December 23, 2009
December 22, 2009
Enjoying an Imperfect Christmas
Christmas can be as frustrating as it is wonderful. While it is usually the time of year when we reunite with family and friends that we don’t get to see very often and there seems to be holiday cheer in the air it can also be a season in which the negatives are magnified as much as the positives. The problem seems to originate from the tendency we have to put too many expectations on Christmas. We build it up to something that it can’t possibly be or fulfill in our lives. The disappointments are that much more poignant at Christmas time. The phone call that never came or the person who elected to not come to the Christmas party is more painful than usual. There is the hope and the expectation that maybe, just on Christmas things will be different and sometimes they are, but sometimes they get worse because of unrealistic expectations.
And, doesn’t it seem like there is much more pressure to get the Christmas dinner right than any other dinner? Or the constant dissatisfaction with the gifts and the frustration of knowing that the person you are buying for is going to be dissatisfied. It can seem that at Christmas the lack of relationships resulting in our inability to know what each other really want is highlighted. And, how about those crowds? Most of the people waiting in line at malls don’t look like they have much holiday cheer. And last but not least is that sinking feeling on the evening of the twenty fifth that “it’s all over in a few hours.” Or the nagging question of “was it all really worth it?”
Although Christmas is certainly a season for putting on a plastic happy face it can also have the unique ability of revealing who we really are. We can see our priorities in the gifts we buy, the kind of gifts we buy, who we buy them for and who we don’t buy them for. Family gatherings also have a way of revealing to us how people really feel, especially at Christmas. “Did they show up?” “Why didn’t they show up?” “Why aren’t they talking to anybody at the party?”
At the very least, I think that all of us have experienced the disappointment of having the day of Christmas that we have planned, hoped and saved for all year arrive and dissipate faster than tinsel melting on an open fire.
Yes Christmas can be “the most wonderful time of the year” as the popular carol quips but it can also be the most frustrating time of the year. Can you imagine that as a song? “It’s the most frustrating time of the year!!!” The point is that if Christmas is just about the eggnog and fudge and gifts under the tree or even family, then it surely runs the risk of not being fulfilling. The true meaning of Christmas is much simpler but yet much more profound. It is simply about God becoming man in order to reach His people because He loves them so much. It’s about humility not hustle and bustle.
The God of the universe was born in a manger. It’s about simplicity not complexity. The story of that First Christmas was very straightforward and powerful. It was simply and majestically about Him the Kings of Kings and Lord of Lords. Without Christ, Christmas is just another day. Rejoice this year in the true reason why Christmas is so wonderful. God became one of us to be near to us and to save us because He loves us.
And, doesn’t it seem like there is much more pressure to get the Christmas dinner right than any other dinner? Or the constant dissatisfaction with the gifts and the frustration of knowing that the person you are buying for is going to be dissatisfied. It can seem that at Christmas the lack of relationships resulting in our inability to know what each other really want is highlighted. And, how about those crowds? Most of the people waiting in line at malls don’t look like they have much holiday cheer. And last but not least is that sinking feeling on the evening of the twenty fifth that “it’s all over in a few hours.” Or the nagging question of “was it all really worth it?”
Although Christmas is certainly a season for putting on a plastic happy face it can also have the unique ability of revealing who we really are. We can see our priorities in the gifts we buy, the kind of gifts we buy, who we buy them for and who we don’t buy them for. Family gatherings also have a way of revealing to us how people really feel, especially at Christmas. “Did they show up?” “Why didn’t they show up?” “Why aren’t they talking to anybody at the party?”
At the very least, I think that all of us have experienced the disappointment of having the day of Christmas that we have planned, hoped and saved for all year arrive and dissipate faster than tinsel melting on an open fire.
Yes Christmas can be “the most wonderful time of the year” as the popular carol quips but it can also be the most frustrating time of the year. Can you imagine that as a song? “It’s the most frustrating time of the year!!!” The point is that if Christmas is just about the eggnog and fudge and gifts under the tree or even family, then it surely runs the risk of not being fulfilling. The true meaning of Christmas is much simpler but yet much more profound. It is simply about God becoming man in order to reach His people because He loves them so much. It’s about humility not hustle and bustle.
The God of the universe was born in a manger. It’s about simplicity not complexity. The story of that First Christmas was very straightforward and powerful. It was simply and majestically about Him the Kings of Kings and Lord of Lords. Without Christ, Christmas is just another day. Rejoice this year in the true reason why Christmas is so wonderful. God became one of us to be near to us and to save us because He loves us.
“Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which is translated, “God with us.” Matthew 1:23
December 16, 2009
Reflections on a Christmas Wedding
Oh I love Christmas weddings. What a perfect time of the year to celebrate the union of two people becoming one. It was that first Christmas over two thousand years ago when Emmanuel (God with us) became flesh and demonstrated for the first time the ultimate union of man and God which would later be celebrated in Ephesians chapter five as a Spiritual union between Christ and His bride the church. And Paul uses the analogy of marriage to drive the point home.
As I prepare a wedding ceremony for this Saturday my heart rejoices once again at the beauty of relationships especially marriage and the significance of it in light of Christ and His church.
In April of next year my beautiful wife Marielena and I will celebrate ten years of our union. It hasn’t always been easy. In fact, there have been times when it has been down right difficult and painful, much more so for her I can guarantee you. But one of the principles that have personally strengthened me in my commitment to make things work over the years has been this idea of what marriage represents for the Christian.
Not only is it important in that it is foundational to our society and because out of it is generated the propagation of the Human race, but for the Christian, marriage is also about being a living example of Christ’s relationship with his bride the Church. So to love and cherish each other when we think of it in those terms takes on a whole new and glorious meaning. When people look at a married couple and they are able to witness the love, submission and commitment to one another they aren’t just experiencing a beautiful relationship but they are also catching a glimpse of Christ’s love and commitment to His people.
I want to take a quick look at a few verses in Ephesians chapter 5 that I believe are the most beautiful ever penned about marriage. Starting in (vs. 21):
“Submit yourselves one to another as the fear of God
The very reason why we mutually submit to one another, respect one another and love one another is because we first have submitted ourselves and our marriage to God.
Wives, show reverence for your own husbands, as unto the Lord ( vs. 22)
Wives, God have not called you to submit to every man on the planet but to submit to and to respect your own husband. God has called him to be responsible for you because he loves you. There is safety in that submission and respect. One of the greatest needs a man has is to be respected.
For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church and He is the savior of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own Husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wife, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it. (Vs. 24 and 25.)
Husbands, these are powerful words for us! We are to love our wives. The first, foremost and greatest need of a woman is to be loved. However, we are not to just casually love our wives but to give up our lives for them as Christ gave up His life for the church. We should be first to make sacrifices and lay our wants, needs and even our rights down for her when necessary.
It’s not a mistake that Paul describes our marriage relationship with Christ as an experience that is not individual but rather one which is experienced within the context of a community. I am not the bride of Christ; we are the bride of Christ. When I perform a marriage ceremony I like to take a moment to address the audience. I ask them as the witnesses of the union to also make a vow that they will not interfere with the marriage but support it and guide it. Marriages like churches exist within a larger context of community.
At any rate, I am looking forward to another opportunity to celebrate the glorious union of two people as they become one flesh in the Lord. And I am thinking about how wonderful it is during this Christmas season that God became flesh and initiated a love relationship with us as His people that culminated in us being joined to Him as His body and married to Him as His bride the Church.
November 28, 2009
Why Do We Need to Be Grateful?
By Todd Tillinghast
What do we usually think about when its thanksgiving and we are talking about being grateful and thankful? We usually think about all the events or things in our lives that have recently happened that we are thankful for.
Of course we have all been taught how important it is to be grateful even of those things that aren’t pleasant in our lives. We have memorized scriptures such as 1 thes 5:18 that tells us to “Give thanks in all things for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” And so we concentrate and focus on the importance of the “attitude of gratitude” or on being in that state of mind even if we don’t necessarily feel grateful or if there may seem to be nothing to be grateful for. In fact, it may even seem that complaining is the more appropriate response to our current set of circumstances.
Now, I certainly believe that being thankful is the correct attitude to have as Paul admonishes us throughout the New Testament (1 Thes 5:18, Col 4:2, Phil 4:6, Eph 5:20,). It is clear that gratitude and thankfulness should permeate our attitudes, conversations and prayer lives. And there is no doubt that for the child of God a continual, consistent and persistent lifestyle demonstrating this gratitude through our speech and our deeds is the only appropriate response to what God has done for us.
