A Snowy Encounter

The call came early.  Really early.  5 something.  The robocall was telling us there would be no school today.  Weather.  Weather in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  As I rolled over to try and go back to sleep the thought in my mind was, “don’t plan any June vacations!”  We get a lot of snow in Southwest Michigan and I love it!  I like the snow.

At 6:00am I determine sleep isn’t returning so I get up, blow one side of the driveway and then head off to the gym for an early workout.  With close to 8″ of snow on the road I am enjoying how my Subaru Legacy handles in the snow!  It’s dark and so I am pretty close to them when I spot two people walking in the middle of the road.

Why don’t they walk on the sidewalk!?  As I look over to the side I realize the sidewalk is hidden beneath the snow that is falling and being blown around.  Looking ahead again I slow down to drive around the people walking in the road.  It is a man and a woman.  They aren’t wearing hats or gloves and are carrying plastic bags with what looks like groceries. The man has a binder in his left hand.

He is slightly in front of her as I drive up alongside them.  I put the passenger side window down.  “Would you like a ride?” I ask.  He looks at her, she looks at him, he looks at me.  Looking in the car he asks with a bit of skepticism, “are you sure?”

“Yeah, get in,” I respond.  He gets in front and she climbs into the back.  My legacy isn’t a big car and he is a big guy and they both have bags of food with them.  It didn’t matter if we were clogging up North Westnedge Avenue, the only people driving around in this weather are goofy folks like me.  We start heading south again.

“Where are you headed?”

“Downtown,” he says.

“Where downtown?”

“The McDonalds.” He says it like a question, wondering if I am willing to take them that far.

“No problem,” I say and we are creating tracks through the snow.

We chat a bit about the snow.  We remark about how early it feels for this kind of weather to be upon us already.  He shares that they have a car but it isn’t working  yet.  He’s confident he will get it running – in the next couple of weeks – maybe.  They’re both rubbing their hands together to warm them up.

There’s no traffic so it doesn’t take us long to arrive at McDonalds.  I pull into the parking lot and stop.  He looks at me and is sincerely grateful as he thanks me for the ride.  Then he stops for a moment and says, “Well this was really unusual!”

“What is?” I ask.

“This.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, there aren’t a lot of white people giving rides to black people,” he states. “Especially at 6:30 in the morning!”

“You’re black!?” I exclaim with mock surprise. He laughs. She laughs. We say goodbye.

Today we anticipate the grand jury in Ferguson will announce their ruling on whether to indict police officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Brown, an unarmed black man and the city is poised for violence.

I can’t help but believe that we can live differently.

Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you? ~ Mt 25:37-39

Love Came To Town Like A Storm

PANIC

It was a little after 3:00am when her iPhone started going off.  Neither of us were able to rouse ourselves out of deep slumber before it quit and landline (yes, we still have one!) was blaring loudly.  As a pastor, any call at 3:00am isn’t good.  When your wife’s father is dying of bone cancer, it certainly isn’t good.

Cathy got to the phone and the message was clear – she and I were headed to WI as her dad was “actively dying” we were told.  We lay in bed trying to figure out what to do and how to go about doing it… It was Sunday morning, early, and I was slated to preach.  Does she go alone? Does she fly or take a train?  Do we both go early? Do we wait until after church? Who will take care of the kids?

Decision: We will drive together, she wants me with her, after church.  We will get someone to come and stay with the kids so it is as least disruptive for them as possible.

Experiencing Christ’s love through the Church is an amazing thing.  I love the Church!

I sent a text out to a couple of people to see if they can come hang with the kids overnight.  Neither one responds.  It’s 4:00am after all!  So in a couple hours I call and wake one of them up.  She freaks out hearing her pastor’s voice at this time in the morning.  However, she is able to pull herself into consciousness and our two-day profound experience of Love in action begins.

What does that kind of love look like?  It looks like God’s children interrupting their own lives in order to serve others. It looks like Jesus.  It looks like this.

Jesus’ love showed up in Rochelle. Setting aside whatever else she may have had going on that day & night, she takes on being fully responsible for the four teens in our home.  It showed up in her playing Yahtzee by candlelight and sleeping in a cold house because the massive storm the wrecked whole towns in Illinois swept through West Michigan too.

Jesus’ love showed up in Tom. On Sunday evening when we hear from the kids that they have no power, he promptly responds to my text from WI which said, “if still out in the am, would you fire up the generator for me?” He says, “yes.”  No hesitation.  So on the 18^th anniversary of his marriage to Julie, he spends hours getting my generator running, getting extra gas for it and running extension cords to all the necessities in the house.

Love showed up in Nanette and Steve. I got a text early Monday morning from my daughter Hayley, “no power, no water, no school – what do we do?”  It’s not even 5:30am in WI after a long night of little sleep!  What do they do…?!? Another early morning text and not only do they let my kids run over to shower and warm up – they took them in for the whole day, fed them, AND when wegot back from WI later that evening, opened their home to my family to sleep someplace warm!

