I know I’m maturing in my faith

when I expect spiritual growth from myself,

but I stop demanding it from others.

Maybe it’s because my sister is emotionally broken by the effects of chemotherapy and the reality of cancer.

Maybe it’s because my daughter has grown an inch since November.

Maybe it’s because I’ve recently watched the blogs of two relatively well-known Christian women go dark after their lives were devastated by divorce.

All I know is that some things don’t feel quite so important anymore.Things like platforms and networks and recognition.

I love to hang out with visionaries, people with big dreams and big faith and big ambition. Sometimes I think I’m one of those people. But lately, I’m embracing small.

I don’t want the dreamers to stop dreaming. I just think this is a pretty good dream: Living well. Growing children. Cultivating faith. None of it is easy. Most of it doesn’t come naturally.

But I’d rather have a small life that is beautiful than a big life that doesn’t work anymore. It’s not that I think the two are mutually exclusive, but I’m pretty sure anyone with a big life that works is there because they were faithful to spiritual cultivation when it was small.

The problem with visionaries is that sometimes their vision takes priority over their living well, and that won’t work forever. They may be left with a lot of vision but no one with whom they can share it.

Things that are important right now?

- family dinners

- memory verses

- hand holding

- game playing

- keeping promises

What’s on your important list right now?

I know there is some debate about the usefulness or redemptive qualities of Facebook, but I am personally a fan. However, I do have certain qualifications for my Facebook interactions that I thought might be useful to others. It isn’t a gold standard or anything, but it is the way I work it.

To me, Facebook, like any other website or communication medium, is a tool. And a tool can be used well or abused. A chainsaw, for instance, is best used for cutting firewood, although it has made a small name for itself in the roadside murder gig as well.

These are my Rules for Making Facebook Useful:

1. No games. None. I delete or block all these applications. That’s not what Facebook is about for me.

2. Stay positive. I realize most people skim through their Facebook feeds to see the highlights of others’ lives. If you are doing that in the line at the bank, you don’t need to add my stinky attitude to your stressful morning. If I don’t have something positive to say, I just say nothing. Recently Serenity and Mom sat for hours and hours in a chemo pod and Facebook was one of their best distractions. Thinking of them reading my updates helps me ask, “Will the person reading this find joy or death?” I want to be honest about my life, but I don’t want to burden you needlessly with my trivial daily inconveniences. You have enough of your own.

3. Value others. I won’t complain about a co-worker, a service provider, or any other person specifically. Why? Because they are people. (This is a post for another day.) However, I also value myself and my time. When a particular friend fills my Facebook feeds with low-brow content, obscenities, or other filth, I block freely. Be gone! In real life I may have to deal with you, in virtual world, I don’t. (This is also not to say I am only Facebook friends with people just like me. This is about what is going into my mind on a regular basis.)

4. Avoid Conflict. I’ve learned this the hard way. Facebook is NOT the place for intelligent, thoughtful debate. Save that for face to face. Tone is too difficult to detect in print and people will type way more than they will say in person. Feelings get hurt. Don’t engage conflict. Comment on cute babies, congratulate on new jobs, but walk away quickly from theological or political debates. No one wins. If I don’t agree with someone’s statement in a status update, I simply don’t comment.

5. Be True. Being happily married is tough enough, we don’t need to add Facebook drama to that! Extramarital affairs have never been a personal fear for me, but I can’t close my eyes and pretend it isn’t a real problem in our world. For Dan and I, we have each other’s passwords so when we send private messages we can always read them (although we rarely do). We talk about our Facebook interactions, even small ones, so there is no room for suspicion. I also know my personal weaknesses (and that isn’t easy to admit) and I avoid certain triggers.

How about you? Do you Facebook? Do you have rules for yourself?

Do you wish some of your Facebook friends had rules? : )

Walking into a nursing home is a distinctive experience. You are overwhelmed with a two-sided sense of compassion and admiration. The patients are genuinely in need, and the staff is providing a beautiful service.

Many times my audience here is barely awake, struggling just to lift open the cover on their hymnals. But this Sunday’s crowd is more lively and a bit more vocal. One woman announces she will be leaving tomorrow, her healing from a total hip replacement is ready to transition home. She brought a pencil with her, a blank piece of paper, and assures me she doesn’t mind women preachers because she watches Joyce Meyers on the television.

Another congregant is less cheerful and obviously in physical discomfort. One arm is in a sling and her face bears the marks of age and impairment. Just before we open the service, this woman begins to cry out for food, “I’m hungry, so so hungry. Won’t you help me?” Luckily, Grandma Harriet is playing piano for us and she knows the woman. She looks her straight in the eyes and says, “You can wait, I’ll get you something as soon as we finish.” Harriet assures me, “She feels hungry when she is upset; she not physically hungry.”

We launch into “Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus” and “A Mighty Fortress in Our God.” Then I pray and open the sermon. Everyone is quiet.

Today I want to talk to you about the word portion.

“What?” asks the hungry woman.

The word portion. I want to share with you what God has promised to be for us. I read the passages I’ve selected:

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Psalm 73:26)

I cry to you, LORD; I say, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.” (Psalm 142:5)

He who is the Portion of Jacob is not like these, for he is the Maker of all things, including Israel, the people of his inheritance— the LORD Almighty is his name. (Jeremiah 10:16 and 51:19)

You can see that the Psalmist was wrestling with the question of what his portion would be in this life. His flesh was failing him. He was looking for a refuge in the storms of life. Then in the final passage, Jeremiah is reminding the people of Israel about the goodness of their God and his uniqueness from the other gods and idols of the ancient world.

