Where Do I Fit In The Larger Scheme Of Things

This is not designed to be a long blog at all. I’m here in the midst of assignment fun where I’ve got something like three assignments to get completed before Monday and that’s not straightforward at all, but by the grace of God everything is possible. In my case, it has to be really.

Today I’ve been thinking quite a bit about how the Sermon on the Mount is about the character of God being lived out. I’m sure I must have mentioned before how this whole sermon/teaching has to be taken as a whole. There is a piecemeal approach that means people miss out on so much that holds it together and the themes that run through it. For example anxiety is only a real issue and treasures on earth will bug us when our focus is away from brings us into a relationship with God in the first place. That is to say when I think my issues are more important and humility is no longer an issue then it’s no wonder I get anxious. Likewise loving my enemy is nigh on impossible when I’ve forgotten my perpetual state of mourning because of the helpless and hopeless position I find myself in without God. I haven’t even touched on the characteristic of being merciful or being pure, because these cannot be an issue until I recognise just how greatly in need of God I am.

In my current circumstances a desperate dependency on God cannot be over exaggerated. Not just in terms of the assignments and other pressing decisions, but in getting the whole life balance thing right. I am endeavouring not to be anxious about everything, but in everything by prayer and supplication and with thanksgiving making my requests known to God. I want to maintain a sane mind before God, one that remains ever connected to Him. One that recognises that without Him I am nothing and that all I do is only possible through Him.

What these events continue to do is expose my own heart to me, which is another crucial element about the teachings of Christ that cannot be overlooked especially in the craze of ‘what does it mean to me’. It is just more obvious than ever that rather than make the bible fit my world I need to fit the world that the Bible is painting and ask myself how do I fit here. How do I fit in what God wants from His children? What becomes ever more evident and all the more harder to live up to is that this is a theocentric business and God does what He does for His glory and to be a part of that is a privilege in itself. The sooner I get that in my system, the sooner I feel liberated to enjoy the part I play in God’s orchestral symphony classic.

Right. Now back to those assignments.

For His Name's Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Role of the Teacher and Praise Perspectives

Just to say how happy I am and honoured to have made it to 200 posts this year before the last quarter begins. I am really grateful to God for getting the level of consistency to this level.

I’ve been rather poorly lately, but have battled on despite everything to carry on with things like work, family and being an usher at the wedding of a dear friend. As ever, however, tonight has been the teacher training session and it has proven again to be a source of much thought and contemplation. Indeed after it I felt somewhat refreshed by the experience and in the context of the day I’ve had today from it I came out with two outstanding thoughts.

The first was on the topic of the role of the teacher. Is teaching a lonely vocation? In the light of the micro-teach and being able to see how our tutor did what happened it got me thinking about what the role of the teacher really is. There is the assumption that the teacher is the fount of all knowledge in a given area and all must bow and learn from them. I don’t think that’s the case and so I believe there must be an alternative,

I believe Jesus lives out that alternative. It is a testament to His impact that He has been able to get people to remember His teachings and endeavour to live them out and pass them along as they do so. This is so much the case that we have gospel accounts where He has not written a word of it yet He speaks resonantly clear for all to read and hear, see and learn from.

So I’m thinking that the measure of a good teacher is not the wealth of their information base, or their charismatic personality and beguiling communication style. There has to be more to it. There has to be an element of authenticity and challenge in that which is taught and the nature with which it is taught that engages the learner to actually take on board the material and allow their lives to be shaped by it. So much so that when the teaching is transferred from the teacher to the learner and then the learner becomes teacher and looks to replicate the process in their own personal style.

The second thought was about the importance of the perspective of praise. I was encouraging a friend in a text sharing that I had prayed for wisdom, peace and clarity in the situation. What it reminded me of is that our first place is not to consider what we have to do, but what God has already done. It really was a balm to my own recent health challenges triggered by self-imposed pressure by the things I have assumed and feel I should do. I’ve had good words of counsel to pace myself and to ensure I do not to put myself through the mill. All of these were sound words of guidance for me leading to this reminder.

As I pondered further I looked at how God made the garden and then set the man in it and then told him what to do in it. Especially in the context of Genesis 2 it is clear that all the fruit in the garden is for man to enjoy. That is to say the work it/keep it deal, is in the light of what has already been done for him. So man does what he does in the light of what has been done for Him.

