Stuff Christians Like...

There is a blog that I follow that is titled....

"Stuff Christians Like"

It has some very humorous entries and every once in a while there will be one that begins to reveal some deeper insight... There have been many entertaining commentaries on the christian sub-culture...

Once, there was a quiz to see how metrosexual your worship leader is...

this sight amazes me.

It is normally well written and pretty clever, but it is not the quality of content that amazes me... it is the quantity of content. The latest entry was #629

six hundred and twenty nine entries about the christian sub-culture, and the weird, quirky, and often unfortunate things that christians have become known for.

I was reading through some of the entries out loud to a couple of the guys at my house and one of them pointed out that the majority of what is written in these entries are only amusing if you are a "christian"... it is basically a site dedicated to inside jokes for christians and poking some fun at itself.... so far around 629 "funs" have been poked at itself...

this seems a little odd to me, and it could be that I just wasn't sure what to write about and this was the fist thing that came to mind.. but still...

it seems a little odd to me.

this is why...

when we pair a christian perspective of christians with an unchristian perspective of christians... at large, two very different observations would be made.

read Unchristian for more on that...

and while this site is obviously made for entertainment... it follows pretty close to the idea that "it's funny because it's true" and there is a part of me that wonders when it won't be funny any longer for the exact same reason... because it is true... time will tell, i suppose. it is kind of a gossip after all...

Just a few thoughts to ponder...

peace.

beer, dancing, fireworks

Last year at some point I was talking with a friend of mine who works with college age students at a church. We actually work at the same church, but that isn't very important.

we began discussing what might make an interesting series to talk on.. and allo of a sudden a phrase shot out of my mouth.

"We like beer and dancing"

The whole concept was to talk about some different cultural traits and stereotypes that are often times embodied by the church.

the title has two components that symbolize larger components...

beer:

The topic of alcohol consumption can be a very touchy one inside a church. It is a crossing of faith with a dash of puritanical splendor, and culture. So this concept represents those topics that can cause extreme division... other such topics would be; tobacco use, politics, homosexuality, worship style,

... those things that cause division

dancing:

The topic of dancing can also be touchy, but is a less dividing area. Once again it crosses faith with culture, but it represents those topics that have been largely accepted by the church or that people choose not to be overly concerned with. Others would be; secular music, R rated movies, drinking wine, boys with long hair, girls wearing pants

... those things that cause division, but we can deal with

We have created two lists - those things we can deal with and those things that cause division

Here is the deal...

I don't really care about the specifics or behaviors and preferences that people have with these different topics. It is interesting to learn about what their preferences are, but if they cannot be discussed or if they become a higher priority than other more crucial aspects of faith... we gots us a problem.

When our primary focus in faith becomes behavior modification, we will find ourselves in a tough place. Our behaviors should be reactionary. This means they are to be caused by something. As christians, we tie our faith in God to His love and sacrifice for us. We make that claim all the time... but if that was true, I think things would look different...

about 3 and a half years ago I had an eye-opening realization.

I had been trying to follow Christ's teachings for several years, and had been raised up learning all the bible stories and listening to countless sermons.... I thought I knew a lot about Jesus and his teachings and life, and was rather comfortable with that... I had been working with youth at church, mentoring high school and college students in their faith, been doing intensive international mission work in Latin America, and was looking to work with a local ministry....

...and....

I realized I had no idea who Jesus was (this was very humbling)... and I began looking for answers...

my world was rocked... I started learning about who Jesus really was, the significance of his teachings in their proper context, the severity of dedication required to be his disciple, the lenths to which he was willing to go to bring people into new life in him. He was open and honest, loving, passionate... he would humiliate false religous leaders and directly oppose the corrupt religous orgnizations of the time.. turning tables, calling them sons of hell.... flannel graph that one.

(one book that helped a lot with this (both with questions and answers) was The Jesus of Suburbia by Mike Erre )

read it.

So.... how does all this tie together. I think that it does, so let me give it a shot...

If we are not reacting to a legitimate faith in Christ and desire to serve him, we will begin creating issues to be proactively interested in. This is legalism. We have done this. We have picked minor social issues and made it clear that if you follow Christ you will do this, this, and this... and you will not do that, that, or that.

The lines are made very clear and simple.

This is not the way of the cross.

When we are legitimately reacting to a faith in Christ (the real Christ) and we desire to serve him... these minor social issues are not the primary concern... issues of love, justice, mercy, and compassion become a primary focus. It is a reaction.

If you light off fireworks the flame will cause a reaction which will produce a brilliant response.

If there is no flame, there is no reaction.

the same is true for our faith... and we are farting around with sparklers while the big ooh ahh is jsut waiting to be set off.

if we aren't reacting to "the flame"... beer and dancing should be the least of our concerns.

