The Rest of Summer

What a hiatus! Not that anyone really missed my blogging, obviously, but still! We've been so incredibly busy with everything at NEXT, Providence, and life, in general, that blogging has been an afterthought for the past months. Well, since March, as you can see. Now, with summer gradually winding down and us Wileys finding a new rhythm to life and family in our new home in McKinney, I'm finding more time to posit thoughts.

"The Rest of Summer" may appear to be the title of an article about what's going on with Carrie, Laura Kate and I the rest of this fine summer of 2009, but it's certainly not that. Summer, as far back as I can remember, has always been a time of rest from the usual grinds of school and whatnot. Even in ministry, when you have to kick it into a higher gear because of all the events you do during the summer (mission trips, camps, weekly contests, etc.), there is this weird sense of things being at relative rest.

This summer, though, has been anything but restful. From the move to NEXT trips to raising support to meeting with men from Providence on a weekly basis and teaching, things have been stressful, tense, and trying. There has been none of the relative ease of most summers, and it's something that I've missed. Most summers have the feel of a sip of cold sweet tea... everything just kind of slows down a little bit. How I pray for this feeling for the rest of the summer!

I don't want things to necessarily slow down or want to slack off, but I (and many of us) need to remember Matthew 11v.28 - "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." Christ is speaking from a spiritual perspective, when it comes to religiosity, but how desperately many of us need to be reminded that this peace and rest is for every facet of our lives. The peace that Christ gives his people is for every part of their life. So, if you are swamped with business, you have peace in Christ. If you are worried about financial problems, you have peace in Christ. If things are not going well in your family, your energy bill is through the roof, you're not getting enough time to get away and relax... find peace in knowing that we are secure in Christ and that, ultimately, we have rest in him.

Easier said that lived out and practiced, but it's always good to preach these things to yourself!

Building the Yoke

I remember hearing Matthew 11v.30 when I was about five or six and being kind of grossed out. In it, Jesus states, "... for my yoke is easy and my burden light." Y-O-K-E. This should probably be explained well to little kids, who think that for some reason, Jesus is going to dump egg on them. The thought of heavenly golden yolks being dumped on me and made into some sort of supernatural omelet weirded me out.

Then came third grade and learning about oxen while playing the super-fun computer game "Oregon Trail." Towing my wagon across the continental United States and its western territories were oxen whose yokes would continually break, costing me numerous loads of imaginary dollars.

In eighth grade, as I really began to be fascinated by apologetics and how what I believed as a Christian stacked up against the religions of the world, I learned that, in Judaism, a rabbi would "place his yoke" upon his students. This really just meant that he would teach them his particular view and theology about God, the Jewish faith, and life in general.

In college, I learned about two muscle-oriented types of yoke: a "Farmer's Yoke" in Strongman Competitions and the fact that the connected muscles of the neck, trapezius, and upper lats are called the "yoke." 

You may be asking, "Why all this talk of yokes?"

In the midst of hardship, it is vital that we (Carrie and I) remember our teammates in this ongoing work with NEXT Worldwide. We're planting churches, seeing people come to know the Gospel and beginning to be discipled, witnessing countless students' worldviews changed and even seeing pastors come to see their congregants and what the Lord is doing around the world in a different light. But we're doing this together, with many of you. We are part of an incredible team that the Lord began putting together last January.

II Corinthians 6v.14 - "Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers." We are yoked together with some incredible people. We are moving forward step by step, even when we're having to slog it out through difficult times. It is during these times and knowing this that we are still able to rejoice. Carrie and I know that we're not the only ones straining at the yoke, but we're blessed to know that there are so many others straining with us.

Nahum 1v.13 - "I will break his yoke from you and will burst his bonds apart." There is no yoke of this world that can hold back the tide of the Gospel moving forward. We experience this when we are saved (the yoke of sin and its fetters are completely broken), but also in the realization that we are part of such an incredible community, known as the Church.

Lamentations 3v.27 - "It is good for a man that he bear yoke in his youth." Although things can seem so burdensome for many of us fighting to move the Kingdom forward, this yoke is actually building us up. The Sovereign Lord has deemed a time for us to be strengthened and encouraged, even though it might be painful at the time. We build and we struggle in order that the Lord's glory may be seen in everything we do.

We constantly need to remember what types of yoke there are in our lives. The yoke of sin has been broken from around our necks. The yoke of team-work allows us to move forward together. The yoke of sanctification is heavy for a time, but allows us to grow.

