an ancient path

Moses on the mountain, Noah in the ark, Elijah on Mt. Horeb, and Jesus in the wilderness. All are stories of the people of God on a trek of the soul. The season of Lent is a journey of reflection. Central to this journey is dialogue. It is not mere conversation, rather it is time given to allow one's soul to speak to its Creator. What enviroment might give way to this solitude of the inner man with the Divine?

Last night it was one passionate Christ follower mixing deep trans-like electronica loops fused with subtle orations of ancient truths. The room was filled with stations, a blank canvas, tea candles, a map under black light, and stones with a basin of water. In and of themselves all very ordinary objects, but mixed with desperate souls and the Spirit of the Living God they became the means to journey inward.

Reflection. Examination. Release.

As I sat at the "Fellowship" station furnished with one large candle, many smaller tea candles, and a paper that read:

God came to Earth.
Like us, He was flesh,
His name was Jesus.

Jesus' light was bright.

He died and his light went out.

But three days later, the light was back.
Jesus rose from the dead.
He was wholly human and wholly God.

Humbled by these images and sacred truths I penned these words:

Ages ago when Light shattered
it began to seek to restore itself.
When the time was full the One Who is Light came to all.
With His great Light He draws all sparks to unite.
Deep within the dark of man dwells a divine spark.
What draws the flicker to flame?
He is the One who is the Name.

No longer exiled in the shadowlands,
the hearts of man are called to ignite the sacred flame.
What once was like wax has melted down,
only the pool of liquid grace remains.
Carry we must our eternal spark
through time and space
until all light is restored
to the One True God.

Last night was such a beautiful expression of faith. It was a natural extension of the Lent journey I find myself on with countless others across the globe. May you find this season one that prepares your heart to know His Grace once again.

the first day of lent

What does it mean to enter the season of Lent? Where did the tradition come from? Along with many people for generations long ago and for many to come, the people of God will travel through this time. I hope to emerge from this time with a sense that it has been a time of reflection and transformation.
Mars Hill (Grand Rapids) has setup a link for daily readings during this season of Lent. Today as I found my way into the sacred story of the people of God, asking some of the same questions of those who walk the road of faith before me. Maybe lent is a season of honest questions to oneself.

Luke 18: If you are content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself.

Hebrews 12: Only irresponsible parents leave children to fend for themselves. Would you prefer an irresponsible God?

Job 3: What's the point of life when it doesn't make sense? When God blocks all the roads to meaning?

Psalm 32: When I kept it all inside, my bones turned to powder, my words became daylong groans.... Then I let it all out, I said, "I'll make a clean breast of my failures to God."

I join with the many who will wander the wilderness of Lent these next 40 days knowing that we are not alone.

speak or crush the stone

A great man once lived who was a sage leader of an unknown people. For four decades he led these nomadic people on a soul journey through the wilderness of identity. This reluctant leader listened to the moans and complaints of the people and finally became weary of their lack of faith in the promise given to them. Frustration was his companion.

One day on the side of an ancient mountain he heard the voice of the One God. In a time when the people were famished and their souls dry like the desert, the One of Being asked him to give aid to the people’s cry. He was to speak to the mountain rock, speak to the center of where lies an abundant stream of water to nourish body and soul.

The frustrated leader acted not from his heart but from his emotional dross and smites the mountain rock with his staff. Despite the leader’s actions, the One God used the man’s wrong doing and brought forth water for the people. Symbolically the people who had been entrusted to the leader were the mountain rock, but the man was unaware of the symbol until later in his life.

This frustrated leader loved and hated by the people never physically saw the final destination of the people, yet he passed on with the promise in place in the center of his being knowing that the One God would bring about the identity of the people who followed the Name.

I have found myself in this ancient story. For I am the leader of a people; the people are the ones who have been entrusted to my care. My frustration seems to grow from an unrealized dream. I listen to the complaints and the bickering amongst my children. It fuels my angst that nothing wonderful can come this way. And so the seed of discontent plants itself; its roots take hold of my words. When I am tested to be their life caretaker amidst their nagging and complaining, I strike out with careful chosen words that sting ever so slightly or give a quick jab to whatever inanimate object might be near.

