The Best Advice I've Ever Been Given (and how different it is from the stuff we normally hear)

When I was a senior in college, getting ready to graduate and realizing I had to make a decision about finding something to do that would give me an income, I was a bit intimidated by the choices in front of me. Thankfully I spent a lot of time that year with one of my heroes, Stu. In the midst of trying to sort through the decisions about my future, Stu gave me the best advice anyone has ever given me: "Make sure you're in God's will today, and you won't miss being in it tomorrow." It's simple and powerful, because none of us knows what our lives will be like five years from now, but I'd be willing to bet that everyone reading this has a pretty good idea of how they could shape today in a way that gives glory to God in the midst of their everyday life. When I have stuck to Stu's advice, my experience has been that I progressively am becoming more the kind of person that I want to be while also coming closer and closer to the kinds of work that are most fulfilling to me and through which I can make the greatest contributions to my family and the work of God's kingdom in our world.

But there is quite a contrast between Stu's advice and advice I've often been given in the first decade of being in ministry.

This other kind of advice is always well-intended and has probably served the person giving it to me at some point in their lives. Let me be clear that I don't think this advice/set of questions is bad in any way, but I'm just trying to point out a difference. It usually comes out something like this:

• What are your goals for your career?
• Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10 years?
• What is your ideal job?

All good questions. Nothing inherently wrong with any of them. The problem is what they raise in me: a desire to set my future for myself, focusing on pursuit of some idea that may not have been well-discerned, to the neglect of the way I need to shape my life today in order to become the kind of person I want to be when I come to my deathbed.

When I have followed the line of advice behind these questions, I have been led down paths that have largely ended up unfulfilling. I have pursued, received, then backed out of professional credentials. I have gotten myself over-committed to processes because of the benefit I thought they would bring me regarding those questions in the future, to the neglect of what is was doing to my life today.

I don't mean this to say that planning for the future is bad in any way. That's often a part of what's included in following Stu's advice and making sure we're in God's will today. But the question is one of focus and trust, as Jesus talked about in Matthew 6:25-34.

So, what is a way that you can make sure that your day today is shaped as God wants it to be?

Why I Almost Lost it Over a Spam Sandwich

[This is one of the posts telling a story from the life of my Dad. Click here to see the others.] Last week I was entrusted with the task of doing our grocery shopping. This doesn't happen often, as my wife carries way more than her share of the load with groceries and meals in our family, just as she also does in many other ways. But it worked out that I could do it one day last week when she needed to work, so I was sent with a list to the grocery store.

Whenever I'm sent with a list, I'm pretty bound by it. I get the things on the list, only the things on the list. But last week I put one additional item in our cart: a can of Spam. Little did I know at the time that this can of Spam would help wake me up to some things going on inside of me that really need to be dealt with.

The day after shopping for groceries, I knew that the can of Spam was available, so I offered to make sandwiches for us for lunch. I really like Spam, Kara will eat it with me 2-3 times a year, and our two-year old's taste for it is yet to be determined. So I was excited to make, and eat, the sandwiches.

In our house, we are trying to be intentional about using certain times of our weekends in Sabbath-like ways, and one of the things we want to do as a family is to use one of our mealtimes together to name things that we are thankful for. As we began to enjoy the rich delicacy of the sandwiches I made, Kara named something she was thankful for. I wanted to say something next so that our son would catch the idea and be able to think of something he wanted to say. So, with Spam-gratitude bubbling up in my heart and mind, this unique meat was going to be part of my statement of thanks. The words that came out were: "I'm thankful for all of the times that I got to have Spam sandwiches with my Dad."

The sentence started fine. By the end of it, I was doing all I could to keep myself from turning into a basket case at our kitchen table.

My Dad really liked eating Spam, and this was the first time that I had any since he died. Any time that it was just the two of us in the house, whether I was a kid or an adult, you could be sure that Spam sandwiches would be the meal of choice. He called it "the good stuff," hinting at our enjoyment of it even though we knew how many people couldn't stand it. He couldn't eat much of anything in the last years of his life, but Spam was the last meal that I remember him fixing, as we came in for lunch one day that I was helping him on the ranch.

