Justin Bieber's Spring Cleaning

Justin Bieber is stepping away from his music career.  Since I was never a fan of his music this news was not disturbing to me. Yet, I know that he was a ‘teen idol’ to millions of adoring fans.  He came to fame at age 15 and his career path led him to a popularity and fortune that few teens know but most dream of achieving.  If his string of awards from the music industry is any indicator, he is good at what he does.

Now he is in a spat with a former girlfriend, Selena Gomez, about why he married his wife, Hailey Baldwin. Their love lives and feelings, which most of us would express in emails or phone calls or commiserating with a buddy at the corner bar, are played out before thousands of eagerly watching eyes and ears. That isn’t healthy, and it is why Justin Bieber needs to step away to focus on ‘family and mental health.’

So, why am I telling you, a generation of readers who, for the most part, do not consume news of Bieber, Gomez and Baldwin, this story? One, if there are children you love, do not wish for them that type of fame and fortune. Discuss with them that their lives have meaning even when thousands are not following them on Instagram and Twitter; that being truly loved by a few people, and returning that love, deserves a lifetime achievement award worth more than a Grammy.

Second, I agree with therapist Siri Sat Nam Singh who observed, "[Our minds] are like our houses. If you don't clean your house it gets dusty and stinky and filthy. If you don't clean your mind — through reading books or calming exercises or meditation — you don't grow. In Western civilization it's all about matter: Everyone is trying to get rich, everyone is trying to buy the house and get the paper. Thus we lose consciousness in spite of the fact that we really are spirits as much as we are matter." (source: Peggy Drexler, cnn.com 3.26.19)

We are in Lent, an old word for ‘spring’. In this spiritual spring, make time to clean your minds, to renew your spirit. And encourage the young people you know to clean their minds and spirits, just like Justin.   

God Loves You Just Like You Are! Easter 2019 Invitation 1

"Free Food!"

I discovered Costco. I have been there enough to appreciate the superstore’s take on the human desire for ‘free food!’  Is there in fact such a thing as a free lunch? It is enough of a lure to capture the mind of an old Dutch man (me).

Of course, you must be a member, or arrive with a member to get the ‘free food!’, but that’s nit-picking. The food really is free. The drink too. In fact, I am sure there are people who plan their meals around the fact that a day of shopping at Costco will mean one fewer meal to prepare because of all the ‘free food!’  Of course, the premise of the very nice mostly female vendors offering you everything from soup to nuts is that someone is going to actually buy the product. They count on suckers, I mean, people like me who suffer from an immediate and overwhelming sense of obligation to buy ‘free food!’ because we want to help the nice ladies just trying to make a buck.  Costco wins.

Which makes me wonder if this is why God has such a hard time giving away ‘free food!’ on Sunday mornings. Christian churches offer Bread and Wine (or juice) somewhere between daily and quarterly.  You would think that would be an attractive offer, one that would cause the crowds to be breaking down the doors.  And yet, people stay away in droves.  Why? They don’t want to make the time? They were taught it is an obligation, and they don’t like being told what to do? They assume there is some hidden cost they will be suckered into because they believe everybody, especially those priests and ministers, all they really want is money?

God issues an invitation to truly free food and drink which results in everlasting life and love.  Yet the majority of people reject the invitation.  Don’t they understand that  the offer has an expiration date? (Isaiah 55:1-3, 6) It’s one thing to walk past the vendors at Costco; it’s a whole other thing to reject God’s invitation to ‘free food!’ What are we doing wrong?

Perhaps God should stop relying on amateurs like me and hire the Costco marketing department.

"The Flames Will Not Set You Ablaze"

“On March 3 (2019) around 12:58am our department was dispatched to assist Beaver VFD with a structure fire at the Freedom Ministries Church, located in Grandview WV. Though odds were against us, God was not. Picture this, a building so hot that at one point in time, firefighters had to back out. In your mind, everything should be burned, ashes. Not a single bible was burned and not a single cross was harmed!! Not a single firefighter was hurt!” Facebook post, Coal City Fire Department

Here is how God tells his story today. There were over 47,000 ‘shares’ and over 4,500 ‘comments’ of this Facebook post. You can spend a long time being absorbed by the testimonies and praise.  And the main theme of it all, God is still doing miracles.  The description of the event reminds me of Daniel 3, where a king sends three men who worship God into a furnace for refusing to worship foreign gods or idols. The fire is so hot that it kills their captors but the flames do not touch Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. 

The world is desperate to believe that in the midst of life’s struggles, God is still mighty to save.  The world is looking for evidence that what the prophet Isaiah wrote is still true:

When you pass through the waters,
    I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
    they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
    you will not be burned;
    the flames will not set you ablaze.
For I am the Lord your God,
    the Holy One of Israel, your Savior… (Isaiah 43:2-3a)

Perhaps you feel like you are standing amidst the flames today; or about to drown in the raging rivers of life.  Can God save you from it? Why do you think God saved the Bibles?