But as another Thanksgiving has passed and the Christmas season is upon us as a pastor I want to talk about gratitude and thankfulness in a different way. I have no desire, again this year to pontificate about all the reasons why we should be thankful because we are the most blessed nation and the most blessed generation that has ever existed. This may be true although I’m sure that all previous generations considered themselves to be the best and the most blessed as well. And I certainly do not wish to talk again about the behavior of thankfulness “The attitude of gratitude” which has almost become a Christian ritual and is most definitely a Christian cliché. It would at times seem that we talk about gratitude as something that we must do whether we understand it or not or whether we feel like it or not. In our zeal to act grateful I fear that we have missed the real reason why we should be grateful and it’s not that new car or that promotion. These are definitely things to be thankful for but they are just things. Things change, circumstances change, fortunes change and life changes. If our gratitude is based on events in our lives then it is going to be difficult to maintain the level of thankfulness that I believe Paul was talking about. There is a deeper level of gratitude that isn’t based solely on events or circumstances but is rooted in something stronger.
Maybe you feel genuinely grateful for some blessing in your life and that’s wonderful. You should feel grateful. I don’t want to take away from that at all. In fact, I rejoice with you that God has blessed you. Maybe you feel as if there is nothing in your life to be grateful for… forget the “things we are thankful for lists” just pass the mashed potatoes and gravy. But you know that gratitude and a positive attitude are expected of the Christian so you are grinning and bearing it through this thanksgiving season. I want you to know that life is sometimes difficult and sometimes the appropriate response is not gratitude but pain. We would do well as a church to weep with the wounded as much as we rejoice with the happy. I believe that what I am going to share about gratitude is for both groups of people and for those who may find themselves somewhere in between.
Why Aren’t We Grateful?
Webster defines Gratitude as: A feeling of thankful appreciation for favors received. This definition is very telling and may clue us in as to why we may struggle sometimes with genuine gratitude. I believe that there are three major reasons why we struggle with gratitude in our lives.
1. We don’t really believe that life is a gift.
We cannot be authentically grateful on a fundamental level if we don’t believe that we have received favors in life. Now we understand that when we receive a gift it us a blessing and it is usually given whether we deserve it or not. If it is a true gift then there is no expectation of reciprocation. And for this, a true gift, our natural response is gratitude and thankfulness. But on an everyday basis we don’t typically see our everyday lives as gifts. If you are like me you don’t naturally look at life or anything in it as a gift. My focus is usually on what I have to accomplish, achieving my dreams and getting what I think I am entitled to. Gratitude is difficult for us forward thinkers who are always looking to the future, preparing and planning ahead for tomorrow. Subsequently, gratitude involves looking back at the past at what has already happened and being thankful for it. My natural posture is not one of gratitude. I habitually operate under the flawed assumption that everything that I have came from my own hands. Nothing is free in this life. I can have anything I want as long as I work hard enough to get it. From the sweat of my brow I will form and fashion the life that I deserve. This kind of thinking does not take into account how many things we have and enjoy on a daily basis that we had nothing to do with. We didn’t supply ourselves with everything we have and to believe so is pure arrogance on our part. Think about all of the things that happen every day and in our lives in general that can be characterized as nothing less than free favors given to us by God:
• The rising sun in the morning
• The air you are currently breathing
• Biological life
• The fact that you woke up this morning
• The rotation of the earth
• The location of the earth in the galaxy in relation to the sun
• The day you were born
• The gravity that holds everything together
And of course the list could go on and on and on. If any of these things were changed or altered in the most minute fashion life as we know it would seize to exist. We spend so much energy and time looking for a reason to be grateful when there are so many reasons readily available every day, in fact every minute of every day.
2. We are afraid that being grateful is synonymous with settling for less.
We aren't often thankful in the moment because we may feel that when we are we are settling for less or surrendering. So often we withhold our gratitude until we achieve what we think we are capable of. The sentiment seems to be that if we are thankful for the present then we are selling ourselves short and that somehow the pursuit for excellence must end. But I would argue that being grateful for now, the present, for what we have today is not surrendering or selling yourself short. Quite to the contrary it empowers us to be more effective and more productive because it has a tendency to take away anxiety and release us into joy which is essential to our success in life. Gratitude also takes our focus off ourselves and being self focused is debilitating to personal success.
3. We are too proud to receive blessings.
To be grateful is to place ourselves voluntarily on the receiving end of a blessing. In order to do this it takes humility and a conscious release of control. The Bible admonishes us that it is better to give than to receive yet receiving connotes a weakness that most of us are uncomfortable with. We have no problem being the giver or the one doing the blessing but receiving can often agitate our pride.
Two levels of Gratitude
1. Contrived Gratitude
This is the kind of gratitude that we muster up within ourselves to make ourselves feel better. This is not genuine gratitude. All of us are trained from the time we are children to say please and thank you. We do this habitually. It is a socially accepted and expected response. But do we really understand why we are even saying thank you in most of these contexts?
When I was a child my mother would tell me to eat all of my vegetables and be grateful for them. It was also understood that I would not get any desert if I did not eat my vegetables with a smile on my face and say thank you because my mother worked hard to cook those vegetables and there were starving children in Africa who had nothing to eat. I always thought and wanted to reply, “Let’s send them this food then they won’t be starving.” So it dawned on me that if I wanted to get what I wanted…desert… then I could use gratitude to get it. So I would choke those disgusting greens down with a forced smile upon my face and looking at my Mother with puppy dog eyes say.. “Thank you Mom, may I have my desert now.”
Now I am sure that you had many similar experiences. What happens is we learn to fake gratitude in order to get what we want or to be socially acceptable. I’m sure that there isn’t one of us that has not said thank you for the gift we didn’t like or the dinner that tasted like tree bark. This is contrived gratitude.
Often times when we are feeling down we rev ourselves up in a personal pep rally in order to feel better. We inject gratitude into our lives as an antidote to the poison of negativity or depression. We say things like:
Thank God I’m not like that guy
Thank God that I didn’t loose my job like she did
Thank God I still have my arms and legs
Thank God I’m not in a hospital bed
There are a couple of problems with this approach to gratitude. Firstly, when we use gratitude in this way we are like the publican who in Luke 18:11 thanked God for not being like other “sinners.” He then went on in the following verse to outline all the wonderful things that he did. This was not pleasing to God then and it is not pleasing to Him now when it comes from our lips. It is competitive and arrogant on our part to hide behind the false guise of gratitude in order to lift ourselves above others.
The second problem with contrived gratitude is that it may work for today but what will happen when we are the one who lost their job or we are the one who is sick? Then we will most assuredly be singing a different song.
Contrived gratitude, though it is often where most of us are in terms of thankfulness, really isn’t gratitude at all.
2. Responsive Gratitude.
Responsive gratitude is the higher level of gratitude because it is generated by a genuine response to what God has given us today. It is the utter acceptance and thankfulness of what we have right now, and the ultimate realization that most of the time our blessings are a result of free favors given to us by our God for which we had nothing to do with. Responsive gratitude is the result of a heart that is consistently aware of and connected to its own blessedness. There is so much we have to be grateful for.
How do we cultivate responsive gratitude?
1. Don’t focus on gratitude, focus on your blessings.
Don’t use gratitude as a means to an end or a weapon to combat negativity in your life. Allow gratitude to be the natural response to an ever increasing awareness of the blessings that surround and permeate your life every day.
2. Be proactive.
Don’t wait until you are depressed to activate gratitude. Don’t wait until someone does something for you to decide to be grateful. Determine to be grateful now. When you wake up in the morning thank God for the day, life and all of the things that are given to us free of charge. Meditate on these things every day. The result will be true gratitude which will produce true joy.
November 9, 2009
Adventure in the Mountains: Surprised by Suffering by Todd
We just returned from the wettest, muddiest, sloppiest and most dangerous experience I have ever had on a short term mission’s trip. For the third time in the last two months we trekked up high into the mountains of an interior province in Panama to a village called Los Machos. On our first trip God enabled us to plant a church with thirty new believers that had surrendered their lives to Christ while we were there. On our second trip we took bibles to this new group of believers. On this trip we took ten people with us from our church in Panama City to continue to work with the people of the village.
I have been on many short term mission trips and they all have their share of difficulties and discomforts. But this one was unique in that aspect. It wasn’t necessarily that it was more difficult, physically speaking, than any other trip but it was more challenging in a specific way.
As with most of these trips a theme began to form on the first day. All of us became aware of something very specific that God was trying to teach us and it became clear that He was going to manufacture events throughout the trip to drive the point home in each of our hearts.
