Domino

What to do when God calls you out....

See you Sunday!

When?

God complicates my theology. I mean, as an idea, He makes a lot of sense and He’s pretty easy to understand. But in actual practice, He messes with my head.

I’ve had more than one conversation over the past two weeks where a person seemed to be struggling with a pretty obvious sin. But when they began to share the rest of the story, what had seemed obvious became less and less so.

Have you ever had your windshield fog up on a warm day and when you turn on the defroster, it just gets worse? Either you had it on cold when it should have been warm, or the kids spilled a 32 ounce supersize special in the floor and left the windows rolled up all night, or you just have no idea why what should have worked didn’t work at all?

It was like that. I wasn’t sure what to do even though there was fog on the windshield. I found myself backing away from the urge to fix a problem I thought I could see, and I just listened carefully. As each one spoke, I could see evidence of the Holy Spirit’s work, and I was convinced that each was pursuing Christ. The fog didn’t seem so prominent any more. So I was gentle. I found some things to encourage, and we prayed.
But I felt guilty. I kept wondering if God was pleased with my soft reactions and my failure to demand holiness.
Then I remembered one of His stories in John 4. Jesus spoke with a woman at a well, and it was scandalous, and we tell that story quite often. I knew much of it by heart. “Wow, look at Jesus, raising the status of women! Look at Jesus reaching out to Samaritans! Look how He drew her to recognize who He was!”

But one thing bugged me all week–I couldn’t remember what Jesus told the woman to do. So I read it again this morning. He told her to get Him a drink, and to go get her husband. I don’t think she did either one, especially the husband part. She didn’t have one–she was just living with some guy. Jesus knew.

Jesus knew. He even drew attention to it. He used it to help her understand that He was the Messiah. Jesus knew she was sleeping with someone and He didn’t tell her to stop it.
We could speculate that she drew her own conclusion, but that’s speculation. John simply doesn’t tell us. He doesn’t even return to the story later on so we can close off our theological concerns. In the face of a fairly obvious problem, Jesus didn’t fix it. This woman met the Messiah. She ran and told people. She led others to Him. Something was happening in her. And she may have run home and told her boyfriend, and then cuddled in his arms for the night.

That’s an uncomfortable thought for us. It doesn’t fit with our ideas about God. But we have to be okay with the timing of God, because He’s not an idea–He’s God.  And sometimes He leaves the fog on the windshield long enough to expose a crack that had gone unnoticed. Sometimes He doesn’t explain himself. Sometimes He overlooks what seems obvious. And maybe sometimes we should too.

My problem is in knowing when. But that’s not really my problem. It’s His.

Melanie

When I went to see Dad in the hospital, I was blessed with empty seats and quiet airplanes—until the flight from Cincinnati to Dallas. I probably sighed out loud as a puffy-coated, spiked hair gal from Wisconsin looked at the row number and plopped down beside me. She had the aisle seat and her over-large winter coat smelled of smoke and crowded the armrest. She buried herself in her book and I settled back into my melancholy thoughts.

It probably took an hour before we began to talk. And then we talked a lot. And then she found out I was a pastor. And then I made sure she drank her vodka anyway. And then we got to talk about God.

She used to like God, but there were so many rules. Her Mennonite family followed them all and she learned to comply. That worked right up until the day she was raped, and then things got cloudy. She’s lived as the black sheep of her family ever since, but she’s thrilled by a recent marriage to a man who truly loves her. And she’s been thinking about God again.

For a moment she looked into my eyes—her own eyes confident at first, then quickly darting aside. “Do you think I need to stop smoking before I go back to church?” Her head fell as the words left her mouth, like she was bracing for what I might say.

It was a beautiful chance to reshare the gospel. We had already looked at John 5:24. I opened it again and said, “Tell me again what it says you have to do?” She laughed—this was the third time I had asked the same question. I don’t think she’ll forget it, but you can pray for her. Her name is Melanie. We were glad we had sat together, and I thanked God for a noisy seat.

I wonder how many Melanies come to our churches or how many almost come but stop because they are still smoking…. I told Melanie I thought churches should have ash trays outside—just so she could know it was okay for her to be there.

What do you think?

Christmas Party

Join us this Sunday at 7 in the Green Room for our end of the year Christmas Party. We'll have all kinds of baked goodies along with games to play and McKibben's special Hot Chocolate.

Also, in order to party with a purpose we invite you to bring along non-perishable food items to give toward the ongoing food drive at Bent Tree in hopes of helping families all over Dallas get enough to eat this Christmas.

So grab a few friends and a couple of cans of green beans and come meet and hang out with other Young Adults at Bent Tree and celebrate the birth of our Lord.

More here: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=215929191590&ref=mf

Pass/Fail

For our entire childhood everything thing we did in school was weighed and graded. If our right answers outweighed our wrong answers by a large enough margin we passed and were allowed to move on to the next measurement or test. This naturally caused us to begin to rank ourselves based on performance. The person that got the least things wrong was at the top and the person that did the least right was at the bottom. And in the end, if you had not done enough right then you failed.

Often I think this is how we view our spiritual lives as well, as if God is just the teacher of a class grading our lives on some giant sliding scale. And as long as our good actions outweigh our bad ones then we're in. Like in school, this causes us to begin to rank ourselves so that as long as you seem to be doing less bad than enough other people you should pass. Because, of course, if this is how God works, no one is perfect so he must grade on a curve.

Fortunately for the entire world, the Bible has examples on almost every page that speak in the face of that kind of system. Throughout history we see God using people who are steeped in sin for His purposes and covering them with His Grace.

Join us this Sunday as we look at the life of Rahab and how God used a lying prostitute to accomplish His purposes and then poured out grace on her and her family.

We'll be in the Green Room backstage at 7, bring a friend and join us as we grow closer to God and each other.

Check out the facebook event for more info.

Paint and Pizza on Sunday, Nov 29

Join us the Sunday night for the Clearing's Paint and Pizza Party at Bent Tree in the FX Live Theatre. We will have pizza and drinks and help finish painting the Christmas decorations and food drive boxes that will be in the Crossing over the Holiday season.

Bring your friends for a fun night of free food, no artistic skill needed (the children's ministry is working on some of the same things Sunday morning)

Hope to see you there!

RSVP on the Facebook Invite.