I consider it an extreme honor

Haiti has been hit with an earthquake which has brought massive devastation on the already incredibly poor country. With untold numbers of causalities and dead bodies lining the streets, the people and country are in deep need. I am so very impressed with the compassion of the world to come alongside the country which is hopeless without this undeserved grace. Haiti doesn’t have anything to offer the other countries of the world neither before this disaster and even less-so afterwards.

Not surprisingly, I’d love to go over there and help in whatever capacity I can. I have been blessed by so many others that I am compelled to do the same (not from a sense obligation or guilt) because love begets love. As I think of this idea of sacrifice, love and faith in light of what I’m currently studying (the Gospel of John) – other ideas begin to connect.

My Hope and Salvation (Jesus Christ) humbled himself as the Creator to become the created. He was deity who chose (for no good reason) to come as the most ordinary to relate to his beloved (all of us). Jesus said of his faithful forerunner, “Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist” (Matt 11:11). John fearlessly lived out his faith by fulfilling his calling – to proclaim repentance and the coming savior of the world, Jesus the Christ. His public calling for repentance angered the powerful – religious, noble and military – which led to his martyrdom only a little more than year after he began. Jesus faithfully obeyed God the Father for three years before humankind rejected his message and demanded a gruesome torture and death because his message was so contrary to our natural selfishness.

I thought of these ideas as I’m running up the final hill to my house the other morning. And, I asked myself, “If I go to Haiti, what opposition would I run into?” Most notably, I believe that my physical safety could be jeopardized and that well-meaning and caring people would advise against such an endeavor. Then, this verse (Phil 3:8) finally made sense (going from head to heart) – “I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”

For me, there are many things I want to believe and then there are the times when I realize that I actually do truly believe them. The ‘rubber meets the road’ (when life gets difficult and tragedies hit my relational life, financial situations and family members) is where the training is proven. So, that morning I honestly said to myself and God, “I consider it an extreme honor to die in the name of Christ (for I am entirely unworthy), if I can live out God’s call for my life even one day.”

Profound Leadership – Jesus Christ

Jesus, as a leader, continually served those around him with complete humility.How profound is it that Jesus did not exalt or praise himself nor did he seek the approval and praise of others.As I choose to learn about leadership characteristics of Jesus’ life, I see a man who had every right to correct, condemn, expect praise, etc.However, Jesus met and accepted people exactly for who they were and revealed God to each of them.Jesus’ patience and love for each person is so out-of-this-world.”The woman at the well” story shows Jesus (1) intentionally taking himself out of the position of piety, (2) patiently revealing life-giving truth, and (3) persisting in love even though the woman attempts to deflect the conversation away from her personal life of sin.

For me, it’s hard to see a leader as somebody like Jesus.I guess, I’m used to thinking of a leader as more of a powerful manager.So, if I attempt to think of myself as a leader, I feel that it’s my responsibility to instill some sort of conformity of what is right across the board.However, Andy Stanley states that the manager “manages to sameness” while the leader “leads into chaos” (Catalyst OneDay 2009). The disparity is apparent when I examine my actions and my convictions and conclude that they are not in concert. I strongly ascribe to beliefs that diversity is to be cherished and no two situations are the same and cannot be solved with the same approach.Moreover, I am drawn to this believe so much because it requires continual dependence upon the Creator for direction as well as consistent submission that my own ideas are lame and entirely insufficient.However, my actions dispel a counter message – one of conformity, performance and fear.

What is a leader then?How does that play about?What does that mean for me?Today, I see that I need to embrace the following leadership characteristics:

  • The leader serves: I must look to serve those whom God calls me to lead
  • The leader is a cheerleader: I must celebrate the good (rather than condemning the bad)
  • The leader does not change others: I must continually follow and point to Christ
  • The leader is authentic: I must seek God’s revelation into my own heart and motives and His strength and wisdom to walk in faith

To conclude, “That is wonderful and inspiring.What happens next – if anything?”Rather than answer that question myself, I seek your response.Enjoy the goodness!

Finally, I reflect on the influence of Jesus Christ:

Nearly two thousand years ago in an obscure village, a child was born of a peasant woman. He works in a carpenter shop until he is thirty, and then for three brief years is an itinerant preacher, proclaiming a message and living a life. He never writes a book. He never holds an office. He never raises an army. He never has a family of his own. He never owns a home. He never goes to college. He never travels two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He gathers a little group of friends about him and teaches them his way of life.

His greatness has never been paralleled. He never wrote a book, yet all the libraries of the country could not hold the books that have been written about Him. He never wrote a song, and yet He has furnished the theme for more songs that all the songwriters combined. He never founded a college, but all the schools put together cannot boast of having as many students. Every seventh day the wheels of commerce cease their turning and multitudes wind their way to worshiping assemblies to pay homage and respect to Him. The names of the past proud statesmen of Greece and Rome have come and gone. The names of the past scientists, philosophers, and theologians have come and gone, but the name of this man abounds more and more.

