Prayer request from the road...

Hello everybody! It's been a while, and I have a lot to update you on. But that will have to wait. Right now, we are in Parker, CO, visiting my terrific family. We're having a lot of fun, and we plan to be here until next Monday.

I want to ask you to pray for us. We got a call this afternoon. I can't go into details, but we were asked if we would be interested in adopting a baby boy. We have been talking about adopting again for months, so we are definitely interested, But we need pray, and lots of it. We need God to open doors. We need wisdom. We just have needs, period.

So, the Mighty Mrs. J and I would really be thankful if you would remember to pray for us.

Thanks!

Does US Christianity need to be less balanced?

I just ran across this post from John Frye over at Jesus, the Radical Pastor.  In it, he makes a strong call for the church in the US to be less "balanced," less comfortable, and less bland. 

I don't have time for much comment right now.  But this post got me thinking, and I wanted to pass along the link...

We understand the feeling...

If we had a camper, we'd be converting it too...

Sometimes I think God wants to get my attention...

I can usually tell when God wants me to learn something, or pay attention to something. He knows that I'm kind of dense, so He has to tell me important things several times. Otherwise, I don't get it.

(When the Mighty Mrs. J reads that first paragraph, I know she'll let out an "Amen!" that can be heard for miles.)

Anyway, God has been repeating something for the last few days, and I guess I should pay attention. It started when I got my weekly edition of the Door newsletter. (warning: the Door is extremely satirical, and offensive. It's not for everybody.) One of the satirical pieces was about how God worship was being replaced by Bible worship in some seminaries. The point was that there's a group of Christians who verge on bibliolatry in their doctrines and practices. In other words their trust is in their own interpretation of Scripture, not in Jesus Himself.

Then our fellowship Sunday looked over John 5. In one verse, Jesus nails the Jewish leaders with this:

You diligently study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.

Sounds like those people were trusting their interpretation of Scripture, and missing the life that Jesus offered them. I'm sensing a theme here.

Then Monday, I read this post by Joel Brueseke on his great blog.In it, he talks about how following biblical principles almost ruined his marriage. What? What he means by that is that he got so caught up in doing his husband "duties" that he forgot to just love his wife.

The application is clear: we do the same thing with Jesus. At this point, I'm pretty sure God is trying to remind me of something important.

We look for the 7 laws of spiritual success, or the 5 steps to a life God blesses. We look for any set of rules or principles that will get us farther down the Christian road. But really, those aren't the things we should be looking for in the Bible. We go to Scripture to find Him.

I need to be reminded of this all the time. It's easier to follow pre-packaged steps than to have a love relationship with Jesus. I'm just glad God thinks it's worth the effort to remind me...

Getting my theology from C.S. Lewis and John Lydon...

Toddler Houdini was a little sick today, so she and I stayed home while the Mighty Mrs. J took the other 2 kids to worship with our peeps. While they were gone TH and I lounged about, watching TV. We especially enjoyed the "History of Rock and Roll" episode on VH1 Classic. The episode we watched was about the punk era (mid-70's to early 80's). (Actually, she watched Little Bear in the living room, while I watched VH1 Classic in the bedroom.)

Mostly I just enjoyed the music and the stories. The part that got me thinking about spiritual things was a film clip that showed the very end of the last concert by John Lydon's group (I won't mention the name of the group, because it's not appropriate for a family blog. Google John Lydon if you don't know his stage name or his first group.)

After the end of their last song, Lydon yells to the crowd, "Ya ever feel like you've been cheated?" Most people thought he was saying that they had cheated the audience. But Lydon said that what he meant was that he and the group had been cheated; that they got into music expecting one thing, but found out the reality was very different, and disappointing. So disappointing they disbanded after being together only 3 years.

The spiritual application? I wonder how many of us are cheating ourselves out the blessings God wants for us. How many of us pursue things that aren't really important in an eternal sense? How many of us harbor doubts about God, thinking He's less great, less good, less loving than He actually is? How many of us see our faith as a duty to be performed, rather than a relationship to be cherished? How many of us build walls between us and other people, keeping them at a distance? All those things, and a hundred more, cheat us out of experiencing the life that God wants for us.

It reminds me of something said during a sermon entitled, "The Weight of Glory."

Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

I hope none of us will look back at our lives to discover we were "half-hearted creatures."

Thoughts on God's second chances...

On her always-thoughtful blog, Emily had a great post about her ambivalent feelings toward getting involved with kids in a local orphanage. (She's in the Ukraine, for folks who don't know.) She seemed afraid that she would use these kids, take their love and affection, and use them to heal her own emotional wounds.

