Christian Living – Page 5 – A Work in Progress

Therefore Stay Awake

I know people don’t like to think about–much less talk about–the Book of Revelation. It is difficult to read, and not just because of its many visions and prophecy. Because it’s about a huge checkmate. But I read it tonight, and it made me think about those 21 men–Coptic Christians–in Libya, and the countless others murdered in that area, by those extremists who claim to hold fast to the tenets of Islam.

“9. When the Lamb broke the fifth seal, I saw under the heavenly altar the souls of those murdered for holding fast to the word of God and their testimony. 10 They cried out in a great, singular voice.

Murder Victims: How much longer, O Lord, the holy One, the true One, until You pronounce judgment on the inhabitants of the earth? Until You avenge our blood?

11 Then they were each given a white robe and told to rest for a little while longer—soon their number would be complete. In a little while, more of their fellow servants, brothers, and sisters would be murdered as they had been”

Revelation 6:9-11 (The Voice)

I think there’s a couple of reasons why people are so intimidated by Revelation. I am, too. It’s a super intimidating read. It’s complicated, and abstract in many ways. Thematically, it’s challenging as well. I think most of all, though, it’s because it talks about the end of things, and is specific about what’s coming. I know what you’re thinking: he’s gotten all “end-timesy.”

No, I haven’t. But I can see why people would think along those lines. The world is clearly falling apart. It’s not starting here in the U.S. It hasn’t directly touched me or my family. No one in Yuma has been seriously persecuted, or beheaded for their witness or testimony, or faith. No one probably ever will be, not in this little border town.

I think our whole country has been fortunate that way for a long time (I know you’re thinking of 9/11, but I don’t believe that was an attack on anyone for their faith–probably more so for their politics and idealogies, and for trying to bring democracy and governance by the people to places where there are clearly a great many people who don’t want to give up their thrones. Whether or not those more liberal than myself want to admit it, a great big portion of the Middle East is controlled by a radical Islamic oligarchy. It’s just obvious, and true, whether or not people are afraid to say it. There are a lot of Copts in Libya, and they’re in a lot of danger.

What’s all this about tonight? I think we have to start preparing ourselves. Because Mark 13:35 is all kinds of true.

“Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning.” (ESV)

Clearly, I didn’t know any of those men killed Saturday in Libya. But I saw the stills online of the ISIS “fighters” walking them down a beach in Tripoli to their deaths and it made me sick to my stomach. Yet I felt I needed to bear witness somehow to their martyrdom.

So I thought I would watch the video.

I saw the part where they are walked down the beach and made to kneel. I saw the very western-sounding jihadi pointing a knife and threatening to take Rome. I didn’t get much farther than that–only as far as the black-clad murderers throwing the Copts on the sand and preparing to kill them. Right as that happened, you can hear some of the men–perhaps all–crying out something in their language. All at once, just as the knives began their work.

It took a little more research, and some remarks by Pope Francis to learn they were crying out to Jesus. They weren’t delivered on Earth, but I believe they opened their eyes in Heaven. These men knew Earth was not their home.

That’s going to keep happening, I believe. ISIS may be stopped. They could even all be killed. But it won’t really stop anything. Someone could shoot the sun–which rises and falls on the righteous and unrighteous alike–and the end would still eventually come.

I get why nobody likes to talk about that. Who wants to think about it, for that matter? That line of thought could change a person’s life–or at least the way they live their life, and to whom they present their fealty and service.

I am certainly no end times scholar, and do not claim to be. My remarks are from my perspective, though they are prompted by scriptural evidence I believe to be true. I know many many people don’t believe scripture to be literally true, and follow Jesus only in the “spirit” of true faith (pun intended). I felt that way, too.

It’s just becoming more and more clear to me what’s coming. Sometime. Maybe soon, maybe not so soon.

“Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning.”

I would rather live the rest of my alloted days believing the truth of scripture and find out I was wrong than the opposite.

