Challenged

I've posted before about how challenged I am with blogging. Its the little upkeep items in life that, when margins are slim, get dropped like a lead balloon. I truly do live up to my self-title, a "slogger"... a slow blogger.

Margins are beginning to return to my life now. Wonder if that'll mean I transform from once a year or two to once every 6 months??? I guess we'll see :)

Monetize my blog???

Apparently I can allow ads to be shown on my blog here. I guess I can make loads of money as my viewers keep visiting the blog and then viewing my ads.

At the rate I "slog" (slow blogging), I'll have $.50 in approximately 500 years! This is awesome!! Sign me up!!!

Authentic People

I was working in a bookstore this morning when I overheard a nearby conversation about business. Three men were discussing their business undertakings. One was clearly the boss. He was younger than (or same age) the others, yet he was clearly delegating tasks to these men. He used a lot of buzzy business lingo... "We'll get this streamlined" or "I'll get you clearance to push that one through" or "I'll be honest with you, the expectation is..."

Something about the way he was speaking was somehow annoying to me. I couldn't figure out why...but it was bothering me.

Was it that it made him sound important? No.

Was it that he was not speaking kindly to the other men? No.

Were there just too many buzzwords? No.

What was it?

After thinking it over a bit, it dawned on me. Something in his voice gave him up. He wasn't really the guy he was portraying. He wasn't really this self-important, expert business executive guy he was playing. He was just a regular guy. His friends from college knew him to be someone quite different. Even his family would be slightly taken aback to hear him in this role.

The problem...the thing that was bugging me...was that he wasn't authentic. He wasn't being himself in his business position. He was playing the part of the very important and powerful business exec. It was as if the tie he donned that morning somehow transformed him from this fun-loving, funny, laid-back person into the pressed-shirt, tie, business exec man.

For some reason, at some point in his life, he (consciously or subconsciously) decided he needed to be someone different in order to be successful in his business career. He needed to play a role. He's becoming a servant to an idol and changing his behavior to please the idol. Is it money? Is it acceptance from the "right" people? Is it power or prestige? Is he after titles and accolades?

If he's not careful, he'll soon forget who he truly is and the actor will forget to turn it off. His social crowd will shift and even his family will begin to relate differently to him.

As I realize this, my annoyance slowly fades to compassion. It's sad to see someone who is probably very likable turn into someone he's not...someone not as likable.

He needs Jesus.

With Jesus, he can still desire money, title, prestige...but it's all subservient to Jesus. My money will be used to glorify God. My title will enable me to influence God's change in the world. My prestige will allow me to influence others towards Jesus. Just look at Bono or Mel Gibson or Mr. T!!! :)

With Jesus, he won't be a slave to those things...they will be a slave to him as he humbles himself. He will no longer need to compromise his true self to achieve those ends. His passion and worldview will be focused on someone other than himself. He'll live to please God, not the masses or his parents or his old coach or whomever he feels the irresistible urge to prove himself to.

Most likely, the change will occur slowly. He'll slowly give up the behavioral patterns that have de-authenticated him over the years. He'll slowly grasp who God has created him to be. He'll slowly understand that that is the man he's working towards...not the business exec guy. He'll slowly find freedom in being authentic. He'll slowly learn that if God has truly called him to be an influential business exec and he follows God's lead, he'll get there as the man he is and not the man he's pretending to be.

This is freedom! This is beauty! This is God's power at work in the lives of his creation! This is what a restored people can be!!!

Oh God...turn his heart towards you! Give us another man after your heart!

Where's the love?

I keep hearing references to simple or organic church. Much of the motive behind this movement and passion seems to be quite refreshing. It is interesting, however, that many seem to be mixing up a model with a set of values. Far too often, I'm hearing simple/organic along with all sorts of wonderful adjectives in one sentence, and words like institutional with all sorts of negative adjectives in the next sentence. I'm concerned that we are tying the wonderful adjectives too closely to a particular model of doing church and the negative adjectives too closely with another model of doing church.

The language we use has an effect, intended or not. The word, institutional, is used for the church model that has dominated the Church for the past 1600 years or so. It is the model most of us are familiar with... the dominating characteristics of the model are a service, a sermon, some form of musical accompaniment, prayer, maybe communion, maybe an offering. In the Orthodox and Roman Catholic church, it takes place in the form of a Mass. In the Protestant church, it is a service. 

Back to this word institutional. What does this word bring to mind?

To me, I think about an old insane asylum...back in the days when shock therapy was vogue. Or, I think about rows and rows of office cubicles filled with hundreds of mindless lemmings (as depicted in the movie, The Matrix). Or, I think of old school government bureaucracy...with loads of red tape and frustrating, anti-progressive policies/procedures.

So, I guess it's only natural that when I hear all these folks espousing their model with all sorts of wonderful adjectives, then, with a thin veil of humility and brotherhood, referring to a more traditional model as "institutional," I cringe. I cringe because I've been in those institutional churches before and met some amazing people. I cringe because the term is, quite frankly, abusive to the millions of Jesus followers throughout history who have encountered, fallen in love with and dedicated their lives to God in the "institutional" church. I cringe because I know the leaders of some of those institutional churches and their relationship with Jesus is more alive and dynamic than most people I know.

