Protected: Music For P

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:

Password:

Hot Coals

Regardless of what stage of life I’ve been in, I’ve always tried to be a guy that thinks abstractly; that sees people and ideas from more than one perspective. I want to see people for more than what seems to be most obvious. Maybe it’s because I would want people to do the same of me, but moreso because I always felt like that was one of the most awesome things about Jesus. It’s not necessarily been a trait of His Church, but it was a trait that I picked up on as a teenager in my reading of the Gospels.

The extent to which I practiced this was definitely seen in degrees relative to where I was in my walk. But if I wanted to be like Christ throughout the years that was a main point that I wanted to focus on. He saw people for what they really were and not for what everyone else saw. Peter was a rough blue-collar guy. Matthew was the IRS.

A subset of people from my past have been hurtful and (in my mind) all alike. They all have one thing in common and because of that I’ve had a real problem practicing this trait towards anyone that has ever had this thing in common with them.

So, there’s someone now that could potentially be someone that I would need to befriend and, sure enough, possesses the one thing that I struggle with most. I’ve made every excuse in the world of why I don’t really have to try with this person and I would honestly just rather write them off.

But they don’t call them your “better half” for no reason! This topic came up tonight on our way down to the beach house where I’ll be spending a couple of days with people that are “like me.” And my dearest pegged me and said,”well you’ll get to go hang out this weekend with people that are in your comfort zone and you won’t have to think outside the box about anyone.” There it is. I’ve become comfortable with a certain type of people. There’s obviously more to this person than I’ve allowed myself to observe. I observed one thing and I was done!

So, I have someone to learn how to love in a way that I haven’t been pressed to do in a long time.
Now I’m nervous. I know how the Lord works with these things. He doesn’t stop with the one person. I’m afraid that once I begin with this I’ll be on a road of trying to reconcile with multiple people. I’ve done this before and people just look at me like I’m a freak. Great.

Thanks Jo for not letting me be! Always trying to be the Lord’s mouthpiece.

Common Bond of Marriage

We were in small group last night and someone asked the question, “do any of you guys ever get so frustrated with your marriage that you just want to give up and quit?” Ha!! Have we met?? Jo and I have been forthright about our struggles, our separation and how we’ve made it through it. Yet, here was someone saying, “all of you guys just seem to have it together!” We have never tried to deceive people by expressing that.
So, other people started piping in. “We’ve almost left each other a number of times.” “I’ve packed my bags and gotten in the car to leave more than once.” “We have our counselor on speed-dial! We haven’t been in a couple of months, but I have it written down to call him this week!”
Granted, there is a couple in there that were high school sweethearts, been married for 20 years, have teenage kids & seem to be the best of friends. Even they reminded one another last night of what it was like in the beginning.
Marriage is tough. Given the right situation, it can be a daily battle. For us, years 1 and 2a were a cake walk. Years 2b and 3 were a bloodbath at times.
Here is what I thought of last night and I mentioned parts of this to them. It’s hard, but God isn’t just honored by an easy marriage. He loves seeing people endure and learn through a hard marriage as well. When you date you can be whoever you want. When we go to small group you could let people see what you want them to. There is no hiding in marriage. If you have character flaws, marriage will draw them out faster than anything. They come to the top and can either be dealt with, or you can walk away and say that you only acted that way because the other person brought that out in you. Marriage is a master at building character. And God isn’t honored by contentment in our character. There are always things to be built on and tweaked.
Most married people feel this way at one point or another, yet they feel ashamed and completely alone in it. God wants us to relate to one another in these things and help each other walk through the things that seem unbearable.

Being Pleased on Easter

I think that in some ways this Easter has really snuck up on me. I find myself doing menial things throughout the days that ultimately make no difference in my life and will be forgotten, most times, within a few hours. Things that I try to make seem somewhat important to me and even if to no one else. But they are just filling a void. They are just making time pass so I don’t have to think about things. It’s escapist.

