The Gator Wrestler

Two weeks from today, I’ll hop on a plane with my good buddy, Gary. We’ll fly from Chicago’s O’Hare Airport to Miami and then, seven hours after landing in Miami, take a short flight to Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The morning of Saturday, the 22nd of May, we’ll drive from Port-au-Prince to Jacmel, where, for the next four days, we’ll work to help rebuild an orphanage that was devastated in the January earthquake, play with the kids, and see what God might have in store for our little church in Verona’s involvement in mission and relief work in Haiti.

For this trip we’ll be traveling with friends from The Journey Community in Madison, a church that was planted about the same time as Living Hope Church. I’ve known Steve Cecil for close to seven years now and am excited to spend some time with him on the trip.

Over the past week, iIn preparation for this trip, I’ve checked out a stack of books from the Verona Public Library on Haiti, read scores of online information, visited the travel doctor for a few shots, and read a great little book called Foreign to Familiar, explaining cultural differences.

The result of my reading has been sobering.

I’ve been to developing countries where radical poverty hits you in the face the moment you walk out of the airport. Twelve years ago, I walked through the slums of Manila and spent two weeks in the northern villages of Luzon with a medical missions team. It took me three days before I wasn’t just in shock over the massive difference between the United States and the Philippines.

Haiti will be different. The January quake has gutted this poor country, with its history of exploitation, violent revolution, corrupt leadership, gang violence, staggering poverty rates (80%), and miniscule income ($2/day). I’m thrilled at the opportunity to go, but staggering under the weight of the country’s political, economic, environmental, physical, and sociological situations. I’m already sobered about the need and my feet haven’t even touched the land there.

Last week, I was upset about a couple things: 1.) the dandelions in my front yard were popping up the day after I mowed, and 2.) Mark Teixeira was batting close to 0.100 for my fantasy baseball team with nary a home run. In fifteen days, we’ll try to get a roof over a group of orphans’ heads in time for the rainy season. Perspective.

I pastor a generous church that has purchased shoes for each of the children in the orphanage. In fifteen days, Gary and I will lug our suitcases of shoes to the orphanage and do our little part. But a few days after that, we’ll return wondering if what we did mattered and what difference does it make.

I don’t know the answer to that and may never know the answer. But I do know that the Jesus emptied Himself for 30-some years, walked and talked with us, and ultimately gave His life so that we might be reconciled with God. For a few days this spring and, Lord willing, other trips and further involvement in the future, we’ll give of ourselves because Jesus was generous with us. The Gospel is changing us at Living Hope Church. It turns stingy people into generous people and self-centered people into giving people. Because Christ has given much to us, we now give to others.

Please keep us in your prayers as we continue to prepare our hearts and as we head out in two weeks.

I am in the anguish of childbirth until Christ is formed in you!
(The Apostle Paul, Galatians 4:19)

If you asked me to give you one verse that sums up the job of a pastor, this might be it. A pastor longs to see Christ formed in the people he shepherds. That anguish is so intense sometimes that Paul compares it with the labor of childbirth. Pastors labor, sweat, push, grunt, and scream to see Gospel formation in the lives of God’s people.

As I currently preach through Paul’s letter to the Galatian churches, this verse rings in my head. I get it. Paul’s “anguish” is my anguish. I desperately want people to not just know the content of the Gospel or to know about Jesus, but to see it form and shape their lives.

What is the Gospel? Paul writes a different church in Corinth and puts it this way: “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day…” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4).

Jesus put himself in our place. He lived a sinless life of obedience to God the Father and through His death took God’s wrath toward sin upon himself and gave us His righteousness. He then rose again, defeating our enemy, the grave, and will return as King. By grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone we are reconciled to God.

The Galatian churches thought that was all well and good, but that it could be added to. Sprinkle some dietary restrictions, require circumcision, and a make a few other laws mandatory and then you’ve really got a nice religion.

“No!!!” Paul screams throughout his letter. It’s all about the Gospel, which frees us from enslavement to the law. Understanding the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection changes everything. Our religious practices won’t save us. Only the Gospel makes us right with God. Why add to the Gospel?!