Jesus doesn't like fat chicks...

I debated whether or not to have this be the title of the blog... apparently I decided to go with it...

I was going to church at The Salvage Yard last Tuesday and there was a message given by a 55 year old man with dreds named David Pierce who gave a message about the work that he had been doing through Steiger International. There were many fantastic stories about the amazing and difficult adventures that they had experienced and the way that God was able to work through their obedience...

there was one thing that stood out more than anything else though...

it wasn't the near death experiences shared with us, not the riots swelling on the streets in the middle east, the extremists beginning to organize an attack.. none of that.

it was the fat chicks.

and the story goes something like this...

paraphrased...

" I was looking out my window one day when a peculiar sight caught my eye. I saw a nest with two little baby birds in it... or rather.. two incredibly plump and obese chicks (baby birds).

These two chicks were so fat and gelatinous that they were barely recognizable as chicks.

The mother bird was working frantically to continue feeding them and was constantly gathering worms to feed these two chicks. All along, the fat chicks were crying out "more, more, more!"

It was surprising that these two chicks had grown to the mass that they had... They barely fit in the nest, they were so overfed.

for several days I would walk by the window and see this scene replayed... the momma bird frantically struggling to feed the chicks, the chicks becoming more overstuffed and crying out for more, and so on.. and so on.

until...

one day I went to the window to check on the situation.

the nest was empty.

The mother bird had pushed the chicks out of the nest, because the time had come.

It was time to fly, or time to die"

David went on to explain how he felt that this was an accurate representation of the church. We have gotten comfortable in our nest and we continue calling out for more.. more... more.

We have become overly saturated with focusing on what God is doing for us.. what the ministries of the church are providing for us... our personal preference for what the music in the church sounds like.... where we think the altar in the church should be placed... more... more... more...

let me spell this out more clearly...

We "christians" have focused on ourselves and expected the "church" ( pastors, worship leaders, staff, ministries, etc...) to momma bird the fat chicks (the congregation) while the people attending continue to get more fat, and more comfortable, and whether we like it or not there will come a new season where it is "time to fly, or time to die"

we cannot fit in the nest any longer.

and...

if the entire focus of our faith is for self-improvement we are probably doing something wrong...

in other words...

If what we are doing within the four walls of the church has no effect on the streets we take to get there... we might be missing the point...

So, as I was processing through some of this with a friend, a simplified summary surfaced...

"Jesus doesn't like fat chicks"

It is time to fly

tambourine

I went to a concert a few weeks back and one of the bands playing consisted of; drums, bass, electric guitars, electric piano, synth, vocals, and a tambourine.

It was a full band, and the instruments were amplified creating a lot of noise.. good noise, but a loud amount of it. is loud an amount? today it is.

There was one instrument that was not amplified however... unfortunately, the title of this blog kind of destroys any hope for suspense that would have surely otherwise overwhelmed you, as you desperately sought to discover what this one un-amped instrument might have been.

it was the electric guitar, the band sucked.

ok, it was really the tambourine...and there is a reason for this. The frequency of the tambourine is at a completely different level than the other instruments and can pierce through the swelling sea of sonic waves in an astounding way. The tambourine needed no amplification. The tambourine needs no amplification because that is how it has been designed... also the tambourine player was absolutely sick! ( in an amazing way) It was like a freaking humming bird was somehow harmonioulsy combined with the tin man and mentored by a muppet named Animal... and I don't say that about many people.

I think we can learn something from this... (as long as you discount the metallic muppet bird part)

I think there is something inside of all of us that is looking for amplification. we all have our own story, thoughts, song, poetry, pain, concerns, passions.. etc.

There is a desire for these things to be amplified and expressed.. for them to be physically manifested and, best case scenario, understood.

Cliche? yeah.. but let's keep going because there is some truth here... most things that are now "cliche" were once original and insightful

Ok... so this is where things get all mystical and deep... what if instead of us trying to simply amplify ourselves were formed into people who by our very nature are amplified... set apart... what if the way we looked, acted, sounded, and lived was at a different wave length than all the rest of the world?

What if we were transformed by the renewing of our minds so that we were able to walk out a holy and God-pleasing life an reality and not just theory... what if we were so drastically radical and made a different frequency than the standard so that people had to call us something else... isn't that what happened to the first "christians"? They manifested the teachings of Christ and deviated from the staus quo to the degree that they no longer looked like everything else... they looked like small Christs.

The word "christian" had a beautiful season and was extremely accurate for that time ,but has been watered down, whored out, and falsely self-embraced... I think we need a new generation of serious Christ followers, maybe we can call them something different like...."Christ Followers" ... or we could call them "tambourines" but that would be more confusing.

more important than a new name is a revisitation of the original call and cost of discipleship and dedication to Christ being lived out, someone else can pick the name. They'd have to.