On the second day we were there one of our team members shared a devotional in which he took us to 1st Peter chapter 4 vs 12 and 13. The idea here, which he communicated well, is that we shouldn't be surprised by suffering and difficulties. But yet we are. We always are surprised.
The first day as we neared the village we suddenly stopped at a home that was about a mile short of the place that we were going to be staying. This surprised me. Especially given the fact that there were three steep hills to climb yet and we had fourteen five gallon water bottles as well as three very heavy crates and a gas generator to carry not to mention all of our personal bags. I have been on enough of these trips to know that stopping meant that the trucks could not go any further and that we would have to walk the rest of the way carrying all of our luggage and equipment. Yet I was still surprised. It also surprised me when the drivers of the trucks could not be talked into accepting less than the agreed upon price due to the fact that they didn't take us to the agreed upon destination.
What happened next shouldn't have surprised me but it did. As soon as we started up the hill it began to rain. So now not only did we have to navigate the steepness of the hill but we had to deal with the slickness of the mud. After getting thoroughly soaked and quite muddy we finally were settled into our camp about two hours later.
The rest of the night was quite uneventful as we had a team meeting and ate dinner in the dark before turning into our tents for an early night as we were all exhausted from a combination of a very early start (3:00 A.M.) and the days arduous events. It rained steadily throughout the night. When we awoke the next morning, the weather was quite pleasant. The sun could be seen to the east piercing through the clouds trying to make a comeback. We all got up and got dressed and had some personal prayer time with the Lord and then we had another team meeting which consisted of some singing and devotions as well as preparatory training for the day of ministry. During all of this it didn't rain. I was beginning to feel hopeful. Then as we were almost ready to leave the camp and the shelter of a roof it began to rain. Now I cannot speak for anyone else but once again, I was surprised.
This pattern continued throughout the four days that we were there. The times that we were under shelter or in our tents the rain would slow down or stop but when we came out into the open it would literally pour. This constant deluge made it difficult for us to accomplish what we came there to do. We had a soccer clinic planned but due to the continuous rain we had to hold the clinic in a building that had a roof but no walls. This was the same place where we planned to show the Jesus film at night. After the kids came to the soccer clinic (there were considerably less than we thought there would be due to the rain) we had to clean the muddy mess up as best we could using tree branches as brooms. Then as we prepared to show the film the rain began to come down harder then it had thus far. And the wind began to blow. Suffice it say, less people came to the presentation than we expected. Once again, our best laid plans were being challenged.
On the day that we left, the sun came out in the morning and it cleared up as much as it had at any time since we arrived. The sky actually stayed clear and sunny until almost noon. Then suddenly as we started packing up our gear we could see the clouds scurry into position as fast as they could in order to dump their contents upon us at the exact time that we began to climb back down the steep hill in order to meet the trucks where they had dropped us off. You may be able to guess by now that this surprised and annoyed me. I was still somewhat surprised when only one truck showed up to carry all twelve of us and all of our gear down the muddy hill. I was surprised but lacked the strength to protest. So we loaded all of our thou roughly soaked gear and personal bags onto the truck and we all piled quite precariously on top of the gear and started our trek down the hill.
Now I want to pause to make sure that you envision this correctly in your mind. We were camped at about 5,000 feet above sea level. Now we were making our way down an extremely steep hill which bordered extremely deep cliffs and which contained large ruts filled with mud in an overloaded pick up truck. At this point surprise or even frustration gave way to fear!!! I could literally feel the truck sliding in the mud as it regularly lost traction on the road and we veered dangerously close to the cliff. During all of this our faithful friend the rain made it’s presence known in sheets. All of these circumstances did not seem to impress upon the driver the need to drive any slower or more cautiously than he would if it was a perfectly clear day.
When we arrived at the bottom of the mountain where we were supposed to cross the river it became increasingly apparent to all of us that crossing the river was not an option. The river had quadrupled in size and velocity from four days earlier when we first crossed it. After checking another crossing point that was completely flooded as well we suddenly stopped in front of a swinging wooden bridged perched about twenty feet above the raging river. The driver calmly got out and told us to leave the equipment in the truck and get out. His plan was for us to cross the bridge while he tried to cross the river somewhere else. This we did with much trepidation as the bridge shacked and shimmied beneath our feet.
Much to our surprise the truck with all of our equipment met us at the other side of the bridge just after the last of our party crossed it. He had actually crossed the river. The mud and watermarks streaked across the windows of the cab. I don’t even want to know how he did it. At this point the other truck joined us and we all piled into it. As we drove down the rest of the way on terrain that was much more stable I began to sense God’s guiding hand through all of this. We later found out that rumblings were going throughout the village that we should have never made it, down the mountain or across the river. Wow! God delivered us once again. But is that all He wanted to teach us was that he could deliver us? For me there was more to learn.
I have been on many short term mission trips and they all have their share of difficulties and discomforts. But this one was unique in that aspect. It wasn’t necessarily that it was more difficult, physically speaking, than any other trip but it was more challenging in a specific way.
As with most of these trips a theme began to form on the first day. All of us became aware of something very specific that God was trying to teach us and it became clear that He was going to manufacture events throughout the trip to drive the point home in each of our hearts.
On the second day we were there one of our team members shared a devotional in which he took us to 1st Peter chapter 4 vs 12 and 13. The idea here, which he communicated well, is that we shouldn't be surprised by suffering and difficulties. But yet we are. We always are surprised.
The first day as we neared the village we suddenly stopped at a home that was about a mile short of the place that we were going to be staying. This surprised me. Especially given the fact that there were three steep hills to climb yet and we had fourteen five gallon water bottles as well as three very heavy crates and a gas generator to carry not to mention all of our personal bags. I have been on enough of these trips to know that stopping meant that the trucks could not go any further and that we would have to walk the rest of the way carrying all of our luggage and equipment. Yet I was still surprised. It also surprised me when the drivers of the trucks could not be talked into accepting less than the agreed upon price due to the fact that they didn't take us to the agreed upon destination.
What happened next shouldn't have surprised me but it did. As soon as we started up the hill it began to rain. So now not only did we have to navigate the steepness of the hill but we had to deal with the slickness of the mud. After getting thoroughly soaked and quite muddy we finally were settled into our camp about two hours later.
The rest of the night was quite uneventful as we had a team meeting and ate dinner in the dark before turning into our tents for an early night as we were all exhausted from a combination of a very early start (3:00 A.M.) and the days arduous events. It rained steadily throughout the night. When we awoke the next morning, the weather was quite pleasant. The sun could be seen to the east piercing through the clouds trying to make a comeback. We all got up and got dressed and had some personal prayer time with the Lord and then we had another team meeting which consisted of some singing and devotions as well as preparatory training for the day of ministry. During all of this it didn't rain. I was beginning to feel hopeful. Then as we were almost ready to leave the camp and the shelter of a roof it began to rain. Now I cannot speak for anyone else but once again, I was surprised.
This pattern continued throughout the four days that we were there. The times that we were under shelter or in our tents the rain would slow down or stop but when we came out into the open it would literally pour. This constant deluge made it difficult for us to accomplish what we came there to do. We had a soccer clinic planned but due to the continuous rain we had to hold the clinic in a building that had a roof but no walls. This was the same place where we planned to show the Jesus film at night. After the kids came to the soccer clinic (there were considerably less than we thought there would be due to the rain) we had to clean the muddy mess up as best we could using tree branches as brooms. Then as we prepared to show the film the rain began to come down harder then it had thus far. And the wind began to blow. Suffice it say, less people came to the presentation than we expected. Once again, our best laid plans were being challenged.
On the day that we left, the sun came out in the morning and it cleared up as much as it had at any time since we arrived. The sky actually stayed clear and sunny until almost noon. Then suddenly as we started packing up our gear we could see the clouds scurry into position as fast as they could in order to dump their contents upon us at the exact time that we began to climb back down the steep hill in order to meet the trucks where they had dropped us off. You may be able to guess by now that this surprised and annoyed me. I was still somewhat surprised when only one truck showed up to carry all twelve of us and all of our gear down the muddy hill. I was surprised but lacked the strength to protest. So we loaded all of our thou roughly soaked gear and personal bags onto the truck and we all piled quite precariously on top of the gear and started our trek down the hill.
