Two Sides to the Same Coin

We recently started meeting on Thursday nights at our new space and the Crave documentary was a perfect way to start us out, clarifying the direction we are moving at Genesis.

In the documentary we saw the importance of how leading a person to faith in Christ may begin first with simply joining them in their journey even as Jesus, unknown to the disciples at the time, joined them on the road to Emmaus. They soon found themselves in a

conversation with God, not even aware that God Himself was the One initiating that conversation.

It seems that many who follow Christ have embraced a certain method of communicating their faith that is often detached, judgmental, and really very different from what we read or see in Jesus himself and maybe instead of trying to win a debate and prove God to someone, we can hope to guide them to a place where they might meet and encounter God themselves.

Sunday morning was the flipside of Thursday’s coin as we are going through 1 Corinthians. It’s quite a contrast to go from journeying with people to find faith to disciplining someone in their faith; difficult unless you realize that the latter is dealing with family, which brings a whole new and complicated dimension to the situation.

It’s a hard sell in today’s society to see that the way we live affects those around us and when we think of a faith community it is usually more like an organization or club we attend than a family to whom we belong. And though we may romanticize the idea that when one person suffers we all suffer, we are not so quick to embrace the alternative that if we screw up, it screws everyone up, but that is exactly why Paul deals so strongly with the Corinthians; because we are not just a social gathering, we are family and what we do really affects those around us.

So Paul deals with serious moral issues and we have to ask ourselves how do we deal with these situations if we really are family? If a child gets hooked on drugs, does that affect the rest of the family? If a dad logs on to porn instead of showing affection to his wife and loving her, does that affect the rest of the family? If a wife flirts with another man and tries to seduce him, does that affect the rest of the family? Of course it does.

Our purpose is not to hunt down all the problems and condemn those who struggle or fall. Our desire is to live in relationship and when these kinds of issues show up, we, in humility, recognize how essential these people are and treat them as more important than ourselves. We do everything we can to strengthen and restore them, because they are our brothers, our daughters. This is exactly what Christ has done for us. He adopted us, made us family and relentlessly works in our lives for good.

So on one side of the coin we journey with a person to find faith

And on the other side we struggle with our family through faith.

Two sides of the same coin.

I Can't Walk Away

This is dedicated to those I love who are hurting and making dangerous choices.

I Can't Walk Away

I'm sorry I don't know how,

to move on like I don't care.

Dismiss the signs all around you,

pretend not to see what's there

I'm sorry I don't know how,

to close my eyes, while you live this lie.

Ignore the danger I see you in,

and then wait till you break, till you cry.

Can I walk away?

I'm sorry I don't know how,

to let go of what matters the most.

Of you and your wellbeing

to live like you're just a ghost.

I'm sorry I don't know how,

to wash my hands of you and be done.

Though before me are two choices,

inside me, there's only one.

I can't walk away.

Perspective

It seems I can never sleep on planes no matter how late it is or how long the flight, partly because the seats are so uncomfortable (at least in coach) and partly because there’s just too much going on in my head to be able to sleep.

That was the case during our recent red eye flight to New York and though it was late and I was tired, I found myself listening to music on my ipod and staring out the window into the dark, until out the window in the distance something caught my attention. I didn't know what it was at first and seriously thought I was over-exhausted and seeing things, but it happened again and then kept happening. I finally realized that what I was seeing was lightning from above the clouds instead of from below them.

From above, there were no jagged bolts reaching for the ground, just explosions of brilliant light echoing like fire throughout the clouds. It was incredible. They were huge and they were even a bit terrifying.

I began thinking about how our perspective plays such an important role in the outcome of what we do. How some are able to go through intense difficulties and become stronger because of them, while others go through identical struggles and crumble under the pressure. How one person sees the challenge to overcome and the other is overcome by the challenge. I wondered how God’s perspective looks compared to ours. I imagined how different everything must appear, how prayer looks like incense rising up to God’s throne, how Jesus saw Satan fall like lightning from the sky as his disciples went out and did the things that Jesus himself had been doing.

I wondered how would our lives change if we could recognize the reality of heavenly things compared to the illusions of this world. How would things change if we had those eyes to see? I think the view would be incredible, huge and maybe even a bit terrifying.

My Heart Breaks

Sometimes I get lost in darkness

Sometimes my heart breaks

Sometimes my eyes swell shut

with pain I just can't take

When will the light return?

When will my heart mend?

When will my eyes open,

and I see you again.

A Hole in our Thinking

I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed, I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. - 1 Cor. 4:3,4


When my kids were young, but old enough to be left alone, we at times would come home to some great surprises, like a hole in the wall. As the interrogation process took place, asking who did this and how did it happen, often times there was no answer; silent solidarity. No one knew or saw anything, which meant that either we had a stranger hiding somewhere in the house, some poltergeist action going on, or one or more of our kids were lying. And we actually hoped it was the latter.

After the questioning (which brought no confession) there might be a sentiment sounding something like this, “God knows who did this” at which point you could feel the sigh of relief in each of the kids and I could almost hear them saying, “Good! As long as you don’t know, we really don’t care if God knows or not.” If we are being honest with ourselves we will admit that we too think this same way at times and the reality of what we feel and actually care of God is sobering.

Paul speaks of three judgments in this passage of 1 Corinthians: judgment by people, ourselves, and from God. He says that he doesn’t care what people think of him (which is usually the opposite for for us). He figures that if he is doing what is right then who cares what others think. He then says he doesn’t even judge himself and though his conscience is clear, that doesn’t mean he’s innocent. Let’s face it; we all tend to paint ourselves in the best light. We justify what we do so even though we may feel good about ourselves, that doesn’t make us innocent because of how skewed we are. He concludes with the most important judgment: God’s.

It is absolutely startling to me how the most important judgment has the least influence on our lives while the least important occupies our greatest concern. We care so much what others think and give such little regard to what God thinks.

What would our lives look like if we really cared more of what God thought than what people thought? What if we didn’t feel the need to justify our actions, but believed that should really be left up to God? I think the holes in our lives, like the hole in my wall, could be fixed a lot quicker.