There are times when I hear my name, turn and recognise Jesus

“Jesus didn’t look very impressive at Easter,” I said, “not in the churchy sense, and certainly not if Mary Magdalene mistook him for a gardener.” [Nadia Bolz-Weber, ‘Pastrix – the cranky, beautiful faith of a sinner turned saint’]

i am busy reading ‘Pastrix’ by Nadia Bolz-Weber, unlikely, heavily-tattooed Lutheran pastor and while i don’t necessarily agree with everything she says, for the most part it has been a challenging and refreshing read and the bits i don’t necessarily agree with are for the most part areas of following Jesus’ness that i continue to wrestle with and try to figure out – this is a book worth reading.

and this extract from her chapter titled ‘Dirty fingernails’ will hopefully give you some idea as to why:

‘As I looked out over the shivering crowd, I suggested that perhaps Mary Magdalene thought the resurrected Christ was a gardener because Jesus still had the dirt from His own tomb under His nails. Of course, the depictions in churches of the risen Christ never show dirt under His nails; they make Him look more like a wingless angel than a gardener. It’s as if He needed to be cleaned up for Easter visitors so He looked more impressive and so no one would be offended by the truth. But then what we all end up with is a perverted idea of what resurrection looks like. My experience, however, is that the God of Easter is a God with dirt under His nails.

Resurrection never feels like being made clean and nice and pious like in those Easter pictures. I would have never agreed to work for God if I had believed God was interested in trying to make me nice or even good. Instead, what I subconsciously knew, even back then, was that God was never about making me spiffy; God was about making me new.

New doesn’t always look perfect. Like the Easter story itself, new is often messy. New looks like recovering alcoholics. New looks like reconciliation between family members who don’t actually deserve it. New looks like every time I manage to admit I was wrong and every time I manage to not mention I was right. New looks like every fresh start and every act of forgiveness and every moment of letting go of what we thought we couldn’t live without and then somehow living without it anyways. New is the thing we never saw coming – never even hoped for – but ends up being what we needed all along.

“It happens to all of us,” I concluded that Easter Sunday morning. “God simply keeps reaching down into the dirt of humanity and resurrecting us from the graves we dig for ourselves through our violence, our lies, our selfishness, our arrogance, and our addictions. And God keeps loving us back to life over and over.”‘

[and then she finishes off this chapter with this piece]

‘There are times when I hear my name, turn, and recognise Jesus. There are times when faith feels like a friendship with God. But there are many other times when it feels more adversarial or even vacant. Yet none of that matters in the end. How we feel about Jesus or how close we feel to God is meaningless next to how God acts upon us. How God indeed enters into our messy lives and loves us through them, whether we want God’s help or not. And how, even after we’ve experienced some sort of resurrection, it’s never perfect or impressive like an Easter bonnet, because, like Jesus, resurrected bodies are always in rough shape.’

things i would love for you to know [part ii]

If i ever met you and we got to sit down together, perhaps over a cup of coffee or a plate of barbecue riblets, there are some things i would love for you to know… and there are a lot of things i would like you to know, but here are some more things that i would love for you to know:

[1] Be who you are. Know who you are in terms of character, belief and behaviour. These things are a creation-in-progress and will shift and adapt as you grow older and there will be strong influences from your culture, your context and the people who are both in and around your life. But make sure that you are in control of the process and make changes when you feel changes are necessary [and don’t be too proud or stubborn to do so] and not because outside forces are causing you to. If you are someone who follows Jesus, then let His life and teachings be the outside forces that help shape this person you are becoming. Also take from His example that even though He spoke differently when He was with the crowds and when He was with the religious leaders and with His own group of friends, He never changed who He was. Be who you are, in all contexts and with all groups of people. Let your Social Networking self be your hanging-out-with-your-friends self be your office self be your Sunday-morning-at-church self… and so on. Once you start wearing different masks and ‘becoming’ different people at different times to please those around you, it becomes way too stressful and complicated. Decide who you are and what you believe and be that person. 

[2] Be when you are. When you’re at school, the tendency is to make statements like, ‘As soon as I leave school…’ or ‘When I have a job…’ People tend to ask you when you will get a boy/girl-friend. The moment you have found someone to date, the questions pretty soon start to focus on marriage. On your wedding day there will be some idiot [yes!] who starts the conversation about ‘your first child’ and apparently as soon as you have your first it becomes all about your second. Be when you are. Celebrate the time and context that you are in [even if something in you is hoping for the next stage or situation to be true]. Be present and be content and make the most of when you are, because that will change soon enough and if you have been living in the next moment, then you will more than likely be missing out on all you could have made of the present one. If you are one of those other people then STOP ASKING THOSE QUESTIONS. For someone who singleness is a real struggle for, for the couple who have miscarried or have been trying unsuccessfully for two years to fall pregnant, for the parents at their wits end about trying to raise child number one well, those questions, no matter how well meaning they may be can really hurt. Let us celebrate those around us in whatever time and season they are currently in and let us come up with some better questions. Be content, but continue to dream and desire if there is something you are hoping for.

