Powerful Words

During a teaming session for Chrysalis, I listened to a pastor describe the act of communion in context of the verbs that are contained in the scripture.  This blog will attempt to be more interactive than my past entries.  I am asking you to look up Luke 22:14-20.  Read the passages slowly and choose what you think are the 4 most important verbs.  Comment on this blog with the four verbs and what you think they mean to you.  I hope this helps you grow in God’s word and gives you a better understanding of the importance of coming to His table.

Ink Tongue, Paper Heart

So tonight, I have decided to post two blogs because as I become more and more focused, the ideas just keep coming to me and I have lost about 5 blogs in my head since December.  

Last blog I talked about resolutions and the steps you can take to make sure they are both relevant and successful.  One of my resolutions this year is to really change the way I talk to others.

We all really do have ink tongues.  The words we say leave marks that will never be forgotten.  To this day, I can recall conversations with friends that have changed me; snide comments from teachers that have stuck with me, and words of wisdom from my mother and father that have made me a better person.  Words are powerful, there is no doubt about that.  Words can start revolutions, end wars, bring tears, and calm sorrows.

For me, I guess I need to start thinking about the words I say as though they will forever be marked on someones paper heart.  You can’t erase things you say.  You can’t write over ink, and no matter how good you are with white out, the original strike is still left on the skin.  In school, I take careful steps to make sure I don’t grade papers with red ink because it is seen as harmful to a student’s feelings, but do I do the same with my tongue?  Do I carefully choose the color of the words coming out of my mouth?  It is downright dangerous to think of how many words each of us speak vs. how many words we speak that are uplifting.

Words…they are just words…right?  Sticks and stones…but…

…God spoke words into Adam to create life.

…Jeremiah & company spoke words and knocked down walls.

…God spoke His word into Mary’s womb to bring us a Savior.

While you may think the words you say aren’t important, or don’t effect those around you, just remember that you too have an ink tongue.  Make sure you are leaving your mark wisely.  To make my resolution more successful, I hold my friends and family accountable to make sure I am taking the steps necessary to make my words more gentle to the delicate hearts of others.

Anchors Away

We are more than half way through the month of January and most of us have already made, broke, and set new resolutions (if you are into that kind of thing).  For me, I have always failed on setting and keeping resolutions, and it wasn’t until recently that I figured out why.

The idea of celebrating  a New Year and making a resolution dates back to 153 B.C.  Since then, people all over the planet celebrate the new year differently, with many traditions, but in each one, we find a way to “start over” or make things right.  In thinking of the word “resolution”, I think of the root…resolve…which means to make better.  When you break things down, there are four steps to making a resolution.

The first of those steps is to admit there is a problem.  You can’t set out to change something unless you pin down what you want to change.  This is often found in a declaration such as “I need to lose x pounds,” or “I really need to quit smoking, drinking, cussing…etc.”

The second step is to make a plan.  You cannot meet your goals without mapping out the road on which you will travel.  Too many resolutions fall flat because people seek immediate change.  Let’s not forget that there are 365 1/4 days in a year.  It would be foolish to set a goal that is either too lofty or too easily attainable.

Third, you need to carry out your plan.  Great thinkers will tell you that you need a replacement behavior (i.e. if you want to lose weight, you need to exercise and eat right).  It takes less effort than step two, but this is what you could consider the meat and potatoes of your resolution.  Get out there and do work.

Then comes the all forgotten fourth step.  It’s what I like to call the anchor that keeps your ship where it needs to be.  Without it, your resolution would float into the sky and you might as well start back at square one.  The fourth step (there is a drum roll in my head) is ACCOUNTABILITY.  You need that someone to hold you responsible for following through with the things you have said you are going to do.  You need someone who has either beaten the thing that holds you down or someone who has never taken part in the action you are trying to rid yourself of.

For me, I always want to strengthen my walk with Christ.  I have an anchor…in fact, I have many.  I have a great best friend who is about the best anchor anyone could ever imagine.  I have a wife who constantly challenges me to do the right things to make myself a better person.  And I have a network of friends and family that I know I can call on when my faith tank is running a bit low.  So who will you choose as your anchor?  Better yet, are you willing to be held accountable for the things you want to do, or are your resolutions made just to puff smoke up the chimney?

Foil(ed)

For a Christmas present this year, one of my students brought me an economy sized box of assorted chocolates.  I decided that I would break it out during our monthly team meeting and let the other teachers have at it because if there is one thing teachers like more than snow days, it’s chocolate.  As one of my co-workers carefully unwrapped each piece and then ate it, I watched her lay the foil wrapper down and press each little crease out, slowly using her finger nail and not putting enough pressure to tear the thin foil.  She did this with each candy then put them in a nice, neat stack.  While I continued on with the meeting, I was curious as to what she would do with them when the meeting was over.  Sure enough, she got up from the table, and threw them all away.  Who would put so much work into making these foil pieces, meticulously pay attention to each detail, only to throw it away?  What a waste of time?