This ISIS stuff–if you look at it carefully regarding scripture–really does make a good case FOR the truth to be found in scripture. I’m not going to exhaustively point out scripture here, but it’s something worth looking into.

I don’t know, man. I don’t have all the answers. But I know where I can go to look for them. Or at least to look for how to deal with what comes.

It may be that eventually, there will be walks down the beach here in the US like there were in Tripoli over the weekend. Maybe for just “regular” people like us. I read the men killed Saturday were just workers (albeit Coptic Christian workers) who’d been kidnapped by ISIS. With the world as it is today, really anything can happen.

“Therefore stay awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or in the morning.”

On Weight, and Crushing Your Larynx

Many years ago, I worked out for a time at the Bally’s gym in Mission Valley—for about a year, I think. For three of those months, I worked with a trainer named Andre, who I began to call Andre the terrible after a while. He was sort of like a Latino version of Stone Cold Steve Austin from the WWE, and I remember the first day I came in he asked me what level of motivation was I comfortable with.

I asked him what he meant, and he said how hardcore did I want him to be with my training. I told him somewhere in the middle would be OK, because I knew he didn’t want to see a grown man cry. He told me it happened more than I would think. It wasn’t that comforting.

Usually, I would show up for my sessions and he would weigh me in, and then proceed to cardio before weights. One time, I showed up and there was another guy there, too. Andre wanted to know if I would mind working out with another guy because he was double booked. I said ok.

I don’t remember the other guy’s name, but he whistled when I stepped on the scale. Jerk.

The cardio went well enough, and then we went to the weights. Andre put me on this butterfly machine, I think it was called. Something like that. The other guy went over to the free weights and started loading up a bar.

Andre stood behind me and barked in my ear while I struggled to bring my arms together in front of my chest. After about 30 seconds, I heard my workout partner yell “f—-!!” from the other side of the weight room.

The man had a barbell with what looked to be over 200 pounds pinning him to the weight bench like an insect.

“Are you trying to F—— KILL YOURSELF?!” Andre screamed at him. “What did I tell you about f—— free weights!?”

“Uh…”

“Use a spotter with that much weight! What if that f—— barbell crushed your larynx?”

I was thinking about that day this morning when I went to the Roadrunner for some caffeine. Andre was clearly no poet, but he had a really good point.

If the weight is more than you can handle alone, you need a spotter.

I thought about that today in the context of all the messing up I’d done over the course of my life. All the mistakes I’d made. All the sins I’d committed. All the people I’d hurt. I spent–no, wasted–so much time trying to get by on my own strength, when it was obvious that wasn’t enough.

Now, when it’s my tendency to dwell on the past and all the bad, it occurs to me the weight I’ve accumulated could crush me if I let it. I can’t lift it alone. I never could.

For most of my life, instead of looking for a spotter, I just loaded the weight on my barbell without thinking too much about it. There were times when it felt like the weight was indeed about to crush my “f—— larynx.”

I’d think about my past, and everything that entailed and I would quickly convince myself of my worthlessness due to how I’d always seemed to find stupid ways to get myself in trouble, and hurt people and even myself without giving it much thought in advance. I would do things because I felt it would benefit me in some way. Or because it would feel good, or make my life easier. Sometimes it even did for a time.

I was able to move past those times, thank goodness. Yet I would still think about them, and it would almost paralyze me when I thought what a f— up I’d been. Still was, sometimes.

And that was one of the most important things I learned about God. He’s a really good spotter. When you’re holding that loaded barbell over your chest, his will be the hands hovering over the bar in case you drop it.

He won’t just yank it out of your hands and lift for you. Not without asking, anyway. But when the bar gets too heavy—when the weight of sin and years and pain feels is so much your arms start shaking and you know it’s only a matter of time before you drop the thing—there’s help.

You don’t have to lift all of that weight yourself.

It isn’t always going to be some ethereal hand reaching down to yank 250 pounds off your chest. Sometimes the help comes in the form of a bald-headed, angry Latino personal trainer. The point is, when you’re dealing with a lot of weight, it’s a good idea to take a partner.

