That real life music...

"Eh, they say hind sight is 20/20.  Well, they're right.  It's behind me.

Back for the third time - you know where to find me!

Hanging on the coat tail of Christ, who designed me -

Keep me off your brain.  In other words, don't mind me. ...

"We ain't in a dream world.  We're spitting that real life.

We live in the real world, and know just what it feels like.

So we're pressing in like steel spikes.

To stand in a fallen world, it don't feel nice.

Eh, even if you're rich or you've got a lot of cash, 

You're still not exempt as everybody's on the map.

We all feel the pressure, heavy burdens on our backs -

Every day, it's still hard, but we're learning like it's class."

- Trip Lee.

My Easter weekend and week was interesting.  My host from the Philippines came into town for a few days during his whirlwind tour of the US, between the end of his semester in law school and his graduation.  We went to some extra services with my church's host church for Holy Week.  It was good to see everyone there and more passionate than they usually are.  On Saturday, we had a Bible study that went late into the night.  Many people who attended the Bible study didn't sleep that night because we had a sunrise service for Easter.

I decided to skip the sunrise service because my still-recurring headaches and jaw pain have given me tremendous trouble sleeping and I was not sure how much sleep I would actually get during the last few hours of Saturday night.  Despite trying many kinds of treatments and sleeping arrangements, I slept through the night only once during a whole month.  During the day, I usually have a dull headache that gets worse as the day goes on, occasionally stabbing pains, pains that shoot around my whole jaw, and popping ears.  It's bad.  Theologically correct or not, I've told some people that everyone in hell has this condition.

So I woke up about an hour later and went to the church that I had visited last Easter.  It was great to be in the presence of almost 4000 other Christians who were passionately worshiping the one true God through songs that echoed Biblical truth.  It felt like going to a conference again.  After the service, I loaded up on books and spent time with a college friend who I had not seen since I visited the same church a year prior.

We shared prayer requests.  I asked him to pray for my career situation, specifically mentioning that I have a desire to do full-time missions in the Philippines but no definite calling on whether I should stay here or drop everything and go there.  He said he would pray for it.

The next day was Monday.  I was back at work.  During two-plus months of this pain, I had not even taken one day off from work, though I've had three emergency dental visits in the last three weeks.  The morning went like a usual morning, with a few meetings.  I let my boss know that I would need to step out in the afternoon for a dental appointment.  He was fine with it.  I started eating lunch at my desk, while still working, while my office mates were out on their lunch break.  I started hearing rumblings about some "1:00 meeting" which I had figured was for a specific project that some others on the team were working on.

Then 1:00 came.  In the middle of lunch, my boss called me into the HR office.  They told me that my performance had not improved enough since my review in January (although all marks on that review were officially good) and I could not work there anymore.  They were seeing my pain as an excuse rather than the root cause why my performance had not improved.  I explained this, but didn't bother to try fighting to keep my job.

I've really been wrestling with whether I should make this post public but anonymous on my blog or private for my Facebook friends.  This is not the first time I have lost my job.  Actually, it's the third.  The first two times, I was laid off for circumstances that were not my fault.  This time, it is officially my fault, though I think others should at least share some blame for it.  But I hate going to church and hearing "How's your job search?" instead of "Hi, how are you?" from so many of my friends.  So I've only told a few of them.

I'm also not sure whether or not I should try to fight to stay in this line of work or not.  The last place made me, occasionally, legitimately hate what I was doing for a living.  I have several choices now.  One is to look for another job - not preferable, but I'm starting to put feelers out anyway.  One is to start freelancing in hopes that it will get successful and I'll be able to live in the Philippines and keep doing it in the future.  One is to do paid work with a nonprofit or charity.  One is to become a missionary to the Philippines - and anyone who has read this blog long enough would know that I have a specific burden for that country.

During the past two weeks, I've mostly just been sleeping a lot.  I hope it is not laziness, but rather a legitimate need to rest after the pain had kept me awake every night for a month.  The pain has subsided to the point where I can function now, though my ears are still popping.  I've been staying in my house for several days at a time and rarely going out anywhere.  It feels like being a hermit.

My relationship with God has seemed distant since Easter.  Due to the pain, I haven't fasted recently; I will try to fast again soon.  And most days, I've woken up and gone straight to my computer to do research for this job hunt / career change / whatever this is going to be.  I've barely prayed about it at all and have barely been in the Word.  You can have a theology blog, be registered to attend another conference in a month, and have a relationship with God that is barely there at all.  I feel ready to worship, but without spending much time with Him - it seems more accurate that I am ready to let out emotion for emotion's sake and call it worship.

A question that keeps coming back to me is: If I stay in this line of work, does that show a lack of faith?  If I stay in America, does it show a lack of faith?  If I start another job that gives me only two weeks a year of vacation (standard in the US), I won't be able to go back to the Philippines until the end of 2013 - if the trip gets approved again.

On the other hand, a friend who is a missionary tweeted earlier this morning encouraging believers to sell all for Christ now.  Another friend who is leaving for South America as a full-time missionary in the summer told me that a trend in his missions organization is to  be an expatriate worker.  That is how a lot of missions to the unreached is being done.  I know several people who expatriated to the Philippines, though their reasons were related more to work than to missions.  There also seems to be a lot of options to teach at schools for missionary kids there, but that seems more like just supporting missions to me rather than being on the front lines.

I know my family wants me to stay in the corporate world, despite my failure there so far.  They don't want me to go and stay in the Philippines.  To many Americans, success equals success in the corporate arena.  To many Filipinos, the same is true.

I hope that whatever decision I make is legitimately surrendered to God and not based on unbelief or fear.  On the way home from work two Mondays ago, I was not crying or screaming at God as I had been after both of my layoffs in previous years.  I was peacefully surrendered to whatever God has for me next - holding my career and ambitions with an open hand and telling Him that I wanted Him to do what He wanted with it.  That's probably the most peace I have had in a while about my direction in life.

Surrender to God must not be a flash in the pan, decided in the moment and then forgotten about.  Whoever leaves anything or anyone for the sake of Christ will receive their reward in eternity:

"Then Peter said to Him, 'Behold, we have left everything and followed You; what then will there be for us?' And Jesus said to them, 'Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.  And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for My name’s sake, will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life.  But many who are first will be last; and the last, first.'"  (Matthew 19:27-30)

My copy of Let the Nations Be Glad arrived a few days ago.  I have read only a few pages in the preface so far and have tried to really dwell on what is being said:

"All the earth-shaking awesome forces unleashed on the world are released by the Lord Jesus Christ.  He reigns today.  He is in the control room of the universe.  He is the only Ultimate Cause; all the sins of man and machinations of Satan ultimately have to enhance the glory and kingdom of our Saviour.  This is true of our world today - in wars, famines, earthquakes, or the evil that apparently has the ascendancy.  We have become too enemy-conscious, and can over-do the spiritual warfare aspect of intercession.  We need to be more God-conscious, so that we can laugh the laugh of faith knowing that we have power over all the power of the enemy (Luke 10:19).  He has already lost control because of Calvary where the Lamb was slain.  What confidence and rest of heart this gives us as we face a world in turmoil and such spiritual need."
- Patrick Johnstone, Operation World.

