Lenten repentance

Typewriter (Photo credit: mikeymckay)

When I was a young boy, my parents taught me how to type on a typewriter, an old, heavy and cold type-writer. I remember very vividly that the first lesson they taught me was to constantly type the letter “a” and the letter “s”, which on that board would correspond to the two letters at opposite ends of the middle row. The keys were very hard to type and each letter was separated enough for my young thin fingers to slip in and cause me deep pain. After several hundreds of attempts, I gained certain dominion on typing “a” and “s” in a quick way and avoiding the fingers sliding along the keys. I learnt two valuable lessons that day. First, that learning to type with an electrical type-writer is less painful than a mechanical one (I shifted to the electric one some years later) and second, that dominion takes practise sometimes.

I share this story with you because with Lent, I find it a little bit like my typing lessons: it can be painful, it does not take one day certainly and acquisition of good skills takes time, a lot of time. I have recently kept away from posting anything on this blog primarily due to my hectic schedule and also, because I wanted to enjoy Lent as best I could during the busyness of my life.  Yet, I wanted to share with you a bit of what God has been teaching in me. I hope you find it helpful.

As you may have guessed from previous posts, I enjoy practicing and living a liturgical year.  Reliving the ministry of Christ, his passing from this earth and his life in general helps me gain some perspective and reality in my life. These events force me to wonder what it might have been having him around us in a bodily presence.

What I have been learning during Lent was nothing ground-breaking or new for you or for me but rather a reminder yet again of coming back to God.

“Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!” Mark 1:15 (taken from the New Living Translation 2007)

Lent is commenced by the reading of this passage on Ash Wednesday  and I think of it as an exciting passage that allows me to look inwardly, in retrospect and check how I am doing in my daily walking with God.

Once again, when I did this check-up, I didn’t like what I saw. I wasn’t doing as good as I thought. In looking at the sin beneath the sin, I saw that the idol that had dethroned God in my life was the idol of Approval.

I realised that  in order to be approved by my community, by my co-workers and my family, I would do “religious things” like writing homilies, or  doing a 15-day fasting.

I understood during the lenten season that I had to repent from this. I had to get back to the basis of why to do those things in the first place. Fasting without God is not fasting, but a lame diet or simply legalism. Homilies that do not praise and focus on God are nothing but the  empty words of an eloquent charlatan.

I recently heard a girl saying  that “recognising my sin is humbling because we acknowledge that  God is the only one who can  work on that sin.”

I read this interesting book by World Harvest ministries called “Gospel Centered Life”. This book suggested investigating your sin in the following steps:

1. Identify the sin that is on the surface.

2. Prayerfully consider what is the sin beneath the sin; that is, the root of the sin that is on the surface.

3.Worship Jesus for his victory over this sin.

4.Look up clear promises that you can rely on in order to defeat this sin.

I would add “Mark 1:15″ in between steps 2 and 3.

Focusing on Jesus in the Gospels has helped me see where my surface sin was. A friend of mine recently said that the Good News is not “good” unless we find ourselves in the story. And I think this is absolutely true. If we are unable to find ourselves in the redemptive story of Jesus, the story that we’re about to celebrate at Easter, then the Good News is not good, and I would even say it’s not even news for us. We’d become indifferent to the Truth.

So it is true that we are not perfect but there is beauty in that. Brennan Manning says that “All is Grace” and I find it quite true. If we look at ourselves, we may find nasty things that we’re not proud of or even able to change but in God’s Grace, we ought to find ourselves. We ought to look at Jesus and see where we stand. Some would find that they’re in front of the cross, looking at it and not willing to fully grasp what it entails, that Jesus died and resurrected for us. Some others would stand gladly behind it knowing exactly what is to come for those who wait in Him. I think it is a game of looking at our past, by holding it accountable in our present and looking with hope to our future.

“Our task in the present …is to live as resurrection people in between Easter  and the final day, with our Christian life, corporate and individual, in both worship and mission, as a sign of the first and a foretaste of the second.” (taken from N.T.Wright‘s Surprised by Hope, page 30)

That’s precisely our task on earth. A life filled with the Spirit should reflect this lifestyle that Wright describes. To me this Lent has been a refreshment to my soul in that while I’m not where I wanted to be with God, I know where I am and where I am going. To my mind, that’s the purpose of Lent.

My prayer for you is that you gain your identity in Christ wherever you are and accept with dignity and maturity the flaws that you bring to the cross.