Her post reminded me of feelings that I've fought with most of my life. (By the way, the rest of this post isn't about Emily's post. It's about my reaction to her post. She speaks very well for herself.) I've spent way too much time and energy keeping people at arm's length. My defense against people getting too close? Humor (or the attempting of humor, at least). And avoidance. Especially in my twenties, when I found it really hard to be around people, except for a close circle of friends. During that time in my life, I would have full-blown panic attacks whenever I was in social situations.

It took me forever to get my bachelor's degree. The panic attacks were one reason why it took so long. I would register for classes, then not be able to walk into class. I mean, I wouldn't be physically able to move my body into the classroom. It's bizarre. I understand that. But it's how I lived for a long time.

I know now that the panic attacks were part of my twisted brain's desire to protect me from getting hurt. And so were all the other ways that I kept people from getting too close. But the results were not at all what I wanted--missed opportunities for jobs and relationships, wrong beliefs about myself and the people around me. And I think I did use some people for my advantage.

The good news? Those awful panic attacks are mostly gone. And I don't fear letting people see me for who I am. God has brought me a long way. (I still have a long way to go!) And my life is better than ever. Even more important, I see how great life is, and I can appreciate it. Soon, I'll post a little about what and who God used to put me in a different place...

A sad day for the J family...

It is a sad day for us. We had to have our sick dog, Maxine, put to sleep today. She seemed to recover for a few days from her illness. But she got worse over the last couple of days, when we took her to the vet this morning, there was nothing else to be done.

Little McGyver is pretty upset. The girls are a little young to get the whole idea of what's happening. And of course, the Mighty Mrs. and I are sad. Max was the first living being we took care of together.

Pray for us. I know she was just an animal, but she was important to us...

Am I building a relationship with God?

I'm reading a great book right now. It's "The Naked Church" by Wayne Jacobsen. (His unbelievably great website, Lifestream, is right here.) It's been really convicting and challenging for me. I've mentioned before that one of my spiritual life goals is to develop a first-hand faith. A faith where I see God at work in my life, and the lives of people around me.

Jacobsen talks a lot about developing intimacy with God. He talks about the normal Christian life as one where we actively hear His voice and depend on Him for everything. Sadly, this isn't true in my life, or in many lives of the Christians I know. But it seems that it was more normal among Christians in Bible times.

Instead, we depend on everything else. We look to preachers, churches, disciplines, anything except God Himself.

The thing that bothers me most is this: if intimacy with God is the norm for Christianity, what does that say about me? What does that say about the church in America, where over 70% of people attending church don't expect to encounter God during the service? It must break God's heart that I'm so far from what He wants to be in my life.

It's times like this that I'm really thankful that God loves me in spite of what I am...

Paralyzing Perfectionism

My little boy is perfect. Or at least he thinks he is. Little McGyver can't stand to make a mistake. He expects to do everything perfectly the first time. When we introduce a new sight word to him, he sometimes cries if he doesn't know it right away. Even though we tell him it's OK not to know it, that he'll get it before long. That's not good enough. "I'll never know it FOREVER!" is how he responds.

The Mighty Mrs J and I both have the same tendencies. So we are trying to help him know that it's OK not to be perfect. So far we've only had moderate success. But, I've only had moderate success in my own life learning that I don't have to be perfect.

The worst part about expecting to do everything perfectly? It keeps me from trying things that I might not be good at. Knowing that I'll probably flub up a few times (or a lot of times) before I get something right is frightening, almost paralyzing, to me. So I don't do anything.

I've missed out on some really super things in my life because I was too afraid I'd do something badly. I'd like my kids to know that's a normal fear. I'd also like them to know that making mistakes, even big, embarrassing ones, is also totally normal...

One small step...

Little McGyver is climbing trees. Well, one tree actually. It's the tree in our back yard. I nailed small pieces of wood going up the trunk of the tree for LM to use as footholds, and now he can scamper right up into the upper branches.

He loves climbing, and I love to see him climb. Really I think I get more out of him climbing than he does. Growing up, I wasn't allowed to do dangerous things like climb up a tree. My mom was pretty overprotective, and the thought of something happening to me was more than she could handle. So, there was a lot of stuff I couldn't do because it was "too dangerous." I grew up afraid of a lot of things because they were "too dangerous." I couldn't realize it at the time, but my mom was really afraid of losing me. She had some losses in her life, and I don't think she processed them very well. So I kind of became the destination point for a lot of her fears.

But enough of my $.25 psychology. The main reason I write about this is because I'm determined to pass on as few of my neuroses as possible to my kids. That's why my son is up a tree. And soon, so will my daughters. I figure they'll be plenty messed up with their own mental/emotional issues. I'll keep mine to myself...