Hitting the Trail

I'll be hitting the trail this weekend for what has become an annual Memorial Day Weekend men's backpacking trip.  Each year for about 4 years now a group of about 4-6 of us strap on the packs, get out the gorp, and suffer through three or four days of slogging.  Actually, we do some hiking, but the trip is as much about eating.  Steaks, potatos, pancakes.  We basically try to outdo each other each night for dinner.  Good stuff. 

 

So, let's see. . . 

 

2004    The Priest Wilderness

2005    Ramsey's Draft Wilderness

2006    Cranberry Wilderness, WVa

2007    Mt. Rogers Recreational Area

 

There are some beautiful places where we live.  These experiences make me appreciate the magnitude and beauty of God's creation each time we go.  Good stuff.  Later . . .

Stuck in Heaven

So my four year old paused briefly in her constant verbage from the backseat and asked, "Daddy, when I get to heaven, will I have to stay there?"  "What, honey?" I asked, not quite sure what to make of the question.  "Daddy, um, when I get to heaven, will I be stuck there?"  "Stuck there?"  "Are people stuck there?" 

 

I've been asked a lot of hard theological questions in my ministry and haven't been shy about saying "I don't know" when I didn't know.  But this question really got me.

 

So, I asked, "Well, honey, Heaven is a wonderful place . . .where else would you want to go?"  And then I got my answer about what could be better than Heaven . . ."I want to go to Disney Dancing Princesses on Ice!"  

 

Oh, well, hard to compete with that, even for eternal bliss, the constant abiding presence of holiness, the very presence of the Divine. 

 

Of course this is the same little girl who asked the other night, "Daddy.  Daddy.  Will you watch the Barbie and the Twleve Dancing Princesses on the Island of the Magical Rainbow with me?"  Darling, I'm sure that someday I'm going to wish we had more dancing princess movies around here, but, um, no, I just can't sit and watch that movie.  I'd rather be stuck in heaven.

Get Out There

So I heard a presentation yesterday from the Community Health Director of a local hospital.  In her very interesting presentation about a wide range of subjects, she said that the hospital offered Blood Pressure and Heart Health Screenings about monthly.  So, once a month, people would line up to come to the lobby of the hospital on a Saturday morning to have their blood pressure checked and other tests for free.  Some people would come who had just been checked out the month before "Just to be sure."  The hospital is glad to help anyone who needs it, but suspected that they weren't really reaching the people who needed it the most. 

 

So, they started setting up the Screenings at Wal-Mart, just outside the McDonald's in the store.  So, with the waftings of Big Macs, French Fries, and Chicken Nuggets in the air and the stampeding sounds of the masses collecting bargains at the Superstore, they offered the same tests.  Here's what they discovered.  In the same confines of the hospital, only 20% of people were in the danger zone physically.  At the Wal Mart McDonald's 55% were in the danger zone.  The Community Health servers had to go to the people to help them; the people who really needed the help weren't coming to them.

 

Seems like the Church could learn something from this example.  It's only when we get out of our walls and meet people where they are do we find the people who really have the needs.  Jesus said that he had come for the sick, not the well.  We are most effective when we join him in that work.

Garden State

I saw an interesting movie the other day: Garden State, starring Natalie Portman and Zach Braff (also directed).  It's a film that has many familiar themes to movie-goers, but is also a good example of post-modernity for anyone who is still wondering what that whole thing is all about. 

 

I won't give away any plot spoilers, but just to say that it's a "boy meets girl", "boy falls for girl", "will boy stay with girl" kind of movie.  Nothing too unusual there.  But the larger themes of the movie are revealing.  The story is centered on Andrew Largeman's return home to his mother's funeral.  She drown in the bathtub and may or may not have committed suicide.  Either way "Large" doesn't feel a lot of sadness for her.  In one scene, he describes how he couldn't cry at the funeral.  He tried to think of every sad memory and movie scene, but he couldn't make himself cry.  The bigger picture is that he has become so numbed to the world because of medications his psychologist-father gave him as a kid, that he basically feels nothing.