- Jreux

Nearly kicked out of the church I work at...

We have recently undergone some very big changes at the church I have been working at for the past two years. All of the services were combined into one service for an undetermined length of time. There are between 2500 and 3000 people attending various services every weekend, corralling that many people into one location was a feat in itself. Combine that with all the different personalities and worship preferences...

let me explain... because, we got it all,

.... you get the sword swinging flag wavers waiting for the schofar to blow, while the liturgically saturated hymn singers are thirsty for a wicked organ solo, and the culturally absorbed "hip Christians"wondering why the pastor isn't wearing a stylish untucked button up shirt and pre-ripped blue jeans or sitting on a stool and waiting for their three easy steps to a better family life... and everything else in between. This is a horse of a different color. So, why is this happening?

Well, the short answer is that we are entering into a season to try to build unity and seek God in order to figure out what exactly we are. Good stuff.

In the midst of this circus, not everyone is truly welcome...

I am going to tell a story...

Remember that story in the Bible about Jesus and the sermon on the mount? That part where Jesus says to a young man and his friend "Hey, aren't you those punks that disrupted things earlier on? Get out, you aren't welcomed here!" It turns out that the young man was Matthew, and he left, very confused.... then Jesus turned to the remaining 11 and said "now, go and do likewise" and Jesus continued on with the sermon...

what? you don't remember that story?... hmm... weird. Maybe this was just in "The Message" version...

Anyway, the story has a point... it honestly does.

Last week we had the first "United Service", and I invited one of my friends to come with. He is on staff with a ministry in Minneapolis... so we attend the service and immediately afterwards an elderly man approaches us and apologizes to us.

This was weird, since it was the first time I had ever talked to this man.

He goes on to explain that he and some others saw us enter the building and were looking for us in order to kick us out, because they had mistakenly profiled us...

I was nearly kicked out of the church that I work at. (title)

Fortunately he ran into one of the pastors and pointed over to us before doing the deed. It was then explained to him that I am on staff and they had the wrong people...

To be fair, we don't really look like we belong in a suburban mega church (this is a weird, kind of sad statement... yet true)

crisis averted, right? No blood, no foul?

Hmm.. what if it this would have happened to another person instead...? yikes.

What if Joe Shmo walked into the church and was tracked down and asked to leave just because of the way he looked? What kind of statement does that make? Where are our priorities as a church?

We looked like people that didn't belong in a church and would have been kicked out if I didn't work there....

It seems like we are more concerned about "protecting" the congregation than we are about reaching out to the lost and hurting... especially true if we won't even accept them in when they walk through our own doors.

well, maybe all this will get sorted out from our "United Service"season? I sure hope so.

-Jreux

2:10am

I am still awake and didn't know what else to do, so I thought I would give this a whirl...

what to talk about?

I cut my finger today. It was very interesting though... the reason being that it was cut by a seemingly harmless object... which I guess is why this stands out to me.

It would be one thing if I cut myself with a knife, or scissors, or the corner of a table, or some other jagged piece of solid material, broken glass, a rusty nail, lawn mower blades, a chainsaw... something at least kind of menacing or intimidating.

no

I cut myself with a piece of string... something incredibly soft... something used to make blankets, comfortable clothing, and sock puppets. string.

It was even more than a cut, it was more like a slice, right along the soft flesh covering the joint dividing the tip of my middle finger from the rest of my hand. The tension, movement, and pressure of this innocent and soft thread turned a normally unimpressive object into a surprisingly strong and destructive tool. It would have kept going deeper if the pain had not startled me and caused me to quickly pull my hand away. Thinking back, I am not even sure how I did this to myself.. but that is not the point...

this is the point, or at least I think it is.. I didn't rally have a point when I started writing, remember?.. it was just late and I was trying to find something to do.. anyhow.. back to the point.

the point...

string is not very impressive.

I kind of feel like leaving that as the point, but I will add some more to it...

As you have heard it said before "string is not very impressive" but when the right pressure, movement, tension, manipulation, and combination with other tools is added to this unimpressive grouping of fibers amazing things can happen. there is potential.

I kind of feel like that string, and I am very glad that I am in the hands of a master artist who is able to look at me, call me good, see potential, and turn me into something more than just a piece of string. grace is beautiful.

-Jreux

Head and Heart

That works for me too...

If you have read any of my past entries, you know that I frequently speak on the concept and practice of christian life as well as the north american church...

I was talking with a friend of mine today as we were eating some exquisite roast beef sandwiches at a little shop called Maverick's near Saint Paul. I ran an idea by him that I have been thinking about for a day or so and has sparked my curiosity... here it is.

