Priority

I read wise words from "Swimmin'upstream" in response to my post on "Encountering God in Rough Waters." He/she says, "In America, we have CREATED so many places to search for comfort or help...God seems to be a last resort." That's painfully true. We tend to trust the problem-solving, crisis-alleviating methods that are fully under our control before we trust anything or anybody whose power is centered beyond us. God is, for many, the line of last defense. I remember a high school track coach once telling us, "If all else fails, pray!" At the time, back in the Jurassic era, I was impressed that a public high school teacher/coach made any reference to God at all. Now I realize that he was reflecting the ethos of our culture. "Do everything you can do first, and, if that fails, get God into the game."

In Let to Tell, Immaculee Ilibagiza faced the painful truth that life can and does spin violently out of control. Still, she encountered a God who should be sought first and always, not after all else has failed.

I'm afraid that the sense of control which we might feel is more an illusion than reality. What would it be like to trust God first instead of last? How would that change us not just as individuals, but as churches, or even as a culture?

What do you think? I'll see you around the next bend in the river.

Encountering God in Rough Waters

While traveling to and from an out of town meeting today I listened to a book on CD - LEFT TO TELL by Immaculee Ilibagiza and Steve Erwin. It's the grisly and amazing story of how a young woman survived the genocidal holocaust in Rwanda in 1994. Immaculee's entire family was slaughtered in sweeping ethnic brutality, which largely was ignored by the international community until the damage was done. In the midst of an horrific three month journey through hell, Immaculee encountered a very real and very powerful God, and plumbed the unfathomable depths of God's forgiveness in and through Jesus. It's a stunning and difficult story to hear, and I commend it to you. (See www.lefttotell.com.)

Sometime I think we in North American churches have been guilty of presenting Jesus as a sort of "Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free" card for the rough edges of life. Maybe without consciously admitting it, we presume that Jesus owes us freedom from the worst that life can offer. I wonder how many times I've presumed that, if the outward circumstances of my life are good, then Jesus must be happy with me. Too bad for the Rwandas, the Darfurs, and all the other places where the demons of destruction seem to run wild.

Immaculee Ilibagiza introduces us to a different view of God, made known to us in Jesus. She encounters a God who is present, powerful, and transformative in the very midst of the worst that humans can inflict on one another. When she has nothing in reserve, not even enough energy to muster faith itself, Jesus stays dramatically present and active.

I wondered a couple of things as I listened to her story; unrelated things, or maybe not so unrelated. I wondered what I was doing in 1994 at the moment Immaculee was cowering from machete wielding thugs, flinging her fate completely into the nailed pierced hands of the crucified and risen one. Was I preaching, fishing, attending a Finance Committee meeting, sleeping soundly in a safe bed, coaching a peewee soccer team, or what? Not that it matters, and not that I feel guilt or anything. I just wonder how connected to Jesus I let myself be at that same moment. Also, I wondered about the fact that faith in Jesus continues to flourish and grow on the African continent, even in the midst of unspeakable violence and poverty, while Christian worship and discipleship wavers so much in our comparatively comfortable continent.

What do you think? I'll see you around the next bend in the river.

Geoff

A Canoe or a Kayak?

Welcome to the float trip which is my stream of thoughts...

I have been floating and fishing the Ozark streams of Missouri for years. For most of that time I've used an aluminum canoe. Specifically, it is a 15 foot Grumman. (I don't own much that's top of the line, but this is.) Ten years ago I'd have said that a canoe is the only way stay in the mainstream of a river, to get to the best fishing spots, and to enjoy the pristine beauty of southern Missouri. Lately, though, I've been thinking about getting a kayak. Kayaks are leaner and lighter; it would be much easier to load on top of my Rav4. They maneuver better in tighter river turns and deep water gradients. Kayaks displace less water, so the vessel drags less in shallow sections. A kayak could really upgrade my experience of rivers.

However, I've floated in my good old Grumman so long that I don't hardly know any other way to navigate a stream. Yet my original purpose was never to stay in an aluminum canoe all my life. My core purpose has always been to experience Ozark rivers, to fish, and to stay in the river's mainstream. I won't necessarily abandon the Grumman completely. But I am saving my shekels for a Kayak.

I am a Jesus-follower mostly because of history. Throughout the ebbs and flows of human events and cultures, the risen Jesus always finds a way to grab the hearts of human beings. Along the way, though, many of us confuse the vessels in which we happen to travel in our experience of Jesus with Jesus himself. Nothing matters to me more than to help people encounter the one called Jesus and to grow in relationship with him. In these days of seismic cultural, economic, and political change, I look at my church and every church and I wonder where are we hanging on to old aluminum canoes only, and where do we need to start experimenting with kayaks. Where are we confusing the forms through which we address the purpose of the Body of Christ with that purpose itself?

What do you think, whether you are a Jesus follower or not? As you observe churches, what needs to be kept and what needs to be released to keep us in the Jesus mainstream? In case you don't know, there's a lot of opportunity for conversation on a river canoe float, and I welcome your thoughts.

I'll see you around the river bend.

Geoff