And yet we do. Over and over and over again. We add politics, morality, spiritual experiences, stylistic preferences, certain authors, social justice issues, and all sorts of other practices and doctrines to the Gospel. The Gospel impacts our behavior. It informs our voting. It compels our involvement in acts of compassion, but it is the Gospel of Christ crucified and risen that stands central and supreme.

And Paul’s anguished longing is to see it forming and shaping the people he loves. I see this in my life and in the life of the people I pastor. We put our income, our possessions, our status, our lawn, our minivan features, the size of our televisions, the athletic or academic performance of our children, the amount of our bench press, and all sorts of stuff in the central and supreme position. The Bible calls this idolatry, making ultimate things out of good things. Enjoy the gifts God gives, but always make Christ supreme in your life.

Jesus died and rose again to bring us to God. We need nothing else. As this truth sinks into the fabric of our lives it forms and shapes everything. We can suffer well, knowing that Christ is triumphant. We can face hardship, knowing Jesus went through great hardship on our behalf. We can enjoy life freely, because we don’t have to perform. Christ’s “performance” on the cross is to our credit.

My job is to see Christ formed in my life, in the life of my wife and children, and in the life of the people I’m privileged to pastor. There is great joy when a child is born after much labor (I’ve got four kids and can personally attest to this). There is great joy in a pastor’s life when the Gospel is formed in the lives of the people he loves.

I’m praying and anguishing for more Gospel formation in the life of Living Hope Church.

Last Thursday, I had the opportunity to speak on submission from Colossians 3:18-4:1 to a few hundred college students at the University of Wisconsin. Let’s just say it’s not an easy text and I would have loved to follow it up with a Q/A session with my beautiful wife.

Key points:
1. Jesus is Lord. We submit to him as Creator, Sustainer, and King.
2. Jesus submitted to God’s plan and gave His life so that we could be reconciled to God.
3. You cannot obey Jesus and ignore human authority structures.
4. Loving leadership and joyful submission “play act” the gospel of Jesus loving, sacrificial leadership and our joyful submission.

(And notice the boos I got when a bunch of Badgers found out they had to listen to a Spartan for a half hour.)

I don’t think I’ve enjoyed a music video this much since the 80’s (or at least that cool treadmill thing by the same band).

HT: Timmy Brister

When I was a kid, I devoured books. I read anything and everything I could get my hands on. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia passed through my hands nearly a dozen times (favorite book in the series: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader; favorite character: Puddlegum; biggest disappointment: the movies). I travelled with Bilbo to the Lonely Mountain over and over and over again. Encyclopedia Brown’s deductive ability blew my mind. The Hardy Boys’ bravery inspired me. I actually wouldn’t have minded a plane wreck in the Canadian wilderness after reading Gary Paulsen’s Hatchet.

I still love books. My wife and I get up at 5 AM so we can have 2 hours of uninterrupted reading time. I’m at heaven in Frugal Muse or Half Price Books in Madison. Amazon may be my most-visited website. We’re unashamed book nerds (okay, mostly it’s me).

I want my children to have this same love. So we’ve read countless books to them. I can quote The Little Engine that Could. It’s thrilling to see them now embark on journeys of their own into the pages of great books. Our 7-year old reads through chapter books as fast as they’re put in his hands. Our 5-year old spends an hours every day thumbing through books on reptiles and Star Wars or reading the adventures of Nate the Great. Our 4-year old daughter can “read” all the Fancy Nancy books to her 1-year old sister. I don’t write this to boast in my kids … too much. I write this because their passion for reading presents a unique problem. I want them to read good stuff and not junk. (Don’t get me wrong. Junk food’s okay once-in-a-while, but a steady diet leaves you sick and obese.)

In an effort to steer my kids toward good books, I’m embarking on a voyage back into the world of children’s literature. I’m not an elementary school teacher or a librarian, but I want to put good stuff in my kids’ hands. I also want to be able to discuss the stuff they’re reading with a deeper conversation than “How was the book?” followed by the obligatory “Fine.” Plus, I want an excuse to read stuff from the children’s section without shame.