I am walking in the Moses story on so many levels. Out of my frustration and discontent, I traverse the days hoping that one day something wonderful will come this way.

Last night I was brought to this revelation of the story I am in by the simple reaction to a poignant scene in the movie the Bridge to Terabithia. I found myself covered in a sea of tears as I watched a father give striking verbal blows to his dreamer son. Wading in my own sorrow, I looked over to see my middle daughter sobbing. Somehow this simple fantasy story transported a real father and daughter to the harsh reality of how things are at home.

But all is not lost. Hope still lingers, because in my heart I know that if I am hearing the soul of my family cry out, then I am not too far away from the arms of Grace. With my humbled heart I reach out to the One who Heals all and ask for his Mercy. And I know that He restores the broken dreams of his people. Maybe something wonderful has come this way and it dwells in the hearts of the ones I have been entrusted to love and care for.

new year for trees

In the Hebrew way of life there comes a day each year to stop and celebrate new beginnings. The New Year for Trees usually occurs between mid-January and mid February signifying the end of the winter rainy season; it marks the renewal of the cycle of growth.

I cannot begin to say how closely that parallels the season of life I am in right now. For the last several weeks, a close friend of mine who moved back to the Tallahassee area and I have been talking about who are we at the core of our being. From those conversations, a reoccurring theme has been: helping people move from where they are to the place they want to be. I think my post from January 19th speaks to this in detail.

It became official on February 1, the formation of a people group who are focused on helping people move from one place to the next; a legal entity called Catalyst Consultant Group LLC was formed. Yes, we have a Federal Employee Identification Number. What is very interesting about this new business formation is that it is not just something that we want to do; it is something being birthed from who we are at the core of our God given inner shape. I think when something is birthed from the core of who you are, it is from the “imago dei.” It is very possible that from that image of God within you, there is an unending supply of power, energy, and creativity. I think we may have actually stumbled upon something wonderful.

Thomas Merton seems to communicate over and over the idea that if you are doing and being who you were created and intended to be, then you are communing with God unceasingly. I am beginning to rethink what it looks like when Paul writes “pray unceasingly.” It doesn’t just look like kneeling in a pew, bowing you head, or closing you eyes for a certain length of time. I think in surrendering your everyday life to God, you place yourself in a humble attitude of communion every moment.

Isaiah says “as you come, the mountains and hills will burst into song, and the tree of the countryside will clap their hands.” (55:10)

Maybe when the people of God “come into” and become who they were created and intended to be, the whole earth rejoices. It is good news for the people of the earth when God’s people learn their true identity from the imago dei.

a change of perspective

Painting number 1 (1601) = Supper at Emmaus

Painting number 2 (1606) - Supper at Emmaus

I came across this illustration while reading Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian culture. Both paintings are done by the same artist - Caravaggio. The second one is five years after the first. As an artist he is interpreting the story of Jesus at the table with the men he met on the road to Emmaus. What do you think he is trying to say?

an agent of change

catalyst = an agent that provokes or speeds significant change or action

talking to a good friend last night, i mentioned that i am coming to an awareness of what it is that i do. i have a desire to help people, who are no longer satisfied with the status quo, move from where they currently are to the place that best represents forward or positive progress.

i realize that when i am doing that i am connecting with what i was meant to do. it doesn't matter where i am, what matters is who i am in that location. i could be in the coffee pub, a local business, the library, or at home; if i am helping someone go through significant change then my role and my soul are one.

In chemistry and biology, catalysis is the acceleration (increase in rate) or slowing down of a chemical reaction by means of a substance, called a catalyst, that is itself not consumed by the overall reaction.

i was looking at my life through the lens of where i was to define what it was i was doing. so if i was at the marketing job then i was this person, if i was at a social gathering then i was that person, if i was at church then i was that person. living a compartmentalized life is the most unsatisfying life i can live. i am so thankful that the living Spirit of God has brought me to this revelation of who am created and purposed to be. in my limited educated view of life, i see that my role of a catalyst doesn't directly benefit me, rather i am present in order to help those who come in contact with a catalyst. for me, a catalyst is a kind of servant to its host environment but yet is not altered by its surroundings. that being said, it doesn't mean that the catalyst isn't affected by the reactions that are taking place. in fact, i would think that the more significant changes that are made as a result of the service of the catalyst the deeper the energy source for the catalyst for future service.

humility has an impact on my view of the catalyst. a catalyst is only an agent. agent meaning a representing entity of a greater power or source. so when i am in the purest sense living breathing and being who i was created to be then i am representing my Designer/Creator.

