Pastor Dave Alderson and I invite you to learn and experience 4 classes on Spiritual Formation topics, at the Bellegrove church a bit north of Anneville, PA.
Going southbound down Rte 943, this beautiful stone church building is located on the left, just north of the small village of Bellegrove. It is 5 miles from I-78 exit South from the Annville/Ft. Indiantown Gap exit for [South] Route 934 heading toward Lebanon Valley College, Anneville (Anneville @ Rtes 422 & 943).
(Get custom directions here.)
I will prepare 4 interactive sessions for the 10 a.m. time slot, for this January 16, 23, 30 and Feb 6, 2011. If you plan to come, please leave a comment below, or call the church (717) 867-7460, so I can prepare materials for your use.
Topics will include prayer, spiritual growth,devotional practices, fasting, and related subjects. Brief and engaging explanations will precede class discussion and involvement. This time is sure to bring added vitality to your prayer and worship experiences with God, and promote spiritual growth and intimacy with our Savior, both collectively and individually.
We really look forward to seeing you!
Please-DON’T Forget! Here is the book I’m giving away (to one “lucky” reader this January) to make Bible reading WAY more interesting and effective.
Can’t make it? Contact me and we’ll come up with something. :)
I use the word “training” here, because if I used the word “discipline” it would be an immediate turn off. You may just click away in a huff or something. I’m tip toeing around for you this time.
Discipline has a “dirty word” feel to it now, right? We seem to associate it with pain for the sake of gain, or something too hard, or bothersome. Really, a disciple is a person in a training mode, learning, and absorbing things meant to improve him and his life.
This post is the third installment to deconstruct and renovate our lives that have taken on the “personal reality show” traits. This default setting we have to center our lives around our desires, wants, needs, and shortcomings, keep us stuck. Gone is the life-giving existence that comes from understanding that Reality is the realm of God–It’s not about us. We are invited into a richer, deeper Story that isn’t gained or lost with our successes or failures. God is the Star of the show, and it’s his Story. This is a life lived in the realm of peace/shalom. Lay your burdens down, friend.
You may have some ideas in mind of what life looks like once this changeover has been made. I’m hoping you’ll share your ideas about it. I’ll 5 ways a person lives out a greater Story, and maybe we can all learn something.
When you live the bigger Story…
1. You regularly make and keep unlikely friends.
You don’t see people as tools for your own purposes, or to satisfy your desires and needs. No one is beneath you in the social strata, because you can well see that it’s not your story, but God’s. God’s Story includes all people, so you do too.
2. You regularly give to those who cannot repay you.
(Volunteer) Your actions stop being about personal gratification and getting ahead in some way. Giving freely punctuates this idea. You realize that generosity is life-giving in its own right, and it’s a win-win situation.
3. You shut up more, ask questions, and wait for the full answer.
Talking with people isn’t about saying something, being heard, or pitching some kind of agenda. It’s about the other person. You ask questions to know better, to understand better, and you give up the selfishness inherent in small story communication.
4. You stop self-promoting.
Making sure others see you in a certain light doesn’t balloon anymore as a thrust of your interactions. Sharing has nothing to do with making yourself look good, or impressing people. The self-centeredness is gutted from your words and actions, making life about something far bigger and better than you.
5. You listen.
In small stories we listen to get an edge. Sometimes what we call “listening” is really just pausing briefly out of some rudimentary convention, so that when we speak, we can be better heard (but only because we aren’t literally talking over someone). It boils down to merely “listening” for a chance to speak; but this is not genuine listening. When we listen, we change. The interaction makes us somehow different than we were before.
If you train with these 5 ways of interacting and seeing Reality in mind, it will give you no choice but to improve your life as you yield to a bigger Story.
A most famous depiction of God the Father by Michelangelo
Here, just the Father’s beard could wipe out planet Earth
A Family of God chat. Dove is like a weird pet, and Jesus still shoulders the cross
Flying Father God hovers in parallel maneuver with Spirit Dove. Gosh-Nice jammies for Jesus, Mary! Just rub it in why don’t you.