[3] Be where you are. If you are doing a gap year in another country or have been transferred by work to another city for a few months or if you are working overseas for six months to pay off your student loan or even if you move to a new city or country, be fully there. Our friend Darin travels a lot and even if he is in a hotel room for one night he completely unpacks his bag to remind him that for that moment or time, he is in that place. It is a habit which helps him to be fully present. tbV and i have lived in three different places in the four years we have been married and it has been so important to make each place our home while we are there. In a similiar way to being when you are, this setting of your focus on the now and who of your present context enables you to have far deeper relationships and experiences than if you were living with a passing-through attitude. Live as if you are going to be there for the next twenty years in terms of creating the space you live in and especially in terms of the relationships you build. Be where you are.

[4] Live. A lot of christians get this one wrong [and others as well, but we have less excuse]. In John 10.10 Jesus warns His disciples that ‘the thief comes only to kill and to steal and to destroy’ [and you can see a lot of that killing, stealing and destroying happening if you don’t choose to be who you are, be when you are and be where you are] and then He goes on to say, ‘But I have come that you may have life and live it to the full.’

Too many people exist. Not enough of us truly live. And that is what we were created to do. We were created to be truly and fully alive and I personally believe that is only possible when we embrace God and live a Jesus-following life, and especially not when we focus simply on rules and regulations and what we can and can’t do but more deeply live out lives that Love God and Love people in life-transforming ways.

Take time to do a quick stock take of your life. If you are spending 6 hours a day slumped in front of the television, if you are playing World of Warcraft for hour at a time that could be spent with your family, if sport or work or church or any other form of hobby or time spender is encroaching upon relationships or people, if no time in your week is dedicated to pouring into someone else’s life in any way, if you are not getting input [through books or speakers] from people who will help you grow and develop into a better person… and a hundred other things… then you are closer to existing than living and there are some changes to be made. There is not time like today to do this. What one change can be made in your life today to help you to truly live?

Anyways, there are many other things i would love for you to know, if i could get to sit down with you at that coffee shop table, but these feel like some good ones to begin with…

Are there any things you would want me to know?

[For the first part of this ‘Things I would want you to know’ series, click here]

things i would love for you to know [part i]

if i ever met you and we got to sit down together, perhaps over a cup of coffee [a mocha, or if it’s later in the evening a kahlua coffee perhaps, sprinkle of choc on the cream], there are some things i would love for you to know… and there are a lot of things i would like you to know, but here are some of the important ones…

[1] i would want to tell you that you are important and you are loved. i don’t think that we can hear that enough and i wonder when last it was that someone told you that. perhaps those around you in your life have slipped into the assumption that you know those things as far as they are concerned and it has just been a little too long since they said them. perhaps you are in a space of life right now where it doesn’t feel like ‘those people’ even exist at all – i would want you to hear that they are out there, and they are out there for you and i would hope that it won’t be too long before you have them in and around your life again. but even if you are surrounded by people who let you know you are important and loved, i don’t think you can hear it enough. so i would want to start there.

[2] i would want to you to know that for the duration of the time we are going to be spending together, that my cellphone is turned off. my laptop is packed away in its bag and my tablet is lying on my floor back home. for however long you have chosen to sit with me and talk and be listened to, i want you to know that i am unplugging myself from as much other noise as i can and am going to focus my attention on you. i am going to try to really listen and want to create a space where you feel free to speak about absolutely anything, that you can set the boundaries in terms of what we talk about – whether you are wanting to go deep and intimate and really share some things that are maybe hurting you or causing you confusion or fear, or if you are wanting to keep it light and informal and talk about which upcoming holiday movie you are most looking forward to seeing and whether or not you think Anchorman II has a chance of being half as good as the original. i want you to really get that you are that important to me right now.

[3] i would want to tell you that God loves you more than you know. maybe you are someone who doesn’t believe in God or maybe you used to and now you’re not so sure… perhaps He just seems really far away right now, or the questions you have about life are really challenging His existence to you… well then in any of those scenarios let me tell you that God really loves you so much more than you know or feel or believe… maybe if you don’t believe in God you would be brave enough to close your eyes and even just consider the possibility that He does exist and that this Love i speak of is real and directed at you. i would love for you to know that.