 

After deciding to go off the medications, his eyes begin to open to the world around him, the 'real world' of the here and now (which basically is a world centered on Natalie Portman).  In the process of waking up to his own reality, his newfound awareness is subtly contrasted with the false worlds all around him.  His dad relies on medications as a way to numb himself and others to pain and love.  His friends believe in get-rich-quick schemes (taking merchandise off the store shelves directly to the return desk, a pyramid scheme, and those real estate tapes that promise huge returns for little time), based on what life "could" be rather than what life really is.  God is not real, but is only a bottomless abyss (as is the search for some kind of Platonic ideal for life.  Life just is what is in front of you--how very Aristotilean.)

 

It's not a downer of a movie.  "Large" has some interesting adventures and comes to the conclusion that he must stop waiting for life to happen.  It's happening every day and he has to take it for what it is--the joy and the pain.  But it is a post-modern commentary on the foundations of modern life: religion as void (except for its hope of forgiveness), science is suspect, the economy is a game, family is broken.  The only thing you can really trust is your own experience and the world as you experience it in this very moment.  That's sort of the conclusion of both the movie and post-moderns.  In this way the title of the movie is biblically ironic.  What if Garden State were not just the slogan for a state, but a state of being biblically described.  We live in anything but a "garden (of eden)" state of being.  Life is broken.  Sometimes its hard.  But it's life and it's the only one we have.  It's worth living for.

 

The thing that Jesus showed us is that life is also worth dying for.  And that's something missing from most post-modern reflections on the world.  In the opinion of God, you are worth dying for. 

 

 

 

    

Another Worst Church Sign Ever?

 

Thanks to my friend Ashley for this one.

 

Mosaic Church in LA was a great experience last week.  Their Origins and Ethos Conferences are really exciting, interesting, and insightful.  I could sit and listen to Erwin McManus all day and got to for the better part of three days.  He's just really really good.  And the ministry that Mosaic is doing is out of the box for what most of us know as church.  But of course, Los Angeles is out of the box too.  It's definitely not Charlottesville or anywhere else I've ever lived.  But the postmodern mindset and lifestyle that is pervasive in California isn't far from the rest of the country and in that way it is already here and all over the place in some ways.

 

Check out Mosaic's take on televangelists.  Go to Youtube.com and search for Mosaic Church Televangelists.  You'll immediately find their 2:30 min video.  It's pretty amazing.

Live From Los Angelas

I'm here on a morning break during the Origins Conference hosted by Mosaic Church.  This conference is really about being exposed to the vision and mission of this particular church.  And it's quite a church. 

 

Basically a typically sized Southern Baptist community church that was active in missions through this 1990s, The Church on Brady transitioned in the late 90s into this powerhouse ministry that is reaching thousands of young, single, urban seekers with the message that God loves you and God wants to unleash you on the adventure of a lifetime.

 

This conference is built around exploring the 5 core values of Mosaic, but the highlight is getting to listen to lead pastor Erwin McManus speak throughout the day.  Erwin is really, really good.  He's passionate, articulate, driven, humble, and full of energy.  But it's an energy that invites you in rather than overwhelms you.  You want to believe his vision and feel like that to be a part of this movement, you would find some of your sense of calling.

 

That's not to say that Mosaic and Erwin shouldn't have legitimate critiques: do they foster a growing sense of discipleship and love of God in those they reach?  Is the life of prayer emphasized sufficiently?  Where is the call to justice and mercy beyond evangelism?  These are just some of the questions that should be answered.  But if they are erring, it's refreshing to see a church erring on the side of engagement with the culture, adventure, revelence, and passionate evangelism.  They really believe they are on mission to save the world and everything else is driven by and organized by that vision.

 

What works in LA will not work in most places in America, including Charlottesville.  LA's just a different kind of place.  (That's an understatement!)  But Cville is such a neat place with so much culture, talent, and interesting people who are also seeking Christ in their own way . . .we have a lot to learn, but Broadus has the heart and the mission to be a part of God's work in our part of the world.  I can't wait to continue to see what God does in us and among us, and, perhaps most importantly, through us in the world.

 

If Mosaic is any indication, it's quite an adventure.  

 

I'd love to hear of churches whose ministry you find fascinating.  If I know anything about your favorite, I'll respond with anything I know about it.