Monthly Archives: March 2011

Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 9

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When he looked out over the crowds, his heart broke. So confused and aimless they were, like sheep with no shepherd. Matthew 9:36 (MSG)

The prophet Ezekiel said that God would take away our heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh. I thought about that as I read the verse above this morning. The further I get in the journey I find my heart getting softer. My family will tell you that I’ve always been a softy, but sometimes I think it gets a bit ridiculous. Thankfully, I have a wife who doesn’t seem to mind that her husband cries right along with her in movies, who rarely gets through a worship service without shedding a tear, and who feels things with increasing depth.

I’ve never forgotten my friend, Mike, who said he had to give up being an EMT after he started following Jesus. When God took away his heart of stone and gave him a heart of flesh, he suddenly began to feel the pain of the broken people he was called on to serve in emergencies. “I couldn’t do the work through my tears,” he said.

And yet, what is it to feel empathy and compassion if it doesn’t motivate me to act? And what should that action be? How interesting that Jesus didn’t say, “Look at the confused and aimless crowd, like sheep without a shepherd. I MUST SHEPHERD THEM ALL!” He said, “Listen up boys, we need to pray for reinforcements.”

Today, I’m praying for depth of discernment to accompany my depth of feeling. I want my emotions to motivate appropriate actions.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 8

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Jesus and the centurion in Capernaum (Matthew ...
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“Then those who grew up ‘in the faith’ but had no faith will find themselves out in the cold, outsiders to grace and wondering what happened.” Matthew 8:12 (MSG)

After reading through the chapter today, I took a step back from the text and mentally outlined the events that are described. There are several brief exchanges between Jesus and various people:

  • A leper: (social outcast, diseased, unwanted) Jesus touches and heals him.
  • A Roman Officer: (oppressor, enemy, invader, outsider) Jesus compliment him on his faith and heals his servant.
  • A religious scholar & follower: Jesus offers a “curt” rebuke and questions the man’s motivation.
  • A “follower”: Jesus reprimands him for his excuses
  • Disciples: Jesus reprimands them for their lack of faith
  • Demons: (enemy, dark, evil) Jesus graciously grants them their request to embody the pigs, to the ire (and expense) of the locals

What struck me as I went through the list is that Jesus’ exchanges were the exact opposite of what I must honestly say I see myself doing. Jesus was gracious and kind to the people I would have avoided or to whom I would have been harsh. He was gracious even with demons. The people to whom I would have catered and tread lightly so as to not hurt their feelings or create a stir were the very people he was tough with. He got in the face of “his” people, the people that were following Him.

Ouch. As I think about it, my life seems to exemplify the exact opposite of Jesus’ example. Today, I’m thinking hard about how I relate and respond to those around me. I say I want to be like Jesus, but I have a long way to go. Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 7

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“These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living. They are foundational words, words to build a life on. If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. Rain poured down, the river flooded, a tornado hit—but nothing moved that house. It was fixed to the rock.” Matthew 7:24-25 (MSG)

Is God the bedrock of my life, or simply an incidental addition? It seems like an easy question when I answer from my own perspective. It’s when I imagine what others see when they look at my life, that the question bristles. Is God the foundation of Tom’s life? What evidence is there? What do others see when they interact with me or quietly watch me from afar?

In recent months I’ve been struck by the concept that this journey is simply about life and death. As I read the conclusion of Jesus’ famous mountainside message today, I find a thread of this concept once again woven into the very fabric of Jesus teaching. After going through a veritable plethora of detailed instructions for living, Jesus brings it all back to conclude with one central life and death question: What is the foundation on which you are building your life?

Today, as I make my way, I’m simply seeking ways to make Jesus the foundation of all that I say, do or think. I want this day to be about Life.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 6

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“Your eyes are windows into your body. If you open your eyes wide in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light. If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar. If you pull the blinds on your windows, what a dark life you will have!” Matthew 6:22-23 (MSG)

One of the things that I love about my wife is the way we both enjoy seeing, experiencing and living with wide eyed wonder. The other week we went to the opera. It was not something I foresee us doing on a regular basis, but we were both awed by the experience which was unique for both of us. We sat in wide-eyed wonder at the entire experience, and then enjoyed sharing our wonder and the lessons learned.

