Eleanor

I got the news not long after I had finished my second helping of ice cream while I was on vacation. A friend of mine had just died. She starved to death. We weren't close friends, but I knew her. I had hugged her. She is the first person I've ever known who has died from malnutrition. I had heard the stats before, but this time, one of those stats had a face and a personality.

Eleanor was a little girl who attended the Lifesong school in Zambia that Abby and I visited this past summer. Her health was poor and her spirit was weak when we saw her this summer. She was neglected by her family and she was malnourished. Dru Smith, the missionary we stayed with in Zambia, described Eleanor as one who had "lost the will to live". Despite weighing only about 25 pounds as a 6 year old, there were times when her health seemed to be improving. In fact, I got an email from Dru that she had finally been admitted to a hospital and we being fed from an IV. I was hopeful for little Eleanor.

But then I read the next email in my inbox which read: "There is a new angel in Heaven tonight. Eleanor will suffer no more. May her soul rest in peace."

Eleanor died. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't do anything but cry. It's been a few days now, but the same question keeps nagging at me? The question is: Why?

Why is the world so different where I live than where Eleanor lived? Why do I get as much ice cream as I want and she essentially starved to death? I wonder if she ever got to taste ice cream. Why is the world so different in two different places? Why do I live in a place where kids do not die from the things that caused Eleanor to die? WHY? WHY!? It gets me angry. I thought I'd feel guilty, but that's not what I feel. I feel the kind of anger that I think I would feel if somebody slapped my wife. I'm angry and I want to set things right. I want to do something about it.

Lord, I know you are good, even when things seem so bad. I know that you hate injustice and that you will one day bring reconciliation to this broken place. You will make all things right. I don't understand, but please give me understanding. Please give me understanding that leads to right action. Please use us, your church, to bring your justice and your peace and your compassion to this world today.

"I know the Lord secures justice for the poor and upholds the cause of the needy." Psalm 140:1

"Woe to you who are well fed now, for you will go hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will mourn and weep." Luke 6:25

Minimalism for the Mist

I came across an article today by John Piper entitled, "Should I Invest for Retirement?" and really enjoyed his concluding paragraph, which I've pasted below. I hope I live it and I hope you do too. The link to the full article is: http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/AskPastorJohn/ByTopic/8/2727_Should_I_invest_for_retirement/

"So, all that to say, put a governor on your life. Make as much as you can, give as much as you can, and save what you need to in order to be a responsible non-borrower. Then do retirement with some minimalistic plan that frees you up for gospel ministry till the day you drop."

"Why you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes." James 4:14

The Sun Will Rise Tomorrow

One of my fellow teachers reminded the staff yesterday morning that we have something to be very thankful for, even if the election doesn't turn out how we so desire. He reminded us that we will get to witness a peaceful transfer of power in our nation, which is a rarity throughout world history. Regardless of the outcome tonight, I must give thanks.

"From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live." Acts 17:26.

I didn't deserve to be born into an affluent and peaceful nation. Tonight, I give you thanks.

Facial Hair, Cool Glasses, Coffee Breath and MacBooks

One of the requirements, I think, for being a church planter is that you have to own a Mac laptop, drink a lot of coffee, have Rob Bell glasses, and shave irregularly. I've been at an Acts 29 Church Planting Conference in St. Louis for the past day and a half as a requirement for a class I'm taking this semester at Urbana Theological Seminary. The conference is great, other than the fact that I own an HP laptop, don't like coffee, have the wrong glasses, and can't grow legit sideburns. After half a dozen speakers and another half a dozen conversations, I've spewed plenty of ink on my conference notebook so I thought I'd jot down a thought or two on the ol' blog from the conference.

The first morning a guy named Darrin Patrick from the Journey Church in St. Louis told us to never forget James 3:16 if we are doing ministry. The verse says "For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice." How quickly those of us in the ministry chase selfish ambition! I hope I don't forget that verse.

In Bryan Chapell's message from yesterday afternoon he mentioned "The expulsive power of a new affection", which is a phrase coined by Thomas Chalmers. The point is that the real power over sin is not simply to suck it up and try harder but rather to fall more in love with Jesus so that the desire to obey Christ, our new affection, expels the sin from our life which is the antithesis to the new affection.

Lord do not let my affection grow cold. Help me to love you more than my sin. Remind me that I am not sanctified by works of law or by simply trying harder, but only by your grace. Kindle within me and within your Church a greater affection for your glory!