Regardless of how we choose to promote Him, we must promote Him.  The Lamb will receive the full reward of His suffering.  Don't we want to be used in that great cause?

"9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, and palm branches were in their hands; 10 and they cry out with a loud voice, saying,
   “Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.” 11 And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures; and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12 saying,
   “Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. Amen.”
 13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “These who are clothed in the white robes, who are they, and where have they come from?” 14 I said to him, “My lord, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15 For this reason, they are before the throne of God; and they serve Him day and night in His temple; and He who sits on the throne will spread His tabernacle over them. 16 They will hunger no longer, nor thirst anymore; nor will the sun beat down on them, nor any heat; 17 for the Lamb in the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and will guide them to springs of the water of life; and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.”"
- Revelation 7:9-17.

Sunday is only a shadow.

The Heart of a Church Planter

If you have read my posts from several years ago, you may have noticed that I have been championing the cause of Biblical manhood and womanhood for a few years.  I used to compare myself to most of my friends and say that I was one of the most advanced "men" among them because I had a lot of the books and listened to a lot of the sermons.  Lately, I've gone through somewhat of a season of humbling regarding how advanced I am in this.

Andy Mineo's verse in 116 Clique's "Man Up Anthem" has a line which continues to stick in my head after I listen to it:
"Yeah, being a man's got nothing to do with age.
You can be a boy til the day you lay in your grave.
None of us behave like the image of who we're made.
'Cause we're fallen away - it's better known as depraved
Running from responsibility - really we crave
The easy way out of places that call us to pull our weight
Man they blowing through everyday decisions are made,
Responding to the call God's giving 'em from the gate."

The places that call me to pull my weight right now are work and ministry.  Regarding work, I'm admittedly "running out of time to make a sentimental plea".  My job is very mentally intensive, which is part of the reason why I do most of my sacred reading and writing on the weekends.  And my health has not been good this year.  After my trip to the Philippines, I had more jet lag than I have ever had and fell ill for about 2 weeks while I recovered from that.  Then I felt well for about a week or so.  Then, due to ongoing dental treatment with several different dentists, I have had terrible headaches for the past month and a half and counting.  I've needed a lot more help than I would like to ask for at work.  And my already average at best performance has gotten worse.  I sense a desire to go on vacation again and escape the responsibility for a little while.  But this is taking the easy way out of places that call me to pull my weight.  And if I do this to get away from responsibility, I am not manning up.

In ministry, I've noticed that I have mostly been choosing the aspects of my role in the church that do not involve much relation to other people.  But I am called to pull my weight in relating to others.  I am not exempt from sharing the gospel or from ministering directly to the needs of others.  God calls every believer to this role.

Today, I have been realizing that no local church will be exactly like I want it to be.  My church is historically Filipino with a lot of Filipino-Americans and some others.  We are still a small church that meets most definitions of a church plant.  I relate much better to the Filipinos than the Filipino-Americans do.  I can speak a good deal of Tagalog, embrace their culture wholeheartedly, and have been to the Philippines.  Some of the Fil-Ams are much harder for me to relate to.  I don't quite understand or know much about some of the cultural identity that they bring to the table.  So after the Saturday night service, I mostly hope that certain other guys will be there and I can talk with them.  Or it might be like last night, where I couldn't even really join a conversation.  But how sinful is my heart for choosing who I want to minister to?

Part of the regression in my path toward manhood has, no doubt, been due to the lack of examples of godly manhood among my friends in this world.  Other than my pastor, who is just a few years older than I am (more kuya than tito), I can't point to anyone in my church as a godly man who exemplifies Biblical manhood in both work, ministry, and family life - and, most importantly, in affections for Jesus Christ.

I have to say it's my own fault too!  I have a heart for helping pastors to establish Biblical churches in areas that do not have them.  Naturally, a new or restarted church plant will not always have a mature core of charter members who bring all of the strengths that their church needs to have.  Just as our physical bodies will break down and betray us more and more until we meet our Lord Jesus Christ, we should not expect the body of Christ to be perfect here on earth.  We tend to look at churches like Bethlehem Baptist Church (John Piper and soon to be Jason Meyer), Grace Community Church (John MacArthur), Covenant Life Church (Joshua Harris), and other churches like these and expect our smaller local churches to have all the same strengths that they do.  But for each one of these, there are tens or probably hundreds of smaller churches that are wondering why they are not this successful in the eyes of men.

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Second Thoughts on Park Days and a Philippines Update

For the past 4 years, I have been a season pass holder at my home theme park and have already renewed earlier this month for a fifth season there. But for the first time, I have felt convicted about that recently.

A lot of hobbies start off with very good intentions. I once took a homeless young man to the park with me, paying for the trip myself, and he had the time of his life. I also took a janitor from one of my previous employers to the park with me and allowed him to spend the whole day riding rides with me and other Christian in our office. On other occasions, I have been a single rider but have spent days befriending other single riders from other states and regions. I became friends on Facebook with one of them, and he has been able to see the many Christian quotes I put on my personal Facebook page. So I began to look at park visits as something with potential for evangelism and fellowship.

This year has been different. My usual park buddy from the past 3 seasons got married this spring. I went to the park with him in April before he got married. Other than that, all of my visits have been solo. This year, I have become more of a loner than I was in the past. So the visits this fall have been not only solo, but mostly silent. On my most recent visit, I barely interacted with anyone, just rode rides and interacted a minimal amount with the crews. The weather was awful for riding, but I went anyway because I knew the lines would be short. For the past two visits, the weather was sunny and I could spend the whole way there praying and the whole way back worshiping God in song. This time, I needed music on for the morning drive because it was cloudy. On the way back, I still worshiped but could not feel the reality of the songs in my life. It was mostly emotionless singing into empty space to admire the sound of my own voice. It was hollow, selfish worship using God-centered words.

The week had gone well up to that point. On Monday, my leave had been approved for going to the Philippines. (Since then, I have bought the tickets! :-) ) I had been reading more than I had in most other parts of the year. On the surface I looked pretty holy for the week. But after I got back, God started to reinforce that this park visit was selfish.

As a coaster enthusiast, I keep meticulous ride logs that include the total number of rides I take in each visit, my running totals for the year for each, and where I sat on the train for each ride. But yesterday, my main motive for going was just to make sure that I had more coaster rides this year than last year. I thought I had been slacking off.

But what else could I have been doing? As much as I dislike going to weddings, one of my other friends was getting married that day. There was no Saturday night service for that week, although I had arrived back from the park in time for that. So I could not minister to anyone in my church. It was a lost day, and it is better to lose my life than to waste it.

