we can all learn – about ourselves, others, gifts, teams, and our lives together.

So in these posts, the point was to be deadlifts & public speaking, and not hating ourselves because we’re not squats or scrapbooking.

BUT/AND…

After last night, I was gripped with what can only be called regret, very low level, but regret nonetheless. My mission is to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ, does this sort of behavior build walls or bridges? And the truth is, I’m not sure. Maybe for some, I’m a lunatic and this erects a thick wall, but for some, it might make me relatable and authentic and easier to approach. I am a lunatic in lots of ways, but an authentic, approachable, easy one. Those are all true. It’s the best and worst about me.

But the conviction quietly knocking, what about that?

I reached out to two trusted friends to ask, but didn’t need a response. The question was enough. We don’t ask what anyone thinks of drinking water or eating vegetables.

What if I’m not supposed to be a deadlift anymore. What if the Spirit is asking me to be a kettlebell swing? At least at basketball games, or home basketball games;) Should I continue to say, “I am a deadlift,” and isn’t that the opposite of humility and growth?

This is why a relationship with Jesus is so important, why true, working wisdom is vital to our lives. Maybe 2 weeks ago, the lesson was to love and accept me where I was, as a deadlift. But now, today, maybe the lesson is to not resign myself to always being a deadlift. I am a fiery, passionate man in the service of The King, not in the service of me, or “that’s just who I am.”

Lots of work in a meaningless pursuit is just plain silly, but which is the meaningless pursuit: change or acceptance? I can love the me God so lovingly created, and I can be transformed.

It’s almost New Years, a life of faith requires examination, what are the things to hold on to, and what are the things to leave behind? What is the work to do? I don’t need to be everyone’s favorite song, but the song I am must not be rooted in pride and rebellion.

Sports teaches a million lessons, this is just another one. I’m very thankful I have Jesus to guide me, and a community like you to walk alongside.

Coincidence

What stories are we telling ourselves? What meaning are we assigning to the circumstances of our lives? Where have we believed lies instead of Truth? What lies, specifically? Where do they come from?

The last few months have held some of the most important practical implications of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and faith, in general. Too often, we stow our faith away in a nice, tidy box in the corner and take it out at convenient times, comfortable places. Sunday morning, (maybe not every Sunday morning), we go to a special building, spend an hour or two, and come home to watch football. Maybe we remember what the sermon was about, but probably not, more likely a few words or phrases. Maybe we talk to someone else, maybe we sing along to the band, maybe someone asks us how we are and maybe we tell the truth.

That last paragraph is a generalization of the American church that may be true for each of us to a certain extent. The point is, sometimes we have different sides of us – a work Chad, sports Chad, friend Chad, spouse Chad, church Chad, on and on. And our spirituality is something where the gap between theology and practice can be very, very wide. What in the world could the rebellion of David’s son Absalom possibly have to do with us, here, now? And we can list facts of Jesus’ birth, life, and death, but do any of those facts really impact my cubicle or today’s math test or my next text message?

The short answers are A LOT, and YES, they absolutely do!

So, these last few months have had a bunch of planks that make a sweet bridge across that theology-practice chasm. Yesterday, we discussed the stories we tell and why? What makes us believe what we do – about God, about us, about everything and everyone else?

It’s always surprising (though I don’t know why it continues to surprise…it’s like being surprised when the sun sets, the rain stops, or our Dallas Cowboys win) how these passages we study are weaved into current or calendar events. We choose a book (that I will admit sometimes feel random to me) and the 4th chapter on unity/division happens to line up with an election cycle. Or right as we’re diving into helmets of salvation and digging through the trash of the damaging lies we’ve accepted, New Year’s Day is 3 weeks away and we’re reflecting on the year that was and that will be, where we’ve come from and where we’re going to. What could be more vital in engaging our imaginations to paving the new roads of our lives than this?!?

This isn’t coincidence. This is invitation.

Now we have a choice as to what box we’ll check: Yes or No? He comes in our direction in a million different ways, extending His hand to us – will we take it and jump? Can we finally erase the disconnect between all of our faces, combining them into the one He calls us to wear? Of course, it’s scary and hard, that’s why He gave us each other to do it all together.

Last Weekend

Last weekend was very full… There are many different kinds of full. There is a bad full, where the stacked responsibilities are burdens, greedy vampires that suck & suck, leaving us completely drained. But the good kind operates in an inverse relationship, where as the items are completed, as the to-do list decreases, our hearts and souls increase. As the calendar empties, we are filled, with emotion, meaning, purpose, joy, with love.

There is the full that crowds out connection and presence. We miss sacred moments and invitations in the service of our productivity.

And there is the full that uses the schedule as a guide to direct our own participation in the gifts of our lives.

As we move into the Christmas season and it’s demands, I pray that, as much as is possible, we choose to be this 2nd kind of full.

