Ever since I listened to a great lecture and follow-up Q & A on evangelism by a church planter from New Mexico (who encouraged pastors to do more work outside the office), I’ve been challenged to follow his lead. So I did a few hours of work in a coffeehouse on Friday. It cost me. Unfortunately the 2 allotted hours in its present spot was taken quite literal. I showed up about 2 hours and ten minutes later to find an ugly stinkin’ ticket on my windshield.

Everybody hates, or at least gets quite angry with the ‘parking ticket cops.’ One of our golf cart parking ticket ladies at Furman was actually attacked by a local, high on drugs. And no one felt bad. I wasn’t an eyewitness and was unavailable for comment. I still am.

Around any downtown area, these ticket cops hover over cars like vultures, waiting for their time to expire. And to make matters worse, they seem to take great delight in ruining people’s days.

Then something hit me as I drove passed the ticket cop with some anger in my heart. I preached the other day on the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. This Sunday, I’ll be preaching on The Parable of the Hidden Treasure (just a shameless plug). I think the parking ticket cop would have made for a much better illustration. I used people least likely to be seen in church: strip club owners or gay folk.

But as community, who likes these ticket cops? Strippers, gay folk, democrats haven’t personally ‘wronged me’ (I know 10 minutes over is still 10 minutes). That only scratches the surface of what tax collectors would do back in the day. They would actually keep the money for themselves. If this ticket lady were keeping the money for herself and charging arbitrary (not 25 dollars if paid on time) fines, then we’d have a pretty close parallel.

And it just reminds me how shocking Jesus really was. And he still is now. How offensive would this parable have been to its original religious audience? Amazingly offensive. When Jesus stops offending us today (remember his greatest offenses were to the religious crowd), we need to stop following a religiously comfortable, fabricated Jesus; and follow the real, offensive one.

This will be my final post on our coffeehouse. We had a decent turnout this year. Quality music by folks who were outside THE Church, outside OUR Church, and inside OUR church. The art was quality as well, in my humble non-artistic opinion. All in all, we left the evening encouraged and probably will do it again next year.

One affect of the coffeehouse/art show that we had hoped for was for more Christians to enter into this creative world. None of us expected we should see such fruit almost immediately.

After the coffeehouse on Friday, several folks hung out for several hours and began to write a song. I wasn’t there but I’m told that four of them contributed to either the music and/or lyrics.

There are some extremely well written hymns (with some being better/worse than others) and it is a mistake to throw them out. However, it is also a mistake to ignore any new hymns/praise songs (I know that many are shallow, but not all, for instance “In Christ Alone”). And it is still a bigger mistake to not continue writing new hymns/praise songs. Has God stopped working in the hearts of believers or our world? Then we ought to write and sing about it.

Here is an excerpt from a song called Sacred Seduction which several of our young adults composed on Friday evening (or I guess early Sat morning) and sang for our offertory Sunday morning.

All that I can see, Is you drawing me into your arms
Wiping clean my tears of fear and alarm
Who can resist, your sacred seduction
Slowly breaking down my defenses

Miriam sang after crossing the sea, Deborah after victory over Jabin, David after one of his many deliverances in Psalm 40, Paul quotes a hymn celebrating Christ’s victory in Phil 2. So why should we stop singing or composing new songs?

I’m now a man with no more baby classes. I probably even look different. We only have to go to Lakewood Ranch once a week (instead of 2-3 nights) for doctors visits. Soon “Little T” will become Connar or Anna Kate. Soon.

Anyhow, I just wanted to follow up on the last post about our coffeehouse, and why we are doing it. Some folks would wonder why we care at all about cultural transformation, restoring neighborhoods, bringing community where there is none, etc…Many Christians have put for the question: why should you care anything about the world around you, or enter into the world and culture since it is all going to be destroyed? They have compared such efforts to polishing the deck of the Titanic (BTW-last week two separate people used this analogy as a way not to think of culture so I find it apropos to use it now). Why do anything when the ship is going down anyway?

Such thought arises from the Anabaptist tradition. During the period of the Protestant Reformation, two streams of thought developed. The Anabaptists sought to flee from cultural involvement, politics, military, etc…They divided the world into spiritual and secular. The spiritual component was sacred and eternal, while the secular world of politics, military, the arts, were left to others. Now there were some amazing Anabaptists who endured fierce persecution from not only the Catholics, but other Protestants (to our shame), so I commend them on such amazing perseverance. Yet I think their cultural legacy leaves something out.

The Reformed view of the world leaves no distinction between sacred and secular. According to this world-view, there should be no major section of the world and culture in which Christians shouldn’t be present. Again, as mentioned in the last post, they don’t have to be witnessing to others in order to fulfill their calling in work. As Christians go forth, they ought to embrace and express truth, beauty, love, goodness about God and His world. Painting a picture of a beautiful sunset or radiant full moon displays something about our creator in the same way that the moon, stars, sky display something of God (Psalm 19:1-2). It doesn’t have to have a bible verse (though I’m not knocking art that does) to honor God.

