I have been laying low on this site since taking my new job.  Some of that is the craziness of the transition and some of that is that I've been blogging for my church.  Click here if you want to see those posts.  This post below is one I just posted there and thought fit my personal blog as well.  Enjoy!

One of the best parts about spring is the renewal that it produces for all creation.  Flowers bloom, trees return to green, grass begins to grow once again.  Fresh rain covers the land.  People make new choices and do their “spring cleaning”.  Some people I know change careers and move to a new state.  In spring we enjoy the, “new” that is being offered by God.

Every ministry job that I have had before always started at the beginning of something.  The previous two (my full-time positions) began on January 1.  My internships either started at the beginning of a summer or the beginning of a school year.  It was easy to begin, because it was natural.

Knowing that we wanted to come to University Church, I knew that wouldn’t be able to start in January.  I also knew that waiting for the beginning of the summer would be way too long to wait.  So Leah and I decided that we would start April 1.  Let the jokes begin.  Yes it is April Fool’s Day.  However, it is also Palm Sunday.

Palm Sunday may not be a beginning of a calendar season, but it is a beginning of Christian calendar season.  Palm Sunday is the beginning of the last week of Lent.  It is the beginning of Jesus’ final week.  It is the beginning that is leading to another new beginning; Easter and the Resurrection.  So I’m pretty excited about my first sermon being on Palm Sunday, April 1.

I appreciate New Year’s resolutions.  I hardly ever make one, but I appreciate a new beginning and that others set out for a new beginning.  Palm Sunday becomes a new beginning’s resolution for Christians.  As we just practiced preparation, sacrifice, and slowness we now can make a focused, prayerful resolution to God of how we will begin anew in Him, His Son, and His Spirit.

Lent is our winter season where we die to ourselves.  Easter is our spring season where we celebrate newness.  Palm Sunday is setting the tone that all things will be made new, even if it means not yet.

I’m looking forward to our New Beginning!

 

I made this announcement on January 8 of this year, but have yet to post anything about it on my blog.  Life since before the holidays has been a whirlwind, so I haven't posted much any way.  

Starting April 1, 2012 I will be the preaching minister for the University Church of Christ in Conway, AR.  Leah and I are very excited about this new path on our journey.  We began interviewing in mid-September and were asked to visit the area and do a formal interview in early December.  The search team, leadership, and us all felt that this was a great fit.  So on January 8 University and Highland both announced that I would be coming to be the preacher at University Church of Christ.

I have been involved in year-round youth ministry since February 1996.  That means I have been doing this gig for over 16 years.  I have been most recently at Highland Church of Christ in Abilene, TX since 2006.  I was born and have lived in Texas all my life.  Leah was born and raised in Texas as well.  Our two boys were born right here in Abilene.  In fact, we brought them home from the hospital to our current house.  Needless to say since we are changing careers, city, and state this will be quite a transition. 

In the next set of blogs I want to talk through transitions by walking through some of my own experience.

Today I read a phenomenal common day parable written by Donald Miller.  The parable is about the way we do church and really Christianity in most ways.  You can read it here, "You'll Be a Dentist."  It is a bit lengthy and he admits to that on his blog, but I couldn't stop reading and you shouldn't if you care about the church.

After reading this parable I was able to take some quiet time and process the implications of the story, agree with what I wanted to and disagree with the things that don't match my culture or experience.  In that processing time, though, I got to thinking about parables and why we hear so few, if any, common day parables.  There was a time during my undergrad at ACU that I heard Andre Resner, a preaching professor, work a common dat (for that day) parable.  It wasn't an illustration for his sermon, it was his sermon.  I was impressed then, like I was today.

I think today people aren't telling parables for a couple of reasons:

1.  We don't understand the reason of parables in the first place.  I would imagine that if we didn't have preachers/teachers exploring the many meanings of biblical parables we might be just as dumbfounded as the disciples were.

2.  We've lost observance of our world.  We have drowned ourselves in technology, people, work, material things, and entertainment that we can't stop to smell the roses or even watch the world as it goes by.

3.  We don't like to learn through pain.  Like acupuncture, when a parable hits the right spot it can draw pain.  Sometimes we cannot learn from parables because we are too busy being defensive about the very behavior that the parable is confronting.  However, sometimes in the pain there is a message that when seen through the sear of pain can bring us to a place we haven't been before, nor could have made it to without the pain.