Question the norm, the expected, the rational path

As I was talking with a friend this evening, it hit me that this world (society – our lives) is so infiltrated with deception. In particular, I was ranting how men aren’t men anymore. Why can’t we guys take responsibility for our romantic relationships? The women in our lives are constantly attacked with lies about their identity, where to find value, gossip, loneliness, and so much else. So, when God lays out the fact that men need to take responsibility to protect the women – are we not protecting these treasures from the lies they constantly battle? What kind of reassurance is it to the woman to leave her wondering about something so very dear to her (something that likely occupies much of her thought) – her romantic relationship. Blurring the line between the responsibilities of men and women cannot lead to the joy that these relationships were meant to exude. For, how can anything that is apart from God’s perfect plan most full and amazing? Let’s be men; let’s be clear; let’s lead with responsibility and humility; let’s live the full life!

Along similar lines, we have been so brainwashed by our world with a feeling of entitlement, independence (maybe American independence is actually ripping us from what we need the most, dependence on the body of Christ), and arrogance that we don’t even realize it. The Evil one has worked against the goodness in society for generations to where we see tendencies that move us away from God as actual traits that are godly. We are so deceived. “It’s natural, there are good reasons for this mentality, and it’s necessary to exist in this society” – I agree with all of these. However, in the parable of the unmerciful servant, there is a king who forgives a servant, then a servant who doesn’t forgive. Moral of the story – forgive when forgiven. But, Rob Bell goes a step further and points out that maybe it’s not as simple as do X, but it’s a complete perception and society issue. Maybe our world and how it works may be against the God who created us and His design. Take a gander for yourself.

Sermon: http://www.marshill.org/cart/download/062109.mp3

Scripture: Matt 18:21-35; http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matt%2018:21-35;&version=31;

“If I stick with the accounting system, this guy is never going to pay me back.” ~ kings thoughts.

Somebody has to pay the debt. The king pays the price, bears the cost, and dies to the system so that the servant may have a new life. [Sound something like Jesus?]

Forgiveness costs somebody. When we decide to get revenge, we are essentially saying, “I’m not paying for this one.”

What if I chose to pay the cost when somebody sins against me? What if I chose to say, “I’m not going to keep track of all of the wrongs or rights.” What if I didn’t view the world as if there are scales with good on one side and evil on the other? What if I saw the beauty of truth for what it really is – the face of God.

Follow this up with a few songs.

Passion – One Pure And Holy Passion: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I17edLkBDCo

Give me one pure and holy passion
Give me one magnificent obsession
Give me one glorious ambition for my life
To know and follow hard after You

Dizmas – Redemption Passion Glory:

This is redemption,
that you would die for me
And this is salvation,
that you would live in me
This is rejection,
that they would all hate me
And this is submission
that I would live holy

Hillsong – In Your Freedom: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLJctSXX-fA

In Your freedom I will live
I offer devotion, I offer devotion

Simple Prayer

Jesus, when I skip out on reading your word, postpone prayer, or otherwise neglect our relation, I am totally dissing you. It’s like you go out of your way to hang out with me and I walk right past you with some inaffectionate but polite excuse. You simply stand there in the rain waiting while I go on with the many things I believe are important to do. However, you let me continue to break your heart as your beloved (me) walks away in my own ignorance toward destruction. Oh, how you wish you could control my decisions or that I would listen and believe you enough to do what is best (for all) – what you keep trying to tell me. Oh the frustration you must endure because as your beloved and heart’s desire politely neglects you. Your heart agonizes as you must watch me hurt myself (just as any good parent or lover must endure as their loved ones experience pain).

Compassion – If you love one another…

For me, I neglect to realize the profound joy that exists in my life when life is going along easily. For some reason, I am busy doing life rather than fully existing in life. However, God steps in occasionally and rocks my world just a bit. My parents have been stressed due to both mounting farm chores and health issues. As I came to realize this, I mentioned it to some friends in conversation. This is the opportunity to experience great joy – it’s where the “rubber meets the road.” These friends saw this opportunity and reacted out of love and compassion by immediately volunteering their time and talents to come alongside and carry the burdens of my parents.

I’ve talked about this idea of “Love in Action” before (see http://www.jason1365.com/2007/03/11/love-in-action/), but recently I have been on the receiving end of the love. It is completely mind-blowing to receive love through these friends; I am humbled because I do not deserve it, nor can I repay them for their expressed love through service and companionship.

Two passages from Scripture come to mind as I reflect on the blessings of relationship. These passages have continued to resurface over the past couple of years. I am compelled to let these permeate my lifestyle and being; however inept I am now.