When I consider what has been done for me in God creating me, Jesus dying for me and the Holy Spirit making me alive again. When I consider the provisions made for me in relational, physical, financial, intellectual and spiritual issues it shows how great God is and what great things He has done. It is on that premise of praise that I go forward in doing what I am called to do with much joy, not in the light of apparently averse circumstances, but in the light of God’s promise, presence and power.

For His Name's Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Making A Right Pig's Ear Of The Matter

I have never had bacon in my life, but I was thinking this evening just how sad it is that the pig has been attributed with so many negative traits. Sweating like the pig, a room in disarray is said to resemble a pigsty and a man returning to revel in some bad thing is meant to be like a pig in muck. Then of course George Orwell makes matters worse by allowing the pigs in Animal Farm be the sort to seek a better equal status than their counterparts. Indeed as you may have noticed from the title of this blog entry when we’ve made an error we are told we’ve made a right pig’s ear of that encounter. What has the pigs ever done to deserve it, I wonder?

Well I’m sure one episode in the Bible that doesn’t help the pig’s lot is that episode of Jesus with the Legion. Yet it is here that I want to dwell to make a point. So as the scripture goes there is a man who has been a menace to society and to himself. His ravings and lunatic activities have meant that people have tried to lock him up naked among the dead people. That was the way the city tried to deal with the problem, because they could not deal with it they tried to contain and keep it from public view. Jesus obviously pops on the scene and spoils everything through challenging the demon possession and then giving them permission to go in a herd of swine. Then the remarkable scene of the entire herd doing a Benny Hill all the way off the cliff to their sad demise at the bottom of the deep blue sea (alright it was a lake, but you get the point).

What happens next is a remarkable insight into how people cannot take someone upsetting the status quo even by removing that which has made an individual a menace to society. The man formerly crazed by demons is now sitting sane, coherent and ready to engage in society. Rather than embrace Jesus and call Him the miracle-worker, they are afraid of the fella and tell him to get out of the place. When the former loony wants to follow Jesus he’s told to go home and share God’s good work.

Sometimes I’m not sure if society and the church are made up for healing and restoration. Sometimes our mind-sets and cultural institutions are built to maintain negative situations as opposed to seek ways of healing them. It’s a bit like the war thing – it’s actually in the best interests of the military to keep a status that keeps them in business – i.e. one of a need for security and protection. So actual peacemaking schemes are dangerous because they would upset the way the economy is based. On the individual level I’m not sure if people are geared to desperately seek for peace, deliverance and healing. Sure there have been many disappointed by unanswered prayer and perhaps bitter at the lack of the miraculous. This should not make us hard to that glimmer of hope by faith of Christ doing the same with those wracked and bound with various issues as he did to the victim of Legion. Even as a witness to tell others of the life restoring power of Christ, we should hope and pray with that regard.

My faith journey has only given brief glimpses of what could happen, but I work in an environment about the neglected and misunderstood by society, many of whom are deeply wracked with issues that could keep them bound or send them loopy. It would be easy to cast them aside and try to contain them and keep them under wraps. The compassion of Christ compels me, sometimes against myself, to look out for them all the more. Pray for them and believe the miraculous can take place. Whilst I wait on that there are still things I can do to highlight the hope we have in this miracle worker and move to see them where he is. In the meantime are we ready for the mad and bad to be released and delivered and embrace God’s grace in action like this? Dear Lord make us ready.

For His Name's Sake

Shalom

dmcd

Re-Evaluations

Today (Thursday) I came across a valuable lesson of God in appreciating things from a different perspective – through re-evaluations.

My dear friend Steve Wood is a Liverpool fan. You will be aware that I too support Liverpool, but this brother really does worship Liverpool Football Club. I am but an amateur in comparison to what this brother does. I got to catch up with him for the first time in a fair few weeks. He gave his refreshingly optimistic opinion that Liverpool are still up for winning the league. His rationale was fair – apparently if you look at the run-ins to the end of the last three seasons Liverpool have done better than Manchester United. Indeed over the calendar year 2008 Liverpool accumulated more points than Manchester United and where they let themselves down was in having such a shocking middle of the season that by the end we were just too far away. Now we are still within touching distance of the Red Devils and are yet to play them at Old Trafford and so if we were to follow the pattern of the last few years then winning the top trophy is not beyond us.

Now that’s Steve’s view of which he is certain and that is what makes me love the guy – that sense of certainty. I remain to be convinced myself and as I’ve shared elsewhere I am of the opinion that the trophy won’t be leaving the cabinet room of the Theatre of Dreams.