There may be plenty of reasons why we are telling good parables.  In fact, these reasons may be awful.  But this is what I really want us to ponder.  Can we find a way in 2012 to draw on more common day parables?  Can we write parables into our lives that help us learn today?  Are there any authors out there who want to take on the challenge?

We need some good parables for today.

Advent is not a season that I celebrated or even noticed 6 years ago.  I am thankful to Highland for really bringing me along on the meaning of advent.  In many ways I still feel very young in celebrating the idea of anticipation.

Jesus coming into the world as a baby has a lot to say about God.  I love the birth narratives of scripture that share such wonder, mystery, joy, and anticipation.  You get the feeling that something big is about to happen and that life is about to change in ways we never expected.  Then the baby is born and the family flees for its life.  Not the traditional story of how a King comes into the world and yet a perfect beginning for what would be a perfect savior for such an imperfect time and an imperfect world.

Jesus' return to the world should be even more than the birth since we know the story of how Jesus will indeed come back with every bit of glory.  And yet I feel that we have quit being excited, we understand more than we wonder, we have solved all the mysteries, we feel brokeness and lament every day, and simply we only anticipate our own ending rather than a homecoming.

That's why Christmas is important every year and the celebration of Advent.  Because when we celebrate advent we can lay down our mundane lostness and pick up once again wonder, mystery, joy, and  anticipation.  I do long for my end where I can meet Jesus, however, I more long for the return of Christ where we can all meet Jesus once again.  But until then, we wait not with the uncertainty or fear of a Doctor's office, but rather with the great excitement and elation of a 3 year old on Christmas morning.

Maranatha!

So just like the rest of the world, I now have a post about 11 11 11.  Not sure why this is so significant, but I guess this kind of thing won't happen every year.  Next year I will be blogging about 12 12 12.  I'm not a numerologist so this is all lost on me.  Nothing really interesting happened to me at 11:11 am so I will wait for 11:11pm to see how it goes.  If something crazy or exciting takes place, I'll let you know.  11.11.11  

There was this one time when I went to visit Atlanta for a conference.  I was a country boy in a big city.  I had some free time, lots of free time, so I decided that I would go visit Mercer University outside of Atlanta.  I wanted to go to the bookstore and buy paraphernalia with my name (Mercer) on it...I was young and full of myself!  So I took the Marta, but had no idea how to really read their map system.  I got off the rail and thought I was pretty close so I began to walk.  After about an hour and as I entered a deteriorating community I began to think that my decision was not the best.  I found a gas station finally and asked for directions.  I was an incredible distance from the University and not enough time in the day to walk.  As I was standing at the counter considering my options:  walk back to Marta, call for cab, or...there really wasn't a third option until a man said he knew where it was and would give me a ride.  I swallowed my pride and fear and got in his car and went for a ride.  It was awkward for both of us, but as soon as he found out I was a Christian our conversation eased and we both felt more comfortable.  I made it there and bought enough merchandise with my name on it to make it worth it.

I didn't have a good plan.  I had planned out every other detail of that trip, but this was me being spontaneous.  I'm glad I did, because I have never had the chance to go back and visit yet.  I wish I had a better plan.  Sometimes we can have bad plans and God works despite them and sometimes we have wonderful plans and nothing works out.  Sometimes our plans are just puny!

In Numbers 13 the spies are sent to Canaan.  The land is great, everything that God has promised it should be.  Joshua and Caleb agree that the risk is worth the reward.  However, the other 10 can only focus on one aspect.  They look like grasshoppers in their own site next to the Nephilim and even to the Nephilim they look this way.  Nephilim were known from a specific area and were basically Giants.  

In order to take this land they would have to go up against men 10 times their size that could crush them easily.  So really you can defeat Pharaoh and the entire Egyptian empire.  You can walk on dry ground through the parted Red Sea.  You can watch food fall from the sky and water gush from rocks.  They had heard the stories of an entire world being flooded, languages changing, not to mention the unique way that a Hebrew found his way as a great commander within the Egyptian empire.  

But their plan is puny and they cannot see past a few giants.  They cannot see God and can't trust in his power.  And so they stir up the report and let it spread throughout all the Israelites and effectively killing the plan to enter the promised land all together.  They would wander around until they would all die except for Joshua and Caleb.  

They gave up milk and honey and great land due to a puny plan and a great lack of faith

C'MON MAN!!!