One day we will have a whole new world, as heaven comes down to Earth. And on that world we will have culture which perfectly and fully emphasizes truth, beauty, and goodness. There is a picture in Revelation of the different kings of the earth bringing their glory to the New Jerusalem (Rev 21:33). We bring the best of our culture into the new world we are promised. It’s more that we are getting a head start in this magnificent endeavor than we are polishing the deck of a sinking ship.

Yesterday was a day of highs and lows, and I’m not talking about the tides. However they, by the way, have been awful lately, and what I’m blaming for my lack of fish in the boat (or rather kayak). Anyhow, I was down because the promised article from the Herald was no longer a possibility due to the proximity of our coffeehouse/art show (in two days). Then all of a sudden, a woman called and interviewed me. And 30 minutes after that, someone came by to take pictures. My office has never looked so good. Seriously. All the art crammed in the tight space covered over some of the other clutter.

To read the article, click here. I think they did a good job.

One of the reasons we do this coffehouse/art show each year is to give the community, our church, the Church in general a chance to more greatly appreciate the arts. Art, music, writing, story-telling don’t have to be explicity Christian to be good. God is a creative, story-telling God whom we honor by reflecting back that creativity through pursuing art, music, story-telling, and/or simply by appreciating the aforementioned through the arts.

My Reformed background has always expressed a high regard for arts, music, and cultural engagement. The Reformed view of the arts is to appreciate beauty and the creative processes God has given to men and women because they are in fact made in the image of God. Animals can’t do this, nor can their descendants. Christians ought to celebrate this unique God given creativity through the arts.

In addition to simply reflecting a creative God, art, music, story-telling point us to a greater story behind our story. To depict God’s world, even in its brokenness, points us to some aspect of God’s Ultimate story of Creation, Fall, Redemption, Consummation. It needn’t be explicitly Christian, nor done by Christians for it to be of great benefit to us.

The NFL Draft was last Saturday and Sunday. And yes, I’m one of the football starved degenerates (I’m mad there’s no NFL-Europe anymore) that actually gets excited about it. Of course I had an elder retreat, sermon prep, and dinner with friends on Saturday night that precluded me from wasting my time following it. And just for the record, I DO think I could do a better job drafting than the Bucs usually do. But I’m probably wrong.

Anyhow there are two dominant strategies for how to pick a player: go with an area of need (for instance if you need a QB, then pick the best QB you can) or simply go with the best overall player available, regardless of need. Either way a team is obviously picking a person based solely on what they can bring to the ball club.

While I believe it is important to network as much as possible (two of my musicians for our upcoming Coffeehouse came from networking: they were friends/contacts of my friends), I need to be very careful not to treat relationships like an NFL draft. We are all prone to pick relationships based upon what others can do for us.

But the pattern we see in Jesus’ behavior and heart is very much the opposite. He perfectly modeled Phil 2:4 “Let each of you look not only to his own interests but also to the interests of others.” I’m not discounting the need to have friendships that build you up and don’t drain you. We need these.

But I know my tendency is to look at people like I would if I were drafting them to make “my team” better. Yet if I look at Jesus’ life, he builds his team not with high draft picks, but with un-drafted free agents that all other teams look over. And strangely enough, just like football, these un-drafted free agents can (they don’t have to) do amazing things for His Kingdom. Interestingly enough, retired Denver Bronco’s receiver Rod Smith, undrafted out of Missouri Southern State University, is the NFL’s 15th leading receiver.

But our final motivation to not look at others like an NFL draft is that Jesus doesn’t look at us like that. Fortunately. He didn’t choose us because of what we could do for him but simply out of love.

Sometimes its good just to laugh. Sometimes its just good to fish. This video combines both of them. Its a spoof on American Idol star Carrie Underwood’s “Jesus take the wheel.” Hope you enjoy.

I listened to a few very informative and challenging lectures during my study leave week. Due to the fact that I drove to Riverview twice, and Lakeland once, I had such time.

Anyhow, here is one of the lectures I would like to commend to you. The president of Exodus International (a ministry assisting homosexuals attempting to depart from the active gay lifestyle) spoke before Central Florida Presbytery. They get good speakers at that presbytery. We don’t get any speakers down in our parts.

I realize the word “lecture” means something less to many than it does to me. After all, I don’t have any music on my Ipod: only lectures and sermons. However I think this lecture/testimony (its more of the latter) and following Q and A session may be helpful in understanding more about the homosexual community. And of course that is one in which we know very little about-so anything more is good.

The president, who is now married with kids, openly discusses his unique struggle and story, as well as those of his dear friends. One main point in which he challenged the church was to aspire more to deep fellowship. Unless the fellowship the church offers is better than the gay bars, how can we expect gay folks to come? While what we display in the church IS POTENTIALLY better in many cases, many of us don’t embrace the freedom, honesty, grace, and love centered around Christ. And so our fellowship boils down to eating food, surface friendships, being too scared to share struggles and doubts, never challenging others when they are clearly in the wrong, and never open to challenge.