I have a body, you have a body, and…..
we’ve gotten used to God (the Father) having one too. “The Man Upstairs” We’ve heard this dysphemism, right?
This almighty person* of the three-in-one Godhead, who is the center of Reality, is the One Jesus invited us to respectfully, personally, and literally, address as “Dad” in our prayers.
Yep, this is probably why the male depictions crop up. And, it’s not surprising that since God has been around for quite a while (okay. That is hyperbole….it’s been forever and ever) that he would be depicted as elderly. There’s the white hair, wrinkles, and, of course mad skillz at wisdom etched in the contours of his face. He’s usually shown as robed (relaxed fit clothing , perhaps), light-skinned (really huge shock, right? Thanks, Rome.), and bearded. There’s a verse about Jesus having the hair in his beard ripped out, but God the Father having a beard, well, maybe he’s just too busy to shave? Did famous Greek Stoics look like this, so it was a jumping off point for artists? God, so many questions…
AND-Yes, curiously the depictions appear very much like Father Christmas (Santa Claus). If you think about that bit for too long, it will start to get creepy; especially with those holiday songs that include lines, “he sees you when your sleeping…” and such.
Here’s the part where I pop the fantasy bubble, like it or not.
God is not a man.
God does not have a body.
“He” isn’t “upstairs”.
That deity in art, and in our minds, looks like a human, and acts as such. It’s human created. The street term sadly, I’m sorry to say, this is, an idol. There, I said it.
More importantly to our spiritual growth, those types of pictures of God are bitty and short-changed. God does not have body parts, or biology to make God one or another gender. Jesus, and others may say “he” for God because it is a term of relationship. It is a gift of grace, goodness, and love toward us (as children) that no human father can accomplish perfectly well. But God can. God displays qualities most often distinctive to both genders respectively, and in perfection and holiness.
God is everywhere. Let’s just try to wrap our brains around this a bit, because we are not at all everywhere. I’ll just repeat it: God is everywhere. This is one big benefit a Spirit Being has, someone like “the man upstairs” is only, well, upstairs. And sometimes downstairs, but not both at the same time. This is where Deism is straight out against the Trinitarian percepts of the Bible. Deism, separates God from his creation: God-The Watchmaker. Distant, Aloof. It’s just dead wrong, because Jesus called him Father, and invited us to do so, too.
To perform an act of God in the flesh (in human form) Perfect God needed a body. So, yes, God incarnated a real human body to heal and redeem humans, body and spirit.
That incarnation: Jesus, the Anointed One.
The Holy Spirit, also a full member of the three-in-one Godhead (not just a pale bird in flight above a placid, pasty, bearded white guy often seen in artistic depictions), is the full power of God that is with us who receive God and Jesus. This Being, works on us to teach us, and transform us into Jesus’ character, what we call “Christ-likeness”.
In a recent survey, Two out of Three members of the Trinity prefer being body-free.
From Jesus, written by John in Chapter 4. Verse 23 “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”
*(person here does not signify a human person (i.e. human individual), but instead, one with a personality. personality |ˌpərsəˈnalitē|noun ( pl. -ties)1 the combination of characteristics or qualities that form an individual’s distinctive character). In mystic tradition there is some issue there too.
Now it’s your turn.
Like me, have you ever thought of God the Father as a man? Or an old man in the sky?
Or a Being with a body?
How do you image or imagine God?
Which artistic depiction of God (shown above) do you find the strangest, or most fascinating?
I’m not a big fan of prepared foods, like the one you see above.
But, I have to admit, usually when food comes from a factory, it’s quick and simple.
It’s also sealed with cellophane and full of sodium to keep it “fresh”. How long could you keep this “meal” before heating it? …months for sure, maybe a year. It’s a bit of a one-size-fits-all cuisine approach, right?