John 13:34-35 – “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

1 John 3:16-18 – This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

So, to you, friends, you do not know how your service releases the worry from the mind of my parents (in particular my dad). Thank you, the following is for you.

Continue reading Compassion – If you love one another…

I trust you (audioblog)

Control – why do I want to be in control? It makes no sense really, because there is nothing in which I have control except for my own actions in and reactions to the situations of life.

What does it look like to let go of the stresses of my life? For me, I am left to wonder about life when circumstances, pain, and uncertainty hit close to home. When this happens, how do I react? First, I am frustrated at first that things are out of my control. I then question God about what is going on – I want to understand; I want to feel like life (a.k.a. God) is fair. Finally, my God reminds me who He is, His nature, and where I need to be. It’s then up to me to make the decision as to how I will react.

This is my second audio-blog which was recorded on my drive home from the hospital after my mom’s surgery. Enjoy the background music and the noise of the car ride for the 9:32 of this audio-blog.

Audio-blog: I trust you

Beyond what you can bear (audioblog)

My life is driven by my own world view which is driven by the truths of Scripture (as I make the time to reflect). Over time, I wrestle with some ideas around the nature of our world, our God, and how our existence meshes beautifully with the goodness of God. However, there are tough life experiences that call our understanding of God into question. These questions can then lead to a deteriorated (or invigorated) relationship with our God.

This is my first audio-blog which was recorded on a long drive when I was visiting my mom as she was undergoing surgery. If you are going to take the 14:19 to listen to this audio-blog, take the time to read through some of the passages of scripture and ideas that I’m going to wrestle with in this recording. Please enjoy the background music and the noise of the car ride.

Verses:

  • 1 Corinthians 10:13 – No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.
  • Matthew 6:33 – But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

Ideas:

  • Sin of commission: is to know something is wrong, and do it anyway; deliberate disobedience to the known will of God
  • Sin of omission: sins of failing to do what we should have done
  • Temped: being compelled to sin (to act in a way that not in complete alignment with the will and nature of God and His goodness)

Audio-blog: Beyond what you can bear

Migration to Bugzilla 3.2.x from custom defect tracking solution

Since I use Google and blog and forum posts frequently to help solve problems, I felt it only appropriate to contribute back to the interwebs some of the solutions I have developed to solve problems. So, here are the details for migrating from a custom defect tracking system in MS Access to Bugzilla 3.2.x. I will be installing this in a Windows environment, but I like to work in the simpler world of Linux and then just copy over the data to Windows (If you want to use Windows as your sandbox, set it up by following https://wiki.mozilla.org/Bugzilla:Win32Install).

Continue reading Migration to Bugzilla 3.2.x from custom defect tracking solution

Ethiopia: Christ is too simple for the adult

While in Ethiopia, my translator, Bareket, shared why he is compelled to teach children of the love of God through Jesus Christ. He started off with a little story.

One day a preacher came home and told his wife that two and a half people came to know Jesus Christ that day. His wife was confused about what he meant by a half a person and asked if her husband implied that a couple and their small child accepted Christ. He replied, “No, the two and a half people refer to the two children and one adult that chose to follow Christ. For the two children have their entire life before them live for Christ’s glory whereas the adult has already wasted half of her life.” Bareket went on to explain that it is much more difficult for an adult submit to Christ because the adult carried much baggage and believes many lies that must first be dispelled before he will be convinced of the truth of Christ.

Bareket focus on teaching the little children of Christ’s love. He reiterated to me that the gospel is so simple and easy to grasp that it’s easier for children to accept than adults because the adults are confounded by its simplicity. Children know they cannot understand everything and don’t need to; however, us adults think we are something greater and need to be able to understand all aspects of everything before we commit. I’m just glad that we don’t live by this mentality for anything else in life – for we’d never commit to anything (name any risk – investments, projects, pursuing new ideas, etc., marriage, children, or our word).

Ethiopia: Story of confidence in God’s power

The third day in Ethiopia, Lacey (http://kansasandcosmos.wordpress.com/) shared a story with our team that I wanted to relay to the world. It’s a story of good and evil, of deception and fear, of control and manipulation, of good over evil – the fairy tale, however, in truth and reality.

I’d like to caveat the following story for the western mindset. In America, there isn’t witchcraft, voodoo, or other eerie mysticism. That isn’t how Satan chooses to control us; he chooses much more intellectually benign things like busyness, money, status, hedonism, and pride (our own pride in our intellectual ability to reason away the reality of the spiritual).

God opened my eyes to the spiritual world in a very real way one day while I was in a rural Ethiopian village to tell the people about our upcoming clinics and share the Gospel. I walked past a hut where my translator said they worshiped a spirit, and dark smoke filled the air surrounding the home. We also came across a large tree with fabric tied around the trunk, and I found out some of the local villagers worshiped the tree. But the biggest revelation came from two small lemons on the side of the road.