So I’ll be reading books slightly ahead of my kids’ reading level in an effort to locate and pass on great material to my kids and catch up on some of what I’ve missed. Artemis Fowl, The Dark Is Rising Sequence, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, The 39 Clues, How to Train Your Dragon, The Ranger’s Apprentice, Inkheart, and Fablehaven have all made it onto my to-read list along with classics like Huckleberry Finn and Old Yeller. I’ll also be reading to and alongside my kids more often. The plan is to be putting up a few reviews here. I’m not a book reviewer, but here’s a couple of my initial goals.

1. I want my children to be inspired to bravery and sacrificial heroism, but realize that they don’t have to be the ultimate hero. Jesus fills that role. Children’s books are almost always about a young boy or girl discovering “who they really are.” Quite often, we’re left with a message of “You have to be the hero.” The Bible leads us to the conclusion that you can’t be the hero, but Jesus is. Does the literature we point our children to in turn point them to a greater hero like the Christ figures of Aslan and Gandalf? Or do we say to our children, “You can do anything you want because you’re perfect (and misunderstood).” At the same time, I want to inspire them with tales of bravery, nobility, and chivalry. Conversation with your children over what they’re reading and watching is critical in parenting.

2. There are a ton of good stories. Throw a dragon and a cool map together and you’ll come up with something. But does the work contain good writing and wordplay? Lewis was a master of this. How else can you come up with lines like “There once was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” or “…a Unicorn and a fat, full-grown donkey indoors always make a room feel rather crowded.” Brilliant. I want to introduce my children to that kind of writing. And to be honest, I could use a few good mentors in the wordplay and sentence structure department. Reading Lewis and A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh have reintroduced me to literary genius.

Since I have a hard time reading one book at a time, my first selections will be Rick Riordan’s The Lightning Thief and N. D. Wilson’s 100 Cupboards. I’ll come back here periodically and review the books and the conversations they inspire with my kids.

I’ve still got some work to do in defining what “good literature” is. Hopefully, immersing myself in it will aid in that discovery. I’m also not one of those pastors who thinks that the only quality reading material is what you can pull off your local Christian bookstore. Most of the fiction you’ll find there (children’s books in particular) is trash. But in the quest to parent wisely, I have a fun task ahead.

If you have books you think I should tackle, let me know. If you want to read along, go find 100 Cupboards or The Lightning Thief and let’s begin!

I have a number of friends who are in the initial stages of planting a new church in various communities around the world. Conversations with them have led me to remember our early days and how desperately we prayed this passage in the early years of our church.

Moses said to the Lord, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’ Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” And he said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” And he said to him, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”
–Exodus 33:12-17

Here’s Moses’ prayer: “God, show me your ways!” Moses is leading a rebellious people toward the Promised Land and he’s unsure how it’s going to get done. (This scene takes place right after the golden calf incident of chapter 32.)

Churches pray that prayer over and over and over again. God, what should we do? This program? New building? Staff hiring? Show us your ways! God’s answer: “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”

What churches need more than programs, buildings, new staff, fancy flyers, and even dynamic leadership is the presence of God.

Moses gets that and ends up praying, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here.” It is the presence of Almighty God that will distinguish the people of God.

So what’s your prayer? Is it, “God, tell me what to do. Clarify things. Show the way.” I don’t think that’s a bad prayer. Moses isn’t reprimanded for it. But do your prayers focus on “God, go with us.” That’s the prayer that understands our dependance on God’s sovereign hand more than our strategies and vision and leadership and ideas and abilities.

I read a lot of books in ‘09. I wish I could have read more, but I have yet to find that benefactor who will financially provide for me to sit back and read all day long. If you’re interested, please e-mail me.

I’m always in the middle of reading one book for pastoral development and another for personal enjoyment. Right now, I’m working on Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov and Clowney’s The Unfolding Mystery. Both are great. Since we just finished up 2009, I thought I’d throw together a little end-of-the-year list on the most memorable books I read during the last 350 days or so. These books are in no particular order and are books that I read in ‘09, not books that were published in ‘09.

In the FICTION category:

Paul Theroux, The Great Railway Bazaar. Theroux travelled from London to Istanbul, through the Middle East, India, and eventually through southeast Asia, Japan, and back along the Trans-Siberian Railway. All of this by train in 1975. I love traveling and Theroux’s book made me want to jump on a train somewhere.

Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls. What does a man do when he believes the fight he’s in is just, but the chances of success are gone?

Joseph Heller, Catch-22. Somehow I missed this one in my high school and college literature classes. I probably enjoyed it more as a 35-year old than I would have as a 19-year old sophomore. Great characters, absurd situations, and this description of the chaplain: “He [the chaplain] was pinched perspiringly in the epistemological dilemma of the skeptic, unable to accept solutions to problems he was unwilling to dismiss as unsolvable. He was never without misery, and never without hope.” One of my all-time favorite quotes.

David Benioff, City of Thieves. An unlikely friendship in the middle of the starving city of Leningrad. An unforgettable book.

NON-FICTION

Chris Brauns, Unpacking Forgiveness. Common assumption: forgive and forget. Brauns challenges are easy escapist notions of forgiveness. Still thinking through a lot of the practical implications of this book and I’d like to revisit some of his thoughts, but I’m waiting for my sister to return the book.

Francis Chan, Forgotten God. Evangelicals love God, believe Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, but largely ignore the person and work of the Holy Spirit. Chan writes a great, straightforward challenge to those of us who easily forget that God is three-in-one, not two.

Timothy Keller, Counterfeit Gods. I’d likely rate this higher if I hadn’t heard Keller speak much of this book at the Gospel Coalition conference and read so much of his online articles that cover the same stuff. Along with The Reason for God, and The Prodigal God, Keller’s books may be the three that I’ll give out more than any other.

Paul Miller, A Praying Life. Revolutionary. Miller not only is blunt and refreshingly honest about our need for prayer, he offers very practical and highly “do-able” suggestions for the development (or re-development) of a personal prayer life. This book has been an answer to my prayers.

Eugene Peterson, Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity. Pastors must be in prayer, must be listening to Scripture, and caring for people. Although written decades ago, Peterson’s book delivered a brutal combo on how I view my role as pastor.

For the past few years I’ve been reading through The Art of Manliness’ “100 Must-Read Books: The Man’s Essential Library.” There have been some great selections (I’ve really enjoyed reading Steinbeck for the first time) and some that just don’t work for me. Tom Robbins’ Another Roadside Attraction was one that I had a hard time enjoying. But in the midst of all the psychadelic oddities, I found these two quotes critiquing the American church of 1971. Unfortunately, they still apply today.

Prayer meetings have turned into existential group therapy sessions, liturgies into rock-and-roll shows.

I saw all around me a voracious spiritual hunger, but the Paleolithic mush served up by the church was neither nutritious nor appetizing.

I just returned from three nights alone in a cabin in the woods near Tomahawk, WI with no electricity and no running water. When people heard of this, I was compared to Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), who wrote the very excellent album For Emma, Forever Ago in a cabin in the northern Wisconsin woods. On the flip side, I was also compared to Ted Kaczynski (aka The Unabomber), who sent bombs to people in the mail from his cabin in the woods. If you get a package from me, please don’t freak out.

This was all made possible by the generosity of a couple from Minnesota I’ve never met. So while my wife was hunting white-tail deer in northern Michigan and the kids were with Grandpa and Grandma, here’s what I learned over the last four days.

1. Indoor plumbing is incredibly awesome and very handy.

2. Back pain and rain can be a blessing. I threw out my back last weekend. That combined with the rain meant I spent a great deal of time on the floor reading, writing, and praying in front of the fire.

3. Extended reading and prayer time, uninterrupted by kids or computer, is extremely valuable.

4. Nothing gets one’s thoughts ticking like a fire in the fireplace.

5. Bacon’s great taste is directly proportional to the primitive means in which it is cooked.

6. Eugene Peterson kicked my butt. Following a couple on-line recommendations from people I’ve never met, I dusted off my copy of Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity and gave it a read. Highly convicting stuff: Am I in prayer? Am I listening to Scripture? Am I a Spiritual Director? This is a book that I need to re-read every year in order to avoid becoming a manager rather than a pastor. (Incidentally, I have personally known two “Eugene’s” and neither of them have kicked my butt, nor could they if they tried.

