8 Years to the day...

Eight years to the day... my wife and I's first child would be eight year old. Since then the Lord has blessed us with 4 wonderful, healthy children. But this was not t be for Ezri, our first child. Ezri's due date was May 25th, 2001. However, Ezri's life ended just six weeks after conception, although Ezri's mother and I did not find out for another six weeks after that. To many, what we lost was not even a baby, but we know that it was, that it was a child unique in all creation.

So on this day, eight years later, while I rejoice in the four children God has blessed us with here, and revel in their exploits as we watch them grow, I look forward to that day when our whole family can be reunited, when Ezri can meet Ezri's three brothers and sister. What a day that will be as we rejoice at the feet of our King.

God bless you everyone, and God bless you Ezri. No daddy still has not forgotten you. Not now, not ever.

How Should the Church as a Fellowship Give?

First of all, I want to relay a true story to you which is an example of how NOT do things when it comes to benevolent giving. Several years ago, Joan and I were in a young married Sunday school. In many ways, it was an awesome period in our marriage and our walk with the Lord. Our young marrieds group was very close. We had an awesome time worshiping and fellowshipping. We all knew each other and often got together outside of the context of our Sunday school.

Well, at some point some dear friends of ours in that Sunday school encountered a financial hardship. They were a single income family at the time and money was tight. Then their central AC went out. The word from the HVAC man was that it needed to be replaced, and they did not have the money to fix it. On top of that, this happened during a particularly hot and sticky summer.

Our group decided to bless this family, which had been a member of our little fellowship for years. We were all going to contribute to a pot and give them enough money to pay for a significant portion of a new AC unit. Then the "Church" got involved. By church, I mean the corporation, the official 501c3 incorporated church. Someone in church leadership got wind of the situation and insisted that this gift could not come directly from those who gave, but had to come from through the organization which was the church, (not to be confused with what I believe the church is really supposed to be, a fellowship of believers). On top of that, they said we could not just give the money to them, we had to pay it directly to the AC company. What complicated this more was the fact that by the bureaucracy which was the church office got it's act together, this family who had been sweltering in the heat for months now, finally just purchased a new AC unit on credit. In end we were able to convince the powers that be in this church to give the money directly to the family so they could pay off the credit they used to purchase the AC.

The point of all this is that we did not see ourselves so much as duty bound members of this particular church as much as we were just a fellowship of believers who cared for one another and wanted to just spontaneously through the Spirit, to bless this family. The corporate church, (as in corporation) butted into the situation and I feel, stifled the spirit and delayed God's blessing and provision for this family.

My analysis of this behavior in retrospect is that this was about control. It seemed like church leadership was afraid that we might do it wrong and that we did not go through them. We weren't trying to use church funds, or use any resource of the church, but because we were all belonging to this Sunday school, which was in this church, they felt we needed to submit to their authority on this matter. Now we did submit, to honor the Lord, not to honor men, but I feel God was grieved by the way the bureaucracy intruded into this situation.

This all seems to come out of three things, religiosity, (read Pharisees), a spirit of control, and a substantial fear that they laity might do it wrong, and I suppose by extension, that the leadership would some how be held responsible by God or men. Now I totally agree whether it's our personal finances, or a church’s, that we have an obligation and duty to spend our money wisely and not just throw it away. However, I think we can go too far in defining rules and regulations, where we offer the Spirit no room to work. Yes, we don't want to give money to the drug addict we know is going to go use it to by cocaine, that's just common sense. But what about the poor family down the road? Do we not give to them because they might buy a big Mac instead of fruits and veggies at the supermarket?

This leads to my next point. The bible tells us we are to be generous an give hilariously. Now if I give $50 to a beggar, whose money is it, mine, the beggars, or God's? Whose responsibility is it what the beggar does with that money? If God told me to give it to him, it's God's responsibility, meaning that this frees me from the need to control it or force the beggar to purchase only church approved items. At that point, what the beggar does with the money becomes an issue between him and God. Sometimes I think we take on more responsibility than we should on these items, ours is only to obey. So how do we give to others in a responsible way,... through the Spirit! If we are one with Christ, we are also one with the Father and the Spirit, and can know His will. Therefore, if we give according to the Spirit's leading, we can never go wrong.