Duped by the Make-up Man

I've been sucked into the political circus. All over the T.V. and radio there are thousands of people saying millions of words that amount to nothing and the thing that makes me mad is that I like it. I talk about politics at work, I listen to the circus on my way to and from work, I watch the conventions at night . . . it has subtly become an idol. I'm not at all suggesting that politics are a waste of time. In fact, the stakes of this next election are massive and the issues our country faces are not insignificant. Yet, the media is trivializing the governing of our country and we the people are eating it up. We should be looking for a great civil servant who desires to govern in wisdom and we are enjoying this political game like drunks at a cock fight.

I read a quote last week in J.P. Moreland's Love Your God with Your Mind that speaks directly to the political fluff I've been entertaining myself with lately.

"Our society has replaced heroes with celebrities, the quest for a well-informed character with the search for a flat stomach, substance and depth with image and personality. In the political process, the makeup man is more important than the speech writer, and we approach the voting booth, not on the basis of a well-developed philosophy of what the state should be, but with a heart full of images, emotions, and slogans, all packed into thirty-second sound bites. The mind-numbing irrational tripe that fills TV talks shows is digested by millions of bored, lonely Americans hungry for that sort of stuff. What is going on here? What has happened to us?"
-J.P. Moreland, Love Your God with All Your Mind, p. 21

Lord, Help is to grow in wisdom so that we may discern what is best and live for that which matters. Save us from falsehood. Help us to stand up for truth and to love the blessing of freedom without falling into the trap of thinking that your Kingdom is of this world. Guard our hearts and give us the eyes to see through the fog and delight in what is true, noble, right, excellent, and praisewothy. Please give us a a leader who serves and help us to be servants ourselves. Amen.
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My Toilet Talked to Me

This past week Abby and I got to take a group of high schoolers to a Christ in Youth Conference at Southern Illinois University. I enjoyed the racquetball, silent football, smoothies, chicken nuggets, worship music, Bible studies, and dorm room chats with the kids, but I especially enjoyed the sermons. One line from the first sermon of the week really sticks out to me.

"Most Christians spend more time on the toilet than they do talking to God."

I know God doesn't have a giant graph up in heaven comparing the time I spend on the can to the time I spend on my knees in prayer, but the fact of the matter is that, for me, that statement is probably true.

In Matthew 7:21-22 Jesus said, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?" Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers."

It doesn't really matter if we call ourselves Christians. It matters what God calls us. I can do all kinds of Christiany stuff, but it doesn't matter unless I know Him--not know about Him, or know of Him, or know trivia facts about the Bible, or have read the latest theological books,but whether I know my Father and He knows me.

"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

Matthew 6:5-6

I Just Received 55 Billion Dollars

Seriously. I was just given $55 billion in currency from Zimbabwe, which is worth absolutely nothing. Abby and I are blessed to be staying with Mac and Elsa van den Berg, the directors of Eagle's Nest Christian school in Polokwane, South Africa this week. Mac gave me the $55 billion tonight as a gift because he picked it up off the road last week in Zimbabwe. He was taking food rations to the country last week and saw the currency flying out of a bus in front of him. He drove up next to the bus to let them know that money was blowing out the windows and they literally laughed at him and told him it was worth nothing. He later bought a Coke for $3 billion.

Zimbabwe is in the news around the world, but here in South Africa on the border, the news is reality. The people in Zimbabwe literally have nothing. The government has seized most everything, and the people are starving. Tonight a friend of Mac's, Thaddeus, a church planter in Zimbabwe, came over because he was in South Africa buying food to take back to Zimbabwe tomorrow.

What do you say to a pastor from Zimbabwe who is sitting down to dinner with you for his first meal of the day and he asks you, "What is America like?" and "What is the Church there like?" He got his first pair of shoes when he was 21 and his truck is full of meally-meal that most American Christians wouldn't feed to their pets . . . what do you say to a guy like this?

We sat there and talked for awhile and during our conversation, my mind drifted to the prayer that I utter every Sunday morning with the rest of the Church--"Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread . . ." What? Have I ever really meant it? Will I ever say it again? How would Thadeus say this prayer?

Thaddeus will be the first to tell you that Zimbabwe needs more than food--it needs the hope that only Christ offers. But it does need food. Statistics got a face tonight. Real people are really starving. God's Word is clear, "But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth" (1 John 3:17-18) I'm not sure how much we will give or how we will go about it, but I am sure that I cannot do nothing and continue to call myself a Christian.

Paul once wrote that the "His grace was not without effect." Lord may your grace have collossal effect in our lives!