Abba’s Kid

The Staff Syndrome

Psalm 23 (Photo credit: lipjin)

Some time ago, my theologian friend, Garrick Roegner, and I had a very interesting conversation related to his studies, in which we talked about the direction of the universal Christian Church, along with it’s buildings and denominations, was moving to.  In our experience we found out that big churches are needing small cells, or community within it to actually grow. It is as if the big gathering on Sundays no longer resound on the hearts of people simply because there are so many people sometimes that it does not reach the individual. One of the reasons why we concluded that this is so was because the leading teams of the churches do not delegate, they do not fire up the individual with action. In other words, you get the big church with the “important” people in it; namely, pastors, priests, elders and so on. These big people  have all the responsibility to make the Sunday service a nice show in which people come, see, get something (whether bad or good) and they’re off with their lives. Now, the reality is that small groups or small communities are  being the platforms for the lay people, for the church-goer to take ownership of their faith, to get moving and to reach others. The way I see it is as if these platforms are the easy way of rounding the problem; the problem being  the Staff Syndrome. People in the official positions through time, they become big. Put differently, God gives them responsibility and after some time on it, they believe they are God. Now, this is not new, or some kind of sickness that people in the churches are suffering from as if we were talking about the flu. If we look at the Bible, we see that happening from the very beginning. Adam was given the responsibility to name things (Gen.2:19-20), eventually, temptation came and he thought of himself as some sort of a god.   My favourite instance is the life of Moses, probably because it is the most explicit one. The people of Israel is going into exile and they need water, Moses asks God who tells him to talk to this rock to draw water out of the rock. The following verse gathers the whole action of the “staff syndrome”: “Then Moses raised his hand and struck the rock twice with the staff, and water gushed out. So the entire community and their livestock drank their fill.” Numbers 20:11 (taken from New Living Translation). Moses decided to go ahead and overuse his responsibility and authority that God had given to him. The consequences of his actions caused him to not be able to arrive in the promised land.  In other words, instead of doing what God said, he chose to do what he best thought . Then in the New Testament, we can see how Jesus’ apostles behave as if they were more important when people bring children to Jesus. “The disciples spoke sternly to those who brought them” Matthew 19:13 (taken from NRS with Apocrypha). The staff syndrome also involves the attitude of judging and forgiving. After many  years “in charge”, one in a position of leadership falls into the patterns of feeling the right to judge others,  for supposedly “they have invested so much in the church and people still make the same mistakes”.  This is the legalistic way of approaching forgiveness: if I can do it, then  others must do it too, so when they fail to be like me, then I can’t forgive them.

Humility and reality checks are required to avoid the staff syndrome. However many years a person has been working for God, one is not any better  than the least of the people in the pews.   To my mind realizing that you are not actually worthy to even imagine being better than others is a matter of knowing who you are at the sight of God. To the eyes of God, ministers are as equally messed up as the people they minister to. Yet he is great enough to even want to partner with us for his master plans. It is through the brokenness of heart that one can achieve being in ministry for so long without holding on to the staff as if their own. A good example of this can also be found in the Scriptures. John the Baptist, Mary, and Paul are great instances of losing oneself for God and accepting the brokenness that comes with it. If you’re in a position of responsibility to serve the Lord, I pray that you keep in mind the staff syndrome and the Holy Spirit teach you how to avoid it. “Unfortunately, in the church today titles often are used to evoke status and position, while the leaders bearing these titles fail to inspire genuine respect.”B. Courtney McBath (taken from  http://www.charismamag.com/spirit/church-ministry/811-why-so-many-titles1) Abba’s Kid

An angel among the multitude

Crop of original painting “Anbetung der Hirten” (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 ”And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!” When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us.”  So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child;  and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them.  But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart.  The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.”

Luke 2:13-20 (taken from NRS w/ Apocrypha)

 When I was 16, I went with my mum and dad to a county show, that’s a county fair in the US where there are cattle, normally exhibitions of animals and stuff like that. I was very impressed because, though I had been to things like that before elsewhere, I wondered how cool life in the countryside would be. “Life in the country must be so peaceful and lovely” I think I said. “Nah, my dad said. It’s all cow poop and hard labor.” Indeed it is hard labor!

 But what really disenchanted me was that nothing really important would ever happen in a place like that. There’s nobody else you can gossip about or interesting museums to visit… So I have been thinking this year (after 25 years of listening to the same Christmas story every single year), that it must have been absolutely crazy for a bunch of shepherds to actually see an angel. I mean, I would flip out if I were them. People whose highest experience in life is that their sheep have some lambs, or having some mundane affairs, get to see an angel.