Going to the Philippines might help me to be less self-centered, and not just because cultures in the East tend to be more group-minded while American culture focuses much more on the individual. Pending a background check, I will get to see at least one of the children that I sponsor. I am trying to mentally prepare myself for his different world. But I don't know what to expect. I know some academic statistics about the international poverty line and how I can't buy a sandwich at Subway here with the money that most people there make in a week - if they can even find work for the day. I have seen pictures of the children that I have sponsored. But I have never been able to reach out my hand and touch a person who is truly poor by global standards. How could this affect me?

I hope and pray that these kids do not see me as an alternate Savior. My American lifestyle - wartime or not - could be a stumbling block that keeps them from seeing the gospel. They have needed to have faith for basic provisions in ways that I have not. But Scripture says, over and over, that as a Christian, I need to help people in need. So, although I seem to do a lot compared to many others in my church, I do very little when I compare myself to the Word. I should be doing more than just sending some money every month. My work weeks know very little of sacrifice, except for giving a good deal of time and effort to do work for others. Working in a job is not often a very voluntary form of service. A person who is common will do that same job and just take the money. A person who is consecrated will not stop there.

So in about 7 weeks, God willing, I will board a flight to the Philippines, not knowing what I may see there. I come with five loaves and two fish, trusting God to do with it as He will - and may that include feeding His sheep and drawing more into His kingdom?

You may be praying for God's plan to be carried out in some area. But some people only have the willingness to pray. Sometimes God's answer to those prayers is to set you on a course to do something through you for His glory. Recently, I have been more convicted that I should spend less time in solitude having high-flown thoughts about serving others and sharing the gospel, and more time actually serving others and sharing the gospel. One could say that the reason is the survival of my church, but that makes an idol out of my church. God will do as He wants with our church, but is His glory really our motivation for serving Him?

Although not entirely related, I feel compelled to mention this. What is the glory of God? Is it only seen in doing things for others, which seems to be the point of Jaeson Ma's song "Glory"? If the glory of God is only reflected in other people and is centered on man, as it were, then either 1) man is the origin of that glory and when God created man, man was given an attribute (glory) that God himself did not have, or 2) God didn't have glory until He created man, which means He gained a new attribute at creation which He has not had since eternity past, and thus He would not be an unchanging God. On another hand, if you don't realize that God does glorify Himself through changing the lives of people, your Christianity will not do any good for the world.

God is an eternally glorious being Who has displayed perfect love and perfect glory among His three Persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) since before the world began. He created the universe as a means of glorifying Himself through the vast reaches of space and time. But His glory is eternal. Therefore, when we do things that give Him glory (not that we can give Him any that He does not already have; He needs nothing from us but graciously allows us to serve Him), that is an eternal investment and prevents our lives from being wasted on ourselves.

If you have prayed for me to go to the Philippines, thank you! This is something I have wanted to do for about ten years now for various reasons, but God had to refine those reasons and connect me with the right people in order to glorify Himself through it and not just give me an expensive vacation. I don't know why, but I was just thanking God for it without any tears since I found out I could go, although many tears in the past several years have gone into the prayers that I would go. Maybe it has not completely hit me yet. Maybe it won't until I am actually on the plane. :-)

Lessons I Learned from Next 2011

Here are some lessons for my spiritual life that I took away from this year's Next Conference. The sessions did not cover these points, but I thought of them as a result of worshiping God and having fellowship with other believers there.

1. Do not think of corporate worship as a performance where you must be seen by God or others. After a couple sessions, the passion of the worship sets started to get to my head. Before one session, I went down the stairs of the hotel like an arena announcer was about to call my name to get on the court in the NBA Finals. And I had my hands in the air like a lot of other people, but no tears in that worship set. I could not really think about God. I wondered why I could not behold the beauty of Christ or really think about what I was singing. I was doing what I was doing not in order to be close to God and worship Him as I ought, but to get the emotional high and the general sense of euphoria first. Crying in a song is stupid unless the subject of the song means more to you than life.

2. If you see someone who you will probably never see again and you know that they also know the Lord, maximize that short time with them by pouring into their life and being a blessing. Similarly, lean upon and learn from the words of Scripture to a point where, as C.H. Spurgeon said, if people cut you, you bleed Scripture. This can be a great encouragement to others.

3. My "bachelor pack", as Brother Washer calls it, is a great help to me spiritually, but is not forever. Four of us made the trip to Next and stayed in two hotel rooms. My roommate, who has been a great friend to me during the several years that I have known him, will be married by the end of this year. One of the other men has been pursuing a young lady for a year. And the other one seems to meet a new young lady every other week! (Only an inside joke. :-) ) As a career-age single, I know that people get married and move on. Several men from my previous church with whom I used to spend a lot of time are now married and have been mostly or completely out of touch with me since their weddings. (It's almost comedic, the responses I may get from saying this. Even recently, someone told me, "You're 25? You're so young. You shouldn't be married yet!" And I'm sure many people from my old homeschool group would think I belong in a monastery because I am not married at my age. Silly culture! ;-) )

4. Thy bachelor pack is not sufficient for thee. There are times when I cannot continue hanging out in my bachelor pack; I must be alone with God. Spending time with them is very edifying but does not, in the end, leave me satisfied. Regularly, I just need to cordon off certain times in my life and say that only God can go there with me. And this does not come, necessarily, at a set time. I can't just schedule certain times in my life for God to reveal more of Himself to me and leave me undone. My schedule is subject to Christ's Lordship. Sometimes He just calls me to come away with Him, and I must do it, or else miss a time of deep and abiding fellowship with my Lord.

5. I was bolder in evangelism on this trip than I am at home. In my own town, I almost never witness, since my work is very busy and tiring and most of my free time goes to either the church or solitude with God. At Next, around many other Christians, I had a few minutes to explain to a Catholic man at the resort why so many people were there for the conference, and hopefully left him with a better understanding of who the God of Scripture is and why we should worship Him. The conference itself could be used as a means to witness to others in the host city.

6. Sometimes the best worship is just to sing the words of God back to Him. The song I will remember the most from this conference is Shane & Shane's "Worthy of Affection", based on Hebrews 1:

"We are the broken down, and we are the beaten up.

But what could stop us from a song of unending love?

Holy is the Lord!

You are a treasure, the hope, the bright and Morning Star.

You are the Lover of our Souls, and You've won our hearts.

We sing of Your great love.

So we sing. We lift our hands and sing:

"You are worthy of affection!

You're the radiance of all of His glory.

Let adoration fill this place.

You hold everything together

By the word of Your immovable power.

We sing a song of praise!"

-----

"1:1 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. 3 He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, 4 having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs.

5 For to which of the angels did God ever say,

“You are my Son,
today I have begotten you”?

Or again,

“I will be to him a father,
and he shall be to me a son”?

6 And again, when he brings the firstborn into the world, he says,

“Let all God's angels worship him.”