It seems the conversation on simple/organic church has a lot of potential. But, the people behind the dialogue have to make some choices. Go the route of post-modernism, which seems to define everything by what it rejects (e.g. institutional) and as a result, often boils down to a cesspool of despair. Or, go the route of modernism, give up the dialogue (or just make it academic) and return to the traditional church. Or, find a higher way...recognize that a model is just a value-neutral tool that can be associated with wonderful or negative adjectives. Instead of splintering the Church further, make an honest attempt at lovingly, tactfully, thoughtfully and carefully revitalizing those values that have guided Christian thinking for centuries (defined by God and handed to us from Jesus through his earliest disciples and our Christian ancestors), within the context of the current Church.

Maybe we should ask a simple question. Did Jesus try to start a new church or did he attempt to revolutionize the current church?

If Mac is so great then...

...why did the first Mac I've ever had turn out to be a lemon?

We recently got a Mac, after a lifetime of PCs (except for that old Apple IIe when I was little). I was excited to see what this little fella could do. After all, I had heard so many great things about the oh so powerful and mighty Mac. Scores of friends who had converted years before me had espoused the wonders of the Mac.

It was now my turn.

I get to see the glimmering white rectangular box sit on my lap. I get to feel the smooth click of the keyboard. I get to experience the awesome power of the graphics card/chip or whatever you call it. Me. My turn!

We got it on a Friday. We connected to the internet. We played with Garage Band. We began the Mac honeymoon.

Saturday morning...we woke up. We powered the Mac up. We opened one of the many glorious apps. Then...

All was silent. The mouse was ineffective. The precious keyboard lost life. The beautiful screen was frozen. The Mac forgot it was a Mac. It appeared to be doing it's best Windows based PC impression. To say the least, a stunning rendition.

We turned it off, then on, then off, then on, then off, then on. Battery out, battery in, battery out, battery in. Hard reset, soft reset. Call Apple...need help. Off, on, battery out, battery in, hard reset, soft reset, Control, Apple, Delete...nothing.

The Apple rep told me to box it up. We lost her. We got a lemon. Before the honeymoon had gotten into full swing...we lost her.

Of course, it took about two weeks for Apple to replace the new Mac. It was as if they were more stunned than we. They didn't seem to know what to do! It was as if they were saying..."give it back!" "You're not worthy of such a wonderful machine." "You can't even get through the first 24 hours without ruining it!"

I felt guilty. "What did I do?" said I. Could it have been my fault? Did I open up too many apps at once? Was I moving too fast for it? Did my fingers still smell like PC?

We now have the replacement. It works fine. But, my first impression of Mac is tumultuous. A love/hate relationship we've started off with. It's complicated.

Learning to Serve Others

So for Valentine's Day, the people in my church community decided together that we'd give out free flowers to people on the Downtown Mall (a very popular pedestrian mall with loads of restaraunts) as a way of blessing the people of Charlottesville and sharing the love of God with them. We had a great time...we brought 150 flowers and gave them all out in about an hour (maybe 1.5 hours)...such fun.

One thing I noticed was that some people really have a hard time receiving. Quite a few people would lower their heads, stare at the ground, and mumble a "no" as they passed by...as if they were being solicited for money or a job or something. It was both sad and humorous at the same time. I would say..."no really, it's free...no strings attached...a free rose for you." They would respond, " . . . ". Nothing.

Some people would be more resolute, cutting you off mid sentence..."No. Thank you!" As they briskly walked away.

I wonder if they just didn't want to carry another thing around with them? Maybe we are so inundated with offers from slick ads that we develop this conditioned response..."NO, I don't want to give you any money." But, it wasn't about money. "No, I don't give money."

Other people would stop as their eyes lit up..."really?" "Are you kidding?" "Free?" "Okay, thanks!" As if they had never really gotten anything for free before.

One person asked if we wanted some sort of donation. I smiled...chuckled a bit to myself...and said, "No, we really just want to bless you...please enjoy your flower and have a great Valentine's Day." hesitation...."okay...thank you...this is very kind of you."

Some were really good at receiving. "Oh...this is great...I'm heading over to meet my girlfriend...I'll really score points now!!" :)

We had a lot of fun. We're still learning though.

As we were handing out the last of our flowers, a guy came over and thanked us. He asked, "Who's giving these away?" A moment of silence ensued as we pondered what he might have meant by asking such an odd question. With hesitation in our voices, two or three of us (me included) said, "Us." "Oh, okay...thanks" as he walked away.

Odd question? That wasn't an odd question. It was a perfectly normal question. We seem to get the giving stuff to people to bless them part of this...but we're still learning about the evangelism part of "servant evangelism." Oh well...we'll be back at it again soon. :)

Can you really say that you have a blog when...

...you post once per quarter and more recently only once every 6 months? Wow. I'm a blog slacker. Infact, I think we need a new word in our vocabulary for slacking bloggers. Maybe we could start a new trend. "Hi, my name is Jim and I'm a slogger." Or, "Hi, I'm Jim. I'm a slagger!"

Its funny that I'm even writing this right now. Unless I pick back up on my blogging, I'm sure my friends have all given up on me by now. This post will just sit there on the Blogger storage devices, never to be called up or projected into cyberspace again...or at least not for another 6 months. I can almost hear the echos every time I take a break in typing...as if the last key stroke clangs off into the deep void void void oid oid oid d d d...

Oh well...maybe now its like a real journal. I can unload all my business on the blog and nobody will ever see it.

Hi, I'm Jim...I'm a new blogger. Well, some call me a slogger, but I prefer to be called a born-again blogger. See you this summer!