Well I hope everyone is out enjoying their summer. Wait….what?!?!? It’s September 1st?!?!?!? It’s quite cold outside?!?!?!? School started today?!?!?!? But… But…. But….. there’s nothing we can do to change it?
Every year around this time we all start saying that summer just flew by faster than any other summer. Apparently summer is once again defying the laws of time and continuing to speed up.
It was an interesting summer for me and my family. I said bye to a grandma and a young man I use to spend a lot of time with. I realized how fast my children are growing up as I watched both of them learning to swim and my son play his first season of t-ball. During my baseball games I once again displayed a wonderful and positive attitude (note sarcasm). I grew an extra limb in the shape of an iPhone. I became busier and busier with work as my business continues to grow but am wearing down a little as lots of it is not in the core area I want to be focusing on. (Not that I’m complaining. Lots of people are without work all together right now and I realize how blessed I am to be working steadily as a full-time freelance artist).
As a family we decided it was time to once again begin committing to a family of believers and we chose a congregation we were going to investigate and begin worshiping with. We promptly followed that up by missing four Sunday services in a row. Oops. (I’ve missed more Sunday worship times in the last 7 months than I have in the last 10 years)
It’s now been 7 months since I finished my time in paid ministry. In some ways it seems like yesterday I was done and other ways it seems like ages ago. Some of that time has been spent in lowly places filled with struggle and resentment. However, I “tweeted” the other day that I’ve been feeling some rumbling in my spirit (For those of you that replied to that tweet I mean spirit not stomach). I am all about doing things full out, 100 percent and wanting to do them as correctly as I can and since I left paid ministry I’ve been having troubles figuring out how that works for me in my journey and as we look at getting seriously connected to a church somewhere. I am in no way saying you need to be staff at a church to be full out for God or the church, not in the slightest. But I’ve spent the majority of the last 10 years leading in some form or another on staff at a church so I’m trying to figure out my place.
So I’m declaring right here and now that I want to rejoin the conversation. I want to regain the passion in my faith and spiritual walk and do my part for God’s kingdom. I want to be part of the larger church community as we together wrestle with what a journey of faith looks like and how the church is called to minister to the world. I want more (sorry I know that last sentence was pure cheese).
So after much kicking and screaming I joined Twitter. I started a personal account a few weeks ago but wanted to start one where I could share more of my thoughts on God and church. So if you are on Twitter you can follow me @wanting_more
Here on the wanting-more.ca website there is a widget on the right hand side that will display my most recent “tweets”. I’m thinking that Twitter will be the place I blurt out the large number of thoughts I have during the day that I’m not able to blog about.
So I’m a big Stephen Colbert fan. I find him funny and thought provoking and quite often after watching the show I find myself investigating things that were talked about.
Here is a clip of an interview he did with Dag Soderberg who published a new version of the bible. It’s called “The Book; The Bible Illuminated”. Again here is a link to the clip.
I’m not going to comment too much on the book because I haven’t seen or read it but some of the statements that were made really grabbed my attention and resonated with me. Mr. Soderberg said that the bible was the “most referenced yet least read book. ” That his organization’s goal is to bring about discussion and bring the bible “from the book shelf to the coffee table. ”
I’m totally into their goals for the bible, but I don’t want to get to excited because I don’t know too much about this version. Like I said I resonate with all of their goals and want to see Christians engage the world but I want them to engage the world with Jesus. Are the pictures and things they’ve added going to help engage the world with Christ and His message or are they a cool way to sell books and going to be a distraction from the message?
Again I haven’t seen the book so I’m not going to give my opinion on it. I just want to be careful before I get to excited about it. I did a very quick google search and didn’t see any rage over the book but nothing that seemed to rant and rave over it (other than the publishers homepage). I’ll probably order a copy because I’d love to see it and know if it could be a useful ministry tool and when I do I’ll write a review.
Has anyone seen the book or any thorough reviews? Anyone have any thoughts on what their trying to do?
Hi my name is Charlie and I’m a delinquent blogger (Hello Charlie!)
It has been almost 3 months since my last post and this blog needs some major updating. I apologize for my long absence (although I’m sure everyone survived without me). When I started the blog I promised myself I wasn’t going to be one of those people who stuck with it for a short while and then dropped off the face of the earth. OOPS! Well I’m back now.
So why the long absence you may ask. Well the best way to describe it would be that I have had no interest in putting effort into anything spiritual. This includes (but is not limited to) finding a new church home, study and this blog. I told one friend how I was feeling and he asked if I no longer believed. I said I still believed and would speak for or defend my faith in Jesus, but I just didn’t feel like doing anything with it or about it.
Needless to say I wasn’t in the greatest place. But I’m starting to get my head out of my you know what and trying hard to get back where I and God want me to be. I guess it’s just a part of the journey.
Hopefully you’ll continue to join me and we can share our adventures together. I’ve got lots of interesting things to share over the next while. Things about me and my journey as well as some information and things that I hope will help you on your journey.
Found this track on Youtube. I’m totally a blues and funk guy so I love the vibe of this track. Something different than the typical Christian music people usually produce both lyrically and musically. Check it out (not sure if it will show up in RSS readers. You might need to click to the site).
Well I’ve been thinking more and more about where I’m at in my spiritual journey. In a post last week I talked about my desire to have a greater impact on non-believers around me. As I’ve been wrestling with it I’ve been reminded continually that it all starts with me.
The big picture is that I want to see the world and lives changed for God. I think most believers would say that as well. The problem is that we’re so busy trying to change the world around us that we forget that the change starts with us. If we want to see God work in our community and the people we interact with we need to first allow Him to work in our own lives. We cannot expect to have a real impact until we have been really impacted.
