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Bill Johnson, From Bethel Church in Redding CA, has some intense reflections on being a courageous disciple this week. His message, Crazy Courage, is a sequel to Kris Vallotton’s message last week on applying heaven’s power to our earthly service. Bethel is an awesome faith community. They’re actually walking the discipleship road in earnest.
Not that other communities aren’t; my own community has been ramping up for two years now in that same direction. We’ve been blessed with a lead pastor who understands where Jesus is calling us as a community, and is leading us all in that direction. I’m proud of the steps we’ve taken to walk the talk!
But Bill and the Bethel community are way out in front of the real-discipleship curve, and they’ve been walking that road in integrity and faithfulness for decades, even as other pastors and communities have fallen by the roadside. I really admire the believers at Bethel for their faithfulness and their risk-it-all courage.
“The most important [commandment],” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.‘ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions. (Mark 12:29-34)
Do you ever think about what “Love” really means? I do.
There is lots of baggage on what we understand about loving–lots of qualifiers… “if they agree with me,” “if they look and act and live like me,” “if they go to the same church, denomination, religion, or school as me,” “if they work for a living, if they have a nice home, if they’re industrious, if they never ask me for anything, if they clean up after themselves, if they smell good and act “normal,” “if they don’t sleep around, get drunk, do drugs, or get violent,” “if they stay on their side of the fence, if they stay in their own neighborhoods, if they accept my ‘charity’, if they act grateful when I do something for them, if they speak the same language…” The list of qualifiers is endless. And they’re all sinful.
Pastor Kris Vallotton, from Bethel Church in Redding CA has a great message this week, Heaven Superimposed on Earth. His theme, Kingdom Stewardship/Service, is one that the Spirit of God has been planting in the hearts of leaders, pastors, missionaries, and ordinary believers across the globe. The prospects for His Kingdom are exciting! We’re finally gonna be about the Father’s Business!
Not that some folks weren’t already doing that, but there have been way too many “pew potatoes”, “religious” million-dollar entrepreneurs, and “doing only what’s humanly possible” shepherds working their own gigs throughout our history, and blocking the road to real discipleship–as defined by Jesus Himself–for everyone else!
OK folks, It’s time to take a breather from the serious stuff. Here’s a little ditty that is making it’s way around the Internet.! Remember-vote your conscience and let our Creator sort out the results!
I’ve been overwhelmed lately with how much corporate Christianity has to repent from. Over the two thousand years of its history, we’ve managed to abandon our God-given authority to steward the earth, seriously “dumb down” the mandate Jesus gave us to be and make disciples of all nations, and pass off our “bring heaven to earth” responsibility either onto generations of believers long dead, or forward to some “heavenly future.”
In addition, Christianity has regularly attacked its own believers, including Joan d’Arc, and slaughtered whole nations (Jews, Native Americans, Moslems, etc) who were unlucky enough to be perceived as “heretics” or “pagans” by governing clerics. And we’ve done all these acts of darkness in the name of God. Why? Read the rest of this entry »
There’s a great testimony, Perhaps Death Is Proud; More Reason to Savor Life in today’s New York Times, written by a local nurse, Theresa Brown, after the death of her first terminal patient. Her testimony says everything that needs to be said. I’ll just add an ode by Tennyson, as tribute to her reflections.
Crossing The Bar
Alfred Lord TennysonSunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.
My computer got sick this week–with some able help from me! I took down my trusty Kaspersky Internet Security Suite, because my video streaming wasn’t working and I wanted to see what was interfering with it. I installed an expired McAfee anti-virus edition, but that obviously was not working either. What “streamed” past was a nasty computer virus. So my home computer went off to the computer shop and I used my four days off from work to garden, read, run errands, and do laundry. Read the rest of this entry »
The mountain is noisy tonight
cacophonous cicadas crickets katydids
Driving home from work my memory wanders
thoughts and words and images
sludge drawn up from ancient wells of feeling and life
It’s cold
But the woods still smell of skunks in estrus