Now I want to pause to make sure that you envision this correctly in your mind. We were camped at about 5,000 feet above sea level. Now we were making our way down an extremely steep hill which bordered extremely deep cliffs and which contained large ruts filled with mud in an overloaded pick up truck. At this point surprise or even frustration gave way to fear!!! I could literally feel the truck sliding in the mud as it regularly lost traction on the road and we veered dangerously close to the cliff. During all of this our faithful friend the rain made it’s presence known in sheets. All of these circumstances did not seem to impress upon the driver the need to drive any slower or more cautiously than he would if it was a perfectly clear day.
When we arrived at the bottom of the mountain where we were supposed to cross the river it became increasingly apparent to all of us that crossing the river was not an option. The river had quadrupled in size and velocity from four days earlier when we first crossed it. After checking another crossing point that was completely flooded as well we suddenly stopped in front of a swinging wooden bridged perched about twenty feet above the raging river. The driver calmly got out and told us to leave the equipment in the truck and get out. His plan was for us to cross the bridge while he tried to cross the river somewhere else. This we did with much trepidation as the bridge shacked and shimmied beneath our feet.
Much to our surprise the truck with all of our equipment met us at the other side of the bridge just after the last of our party crossed it. He had actually crossed the river. The mud and watermarks streaked across the windows of the cab. I don’t even want to know how he did it. At this point the other truck joined us and we all piled into it. As we drove down the rest of the way on terrain that was much more stable I began to sense God’s guiding hand through all of this. We later found out that rumblings were going throughout the village that we should have never made it, down the mountain or across the river. Wow! God delivered us once again. But is that all He wanted to teach us was that he could deliver us? For me there was more to learn.
November 1, 2009
October 26, 2009
Celebrating Community
Yesterday was a beautiful, sunny day in Panama. After our church service in the morning several of our members joined together to play soccer in the field near our home. It was one of those days that seem to last forever. The fellowship was exquisite as we enjoyed each other's company within a great context.
The day was a great example of the completeness of what it means to be the body of Christ. In one day we encapsulated much of what the church is called by God to engage in according to Hebrews 10:24 and 25. We assembled together, we exhorted each other, we considered one another and we stirred up love and good works amongst ourselves and we had fun doing it. yes we heard the word preached as I brought a message on the deceitfulness of the heart (not such a fun subject I think you'll agree) but we did it together and we fellowshipped together after words. I beleive the saying that says the family that prays together stays together. But I also beleive that it is the family that plays together that stays together. As a church we are a family.
We call our church La Comunidad or The Community. I beleive very strongly that as a church, our churh, the Church, any church is a Body, a Family and a Community. It's not one of these expressions but all of them working in tandem. We are a body according to Eph chapter 4:16 which is indicative of the fact that we are alive, an organizm that is organized not an orginization and that we each have a role to play as the uniquiue individual parts of the body. We are a family (RM 8:14-17 and 29)thus reflecting our commitment to one another as brothers and sisters. And we are a community, which provides the context for living all of these principles out not only within the four walls of the church but within and as a part of the greater community at large.
So for me, yesterday was a picture of these things moving and operating in reality not just existing in theory. We worshiped together and then learned about His word together. then we ate hot dogs and sharpened each other. Then we went out into our community and played soccer. A few people came that were not Christians from the community or who were invited by someone from the church.
So, even though my soccer playing skills left much to be desired (and I almost threw those hot dogs up several times)I went to sleep last night with a profound sense of satisfaction that for once on a Sunday we didn't just do church but we were the Church.
The day was a great example of the completeness of what it means to be the body of Christ. In one day we encapsulated much of what the church is called by God to engage in according to Hebrews 10:24 and 25. We assembled together, we exhorted each other, we considered one another and we stirred up love and good works amongst ourselves and we had fun doing it. yes we heard the word preached as I brought a message on the deceitfulness of the heart (not such a fun subject I think you'll agree) but we did it together and we fellowshipped together after words. I beleive the saying that says the family that prays together stays together. But I also beleive that it is the family that plays together that stays together. As a church we are a family.
We call our church La Comunidad or The Community. I beleive very strongly that as a church, our churh, the Church, any church is a Body, a Family and a Community. It's not one of these expressions but all of them working in tandem. We are a body according to Eph chapter 4:16 which is indicative of the fact that we are alive, an organizm that is organized not an orginization and that we each have a role to play as the uniquiue individual parts of the body. We are a family (RM 8:14-17 and 29)thus reflecting our commitment to one another as brothers and sisters. And we are a community, which provides the context for living all of these principles out not only within the four walls of the church but within and as a part of the greater community at large.
So for me, yesterday was a picture of these things moving and operating in reality not just existing in theory. We worshiped together and then learned about His word together. then we ate hot dogs and sharpened each other. Then we went out into our community and played soccer. A few people came that were not Christians from the community or who were invited by someone from the church.
So, even though my soccer playing skills left much to be desired (and I almost threw those hot dogs up several times)I went to sleep last night with a profound sense of satisfaction that for once on a Sunday we didn't just do church but we were the Church.
September 15, 2009
April 30, 2009
March 6, 2009
February 13, 2009
Going Deeper In Relationships part 4
Ok, Here's the last installment in this series on relationships. Have a great Valentines Day tomorrow and remember to try to really connect to the people in your life. Here's some ways that I believe can help us do that.
HOW DO WE GO DEEPER?
1. GO DEEPER INTO YOURSELF FIRST.
Self analysis is where going deeper in our relationships begins. What is there inside of me that is preventing me from going deeper in my relationships? What roadblocks are keeping me from opening up and letting people in? What is holding me back from being real with people? These are the self analytical questions that will form the foundation of your relationship building process.
There’s an old saying that I’m sure you’ve heard before… “ People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Do you and I genuinely care about people or do we really just want them to care about us and meet our needs? Do we truly love people or do we just want them to measure up to our standards? It’s easy for all of us to inadvertently use people to define us, approve of us and meet our needs. This is manipulation not true relationship.
Here are some more questions to ponder:
Are we only comfortable around people who are like us or who share certain common interests?
Do we constantly surround ourselves with people who make us feel good about ourselves?
Do we have certain requirements that we have already predetermined in our minds that we apply to whether or not we are going to like a certain person? For instance:
I like hyper people.
I don’t like hyper people.
I don’t get along with introverts.
I hate control freaks.
People have to make me laugh to be good friends with me.
Usually we are our own worst enemies when it comes to developing deep relationships. Nobody can measure up to our endless and impossible standards. We have to be able to recognize that we do this on a subconscious level on purpose to keep people at arms length. We must recognize our own self sabotaging. We need to embrace the reality that we are afraid of deep relationships. It’s imperative that we deal with the fears in our own lives first.
How do you view people? Are people a means to end for you? Do you endlessly seek people’s approval? Do people’s opinions of you define who you are?
We have to truly ask ourselves who our source is. Is it God or other people? People were not meant to be your source. Only God can fulfill that role in your life. If we are getting our deep emotional needs for identity, approval and definition met by God then we don’t have to try to get that from others. Other people can’t give it to you anyway because they don’t have that ability. So when we are putting those kinds of expectations and pressure on relationships it’s no wonder they crumble and cannot go deep.
PEOPLE CANNOT MEET OUR DEEPEST NEEDS!!!! It’s that simple. Write it down. People meet needs in our lives but our deep needs are only and can only be met by God.
Are we spending time with God? Are we in His word? Are we allowing His Holy Spirit to define us and give us our identity?
In many of our relationships we stay on the surface levels of role playing and expectations. This is what I call the “shoulds.” There is the way it is and the way it should be and the way it is wins every time. The way it is, is reality, the way it should be is fantasy. In fact, when the way it should be comes to pass it is no longer a should but a reality so in reality “shoulds” are never reality.
She’s my wife so she should do this or be this way.
He’s my leader he should be this way or do these things or talk like this.
She’s my daughter and she should do these things or those things.
We sacrifice real deep relationships for the illusion of relationship which is role playing. Doing all the things we are supposed to do socially or culturally and expecting everyone to keep playing those roles instead of trying to discover who someone really is and why they are the way they are.
When we are able to stop trying to make people into our own molds and we stop trying to get our needs met from others then we can truly go deeper in our relationships. Depth in our relationships becomes a discovery that we share together. Getting to know each other, being there for each other and experiencing life together not using each other, or judging each other but really truly loving each other.
2. Listen More, Speak less.
Did you ever wonder why God gave us two ears and only one mouth? Because we should listen more than we should speak. I’m not talking about the appearance of listening or relying on gimmicks to give the impression of listening but genuinely listening. Not thinking about the next thing you are going to say or wondering when the conversation will turn back to you but really just listening.
