Change is your friend!

                I wrote several posts ago about finding change on the floor of my bus now that I transport middle and high school students. I find it every day. I am still surprised. I forget that these are not elementary students who would throw down over a quarter and go to war over a dollar. The quarter equaled candy at school and the dollar ice cream. Come to think of it I would throw down too over candy and ice cream. It seems older students are not so inclined so it goes in our coke can bank for our Operation Christmas Child Shoe Boxes. That kind of change is my friend.

                We all know that the kind of change that involves disturbing our lives or lifestyles is NOT our friend or so we believe. Change like that will take us out of our comfortableness of what we have known. We don’t like that as a rule. Some do, but most not at all even though change is constant. I think this is a first world problem and particularly so in North America. We like and cherish comfortable and hate, despise and thwart any and all change all because it threatens our comfort, and our comfortable life.

                I have spent some time this week thinking about comfort and being comfortable. As much as I like to be comfortable and in comfort, I wonder if it the best thing for me? Is comfort my friend or enemy? The following is a list of ways comfort or comfortable is my enemy: 1) It demotivates innovation. Why make something better “that ain’t broke?” 2) It is opposed to change. 3) It stops growth. It makes it a non-starter. 4) It stifles entrepreneurship. Why do anything different? 5) It halts conquest. 6) It avoids a challenge. Consider those qualities, hallmarks of Americans and America, qualities we state with pride yet comfort and comfortable will stop them dead in their tracks. Our comfort and comfortable lifestyle is an enemy to our spiritual progress as well. When God called Abram, God was calling Abram from his comfort. The Lord said to Abram: Go out from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. Gen 12:1 (HCSB).               

I have underlined the three areas that make us comfortable but also hold is back from the greater possibility in the Kingdom of God. Abram had to leave his comfort of those people and places to become the father of a great nation, a man of great faith and the first in the lineage of the Messiah. He could not become all God had in store until he left his comfort and embraced change. The REAL challenge with change is a spiritual. One of comfort vs. faith. Comfort represents what we know and believe we have obtained through our own efforts (It’s not really true). Change requires obeying when we do not know where, how, when, and why but must trust and believe God.

Abram believed God.

⁶ Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness. Gen 15:6 (HCSB)

What about you?

In HIS Service and Yours;                                      

BroG

P.S. No change this morning but the day is young!

We just don't want to do it!

                This hurricane season has been busy. Four, count’em, four tropical storms in one season. They have not been bad locally. However other parts of our area have suffered flooding and downed trees. This last one Julia is still wandering around and just this morning (Thursday) CEMA is forecasting a return to shore in our area Sunday (I will update you later on that prophesy). I must admit I don’t want to do that again. Yes, we are prepared (well almost). Yes, the previous storms have not been bad at all for us. All of that being said, this one could be different. Life is like that. All of the preparation in the world comes down to riding the storm out (REO Speedwagon) and dealing with the aftermath.

                A story on the CBS program 60 minutes last Sunday has bothered me all week. The piece was well reported, well done so it is not the mechanics of reporting or editorial bias nor the subject matter. It was about gold star parents (parents who have lost children in military service particularly since 9/11). The story brought to light the efforts being made to help these folks in their loss. Especially on the part of blue star parents (parents who have children still serving). What has bothered me all week is the nagging question are all those efforts were helping them with the grief or facilitating their stagnation in their grief?

                The obvious answer is to make sure no other parent/family ever has to go through the loss of a child. There is hope one day Jesus will make that happen. That day is coming. But, it is not here yet and we live in a world infested, infected and affected by sin. The reality for the time being is parents will lose children. Death not just in military service but by disease, accident, defect, drugs you name it. It is going to happen. So my question is how do we help these people and families and not facilitate their stagnation in grief? I wish this was definitive but it is a work in progress.

                This morning my wife said, “God is God over Google.” She gave me permission to use this (thanks). If He is God over Google then he is God over everything even grief. That of course leads to why and I refer you to the above answer regarding sin. But God never leaves us dangling in the wind. He never leaves us nor forsakes us. We have that in writing. However he does not take away the pain either. Now we want that pain gone. But pain identifies us with others in a unique fraternity. It gives us authority and experience in their eyes. Experience you would not wish on anyone but real and undeniable none-the-less. Once connected we would like to take the burden off of these folks and they would like us to do it too. But we cannot and God does not. What we can do is comfort them as we have been comforted.

⁴ He comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 2 Corinthians 1:4 HCSB

                God’s example is to walk with them. Be there for them when they hurt and when they are happy. No, it’s not easy nor fun and at times we don’t want to do it but it is healing. No, it is not a short commitment but a marathon maybe even and Iron Man type connection. Come to think of it, Jesus is the Iron Man!                                     

In HIS service and yours,                                         

BroG

We survived a third tropical storm!