In conclusion, I would say, yes we need some general guidelines on giving, so people basically know where the boundaries are and what's appropriate. That being said, those guidelines should not be so rigid that the Lord can't use us to do something we think is ridiculous, but in reality is at the bulls eye of what God wants to do.

Etwal Gade - Star Watching

I thought you might want to see another photo one of my favorite hobbies, star watching. This is a photo of the Great Orion Nebula in the constellation of Orion. I took this photograph on January 31, 2009 using my Olympus E-1 camera and my Orion 8" Telescope. This photo is a composite of two photographs, 1 of a 60 second exposure and one of a 10 second exposure. Doing this allows me to capture the brightness and color of the gas cloud, while at the same time being able to capture the fine detail toward the center of the nebula. What you are looking at is hydrogen and other traces gasses being ionized by the large stars in the center of the nebula. The radiation and solar wind from these stars is what powers this nebula and makes it one of the most wonderful things in the night sky.

There was a time when I felt guilty about spending time on this hobby. However I cam to realize that for me, this was a form of worship of my creator and a wonderful way for me to spend time with him, since I am usually out late by myself when I do this. I hope you enjoy this and the other photos I have posted here. Here to the right, you can see a photo of the moon I took on the same night.

Painting for an audiance of One

Stirring...

Recently a member of the fellowship we are a part of gave everyone at our home meeting a book written by a young artist named Akiane and her mother. She began painting at a very young age and has what I call a miraculous ability to draw and paint. You can see some of her work and read a bit about her story at http://www.akiane.com/. I found as I read her life story so far, and viewed her painting that something inside me stirred. Something I had almost forgotten about.

Where the dried paint is...

Many of those who know me may not know this, but I used to paint. Seriously. Now don't get me wrong, my ability is no where near what I would call professional, no one would sell any of my paintings for even a 100 dollars much less thousands, but paint I did. I love to create, and painting was one of those outlets for me. And then life happened, got busy, moved on to other things. Sitting somewhere in the garage was a box with some old tubes of paint and some brushes.

Awakening...

The more I read about Akiane's story, I began to wonder where my old brushes were. I began to be drawn to paint again. Now, I am not kidding my self, you will probably never see my work at an art show or at a museum, or pay lots of money for it, but I felt drawn (pardon the pun) to paint, and began to feel that this was at the Lord's leading. As the fire welled up within me, I felt I just had to find my brushes. I tore my garage apart for some time, totally disorganizing it, until I found them, long forgotten until now.

Painting for an Audience of One...

So with my feeble skill, I paint for an audience of one. For it was He who gave me hands to hold the brush, it was He who gave me a mind to perceive beauty, and it was He who provided the inspiration to paint in a hundred sunsets and thousands of glistening ocean waves. I feel that for me, I must paint and I must paint for Him, to bring him glory in what ever small way I can, and because it was He who put this desire in me.

Out of the Mouths of Babes...

Today I went to the store and bought a few more colors (to replace some of the one's dried out) and a few new brushes. I brought them home tonight and my children were very excited and wanted desperately to watch daddy paint. Especially my second born. In passing I had mentioned that I felt God was leading me to paint again, but I did not make a big point of it. I did not promise to paint tonight, and had not really meant to paint tonight. But for some reason my big "bug bug", got it set in his mind that daddy was going to paint tonight. Well I was busy and it came time for bedtime, I told him he could watch me paint tomorrow. He immediately burst into tears. I pulled him aside and I asked him, "buddy, what's wrong?" "I really wanted to watch you paint..." he replied. When I asked him way he said "I think if Jesus told you to paint, you should paint." How could I say no to that? Out of the mouths of babes, comes the voice of the almighty. So I painted one of the Sand dollars I brought back from South Carolina many years ago. With my children huddled around, I painted a sunset over the ocean.

Why...?

Why do I paint, I mean really? I don't know. I think partly it's a mystery he will unravel for me at a later time. All I know for sure, is that it is for Him, and I enjoy it.