This isn’t just a one time thing I’m talking about. We need to continually allow God to change and reshape us. The changing of the world starts with the change in ourselves. So I’ve been trying to allow God into my life more and more to show me what still needs worked on. Unfortunately that’s never going to stop. So the other thing that I need to remember is I can’t wait for me to have everything perfect (cause that’s never going to happen). I’m trying to find that balance or tension between allowing God to prepare me to go into the world and knowing that He’s with me and I’m capable of going out into the world.
So Monday was my son’s third birthday. I’ve never seen birthday celebrations like Liam got this week. Sunday was a birthday party with 3 of his grandparents. Monday was a little party with his other grandparent. Wednesday was a blow out bash with a bunch of his little friends. Needless to say this morning Liam was asking about his party and for cake. We’re trying to help him understand that his birthday has now past.
I had a blast watching all of the little kids yesterday but especially Liam. I love how free he is. He’s just partying and doesn’t have a care in the world. He could care less about what any of us think about how he looks. He doesn’t care if he “looks stupid”. Here’s a couple of picture of him blowing out his birthday candles and how excited he got when everyone was cheering and clapping. (Not sure if they’ll show up in RSS readers or not. Might have to click to the website)
Man I wish I was that free. Especially in my walk with and worship of God. I wish that when I was a worship leader I felt like I had the freedom to just celebrate God like that. Totally free to pour my all into it without a care of anything else. No worries of what others thought. Just giving into the moment between God and I.
Sorry for the lack of a Resistance Fighters post yesterday. It was my little guys 3rd birthday on Monday and between celebrating on Sunday and Monday (one more party still to come on Wednesday) I’m a little behind on the blogging.
So I was walking home this morning from an appointment (yes I chose to walk) and just letting my thoughts run a little. Reflecting on where life is at right now. The big thing that is missing for me right now is some ministry/outreach. When I was working for a church I was constantly going on about needing to be more outwardly focused and reaching out to the community. Right now I’m not really putting that in to practice in my own life. We still have no idea what we are going to do about church on a long term basis but this issue goes beyond that.
I am the only believer in my family and one of only a handful of believers among all the people I grew up with. Despite this I don’t feel like I’m spiritually investing in any ones life. I’m not connecting with people I should be and I’m not in the community the way I feel believers should be. I am building into the lives of my students and have had a number of fantastic conversations with some recently. I have a few who really feel comfortable sharing stuff with me when they’re having a hard time but I still feel like there’s more.
Maybe I’m being too hard on myself. Maybe I’m missing some good that I am doing. I am thrilled with the direction my life is taking right now but I do still feel like there is something missing. I’m not positive what it is but I’m looking forward to finding out what it is and what God is going to do with it.
As I’ve been writing this post the thought that started going through my mind is that the key for me is to be patient. I have a tendency to try and force things sometimes when I feel like I’m missing something. I need to remember that the plan for this time was transition and healing. Why would I want to force or rush that? I want to come out of this time energized and refreshed and prepared for whatever ministry God has planned for me.
Thanks for reading my ramblings. This wasn’t my intent but it was very therapeutic.
So I was spending some time practicing and a thought occurred to me. (“Wow Charlie, you developed a thought.” Pretty surprising I know).
We as Christians have serious troubles with listening. This applies to many different contexts but I’m referring specifically to listening to God.
We spend lots of time doing Christian activities (that is a good thing) and hopefully lots of time in God’s word and prayer. We strive to find God and meet with Him. We try to follow where he is leading because we know that is what He wants and is best for us.
But how good are we at listening?
Let me explain why this thought came to my mind. This might seem quite odd to some of you but I’ll do my best to explain. Quite often when someone is trying to learn an instrument they learn “how” to play that instrument. Let’s take the piano as an example. They have an understanding of how it’s suppose to sound and how to make it sound that way. So practice time is spent trying to manipulate the piano to sound the way it’s suppose to.
Here’s the odd part that most people don’t realize. When most people are playing an instrument they don’t actually listen or hear what they are playing. You may be thinking ”that sounds funny, how do they not hear it?”. When playing most people can hear when they hit a wrong note or make a big mistake but don’t hear the sound of the instrument and or the musc they are playing. A popular (and excellent) exercise that many people do is to record their playing to hear it back and listen to how it sounded. That is a great exercise but did you catch that? We have to record ourselves to hear how we sound! Very few people learn how to listen to their instrument as they are playing. They don’t hear the flow and the movement, the expression, the subtle harmonies or how the sound is filling the room. They are too busy learning how to manipulate their instrument instead of hearing what they sound like and adapting to it. Best example I can give is someone absolutely reefing on their instrument. It’s loud but it sounds like garbage. Every instrument has a volume where it “sings” and we need to learn to listen for that.
In the example of classical pianists that’s what separates a good player from a great one. With the great ones you don’t just hear a lot of notes played really fast, you hear harmonies and textures and emotion. Yes they are playing fast and fancy but it’s about so much more than the notes.
When I look at people of faith whom I admire and have been great examples to me they have that listening quality. Yes they do lots of things but it’s about so much more than those things and it’s not done with the intent to (for lack of a better word) manipulate God. They are in a relationship with Him and when they spend time with God it is a two way street. They are listening to and in tune with God. They aren’t doing it just to get everything right, they are doing so they can hear God, see how He meets with them and fills the spaces in their lives.
A place where I share my thoughts and ramblings about spiritual life and my desire for more of God (for me, for the church and for the world). Thanks for stopping by.
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