Around here, I say, we aren’t likely to have statues of silver that we pray to, but we do mistakenly believe that our portion will come from places other than from God. We look to our homes, our families, our money, our health. I make this statement without really thinking and then look around at the faces fixed on my words.

But these substitutions for God have failed us all, haven’t they? Here, in this place of all places, we understand what the Psalmist cried about. He was looking for his portion and the avenues he had expected it to come from had failed to deliver.

But “He who is the portion of Jacob is NOT LIKE THESE” – I repeat; emphasis mine.

He is our portion. In turn, we are his prize. (I’m reminded of a favorite John Mark McMillan lyric, “We are his portion and he is our prize.”)

How many of you feel like a prize right now? A small woman in a blue sweater and coordinating string of beads giggles and shakes her head. But that is how he sees us, as his prize. That is how he sees you. She smiles and nods.

No one can take away your portion, if your portion is him. Other portions – health, money, relationships – can all be taken from you, but not him. And likewise, you are his prize, no matter how you feel, what you look like, where you live.

We prayed and sang one more hymn, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”

When I left, Grandma Harriet was settling our hungry friend into her room, holding her hand and talking to her softly. Sometimes the portion is more tangible than other times. But he is always ours.

*Flickr photo borrowed from Rosie O’Beirne

Your divine destiny is NOT a default setting.

You may know what you are called by God to do in this life, but unless you do it, it won’t happen. There is action required on your part. In the chapel service this morning, the visiting pastor talked about character. He used Stephen the martyr as his example and reminded the students,

Build character BEFORE you need it.

And in case you are worried about someone else’s failure or mistakes messing up your divine destiny, remember this:

Your divine destiny is not a specific job, a geographical location, or a dream you want to fulfill. Your divine destiny is to be formed into the image of Christ.

That’s attainable for us all, thanks to Him.

We had dentist appointments today. I don’t usually mind them. You know, it is what it is. Not comfortable, but necessary. Even the terrible stuff, like the wisdom teeth I have to get surgically removed sometime this year, is not generally a life-long trauma.

Other things are. I get that. But I learned something about pain and spiritual growth at the dentist’s office today.

Forced to have the orthodontia discussion in regard to my children (they are doomed – Dan and I both had braces), our dentist mentioned the Invisalign system that many patients ask him about.

Invisible sounds good, they say. Wireless sounds good, they say.

It won’t work, says my dentist.

The Invisalign system is a series of computer casted, clear retainers. The idea is that you wear one set for a certain amount of time and then after your teeth have shifted you switch to a new set. Sounds easy. But my dentist says the problem is patient cooperation.

Our natural reaction to pain is to get away from it. Run. Hide. Whatever. With Invisalign you have to be committed to the process and force yourself to wear the retainer even when your teeth hurt so bad you can’t chew your tacos.

Traditional braces are better, my dentist says, because you can’t get away from them. You can’t pop them in the drawer for a night of relief or a weekend break. They’re on. The pain is yours to deal with. And so they get the work done of transforming your smile into something straight and beautiful.

This excerpt is from John Ortberg’s book The Life You’ve Always Wanted:

I was recently involved in a survey in which hundreds of people were asked to identify the factors that were most formative in their spiritual growth. The number one response overwhelmingly involved times of suffering and pain. Ironically, the role of suffering is one of the most neglected issues in spiritual growth, because we do not arrange for it to happen as we might Bible study or prayer. Instead, life inevitably arranges it for us. So if we are going to be transformed, we must look at how suffering benefits us, or at least how to respond to it.

Ortberg then shares a compelling account of Abraham’s life and how, while far from handling every instance of suffering or pain perfectly, he did endure. He hung on. He stayed in the conversation with God even when he didn’t understand.

And that seems to be all God asks. That we endure. That we persevere. We don’t have to do it with fireworks or with religious declarations.

In conclusion, Ortberg transitions to the story of Jesus, comparing it to Abraham’s suffering when asked to offer his beloved son Isaac as a sacrifice:

When Jesus was bound, no voice cried out to stay the ropes. When the blade went to pierce his body, no power held it back. This time, no other sacrifice was provided. This time, the Son died. This time, the Father grieved.

But then the third day came. As it will come someday for you and me. In the meanwhile, just don’t quit.

I guess what I learned today in the dentist’s chair is that life sometimes gives us braces and that’s OK. If life gave us Invisalign, we’d probably take off the suffering, put off the pain for another day when we don’t have anything else going on. But God isn’t asking us to pretend those braces don’t hurt. He knows He can get us through. He knows in the end He can make it better.

He can make it straight.

I’ve been teaching from John Ortberg’s book The Life You’ve Always Wanted for several years. I use it in complement to Gary Thomas’ book The Glorious Pursuit. Between the two of them, I have created an introduction course to Christian spiritual disciplines where our success is measured not by the length of our devotional time but by growth in the practice of the virtues demonstrated in Jesus’ life (humility, love, discernment, etc.). This semester my class includes a number of students still completing their recovery program at our church and it has been a rejuvenating experience for me to learn from them.

Can you imagine how excited I was to get an invitation to a free luncheon at Story where John Ortberg would be the featured speaker? Free food + John Ortberg = PERFECT!

And the experience (hosted by the Monvee group – more on them another day) was all that I hoped it would be. Maybe more, except since we had to eat at the same time I felt a little bit blasphemous letting mayo and tomato juice drip down my hands while Ortberg shared his generous thoughts on spiritual formation. He doesn’t know who I am, but I was embarrassed anyway. I ate as quickly as possible so I could start scribbling down notes.

Here is a great picture taken during this lecture as well as one of my favorite quotes from the luncheon:

“We must aim at the transformation of people’s actual lives, not merely their devotional practices.”

I’ll be thinking about that one for awhile! And I’ll share. I have some ideas. : )