There was a memorial service, wedding rehearsal, wedding ceremony, 2-day basketball tournament, and church service, each overflowing with beauty. We – all of us, with very few people overlapping events – showed up, as we are, and generously poured what we had to give into each other, like human offerings. Death, life, creativity, athleticism, new creations, passion, pain, celebration, everything all at once. On Sunday morning, as we held hands at the end of the service, I was exhausted, on the verge of tears, physically, emotionally, and spiritually spent, yet very alive and keenly aware of the significance of the blessings.

I barely finished my lunch before falling asleep to the sweet, soothing voice of Scott Hansen of the RedZone. Then, last night, I made the final touches on my book, and ordered the first copies. It was at that “Place Order” click that I could hold no more and those tears finally fell. The significance of months/years of work becoming tangible, harsh vulnerability and the naive hope of it’s impact, after already struggling to hold the beauty of the weekend, was waaaay too much for my soft, hyper-sensitive heart.

We still need our tree, to do some more shopping, presents need to be bought, meals need to be planned, people invited, holiday parties to attend, and there are so many basketball games. It’s easy to think of these things as nuisance or bother, as if they are obstacles to the lives we’ve always wanted. But that’s simply not true, they are our “as we are going,” from Matthew 28, they are our Great Commission. They are our lives and they are full of wonder & awe, if we only have eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to feel them.

This is the season where we celebrate The Creator of the Universe, and it’s Savior, “moving into the neighborhood,” a season of hope and possibility, of the Kingdom of God bursting into this fragile, broken, wonderful world. It’s a season of presents AND presence, both of which can coexist if we only decide they will. It’s a season of basketball games for sitting together and experiencing the extraordinary gifts our boys & girls have been given. A season of mistletoe for kissing, family meals for listening and laughing. A season of missing those who are gone. A season of heartbreak. A season of new people in our Bridge circle. A season of such unexpected beauty that sometimes runs us over, smushing us into the fabric of forever.

I don’t pray for less things to do, for a life less full. In fact, it’s the opposite. I pray for more – of you, more time together, more hugs, more prayers, more gratitude, more Christmas songs, more of the Spirit, and much, much more love for all of us.

Current Favorite

I’m going to share my lovewithacapitall post, again. There was a prompt on the hosting website and, as I began to fill this screen, I realized what I was actually writing about. The post, instead of being about the movies and songs we like now, superficial and light (as was surely intended by the prompt), quickly morphed into Sunday’s message on salvation, grace, and the cultural attraction to conditionality.

We are MFPs, extravagantly loved, and accepted, adopted into God’s family without a trace of the word “current.” And we are invited to also eliminate the currency of our love and commitment, become hi-fi brothers and sisters, and change the world, one extension of forgiveness & grace at a time, together.

Here it is:

Yesterday’s site prompt was, Who are your current most favorite people? It’s an strange question, feeling clunky and slightly unsettling. Most Favorite People should surely be capitalized, as if a title or award that is bestowed on the deserving. However, the inclusion of the word “current” implies that this title can also be rescinded. What is earned can be taken away.

Current MFPs are Chris Evans and Bong Joon-ho, star and director of the dystopian nightmare (yet still hopeful) Snowpiercer movie. Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, who is expecting a baby with his girlfriend Sarah Jane Ramos, is, too. Why do I know who his girlfriend is? Or especially that they are pregnant? Is this really important for us to know? I’m not certain that all lines between public and private should be erased, but that’s a little strange for me to say as I sit in my living room chair writing a blog where I share all of the personal, sometimes intimate, details of my life with you. But I get to choose what is shared. Maybe Dak Prescott or Ms. Ramos issued a press release, but very often the breaking information/news is clearly not for me. The social contract of fame, whether I like it or not, has a very high cost.

What is unsettling to me about this question is the conditionality of it all. If Snowpiercer was terrible, would Joon-ho make this list? I wasted an hour of a Netflix movie, 6 Underground, before I had to turn it off with extreme judgment, and that director isn’t an MFP. Dak has been awesome lately, but the next time he throws 4 interceptions, or loses another playoff game, will he, his girlfriend, and his baby still be Most Favorites?

Nev Schulman, Max Joseph, and Kamie Crawford – hosts of Catfish – are perpetual MFPs. That sounds right. If they are truly our Favorites, they should remain favorites, right? Not all episodes of Catfish are great. In fact, most new episodes aren’t.

Morrissey is the best example of this contrast. He often says regrettable, problematic things, not every song is an A+ anymore, some solo albums are admittedly average, but he will stay my #1 MFP forever.

I’m so far considering celebrities or famous artists I’ve never met, but the temptation to carry this idea of currency is insidious, infiltrating our actual relationships and lives. We commit to our spouses, children and friends with the same level of faithfulness as our quarterbacks, and directors. If we don’t feel it right now, we move on, they were a current love, but that’s over and we’re down the road onto the next “current.”