 I always found that quite normal. However, that very fact is astonishing and then, not only they get to see that but they are told that all they have been waiting for has finally come. Their parents have been waiting for it, their grandparents have also been waiting for it and many many generations before them… and they get to see it. What a privilege!

 No wonder we can read in verse 20 that they returned “glorifying and praising God for all they have heard and seen”. I think I am starting to understand the amazement of Christmas and the privilege that it is in my life as I get to live on this side of history in which he came, died and rose again for me.  I feel like joining those shepherds, who in their humility and simplicity got to say: “I saw my Saviour”

 Merry Christmas,

  Abba‘s Kid

Expecting what’s already come

    Waiting (Photo credit: Image Zen)

I recently watched an interview of Marlon Fitzgerald Hall in which he says that he waits not for Jesus but for the people he came to serve. That made me think of the advent season and it brought me back to when my wife and I were waiting for our son to be born. We didn’t know when it would be, we didn’t know how the delivery would be let alone, what he would really look like… The excitement and expectation made me anxious. I wanted him to come as soon as possible, in the best way possible, and as painlessly as it could possibly be. Marlon gets it right. When Advent comes in the calendar, I don’t wait for an unknown saviour who I cannot relate to yet but rather, the good, loving friend who loves me  so much that he died for me and challenges me to do the same for others.

That’s the expectation I can experience. My expectation is that which leads me to an excited action into helping others, into bringing Jesus to others; that he was born and will come again. In this reality I want to live in constant advental mood. My expectation should move me to the action of reaching others for the sake of his love for us  through the sure hope that he will come again  and that would most likely leave me in a position of full intimacy with the one who was, is and is to come.

“Remember, Advent is always – until the end of days” Richard Rohr on PREPARING FOR CHRISTMAS.

The King of kings

I recently came across with this passage in Scripture in my church and I thought it would be good to reflect on them prior the new season of advent:

“33 Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” 34 Jesus answered, “Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?” 35 Pilate replied, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” 36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” 37 Pilate asked him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”  John 18:33:37 (taken from NRS with Apocrypha version)

I find this passage very significant before Advent and Christmas and all the festivity that is to come because it really reminds us what to my mind is an important aspect of Christology: that Jesus Christ is a king.

The first thought that pops into my mind is linked to the question Pilate asks Jesus: Are you the kings of the Jews? Clearly, different sections of the Jewish population of the time would expect the Messiah to be different from the other section. For some he would be a warrior coming from the high priests; others would expect him in a rather sci-fi view. None of them would remotely expect Jesus to be who he was. “Are you the King of the Jews?”… I ponder on this question and I wonder if we see him as the King of the Jews. I mean, I personally see Jesus as a friend, my personal saviour, a role model, my hero, my god but hardly ever as a king, let alone the King of the Jews. Surely we hear on Sundays that he is the king of the Jews, the King of kings, the king of the Earth, the king of the Church, and even the King of the Institutional Church. He has sovereignty above all.

Yet, he says in verse 36 that his kingdom is not from this world.  I often wonder what Jesus meant by that statement other than the literal meaning. Right at that point of  trial, he is not the king of this world as he hadn’t conquered death and sin just yet. However, when I read his answer slowly, I feel convicted in my heart and start questioning if he is truly the king of this world, if he is truly the King of MY world, my heart,my life? Is Jesus the king of your world?

So I think and think and come to the conclusion that if it is on my own account, that is, if I consciously  and utterly believe that He is my king, then yes. Unfortunately, I fall into the discordance of thinking that I tend to give more credit to the burden of my sin, or my rebellion.In other words, I fail to see him in my life and then what? is he not the king?… Whenever I dwell in my guilt alone, I become a Judas, where hope, and restoration do not come to me. In those times, I let the king of lies, the usurper take over my soul. But that’s not who God is. I have already said that if I declare with my heart and my mouth that Jesus is Lord and has been raised up from the dead, then I am saved, then I can confidently say that HE IS MY KING!! Satan has no power over me nor does he of Jesus being a king.  Accepting who he is in my life and accepting who I am (a total wreck),  makes me like king David, messed up to the bone but restored by his grace. His kingship is not about me but about him; my life is not about me but about him.

In 1995, Jessica a sweet 7-year-old girl from southern Spain, had another brain seizure that caused her high temperature and put her parents’ faith to the test once more. When the temperature had gone Encarni, her mum recalls her saying “Mama, I’ve seen Jesus. He was seated on a throne, with a golden crown and golden rings and he was telling me: “Jessica, I’m with you, do not fear” For an Evangelical family from the south of Spain, seeing Jesus in pictures was not normal and very likely, Jessica had never seen a picture of the western guy we normally paint on pictures with crowns and golden stuff. The chances for her to have seen this in real life were very low. From that day on, Jessica has had the privilege of seeing Jesus as that crowned man who would call her name in that “dream when she was very poorly”.