Jesus’ love showed up in Niki.  The consummate taxi driving mom of four, in all the busyness of her own family “post-storm,” loves on us by hauling my daughter around so she can still get to dance for her Nutcracker rehearsals.

Cathy’s dad did pass away just before we got to his bedside.  But that’s ok.  He went to be with Jesus and over the last several months deep reconciliation had taken place.  Everything that

needed to be said was said.  He is with Jesus.

In the midst of the loss of Cathy’s dad, we never lost peace. Why? Love.  Loved showed up in our lives.

When God’s people choose love – there is a tangible shift in reality.

Everybody you meet today is facing a battle of some kind… Who are you actively loving today?

Jesus’ Deep Belief

My son Andrew helped plant my neighbors garden.  And this year he planted a row of popcorn, fully believing that there would be a harvest and many evenings spent enjoying the fruit of his labor…

 I love the Gospel of Mark.  It’s one of my favorites!  Part of what I love about Mark’s account of the life of Jesus is how he just gets to it.  It is shorter than the other accounts and most likely written first.  And in the first chapter Jesus is already deep into his ministry – even though it has just begun.

I believe that Jesus’ love gets expressed in three deep beliefs in the middle of the first chapter – in the calling of the first disciples. And, I believe Jesus believes these things so deeply it moves him into action!

Jesus believes the Kingdom of God is accessible.

In verse 15 Jesus begins his ministry with the words, “The time has come, the kingdom of God is here.”  Powerful and bold words spoken to culture that had been wrapped into another kingdom, Rome’s, and believed that God’s kingdom would come forcefully and politically.  But Jesus, see, knows what the kingdom of God is.  He has a deep belief that God’s kingdom, is inaugurated with his coming and is fully accessible to those who seek it.

So what does he do with this belief?  He get’s into action.  He goes out into his society with a message unlike any they have really heard before – that the kingdom they are longing for and looking for is here, now and fully accessible.

Jesus has a deep belief that the kingdom isn’t only reserved for another time or another place, but that it is fully possible for those who would listen to his voice to enter into and live in that kingdom in the present – without having to wait!

For Jesus the kingdom was now and the kingdom was accessible.  However, I believe that we, the US church, live as though the kingdom is sometime else and someplace else.  This is manifested in so many ways in our lives: a lack of urgency around the mission of God, lots of resignation that anything in this life is going to be or get better, spiritual disconnectedness and the list could go on…

Jesus held a deep belief in his capacity to transform lives.

Let’s face it, it takes a certain amount of ego (yeah, that term will probably bother most of you) to invite someone to follow you as a disciple – and more so on the first day of school!  But he did it didn’t he?  He asks Simon Peter & Andrew and then also James & John to leave their family business to follow him.  Why?

Because he is going to transform their lives, turn them upside down, and make them fishers of men.  What?  These are unschooled men – considered boys in our culture – and he is going to do what?  Look at what he says, “I will make you…”

Jesus believes so deeply in his ability to bring about personal transformation that he not only invites them to follow him, but he makes a massive promise at the same time!  Jesus belief is so deep, that he doesn’t waste any time and begins inviting others into his journey right from the beginning.  Why?  Because he knows.  He knows the kingdom of God is here and that he transforms lives.

Jesus held profound belief in our capacity too!

Think about it. Really. In fact, take 60 seconds to reflect on this – Jesus asks us to repent as we would receive the kingdom of God.  Repent means to change.  Repentance is not saying “I’m sorry.” It is a radical turning in one’s life from disobedience to radical obedience.  Follow my logic here:  Jesus is fully God, God is fully & always completely loving, therefore everything Jesus does and says is completely loving.  Even asking us to change!  What wouldn’t be loving is is Jesus was to tell everyone to transform their lives knowing that it just can’t happen.  That would be cruelty.

Then he goes on.  He tells Peter and Andrew that he will make them into something new.  We must be able to change if part of Jesus’ promise is that very transformation.

I don’t know about, but I know that I have spent a larger portion of my life than I wish I had full of resignation that anything can actually be different in my life, the way I am, the sins I struggle with and etc…

But.

That’s what Jesus promised!

Jesus’ deep belief in the potential transformation of those who are made in his image moves him to leave the Father’s side.  Jesus’ deep belief in you – his belief in me – is so profound he just can’t sit still and dream wistfully.  He got into action around it.

In John 15 so many of these dots are connected for us.  Jesus proclaims to us that if we abide in him and he abides in us, we will bear much fruit – kingdom fruit.  Jesus also tells us in John 15 that our transformation is only possible in that abiding relationship – apart from him we can do nothing.  Nothing.

I don’t want to do nothing.

I want a deep belief in the presence of God’s kingdom. I want a deep belief in Jesus’ power to redeem.  I want a deep belief that I too can be transformed.

I don’t want to do nothing.