"...my yoke is easy and my burden light." Although this may not always seem the case, we know that, in Christ, this is nothing but the truth. These things that we struggle with and feel so depressed and weighed-down by, are momentary. We will soon feel the sweet release of its breaking and the freedom of the strength that the Lord has grown in us.

Armor in the Tent

There are certain men, in my life, who are mentors to me without even really knowing it. These are men who I would drive hours just to have a cup of coffee with. Guys who I'd cut an hour out of anything other than being with my wife and daughter for. Men who I admire and want to be like and have a lot of influence over me. They are men whose lives I look at and measure how my life emulates and stacks up with. Do I carry the same aspects of character as these men? Biblical and modern life, relatives and friends, there are not very many of these men, but those who I admire in this way are so incredibly valuable to me. Gorden Cook is one of those men and dropped a lot of wisdom on me last week.

"And David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem, but he put his armor in his tent." (I Samuel 17v.54b)

David took the most prevalent proof of killing Goliath to the leaders of the nation. But, he took the armor and kept it, not as a sign for others to see, but rather as a reminder to himself of the battle he fought and how the Lord came through.

With everything that is going on in mine and Carrie's life, it feels like one battle after another. What Gorden did was reminded me of the real need to look back on those pieces of battle that we've taken from previous skirmishes and remember what the Lord has already done. Our great commander and general, our fortress and salvation leads us through the warfare of life. He always comes through... many of us need to remember the incredible ways that HE wins the battle and carries his children.

Fortis esto. Ardens esto. Moderatus esto.

Coram Deo

coram Deo - "to live one's life in the presence of God, under the authority of God, to the glory of God." literally, the term coram Deo means "before the face of God"

The idea behind coram Deo is something that, since I was in high school and read John Piper for the very first time (after seeing the college ministry at Southcrest Baptist go through "Let the Nations be Glad"), I have tried and tried to live out in my life. In I Corinthians 10v.21, we read "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." Whatever we're doing, we are to live in the knowledge that it is all in front of God's face.

I know that I live this out completely imperfectly and, in fact, am the chief of all hypocrites who seek to do this. But oh, how I wish to remain in a constant state of remembering this truth. In the society in which we live, though, we love to compartmentalize our lives, spiritually and in every other facet.

We seem to think that it really doesn't matter what we do the other six days of the week, as long as we're there on Sunday (or Thursday, if you're in college in some parts). We love to play the game and be "spiritual" or "religious" or even "Christian" people (it saddens me, though, when these "Christians" are the ones who compartmentalize most). How much different would churches be if Believers actually lived out a sense of coram Deo, that every little bit of life is for the glory of the Lord?

The Over-Dramatized Death of Stephen

As a society, we love having a flare for the dramatic. The movies we watch are full of drama, shows like American Idol and the Bachelor keep many Americans on the edge of their seats, and our teenagers are inundated with the idea that romance, especially teenage romance (if that even really exists) is full of it. We have these overly-dramatic views, too, of scenes from the Bible. These "Alas! Woe is me!!!" Shakespearean scenes of death, torture, glory, etc. One of my favorite examples is Christ's death on the cross. 

The common view is of a sickly skinny guy with hair that was once long and flowing, but now matted, giving an Oscar-worthy farewell address. The truth is that Christ, even in death, spoke with authority and power. He bore the pain and took it, as well as the weight of sin, for hours and hours in the heat of the day. There is nothing that says he writhed and squirmed like so many images of the Catholic church portray. I believe that Christ showed another glimpse of His power in how He faced death... not like a weakling, but like someone who knew exactly for what He was dying.

This morning, it strikes me how similar the death of Stephen is. I knew that there was similarity, but what really struck me is the same way in which we tend to over-dramatize his martyrdom. Up until this morning, I'd always thought of Stephen in a nice, long robe just kind of giving a really good speech to a bunch of people who were going to hate him, regardless of what he said. In my mind, for whatever reason, he had almost a whiny appearance. Then there's this conclusion to his incredible speech: "You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you."

Those are not words to be uttered forth by a weak man. Stephen called the Israelites out on their home turf! After speaking of Moses and redemption and Christ, Stephen used the same words to denounce the Israelites. He called them out for being no different than their ancestors, so long before. These Israelites, who thought they had everything figured out and fit into a really solid religious mold, Stephen defied and told to bring it on. We often tend to wonder why the people got so upset with Stephen? Because he knew them and called them out.