We all have our foil pieces, don’t we?  We plan out our days, pressing each minute and hour into neat little square.  We go over things again and again until they are smooth.  What happens when we push too hard, or try to shape things that just aren’t ours for shaping?  The foil rips and you have spent all that time for nothing.  You just end up throwing it away and starting again.

I experienced this dilemma on Christmas Eve.  Our flight to Tulsa, OK was to leave Atlanta at 4:30 PM.  We were to begin boarding at 3:40.  As I anticipated the speaker call to begin getting on the plane,  I looked at the TV screen and in huge, yellow letters…CANCELLED .  I know they use yellow to be soothing, but nothing could have been soothing about your whole day spiraling out of control from inside of an airport.  We were rescheduled to fly to Tulsa on Christmas Day at 9:15 at night.  My parents had turned around half way to Tulsa and were heading home, and then I decided to flatten out this wrinkle on my own.  I found a closer flight to my parents house that would have us leaving in a few hours, and I began to press the crease until it became smooth.  We boarded a flight for Fayetteville, AR and by 7:55, we would be in my parents car, heading home and make it in time for Christmas Eve service.  I began to pat myself on the back because I had made the foil smooth again.  I forgot something important though…I am not in charge, God is.  20 minutes outside of our destination, the pilot says, “We cannot land in Fayetteville due to ice on the runway, we are setting down in Little Rock, refueling, and waiting.”  I will spare you the rest of my feelings and sentiments towards the airline, the weather, and the kid screaming in front of us (our 1 year old was great through all of the chaos).  While we were grounded in Little Rock, I decided not to scrap this foiled plan and throw it away, but instead, I tried to recycle it or turn it into a different shape.  I began to minister to those around me about contentment during the holiday season.  I pulled my New Testament out of my back pocket and passed the following prayer around that I keep tucked in the back pocket:

“Lord, help me to be grateful for what I have, to remember that I don’t need most of what I want, and that joy is found in simplicity and generosity.” ~ Enough by Adam Hamilton

I read it, more than once.  My wife read it.  The passengers around us read it, and pretty soon, the complaining stopped and we started to get to know one another.  I am thankful that I was given the opportunity to minister on Christmas Eve.

So this Christmas, I hope you remember that the plans you make can easily be ripped like a thin piece of foil, and while you may throw your plans away and start over, God never will. You can push your will all you want, press down harder and harder, but in the end, always remember that God is all powerful.  He will reshape you, give you new direction, and recycle his plans for you.  God has taken great time and detail in making you who you are, pressing out each crease to make you unique, but will never throw you away after all the hard work.  He doesn’t do it because He has to, but because He loves you.

Round Peg, Square Hole

Each year, there seems to be a new catch phrase in my line of work, and for the past two years that phrase has been “differentiation in instruction.”  For those outside of the teaching realm, it’s a fancy way of saying that not every student learns the same way, so do not teach each student the same way.  I love these phrases because they aren’t really new ideas, but can be traced back to age old sayings.  In this case, the new terminology pays homage to the idea that you can’t fit a round peg in a square hole.  These common sense moments always come along with someone who will try to defy the odds by making rules that would apply to specific situations.  For example, someone could say, “If I ram it hard enough and fast enough, the peg will fit.”  Or, “If I make the peg smaller and visa versa make the hole bigger, it can work.”  There’s one in every crowd that will work their hardest to defy the laws of common sense and push full steam ahead to make their ideas realistic.

This is a problem I see sometimes in churches and their approach to make or help others relate to the awesome relationship to be gained by following the word of Christ.  For the next few examples, I am going to personify God as the peg, and use the hole as a representation of ourselves.  While there are far too many snafu’s with these philosophies for me to write about in one blog, I will give you a few examples to ponder.

For the first person who wants to make the peg (God) smaller, you get a watered down effect.  God becomes pocket sized and goes where you want him.  The big problem with this effect is that as the peg gets smaller, you lose some of the characteristics that make it a peg.  You have lost that genuine relationship with God and his word every time you choose to leave certain parts of the scripture out.  Visa versa, if you choose to make the hole (yourself) bigger to fit God in, you become too stretched out.  That extra space between you and God leaves more room for worldly things, temptation, and sin to fill the void.  Pretty soon, any shape will fit into your life and that shape can often be in the form of Satan.

Moreover, if churches take the approach that if they slam the peg hard enough and with enough speed into the square, it will eventually fit.  This approach leaves one of two results.  First, you will experience exhaustion and frustration, eventually leading to you giving up.  Secondly, you run the risk of damaging the square or splintering the peg.  This can be very dangerous and has been happening in churches across America as we try to make God fit into everyone’s lives by splintering off parts of what makes God who he is.

In the classroom, it is all about meeting the students needs.  It doesn’t matter the approach, it doesn’t matter the curriculum, but what matters is the end result and the delivery.  We spend hours on end assessing and reassessing the students to see where the areas of need are, what is working right, and what needs to be tweaked.  The same is true with our relationships with Christ.  We should always be assessing our faith, commitment, worship, and witnessing.  It only makes sense.  We need to stop trying to fit God into our holes by defining what the peg looks like and change our outward appearance so that the peg fits just right.

It works with 9 year olds, and I’m sure it can work in your life.  Don’t believe me?  Check out Isaiah 29:16 and share with me your thoughts.