Having said that I’m still not convinced that Stoke City will stay in the Premier League but I have heard two decent comments which have suggested that with their decent home form and the fact that they have played the tough sides they have a great run-in that could see them stay up. So the ideal situation for all parties concerned is for the Reds to clinch the top trophy and for Stoke City to somehow miraculously stay up.

I am putting it on record that if Tony Pulis manages to keep the side in the Premier League he should get Manager of the Year. Don’t get me wrong, I think Stoke City play the ugliest football in the top division and would find it fitting that they return to the Championship from an aesthetic perspective. I appreciate the fact, however, that for the sake of regeneration in the city and general morale it is in the best interests of all for the club to stay in the Premier League. There again I was reminded then of other views of looking at thins that can better inform the way that I look at things.

Then the conversation with my dear friend Steve touched on the achievement of David Beckham in equalling Bobby Moore’s outfield record caps for England. I am not a Beckham fan and feel he’s overrated to the extent that I felt it was an indictment on English football that the brother has got so many caps. Steve and then another top bloke Steve Bailey chipped in to suggest that actually Beckham could only make it if there was something there. It is true that he is a hard worker and I conceded that there is something for marketing people to put their hat on and there is good reason why he has played for Manchester United, Real Madrid and now AC Milan arguably the three biggest teams in Europe (although I’m sure Juventus, Barcelona and Bayern Munich would want a say in that).

Although I maintained my difference of opinion it did make me think. At the end of the day it’s not Beckham’s fault that he’s come about in this time in history. He has created a lot of seminal moments in English football history over the last ten years. It is not Beckham’s fault that no other English right-sided midfielder has been able to make a case to be in the side. It is not Beckham’s fault that no other England player over those 10 years has impacted football with his style of play like Beckham. The brother has worked hard and got his results. It’s like the Madonna factor – it’s not natural talent, flair or gifting, it is about making the most of what you have and putting it to good effect to the appeal of those who look on. I cannot begrudge a brother that.

On further contemplation and reflection I do not begrudge him that. I congratulate him on his significant achievement – good for him. So what that proved was that the measure by which we assess things and people has to be carefully considered because it maybe a case that for this season and in this time particular players rise to the top. It does not have to mean they are the best in the world or the best ever, but credit where it’s due. That again allowed me to be careful how I perceive things.

The final episode that reinforced this was a training session in which I participated this evening. It was looking at mental health and engaged in wits definition, its mentors and where it has grown. That required quite a number of difficult terms and potentially long-winded explanations. Thankfully people engaged with the session to prevent it becoming too tedious.

Yet I have to confess that I found the session somewhat boring and mundane – there was something about the presentation material that was not engaging and the content itself, although highly informative, was just dull and far too wordy. (Yeah, you read that right, Mr. Wordsmith who was born with a dictionary in his mouth and a thesaurus in his ear found something with too many words.) Usually such an experience would leave me rather cheesed off at a waste of an evening.

As I walked home, though, reflecting on it I heard God point out that walking with Him is not about doing everything that’s glitz and glamour and razzmatazz. God is not only found in the exciting and the thrilling. Just because it’s loud and bouncy does not mean it is straight from above. It is in the mundane and routine that God can speak and as followers of Him we need to look for Him there. Even in that which appears mundane and boring I must look for God’s presence there and rejoice in it so that I can see life in something that on the face of things appears lifeless.

God was at the training session – there was a lot that I was not aware of like an accurate definition of schizophrenia. It also highlighted how relative the issue of mental health is and how based it is on political and social trends. It also highlighted the anthropocentric nature of mentoring and the mental health care situation which promotes a level of relativism that is subtle but dangerous when left unchecked bringing to the fore again some of the reservations I have about the modern trend towards the therapeutic as the answer for all ills. It then challenges me to find the godly alternative – indeed the original way designed by the Heavenly Father by which we can find and relish wholeness in body, mind and spirit and how communally we can express that through the community of grace.

All of which re-emphasises again how important it is to see things from a different perspective so that we can get the depth and richness from something that we would have missed out on had we left it to our own stuck-up, prejudicial ways. Thank God for the light. Thank God for hard-working men. Thank God for shining even to make the boring and mundane the source of the profound by His Presence.