                Tropical storms really throw everything for a loop then add a short week following. Those two things make for an almost perfect storm for schedule and life in general to be extra difficult. I hope we don’t become complacent about future storms and our preparation for them since these three have not been very significant events. That being said past performance is not necessarily a predictor of future performance. The next one could be a significantly destructive storm. There is just no way to know. Preparation is the key.

                Most of us are lulled into a false sense of security and certainty on a daily basis. Life develops a routine, a rhythm that we move and dance in each day. Soon enough we believe it will always be like this because it has been like this for some time. It becomes predictable, comfortable and secure or so we think and act. This leads us to prepare for what we “know” is coming and not what could be coming. The trouble comes when the “unexpected” (what should have been expected) happens and our apple cart loses its wheels.

                An upset apple cart leads to upset schedules, activities, plans, expectations and dreams. It may lead us to an upsetting discourse directed at and to God for his lack of care and security. What we thought we understood has been shaken to the very foundations of our soul and it is God’s fault. Really? “Change is constant,” Queen Elizabeth said. True! What happened is we relaxed our preparation for change physically, emotionally and most importantly spiritually. We began to believe we had all of God we needed. This a need to know faith.

Truth is we need to know more than we can ever imagine to face the change that is inevitable in our lives. Some of those changes will shake the bedrock of our belief and faith. Because we counted on a foundation that was not and could not be solid or certain. Oh sure, it seemed solid and immovable but it turns out not so. That’s when we look so anxiously, desperately, hurriedly for a solid footing. When all along we knew where it was and who it was. That’s when we find the invitation.

                “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” Matthew 11:28-30 The Message

                How about that invitation? Jesus is inviting you and me into his presence and his home. He is inviting us into his rest, his peace, his security. That is what we do, where we go when our apple cart has lost its wheels. But what about before? How can we head this off? Preparation is the key. What about taking him up on his invitation daily. “Come to me,” he says. “Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it,” he invites. That’s storm preparation at its best. The truth is storms will come. Change is constant. Apple carts lose their wheels but we don’t have to. With daily preparation in the presence of Jesus we live with a new perspective. Let’s get ready! Be prepared!

                

In HIS service and yours,                                         

BroG

(P.S. I found some more change on the bus. Lunch could be free one day)

Can I get a nickel and two dimes for this quarter?

                This morning I was sweeping the pine straw, sand and wrappers up from the floor of the bus when I came across a bright shinny quarter. The last several days I have found change of various denominations on the floor. That is strange. I now have Middle and high school students on my route only. Previously I had elementary age children. For them, the world revolved around a dime or nickel and to misplace one meant everything stopped. Not so with this new group. That is different.

                For the most part these older kids just want to get to and from school and as quickly as possible. Not so with elementary children, they find things to do and say. Yes, the older ones are easier in that regard. They are not as animated and through today have not produced any sermon material. The younger children were always sparking new thoughts about life and living. Maybe I have not hit the sweet spot yet. Now be sure in a crowd of 54 people there are exceptions and one 9^th grader and several 6^th graders have the potential for future sermon fodder. There is hope.

                My new students have required a different routine in my afternoon schedule. I am not sure if it is better just different. Not as much sitting and waiting as before so I know that is better. I hate to sit and wait (probably you too). Wait is the ugliest four letter word in our language. Those ones George Carlin made famous all those years ago have nothing on W-A-I-T. So that change is good. The other changes, the jury is still out. That’s a danger with change, we often make judgements before we have seen the full extent of the change.

                All of us cringe with change at some level or another. Yet, change is part of life. Queen Elizabeth is attributed with saying, “Change is constant” recently. That is so true. Consider the weather, it changes by the minute or hour. Seasons change every three months. Cells in our bodies die and are replaced frequently. But somewhere in there we equate the changeless nature of God with no change. That is just not true.

                God does not change but our understanding of, our faith must be growing/changing or it is dying. To grow it must change. Like a child to an adult change must take place. But we don’t like it. I know. In just a few days a new shepherd will begin leading FBC Springfield. A change from the past, ugh but really? A previous shepherd Jeff Rollins said almost every day “God is in control.” He said that usually when I did not want to hear that because something was changing that I did not like or want. However, it is always true. God IS in control. He provides new leaders so that his people have the opportunity to grow in the image of Jesus, to mature in the faith and minster in their world as it changes. Our difficulty comes when we try to evaluate changes in the short term and not consider the long term. Too often we believe “all is lost” when it is just a new chapter in a very long saga of faith and “followship.” No shepherd is the author. The author is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, he alone is the tale’s originator. By the way God writes the best books with the craziest twists and turns and seems especially fond of the underdog, like me and you.

How about we make some change?

By the way, two dimes and a nickel are 25 cents!    

In HIS service and yours,                                         

BroG