I'm finding that there is a strange irony in grief: on one hand, the times that it hits me are unpredictable. I did not intend nor expect to be fighting back tears and struggling to get out choked-up words while eating such a good lunch with my family, and I definitely did not expect that the catalyst for the emotional shift would be the canned meat that I had on my bread.

But on the other hand, I'm discovering that I am consciously and subconsciously very capable of avoiding incidences like that. For me, avoiding any unwanted emotion coming out largely has to do with refraining from saying anything. One level of avoiding it is for me not to say anything in any way. Another level is for me to do what I'm doing now and write about these memories with my Dad. A third level, which I can't handle very well is to physically say the words. (I can write this, but I wouldn't be able to read it aloud to you right now.)

So I realize that I haven't written much since Dad died, and I think it's good for me to change that. But part of my difficulty in writing is that often I feel like that only thing that wants to come out is my grief, and I can come up with a lot of reasons not to write about that. But the fact that a Spam sandwich could so easily bring up emotion in me indicates to me that I'm not getting enough words out about my Dad. So I hope that some of what will come here is that I can tell stories of his life, how they have shaped my life, and how they have taught me so much about the bigger story we all live in- of God's subtle and subversive work in the world in and through normal people.

Methodists Who Don't Know It

Although I still often have to give some explanation of what Spiritual Formation is if someone asks what I studied in school, it has become a pretty popular buzz term in Christianity in recent years. I recently spoke with a seminary professor who said that one of his students' reasons for enrolling in his course on Spiritual Formation was because "it's the hottest thing out there." While that's an overstatement, it certainly has been popularized tremendously in recent years. Contrast that with the tradition of Christianity in which my roots are firmly planted: Methodism. There is absolutely nothing hip, buzzing, hot, or popularized about being a Methodist. Methodism in our country is on a remarkable rate of decline, and has been for decades. To illustrate this difference, compare the "cool factor" on what comes up on an image search for Spiritual Formation with what comes up for Methodism. Okay, so maybe neither page's "cool factor" is tremendously high, but the page on Methodism might actually score below zero. I believe neither that the faddishness of Spiritual Formation is all good, nor that the un-faddishness of Methodism is all bad. But the contrast is ironic, because Spiritual Formation and Methodism are the same thing. In fact, something about yourselves that will surprise many of you, which may have been true of you for many years, is that you're actually Methodists and haven't even known it. (Don't worry- I won't tell your pastors.) My problem in trying to convince people of this is that many things that get described by the terms Spiritual Formation and Methodist have little if any relation to what those things actually are. So let's define some terms:

First, Spiritual Formation. Two definitions I use are:

• "The process by which those who love and trust Jesus Christ effectively take on his character" (Dallas Willard)
• "The process of being conformed to the image of Christ for the sake of others" (Robert Mulholland)

These are both good definitions, which convey different nuances, but come out with the same kind of person: someone with an inward and outward life significantly like that of Jesus, and who systematically arranges his/her life toward that goal.

Now for Methodism. I have to make very clear that when I say Methodism and Spiritual Formation are the same thing, I am referring to what Methodism was in its beginnings, when it changed the face of England in the 1700's, and not necessarily referring to anything about someone who is a part of today's United Methodist Church or any of our cousins in the faith.

What it meant to be a Methodist in John Wesley's day was essentially that you agreed upon the goal (living a holy life) and you signed on to a kind of lifestyle that would be conducive to growing that holiness in you. Components of this lifestyle were prescribed simply in the General Rules: Do no harm, do good, and practice the means of grace (things like prayer, reflecting on the scripture, taking Communion, and participating in large and small group meetings with other Methodists shaping their lives in this way).

So the language and cool factor have certainly changed, but the kind of life offered has not. Today's Spiritual Formation movement is much more likely to use the term "Christlikeness" than early Methodism's "holiness," but the goal is the same. And, when they are at their best, the means of getting there are the same also: spiritual disciplines/means of grace practiced in community under the guidance of the Spirit of God and of others who love and trust Jesus as you do.