For His Name's Sake
Shalom
dmcd

To Hell With Hell

Don’t know if I’ve talked about hell before, and this is not going to be an explanation of what it is and it isn’t. This entry comes about though, as I am reliably informed that people seem to think that their existence here on earth is hell. I can sympathise to a degree with their plight. A lot of people around the world are living in varying degrees of hardship, persecution, torture, suffering and torment that few would be able to cope with. For all that though, I still think this is a cheap view of hell, even as we have a pretty cheap view of heaven as our mortal finite concepts and imaginations only give brief glimpses and hints as to what beauty awaits us should we be found in Christ on His return.

In any case, for all the misery that people are enduring to different extents in different contexts I get the impression that the role of a peacemaker (part of the deal of those who follow Christ) is to bridge the gap between the perception of their hellish existence and a path of seeing it from a godly perspective which doesn’t always alleviate the physical circumstances necessarily but allows the spirit of love, joy, peace and righteousness to inform the view of that circumstance. In this way it’s the chance to see the answer to the prayer of the heavenly kingdom seen on earth as we replace the person’s sense of hell with our best Spirit-driven efforts to announce and reveal heaven on earth. So to hell with the hell that people endure and let the righteousness, beauty and joy of the presence of Christ pervade the lives of those to whom we come in contact through our word and witness. That means it’s as much a glass of water, a listening ear and relief of pain as it is the proclamation of God’s love expressed in Christ’s sacrifice.

Now let me get this clear. My heart does break at hearing the kind of things people have to go through and the lack of love, respect and basic necessities people endure through, but it’s very true to me that while there’s life there is a glimmer of hope in that situation. That is why it’s not hell to me. Also when I note how some cultures and communities rise above their plight and are able to carry on and persevere through the trials – check those who went through slavery – then there’s no reason to accept the status quo. Real hell would be not even having that opportunity or glimmer to see things from God’s perspective. Real hell would be never having a chance to see that brighter future in Christ. Real hell would be eternity without God.

This though also runs into the issue about what heaven is like and the arguments that people put to me as to why it would be boring ig everything was perfect and how we need the evil to appreciate the good. I’ve never found these arguments to be particularly convincing. Sure if I never had a problem I wouldn’t know God could solve them, but that’s only because I wouldn’t need God to solve them and presumably our relationship would revert to how it was with Adam and God pre-Fall and what Jesus indicates in His time on earth. I so want to open up people to the fact that we were not meant to be this way, and this way is not going to stay with us forever. There’s got to be something in a perspective on perfection that helps us realise ourselves and just how hard the discrepancy is. I believe that is available in and only through Christ.

I also think this informs us as to the whole issue of living this life to see the kingdom come but also living in the light of the fact that this is not our resting place, this is not our abiding home, but there is one to come and we so want to see it and invite others to live today in the light of that eternity.

For His Name's Sake
Shalom
da man cd

Alright God I'll Do The Dishes

So it’s almost 23:00 and I’ve come home from a brilliant Men’s Meeting to find the bedroom in a state of repair as laminate flooring is being put down. Then I get to the kitchen to see a wonderful array of crockery awaiting a man’s touch to bring order in chaos. Then in looking for me two bakewell tarts and two apple pies I discover that one of the bakewell tarts has disappeared and know it's new home.

As I survey the wondrous scene of blissful domesticity I go to grumble when I get a thought. The thought is of God asking who do I think clears up the mess of my sins and I say grudgingly that He does. Then He cajoles me to answer the question properly before which I point out to the Almighty Creator that it’s one thing to deal with the sins of the world, it’s another thing coming home from a long and tiring day to realise you can’t feel comfortable in your own bedroom neither will you be able to get to sleep without sorting out the mountain of plates and assorted other crockery that will need to be sorted tonight as I’m out and about early tomorrow.

At this list of overwhelming evidence the Lord again points to the cross and my stubborn, sulking child is replaced with a knowing gratitude and humility at the pain that my Saviour endured without a word of complaint. I consider the stripes by which I’m healed; I consider His crushing for my evil-doing and sin-nature. I reflect on the wondrous cross and resolve that I reckon I will do the dishes, have me dinner (yeah my eating patterns are almost as wacky as I am) then retire to the bedroom and give thanks for Calvary before getting the sleep that He’ll bountifully supply and should He see fit I’ll get to start another wonderful adventure with Him all over again.

Having said that, if you do have another bakewell tart, Father, you know it will find a good home in me tummy.

For His Name's Sake
Shalom
da man cd