Since I have been living in Panama in a new culture learning my second language (Spanish) I have been forced to listen in order to understand. This goes against my nature. It’s not easy for me.
David Augsburger said “Being heard is so close to being loved that for the average person, they are almost indistinguishable.”
Proverbs 10:19 “In a multitude of words sin is not lacking but he who restrains his lips is wise.”
Proverbs 4:7 says, “wisdom is the principal thing therefore get wisdom and in all your getting get understanding.” Do we listen to understand or just so that we can answer? Do we try to understand the deeper roots underneath why people act the way they do? Do we try to understand who they are?
3. DEEP RELATIONSHIPS TAKE TIME TO DEVELOP
“The time you invest to deeply understand the people you love brings tremendous dividends in open communication. Many of the problems that plague families and marriages simply don’t have time to fester and develop.” Steven Covey in “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”
Deep relationships happen they cannot be fabricated. We need to pro actively take an approach to relationships in which we create opportunities for going deeper to occur. You cannot force, fabricate or fake deep moments. They have to happen on their own as a result of time invested as well as attention, care and trust applied. When two people know that they can trust each other and they know that the other person cares then depth occurs.
This is difficult. It’s easier to stay on the surface. We have our face book pals that we only have face value or surface level relationships with. We text all day long and really don’t say anything of depth about ourselves or ask anything of depth about others because it is easier and more comfortable not to. It doesn’t take as much time and most importantly there is no risk of rejection. But we have to get real and face the fact that these are not authentic relationships. They are pseudo relationships.
Are you too busy to have deep relationships? Are you too busy doing things with people and “having fun” that you don’t have time to really know people in your life and to be known? Real deep relationships take time to develop. You can’t generate them out of thin air.
We can get like this in the church can’t we? We can become so program oriented and activity driven that we do all these things together and we talk about all the things we do together but we don’t talk to each other. We don’t talk about ourselves to each other. We don’t talk about anything deep. We talk about our shared experiences. We talk about movies or politics or shared interests but we don’t talk about who we are or how we feel about much of anything.
Husband’s (I am a husband this includes me) when was the last time you took your wife out to dinner or had a quiet evening at home with her and really talked to her and listened to her and talked about each other? I’m not talking about just doing a date night because if you really don’t have anything to say to each other then date nights become obligatory and routine. I’m talking about talking about…not your job, not even the kids but her and You!!! And all the ladies said amen!!! That sounds scary doesn’t it? Especially as men we don’t know what to say to our wives half the time.
We need to create time for deep relationships. Have you ever called a friend and said let’s go out to eat just you and me? With no special reason, event, context or activity but just to be together and talk?
4. Ask better questions to go deeper.
Now that you have set aside some time to build relationship and you are in your non scripted, non event oriented environment, what do you say? This can be a bit tricky. Ask people questions. Get them talking about themselves but at a certain point ask them things like…
• How does that make you feel?
• What is that like?
• Tell me more about that.
• That must be very difficult for you.
• What is your opinion about this or that.
We have to be careful not to do this in an evasive or inappropriate way. You have to be comfortable with people first and they have to be comfortable with you. We are talking about going deeper with the relationships that we already have.
5. BE INTENTIONAL
If we want deep relationships then we have to initiate the process. If we want to be understood then we have to first be a person who seeks to understand others. If we want to be known then we have to show interest in knowing others. If we want friends then we have to be a friend. If we can forget about ourselves long enough to truly care about and know someone else then we have already taken the first step into deeper relationships. It’s not all about us.
Start today with the people who are already in your life. Start by asking deeper questions, creating more time, making sure your motives are right, spending more time with God so that you do not need to try to get your needs met from others. It starts with you making a decision to go deeper.
WHO DO YOU PURSUE DEEP RELATIONSHIPS WITH?
Not everyone. I’m not advocating that you should try to develop deep relationships with fifty people or that you need to have this level of depth with everyone you know. There are some people in our lives that we need to be a certain thing to a teacher or a mentor or an acquaintance. There are some natural limitations to who you can go deep with. Many people aren’t ready. Also, unless you are married I would not suggest trying to go deeper in your relationships with someone of the opposite sex. I have heard people say that you are lucky if you have one true friend you’re entire life. I think that in many cases that is true but I do not think we need to settle for that. If we are intentional and proactive we should be trying to go as deep as we can with as many appropriate relationships that we have.
There are the obvious ones, husbands and wives, parents and children. When it comes to friends it is not always as clear. Pray and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you in this endeavor. Ask God to bring people into your life with whom you can have this level of relationship. Ask God to lead you as you are with various people. What stage are they at? What stage are you at?
I do believe that we can go deeper with everyone to some extent. Not everyone can be your best friend but we can get more serious about our relationships and go deeper than our current level with just about everyone in our lives.
Don’t just settle for the illusion or the appearance of deep relationships. Don’t be afraid to lock arms with the people in your lives. Not just hold hands but lock arms. Let’s make a commitment in our hearts to go deeper.
HOW DO WE GO DEEPER?
1. GO DEEPER INTO YOURSELF FIRST.
Self analysis is where going deeper in our relationships begins. What is there inside of me that is preventing me from going deeper in my relationships? What roadblocks are keeping me from opening up and letting people in? What is holding me back from being real with people? These are the self analytical questions that will form the foundation of your relationship building process.
There’s an old saying that I’m sure you’ve heard before… “ People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Do you and I genuinely care about people or do we really just want them to care about us and meet our needs? Do we truly love people or do we just want them to measure up to our standards? It’s easy for all of us to inadvertently use people to define us, approve of us and meet our needs. This is manipulation not true relationship.
Here are some more questions to ponder:
Are we only comfortable around people who are like us or who share certain common interests?
Do we constantly surround ourselves with people who make us feel good about ourselves?
Do we have certain requirements that we have already predetermined in our minds that we apply to whether or not we are going to like a certain person? For instance:
I like hyper people.
I don’t like hyper people.
I don’t get along with introverts.
I hate control freaks.
People have to make me laugh to be good friends with me.
Usually we are our own worst enemies when it comes to developing deep relationships. Nobody can measure up to our endless and impossible standards. We have to be able to recognize that we do this on a subconscious level on purpose to keep people at arms length. We must recognize our own self sabotaging. We need to embrace the reality that we are afraid of deep relationships. It’s imperative that we deal with the fears in our own lives first.
How do you view people? Are people a means to end for you? Do you endlessly seek people’s approval? Do people’s opinions of you define who you are?
We have to truly ask ourselves who our source is. Is it God or other people? People were not meant to be your source. Only God can fulfill that role in your life. If we are getting our deep emotional needs for identity, approval and definition met by God then we don’t have to try to get that from others. Other people can’t give it to you anyway because they don’t have that ability. So when we are putting those kinds of expectations and pressure on relationships it’s no wonder they crumble and cannot go deep.
PEOPLE CANNOT MEET OUR DEEPEST NEEDS!!!! It’s that simple. Write it down. People meet needs in our lives but our deep needs are only and can only be met by God.
Are we spending time with God? Are we in His word? Are we allowing His Holy Spirit to define us and give us our identity?
In many of our relationships we stay on the surface levels of role playing and expectations. This is what I call the “shoulds.” There is the way it is and the way it should be and the way it is wins every time. The way it is, is reality, the way it should be is fantasy. In fact, when the way it should be comes to pass it is no longer a should but a reality so in reality “shoulds” are never reality.
She’s my wife so she should do this or be this way.
He’s my leader he should be this way or do these things or talk like this.
She’s my daughter and she should do these things or those things.
We sacrifice real deep relationships for the illusion of relationship which is role playing. Doing all the things we are supposed to do socially or culturally and expecting everyone to keep playing those roles instead of trying to discover who someone really is and why they are the way they are.
When we are able to stop trying to make people into our own molds and we stop trying to get our needs met from others then we can truly go deeper in our relationships. Depth in our relationships becomes a discovery that we share together. Getting to know each other, being there for each other and experiencing life together not using each other, or judging each other but really truly loving each other.
2. Listen More, Speak less.
Did you ever wonder why God gave us two ears and only one mouth? Because we should listen more than we should speak. I’m not talking about the appearance of listening or relying on gimmicks to give the impression of listening but genuinely listening. Not thinking about the next thing you are going to say or wondering when the conversation will turn back to you but really just listening.
Since I have been living in Panama in a new culture learning my second language (Spanish) I have been forced to listen in order to understand. This goes against my nature. It’s not easy for me.