Jesus calls us today to be welcomed in our hearts as our King and ruler; then we can hear his voice, a voice of love and mercy and we know this because Jesus is Lord and he is Love and he is the Truth and “those who are on the side of truth listen to my voice” John 18:37. Like sheep to the shepherd so we hear our Abba’s voice. Let us rejoice in believing Jesus is the King.

My prayer for you today is that you can admire Jesus as a king and that you make him king of your life.

Abba’s King

Diversity in the body

“ Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 19 If all were a single member, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many members, yet one body. 21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” 22 On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; 24 whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, 25 that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another.” 1 Corinthians 12:14-25(taken from the NRS with Apocrypha version)

Prior to this part,  St. Paul explains to the church of Corinth that the gospel is supposed to reach Gentiles, that is pagans as well as the Jews albeit not in the same order( Jews first, then Gentiles). However, when reading this part above, it always reminds me of my role in Jesus’ church, in Jesus’ body. Yes, we are all the body of Christ but each part has a function, doesn’t it?

In any good classic fairy tale, each character has a specific  role in the plot, a function. Such is the importance of their roles that Russian professor Vladimir Propp came up with a list of functions within Russian folktales proving the relevance of each role. The list has 31 functions out of which it had to be followed in that specific order, or so it seemed.  Like tales, we too have some functions. Our roles are designed for a purpose, so when I read 1 Corinthians 14 onward, I cannot but think the role that we all have in the body of Christ.

“It’s like the body”, Paul says, “one can not expect the eye to be the whole because it is not the body but part of it; nor can we expect the ear to consider itself the whole body.” Yet all of our organs form the body, however different they may be.

Of course, my purpose is not more important than yours.  Paul says in verse 22 that the weaker is  indispensable. Back in 1993, I was given a book on bees for a school project. I learned then that there was a queen bee, a drone and a worker bee. I couldn’t quite get what was the point of a worker. I mean, they get all the hard work and all for the service of the queen really. So I asked my father, “Dad, why do workers exist, I mean, why are they not queens?” My father’s answer was, “Well, that’s what they do, they work. That’s what they’re there for.” If I had to choose, I would probably pick the drone but the truth is, our roles are given in accordance to our abilities. God gives us gifts so that we can be part of his plans and our gifts are indispensable, however poor, low, or useless they may seem. You may not be the brain but you may be the eyes, or mouth, or even the pinky nail. The freedom comes in our choice to accept our role no matter how irrelevant it may seem to us. What is my role in the body of Christ? What is your role in the body of Christ?

As I said before, prior to the former passage, St. Paul says that in the Spirit “we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit” (verse 13) For Paul, there were Gentiles and Jews, freemen vs. slaves which in our days would be like Catholics and Protestants, clergy and lay people.  I think these big names of our society are equal to gentiles and Jews, or free person and slave. At the same time, it is alright if you are not a pastor or an elder, a bishop or a  deacon; you can still execute a role within the body of Christ. God longs for your part in his body. He wants us to use our gifts in its full whatever that may be look like.  As Christians we ought to forget surnames (like Catholic, or Anglican, or Methodist…) or job positions (elder, pastor, priest, missionary) and really take up the responsibility of what we are called to do as the body of Christ. It is time for us to let the glory of Jesus’ body to boldly glow through us.

To achieve that, perhaps we  need to ask ourselves the question I raised before; what’s our role in the body of Christ: Where am I needed? Where and how can I give out my God-given gift? Where can the Holy Spirit use me? How can I show a gospel of life and freedom? In my mind I simply want to be a worker but in my heart I tend to act like the “king” bee. What kind of bee are you? And why or why not are you happy with the role you have been given? I don’t care what denomination you are or how “Christian” is your lineage. I want you to be part of Jesus’ body and find enjoyment in it.

My prayer for you today is that you find your role in his plans and enjoy being part of the body of Christ.

Abba’s Kid

Shame

 

As I said before, I’m coming back with a topic recently mentioned in my posts: shame.  On this occasion, I would like to talk a little bit more about it and its significance as opposed to finding God’s love in our lives.   In other words, what is shame replacing in our hearts?

The way I see it, shame is one of the biggest problems of humankind in the 21^st Century.  I can’t think of anyone who is actually free from shame issues in their own life.  We all have problems dealing with shame because to my mind, shame is highly connected to our self worth and how we see ourselves.