"the revelation of God is whole and pulls our lives together. The signposts of God are clear and point out the right road. The life-maps of God are right, showing the way to joy. The directions of God are plain and easy on the eyes." Psalms 19 - the message

exiles: living missional

I got this book for a gift for Christmas. I am excited to crack open the pages. Last night I began the first chapter. The intro explains who might be reading this book.

"This book is for the many people who wish to be faithful followers of the radical Jesus but no longer find themselves able to fit into the bland, limp, unsavory straightjacket of a church that seems to be yearning to return to the days when "everyone" used to attend church and "Christian family values" reigned.

This book is for those Christians who feel themselves ready (or yearning) to jump ship but don't want to be left adrift in a world where greed, consumerism, laziness, and materialism toss them about endlessly and pointlessly."

And so I read on...

two invitations one decision

Imagine you got a party invitation in the mail. Inside the card reads:

Are you confused about life? Don’t know what’s going on?

You take a moment to deliberate if you will attend the fiesta. The next day you receive another invitation in the mail. Inside the card reads:

Are you confused about life? Don’t know what’s going on?

Now you are really perplexed. Two invitations. One decision.

Reexamining each card you find that the first card offers an evening of insight and healthy dining, a full feast with bread, choice meats, and fine wine. The second card offers a pleasure filled night of passion and feverishly wild festivities.

Which one do you attend?

work. thought. dance?

“The requirements of a work to be done can be understood as a will of God. If I am to hoe a garden or make a table, then I will be obeying God if I am true to the task I am performing. To do the work carefully and well, with love and respect for the nature of my task and with due attention to its purpose, is to unite myself with God’s will in my work.

Unnatural, frantic, anxious work, work done under pressure of greed or fear or any other inordinate passion, cannot properly speaking be dedicated to God, because God never wills such work directly.” Thomas Merton – New Seeds of Contemplation pg. 19

I have read and re-read this page about a dozen times. I have handwritten it in my journal and now I am writing it electronically. Someone must be trying to tell me something about the thing I put my hand to or as we would say today, what kind of work do I do?

Contemplation is a big word, thirteen letters in all. A simple working definition for me might be how I think about things. Now to take that one step further is to say that if I really want to experience the most intimate relationship with the Original Thinker, then I must open my thought life to Him, but that isn’t exactly the way it works. I think that I must open myself to the concept that He is present in my thought life. It isn’t like my thought life is some area that is off limits to the Creator of all Thoughts, rather it is me being honest to acknowledge that my thoughts are not off limits but are a place where I can join the incredible dream realm where anything is possible.

Most of the time my thoughts are not an incredible dream world. Many times they are full of doubts, fears, and unsatisfied frustration about the way my physical world hasn’t worked out the way my dreamed world thought it should. I would be embarrassed and ashamed if God knew what my real thoughts were. But maybe that is just it; maybe He knows the frustration - He is just wondering why am I not sharing it with Him.

If my thoughts were like a dance, why would I want to dance alone? I don’t know about you, but my thoughts occupy most of my time. They continue even while I am asleep. Maybe the thought-dream-dance-with-God is the crossing over into a life of contemplation, or what others might call a life of prayer. In that context, it is not some concept I am trying to apply, but it is something that I naturally practice out of self-discipline because it is who I am. I dream and dance in my thoughts everywhere I am.

something's burning

This past summer I spent a week with some people that would change my life forever. It was close quarters as our two families of 5 crammed into a 3-bedroom house. When I sleep I like a ceiling fan above me; so most nights I crashed on the couch in the living room. Each morning I would awake to the aroma of incense. It was really amazing. The thing that made the aroma even more beautiful is that my hosts were in the next room offering the thoughts of their hearts to the One Who listens. I was so captivated each morning by the scent of the day, knowing it was coupled with the prayers of my new friends.

