Eudaimonia

If God is a father, is he at least as good a Father as you?

(excerpts from this weeks sermon that have remained in my thoughts)…

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those whom ask him!”  - Matthew 7:7-11

Children need, and the fascinating thing is, they ask. Fascinating, I say, because somewhere between childhood and adulthood asking becomes unthinkable. But it isn’t for children. It’s natural. It’s reflex. In a sense, they are wiser then we….Because somewhere between birth and adolescence we all lose that wisdom which sees ice cream and just asks. The serpent’s whispers have gone down deep. The only people worth anything are those that feed themselves, he tells us.Go on, take the fruit. Then you’ll be independent, like he is……If the goal of our lives is advancement toward some end, some goal of grown-up independence, we have fundamentally misunderstood the nature of the world…

We pray because we need. We are not created independent, but dependent. We are not created to be self-sustaining, but to be served.…

Your place in the universe should be as obvious to you as hunger. You are in a position of need. Specifically, you need provision. Every day….By contrast, when I find myself in a position of need I usually feel like I’ve done something wrong….Jesus calls this phenomenon what it is: unbelief. (Matthew 6:26-27)…The fundamental problem, Jesus tells us„ is that we misunderstand our place, and God’s. Our place is need. God’s place is service. It is actually His joy to serve. (Matthew 6:28-29) Our job is to need and ask. Anything less exposes our unbelief. Do we believe that God is Father? Do we trust him with our daily needs?…

The Father Provides. It’s pointless to worry about provision. Provision is simply not our job. It’s God’s. Our job is to seek God’s kingdom where the rhythm of need-ask-receive is as natural and as common as drawing breath. Worry is foreign in God’s family. The Father knows. All we do is ask…

We Pray because we need Love…

We need to know that our Father still exists, and that his feelings toward us have not changed. Paul writes, 

The spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God  -Rom 8:16

Do we come with the expectation that God will again wrap you up with fierce embrace?…We know what happens to children that don’t get that kind of love growing up. Distrust. Insecurity. Shame. Doubt. The adopted sons of the Father of the universe don’t have to live that way. We need love. And he is ready to provide. 

We Pray because we have no idea what to pray for…

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. -Romans 8:26

I don’t know about you, but this kind of prayer comes least natural to me. I feel like I have to get the words right for God to hear. But is that who scripture says God is? Does he really see us there on the doctors table and withhold affection until we learn to say “hug”?… 

We pray because we need comfort…

(2 Corinthians 1:8-9) 

Have you ever despaired of life itself? Have you felt like you were under a death sentence? It happens….Christian, that whisper in your ear that tells you that God enjoys seeing you suffer, or that he doesn’t care, or that he doesn’t see, that voice is a foul lie. That voice will be thrown into the lake of fire and be tormented forever for leading you astray. Fathers hate seeing their children suffer… If you suffer, It is necessary. It is because God has something that so far outweighs your suffering that one day you will look back and say with Paul, 

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. - Romans 8:18

No Father delights in the suffering of his children. We can cry out with confidence to our Father in suffering, and be assured of his comfort, for our pain is his also. 

Finally we pray because we need forgiveness. 

The simple truth is that the life of prayer and need and service is utterly foreign to us. We do not pray, and this simply because we do not believe. We still behave like sin-sick adoptees, stealing bread from mom and dad’s pantry and hiding it under the mattress. but there is one who prayed well. He prayed

Not as I will, but as you will -Matthew 26:39

God heard his prayer, and we can be saved…. Children need. The Father Serves. The son died to save. O, how proud we are in our serious meditations with our serious friends and serious talk about serious things. But anyone could see what we really need is a bath. 

- Aaron Youngren

(For the entire sermon, which is my recommendation, click here)

S(tupid) A(ss) T(est)?

In 1914, a professor in Kansas invented the multiple-choice test. Yes, it’s less than a hundred years old.

There was an emergency on. World War I was ramping up, hundreds of thousands of new immigrants needed to be processed and educated, and factories were hungry for workers. The government had just made two years of high school mandatory, and we needed a temporary, high-efficiency way to sort students and quickly assign them to appropriate slots.

In the words of Professor Kelly, “This is a test of lower order thinking for the lower orders.”

A few years later, as President of the University of Idaho, Kelly disowned the idea, pointing out that it was an appropriate method to test only a tiny portion of what is actually taught and should be abandoned. The industrialists and the mass educators revolted and he was fired.

The SAT, the single most important filtering device used to measure the effect of school on each individual, is based (almost without change) on Kelly’s lower-order thinking test. Still.

The reason is simple. Not because it works. No, we do it because it’s the easy and efficient way to keep the mass production of students moving forward.

-Seth Godin, ‘Stop Stealing Dreams’

I Just Feel

So Entirely Loved.

Life, now.

Life, now, is different. It is the same life, but in a much different context; and oh, the difference context makes! I rather enjoy this context, not that the old context was by any means bad, however, I do feel that it had given as much as it could to me; at least in the mindset I had previously owned. But how can one gain a new mindset with fresh perspective if they do not change their context? I was not able to do so.  Therefore, a new context has been monumental. 

This life is busy. I work a lot, and I work early. Waking at 3:15am and walking to my stop by 4 brings new perspective on life. The gleeful individuals who are leaving the bar to finally lay down and rest as I am walking to work, greatly contrast the homeless individuals that so odorously greet me 3 minutes later on the Blue line. Within the first hour of my day I am challenged by seeing life lived in some of its finest contexts and the question of purpose is already on my mind. 

This life is new, or at least it’s full of new experiences. It is actually overwhelming to think of the newness of this life. I live in Logan Square, Chicago, which, itself is worth repeating several times. I live with Will and Jack, both of whom books could be written about and people would fall in love with them…you will just have to take my word for it, but they are great. I eat and taste great food, unique beer, and rich coffee on an ongoing and constant basis. My mindset on fashion, what it is and what it can be, is constantly challenged (of late I have been challenged by an incredible individual who I hope to get to know better: jeffery of http://themidwestyle.tumblr.com/ )  I partake in the Liturgy of the line  on a weekly basis, my Logan Square gospel community every wednesday, and of course my rouge cord prior to GC… no need to know what any of these things are, it’s okay to simply be impressed ;)

My life is found, solely, In the context of the Lord’s Grace. He is constantly teaching me what it means to trust him with everything. He has given me freedom which allots me peace. He constantly uses this new environment and these new people to challenge me, to question me, to love me, and ultimately to direct me to trust and find faith in Him. Maybe this air He has given me is cleaner, maybe the context He has guided me to puts more pressure on my rib cage, but it is He alone who compresses my lungs, fills them again, and allows me to breath peacefully. 

Life, now, is good. 

Apple had just one customer. He passed away last year.

Who is your customer?