What gives value

For many years I struggled with my worth as a human being. Often thinking I was inferior, worthless and useless. Over the years however, the Lord has been faithful to re-write this defective piece of my programming. Through the relentless efforts of my loving wife, divine intervention and scripture the Lord has helped me to see that I have value. If I have value, then you, the reader also have value. But why?

Let's say I have two violins. The first way is made by Crescent Company. The second one is made by some "dead guy" named Anontio Stradivari . Which one is worth more? The one made by Stradivari of course, you exclaim. But, why? Because of WHO made the violin. The maker is what gives it value. It's the same with us. We are priceless, one of kind works of art because of WHO made us. We are the work of His hands, the fruit of His labor. We have undeniable value because the living God created us. It was not an assembly line creation, but that of a craftsman, delicately and precisely crafting each one of in His image.

Warfare Lesson from a FootBall Game

Not this weekend, but last weekend, my Nebraska Corn Huskers lost. And they did not just loose a little bit, they lost in a huge and devastating fashion. I got to thinking about the things that lead to such a horrible loss.

Two things really did them in above all the other minutia of the game. The opposing team scored right away, quick and hard and overwhelmed their will to fight. The other thing was that Nebraska kept giving the other team the ball through fumbles and interceptions. In other words, they kept shooting themselves in the foot. And then the Lord spoke to me.

While I was contemplating the this loss, and some of my own struggles with sin and failure, the Lord spoke to me an object lesson using this football game.

The enemy hates those of us who call Jesus Christ Lord, and who attempt, (all be it feebly at times) to live a life set apart for God. With that hate he tries to either destroy us or cripple us to a point where we are no longer a threat to his evil plans. To do this he will try many things, but among other things he will hit us hard with an attack, a temptation or “problem”. If we are not on our guard, this can have the effect of crippling us to a point were we stop fighting and just let him keep hitting us, just like my Corn Huskers kept letting the opposing team make touch down after touch down.

The other way we fail is that we shoot ourselves in the foot. We do things that seem like innocent little compromises which end up opening us up to a big attack from the enemy of our soul. We keep handing the ball back to the enemy. It might take the form of having the second piece of cake when we know we should not, or taking a second glance at the pretty woman walking down the street. Either way, we know we shouldn’t. It’s not that either these examples are sins in and of themselves, but I know for me, they can lead to sin. We all know what our weaknesses are, those things that will cause us to take the next step, after which leads us into sin and failure. The enemy knows this too and delights in making sure we have ample opportunity to fail.

The point I feel that the Lord was trying to make to me, and indeed all of us, is that we must be on our guard at all times. This is much more important than a football game, and the stakes are much higher. We must train ourselves to be on our guard and be ready to hit the enemy back immediately when he strikes, or else apathy and defeatism settles in and we can barely breathe, much less repulse his attack. We must also discipline ourselves to guard against those things we know will trip us up.

By ourselves, all this is impossible, but with God anything is impossible. He is also merciful and just. And thought I fail a thousand times, still he hears me, forgives me and saves me. To God be the Glory of all I will become.

Do we do what HE says?

I was reading the parable of the house built on rock and the house built on sand. Funny thing is I never realized the question Jesus asked as a preface to this story. He asked "Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord', and do not do what I say?" Whoa! Ouch! Then he goes on to tell us that he who puts his words into practice is like the man who builds on the rock and he who hears but does not put them into practice, is like he who builds on the sand. I feel in many ways that this is an indictment of modern Christiananity, right out of the scripture. We have services, go to potlucks, sing hymns, and then go right back to life as usual with no power, no obedience. The scripture tells us obedience is better than sacrifice.

I think what was attractive to us about the StoreHouse, (the part of the body of Christ we are participating with, i.e. church), after we left our old church, is that is was a group of people who were DOING what He says. Omaha Rapid Response, Angels on Wheels, etc, etc. People not just obeying God on Sunday, but endeavoring to do it everyday. This ties directly into what God is calling my wife and I to. In fact the Lord pointed out to me this morning as I read that the breakthrough we have had the last several weeks did not come until we obeyed, until we took that step of faith and did as He asked. I dare to suppose that when Christians actually obey the word of the Lord, it inspires Him to come through for us in mighty and awesome ways!