7 Of the angels he says,

“He makes his angels winds,
and his ministers a flame of fire.”

8 But of the Son he says,

“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.
9 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.”

- Hebrews 1:1-9 (ESV, emphasis mine).

My Trip Report from Next: Part 2, and Pray for Sovereign Grace.

On Day 3 of the Next Conference, I attended a breakout session with Dr. Vern Poythress (Science and Faith) and a vocational breakout with Tom Fluharty (Arts). One of Dr. Poythress's first statements struck me: God has not revealed Himself in spite of scientific discovery, but through it. In college I took 6 classes in astronomy, almost a full minor. Even though I had not yet started listening to sermon podcasts at the time, I saw my study of that subject as something of an act of worship because it allowed me to use my mind to understand more of God's creation and the vastness of its scale. Astronomy allows a better appreciation for some of the attributes of God. When a biologist or chemist studies a cell or a molecule under a microscope, he feels "big" and possibly somehow deserving of favor from God. Astronomy turns my mind in the opposite direction. When I watch Powers of Ten, I feel incredibly small, as I stare at something far more vast than the Grand Canyon. And God created the sun, moon, and stars with His voice in one day's work! Even if that were the absolute limit of God's power, the most powerful person on Earth could never do that. And that is why the rich businessmen and kings of the earth who do not know Christ will melt before the Lord on judgment day - because they do not really have any power, and they will stand before the sovereign Lord of all.

I also delighted in God, to hear Dr. Poythress explain about the "sameness of law" and how the laws God set to govern nature give us one coherent universe and show that it all has one Creator. The universe was not fashioned by God and His friends, or by rival gods who fought to establish each of their own interests in the created order. Overall, Dr. Poythress's session was fascinating. Rather than restating the rest of his points, I encourage you to download it from the Next conference's website! After that session, I did a short workout to more gospel rap: Dillon Chase's Pause mixtape, including his "Here in Your Presence Remix" and "How He Loves Remix".

I decided on a whim to attend the vocational breakout concerning the arts. Although I am not an artist, I have a casual interest in digital photography and frequently take my camera on hikes. Several young ladies who attended the young adults' camp with my church the previous weekend are artists, so I attended this session partially to understand more of where they are coming from and what challenges they face as Christian artists.

Tom Fluharty is a very talented caricature artist who has done a great deal of hilarious work for a wide range of publications. I was surprised to find how much he and I have in common spiritually in spite of our widely different vocations. He got the job that he wanted but was not ultimately happy with it. After college, I spent nine months applying for positions before I got my foot in the door with a company. Several years later, I have realized that work is a good thing because it keeps me busy, but it is not my ultimate source of satisfaction. I must look only to Christ for that. In this world, the metaphorical "ground" that I work on is cursed and often frustrates me, leading me into grumbling, sometimes profanity, and being difficult with people. That doesn't make work a bad thing. But since my work causes me to sin, does that mean I should find a new line of work? I am still wrestling with that. The work itself doesn't make me sin; my own heart does. Artists often have to choose between often more lucrative opportunities to make art that glorifies sin and chances to make art that is not morally objectionable. But Christians in all professions need to choose their jobs based on whether they are convinced that the work will allow them to make much of God in both their vocations and the rest of their lives. By God's providence, enough jobs exist that most Christian workers can make a choice between jobs that will give them enough time for family and ministry and jobs that will not.

Like me, Tom got to a point where he saw that God is truly his satisfaction and spending time with Him stopped being a legalistic exercise. Children are often raised in some measure of church ritual. And it is good to have that, but all that it can do is show them where the right path is. God must change their desires to see devotions as anything other than 15 minutes or half an hour in the morning that gets in the way of games, friends, or sports. I have had several seasons in life where I have had just an intense desire to be with Jesus. Even now, I like to fast and hit the trail for a full day with nothing but a Bible, a camera, and of course Gatorade (it gets pretty hot here in America in the summer :-) ), just so that I can be alone with Him.

Tom also suggested that young artists contact and follow their heroes in art. In my profession, I have taken that idea away in the form of reading books and blogs by many people who I deeply respect in my field. For most of the year, one-on-one mentorship had been my only source of professional development. Since the conference, I have tried to spend more time taking in the view from the giants' shoulders. As a Christian, I should not give my whole life to my craft. There needs to be time for family, ministry, exercise, godly fellowship, and time alone with God. But many of those who have given their lives to their craft have shared their wisdom because they have earned the platform for influencing their entire field. Taking their advice allows me to work more productively with an eye toward pleasing God, whether my manager is watching or not.

Dr. R.C. Sproul spoke in the fourth general session about the sanctity of God's truth in a world that, by nature, despises it. I found his statement that there are no moral relativists very interesting. I have not heard many people praise moral relativism since I graduated from college, although that philosophy probably still dominates many college campuses. But, as Dr. Sproul said, if there is a Mack truck in an intersection, you believe there isn't one, and you attempt to cross the street, "It will be the end of your relativism at the same time as the end of your life." Brilliant!

Shane & Shane led worship in that night's general session and gave a concert after the session. I was very blessed by their music, which focuses very much on putting Scripture to song. In general, the bands at this concert (the others were Reilly and Generation Letter) gave me some hope for Christian rock. Most of the Christian rock I had heard before was silly or doctrinally bankrupt. So for years, I only listened to secular music, and several years ago, some friends introduced me to gospel rap. But don't write off Christian rock; just know where to look for musicians that who focus on the glory of God, not on having a good time.

The conference ended on its strongest note with Pastor Kevin DeYoung's general session, "Who Am I? Humanity in the Eyes of the World and the Christian". After many American churches tackled man's purpose throughout the late 1990s and 2000s, influenced heavily by The Purpose-Driven Life, I have seen some shift their focus toward the believer's identity. My church's youth ministry has been covering it this year, and Eric Mason has been preaching a sermon series at Epiphany Fellowship about it. I've also spent more than a year writing about it, in my most ambitious project for this blog so far. And I love the doctrine of imago Dei, which Tedashii covered so well in Identity Crisis. So I was thrilled to find out Pastor DeYoung would give his treatment of the topic at Next this year.

Among other points, Pastor DeYoung focused on Biblical manhood and womanhood and God's design for gender. God does not free us to create or express ourselves, but to bear His image in the world. The distinct gender roles God gave Adam and Eve predate the Fall, so complementarianism actually gives Christians a means of restoring the beauty of God's original creation. What struck me the most from this discussion was that twisting gender roles actually hurts women more than it hurts men. His example was abortion, which turns women into both the victim and the bad guy. Another example that I recall from one of Pastor Voddie Baucham's messages is that expecting women to have careers outside the home forces them to bear the curse of Adam (the curse on work) when they already bear the curse of Eve (pain in childbirth); giving the curse of Eve to a man is a biological impossibility.