As the translator Jerusalem and disciple maker Haiminot and I walked down the dirt road, we passed another house with smoke coming from it. Jerusalem told me the family of that house worships the devil and tries to put curses on people in the village. As we continued our journey through the village, we saw two small lemons on the side of the road. I thought it was odd to see the fruit in such a random spot in rural Ethiopia, but didn’t think much beyond that. I was about to continue walking, when Haiminot stopped to pick up the lemons. Jerusalem told me the lemons were actually used by the family whose house we just passed in creating their potions and curses, and then they throw the lemons on the side of the road. Whoever picks up the lemons or accidentally steps on them is supposed to get the curse. (Sidebar – this is exactly how Satan works, he uses fear and manipulation to control.)

Without any hesitation or fear that maybe he really could get a curse, Haiminot carried the lemons with him throughout the village, playfully tossing them in the air. We continued our walk down the road and Haiminot saw a young farmer who he said we needed to go speak with. We all sat down on the ground, and even though I couldn’t understand the conversation between Haiminot and the farmer, it was clear they already knew each other. After sharing the Gospel, the young man didn’t want to accept Christ, but said he did want to invite us into his home to learn more. Unfortunately his wife wasn’t home so we couldn’t speak further, but Haiminot said he’d return at a later day.

During the conversation, the young farmer asked Haiminot why in the world he was holding the lemons when he knew what potential they had. Haiminot replied that because of Christ, he doesn’t need to worry about a curse having power over him since Christ rules the world. I later found out that this young farmer was actually the son of the family who throws out the lemons.

Every villager we met had a huge fear of two small pieces of fruit. When they saw the lemons in Haiminot’s hands they would take a step back away from us. Children would say, “Dirty! Dirty!” and adults would fearfully shake their heads “No” when Haiminot asked if they wanted to touch the lemons. The two small lemons became a huge testament to the villagers about trust and reassurance in the power of Christ to protect us. After a long day of walking throughout the village, Haiminot went home…and ate the lemons for a snack, confident in the power of Christ.

Ethiopia: WOW, God loves me dispite of my future

One of my teammates, Anne, shared a profound truth with our team one morning over breakfast in Ethiopia. She opened with the idea that God is not stuck in the present like we are; he knows our past, but even our future. Of course, he is God, no big deal. But, then she put that together with another truth of God, He loves us. These two separate are easy to digest, but put them together and the purity of God’s love for me begins to reveal itself.

How amazing is this – God loves me despite of my future. He loves me right now even though he knows I will reject him, I will backstab, I will lie to his face, I will live an adulterous lifestyle worshiping the things of this world (His creation and not the Creator), I will abandon Him, I will…

This idea isn’t too hard for me to grasp until I begin to personalize it. For, this is intensely personal to God and I need to empathize a little to grasp God’s profound love. So, would I love anybody with such fervor, devotion, and unrestrained selflessness if I know that the object of supreme affection and dedication would betray me in a few short days, months, or years? How can I love somebody when I know (s)he is going to betray that love? How can I love when I know that love will be taken for granted, forgotten, rejected, and even scorned? Would I marry somebody if I absolutely knew all of her flaws, when she would reject me, that she would live adulterously, that she would abandon me, divorce me and marry another, that she would backstab, that she wasn’t completely committed, that she would not love in return? How could I? I do not know; but, I know it’s not possible for me to do that (without the divine intervention of my God).

Here we are, each of us, with the truth that God loves us despite of our future. He remains completely committed, continuously pouring out himself selflessly. His love is so deep; it’s incomprehensible (like really, give it a try). He chooses to love when he already knows the future pain, rejection, and heartache he must endure. What am amazing God we have. May we glorify His name throughout the world and at all times.

Tangent: about my tenants of life

Ultimately, the one thing I wish to say to everybody is, “be willing to give up everything you hold dear for the sake of Christ.” And, discern those things of God through the following: “Goodness, Rightness, and Beauty.” God is Good and everything I do should be “good.” Everything I do should be “right” or righteous and “seeking first the kingdom of God.” So, things may seem good and be right, but not for a certain time. An action must have both goodness and righteousness at the time it is to be accomplished. And then on top of that, God is beautiful and all of us should proliferate His beauty. One thing I like to say is that, “Truth is elegant.” When I’m attempting to understand God’s truths, I shouldn’t have to make up complicated conjectures to account of fringe-cases. I’ve always been in awe of God when I begin to understand His truths. I fully expect that all of His truths will cause be to wonder in awe at the beauty of the simplicity. For if I could grasp His truths and explain every fringecase, I would be in a place where I don’t need God. I know that my God loves me too much to let me do that to myself (run in overconfidence and live without needing Him for everything in my life).