Fidelity means “the quality or state of being faithful or loyal,” and maybe the term hi-fi shouldn’t apply only to our stereos. Maybe we should be hi-fi. Currency is fine for singers and sports teams, but not families and communities. I wonder how everything would change overnight if the impulse to disconnect, leave and find a new current based on this moment alone, were left behind. If our MFPs were never again current, and just remained the favorites they are now. Maybe we could just give our love, based not on performance, covering over the metaphorical interceptions and 6 Undergrounds. Maybe we could begin to choose hi-fi over why-fi, and just see what we could build.

2 Songs For Thanksgiving

Bruno Mars, in “When I Was Your Man,” breaks all of our hearts with: “I should have bought you flowers. And held your hand. Should have gave you all my hours. When I had the chance. Take you to every party ’cause all you wanted to do was dance. Now my baby’s dancing. But she’s dancing with another man.”

We all know this feeling, but maybe it’s not because she’s dancing with another man. Maybe it’s because she’s gone. Maybe it’s because she can’t dance anymore. But the feeling of, “if I only knew,” is real, and universal. We all understand “should have,” right? I should have held your hand one more time, when I had the chance.

The opposite is illustrated in Thomas Rhett, in his song, “Notice,” who sings: “At that party last night. Baby, I don’t know why. I forgot to mention. You were looking drop-dead. Not even a contest. Center of attention. If I had to say every time you looked amazing. You’d think I was joking. But I brag about you. When I’m not around you. You don’t even know it.. You think that I don’t notice. How you brush your hair out of your green eyes. The way you blush when you drink red wine. The way you smile when you try to bend the truth. You think that I don’t notice. All the songs you sing underneath your breath. You still tear up at a beach sunset. And you dance just like you’re the only one in the room. You think that I don’t notice, but I do.”

I have lots and lots of faults, too many for me to count (or to list), but one thing that cannot be said is that I do not notice. The Angel played this song for me, and the truth is that it’s not something I like too much. But I do like that she does. I love how she sits when we look at her phone while it plays, how her mouth moves to the lyrics. She knows I notice, and that’s why she curled up into my arms to listen to it with me.

I didn’t always (and, if we’re honest, I probably don’t always.) There were so many old, dead relationships where I was way more Bruno Mars than Thomas Rhett. The thing about the Mars song is that it isn’t to send us down a spiral of regret and self-loathing. Instead, it is a string around our finger, a reminder that nothing is to be missed. Both of these songs are sisters of Genesis 28:16, where Jacob laments, “Surely the Lord was in this place and I was unaware.”

Thursday is Thanksgiving, and this reminder is an invitation into a new reality that begins any time we say it does. But it is Thanksgiving, and it’s a very good time to say it does.

Of course, we should have held her hand one more time, but we can’t do anything about that now. Guilt doesn’t give us that one more dance, and neither does regret. We honor those moments we chose something else besides bringing flowers or giving our hours in a different way: by choosing to not miss the hands and hours that are here now. These gifts are precious and sweet.

There will be turkey or tofurkey, filling and apple pie (which my mom, for some reason, is now calling apple gazette), and people who are absolutely the very best and can be absolutely the very worst. When I talk about my sister, you will know she has always been my hero, and she has often been my nemesis, and my heart aches thinking about how much free time I haven’t spent with her. But what I will do is soak in Thursday on her couch with my mom (who is now calling apple pie apple gazette, and so will we), brother, nephews and my favorite dog ever, I will thoroughly enjoy every second.

The Rhett song has a line, “Baby, I don’t know why. I forgot to mention. You were looking drop-dead.” The conviction we feel is to not forget to mention ever again.

Look into their eyes. Hold their hands to pray, to say thanks. Say thanks for them and for the God who created us all and gave us to each other to make these days so full of wonder and light. Kiss too deeply, hug too long, laugh too loud, and eat as much apple gazette as you can, get sick on joy and love. It’s Thanksgiving!

About The Weather

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 says, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances…”

Next week is Thanksgiving, so it’s a terrific time to reference these verses. Give thanks in all circumstances. We talk often about creating lives of gratitude, and the reason we do it so often is because it’s so difficult. It’s far more natural to allow lives of resentment and lack. Nobody has to tell us to take anything for granted, to hold grudges, or to try to control everything and everyone. I don’t remember any class syllabus with, “The Necessity of Wanting What We Don’t Have.” Yet, these are the wide paths we regularly walk.

Do we rejoice always? Pray continually? Give thanks in all circumstances? All? Really?

The words of Scripture confront us with a gigantic, usually unspoken, question. Are these characteristics we are asked to build realistic? Is the life Jesus (and in this case, Paul) calls us into possible? Or are they simply ideals, never meant for practical use?