Following up on a point from his breakout session, Pastor DeYoung mentioned the shift of words in describing sin, from spiritual and volitional words to medical and unavoidable ones. A common example of this in the world is any sort of addiction. In my previous church, many of the men mentioned their various addictions in small groups, and the answers that they were given did not always involve replacing their desires for sin with a genuine desire for God. I called it "sin management" and told my professing "brothers" that idolatry was really at the root of their problem. I don't believe in "addictions", only sins. Reducing sin to a "disorder", as Pastor DeYoung said, makes the world a more dangerous place, because taking away the words that describe evil as evil does not take away their realities.

In closing, Next was an amazing conference this year. Much thanks to everyone who worked to put this on. Each session taught me a great deal, and it was a great blessing to worship the Lord around many other people who love Him with a great deal of passion and have a great appetite for more of His truth. Please, please, please pray for Sovereign Grace Ministries, who organize Next, Together for the Gospel, WorshipGod, and other conferences. I am not a member of a Sovereign Grace church, but they have been a great blessing to me and many others. For reasons that many articles and blogs have described, CJ Mahaney has gone on indefinite leave as their president and Joshua Harris has stepped down from their board of directors. Their church network appears to be in a state of disorder right now, and whether you consider denominations or church networks a good thing or not, please put that aside and consider that these men are much more faithful to Scripture than many other influential pastors and teachers and that they collaborate not to give a new definition of Christianity, but a new demonstration of it.

For every Next there are thousands of rallies, conferences, convergences, and Joel Osteen speeches to sold-out stadiums that glorify false teaching and give millions of people a false view of who God is and what His Word teaches. Few groups that seek to practice true Biblical Christianity have the size or resources to gather thousands of people together to celebrate and learn about the true gospel. May this trial bring my brothers and sisters in Sovereign Grace Ministries, including the many who have left SGM and are coming out of the woodwork now to scream against it, to a higher degree of unity in Christ while not causing them to compromise to the world in what they teach. And may the men involved be restored in their fellowship with one another as well.

Retreat Reflections: 1.

I have not written much recently due to several weekend events out of town. In the last two weekends of May, I attended a young adults' camp for my church, followed by the Next Conference on Memorial Day weekend. I spent four days in the mountains with my church at the end of June for our first ever, whole-church Family Camp. My church's men's ministry also met on a Sunday morning in June, and Sunday morning is my usual writing time because our Sunday service takes place in the afternoon; we share a building with our host church.

Work has been more hectic with several deadlines and several new people starting on my team, so I haven't had much time to really reflect on Next or the church camps. So, rather than finishing up the posts on courtship now, I am starting this series of posts at the start of a quite welcome three-day weekend at home, while I edit some of my long queue of photos from hiking trips, hopefully start plowing through the roughly 850 photos I took at Next, and (of course) work out. (Suffice to say, I have an interest in photography - but no DSLR yet.)

Our young adults' camp focused on opposition, as a more intense continuation of our series on Saturday nights. Because I worked on the first day of the camp, I arrived partway through the sermon in the first session. One of our pastor's classmates from Bible college was our guest speaker for all four sessions. He now serves as a Presbyterian pastor and will move out of the area later this summer for more training in the ministry. My pastor told our group about him before the camp started, saying, "He is really ghetto but uses more SAT words than I do." And he was right! He had grown up in the inner city with a hard upbringing; he was quite open to discuss that and his struggles with us during the sessions, even though he had not seen many of us before.

The first sermon discussed idolatry with Luke 19 as its text. (Our church only uses expositional preaching, even when we try to go topical. I love that! :-) ) Some of the points were as follows, along with my reflections:

1. Everyone looks for something outside themselves to justify their existence. For many people in my church, this usually means friends and can mean basketball. We are looking for approval from others any way that we can get it. For Zacchaeus, that meant taking a job that allowed him to get rich: a tax collector. Everyone in that society hated tax collectors, but everyone wanted to be one because they had money. It could also mean a girlfriend or courtship; when mine ended a few months ago, I had to struggle to put who I was back together because I had reached a point where she, not God, was justifying my existence. And... God calls this idolatry.

2. "Broken people do broken things." Desire for validation is God-given, but He presents Himself as the only solution. This is why people can get all they ever asked for materially and still feel poor.

3. In order to lose idols, Jesus must become a superior satisfaction.

4. A Christian needs to be worried about succeeding in things that do not eternally matter. "Only the cross of Christ can bestow true glory on your life."

5. "Idols always tell you to come back for more, but they never give you what you were asking for."

Session 2 dealt with costly grace, with Luke 15 as the text.

1. "If I had 100 cars and one broke down, who cares?" But the shepherd cared for the one lost sheep so much that he left the 99 other sheep to go find it, and he rejoiced when he found it. He wasn't treating that sheep as replaceable the way we do with most of our possessions, but as an irreplaceable treasure. This is how God looks upon those He has redeemed!

2. The lost son told his father to drop dead. He made it rain for days and days. When he had squandered everything and come back, the father replaced everything he had lost. It took years to fatten the calf that was killed for the younger son. Tony Campolo: "I belong to a church that throws birthday parties for whores at 3:30 in the morning."

3. God is seeking the lost: "Adam, where are you?" "God does not love cars or big houses. He loves people, unlike Americans."

4. The older brother is more dead in God's eyes. The reason why is damnable good works. Good works are your own righteousness. People who define themselves by their sin, such as drug dealers and pimps, know that they are sinners. "A pastor or worship leader needs the same amount of grace as the most hardened sinner. You nailed Jesus to the cross." Christians must repent of all the good things they have done for the wrong reasons. In the gospel economy, if you bring something to the table, you may not be saved.

5. The Father (God) is the true prodigal. The older brother should have been a search party for the younger brother because the Father was grieving. In my family, this was inverted. My older brother had a prodigal stage in his early twenties. I was still in high school at the time and was trying to approach the situation moralistically, as if to say, "I can be moral. Why can't he?" So I could condemn his sins without a tear in my eyes. I was not going out to the places where he was to try to find him and bring him back. I was not even really praying for him much except for brief mentions in my prayers at night. Mostly, during the several years where I watched him fall, nothing surprised me. I just determined that I would look at him and do the opposite, only rebelling in ways that were socially acceptable within my church at the time. There were still idols and sins in my heart. They were just more culturally acceptable ones. And that is what is dangerous.

Session 3 covered John 6:

1. Tim Keller: If you ask a longtime churchgoer, "Are you a Christian?", the fake Christian will try to validate himself. The true Christian will chuckle that God would choose him - a sober, somber reply understanding that Jesus, the Justifier, went to the cross.

2. How often do you barter with God? These people wanted bread, a kingdom, health, and prosperity, not a cross, holiness, or purity. Earlier in my Christian life, my prayers tended to take the format, "God, if you do this, I'll do that for You." It was conditional surrender, not unconditional surrender based on His Lordship over my life. I was not really looking at Him as my Lord. I thought His government over me was a democracy where I got most of the votes and therefore always won. I had no clue how to submit to Him as my King. Kingship means you submit to Him even if He gives you nothing. But the fact that He gave you Christ should give you unspeakable joy, if you realize even in small part how great Christ is.