David Augsburger said “Being heard is so close to being loved that for the average person, they are almost indistinguishable.”
Proverbs 10:19 “In a multitude of words sin is not lacking but he who restrains his lips is wise.”
Proverbs 4:7 says, “wisdom is the principal thing therefore get wisdom and in all your getting get understanding.” Do we listen to understand or just so that we can answer? Do we try to understand the deeper roots underneath why people act the way they do? Do we try to understand who they are?
3. DEEP RELATIONSHIPS TAKE TIME TO DEVELOP
“The time you invest to deeply understand the people you love brings tremendous dividends in open communication. Many of the problems that plague families and marriages simply don’t have time to fester and develop.” Steven Covey in “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”
Deep relationships happen they cannot be fabricated. We need to pro actively take an approach to relationships in which we create opportunities for going deeper to occur. You cannot force, fabricate or fake deep moments. They have to happen on their own as a result of time invested as well as attention, care and trust applied. When two people know that they can trust each other and they know that the other person cares then depth occurs.
This is difficult. It’s easier to stay on the surface. We have our face book pals that we only have face value or surface level relationships with. We text all day long and really don’t say anything of depth about ourselves or ask anything of depth about others because it is easier and more comfortable not to. It doesn’t take as much time and most importantly there is no risk of rejection. But we have to get real and face the fact that these are not authentic relationships. They are pseudo relationships.
Are you too busy to have deep relationships? Are you too busy doing things with people and “having fun” that you don’t have time to really know people in your life and to be known? Real deep relationships take time to develop. You can’t generate them out of thin air.
We can get like this in the church can’t we? We can become so program oriented and activity driven that we do all these things together and we talk about all the things we do together but we don’t talk to each other. We don’t talk about ourselves to each other. We don’t talk about anything deep. We talk about our shared experiences. We talk about movies or politics or shared interests but we don’t talk about who we are or how we feel about much of anything.
Husband’s (I am a husband this includes me) when was the last time you took your wife out to dinner or had a quiet evening at home with her and really talked to her and listened to her and talked about each other? I’m not talking about just doing a date night because if you really don’t have anything to say to each other then date nights become obligatory and routine. I’m talking about talking about…not your job, not even the kids but her and You!!! And all the ladies said amen!!! That sounds scary doesn’t it? Especially as men we don’t know what to say to our wives half the time.
We need to create time for deep relationships. Have you ever called a friend and said let’s go out to eat just you and me? With no special reason, event, context or activity but just to be together and talk?
4. Ask better questions to go deeper.
Now that you have set aside some time to build relationship and you are in your non scripted, non event oriented environment, what do you say? This can be a bit tricky. Ask people questions. Get them talking about themselves but at a certain point ask them things like…
• How does that make you feel?
• What is that like?
• Tell me more about that.
• That must be very difficult for you.
• What is your opinion about this or that.
We have to be careful not to do this in an evasive or inappropriate way. You have to be comfortable with people first and they have to be comfortable with you. We are talking about going deeper with the relationships that we already have.
5. BE INTENTIONAL
If we want deep relationships then we have to initiate the process. If we want to be understood then we have to first be a person who seeks to understand others. If we want to be known then we have to show interest in knowing others. If we want friends then we have to be a friend. If we can forget about ourselves long enough to truly care about and know someone else then we have already taken the first step into deeper relationships. It’s not all about us.
Start today with the people who are already in your life. Start by asking deeper questions, creating more time, making sure your motives are right, spending more time with God so that you do not need to try to get your needs met from others. It starts with you making a decision to go deeper.
WHO DO YOU PURSUE DEEP RELATIONSHIPS WITH?
Not everyone. I’m not advocating that you should try to develop deep relationships with fifty people or that you need to have this level of depth with everyone you know. There are some people in our lives that we need to be a certain thing to a teacher or a mentor or an acquaintance. There are some natural limitations to who you can go deep with. Many people aren’t ready. Also, unless you are married I would not suggest trying to go deeper in your relationships with someone of the opposite sex. I have heard people say that you are lucky if you have one true friend you’re entire life. I think that in many cases that is true but I do not think we need to settle for that. If we are intentional and proactive we should be trying to go as deep as we can with as many appropriate relationships that we have.
There are the obvious ones, husbands and wives, parents and children. When it comes to friends it is not always as clear. Pray and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you in this endeavor. Ask God to bring people into your life with whom you can have this level of relationship. Ask God to lead you as you are with various people. What stage are they at? What stage are you at?
I do believe that we can go deeper with everyone to some extent. Not everyone can be your best friend but we can get more serious about our relationships and go deeper than our current level with just about everyone in our lives.
Don’t just settle for the illusion or the appearance of deep relationships. Don’t be afraid to lock arms with the people in your lives. Not just hold hands but lock arms. Let’s make a commitment in our hearts to go deeper.
February 12, 2009
Going Deeper In Relationships part 3
You know here in Panama Valentines day is not just the celebration of Romantic relationships. The holiday here is called "Dia Del Amor y La Amistad" which means day of love and friendship. I thought that was interesting as in the states the day has become a commercial giant focused mainly on Romance. While romance is certainly important in a marriage relationship a strong marriage cannot exist on romance alone. Part of what I want to discuss in this blog is the importance of friendship as the foundation and stuffing of every successfully deep relationship.
THE VALUE OF FRIENDSHIPS
Godly friendships are the most valuable thing on this planet second to our relationship with God. Every relationship is at it’s best when it becomes a friendship. Friendship is the essence of deep relationships.
When my wife and I first got married we didn’t know each other that well and we did not have time to develop a friendship first. So not only were we from different cultures and speak different languages (Marielena is Panamanian) but we also were not friends first. The first couple of years of our marriage were difficult to say the least. It’s still hard and to be honest it’s only by the grace of God that we are still together. But success has come in our relationship when we have put away the “should’s” about what a wife "should" be or what a husband "should" be and we just “be” friends.
You "go" deeper. You do not push for depth and you cannot fabricate depth in relationships. The deep things are already there inside of you, the other person, the word of God, life itself and truth. Depth is already there. Going deeper in our relationships entails plunging those depths with another person not trying to create some kind of false depth. Deep relationships are like going scuba diving with another person, going beneath the surface and discovering together.
WHAT ARE WE AFRAID OF?
The first step to going deeper is admitting to ourselves the embarrassing reality that we are afraid to go deeper in our relationships. It doesn’t matter what your temperament or personality or culture is you as a Human being are afraid of deep relationships. You may be a people person or even the life of the party but you are inherently, in your Human nature, still afraid of deep relationships.
It’s like the child who is afraid to swim in the deep end of the pool but won’t admit it. The only way that he will ever plunge those depths is to first admit that he is afraid. Unless he does this he will continue to simply avoid going in to the deep end of the pool.
We lost our natural ability for intimacy in the Garden of Eden. Let’s take a look at GEN: 3:8-10. “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees in the garden. Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him “where are you?” So he said “I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.”
After Adam and Eve sinned they heard the sound of God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. Now this was a sound they were familiar with because they recognized that it was God when they heard it. The Bible does not indicate this directly but they must have been familiar with walking with Him in the cool of the day and communing with Him. But when they heard Him on this day Adam’s response was one of fear and he said something very significant …“I hid myself because I was naked and ashamed”.
We hide from the disclosure and exposure that deep relationships bring just like our first father did. Now we have to work and fight for depth in relationships. Genuine depth in relationships is not natural for us as Human beings.
Deep relationships are not automatic either. We have to be intentional about overcoming our own fears, insecurities and reluctance to let people get close to us. And at the same time we must be intentional about gradually and slowly proving to others who have the same fears and insecurities that they can trust us. Make no mistake this approach to relationships takes a great deal of work to be sure.
THE VALUE OF FRIENDSHIPS
Godly friendships are the most valuable thing on this planet second to our relationship with God. Every relationship is at it’s best when it becomes a friendship. Friendship is the essence of deep relationships.
When my wife and I first got married we didn’t know each other that well and we did not have time to develop a friendship first. So not only were we from different cultures and speak different languages (Marielena is Panamanian) but we also were not friends first. The first couple of years of our marriage were difficult to say the least. It’s still hard and to be honest it’s only by the grace of God that we are still together. But success has come in our relationship when we have put away the “should’s” about what a wife "should" be or what a husband "should" be and we just “be” friends.
You "go" deeper. You do not push for depth and you cannot fabricate depth in relationships. The deep things are already there inside of you, the other person, the word of God, life itself and truth. Depth is already there. Going deeper in our relationships entails plunging those depths with another person not trying to create some kind of false depth. Deep relationships are like going scuba diving with another person, going beneath the surface and discovering together.