Over this past weekend we watched two fascinating movies. One produced a wonderful conversation about reality and dreams. The other prompted an interesting conversation about, and appreciation for, community.

I don’t understand squinty-eyed living. God is so vast. His works are so infinite. Each day’s journey can be a glorious, wide-eyed exploration of Life that produces light, knowledge, wisdom, understanding and love in increasing measure.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 5

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“You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.” Matthew 5:6 (MSG)

I have never heard a message delivered about appetites. Someday, when God gives the opportunity, I’m going to do so. Over the last several years of my own journey I’ve come to understand that my life reveals my appetites, and my appetites reveal the condition of my heart.

I can draw a dotted line between those things with which I struggle and appetites out of control. The first bite of forbidden fruit was rooted in Adam and Eve’s appetites. The fruit was pleasing to the eye and they wanted to possess it. It was so juicy, looked so scrumptious that they wanted to taste it. It would make them like God and they wanted to experience it. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life are appetites without a governor. Every one of the seven deadly sins (greed, lust, sloth, envy, pride, gluttony, and wrath) are unbridled appetites.

Today, I’m asking myself: For what do I truly hunger? For what do I truly thirst?

The fruit of my life will reveal my appetites.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 4

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Angels Ministering to Christ in the Wilderness
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 Jesus prepared for the Test by fasting forty days and forty nights. Matthew 4:2 (MSG)

In the wee hours of the morning, in the twilight between sleeping and waking, it struck me that we are in the season of Lent, when followers of Jesus prepare their hearts for the celebration of His death and resurrection. I hadn’t given Lent much thought.

I don’t know why that thought would rise out of my half-conscious brain, and I found it a moment of synchronicity that today’s chapter was about Jesus’ preparation for an hour temptation in the wilderness. Jesus’ ministry was bookended by tests: His testing in the wilderness and His testing in the Garden of Gethsemane. He prepared for this spiritual test with physical deprivation.

In a culture of abundance, willful deprivation is a strange concept to most of us. My experience, however, is that there is a relationship between physical appetites and spiritual power. There is something about the satiation of our physical wants and needs that dulls our spiritual awareness. When we stuff our physical appetites, our spirit is buried under a blanket of momentary, false contentment.

Today, I’m thinking about the condition of my heart in relation to Lent, and the current state of my own physical appetites. I’m meditating on what I need to do about either, about both.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 3

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“What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming? Because if it’s deadwood, it goes on the fire.” Matthew 3:10 (MSG)

I’ve been fascinated by the reports of radioactivity coming out of Japan. Just the other day a plane load of passengers from Tokyo arrived at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport and set off the TSA‘s radiation detectors. How interesting radioactivity is. We can’t see it, feel it, hear it, smell it, or taste it. But, it’s there. I wasn’t even aware that airports had detectors for those things.

Imagine a hand-held device like a Geiger Counter. It also detects an energy that can’t be seen, felt, smelt, heard or tasted. It’s a Life Detector, and measures the amount of Life welling up inside our spirit and radiating out of our life. What would this Life Detector reveal about me? Would it show Life radiating from me in increasing measure and pegging out the needle? Would the needle barely register a blip on the screen as my soul slowly becomes dead wood?

The further I get in the journey the more I realize that the needle is moving each day for each one of us. Life is either growing more fully inside of us or it’s seeping slowly from our souls. It’s pretty simple. We’ve got to get busy livin’ or get busy dyin’.

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Random Thoughts, Wayfarer's Journal

The Tom Hanks Phenomenon

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It happened again at the opera last Friday night. During the intermission, the nice people sitting behind us struck up a conversation (she wanted to let us know how nice we looked!). We chatted about where we were from and what prompted us to come to the opera. Suddenly, the woman looked at me and the conversation switched gears:

Lady: Oh! I’ve got it! I’ve been trying to think of who you remind me of, and now I know…

Me: [Don’t say it. Don’t say it. Please, don’t say it.]