This year to celebrate the dawn of a new kind of humanity, my wife gave me a gift; a small ornate incense box. Each time the smoke rises from the wooden chest, I am reminded of my friends and their care for my family as guests in their home.

This simple wooden chest being porous in nature absorbs the scent of the incense long after it has burned. Each time I walk by it I smell and I remember.

Long ago the fledging people of God were told to create an altar for the burning of incense. The incense was meant to be a symbol, a symbol for the prayers of the people rising up to the One True God. It was to be a reminder to the people. Daily burnings were central to the life of the priests attending the duties of the temple.

I wish I could carry that scent with me. I wish somehow I could be a wooden chest with the burning offering of prayers to the One I love. The peaceful solitude I find when just sitting and taking in the aroma is transcendent. No wonder the scriptures talk about the thoughts of our hearts are like a sweet, sweet smell in the nostrils of an attentive Father. How else could we connect with what it must be like when we humble ourselves and speak from the deepest most insecure part of our being to the One of Being.

May the altar of our lives burn daily with our prayers to the Most Holy One.

charting the Great Trail

This is the real beginning of a new year. Wow, here we are January 2 and things are heading in a signifigant direction. For so many years Darla and I have planned to make changes in our life after the New Year, but this year is different. Two months ago we began to take a hard look at our finances and the way we spend our money. As a result, we opened a second account for savings and taxes; we talk about purchases with each other before we make them and we are looking for ways to save money so that we might be in a better position to help those who are in need. Two weeks ago we began to take a hard look at our physical condition. We are talking to each other about what we eat and why we eat it. I am drinking more water than I ever have. Losing weight for me is secondary, my real goal is to establish the spiritual discipline of self-control. Darla and I agree that spending, eating, sleeping are all spiritual activities. Meaning that behind each decision to buy, consume, or engage in any activity there is a deeper connection to our inner person.

A wise sage once said, “We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”

For the last year or so I have a couple of things emailed to me on a daily basis. One is a daily life lessons from a messianic Jewish rabbi who looks at each day of life from the bifocals of Jewish culture and Christian heritage. Click here to get it emailed to you. Today he used one of my favorite quotes: “Write down the vision clearly on tablets, so that even a runner can read it (Habakkuk 2:2).” I can’t think of a better way to start off the new year than to write down the things that you would like to change, build upon, or start new. I need reminders to help me remember what it is that I am doing. As a person of faith, remembrance is a life practice. To really live is to remember.

The second thing I have emailed is the daily lectionary readings, which are read by the people of God all across the world and across many denominations. Over a three year period, these reading will take one through the entire sacred history lived through people for thousand of years. click here to get it emailed to you. One of the passages today was Genesis 12, the beginning of the Abrahamic journey, a journey to become a blessing to all the nations. The journey was never a journey to become an exclusive people to themselves, rather it was to become a people who were readily welcomed because of their incredible forgiveness, generosity, and hope in the lives of every family in this age and the age to come.

When I read these two emails, I was encouraged that today is a beginning in many ways, and it is a reminder that we did not just begin this trail today but have walked on and off it for many years.

An experienced journeyman once said, “the only way to keep a trail fresh is to walk on it.”

May you find your feet walking the Great Trail and know that it is not found by any man made maps but is written on your heart.

the wonderful unknotter

My daughter came in this morning and threw one of her barbies onto darla’s lap and said, “please get the knot out of my Barbie's dress, you are the best unknotter!” I thought to myself that is absolutely true for me too. After reading darla’s post today, it is obvious that both of us have been grappling with the same issues. I wrote in my journal yesterday to God that I was mad at him for dropping us in this spot: this spot where we are not pleased with our current position even though this is the spot we have been placed for a reason beyond our understanding. Honesty, I think that is the thing God wants from his children. I think he is big enough to take my blaming and complaining. I don’t want to stay that way for long. I think that is why he has placed the wonderful un-knot-her in my life. You see yesterday I was twisted up in knots after two days of wringing my thoughts over how lonely it seems to be in this place we currently find ourselves in. Last night in a moment of sheer exhaustion and desperation, knowing I could not undo the knot I had twisted myself into, I threw myself onto darla’s lap and without words asked to be unknotted.