Use a spotter. That probably looks a little different for anyone.

Over the course of my life, I’ve been to a few AA and FA meetings. One of the first things they’d tell you to do is call your sponsor when you needed help.

I didn’t want to at the time, but I get it now.

Sometimes you don’t need to be touching that bar at all when you’re alone. I would think I was just going to lift this crap off my chest, when really I was on the way to crushing my larynx.

Maybe that’s happened to you, too.

Use a spotter when you’re lifting heavy weight. Maybe that’s a pastor. A sponsor. Or even simply a friend.

The weight of a lifetime of garbage can really pile up fast. Sin, mistakes, all the things you’ve done or been part of.

It’s heavy, man.

Ask for help. Being a tough guy doesn’t mean a thing if your neck has a barbell through it.

I think you’ll find that everyone, everyone needs a spotter sometimes.

Child

“He is known in the wild as Strider. His true name you must discover for yourself.”

That line is from a scene toward the end of The Battle of Five Armies, the third film in the somewhat bloated Hobbit series. I didn’t expect any great or profound truths to come to me while watching a fantasy movie–I was just simply trying to keep to my night shift sleep pattern while on sick watch over the family.

But. It was exactly 0105 when that elf-to-elf line was uttered, and then something occurred to me.

We don’t learn our true names until we pass from this world and stand before the throne of Christ. I think on that day, he will welcome us, and whisper our true names into our ears and hearts.

Clearly, that is no accident.

We go through our lives with some inkling of who we are. We know our given names, of course. Typically, they’re carefully considered by our parents. My first name, for instance, is after a friend of my father’s. It’s Thomas, as was his, but people called him Tommy. That’s what everyone called me as well, until I was old enough to decide I wanted to be called something else–which I thought sounded more mature (I don’t really care anymore, and nobody calls me Tommy anyway, except my siblings and a few ancient friends online).

But that isn’t my true name. It’s who I am here, not who I am in eternity.

Scripture assures me that I will be one day welcomed into Heaven, provided my name is written in the Lamb’s book of life. I don’t think that name will be Thomas Eugene Wilkins. I have no idea what it is, and in my opinion that doesn’t really matter anyway.

One thing I do know–one thing that matters to me a great deal–is WHO I am to God. Who I have been since that day in March back in 2000.

Until I get to Heaven–until angels carry me to Abraham’s bosom, that is the name I quietly speak to myself in my heart when I want to know who I am to God.

Child.

Hallelujah.

Listen to the words of this amazing song by Todd Agnew–it says close to what I’m trying to, but in a better way than I ever could.

We Are The Church

It isn’t our religious denominations or institutions that will change the world, even though many do great work and help a lot of people.

Those things aren’t the church.

It isn’t our church buildings that will change the world, either, even though many of them are grand and beautiful and house a lot of good people, not to mention good works.

Those things are churches, but they aren’t the church.

The church is made up of those people who actually know Jesus in their hearts, and follow him even though the cost is, or can be, very high.

The church is made up of people like us, and people like them. Doing the work The Lord arranged in advance for us to do.

For better or worse, we are the church.

Lets act like it.

Thoughts From The Park

I’m sitting here at the park and watching the boys play. They’re playing together for once, and they aren’t fighting. It’s been a pretty good day so far.

I’m thinking that they’re growing up so fast, it’s like a soft rope, slipping through my fingers. I wonder what kind of example I’ve been as a man? As a father? What kind of example will I continue to be?

I think of the example of my own father, who was close to the age I was when I got married and started my family. It wasn’t necessarily bad, I just think that people of his generation were different than they are now. And then he died when I was still young, just 16.

I think I learned more about manhood from my brothers-in-law than I did from my father. Mainly because I spent so much more time with them. Especially my sister Lee Ann’s husband, Phil.