3. The crowd did not want the bread of life or its Giver. "Can I go to heaven without truly and affectionately loving my Jesus?"

4. Theology, your decision, and contrition do not and cannot save you. Jesus saves you. "If you are not saved, you do have a relationship with God. You are his enemy."

5. A spiritual high cannot replace a steady relationship with God. "The presence of Christ becomes real, not in miracles, but in mayhem. He becomes closer than your own skin."

6. "The greatest enemy of the best is not the worst, but the very good." Satan did not challenge God's existence, but His goodness.

7. Jesus saved you that you may enjoy Him and glorify Him to all the nations.

8. When you fall, do not trust in doctrine, but in "Christ in you, the hope of glory". The gospel does not tell you to focus on the law but to gaze on Christ. "Take your eyes off the mirror. Gaze upon your Savior and let His beauty transform you."

This post is already long, so in the next post, I will discuss the last session and general reflections.

Lessons Learned from My International Courtship, Part 3

18. If I compare myself with others, I will cease to be satisfied in Christ and will probably become covetous. He really is all-satisfying, and I really do see Him as all-sufficient, if I run after Him like a horse wearing blinders. Covetousness, on the other hand, is at the root of all kinds of sin, not the least of which is discontentment with what God has given me. If I balk at losing a courtship, how would I handle real suffering for the name of Christ?

19. There is no magic reset button that erases my memory of the courtship and helps me feel much better. And I don't want that. I don't regret meeting her. I was expecting that a recent church camp and conference in May would cure me of the pain that I have felt as a result of this courtship ending. But I continue to think about it every day; it enters my mind whenever my mind is idle, and even when I am trying to read or worship. Thoughts about her and the other characters in this story haunt me. Healing takes however long it takes, and I cannot draw a deadline for it.

20. I must rejoice with those who rejoice regardless of whether I have received the same blessings. Recently, one of my good friends got married. He is in his mid-30s and had never been on a date until about 2 years ago. Their wedding, in May between the church camp and the conference, was hard for me to bear. This was the first wedding I had attended since my courtship ended. I was happy for them, but during the ceremony my expression was a blank stare. One of my friends noticed that. Ignoring another person's happiness is actually disobeying Scripture.

21. People in the theological rarefied air of Reformed Christianity tend to have less faith than people who embrace false doctrine. Her family firmly believes that God will turn the Philippines into a Christian nation with an all-Christian government and no political corruption, if only they pray and fast enough. They were also quite convinced for a while that God would give them good things and that I was "the man for her". Meanwhile, I would sit in my collection of books and podcasts, trying to deconstruct the myth of "the one" for them and explain how God promises that Christians are going to suffer and you should feel fortunate if God gives you anything good on this earth. And my conclusion is that maybe I have gone too far in this. I am believing the right things, but it has led me to a general lack of faith and a doubt when I pray for God to bless me or to work in the lives of others. And that shouldn't be. My God is bigger than the god of the health and wealth gospel, because He saves me from my sin, not my lack of self-esteem, and He keeps me regardless of me.

22. I am still trying to rebuild a prayer life that was formerly much better than it became during the courtship. Before the courtship started, I was praying radically for the nations, especially for the Philippines. On the way to work, I would pray through tears for members of the New People's Army and the Abu Sayyaf, the two most major terrorist organizations in the Philippines, that God would tear out their hearts of stone, which exist in every man, woman, and child, not only in criminals, and replace them with a heart of flesh that can respond to Him - that He would pour clean water on them and they would be clean, for His glory. During the courtship, my prayers turned mostly toward her, that she would be right for me, that she would make much of Christ and grow in Christlikeness and knowledge of and about Him. As the courtship went on and I realized that she and I did not share the same vision, my prayers about her got more and more desperate until I realized, months later, that I just needed to submit to the Lord and let her go. But now that I don't have her to pray about, I am praying more for myself and others to be able to sustain their spiritual and emotional highs that we get at camps and conferences.

23. Much of what I looked for and prayed for in a wife does not really matter. I was focused too much on outward appearance and background. Just because I have a covenant with my eyes regarding how I look at women, that I will only look at their faces, does not mean at all that I don't have idolatry regarding "what is the perfect face"! Even if I do not focus my prayers toward the... er... non-facial attributes of a woman's appearance, I still spent a lot of time before I met her telling God, "Lord, I want her to be exactly this cute!" After a while, He answered that prayer and showed me over time that I should not have prayed for that.

24. The above raises a question: why are my prayers so focused on her outward appearance? A large part of it is the pride that I will feel if I outdo other members of my family or my friends by marrying someone who looks very beautiful. I have never been popular, but being able to be the ugly half of the world's cutest couple gives me status among my friends. Having cute children in the future increases that status. During my courtship, I felt much more confident than I did before or do now. Another reason is fear. I know several men who more well-read in theology than I am, quite close to Christ, quite a lot more well-prepared for marriage than most of the "men" I know who actually get married - and yet they do not marry until later in life than most. I have fear that it is my fate to stay single for life or for a while, when I am too weak to stay unmarried intentionally for an extended time, and then settle for a woman who takes care of herself spiritually but not physically. (Speaking of which, I have a very disciplined workout routine and took a break from my workout for this morning to write this. I took a break since I have the time and energy to write right now. :-) ) Yet God's grace is enough.

25. The other half of that question is "... when God looks at the heart?" - both her heart and mine. The pool of available candidates becomes much smaller when I narrow it to only women who are not Sunday Christians, but who have a radical vision to make much of Christ. And having a common vision is not about wanting to have a bunch of cute kids and raising them just so, because that can be done in a way that does not make much of Him. Rather, it is a question of where her ambitions lie. Does she realize the seriousness and urgency of Christ's kingdom and seek to live in a war? Does she know how to be alone with the Lord and delight in Him? Does she desire to sit under sound preaching and be convicted by the Word of God? Does she know how to be an intercessor, not for health and wealth, but for redemptive history to move forward, for Christ to be supreme locally and among the nations? Does she have a heart to draw others closer to Christ? Does she love the body of Christ sacrificially? Can it truly be said that this world is not worthy of her? All of this is what matters, and not her perfection in each point but her making progress toward it. As a man, I must be able to lead this kind of woman spiritually. To do that, I must not be a Sunday Christian either. This also intensifies my own drive to spiritual maturity. When I do meet her (probably another "her" now), I must also be the kind of person that desires to make God's name great in my own life, in my local church, and among the nations.

These and the lessons I listed in the two previous posts are just 25 of the lessons that I have learned in the first 3 months since my courtship ended. I am sure the Lord will continue to teach me about this as time goes on. My courtship was not recreational dating, so going through this has felt like going through a divorce. For now, I still think about her and what might have been every day. But I am starting to move past it, by the grace of God.