WHAT ARE WE AFRAID OF?
The first step to going deeper is admitting to ourselves the embarrassing reality that we are afraid to go deeper in our relationships. It doesn’t matter what your temperament or personality or culture is you as a Human being are afraid of deep relationships. You may be a people person or even the life of the party but you are inherently, in your Human nature, still afraid of deep relationships.
It’s like the child who is afraid to swim in the deep end of the pool but won’t admit it. The only way that he will ever plunge those depths is to first admit that he is afraid. Unless he does this he will continue to simply avoid going in to the deep end of the pool.
We lost our natural ability for intimacy in the Garden of Eden. Let’s take a look at GEN: 3:8-10. “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees in the garden. Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him “where are you?” So he said “I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself.”
After Adam and Eve sinned they heard the sound of God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. Now this was a sound they were familiar with because they recognized that it was God when they heard it. The Bible does not indicate this directly but they must have been familiar with walking with Him in the cool of the day and communing with Him. But when they heard Him on this day Adam’s response was one of fear and he said something very significant …“I hid myself because I was naked and ashamed”.
We hide from the disclosure and exposure that deep relationships bring just like our first father did. Now we have to work and fight for depth in relationships. Genuine depth in relationships is not natural for us as Human beings.
Deep relationships are not automatic either. We have to be intentional about overcoming our own fears, insecurities and reluctance to let people get close to us. And at the same time we must be intentional about gradually and slowly proving to others who have the same fears and insecurities that they can trust us. Make no mistake this approach to relationships takes a great deal of work to be sure.
February 11, 2009
Going deeper In Relationships part 2
Hello again, Hope all is well out there. Here are some more thoughts on developing deep relationships in our lives.
ARE WE REALLY CONNECTED?
Stats: 90% of all American Students have cell phones
85% on facebook
95% on internet.
150 Million people world wide are facebook users
These stats are from Steve Douglas The President of Campus Crusade For Christ International. These are mainly statistics that reflect the habits of university students but I think that this cross section is representative of our society as a whole. We are the most “connected” generation of all time but do we really have deep relationships? Are we really any closer on a genuine relational level? Maybe we are further apart then we ever have been because these technologies give us the sense or appearance of connectedness many times at the expense of genuine depth in relationship. In fact, if we pour ourselves into checking our emails, texting each other and updating face book then our energy may be diverted away from generating and maintaining real deep relationships.
Do we really think that our "Twitters" and our cryptic text languages equate real interaction and connection with each other? Not that these applications are necessarily bad but we really have to ask ourselves the question does it mean that I am truly more connected because I have conversations with people about what I ate for dinner or what I did today? These applications, in my opinion, just expand the breadth of our networks but do nothing to extend the depth of our individual relationships. Now I'm not saying that there aren't people out there on the net who start at this level and go deeper. But true depth in relationship now, as has been the case for thousands of years before the WWW, comes when people make the conscious decision to explore that depth. When true depth is sought out and explored people break away from the superficial sarcasm that floods the social utility world and meet together for coffee or pick up the phone and have a real conversation.
We all have relationships. That’s not the question I want to examine today. The question I want to probe is do we have deep relationships? We can know all the stats and figures and history of somebody but still not really know them. Men and women are historically known for not really getting each other.
So many books have been written about this subject maybe you recognize some of these titles. “Men are from Mars, women are from Venus.” Or the latest one that I still want to get “Men are boxes, women are spaghetti.” These titles and all kinds of other media demonstrations are pervasive with this sense and maybe even frustration we have with the reality that we don’t really understand each other all that well.
Do we really know each other? Not just men and women but all of us as people in general. Going deeper in our relationships is a quest and a commitment to really know each other. Do we really do that? Do we really want to? Do we really want others to really know us? These are difficult questions that must be asked.
DEFINING GOING DEEPER
What are your relationships based on?
Common interests or doing things together (men)
Secret keeping
Role playing
Loyalty
Having fun (laughing together)
Obligations, commitments
These things aren't bad ingredients to have in a relationship. The problem is that all too often these things are the relationship. In other words these characteristics take the place of true depth. Rather than being the fruit or the result of solid relationships they become the substance and overall purpose of our relationships.
We have so many platitudes and descriptions of what meaningful relationships should be. And expectations, I love it when I hear single people describe their idea of a perfect marriage in simple terms like “I want a husband who I can laugh with” or “I want a wife that looks like a supermodel.” Marriage and any significant relationship is much more complicated than just platitudes, expectations and descriptions.
What does it mean to go deeper in relationships? Notice I used the phrase "Going Deeper" as my title. Relationships are organic. They cannot be forced or rushed. They have to grow and develop and evolve organically. They are living.
Let’s consider Ephesians 4:16 “From whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does it’s share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” Paul refers to the Church of Christ as a living organic body made up of real people. A body is a living thing not a mechanical system. It has systems and it has organization in order to perform and function correctly but it is first and foremost living. In our relationships we can only go deeper together.
Going deep is an effort made by both parties in a relationship. It is a locking of arms and a commitment to discover, explore and experience life together. It only comes as a result of time and intentionality. It does not happen by quick clicks of the mouse or texting shallow little messages to each other constantly.
Now, I think that forwards are OK when they are useful but some people never send a real email they just send forwards. We try to force connection with gimmicks, “email this forward to ten people in the next ten minutes or the chain will be broken.” Genuine relationships can not be forced.
Real deep relationships are formed when two people lock arms and are heading in the same direction. This is a much better visual of true depth in relationships than the joining of hands. When you’re arms are locked your hearts are connected. let’s ponder Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 especially vs 12. “two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall one will lift up His companion, but woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up. Again if two lie down together they will keep warm; but how can one be warm alone? Though one may be overpowered by another two can withstand him. And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”
These verses outline the obvious advantages of deep relationships. We are stronger together than alone. We all understand that. But let’s look at vs. 12… “A threefold cord cannot be broken.” The threefold cord is you the other person and God. A deep relationship is about connecting, interconnecting, locking arms and having a common battle to fight. And when God is the third cord the relationship is strong enough to withstand anything.
ARE WE REALLY CONNECTED?
Stats: 90% of all American Students have cell phones
85% on facebook
95% on internet.
150 Million people world wide are facebook users
These stats are from Steve Douglas The President of Campus Crusade For Christ International. These are mainly statistics that reflect the habits of university students but I think that this cross section is representative of our society as a whole. We are the most “connected” generation of all time but do we really have deep relationships? Are we really any closer on a genuine relational level? Maybe we are further apart then we ever have been because these technologies give us the sense or appearance of connectedness many times at the expense of genuine depth in relationship. In fact, if we pour ourselves into checking our emails, texting each other and updating face book then our energy may be diverted away from generating and maintaining real deep relationships.
Do we really think that our "Twitters" and our cryptic text languages equate real interaction and connection with each other? Not that these applications are necessarily bad but we really have to ask ourselves the question does it mean that I am truly more connected because I have conversations with people about what I ate for dinner or what I did today? These applications, in my opinion, just expand the breadth of our networks but do nothing to extend the depth of our individual relationships. Now I'm not saying that there aren't people out there on the net who start at this level and go deeper. But true depth in relationship now, as has been the case for thousands of years before the WWW, comes when people make the conscious decision to explore that depth. When true depth is sought out and explored people break away from the superficial sarcasm that floods the social utility world and meet together for coffee or pick up the phone and have a real conversation.
We all have relationships. That’s not the question I want to examine today. The question I want to probe is do we have deep relationships? We can know all the stats and figures and history of somebody but still not really know them. Men and women are historically known for not really getting each other.
So many books have been written about this subject maybe you recognize some of these titles. “Men are from Mars, women are from Venus.” Or the latest one that I still want to get “Men are boxes, women are spaghetti.” These titles and all kinds of other media demonstrations are pervasive with this sense and maybe even frustration we have with the reality that we don’t really understand each other all that well.
Do we really know each other? Not just men and women but all of us as people in general. Going deeper in our relationships is a quest and a commitment to really know each other. Do we really do that? Do we really want to? Do we really want others to really know us? These are difficult questions that must be asked.
DEFINING GOING DEEPER
What are your relationships based on?
Common interests or doing things together (men)
Secret keeping
Role playing
Loyalty
Having fun (laughing together)
Obligations, commitments
These things aren't bad ingredients to have in a relationship. The problem is that all too often these things are the relationship. In other words these characteristics take the place of true depth. Rather than being the fruit or the result of solid relationships they become the substance and overall purpose of our relationships.
