Bending Over Backwards

This past week I sat in on a great discussion about a Max Lucado book. Courteousness was the central theme, and quickly the conversation turned to public displays of rudeness - in line at the bank, unreasonable customers, bad customer service, and the like. There were several small business owners in attendance, who were quick to share stories of customer service 'challenges' (i.e. horror stories!)that they'd encountered.

The fundamental problem was conflict between the Christian ethic of 'turning the other cheek' and the pragmatic responsibilities of running a viable business. Where is the line? When a customer expects a business to address a problem for which the business is not responsible, how is the Christian businessperson to respond? By extension, it's not just business owners who are caught up in this ethical dilemma. If I have a spare bedroom, or even space on my couch, and I encounter a homeless person, am I obligated by my Christian faith to open up my home to the person with no where else to sleep?

So that frames the question. I'll share some thoughts and perhaps resolutions in a couple of days. In the meantime, what do you think?

A Devotion on Another Level

One of the initiatives I'm involved in is Another Level - an upstart outreach to persons who for the most part have never been to church. This post is written as a meditation for the leaders, based on Jeremiah 1:4-10.



The word of the LORD came to me (Jeremiah), saying, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations."
“Ah, Sovereign Lord," I (Jeremiah) said, "I do not know how to speak; I am only a child."
But the LORD said to me, "Do not say, 'I am only a child.' You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you," declares the Lord.
Then the LORD reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, "Now, I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and to plant"
Jeremiah 1:4-9

This month, we’re going to be focusing as much effort as we can on getting the word out about Another Level. We’re going to be focusing on inviting others to come and see what God is doing, to come and consider what God might be doing in their lives, to come and share with us their wisdom and their struggles, to join with us in seeking out the life God has set before us. This sharing comes with some level of risk. We risk being rejected, we risk putting our proverbial foot in our proverbial mouths, we risk failing and we risk being criticized. We also risk that the people we invite will actually come; and when they come, who and what will they find? They will find ordinary people, whom God has known since before God formed us in the womb, who were set apart for this mission that we are a part of. It’s daunting, really.

Jeremiah was a prophet who God chose to speak to the nation of Israel. When God talked to Jeremiah about tearing down – he was talking about nations and kingdoms. I don’t know about you, but I am not feeling called to tear down or build up nations.
But there are walls that we ARE called to tear down: the walls that insulate the church – Christ’s body on earth – from the people she is called to serve; the walls that divide persons of different color skin or different levels of income; the walls that disconnect the wise from the disillusioned.

Maybe we can find great comfort and purpose in the words God spoke to Jeremiah and the words God speaks to us: “You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the Lord. Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is the decision to act in spite of the fear. Faith is putting our trust in the One God who calls us to courage, come what may.

Cold Winter's night

Most of our day was filled trying to occupy our little snow angels, who made countless trips in and out of the house to find things to do in the snow. I started to sense that even in the midst of the glorious family time, God was calling me to some time apart to listen. So much of our lives are spent tending to this, watching that, investigating this, trying to plan that, that even on 'family days' we can be out of balance. After a full day of sledding and drying jackets and gloves, after some time in front of the TV, after my wife turned in because she was wiped out herself, I did the dishes, and then took the trash can to the curb (actually in error - I was a day early). But as I stepped out onto the porch, i gazed up at a peaceful, crystal clear sky. It had been so long since I just stopped and sat and gazed at creation, I decided the time was right.
I got out my warmest sleeping bag and put a couple of camping sleeping pads down on my snow-covered deck, and climbed into my goose-down coccoon, pulling the draw cords on the bag to a small circle around my face. The moon was so bright that I almost needed to shield my eyes. The air in my lungs was cold, but the sleeping bag did the trick and kept me warm.

I tried to stop, to pause, to rest, to pray. To bask in God's beautiful creation. I thought about people who had no choice but to sleep outside, and how blessed we are to have a warm house. I thought about how big the universe is, and how small we are. What I was mostly aware of, however, was how little time I spend in quiet stillness. I don't think I made it all the way through a single hymn without having my thoughts drift off on some tangent.

In the end, I got cold. I was continually shifting in the sleeping bag, trying to find a warm position. I finally gave up, when my feet got cold and in the constraints of the sleeping bag I couldn't get my socks back on. I went inside at about 5am, not having slept a wink, and crawled into bed next to my wife. I suppose it was a vigil of sorts, a reminder that prayer is hard - even in utter silence and alone-ness. God used the day without church to call me back to relationship; he used a time without interruption to remind me of how many interruptions I put in our way; he used the middle of a cold night to remind me of how cold the heart can grow without his presence. I'm ready to be warm again.

Ed