This morning I awoke and realized that the knot has been undone and I am not as anxious. Yesterday, darla tried to ask what was wrong, but I was so twisted inside I couldn’t even verbalize it. I made the most foolish statement. I told her I didn’t want to tell her because I didn’t want to bum her out and besides she couldn’t do anything about it anyway. What a load of crap that is, today I realize that she is the one I can tell and share my pain, fears, and doubts with. In trying to protect her from the pain that I am going through, I am hindering the thing that the Spirit of God would use to knit us closer together.

I am forever grateful that the One Who knitted me together in my mothers womb has given to me my wonderful un-knot-her.

dawn comes everyday

it is not a question of if or when was Jesus was born, rather it is that he was born. does anyone know exactly when the sunrises? or is it that we know that everyday the sun does rise.

get it out in the open

“Prayer is elemental, not advanced, in language. It is the means by which our language becomes honest, true, and personal in response to God. It is the means by which we get everything out in the open before God.” Eugene Peterson (intro to Psalms)

My thoughts:
If prayer is me being honest before God, in response to God, it is assumed that God has spoken first. I think I have approached prayer first as me speaking to God upon my terms, but in light of Eugene’s concept of prayer maybe when I come to the point of thinking of speaking to God, it is actually my inner being responding to a divine prompting that I wasn’t even aware of. So maybe a new understanding of prayer might be to first listen, or maybe before I open my mouth, I should open my ears.

Listening to my life:
Today I found myself all wound up, meaning I was in a really foul mood. Sometimes when I get in moods like that I start cleaning the house like a madman. As I clean, I grapple with the issue. Sometimes the cleaning makes me more frustrated than I was before I started. Nonetheless, today I was mad. Here were the series of triggers:
I learn of friends who have found themselves wanting to serve God, yet don't have a clear sense of what that looks like. They are in limbo. (It reminds me of the struggle I too find myself in in our current position.)
Another friend has purchased a building and is looking to start a church. (This frustrates me, because I can’t come to terms with the fact that I –me- can’t just conjure up this thing called church. It is too sacred, it is such a precious gift, how can I be so pompous to think I can just start “label x church.”) I haven’t been together with fellow travelers of faith in some time. I miss that.
Things are just out of order in my inner life. I turn and look and the house is in somewhat of disarray. Then it all comes crashing in; uncertainty leads to frustration, frustration leads to bitterness, bitterness leads to burning anger.
All of this happens in the span of about 2 minutes.

I am so thankful that my wife gives me space to go off on my little stinky tantrums. She asks, are you ok? NO! I AM MAD! What are you mad at, she asks. Now, I could respond, no one helps clean around the house! That would be BLAME. That is not what has got me worked up. No, it’s really me. I respond, “I am mad at myself!” She replies, “Why are you mad at yourself?" Stinky under my breath I respond, “I don’t know. I haven’t figured it out yet!” I think to myself- leave me alone, I am just stewing.

If I am really honest, I am mad because I have chosen other things over spending time journaling with God, which I really love to do. But this week things have just come up. I am mad at the fact that I have gotten so mad so quickly over something I don’t have any control over. I stop cleaning and sit down on the couch with Darla and explain the triggers that have led me to this point. In doing so, we communicate openly and honestly. I can sense that she isn’t mad at me being mad and wants to walk through this thing with me wherever it leads. I love my wife. She reminds me of God’s latitude of grace towards me. We are moving closer to living our complete life out in the open with each other, and if that is the picture of our marriage, then how much more are we open before the One who knitted us together once in the womb, and then again in relationship to one another.

I am not mad anymore, in fact, I am actually filled with awe, wonder, and love.

a full life in the emptiest places

"If you are generous with the hungry and start giving yourselves to the down--and-out, Your lives will begin to glow in the darkness, your shadowed lives will be bathed in sunlight.

I will always show you where to go. I'll give you a full life in the emptiest of places--firm muscles, strong bones. You'll be like a well-watered garden,a gurgling spring that never runs dry.