Stumbling

There are very few things these days that bring me more joy than watching our son try to walk.  He has been walking on his own since he was 8 months old and now that I am over my fear of him falling, I could watch him amble around for hours.  I’m not sure there is anything funnier than seeing him do laps around our living room armchair, chasing after mommy, and then screaming with joy as he catches her.  I don’t even mind when I’m trying to sleep and he walks up to me and bangs a book against my head until I read it to him (you never can get enough Eric Carle).  There are days though when he gets fixated on something and walks full steam towards it, only to trip over something laying on the ground, or a spot where the carpet has bumped up. Maybe he’s caught glimpse of his “gaggie” on Skype or sees mommy in the window of the kitchen and BOOM! He just takes off, feet flying, arms waiving and before you know it, he’s on the carpet, face down and crying for comfort.

In a lot of ways, isn’t that us?  We get our eyes on a the big prize and become so focused on obtaining our goals, that when we stumble, it’s usually over something small that could have been avoided had we just taken the time to do so.   Why do we overlook the the things we forgot to put away, and end up just like my son, face down on the floor?  It is because we have forgotten that our path is not our own.  God promises to show us the way.  One of my favorite hymns (yes, I do like a few hymns though I find most of them drone and archaic) will always be Thy Word Is A Lamp Unto My Feet.   It is written as a lyrical response to Psalm 119:105:

“Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.” NIV

Why in the world would someone want to light your feet?  Wouldn’t it be much wiser to light the path ahead of you?  Why didn’t the scripture say, “Thy word is a beacon into the future?”  It’s because God knows where you are going and only wants you to be concerned with where you are.  When you start to run too fast towards the bigger picture, you candle burns out and you will surely fall.

A few weeks ago, I had my first teaming experience on the Walk to Emmaus, Loudoun Valley style.  My table mates were quick to point out that one of the biggest things they learned from the weekend is that you should take baby steps in your walk with Christ, and I couldn’t agree more.  Take your time and you will find that the steps you are taking will be lit just enough to get you there.  Put your trust that the path you are on will still be the same path whether you can see 10 feet down the road or 10 years.

A few thoughts to leave you with.  First, I get a chuckle when our son walks with a blanket over his head and is then surprised he ran into the wall.  Don’t walk with a blanket over your spiritual eyes.  Second, when you drive at night, you can only see what you need to.  You concentrate on what is going on right in front of you, not with what is going on outside of your control.  Your spiritual life should be much the same, unabated by the outside world.  Lastly, read Psalm 119:105-112 as well as Proverbs 6:23 for further encouragement on keeping your lamp light with knowledge and study.

In The Hands Of God

A couple of months back, I said that I wasn’t able to talk about being a new dad yet, but in the past month, something wonderful has changed that.  Now that my son is 8 months old, crawling, talking, and walking (although I am to call it “cruising”) I can tell you in one word what being a new dad is like:  SCARY.  Never mind the changes that all men have to go through when a newborn becomes part of a family dynamic that was running smoothly, I’m talking about the fear of watching him fall.  We’ve already had to move the coffee table, put a gate up to the kitchen, raise the blinds, move all picture frames, and move the armchair in front of the stairs to prevent climbing.  In the midst of all the rearranging of furniture, I can’t help but think about always wanting to be there when he falls.

Three weeks ago, I had the privilege of giving the children’s message at church.  I talked to them about how important our hands are.  We use them for praying, praising God, giving high fives, expressing our feelings, and of course passing the offering plates.  Possibly the most important thing we take to worship with us is one of the things we can’t take off and leave behind.  At home, I have added “catching” to the long list of uses for my hands.  As a father, I can do one of two things when our son falls.  I can rush over, pick him up, and hold him until he stops crying, or I can clap and say “YEA!!!” because if he thinks he did something good, the tears usually don’t come.  This new role for me is old news to most, especially to God.

As our father, he has done some amazing things with his hands.  He created Earth, Adam and Eve, parted the Red Sea, moved mountains, and carved out a universe.  Perhaps bigger than all that, his hands are always there to protect us in the same way I try to protect my son.  God’s hands are there to pick us up and comfort us when the bruises are deep enough to bring tears.  His hands are there to clap for us when the fall wasn’t as bad as we thought and the end result is something that makes us stronger in His eyes. 

In God’s image, Jesus’s hands were just as strong.  They took the nails for us, healed the sick, and pointed the way to Heaven (just to name a few).  “He canceled the record that contained the charges against us.  He took it and destroyed it by nailing it to Christ’s cross.” (Col. 2:14 NLT).  While I am in no way saying my hands are as strong or powerful than that of God or Jesus, I can draw a comforting conclusion that the strength in my hands to protect and comfort my son comes directly from being His son.  By using my hands more for praying, praising, and communicating love, they will only get stronger.

“Oh, the hands of Jesus. Hands of incarnation at his birth. Hands of liberation as he healed.  Hands of inspiration as he taught.  Hands of dedication as he served.  And hands of salvation as he died.”  (From:  He Chose The Nails.  by Max Lucado)