"And when the peony showed up..."

Metamorphóō (Greek), changing from one form into another, still retaining the essence of what one was and one is. Transfiguration. How are we to behold Christ’s glory and live? How can it be that we too are to be transfigured, transformed, that we are to experience metamorphóō in our being? (2 Corinthians 3:18) Some mysteries need a poet’s touch.

Contemplative prayer with peony                                                                                     

by Luci Shaw

So, I didn’t latch onto a holy word                                             

and go into space and, ethereal,

lose touch with my body. But God,

in those thirty slow minutes, you

unfolded in me the bud of a fresh

flower, with color and fragrance

that was more than my soul

was capable of, on its own.

. . . We all, with unveiled face,

behold as in a mirror

the glory of the Lord.

And when the peony showed up,

I knew it as a kind of mirror. This

was glory in pink and cream, with

a smell of heaven. Petals like valves

opening into the colors of my heart.

I saw myself kneeling on a grass border,

my knees bruising the green, pressing

my face into the face of this silken,

just-opened bloom, and breathing it,

wanting to drown in it. Wanting

to grow in its reflected image.

(Source: Christian Century, Nov. 19, 2015)

Why Is It Hard to Be Nice?

Do you remember when it was fashionable to live by the rule “If you have nothing nice to say about someone, say nothing at all”?  It’s one of those life-lessons, “things I learned in kindergarten” kind of sayings.

A famous Christian writer observed over 500 years ago that, ‘there is hardly anyone who is not tickled with the desire of inquiring into other people’s faults….This depraved eagerness for biting, censuring, and slandering, is restrained by Christ when he says, Judge not.” (John Calvin on Luke 6:37)

Perhaps it is contrary to our human nature to speak nicely of others.  But is this an incurable disease, this practice of speaking mean words about people’s lives? Or is it possible to find a new way forward?  We believe we should say something ‘not nice’ about other people’s faults because ‘they deserve it’, or perhaps words will change society. For example, if a wealthy, famous man gets caught engaging in prostitution; or if an actor stages a crime to gain sympathy, there is nothing nice to say, but does that mean we should say nothing at all? 

But, before we speak words that condemn we should say, ‘there but for the grace of God go I’.  Judging is a sin when we do so from arrogance. When we condemn the sins of others, we should be careful to use words which reflect our own shortcomings, speaking with humility, not with glee.  That a wealthy, 77-year old man seeks sexual pleasure from prostitutes is not something to laugh about, it is something to cry about.  That an actor is so insecure that he thinks the best way to become famous is to deceive the police is a sad commentary on his life and our society, but it isn’t something we should take joy in repeating.

It is so easy today, in our hyper-connected world, to write mean words; to forward or copy tasteless ‘humor’ at the expense of another human being; to use labels as a means of ‘killing softly with words.’  In a society which judges people guilty based on headlines and rumors it might be hopeless to suggest we can do better.

Let’s try to be nicer to each other.  You might change someone, like yourself, for good. (Luke 6:38)

Chris Pratt, Stephen Colbert and Daniel's Den

I didn’t know who Chris Pratt was until he was attacked for being a Christian.  I learned he was a voice actor for the “Lego” movie series, which I will confess to watching (with my grandsons). I did know who Stephen Colbert was, mostly from reading clips from his Late Show monologues. I would not have guessed either man to be a ‘religious’ practitioner.  That’ll teach me.

Chris Pratt, a famous actor (22.9 million Instagram followers!), was being interviewed by Stephen Colbert when Chris explained that he had recently completed the Daniel Plan diet. Stephen asked, “So, is this the prophet Daniel?”  When it was confirmed that it was a diet based on that Daniel, Stephen asked Chris if life as a famous actor was like being in the Lion’s Den.  Stop for a moment and think about this.  In our secularized society, here are two famous Hollywood-types talking about Daniel and the Lion’s Den on national television. That’s more late-night TV air time for God than any church could ever afford to purchase!

Chris took that opening to talk about a clue his Pastor had given him about handling fame.  After the interview aired, an actress took to social media to attack Chris because of the beliefs of the church Chris attended. Chris’ responded with an Instagram post defending his church as being one that loved him through his divorce and, he explained, regardless, he followed the ‘New Commandment’ of Jesus to love one another. He concluded: “This is what guides me in my life. He is a God of Love, Acceptance and Forgiveness. Hate has no place in my or this world.”

And just like that, millions were exposed to the true Christianity.  Jesus warned us that it would be a bad thing if everyone spoke well of his followers. (Luke 6:26) If we speak the Truth those who oppose the work of the Church will attack us. Chris offered a model response to those attacks. God opened my eyes to see how, while it may seem that God is losing the battle for the world’s heart, nothing is ever as it seems. God is still winning. “God is love” is still a message which God is sending to millions of hungry souls.

Nice to know you, Chris.