What if...

I were to spend a year traveling across the United States of America and would completely depend on churches and their members to take me in, feed me, let me sleep at someones house, care for me, and send me on my way....

?

What if I spent a year doing that as I traveled all across this country? Do you think that the people in the church would really look out for me and offer me care and provision? My immediate suspicion is no, but I would like to think yes, I really would like to think yes.

This is the other part - I don't tell them that I am doing this as an experiment or test, I don't tell them that I had been on staff with a church or done international mission work, or any of that jazz... I come to them in brokenness and humility ( I am sure that I would n0t be faking this after the first month on the road) who loves the Lord and is expecting his people to show me His love.

If I were to document this experience, i wonder what we would find out... Would I be accepted? Would I be dismissed or cast out?

It struck me as a very interesting thing to consider... I am sure you would be interested to see this actually happen and to hear updates as the year goes on. Well.....

...maybe someday I'll be that person and give this a shot. I am sure I would learn a ton and be forever changed... but until then I would like to think that if the tables were turned I would be willing to take that person in, if just for a little while and show that person love and compassion.

Now that I have processed the idea a bit, the oddest part of the whole thing is that this concept of welcoming in a stranger is such a foreign idea.

I once met a man who did something similar to this. He was from France and began his travels in The united States. By the time we crossed paths he had made it all the way to the Darien Gap, and realized that nearly everyone who has crossed this guerrilla and cartel infested stretch of rain forest separating Colombia and Panama has written a book about their survival. He probably made a good call in turning around. He was a storyteller and performer and had spent close to a year travelling the Americas, refusing public transportation or paying for a place to sleep. he was kind of a modern day E.C. Frommens. He became dependant on mankind for his care and survival. In exchange, he would tell stories and perform, he would teach, sing, dance, juggle, and share pieces of culture that he had learned along the way. The mission that i was working with gave him food, shelter, friendship, and opportunities to share his stories and crafts for the time he was with us, and then he went along his way... I haven't thought much about him since until right now...

turn, turn, turn...

Dear 14 readers ( I am accepting new subscribers as well),

I am so proud of you for making it this far, but I think I am going to attempt to lighten up these entries a little bit. This may or may not work, I'm not really a betting man but I feel safe leaving those as the two most likely options...

I also think that it might be nice to have some sort of new consistent theme or direction to these entries and to add a new entry every other day. Don't get me wrong, I have been writing a on a pretty consistent theme, but maybe it is time for a change of pace... as my entries should represent my style which could be described as "awesome" ... also I should be writing about things that are more interesting to make up for my rather bland and unexciting personality.

With that being the case I am not going to strive to be the best at writing blog entries that are engaging and entertaining. I will just try to be better than most at doing those things.

So consider this entry number one of our new experiment.. what would the 14+ of you be interested in hearing my perspective on? you have two days.

Complicated Simplicity

I saw that this was an unfinished blog of mine from May of this year.. So I am going to attempt to pick up where it left off....wish me well.

originally
Somehow we manage to make this concept a reality. I think that we tend to over think things quite often, leaving us with nothing more but a set of plotted out statistics. I have been reading book in which the author confesses his addiction to purchasing books, a good number of them on the topic of simplifying life. He has come to realize that the more he has learned about methods and philosophies of simplification, the more complicated the pursuit of it has become.

additionally
So, why is it that we find ourselves making a mess out of something that should be natural? Of course this is only the case with abstract ideas, it is not as though we do actually do this in the real world. ( he said with mild sarcasm ) I think in that last thought progression there was a seed of truth that might explain the concept of complicated simplicity. I realize that the more I talk about this and begin criticizing it, the more hypocritical this entry becomes, so I better hurry up.


I think the seed of reality is that we have a deep desire for something authentic. We have realized though that it is much easier to produce something that looks authentic than to actually go through the sacrificially exposing work of being something authentic. Simplicity is one of those things. It looks and sounds good, but the natural evolution of a simplistic lifestyle comes at a great cost. It is much easier to; do these three things, or read that book, or dress this way, and appear to have a simplistic lifestyle than it is to actually search deep within and manifest a simple and peaceful beauty in our everyday lives.

This is not to say that advice from others or studying from peoples experiences is not helpful. It is helpful, as a matter of fact, I would say that the majority of what I believe and who I have become has been heavily influenced off of the blood and sweat (mostly figurative) of others. There needs to be a crossover though. There needs to be ownership and introspective archaeology... there is something hidden away inside of all of us that will be exposed. Something inside that has been forgotten. Something alive that is waiting to be unleashed. what a simplistic complication.

-Jreux