It’s easy to argue the latter. Listen to how that passage begins (verses 13-15): “Live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always strive to do what is good for each other and for everyone else.”

Do I even have to ask if we live in peace with each other? How about our success in being patient with everyone? Everyone? And strive to do what’s good for each other and for everyone else? That’s infinitely more complicated when we’re focused on doing what’s good for ourselves, right?

In a world where peace is in such short supply, where the accepted norm is to pay back wrong for wrong, these words seem so far away. Loving our brothers and sisters, moms and dads, loving ourselves, is so challenging, how can we honestly be expected to love our neighbors, much less our enemies? It’s hard to even guess what it means to love our enemies. Is it hyperbole? Just pie-in-the-sky rhetoric that sounds awesome on a mountainside or in a letter to a church?

But there is the end of verse 18: “…for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” What about that? We wish to know God’s will for us and our lives, but maybe we already do, we just keep asking because we don’t like the answer. God’s will for us is that we are patient? Sounds that way. That we give thanks in all circumstances? But what if the circumstances are terrible?!? (Just a quick note; it does say in all circumstances, not for all circumstances, and that’s a big distinction.)

The last 3 words are the keys to all of it, of course. Chad alone can’t do any of these things with any consistency, if at all. But Chad in Christ Jesus is a new creation with a new nature, and with those things being true, anything and everything is now possible. We can be patient, kind people in a chaotic, upside down world. We can rejoice always, and we can give thanks in all circumstances. We don’t have to live the way we have been, we can live beautiful lives of hope & love in the middle of this hurricane. And maybe that can calm the hurricane. Or maybe it can’t. I don’t know. But it doesn’t really matter if I know or not, that’s what faith is.

Next week is Thanksgiving, and it sounds perfect to be the jumping point into living 1st Thessalonians 5 lives. Even if the turkey is dry or the pies are burned. Even if we happen to be alone (and if you are, maybe you would call me). Even if lots of things. We can start there, one day, step, moment, at a time. Let’s try to change this weather together.

Everywhere

Last night, we watched the 6th and final episode of the second season of Loki, a series on Disney+. As everyone who has spoken to me even once is well aware, I love superheroes and my interest in their stories seemingly knows no bounds. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is bent on testing my commitment. I now have reservations about each new release. I didn’t see the 3rd Guardians of the Galaxy or Black Panther 2 in the theater, and the Marvels came out last night and I was not there. I still see them all, but my rose colored glasses are off. My child-like excitement has been replaced with weary hesitation. Which brings us to Loki.

There are many many things to say about it, both positive and negative, but just one is going to remain long after this series is forgotten. I am going to ruin the ending, sort of, and for that I’m a little sorry.

First, Avengers:Endgame ended with the completion of the Tony Stark/Ironman arc. When we were introduced to him, he was an arrogant weapons dealer, selling to the highest bidder, building a life built solely on the next selfish pleasure. Over the course of the Infinity Saga, he transformed, finally meeting his heartbreaking demise in the climax of Endgame. His death was the ultimate sacrifice, giving his life to defeat the Big Bad, Thanos. He gave his life so everyone could live. Of course, it’s not hard to draw lines to the Bible, and to the passion of Christ – His sacrifice to rescue us, His death so we could live.

Now, to ruin Loki… His story began as a villain, selfishly seeking nothing but power, everything to bring glory only to himself. Through the years, films, and stories, like Tony Stark, he eventually became the kind of character who would also sacrifice his own life so everyone could be free to live theirs.

The stories that move us, really move us, that make us feel something beyond ourselves, are the ones that point to deeper truths about our world, our selves, our purpose, our humanity, and Our God. What that means is, they point us to Jesus.

Of course, we’re drawn to the relationships and connections between people. We’ve been made this way, and the further progress takes us from this original creation, the more we ache for it. So when Black Widow, in an early moment, leans in when her friend Hawkeye is in danger, that matters. Her movement touches us in those parts way down inside that we don’t always acknowledge and certainly don’t talk about.

Of course, we’re drawn to themes of guilt and forgiveness, atonement, courage, and sacrifice. The Story we have been born into is one of a Redeeming Savior, Who saves us from lives of loneliness, meaningless pleasure and destructive (of self and others) behavior, Who rescues us from avarice and superficiality. And Who calls us into that Story, too.

Of course, we’re drawn to good and evil. We fight darkness wherever we find it. We’re not super-soldiers, incredible hulks or spider-men, but the impulse is the same. We are called to create and protect new, kind, gentle, safe worlds for our families, neighbors, and communities, no matter the cost.

Of course, we’re drawn to love. As pride is the catalyst for all wayward paths, Love is the engine that drives everything wonderful and pure. Love points us to Jesus Christ.

And of course, of course, we’re drawn to anything that reminds us of Jesus Christ, any and everywhere we find it (even superhero movies).