But why did you lead me here God?

[James] This past fall a woman from my church community approached me with, what she felt was, a word from God. She told me that she felt that God wanted me to go to Seminary this past fall. I told her that I am hoping to eventually go but that as a youth pastor carrying large undergraduate student loan debt, there was little possibility of that being a reality. She told me that she wanted to help me in anyway possible to go. So she signed me up for the informational session in August. I attended the session, found out about the amazing Community Ministry Leadership program and so I applied and was accepted in a matter of weeks. She has been contributing every month in order for me to make my payments. Since January she had been sporadic with her assistance. When I sat down to talk with her about life and seminary, I discovered that she is being laid off and that she will no longer be able to support my endeavor at Bethel at this time...

I have not been able to pay off my last quarters bill and therefore have not yet been registered for classes yet. I attended last week, but unless I am able to register I will not be able to continue in attendance. And once I drop from the cohort I know it is not as easy as picking up next semester or in the fall, because I lose pace with my track and I lose my grant for the CML program.

I have been so busy with life these past two weeks that I have not had a chance to face the facts. If I am not able to catch up with my payments by monday... I am done. After praying with Tony last night he suggested that this might be an opportunity for our community to support me for a period of time. It is my last option to ask people for financial support, but I also feel that I need to do my part in order to stay where I feel God has called me before I throw in the towel all together...

In these times of economic stress for so many families, do you feel this is unrealistic?

"You're making me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry"

So I got angry today...but it wasn't like the turn green, rip off my shirt and smash everyone in town, but it was more just the type that you get in your head. It was the type of anger I'm sure we all have felt that ruins a great day and you get this sweet vision in your head where you "accidentally" bump someone off a cliff or something like that. Which got me thinking. When does anger turn into a sin?

Most know the passage where Jesus clears out the temple. In Matthew it says, "Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves"(Matthew 21:12). This same story is told in Mark 11:12-19 and. Luke 19:45-48. Jesus then goes on to say, "It is written, My house will be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of robbers"(vs 13).

Jesus got angry! But what comes next is NOT where Jesus goes off with his disciples live in their anger, but right in the next verse it says, "The blind and the lame came to Him at the temple and He healed them"(vs 14). Since Jesus, the perfect man who we are called to be like, got angry then when is it okay for us to be angry?

In Proverbs 29:11 it says, "A fool gives full vent to His anger, but a wise man keels himself under control." When does control turn to full vent? Some help could come from Ephesians 4:26-27 where Paul writes, "In your anger do not sin. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold." When, then, can I be angry without sinning?


PS- As I write this I am currently not angry, so this is not a rant.

Another incomplete thought...

[Tony]

Oh,

How my soul

Is so

Broken.

On the edge of the end of a season of death, of cold, of shadowy colors, I sit, and I wait, anxiously, for the air to warm, for the earth to thaw, for the rebirth of life and vitality. It is interesting that Jesus was born in the midst of a season of desolation and died in a season of rebirth. It seems that God performs a new creation every spring, bringing light to darkness, life to barren land, division between water and shore. Yet, I know that this cannot be true. The winter is part of creation too. Spring can only come if it is preceded by the cold winter. Creation is still alive. It builds and forms and changes because of what is happening now. I know that life can only be born out of the dead of this winter. 

I am still here.

I think of the word rebirth and immediately other words come to my mind: renovation, renewal, restoration-

Resurrection.

It seems so much easier, in the winter, to see the brokenness in the world. Maybe its because certain types of suffering and pain may become more tangible at times. Our hands get cold while we walk to our cars. No matter how hard we try,  its hard to keep our shoes clean when we walk through the streets. We know that there are people close to us who are suffering so much more than we are. We feel the cold. We can imagine what it would be like without gloves. We could feel it if we wanted to. We feel uncomfortable when brokenness looks us in the face and we recognize it in ourselves. 

God says to the animals, to the fish, to the birds, to Adam, to Eve: “Be fruitful and multiply.” 

Grow!

And so, God begins something. God creates a world that will grow, and change, and form, that can be built up, that can be torn down. I look like creation. The world was a child. I am a child. I grow. I learn. I change. And like the world, I am so broken. I am broken, and I know that my brokenness cannot fix brokenness. The brokenness in the world is my own brokenness. On my own, only winter will follow winter. The story from the fall seems to follow a pattern like this- brokenness leading to more brokenness. Then something happens. 

The Creator puts himself in the story.

In the death and desolation of the winter- in a barn, on the margins of the city, restoration is born. God becomes both author and character in the story. Jesus travels from town to town, preaching about a way of life that will transform the world. But, we are still broken- until the cross. On the cross, every brokenness, for every person, is washed away. Something else dies with Jesus. Out of death comes the possibility for life- renovation, renewal, restoration, resurrection. We are able to live a life of transformation because we have been transformed. We are creation and we have Good News. We are no longer broken. Our winter is over. Let us resurrect the world.

God, let us be your Good News to each other.

Live goldfish, piranha tank and my "bedroom"

Ryan (pup)
So you may be asking yourself, "How does a fifth guy move in to a house where there are already more guys than there are bedrooms?" The answer is that I don't really have a bedroom. Well I kind of do. It's behind a couch...on the floor. I call it more of an area than a bedroom.
Since I have moved in, I have been feeling the Lord doing a great deal of work in me; not that he wasn't before I moved in, but I have been able to focus more on Him and have been spending so much more time digging through the Word since I have been here (probably due to the lack of television). For those of you who know me, you know that karate is a big part of my life. I have been training in karate for years and for the past 2 years I have been the head instructor of a karate school in Hugo, but over the past few months the thought has been in the back of my head that the Lord has something for me that is much bigger and much more glorifying to Him than karate. I just kept shoving those thought back down and kept karate on that stand above God in my life. I had big plans for my life and I was planning on going places and wasn't about to change them.
But it was shortly after I moved in when I finally heard God say, "Time to live for Me!"
So as of April 1, I will no longer be head instructor of USA Karate Hugo and I am okay with that. When people ask what I'm going to do with my life, well I guess I don't know yet. I am constantly reminded though of Jeremiah 29:11 which states, "For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Now about the piranhas. I recently acquired a fish tank and some piranhas..three of them to be exact. Their names are Manfred, Yancey and Trevor (after Trevor Johnson). They live happily in our living room/kitchen area and I believe that they all love life. They enjoy eating (sometimes each other) and swimming and hiding in the treasure chest that they have. About the live goldfish...I'll let you figure that out :)

God Bless