And here's the kicker: your theological background doesn't determine whether you're a Methodist or not, only that you shape your lives in these ways (i.e. by this method). Although Wesley certainly put effort into defining what he believed theologically, you didn't have to agree with him to be a Methodist. Just shape your life by the General Rules. Similarly, I have met very like-minded and like-hearted people in the Spiritual Formation movement from every Christian tradition I know of, because our goal and means of arriving there are the same.

(Neither Wesley nor I intend to say by this that the  theology is unimportant. The difference between his day and ours is that while you could be a Methodist and disagree with him on theological points, if you were going to be one of his Methodist preachers... you needed to be on the same page with him. Today, both agreeing with his theology and the way you arrange your life have almost become completely irrelevant in the process of becoming a Methodist pastor.)

So, do you know some folks who are Methodist and have had no idea? And if you aren't one already, regardless of what the name on the building of your church says, want to join me in being one?

Book Review: Fasting by Scot McKnight

For most of my Christian life, I have tried to avoid fasting as if it were sin itself. (And, if the truth needs to be told, I’m not always very successful at avoiding sin, but I do have a very consistent record of avoiding this ancient discipline which so many good people- like Jesus- have said to be helpful.) In this brief book, Scot McKnight has thoroughly reframed my understanding of fasting and led me to form a solid intention of incorporating it into my life.

My aversion to fasting has come from two sources: First, it’s uncomfortable, and unfortunately I’ve come to be quite fond of comfort whenever I can get it. There’s nothing admirable about that. The second reason, though, is that much of what I have seen and heard about fasting in recent Christian teaching and writing focuses on the practice as a way of twisting God’s arm into giving us something that, by our fasting, we are showing him that we want very badly. It seems to be not much more advanced than a spiritualized adult version of a toddler’s attempts at manipulating their parents by throwing a temper tantrum. I’ve always sensed that something about the teaching was a bit off, and Scot McKnight has provided the much needed corrective.

From the book’s introduction to conclusion, he directly addresses this misconception of fasting and continually reiterates that in the Scriptures, “Fasting is the natural, inevitable response of a person to a grievous sacred moment in life,” not “a manipulative tool that guarantees results.”

McKnight’s understanding of fasting hinges on his readers regaining the ancient Hebrew understanding of a human being as being whole (what he calls "Biblical body image"), meaning that we reject the dualistic distinction between body and spirit and recognize that our complete response before God will include all aspects of who we are, obviously including our bodies.

If we have this understanding of ourselves in place, then fasting becomes a natural response when life’s “grievous sacred moments” come our way. These moments, as McKnight describes them, come often in our lives, and he organizes the majority of the book around these different kind of grievous sacred moments, respectively: the need for repentance (“Body Turning”), intercession (“Body Plea”), responding to loss (“Body Grief”), gaining awareness of our need to overcome sinful habits (“Body Discipline”), regularly observing days when a particular response to God is appropriate- such as Good Friday (“Body Calendar”), sympathizing with those suffering from poverty or injustice (“Body Poverty”), our longing for greater intimacy with God (“Body Contact”) or for the coming of God’s kingdom on earth (“Body Hope”). The book concludes with practical warnings and admonitions about fasting with chapters on problems and benefits of fasting and its effects on the body.

Anyone desiring to respond to God with more of their whole selves will gain tremendously valuable insight from McKnight on how we can do so in a way that millennia of our predecessors in the faith have done, including Christ himself, by joining them in the practice of fasting.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Scripture Plaques You Won't Find at the Christian Bookstore, #10

[This post is one of a series of potential Christian plaques that we would never find at a Christian bookstore. See the rest of the list here.]

Here's an approach for accountability groups who take their role very seriously.* (You can click on the image to make it larger.)

Works cited: *Brauchi, Barry. "Conversations on the Couch." Rosa's Tortilla Press: Midland, 2011.

Hooray for Baptism!