How can we expect gay folks to leave gay bars when what we have isn’t a whole lot different than what they already have? That was his challenge to the church and one that certainly convicts me and my shallow conversations and my fear to confess sins/struggles to others.

Its not what you say but how you say it. Heard that one before? I’ve heard it plenty of times. El Guapo (from The Three Amigos) might say I’ve heard it a plethora of times. He would probably be correct.

Every so often Amy gets concerned over my ‘tone.’ Unfortunately she’s not the only one to question my tone when I’m disagreeing or debating. Sometimes I’m aware of it, and the tone comes from a sense of anger or defense. At other times, the tone may sound harsh, and not only will I be unaware of the tone, but the heart behind the tone will NOT be defensive or malicious.

Since sometimes I’m unaware of the tone myself, it would be helpful to have it recorded some time so I can hear it. I don’t propose having someone follow me around with a video camera like Paris Hilton. That would be far too incriminating.
However the other day, I was caught on tape, so to speak. I left something at home, as I usually do before church one Sunday. So I ‘kindly’ requested through the answering machine that Amy pick up the phone ASAP. She did eventually.

She said my tone was back, and I of course denied it. I didn’t really have any anger in my heart, so I assumed she was imagining this tone. Well it was on our answering machine, and there could be no denying it. Tone was quite present.

I didn’t feel ‘tonal,’ but I certainly sounded tonal. One more lesson to teach me that its more than what you say, “Its how you say it.” Supposedly communication is 80 % non verbal (I’ve heard different numbers, all of which seem too high). If that’s the case, the remaining 20 % is probably 90% tonal, and 10% content.

We just got back from our elder retreat. In case you’re not Presbyterian, I’m not referring to a weekend get away with the numerous 55 and up communities that dot our lovely landscape down in Florida. Elders are those who have been elected by the congregation to oversee the flock.

5 of us got away, because the 6th is somewhere on the Appalachian Trail. We had a good time to reflect upon the goals of an elder, the way we live out the goals, and how we live them out (our attitude and disposition). Quite helpful, though I’m ready for a break since I have to preach and get some more coffeehouse stuff done.

Anyway, we found refuge at an Episcopalian retreat center in Ellenton/Parrish (I forget which one), as did a number of other like and unlike minded folks. There was everything from a theosophist group (I’m going to be googling that one soon) to Woodland Community Church’s Men’s “Wild at Heart follow-up retreat.” It was kind of funny because they had a HUGE African-American dude as their keynote speaker. Probably a different cat than Eldredge.

Aside from the obvious departure from orthodoxy of the theosophist group (I did read some notes on their wall like “inner light” and stuff like that before folks started staring), there were a number of other evangelical groups pressing on toward the prize. Its always good to be reminded that my or your particular stream of Christianity makes up only a part of the Church as a whole. Otherwise we become a bit too myopic, and eventually frustrated-as though its only US who Jesus is using to build His Kingdom.

I love to work out. I really do. But lately I’ve been hard pressed even to do the bench press (my favorite exercise). Why? I’ve fallen out of the routine. So today, because I have tons of stuff to do, I’m probably not going to make it to the gym. Tomorrow, I have tons of stuff to do, including finalizing my sermon for Sunday, so I might not make it then. And next week, guess what? Tons of stuff. There’s always tons of stuff to do and I don’t even have kids, yet. I’m not complaining how busy I am, by the way. I have a point, I think.

My lax gym attendance began when I took a week off for Amy’s spring break/vacation to St. Augustine. From that point on, it has been harder to get back into it.

While routine simply for the sake of routine kills intimacy and delight, skipping that routine can really make it extremely hard for one to ever get back to doing what you love. For the last 6 years or so, the only reason I took time off from working out was due to either shoulder or back injury. That’s it. I couldn’t fathom how people could just stop going altogether.

But now I see. They were always busy, but working out was simply part of their busy schedule.
They skipped once, they skipped twice, and so on and so forth. Each time they skipped, it became easier to skip.

I think the same thing goes for any spiritual discipline. Once I get out of reading God’s Word, its hard to get back into the pattern. I assume the same thing goes for people who stop going to church; they get out of the routine, and the more they don’t go, the easier it becomes to not go in the future.

The weird thing is that I love working out when I get to the gym. Like church, I love seeing people there and find great joy in it. And I forfeit that joy by NOT GOING. So in order to get that joy and delight back (our highest motivation), I have to put important activities ‘on my calendar.’ While we may find it hard at first to put these disciplines back on our calendars, we are simply, though intentionally, exposing ourselves to Jesus: “thy lovely source of true delight.” When we are confronted with continuing schedules devoid of corporate worship, private devotion, family prayer, time with spouse, let us be motivated by the joy that comes WHEN we get there instead of passively waiting for it to come to us.