A frozen meal typically comes tidy, in a divided plate. So, no mess, no worries. There’s no long prep time, no plate, just a piece of plastic flatware is needed-say a “spork”–to cover any food texture. One might not even need a napkin, if one eats it…calmly. But, I think, you’d have to be on the verge of starvation, have non working taste buds, or have little experience with eating delectable food if you wish to devour this quickly. Not too many salivate over or pine for pre-fab food, like only a mother a factory could manufacture.
When people want to “serve up” the love of God, or share the gospel can’t the same thing happen?
Serving up God. yum... ?
Sometimes not only are the workers few, but maybe what workers there are don’t know enough about the richness of the God’s banqueting table. Maybe they’ve been using the spiritual microwave too much. Or maybe they aren’t patient enough to let God into their kitchen and make the meal, and show ’em how it’s done.
It takes a while, it seems he likes slow-cooker and long roasting recipes. (Ask Moses or Joseph about that one.) Sometimes the longer process of becoming a lot better in the kitchen, and letting God be the Chef de Cuisine, doesn’t seem like the smartest or most efficient move for a ministry. “What, spend long hours in the hot kitchen? Chop vegetables, mince, simmer, sauté, reduce…that could take, well, heck, years! We’re trying to help people, here!”
Well, we might give them something to eat, “really quick,” but how edible is it? Is it healthy or good for them? Will it cause stomach cramps and diarrhea? Will they only be able to serve up the same sort of thing? Will we get to the point of creating and serving the kind of spiritual food that God specializes in–the kind we created with him at his side, just like Abba used to make?
Can we reflect God properly by serving up convenient, ready-made, spiritual fast-food?
I’m doubtful.
What if we tried a sumptuous slow roast?
What if we could mentor (disciple) willing helpers (pilgrims/Jesus followers) and give them a solid, theological, narrative framework (God’s Story) from which to see their reality: God’s present Kingdom, and his Kingdom to come.
What if things marinated, and the juices got savory and settled down deep into the meat, rather than inviting others to dig into some version of pre-fab nosh because, the slow cooker style just won’t suit our time frame and ambitions?
Would we be able to offer something closer to the nature and heart of God the slow cook way?
(For our good and theirs.)
Would we be changed to be more to his likeness in the process of that?
Oh, yes, it’s far messier to prepare, serve, and eat! It takes prep time, long hours of cooking, setting the table nicely. We’ll need plenty of napkins and perhaps a wet washcloth or two. Plus, don’t forget we’re talking about REAL people. There are spills, squirts, and stains. Life is MESSY. Even good relationships are fraught with various difficulties. What about the clean up? A sticky, gooey mess for sure. And maybe dental floss will be handy to keep around. Real meat gets stuck in one’s teeth.
Oh, but there’s this: it’s really satisfying, and tastes fantastic.
Messy, and slow cooked
Add some veggies or a large salad to the slow-cooked entrée you see above, and you have an excellent, tasty, and messy meal many will really enjoy. If the company is good, they might even come back for more.
What do you think about it?
Have you ever been in a situation where it seemed like you had to choose one way or the other?
What happened?
Does the slow-cooker way seem out of reach? (Does this post need a follow up with specifics? Let me know.)
On Sunday mornings I’m reserving my home, and my coffee for friends who want to enjoy it with me, along with some snacks, and a bit of time to converse about the things of life and God. (9:15-10:10 a.m.)
I’ve decided, if my husband makes the coffee, we won’t be forced to look at passages in He-brews. (A few coffee and Bible jokes there. Not very good ones, though. Sorry.)
I may create a home page tab to reflect specifically on our times together, and the topics, or the insights that come from it. Feedback on this idea would be appreciated.
If you join us for Jehovah Java Coffee Club time, or plan to, or would like to join in “at a distance,” please be encouraged to continue our conversation after posts, or add your input.
Today’s topic was entered as the previous post, Sunday Homily.