You'll use the old rubble of past lives to build anew, rebuild the foundations from out of your past. You'll be known as those who can fix anything, restore old ruins, rebuild and renovate, make the community livable again."

God speaks through Isaiah (58)
to the people who follow "the Name."

nativity of the Jews

"From the story of the nativity of the Jews, we learn that life is inherently arduous but also sacred; our task is to repair and perfect God's creation. What challenges do Christians undertake from the Gospels' Nativity stories? Perhaps Christian faith in Jesus will be understood as the faith of Jesus, so the Jewish values of education and social responsibility that his parents inculcated in him will be renewed for Christians in their celebration of his birth." Read More Great article from MSN.com hosted by newsweek.com

This is timely as I am reading Brian McLaren's book a Generous Orthodoxy subtitled Why I am A -Evangelical, Post/Protestant, Liberal/Conservative, Mystical/Poetic, Biblical, Charismatic/Contemplative, Fundamentalist/Calvinist, Anabaptist/Anglican, Methodist, Catholic, Green, Incarnational, Depressed-yet-Hopeful, Emergent, Unfinished CHRISTIAN.

I skimmed this book at the book store when it came out last year. I wasn't ready to read it then, but now seems like a good time. I checked it out from my local library, In the first chapter he discusses how his idea of Jesus has been shaped as he has moved through the various denominations of the Christian faith. It is a kind of brief overview of church history from a personal experience. He is very hard on conservative evangelicals, but that is because he was raised in that environment and found it lacking. His ideas are not to persuade one to accept one particular viewpoint but to ignite discussion and dialogue about the way things have been presented related to the "Gospel" or good news by the various denominational doctrines.

I read McLaren's the Secret Message of Jesus this summer and I really enjoyed it. It is one of those I hope to read again.

could i get a map, i seem to have misplaced myself

During the time that Rabbi Schneur Zalman was imprisoned in Petersburg, one of the czar's miniters asked him to explain the verse (Genesis 3:9) "And G-d called out to the man and said to him: Where are you?" Did G-d not know where Adam was? Rabbi Schneur Zalman asked the minister: Do you believe that the Torah is eternal, that its every word applies to every individual, under all conditions, at all times? The minister replied that he did. Rabbi Schneur Zalman was very gratified to hear this, for this was a basic principle of the "subversive" teachings of the Baal Shem Tov, the propagation of which was at the heart of the accusations leveled against him.

"Where are you?" said Rabbi Schneur Zalman to the minister, "is G-d's perpetual call to every man. Where are you in the world? You have been allotted a certain number of days, hours, and minutes in which to fulfill your mission in life. You have lived so many years and so many days -- Where are you? What have you accomplished?"

i love my brothers from the Jewish faith, they have such a way of capturing the basic questions of life and forming them into a querry that stirs one to action. for me asking the question, "where am i?" is more about not being so focused on where i am going, who i am in this place now. it is a shift from destination thinking, to a current location mode of being. the question is not where am i going, but who am i in the place where i am today.

ask the question

“the tree the tempest with a crash of wood
throws down in front of us is not to bar
our passage to our journey’s end for good
but just to ask us who we think we are.”

Robert Frost –
the poem “On a Tree Fallen Across the road”

in the book Learning to Fall.

shopping for God knows what...

Consumer Reports advise:
Look through the ads, shop for the best, find the one you like… then, BUY IT!

Maybe we have settled for a sort of false advertising. Maybe in our consumer mindset we have thought of the current model of the church as a product of the primary expression of the kingdom. We have purchased this way of thinking and now we are experiencing a sort of buyer’s remorse because our perception is that the product has failed to deliver.

The reality is, the church hasn’t failed; it is our expectations and preconceived ideas about it that were incomplete. Our disillusionment has led us to return our purchase and we are now seeking a new product; a product that we are finding is not available in any one particular store. In fact, it is not even a product or a service. It is simply a way of living.

The gospels tell us:
Look first, look with intensity, look as though the fate of your life depends upon it, look for the kingdom first.