I don’t think I ever thanked him, or my sisters, for being there for me when I was young. They saved my life in so many ways. They taught me how to treat women, and how to be emotionally available. Phil gave me most of my sense of humor. He also taught me how to relate to people in a way that puts them at ease, using the aforementioned sense of humor, mostly. And he taught me how to be a husband.

I’m hoping to give that to my boys. To show them how women should be treated. To be good and godly men, and husbands.

I think I do that by loving their mother, and letting them see. If that embarrasses them sometimes, I can live with that.

They also need to see me love God, and show them what he can do in a life–the changes that can bring. I learned that part from several Godly men and fathers who came into my life every now and then, always right when I needed them.

James Hogan.

Tim Wakefield.

Matt Botkin.

Merrill Roach.

Ray Traynor.

Ken Whitson.

John Whitson.

Zeb Ohland.

Paul Mondragon.

They made me realize how important it is to set an example.

It isn’t easy, and I probably should not expect it to be. Nothing good is.

So I will continue to love their mother, who is truly my better half, and the love of my life.

I will let God be my father, and example. I will love Him through the hard, and the ugly.

I will let him love me.

Brennan Manning said something once, to the effect that when our time comes, Jesus will ask us one question: did you believe that I loved you?

That may be the most important thing I can teach my kids.

God loves them. And when they believe that in their hearts, their lives will change forever.

Mine did.

ALL Who Are Weary

My older son hates getting ready for church. Not going to church, or being at church. Getting ready. So much so that occasionally he will throw a giant fit because he doesn’t understand why he needs to get dressed up.

This morning I woke up at 0500 for some reason, and I looked at my phone, of course, because that’s what you do when you wake up. One of my sisters had posted the David Crowder song “Come as You Are” to me on Facebook and mentioned the song being beautiful.

She was right. It is.

That got me thinking about the Gospel, and more importantly, Jesus.

Come as you are.

I think the most beautiful truth about Jesus (in my opinion) that can be found in scripture is that of Matthew 11: 27-28

In that passage, Jesus doesn’t make any qualifying statements about when you should come.

He doesn’t mention knotting your tie, or wearing a collar.

He doesn’t say anything about being ready, or in the right mindset.

He doesn’t even say you have to believe.

He says come to me, all you who are weary and burdened.

I will give you rest.

In my heart, he sounds something like this:

come to me with your doubt. Come with your loneliness and addiction. Come standing in that sin you just can’t seem to shake. Come mired in the filth of the world with your guilt about all the awful things you’ve done and seen hanging around your neck.

Come to me hurting. Come to me with your wounds still bleeding. With missing limbs. With that chasm down the middle of you that only I can fill. You don’t have to be ready.

Just come as you are.

As the year ends, have you been thinking about what’s missing?

Why 2014 blew so hard you don’t even want to know what 2015 will be like?

If I never write another word, or say another word, I think I would say this to you now.

Consider Jesus.

God.

Consider finding rest for your souls.

You may think Christians are full of shit, and many of them are.

Christ isn’t, I promise you.

You may think your life is too messy, that what you’ve done is too terrible for forgiveness.

It isn’t.

Consider Jesus.

Maybe you’re wondering about God, and yourself, and wondering what to do next.

Consider Jesus. Find a bible. You can get them free in the Kindle store if you have a smart phone.

Talk to someone.

Listen, folks. Maybe some of you will happen across this post and wonder who in the blue hell I am to tell you to do anything?

I’m no one special. I’m a man, like every other man. I’m a person just like you.

I doubt sometimes. I hurt and have been hurt. I am far from perfect. I lust. I hate. I mess up all the time.

But in March of 2000, I was able to literally lay my burdens down and it felt wonderful.

If you want to know more about it, scroll through my blog, or ask me in the comments.

If there’s anything you want to know about Jesus and how to know him from a regular person, I would be happy to answer any question I can without judgment.

If you don’t want to comment here, you can look me up on Facebook and message me. My name is on my blog page.

Talk to someone. Talk to God.

Come as you are.