We have so many platitudes and descriptions of what meaningful relationships should be. And expectations, I love it when I hear single people describe their idea of a perfect marriage in simple terms like “I want a husband who I can laugh with” or “I want a wife that looks like a supermodel.” Marriage and any significant relationship is much more complicated than just platitudes, expectations and descriptions.
What does it mean to go deeper in relationships? Notice I used the phrase "Going Deeper" as my title. Relationships are organic. They cannot be forced or rushed. They have to grow and develop and evolve organically. They are living.
Let’s consider Ephesians 4:16 “From whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does it’s share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” Paul refers to the Church of Christ as a living organic body made up of real people. A body is a living thing not a mechanical system. It has systems and it has organization in order to perform and function correctly but it is first and foremost living. In our relationships we can only go deeper together.
Going deep is an effort made by both parties in a relationship. It is a locking of arms and a commitment to discover, explore and experience life together. It only comes as a result of time and intentionality. It does not happen by quick clicks of the mouse or texting shallow little messages to each other constantly.
Now, I think that forwards are OK when they are useful but some people never send a real email they just send forwards. We try to force connection with gimmicks, “email this forward to ten people in the next ten minutes or the chain will be broken.” Genuine relationships can not be forced.
Real deep relationships are formed when two people lock arms and are heading in the same direction. This is a much better visual of true depth in relationships than the joining of hands. When you’re arms are locked your hearts are connected. let’s ponder Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 especially vs 12. “two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall one will lift up His companion, but woe to him who is alone when he falls, for he has no one to help him up. Again if two lie down together they will keep warm; but how can one be warm alone? Though one may be overpowered by another two can withstand him. And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”
These verses outline the obvious advantages of deep relationships. We are stronger together than alone. We all understand that. But let’s look at vs. 12… “A threefold cord cannot be broken.” The threefold cord is you the other person and God. A deep relationship is about connecting, interconnecting, locking arms and having a common battle to fight. And when God is the third cord the relationship is strong enough to withstand anything.
February 9, 2009
Going Deeper in relationships
Ah February, the month when we are thinking about love and relationships and all things gooey and smushy. There, now that I have made my mandatory joke (which is indicative of my discomfort with relationships) we can move beyond the disclaimer. In all seriousness, I do think that Valentines Day is a great time of year to reflect upon our relationships. But my goal this year and my challenge to you is to go deeper than just remembrance and really reflect and examine how healthy Our relationships are. Don’t allow another valentines day to arrive finding you rushing around at the last minute making dinner arrangements or that eleventh hour Wal-Mart run to pick up the fluffy toy that says “you’re cute” when you squeeze it. These are the Valentines Day obligations that we do just to make sure that we measure up to societies standards (and the expectations of our spouses.) But do these gestures really convey depth in our relationships or do they merely give us a facade of something that is not really there? This may make us feel better about “not forgetting valentines day” but how do these rituals really edify our relationships?
I want to attempt in my next several blogs to challenge us to go deeper in our relationships. Not just in our marriage relationships but in all of our relationships. I will suggest several ways that we can do this and challenge our thinking in areas where we may believe that we are already enjoying deep relationships. I hope you get something out of it.
RELATIONSHIPS: GOING DEEPER.
TAKING INVENTORY
I think that we all struggle with depth in our relationships. I know I do maybe more than anything else in my life. Everything in life that matters has its essence in relationships. The level of effectiveness in every area of your life can be measured by the level of effectiveness in your relationships. So what is our attitude toward our relationships? It’s time to take inventory of our relationships.
Think about your relationship with your spouse, children, parents and friends. Do you really have deep relationships or are they just pseudo relationships merely existing on the surface only?
DEFINING DEPTH IN RELATIONSHIPS (TRUTH TELLING)
Eph 4:15 says “But speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head Christ.” Speaking the truth in love is essential to deep relationships. As this verse says, when we speak the truth in love we mature and grow up and so do our relationships. The verse further indicates that when we speak the truth in love we are becoming more like Christ because He speaks the truth in love. Being able to tell each other the truth in a loving way is the hallmark of a deep relationship. But I bet if you really think about it there are precious few people in your life that you can be completely honest with. There aren’t many in mine. There is always something we are holding back.
So now that we have defined a deep relationship as one in which we can tell each other the truth in a free and gracious way how do we arrive at that place in our relationships? Well, let’s first discuss the importance of relationships.
WHY ARE RELATIONSHIPS SO IMPORTANT?
Why is depth in relationships so important? Not only is depth in relationship important for our own personal growth and health but relationship is at the core of everything. Society is built on relationships. It starts with the relationship of a man and a woman and then branches out to children and a family then to a community and then a nation. If relationships, which is the content and glue that keeps all of these Human institutions together, are not deep then it should be no surprise to us that society is falling apart in front of our eyes.
Jesus built His Church, the most powerful force on the Planet today, on the foundation of relationship. Let’s see what He tells His disciples near the end of His life after he spent three years developing a relationship with them. John 15:15. “No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My father I have made known to you.”
I want to point out a couple of things about this verse. Jesus said this at the last supper. It was at the end of His time with His disciples. He told them after three years of living with them and experiencing life together that they were His friends. Relationships take time they cannot be rushed.
He entrusted these men (a band of friends) to build the church, to write the New Testament and to preach the Gospel to the known world at that time. What was the foundation? Did they have seminary degrees? Were they knighted in some formal ceremony? No, He said you are my friends. I have poured myself into you now go and change the world (Mathew 28:19,20 The great Commission) This was a simple statement to friends but the outcome changed History. The whole movement, the church, the beginning of it all was based on this friendship Jesus had with these 12 men.
I want to attempt in my next several blogs to challenge us to go deeper in our relationships. Not just in our marriage relationships but in all of our relationships. I will suggest several ways that we can do this and challenge our thinking in areas where we may believe that we are already enjoying deep relationships. I hope you get something out of it.
RELATIONSHIPS: GOING DEEPER.
TAKING INVENTORY
I think that we all struggle with depth in our relationships. I know I do maybe more than anything else in my life. Everything in life that matters has its essence in relationships. The level of effectiveness in every area of your life can be measured by the level of effectiveness in your relationships. So what is our attitude toward our relationships? It’s time to take inventory of our relationships.
Think about your relationship with your spouse, children, parents and friends. Do you really have deep relationships or are they just pseudo relationships merely existing on the surface only?
DEFINING DEPTH IN RELATIONSHIPS (TRUTH TELLING)
Eph 4:15 says “But speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head Christ.” Speaking the truth in love is essential to deep relationships. As this verse says, when we speak the truth in love we mature and grow up and so do our relationships. The verse further indicates that when we speak the truth in love we are becoming more like Christ because He speaks the truth in love. Being able to tell each other the truth in a loving way is the hallmark of a deep relationship. But I bet if you really think about it there are precious few people in your life that you can be completely honest with. There aren’t many in mine. There is always something we are holding back.
So now that we have defined a deep relationship as one in which we can tell each other the truth in a free and gracious way how do we arrive at that place in our relationships? Well, let’s first discuss the importance of relationships.
WHY ARE RELATIONSHIPS SO IMPORTANT?
Why is depth in relationships so important? Not only is depth in relationship important for our own personal growth and health but relationship is at the core of everything. Society is built on relationships. It starts with the relationship of a man and a woman and then branches out to children and a family then to a community and then a nation. If relationships, which is the content and glue that keeps all of these Human institutions together, are not deep then it should be no surprise to us that society is falling apart in front of our eyes.
Jesus built His Church, the most powerful force on the Planet today, on the foundation of relationship. Let’s see what He tells His disciples near the end of His life after he spent three years developing a relationship with them. John 15:15. “No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My father I have made known to you.”
I want to point out a couple of things about this verse. Jesus said this at the last supper. It was at the end of His time with His disciples. He told them after three years of living with them and experiencing life together that they were His friends. Relationships take time they cannot be rushed.
He entrusted these men (a band of friends) to build the church, to write the New Testament and to preach the Gospel to the known world at that time. What was the foundation? Did they have seminary degrees? Were they knighted in some formal ceremony? No, He said you are my friends. I have poured myself into you now go and change the world (Mathew 28:19,20 The great Commission) This was a simple statement to friends but the outcome changed History. The whole movement, the church, the beginning of it all was based on this friendship Jesus had with these 12 men.
January 30, 2009
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