Lady: Tom Hanks! You remind me of a young Tom Hanks.

[Wendy laughs and shakes her head; The woman sees this, then sees the look of incredulity on my face.]

Lady: I’m sorry. Is that bad? Did I say something wrong?

No, lady. You didn’t say anything wrong. It’s just that, for more than the past 20 years, I have lived with the “you remind me of Tom Hanks” on a continuous basis. It happens at every play in which I perform. It happens when I speak at a conference. For goodness sake, it happens randomly after talking to a strange woman at the opera for less than five minutes.

For the record, I love Tom Hanks’ work. He is an amazing actor, he seems like a nice person, and I take it as oddly complimentary that I remind people of him (It’s better than living with: “You remind me of Rob Schneider”). I think Tom Hanks and I would get along well and would enjoy one another’s company. However, with all due respect, I have never tried to look like Tom Hanks, talk like Tom Hanks, act like Tom Hanks, or emulate Tom Hanks in any way.

I am perplexed (and, at times, really annoyed) by the Tom Hanks phenomenon.

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Chapter-a-Day

Chapter-a-Day Matthew 2

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Star of Bethlehem, Magi - wise men or wise kin...
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After Jesus was born in Bethlehem village, Judah territory— this was during Herod’s kingship—a band of scholars arrived in Jerusalem from the East. They asked around, “Where can we find and pay homage to the newborn King of the Jews? We observed a star in the eastern sky that signaled his birth. We’re on pilgrimage to worship him.” Matthew 2:1 (MSG)

It’s interesting to read this passage in light of our recent journey through Jeremiah’s story. Five hundred years before the events in today’s chapter, the people of Israel had been taken into exile. Where? To Babylon and Assyria, in the east. Those taken into exile were the best and the brightest of Israel‘s young men who, in some cases, rose to positions of leadership and influence.

Now, hundreds of years later, a celestial phenomena sends these foreign scholars and astronamers searching for its meaning. How did they know this event in the heavens signaled the birth of “the king of the Jews?” Since there is no record of the prophetic sign in the scripture, it’s most likely that a prophetic word was given through one of the Israelites in exile hundreds of years before. Perhaps it was Daniel or one of his friends. We may never know who it was, but we know that these many years later God weaves the tragic events of the exile into the timeless story of Jesus’ birth. The scholars from the east become a beautiful word picture. Among the very first to recognize the messiah and worship him were non-Jewish gentiles. Even at his birth, Jesus was gathering the nations.

Today, I’m encouraged reading the story of the Magi. It’s a great reminder that God is in control. He weaves the threads of past events into our present circumstances to accomplish his purpose. Like the Magi, my journey is simply a thread in a much larger tapestry.

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Wayfarer's Journal

Wendy’s Birthday Present Weekend

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Lyric Opera House

Wendy’s birthday was back in December, but she will tell you that I feel a lot of pressure that time of year. Wendy’s birthday, Christmas, and our wedding anniversary fall within ten days of each other. So, I’ve got to come up with a lot of gifts in a short period of time.

Last year I picked up on something Wendy said during a normal evening conversation. She’d never been to the opera. That started the wheels spinning. The other thing I know about Wendy is that she loves to spend time with her friends. So, the conspiracy began to plan a trip to the opera with our friends, the Vande Lunes.

The only problem in the plan was that the best time to get to the opera was March. So, Wendy got the tickets on her birthday, but this past weekend was the actual experience.

We headed to the Windy City on St. Patrick’s Day, arriving in time to have a pint o’ Guinness at an Irish pub up the street from our hotel. Friday night we dressed to the nines for our dinner at the Opera House followed by a performance of Bizet‘s Carmen.

The ladies, of course, wanted to shop with some of our free time. We also enjoyed some great food, some well earned naps, and a fun night at the piano bar up the street. Our weekend was perfectly capped off with a trip to the House of Blues for their Gospel Brunch. We couldn’t be more thankful to the Vande Lunes for sharing the experience with us.

Happy Birthday, my love!

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