In the next post, God willing, I would like to make exhortations to my fellow singles in the body of Christ who sense a calling to marriage but are still waiting to meet their future spouse.

Recent Meditations on Worship and Missions

“From the ends of the earth,
From the depths of the sea,
From the heights of the heavens,
Your name be praised!
From the hearts of the weak,
From the shouts of the strong,
From the lips of all people,
This song we raise, Lord:

“Throughout the endless ages,
You will be crowned with praises, Lord Most High!
Exalted in every nation,
Sovereign of all creation,
Lord Most High, be magnified!”

- Hillsong United, “Lord Most High”

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"Because, O God, from Thee comes all, because from Thine own mouth has entered us the power to breathe, from the sea of air in which we swim and the unknown nothingness that stays it over us with unseen bonds, because Thou gavest us from the heart of love so tender, mind so wise, and hand so strong, because Thou art Beginning, God, I worship Thee.

"Because Thou art the end of every way, the goal of man; because to Thee shall come of [from] every people respect and praise; their emissaries find Thy throne their destiny; because Ethiopia shall stretch out her hands to Thee, babes [babies] sing Thy praise; because Thine altar gives to sparrows shelter, to sinners peace, and devils fury; because 'to Thee shall all flesh come'; because Thou art Omega. Praise.

"Because Thou sure art to justify that Son of Thine and wilt in time make known just who He is and how soon will send Him back to show Himself; because the name of Jesus has been laughingly nailed upon a cross and is just now on earth held very lightly and Thou wilt bring that name to light; because, O God of Righteousness, Thou wilt do right by my Lord Jesus Christ, I worship Thee."

- Jim Elliot, The Journals of Jim Elliot, "Ecuador, 1952-1955"

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A worship song called "The Stand” has a line, "All I am is Yours." It is one thing to sing that line and then go back to our relatively comfortable American lives. It is quite another to say it in a circumstance where you really are risking your life every day. It has far greater meaning. While on the mission field about 55 years ago, and roughly 2 years before he and several co-laborers in Ecuador lost their lives for the sake of the Gospel, Jim Elliot wrote this in his Journals:

"I recognized that all I am and have is the Almighty's. He could, in one instant, change the whole course of my life, with accident, tragedy, or event unforeseen. Job is a lesson in acceptance - not of blind resignation, but of believing acceptance - that what God does is well done. So, Father, with happy committal I give you my life again this morning - not for anything special, simply to let You know that I regard it as Yours. Do with it as it pleases You. Only give me great grace to do for the glory of Christ whatever comes to me - 'in sickness and in health!'"

No one who is used of God is a great man in and of themselves. It is God’s work in them and through them that allows them to see Him do wonderful things. They are just willing to be used and broken and sent.

Worried About Our Image And Our Space Up On the Internet

I first got the idea for this title shortly after I heard Lecrae's song "Go Hard" several years ago:

"Oh man, we ain't focused on the war. We're just kicking it,

Worried about our image and our space up on the internet.

Take me out of the game, coach. I don't want to play no more.

If I can't give it all I've got and leave it out there on the court.

Thank You for the grace, for the will and the desire.

Got me living for Your glory instead of living to retire.

But I pray I'll never tire of going hard for Messiah.

I don't need no motivation. You're the Reason I'm inspired!"

I guess I could describe myself as an internet missionary. Jonathan Edwards resolved to use new inventions of mankind for advancing the gospel. In our day, perhaps the best example of this is the internet. Right now, few people in the civilized world have not had exposure to the internet. Nearly everyone I know uses it daily. And many people use it to a point of "addiction", or as I prefer to call it, idolatry.

Having used the internet for well over a decade, it is interesting to note how it has evolved into a tool where we ourselves have a significant influence over its content. The top five websites in the world right now are Google, Facebook, YouTube, Yahoo, and Blogger. All provide some means for the users to submit their own content, and Facebook, YouTube, and Blogger exist for almost the sole purpose of allowing people to say, "This is who I am. This is what I like. I want people anywhere, or at least my friends, to read what I write, see the photos I take, watch the videos I make, and visit the links that I like."

William Shakespeare wrote that all the world is a stage and all of the men and women on it are merely players. I submit to you that all the web is also a stage, which gives all of its players visibility to anyone in the world. Nearly everyone today, my parents' generation and younger, has a web presence, even babies.

So, how are you using your stage? Is it, to you, a means to promote the gospel, to become aware of the needs in the world so that you can pray about them and do something about them if possible, to edify and strengthen others in the faith? If you cannot use it this way, it is better to immediately throw it by.

I say all of this as an exhortation because there is so much potential for us to make much of Christ in new media, yet many people just waste their time with it and use it to say what frivolities they are pursuing with their friends. May I say Farmville and Mafia Wars? If you do use the internet to game, may I ask you: are you even in the real war, or just in a fake war with no eternal or even temporal significance? Friendships grow deeper when the camaraderie occurs because of a real, significant cause - not when we use our time together to pass along even innocent internet memes that result from either our sinful culture or Christians' just wasting their time.

The internet can make us forget about the "war" by giving us mere images and videos of the "war" while taking us off of the battlefield. If I see an image or a story about a country that is closed to the gospel, faithful missionaries risking their lives in the 10/40 Window, or Christians being persecuted, my first reaction should be to pray - hard - and do something, not to just keep paging through images and stories and think, "Maybe God should do something; I'll just go back to my life." This is a reaction of wartime living as applied to how we spend our time.

Does a soldier spend all of his time at the fort? For some, it is their job to stay in the fort and support the other troops. But God has given us this gospel that must be shared. Even those called to hold the rope for missionaries who go down in the well must go down into their local wells themselves. And this is an indictment on me; I rarely share my faith with unbelievers outside the internet. And my unbelieving friends probably just ignore what I have to say on the internet.

Also, my internet browsing habits reveal who or what I really love. I don't spend as much time reading every obscure sports statistic about people who I will never meet as I did before. I frequently visit the various blogs that I list in the sidebar of this site. This is an evidence of God working in my life. But, as Json raps in "Chisel Me", "Am I in love with God or in love with theology?"

Constantly browsing theological sites and switching between browser tabs splits your attention, especially if some of the other sites have nothing to do with God. You must have time alone with God in secret if you are to grow in satisfaction and delight in Him. You cannot take technology with you into that secret place. In a sense, technology is a very great help because it allows ready access to so many resources for advancing the Kingdom and it gives a stage for us as individuals and groups to promote the gospel and make much of our Lord. But, everything in moderation, except for sin, which must be put to death. If I go to that secret place and I am playing with my phone, my heart is divided, even if I am looking at a theological resource - because it says, "Lord, You are not enough. I need this too, or I will not be satisfied."