>Christians around the world who follow the calendar of the Christian Year have celebrated today as the Baptism of the Lord. On this day, we remember Jesus' baptism by John the Baptist, and in doing so, today millions of Christians around the planet have reaffirmed their baptismal covenants. Thankfully, our church was one where this was celebrated this morning, and I was moved to watch hundreds of adults come forward to reaffirm their faith in Christ, renew their commitments to walk and grow in Christ's ways, and to celebrate God's faithfulness to them by remembering their own baptism with gratitude.

Since we are part of one of the many Christian traditions that practice infant baptism, our son was baptized when he was six months old. Because he was so young, we want to be intentional about helping him to develop a sense of remembrance about that day as he grows older. We were delighted that our church recorded his baptism on video, so that we will have a copy to show him as he grows, and I also wrote him the following letter that I try to re-read on days like today.

Regardless of whether or not your tradition baptizes infants, I hope that reading this will help you to remember your baptism and be thankful.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Ethan,

Today is a very important day for you: the day of your baptism. Since you aren’t old enough to remember it or understand its significance, I wanted to write you this letter today to help you have a way to remember your baptism when you are older.

Today, you were welcomed into Jesus’ church, and the water used for your baptism marked you as having entered into God’s covenant people. There will be days as you grow that you are unfaithful to God, but for your entire life you will be able to look back upon today and know that God has been faithful to you.

Your Mom and I were there with you this morning, as were Pop & Nana Kate and PawPaw and Nana, and Kathryn Tyra, who with her husband, Chester, have been like grandparents to me throughout my life. When I was born, we went to church at St. Mark’s United Methodist Church in Midland, which is where Pop & Nana Kate got to know Chester & Kathryn. They were probably there at my baptism when I was a baby, and so it was important to me to invite them to be a part of your baptism too.

I want to help you know what happened today, and a big part was vows that your Mom and I made, along with our whole church, to teach you Jesus’ ways. So that you will always know our commitment to the Lord and to you, this is the liturgy that was part of your baptism:

As we all stood in front of the church together, our Pastor, Dr. Tim Walker, said:
“Baptism is an outward and visible sign
of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,
through which grace
we became partakers of his righteousness
and heirs of life eternal.
Those receiving the Sacrament
are thereby marked as Christian disciples,
and initiated into the fellowship of Christ’s holy Church...”

It is a wonderful thing that you are now officially part of Jesus’ church. You are a part of the most wonderful, most influential, most giving, and yet most persecuted group of people in the last 2,000 years. It is through us that Almighty God has chosen to carry on his loving work of redemption for the whole world. I pray that you will always love the church, even though there will be times that it will disappoint you and possibly even cause you pain, Jesus intensely loves this church of which you are now a part and is always working to purify her.

As you have been initiated into Jesus’ church, you have also become a “partaker of God’s righteousness and heir of life eternal.” God, in his grace, is working long before you know anything about it to bring you into a close friendship with him and he has provided everything that you need to know and serve him, to become like Jesus and be a man with his character, leading an abundantly-lived life for as long as you live. It will be your decision when you are older whether or not you want to cooperate with God in this. He has left you free to reject him, but as part of our family and as part of Jesus’ church, you are in the midst of a family and community of God’s grace, which I pray will take a deep hold of your heart.

This is the centuries-old covenant that your Mom and I made before the entire church, because we love you so deeply and are so grateful that God has entrusted you to us as a wonderful gift:
We accept as our bounden duty and privilege to live before you, Ethan,
a life that becomes the gospel;
to exercise all godly care
that you may be brought up in the Christian faith,
that you may be taught the Holy Scriptures,
and that you learn to give reverent attendance
upon the private and public worship of God.

We will endeavor to keep you
under the ministry and guidance of the Church
until you by the power of God
shall accept for yourself the gift of salvation,
and be confirmed
as a full and responsible member of Christ’s holy Church.

Then, Dr. Walker said your full name and baptized you, David Ethan Harris, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

It was a wonderful day for us. I will always be thankful for you, proud of you, and love you more than you may ever know. I will not be a perfect father to you, but I will always try to show you the kind of unconditional, sacrificial love that I have experienced from my Dad and from God. It does not matter what your future holds; you are my son, and my love for you will never end.