I started thinking about what I wanted to go into this weekend thinking about. And I think this is it. I want to be spiritually lean. I want to stay attentive to the small things and discern. What is a colossal waste of my time?? What could I be doing that would be meaningful to the people around me??  I want to live like I believe the resurrection of Jesus was not a colossal waste of time, in regards to me.  So, I’ll leave you with a few things that I’ve read lately that have weighed heavily on my mind.

James 1:23-24 from a small group study we’re currently doing:

Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.

Highlighted in my copy of The Everlasting Man by G.K. Chesterton I found:

A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.

Lastly, in his book The Weight of Glory, C.S. Lewis wrote:

Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

I hope this Easter is incredibly profound and causes the scales to fall from our eyes.  You guys get back to me and let know what you hear the Lord whispering into your hearts.

Naked

This was a post from the blog “Stuff Christians Like”. This guy really strikes a chord with this one.  Most people can relate in one way or another to what he hits at here.  I read it to Jo and we both were blown away.  I won’t expound on it, but take the time to read it.  I think it’ll be worth your time.

Big Week in Sports

I love sports probably to a fault and my wife can attest to that.  I’ve loved almost every major sport at one time or another.  I grew up playing soccer and loved it.  I started playing basketball in middle school and between playing and watching Carolina and the Bulls, it was my obsession for the better part of 10 years.  I really started watching football during the Lawrence Taylor years and was an avid Giants fan until we finally got the Panthers.  I still have an affinity for them regardless of my love for the Panthers. 

Pretty Good Site

Our pastor referenced this website in a message of his and I’ve heard a couple of others say that even though they don’t read blogs much, they never miss this one.  Derfel, when I read the post on Christian endzone celebrations, I thought of you.  I’m gonna put it in my blogroll for easy access, but here it is anyway…..

http://stufffchristianslike.blogspot.com/

New Season

It’s finally spring and the appearances of winter are finally giving way to warmer days, bits of green and blooming flower beds.  Winter is great and all, but the promise of warm weather and beach days not too far around the bend are just too enticing to care about seeing winter go.  It seems like every season brings it’s own challenges though and spring is no exception.  Allergies and a nice thick layer of turkey, cookies and pies that have made their home not in but on my midsection are two main of the main challenges of spring.  Just part of the game though.

For me, spring also brings a few other things.  It’s March Madness, it’s the last third of the Premier League and the relegation and title battles that come from that, it’s the last three rounds of the Champions League, it’s the arrival of baseball, it’s the immaculately manicured Augusta National during the Masters and last but not least, it’s The Quail Hollow Championship (formerly known as the Wachovia Championship). 

My boy Matt Vana and I make it to this tournament for one day each year.  It has become a tradition of ours since ‘05.  when he and his wife Blair came down to Huntersville when Jo and I lived there during our first year of marriage.  We played 18 holes that morning, went to the tournament that afternoon and had dinner with the girls that night.  Since then, we’ve changed up what we’ve done each year, with some years just being one day of us going to the tournament and others involving a couple of days where we play golf, hang out doing what we do and always have done and a full day at the tournament.  Last year, Matt came in town from Charleston on Tuesday night, we played golf at Birkdale on Wednesday morning, watched the Champions League Semi-final second leg of Chelsea v. Liverpool at Connolly’s on 5th in downtown Charlotte that afternoon and spent all day on Thursday at the Wachovia.  It was a bit of a letdown in some ways because Tiger wasn’t there, but this year will hopefully be a completely different story.  Last year he was dealing with his bum leg and eventually had to have it retooled after he won the U.S. Open on one leg.  This year, he’s got a new knee and already off to a flying start.  It’s an incredible thing to watch that guy, but almost just as incredible to just walk around watching the best players in the world taking on that course.  You follow some players for a bit, then find a green to sit beside and watch a few play through.  Maybe you go to another hole for a while or follow another guy around, then head over to the big tree halfway up #9 and chill out there for an hour or so.  We always go to #17 for a while to see what those guys can do with a long iron on that green surrounded by water.  And lastly, we head up the right side of #18 to see them fight what’s been called one of the Top Ten hardest finishing holes in the world.  It’s good times, man.

And, it’s four weeks away….