Based on this, I would also say that we profit from having a printed copy of the Bible. As helpful as commentaries, study notes, and the like can be, I found that after I only read a study Bible for several years, I relied too heavily on the study notes and not on what the Word of God was actually saying. Similarly, in the secret place we must be able to spend time with our full attention on the Word. Always using a phone app as our primary Bible can introduce many more distractions than just reading it in a book.

I realize we are a multitasking generation, and those after us are inheriting that trait from us. Even as I write this, I am working on a Tagalog lesson in Rosetta Stone. But Christ states that the greatest commandment is to love Him with our whole heart, with our whole soul, with our whole mind, with our whole strength - not to divide our attention.

If we want to be chiseled, realize this: the Lord's chisel stops at nothing.

The Proper Place of Sports and Delighting in God

At my old church, whose members are predominantly American, the following is a common sight from September through January: People show up to every service wearing American football jerseys. I remember one guy, a grown man in his late 30s, who enthusiastically supports the Dallas Cowboys. He would sit near the front of the sanctuary wearing a hat with blue and white dreadlocks, matching his team's colors. Our church was nowhere near Dallas, and most of our pastors supported other teams. Yet he wanted everyone to know that he supports the Dallas Cowboys.

Naturally, their love for sports, usually American football (I only use that term for it because in other countries, most equate "football" with FIFA or the World Cup), flows out into their conversations. Some people are able to treat it as just a game and take a win or loss in stride. Others live and die by it and use a win or a loss, especially to rival teams, as a great chance to trash talk others in the church who support their teams' rivals. So instead of discussing with others about what the Lord has done in their lives, they relegate that to times of "ministry" and, apart from that, wonder out loud about whether their team's third-string tight end is "questionable" or "probable" for Sunday's game - on the previous Tuesday. Give a tenfold increase in this effect to owners of fantasy teams. (Fantasy sports could be a separate rant in itself.)

For a while, I thought I was better than this. I do not follow American football; if that makes me less American, oh well!

Then Spring Training happened.

My sports to follow are baseball and ice hockey. Basketball is my favorite sport to play, but I don't follow it closely. Recently, the baseball magazines with my name on it started arriving at my house. And I realized that one Major League Baseball team's closer had a great season last year and I didn't know his name. And that left me beside myself. I went on Wikipedia asking myself, "So who is this guy?" He didn't even play for one of my team's rivals. Every day, I come home from work and wonder what happened in baseball that day. My walk with Christ has at times grown very dull, and one of the ways that manifests itself is through an increased interest in sports. Although a win or loss by my teams does not have a great effect on me, sports is still a broken cistern that I run to when Christ is not satisfying enough.

For those in full-time ministry, following sports or being entertained may be an interesting diversion from the duties of ministry. But those who work full-time in secular jobs must at times make a choice between God and entertainment. If work takes up most of life and entertainment takes up the rest, life is not Christ-centered; Christ becomes a mere afterthought at best.

The Christian's relationship to sports must become somewhat of a balancing act. Saying no one can ever watch a game is legalistic, using outward obedience to a revolting law to try to force inward change in the heart, when it just cannot do that. This can be said of any kind of entertainment that is not inherently sinful: movies, video games, the arts, and so on. These can all be used to make much of the Lord. And sometimes people legitimately need a break. Scripture does recognize a benefit in physical exercise as well. I have told some people that if they are fat as a result of not keeping a proper diet and exercise routine, they are in sin. But the passion that leads people to spend whole days bodybuilding in the gym or sitting on the couch watching pregame shows, games, postgame shows, and SportsCenter must be tempered in the life of the Christian. Just today, God brought to my attention that I read an entire sports magazine (I only read the ones that only discuss sports! ;-) ) before I read anything in the Bible. I should be diving into Scripture, because it is life. Why is Scripture so often familiar and dull to me? Why must I rely so heavily on preachers and writers to expound it for me so that I may see its value and beauty? Yet if I sit in a half-billion-dollar sporting cathedral that I helped pay for as a taxpayer and I see a new player on my team, I want to read all of his statistics and scouting report and know all about him. I will probably never meet the guy.

Some of my friends are up in arms about the NFL lockout and its possibility of canceling the NFL season this year. I submit to you that a loss of an American football season may be the best thing that can happen to the American church this year, particularly to its men. Yet in 2004-2005 when the NHL lost a season to a labor dispute, I still found other places to get my hockey fix: video games and listening to juniors games via internet radio. Even now I take some pleasure in the fact that some of those juniors players have made it to the NHL and become stars there. So a lost season by itself will not do anything to drive American men away from chasing these inferior pursuits instead of Christ and Biblical manhood, which gives them a full-time calling to represent their families before God, represent God to their families, and provide for and protect them. Many will still run to college football or to other sports or other hobbies to get their fix. God must do a work to set our affections on Him alone. If He does this to save even one soul or to draw even one soul nearer to His heart, even the economic impacts of a lost season would be worth it, because Christ has infinite worth and you therefore cannot quantify the value of knowing Him.

I have even noticed the impact of sports on my life in what I wear. Any time I wear a hat or a shirt with a team's logo, I give them some sort of homage or support. Yet it would be absurd to say that it is wrong for a Christian to wear anything that supports a sports team, that they can only wear plain colors and patterns or that they must wear Christian t-shirts all the time. (I used to be a church kid that always wore Christian t-shirts. And I was a hypocrite in doing it!) And it is pointless to add man-made rules on top of God's law, when none of us can obey the whole law of God in the first place. One broken rule at any time in life, and we are a goner; we might as well have broken every law. And everyone has. This is why we need the gospel!

Culture is ingrained in us and has a deep influence over what we buy and sell; everything in any economy (save for probably subsistence farming) is strongly influenced by what culture believes we need on top of what we actually need. The only way to escape this is to leave American culture, and even then that does not diminish the importance of the calling that God has given me to be a light where He has placed me and feel my way towards Him in this cultural context for as long as He would have me live in it. Leaving where He has placed me for an ascetic life somewhere else does not destroy the root idols of my heart, although if He sends me I must be willing to go; maybe that is what He wants in order to glorify Himself in me. We must know when to take part in the different areas of our culture and when we need to separate from them for a time to draw closer to the Lord. Putting a regulation on this is impossible because, although all Christians must be growing closer to God, what that looks like practically can vary significantly from one Christian to another.

Yet my point is this. I don't want people to look at me and only see my work or my interests - or to see some condescending church kid who is so holy that he does not need Christ - and judge me based on that. I have great need of Him. I want to be like Him so that when others see me, they don't see me, and they don't see some level of self-willed holiness that they must attain to be close to God. If they look at me and see my Jesus and nothing else - if nothing stands in the way of His person and work being demonstrated in my life - if they see me attacking my many sins with violent, grace-driven effort, consumed by a desire that Christ alone be praised in my life - that is a blessing. Is there anything I would not give to let this happen?

Chisel me, Lord.