That is what today is about, because you have also entered into this kind of covenant with God. As much as I love you, God loves you much more. As much as I will always try to be faithful to you and provide for your good, God will do so much more. I am a sinful man, yet I love you so deeply that I cannot put it into words, and that love will never end. How much more, then, does God, our Father, love you! You entered into a covenant with God today; you did not choose it, but God has chosen you. Through your entire life, God will always be faithful to you, just as he has always been faithful to me.

May you always look back on today, and know that you are loved.

Love,
Dad

New Year's Resolution 2011: Quit Sinning

Whether you set any or not, I'm sure that "resolution" is a word we hear more in the week before and after January 1 than in the rest of the year combined. I have no idea why there’s a page on the U.S. Government's official website about New Year’s Resolutions, but here it is. These are the ones it lists: Drink Less Alcohol, Get a Better Education, Get a Better Job, Get Fit, Lose Weight, Manage Debt, Manage Stress, Quit Smoking Now, Reduce Reuse and Recycle, Save Money, Take a Trip, Volunteer to Help Others... pretty much the normal list. If those are the resolutions that everyone sets, I thought I would do something different. So, after much deliberation, I am about to share with you my list of New Year’s Resolutions for 2011. Actually it isn’t a list. (The dictionary said I had to have more than one for it to be a list.) So, instead of my list of New Year’s Resolutions for 2011, here is my bullet point of New Year’s Resolution for 2011:

• Quit Sinning.

Just incase you didn’t get all of that. I’ll give you my bullet point again:

• Quit sinning.

Some of you may think I’m being silly, and I'll grant that this may take me more than a year, but it is my hope and my plan that anyone who knows me well enough to know the difference will be able to say when this year ends that I have made significant progress toward completely getting rid of sin in my life.

If I can convince you that I mean this, I am sure that many of you, especially those of you who know me well, are thinking, “...Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.” Or maybe your reaction is even a little more aggressive, like, “Who does he think he is?” Or perhaps aren’t convinced that I’m not joking or playing some kind of word game. But I mean it. I intend to quit sinning, and nothing else is coming in the remainder of this blog post to let me off of the hook on this one.

And I’m not just talking about the big, obvious sins that come to our minds, but I’m talking about completely giving it up: everything that in any way reflects anything less that complete, whole-hearted love for God and love for other people, I intend to stop.

I can’t take credit for coming up with my bullet point of New Year's Resolution all by myself. I had some very good help. In fact, I pretty much stole it (which may have been a step in the wrong direction if I’m talking about giving up sin, since stealing is high on the list of obvious ones). But Dallas Willard talks about this, and it’s so good that I'll quote a few paragraphs directly. He says:

If one day I assure my Christian friends that I intend to “quit sinning” and arrive at a stage where I can perfectly follow Jesus Christ, they will most likely be scandalized and threatened- or at least very puzzled. “Who do you think you are?” they would probably say. Or they might think, “What is he really up to?”

But if, on the other hand, I state that I do not intend to stop sinning or that I do not plan ever to follow my Lord in actuality, they will be equally upset. And for good reason. How can Jesus be my Lord if I don’t even plan to obey him? Would that really differ in substance and outcome from not having him as Lord at all? My Christian fellowship circle will allow me not to follow him and even not to plan to follow him, but they will not permit me to say it.

Yet, I must do one or the other. Either I must intend to stop sinning or not intend to stop. There is no third possibility. I must plan to follow Jesus fully or not plan to follow him. But how can I honestly do either? And does not planning to follow him really differ, before God and humanity, from planning not to follow him? (From The Spirit of the Disciplines, pp. 12-13)

Now, brothers and sisters, it’s not just me on the hook for this. We’re all on the hook for this. Most of us have likely never considered the possibility of just quitting sin, because if we realize it is part of our lives at all, we know how deeply ingrained in us it is. Yet that does not change his point: that we cannot become free of its domination without a grace-dependent plan for doing so.

There are plenty of good things to look at incorporating into our plans, but one that I've enjoyed focusing on during the past week has been the old Methodist practice of renewing our covenant with God at the beginning of a new year. If you're interested in using a modern version of part of the service for your own commitment, click here.