Don’t wait.

A Collision

All quibbling about the actual date of Christmas aside, tonight into tomorrow really does represent something extraordinary.

Heaven meeting earth; a representation of horizon both literal and figurative.

It doesn’t seem likely, really.

Heaven

colliding

with earth.

God’s relentless love crashing into man’s desperate need.

The mere contemplation of such a thing nearly wrecks me, and all I can think of is…why?

The Thing to Remember

There is something I don’t want to forget. It would be easy to, because I have a great deal on my mind right now, and it’s all tied together.

Health, family, church, worry, finances, Christmas and many other things all competing for my attention at the same time.

There is only so much to give and that’s what makes it easy to forget.

I am a broken individual, and in certain ways always will be. I am weird, and mixed up sometimes, and even though I wish I could fix myself and all the things that are wrong with me, I can’t.

And that is what I forget.

I can’t fix myself.

For me, that’s the reminder I need this time of year. That’s what Christmas is about.

We couldn’t fix our problems, so God made a way for us.

He sent Jesus, Immanuel. In a lowly way to a lowly place.

And that’s Christmas.

Whether it be in December (it probably wasn’t) or sometime in the Spring (it probably was), the thing we need to remember about Christmas is that it means there is no longer just us trying to do everything.

We don’t have to try and fix ourselves.

We are seen in the place we are right now. We are known. We are loved.

We aren’t alone.

We never were.

Merry Christmas.

Before

A lot of people don’t think Christmas is that big of a deal, all things considered. It’s a day set aside for good old American-style capitalism, right? Maybe the family gathers, and it’s one of the few days of the year a whole bunch of people who normally don’t go attend church. So that’s cool.

But it’s just another day, right?

Not for me, and not for most folks who believe in what many might call “traditional” Christianity, if such a thing exists.

Here’s why, to my way of thinking.

Before Jesus could learn in the temple

Before he could read the torah

Before he learned how to work with his hands at the side of his father on earth

Before he saved the best wine for last

Before he made the blind see

Before he made the dead walk

Before he fed multitudes

Before he healed hearts and bodies and minds

Before he was chained to a Roman whipping post and flogged to within an inch of his life

Before he felt the desolation of his father in Heaven’s abandonment

He had to be born.

Now, think about all those things passing before his eyes as he hung there with his head down. Did he know what was to come upon his birth?

We don’t know.

We do know that when he cried out “eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani” it was with his heart ripped out in a way that man can never know.

And that was for us.

Been thinking about that ever since Eric shared that this morning in the kids ministry devotional and communion time.

And that’s why Christmas is such a big deal to me.

Black People, White People, and Deuteronomy

I saw a YouTube video today from a man—a black man—regarding the “situation” in Missouri following the grand jury decision not to indict Darren Wilson in the killing of Michael Brown. He made the video back in August, but I think it applies even more now, following the madness of the past two nights. Here’s the video, if you’d like to see it.

I think he’s got some really great points, and though his video is made with African-American people in mind, I think we can all (yes, white people, too) glean some wisdom from it. Watch it and you’ll see what I mean.

You say you want change? Then change!

Deuteronomy 2:3 is mentioned, and I don’t think I’d ever heard that applied to this kind of strife before. It’s perfect. It doesn’t allow for apportioning blame. It just speaks the truth.

Haven’t we gone ‘round this mountain long enough? Turn north!

If you want things to change, change yourself! You need to. I need to. I want to be able to raise my kids and know I’ve done all I can to show them that people should be judged by the “content of their character,” not pigment.

That goes “both,” actually “all” ways.

We are all very different in the way we feel things.

Different in the way we react to things.

Different in our opinions.

Different in our hopes and dreams for ourselves and our families.

But we are also all the same.

We can’t do it on our own. We are not made to be alone, or go through things alone. We were created to be in community with one another.

It isn’t impossible.

But we have to change to make it happen.

Haven’t we gone ‘round this mountain long enough?

Let’s turn North.