Okay, its official ...

I decided my last day here in Colorado will be Wednesday, July 21st. And I'll be driving back to Champaign Thursday and Friday -- getting in town somewhere around dinner time on that Friday (July 23rd).

Okay ... people in Champaign, you can now start planning a party for that Friday :)

Bierstadt Lake

Hiked this morning to Bierstadt Lake (Rocky Mt Nat'l Park). It was a cloudy-and-drizzly kinda day ... but still beautiful. It was a little over a mile straight up to the lake, and then back down.

Thought I'd share a few snapshots with ya ...

LOVE and MISS you!! <3

Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire

I started reading yet another book : ) -- Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire by Jim Cymbala. It's a testimonial type book on the need for and power of prayer. It's a subject I wanted to learn more about, as prayer has been something that is mysterious in nature and confusing/awkward in practicality for me at times. I'm about .. mmm, halfway through, and really attached to 2 parts so far. I wanted to share these with you.

Prayer and Heaven
Among his touching stories, Jim points out that there has to be a heart of seeking God behind prayer. This seems obvious, but he takes it a step further than just praying because we want to hear from God about issues in our lives. He suggests praying sets up a deep connection between this world and the afterlife. A "sound-bite" from pg. 58 that I felt was very motivating in regards to prayer:

If we don't want to experience God's closeness here on Earth, why would we want to go to heaven anyway? He is the center of everything there. If we don't enjoy being in his presence here and now, then heaven would not be heaven for us. Why would he send anyone there who doesn't passionately long for him here on earth?

I'm not suggesting that we are justified by works of prayer or any other acts of devotion. I am not a legalist. But let us not dodge the issue of what heaven will be like: enjoying the presence of God, taking the time to love him, listening to him and giving him praise.

Asking In Faith
Jim shares story after story about miraculous requests that came to reality as he was building up his church, The Brooklyn Tabernacle, in New York City ... seemingly impossible finances coming in, huge revival, truly amazing conversion stories, and so on. He credits it all to prayer. Real, authentic prayer. Prayer that is valued much more than sermons, or singing, or programs. He pleads the case of going to Jesus in honest prayer; meeting with God, the only One powerful and loving enough to truly change lives.

I am well aware we don't get everything we ask for; we have to ask according to God's will. But let us not use the theological dodges to avoid the fact that we often go without things God wants us to have right now, today, because we fail to ask. Too seldom to we get honest enough to admit, 'Lord, I can't handle this alone. I've just hit the wall for the thirty-second time and I need you.'

The words of the old hymn ring true:

Oh, what peace we often forfeit,

Oh, what needless things we bear,

All because we do not carry

Everything to God in prayer.

God chose prayer as his channel of blessing. He has spread a table for us with every kind of wisdom, grace, and strength because he knows exactly what we need. But the only way we can get it is to pull up to the table and taste and see that the Lord is good. Pulling up to that table is called the prayer of faith (85).

This passage, although a little long, has just met me where I am this summer. For the past 5 weeks God has been talking to be about my lack of faith ... called Fear. Fear, that on some level (whether from fear of being disappointed, or past areas of hurt), has whispered to me that God just might not show up ... He could, but probably won't. Through literature, others here, and His Holy Spirit, I've slowly been experiencing the Freedom that comes through admitting that fear and praying right through it ...

She & Him

I've been listening to She & Him on repeat; something about driving through curvy roads in the mountains makes the music even sweeter to listen to : ) I LOVE their sound, and their style .... if you heard of them, check 'em out!

Zooey Deschanel (She) and M Ward (Him)

To Know You in Your Suffering

It is not a religious act that makes the Christian, but participation in the sufferings of God in the secular life. That is metanoia [repentance]: not in the first place thinking about one's own needs, problems, sins, and fears, but allowing one's self to be caught up into the way of Jesus Christ .... Pain is a holy angel ... Through him men have become greater than through all the joys of the world ... The pain of longing, which can often be felt physically, must be there, and we shall not and need not talk it away. But it needs to be overcome every time, and thus there is an even holier angel than the one of pain, that is the one of joy in God.

-- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison

Freedom: Finding the Right Limitations

I've been enjoying reading The Reason for God, Belief in an Age of Skepticism (Keller) slowly over the past few weeks. With each chapter Keller highlights a common argument non-believers bring up to disregard Christianity.

I just read Chapter 3 "Christianity Is a Straightjacket" -- the concept that Christianity supposedly limits our personal potential because it takes away our freedom to choose our own beliefs and practices.

In part of his argument, Keller states that "freedom is not the absence of limitations and constraints, but finding the right ones, those that fit our nature and liberate us."

To illustrate his point, he uses a fish. Because a fish gets its oxygen only from the water, it is only free when it is restricted and limited to the water. If we offer it land it has the freedom of choice of environment, but it will die ... freedom: finding liberation in restrictions that produce a great power of our abilities and a deeper joy.

Keller uses love as the "ultimate freedom" - recognizing that love is the environment that liberates us, but it does limit our personal options to experience it. For love relationships to be healthy, there has to be mutual loss of independence.

Here's where he gets to God:

At first sight, a relationship with God seems inherently dehumanizing. Surely it will have to be "one way," God's way. God, the divine being has all the power. I must adjust to God - there is no way then God could adjust to and serve me.

While this might be true in other forms of religion and belief it is not true in Christianity. In the most radical way, God has adjusted to us - in his incarnation and atonement. In Jesus Christ he became a limited human being, vulnerable to suffering and death. On the cross, he submitted to our condition - as sinners - and died in our place to forgive us. In the most profound way, God has said to us, in Christ, 'I will adjust to you. I will change for you. I will serve you though it means a sacrifice for me.' If he has done this for us, we can and should say the same to God and others .... Once you realize how Jesus changed for you and gave himself for you, you aren't afraid of giving up your freedom and therefore finding your freedom in him (50-51).

... Jesus, I do believe. Help my unbelief.

Solitude, and Rushing Water

Yesterday morning I got to spend a couple hours alone with God in Rocky Mountain National Park. It was quiet. It was refreshing. It was peaceful. It was snowy. It was a good space for me and God to talk.

I thought I'd share a couple snapshots with you so you can see what Bear Lake/Alberta Falls looked like...

-- absolutely no photo-editing, I promise! It's all God ... and my little Canon Power Shot :)

Really Believing I'm a New Creation

... well, trying to.

Colossians 3:10 "Put on your new nature and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator, and become more like him."

Does the stuff we like get in the way of the God we love?

Brooke and I are doing a workshop based off the blog posts from Jon Acuff on Stuff Christians Like (now also a book) ... mainly because we both find him hilarious, but also because his content makes excellent conversation-starters about how culture and Christianity intersect today ...both for good, and sometimes for not so good.

Not only can we laugh at posts like "How Metrosexual is Your Worship Leader" or "Booty, God, Booty" or "Hand Raising Worship - The 10 Styles" but it creates great discussions on healthy use of satire, or Consumer Christianity, or even how we pick churches. We have our second workshop coming up on Sunday night.

Discussions are great, but really ... what's the point? Well, if they get anything out of it we want people to grapple with one essential question, and to memorize 2 verses...

Does the stuff we like get in the way of the God we love?

Romans 12:1-2 So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

(hey, if you haven't already, check out stuffchristianslike.net)

address

addendum to the address; if you wanna send any of us mail out here use this address instead....

name
PO Box 20700
Estes Park, CO 80511