7. Domesticated dogs ruin remoteness. You can be standing on the side of this wilderness lake and when a stupid canine a half mile away barks, the peace is shattered. I’m glad I’m not a dog-owner.

8. Heat is more valued if you split the wood yourself. Of course, I never realized this when I was in high school and my dad made me chop wood for our furnace. Sorry for the grumbling, Dad.

9. Sometimes you don’t hear the Spirit of God because you’re not in a place to listen.

10. I really, really love my wife and kids.

11. I love my church.

12. Introverted pastors (like myself) can’t function like constantly on-the-go like extroverted pastors can. My friend Tom Nebel always encouraged me to divert daily, withdraw weekly, maintain monthly, and avert annually. Spend at minimum an hour per day, a half-day per week, a full day per month, and a few days a year alone with God. This is a minimum for me.

13. I read more when it rains. Since I went to seminary in Portland, OR, I have this rain trigger, that causes me to study and read when I hear raindrops. Love the rain.

14. The internet, TV, and electronic entertainment are totally unnecessary.

15. Books are very necessary. The imprisoned Apostle Paul told Timothy this: “When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments.” (2 Timothy 4:13) Hey, it’s in the Bible.

16. Cell phones are very nice. I was able to talk to and text my wife and kids regularly. (And with as much flak as AT&T gets, be it noted that I had great coverage in the middle of nowhere. I’m not a hater. Now about that bill…)

16. One night doesn’t cut it for me. It needs to be multiples so there’s a full day of solitude and prayer in there.

17. I’ve got a lot of work to do as pastor of Living Hope, but I’m energized and geared up. Sunday’s message could be interesting.

18. Catch-22 is actually a good book. I had struggled through the first 150 pages and was ready to move to something easier (like Dostoevsky), but my friend Eric encouraged me to keep going and by the end I was laughing out loud. Crazy good, disturbing, and sad book.

19. The whole 4:30 sunset/darkness thing is nuts. Seriously, I’m not enjoying living on the eastern edge of a time zone. I’m ready to sleep by 7 PM.

20. Productivity is not always measured numerically.

For a boy growing up in central Michigan in the 70’s and 80’s, the voice of Ernie Harwell was more familiar to me than any of my elementary teachers. He was there every summer. When the Montague clan gathered at Sleepy Hollow State Park outside of St. Johns, MI, we always had food, fishing, and Ernie Harwell’s voice calling the Tigers game over the radio. He was part of our family. He was there in the magical summer of 1984 when the Bless You Boys (including my hero, Lou Whitaker), rolled to a World Series championship. My dad remembers Harwell calling the day games of the ‘68 Series through PA system of Owosso High School. He was there in that decade known as the 1990’s when the Tigers were very, very bad. For this kid who grew up a Tigers fan, Ernie Harwell and baseball are inseparable.

Ernie Harwell would start every spring training by quoting from the Song of Songs: “For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.” (2:11-12) The spring of 2010 will likely be the first time in over forty years when the Tigers gather in Lakeland, Florida without Ernie Harwell. Last summer, Ernie Harwell was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given six months to live. My dad, sister, brother-in-law, and best friend were there when he gave this farewell address at Comerica Park a few months ago:

After his diagnosis, Ernie Harwell has faced impending death like few others. In an interview with Bob Costas set to air next week, Harwell says this: “I’m not overwhelmed by the circumstances. One of the doctors said, ‘If you were my father, I’d say don’t do anything, just relax and wait for the inevitable.’ But I had great peace about that and closure to it, and I knew God was in charge, and whatever happens, happens for the best.”

As a pastor, I’ve walked with people through “the valley of the shadow of death.” Rarely do you see this sort of confidence in the sovereignty of God. And while Harwell will always call himself a baseball announcer rather than a theologian, his trust in God’s care is exemplary.

The Apostle Paul writes these words in 2 Timothy 4:6-8: “…the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.”

Thanks, Ernie, for making baseball great with your great calls. And thanks for making God’s name great with your great faith and hope.

“In my almost 92 years on this earth, the Good Lord has blessed me with a great journey.” – from Harwell’s farewell speech on September 16, 2009