Shame affects us differently in different areas of our being. Some people find shame in their physicality; that is, there is something about them physically that they don’t quite like, or they feel worthless because of that physical condition.  Some weeks ago, I was watching TV and found an interesting show called  Embarrassing Bodies. Basically, people who have some sort of complex come to this team of doctors that helps them sort that problem out.  The problems are primarily physical, and the majority of the cases are resolved through a surgical intervention.  I particularly liked the case of the lady who suffered from varicose veins, and her shame was such that she even had gone to a tattoo artist to cover the veins on her leg that she was so ashamed of. The truth is that she was extremely beautiful, and without considering the pain that it may have caused her, they were not as “awful” as she thought them to be.  Eventually the doctors directed her to a surgeon who removed the varicose veins and she felt “restored” again.  I’m personally glad that science is bringing restoration to people’s problems.  Unfortunately, the shame that comes from physical discontentment is normally derived from some sort of shame inside us.

I’ve never been good at sports. In fact, I was very bad at it. Any sports I would try, I would suck at. In my life, I’ve practiced taekwondo, swimming, boxing, kendo, aikido, archery, football, scuba-diving, etc. I did taekwondo the longest. I practiced it for over 8 years and I remember how shame came to me through my performance.

There was this time when our “dojo” – or whatever you call a taekwondo school- performed an exhibition/friendly competition among ourselves for the families of the people who were in the school. When it came to one-to-one fight, I got very anxious.  When I feel exposed and I don’t wear my glasses, I’m absolutely out of my comfort zone. So my performance resulted in a massive defeat. After that fight, we returned to our respective families to go home. When I got to my father, feeling ashamed for having lost, I embraced him so hard to avoid shedding tears. To my dismay, my father said “Why didn’t you fight back? You don’t know how to fight!” The tone of his discontent was of utter despise. That experience of rejection from my own father was infinitely harder than having lost the fight. I say this with no trace of reproach or anger.

When I tried football, or as the Americans say, “soccer,” I experienced another contribution to my shame. One day, I fell down on the ground in the middle of the field that was made of concrete. The shame of being fat and falling down was so that for whatever reason I couldn’t get up. I could see my mum standing close to the entrance looking at me with what seemed to me like embarrassment. The pain of my heart was worse than the pain on my knee, which was bleeding through the ripped tracksuit.

These two instances bear both physical and emotional shame. The physical shame wore off eventually, but the inner shame I have carried for so long.  I think that emotional shame can be worse than any physical “flaw,” because for better or for worse our bodies change, and in that change, the shame can also vanish. Emotional shame, on the other hand stays longer unless we start a process of healing within us.

I had carried that load of shame on my shoulders for years because deep down, I felt that I was not loved my parents, appreciated by any friend, wanted by any employer, desired by any woman. I was seeking love in places that could reject me, and in fact, they did. I felt let down by so many people because, truthfully speaking, I was putting my trust, my love, my heart on them. The bottom line is, love is what my heart was crying out for, louder and louder through many years, and I knew in my head already that God was to fill that void of my heart.

However, for many years my feelings didn’t match my mind until one day it finally clicked in me. I felt God telling me: “You are my beloved son (John 17:23), the one in whom I delight (Psalm 139:14). I love you just as you are, with your imperfections, your clumsiness, your mistakes, and your sins. I take you as you are right now and I embrace you with tender love and care. You are one of my sheep, and I let you rest under the shadow of my wings (Psalm 63:7).” This brought comfort to my heart in the knowledge of my worth being in Christ and my love is God, my Abba. I am Abba’s kid, and I need nothing more.

Shame comes to govern our souls and it becomes this heavy, seemingly never-going-away chain that convinces us of the filth that we are, the tremendous disappointment that our lives are to others, the ridicule that we are and the feeling of unwantedness in our hearts. A child in a car listening to his mother’s cry:  ”You’re so bad…no one will ever love you”; a teenage girl who gets picked on in class because her looks are not as they “should be”; a parent who ignores his/her kids keeping them away from their life or vice versa; unloved wounds could last for so many, many years… But God’s love is never ending, never fallen short, always satisfying, always filling, always seeking your heart, always there; even when we don’t feel it.

My prayer for you is that shame goes away from your heart to be replaced fully by the love of God in the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen

Abba’s Kid

“2 Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, 3 who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, 4 who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, 5 who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s. 6 The LORD works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed.”  Psalm103:2-6 (taken from ESV)