I have noticed that the gospels do not tell us to look for a church first and then the kingdom. The kingdom of Heaven is to be first. The kingdom takes place in and around your ordinary everyday life. Your everyday life is the optimal realm where the ruling and reigning of God is made known. It is the place where God wants to inhabit.

When seeking the kingdom expressed in everyday life, it becomes the central approach to thinking about the God-big-picture. That thinking will help relocate what the church can look like on your God-life map. Kingdom living is living in the God-life rhythm of everyday life, working, eating, etc…

"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." Written to the people in Rome by Paul. (Romans 12:1, the Message)

A great example of searching for the divine in the ordinary is Reap What You Sew Generosity Project. This article was orginally printed in the San Francisco Chronicle December 2, 2005.

Once you begin to live searching for the kingdom first, then secondary will be a desire to gather together with others who are living from that the same understanding that kingdom (everyday life in relationship with God) is best understood in relationships with others. Just as love is best expressed when it is shared between two people, not towards an object, so is kingdom living expressed between two people. A gathering of people who are genuinely seeking to center their life on this understanding will naturally become an expression of what Paul thought of when he said, “When you gather...”

This will be a huge shift in thinking for many people, because we have thought of the kingdom expressed in terms of the gatherings of Christians as the essential expression of the kingdom. Although it is one part of the kingdom, it is not the central way. The number of hearts who are in such gatherings are just a token representation of the hearts that God is moving through in the world. To think that gatherings are “the ends” of what God thinks about his kingdom, is limited in scope. Gatherings are just one of the expressions of “the means” by which kingdom can be viewed.

This shift may explain the long return lines in the religious goods and services department stores across the country, or as seen in the mass exodus of people from the current church model in the West.

So what do we do next? Search, search everywhere. Search for what? Search for expressions of the kingdom at work in all the nooks and crannies of the marginalized, the forgotten, and the ignored. That is where He came and walked before. I don’t think he has changed his route. Jesus told us in plain language the way is narrow and few find it. I realize that I have been looking for something else. I was looking for a product or a service that would satisfy my need for what only the kingdom (the God-life expressed in relationships with others) can fulfill.

After listening to and contemplating on a series of talks by Euguene Peterson, Dallas Willard, and Todd Hunter entitled Spiritual Formation hosted on Alleleon.org, I am forming a daily question that is helping me put this into perspective: What does my life relationships with my spouse, kids, co-worker, friend, or the guy at the coffee shop look like now that I understand these relationships are the space where the kingdom emerges?

Is there an answer? Is there a solution? Yes and no. There is no quick fix or simple formula to follow. There is only a mode of living to be explored and shared. It is a life that is constantly searching for the divine in the ordinary.

soil of character

Silence and solitude
Silence and solitude

The sound of breathing
The flicker of the candle
The warmth of the fire
The scent of incense
All the reminders that you are near

Take us into you
Take us into the real
Take us into the center
Take to the place
Where we end
And you begin
Let us tremble
With knees wobbling
And stumble into grace

Your light shines in the gray
Your light shines bright in the day
Your light shines bright in the night
Your light shines bright in my plight

Bring us out into the open
Where faith and sight
Join hands and fight
The good fight

No one has ever seen the love
That grows from the One
Who is the beginning of everlasting


If I were to hope again
What would my heart hope in
I would hope in you alone
I would that you find me
Find me longing for thee

Can I know the ways of the One
Can I know the face of hope
Can I know the touch of grace
Can I know joy
Can I know the peace of life

Who can know these things
Who can know the hearts of men

Can the flower that falls
Still find hope in beauty

Can the leaf that turns
Find the hope of green again

Can the ones who have turned away
Find their hopes again

Can the pieces of the broken
Be put back together again

Can the One who makes the hard
Become soft move in and start again

I wish that these things would be
I wish that these things would be
I wish they would grow on the trees
Like fruit ready to be
Ready to be ripe to eat

Can you the great gardener
Bring the fruit of life
Bring it out of hiding
Bring it out of hiding

The roots of the tree
Go down and down to thee
Deep within the toil of the soil
Roots reaching deep
Roots reaching deep
Deep into the life source
Tap the root
Fill the branch
So that the tree would be
Once again into the orchard of me