For many of us, we tend to think that a lot of guys, in the Bible, went down without a fight. Stephen went down calling out the Israelites (even though he probably knew it was going to be the last thing he ever did on this earth, and it was) and praying for them. There are plenty areas in our lives where we need to call things out and, even if it means an end to us in that area, we go down calling it out and praying, praying, praying.

Long Night, Early Morning

It is just after 5:00am and my brain is chugging steadily onward towards its morning rush hour of caffeine and sugar in the form of one 20oz. cardboard cup. I have been awake steadily since about 3:45am and off and on before that since Carrie went to sleep at 11:30pm (after a run to McDonald's for a Happy Meal and anxiously awaiting the passing of tornado sirens and massive thunderstorms). I have spent my time dozing, thinking and praying for this beautiful woman next to me. Although it's not even been 24 hours since we came in with Carrie's acute abdominal pain and the procedure done wasn't what one would necessarily consider "major," for my wife to be in any pain is just about enough to make me want to bust some heads.

In these waning moments of night, though, I'm reminded of several things, though:

1. Carrie and I have incredible people around us - our family, friends, co-workers at NEXT, and our fellow Providence church-goers... wow, I've been blown away. We talk and talk and talk about "being" the Church, not just playing church, living missionally and a host of other catch-phrases to make us sound as though we're "different from those other churches and Christians..." but rarely see any difference. Cancel that thought. God has put us in the middle of a network of people who continually challenge, support, tease and yes, even "endure" us. But, more than anything, the Lord has placed us in the middle of an incredible network of people who know what it is to love.

2. The Lord's timing is perfect - So many factors that could have gone wrong... I was out of town all day on Monday, Carrie had an inkling that something was amiss just a few days ago, we didn't have an uber-stressful day ahead at the office, Andy and Robin were already coming down to spend some time with us and also Cassie and Curtis, Cassie was already coming up to the Northern Climes to watch LK for the day... it's ridiculous to see God's hand at work in such huge ways. All of that aside... Carrie found her new OBGYN down here (she was the OBGYN on call for the ER)!

3. I know that there will be rough times in marriage, but, I'm reminded again of the pain that Christ suffered for His Bride, the Church, and that I would willingly take all the pain that Carrie has endured on myself in a heartbeat. - This brought to mind Ligon Duncan's call to husbands from last years "Together for the Gospel" conference when he said these words: "You love your wife in light of how Christ loved the Church. He gave His life up for her and you are to do the same!" In a world awash in the heresy of emasculated men, husbands must be, in the words of Steve Farrar, the "point men" of their families and LEAD. I've been praying that God might enable me to treasure my wife and my daughter even more and I don't know how I could love the woman next to me any more, at this point in life.

God is good. He continues to watch over His people and lead them forward in advancing His Kingdom and, ultimately, magnifying His glory.

Redemption

As a little boy, I had a fear of being kidnapped. I can remember planning out how I would pretend that someone had already "gotten to me" if there was ever a kidnapper in my house. Whether it was because of movies I saw when I was little, the constant "Have You Seen Me?" advertisements in mailers and at the post office, or even broadcasts in the middle of Chicago Cubs baseball games on WGN, I was scared of being kidnapped and held for ransom. The movie "Man on Fire" was playing in my head almost two decades before it came out.

As we began our new sermon series at Providence over Exodus, some of these thoughts came flooding back to me. Exodus is the story of God's redemption of His people from slavery in Egypt. As I sat there and thought about these fears from childhood, it reminded me of how incredible it is that Christ has redeemed His children.

What would it be like to be kidnapped and not even know it? The heartache, loneliness, abuse, and everything else that comes with our idea of being kidnapped? Or, even worse, to be constantly wooed into a stupor by your kidnapper to where you just thought the things that were going on around you were how things were supposed to be?

To realize and really understand what Christ did in redeeming us is an incredible thought. He paid our ransom so that we might no longer be under the control of the kidnapper. Through His sacrifice, He glorified Himself by purchasing our lives.

We live in a world that doesn't even know it's been kidnapped. In fact, it's very being desires to be with the kidnapper, since we fall into believing that he gives the best treats and candy. Yet, we know the ransom that has been paid, in Christ's blood, for us.

I pray that my daughter and wife know that, if one of them were ever kidnapped, their man would not stop until he had brought them home (as well as their kidnappers...). And to think... Christ has already done this for us!