[4] i would want to tell you that if you are not happy in your job at the moment, or maybe in the place where you are staying, or if things in your dating relationship are not going so well, that if you are feeling burdened by the responsibilities you have taken on at church or that you are feeling a little overwhelmed with some of the meetings you have committed yourself to every week, that it does not have to remain that way. 

– you can leave your job, and, if you are up for the challenge, you can even choose to start a new career or maybe head back to study something different

– you can find a new place to live which could mean a new living arrangement in terms of the people you are currently staying with, it might mean a new neighborhood or even a new town or city, and it may even look like moving to another country

– if you are dating someone and you know that this relationship is not the one you want to invest in for the rest of your life then you can get out of it. it very likely won’t be pretty, but then most relationships that end or transition aren’t and that is okay, but what is not okay is if you end up staying with this person with the knowledge that you really shouldn’t simply because you couldn’t bring yourself to end it

it is easy to get caught up in the rhythm and cycle of how life is and sometimes all you need is for someone to simply say to you – “It doesn’t have to be this way” – and don’t let age or money or circumstance stop you – there is always a way – if you have a lot of people who love you in and around your life then easier still as there are a number of them who would jump at the chance to help you move towards a place and space and context where you can be more you

[5] i would want to strongly encourage you to stop. to just stop and be. for five minutes a day. or thirty minutes a week. or maybe even a few hours on a weekend once a month. if you are aware of God then to be still and know that He is God. time to unplug yourself from technology and the busyness and business of the day. i know you might protest and say that you don’t have time, but even if it starts out being an intentional minute where you just freeze and close your eyes and put your head down and just listen and be and focus on one thing you are grateful for at that exact moment, then i would love for you to do that. to go outside if possible and sit on a bench in a park and people watch and nature appreciate and smile quietly to yourself and take in the feeling of the current weather conditions on your face and arms and just glory in the stoppedness of it all. because life travels faster than it was ever meant to and it is dragging you with it and so sometimes you just have to rebel and throw your hands up in the air and shout “Enough!” i might encourage you to do it right now, just for a minute, as that would surely be enough to give you a taste of what it to come. i would love for you to incorporate something like that into the regular rhythm of your life, because i know how good it has been for me.

anyways, there are many other things i would love for you to know, if i could get to sit down with you at that coffee shop table, but these feel like some good ones to begin with…

is there anything you would want me to know?

[For some more things i would love for you to know, click here]

Sharing Dreams: Meet Uel Maree…

I discovered that this week was the Global Week of Sharing [sharemydream.org] and the invitation was to be ‘sharing your website or blog this week with someone who’s dream you share and want to encourage. Ask them to write a guest post for your site about their dream.’ My South African friend Uel Maree was the first guy that came to mind and he agreed to share his story on my blog, for which i am eternally grateful… meet Uel Maree, the life of the party:

…and then i dived into the river & broke my neck.

Prior to that i “had it all”. 27 years old, a job i loved, living in beautiful Cape Town, beach on the weekends, outdoor adventures on the surrounding mountains, involved in my local church. Life was good.

However after my accident, being paralysed from the shoulders down, there was a definite spanner in the works. No more job, no more beach, no more mountains, no more church, no… more… movement.

100 days in hospital, operations, emergency procedures, tubes down my throat, purified foods, specialists telling me to accept my condition…. Why not just let it rain indoors as well? Hahaha.

I was an avid rock climber so people used to ask me, “Why do you climb the mountain & not use the cable car?” I always remembered then the bruises & cuts i received along the climbs, looking up from the base at what seemed like an impossibility but then i would forget its size but rather focus on the next step & the next handhold. Eventually i would look down from the peek & smile over the world. You see, mountaintop experiences are great but what makes them truly special is the work it took to get there. Generally free things are never as appreciated as earned things.

We stretch & work our body & senses more often than we do our mind & spirit, they need exercise too. For many of us, our cushy jobs, easy lifestyles & facebook addiction this fast world assaults our senses with, keeps us so busy floundering around the shallows that we never explore the deep recesses within ourselves. I know, i was there & at times still am. I was forced into having  a time-out from the world after my accident & i’m grateful that the experience taught me that the eternal things really worth putting effort into in life are friends, family, relationships, love & God. The flashing lights & latest gadgets can only satisfy for short periods until u need your next fix. Its taking half a day to sit without a phone, book or IPod & explore that dusty room in your mind, open its curtains, sweep its floors, rearrange its furniture & see who you really are. I pray that nobody ever has to physically go through what i am BUT, i do hope that everybody takes time out for self-discovery before ending up in a difficult situation (which you will) or before time runs out (which it will). The magic doesn’t happen in your comfort zone. Your career generates your salary, but its your calling that makes your life.

Forward thinking is great, future planning is wonderful.

Yes we’ve seen this day’s dawn but that doesn’t guarantee us this day’s dusk.

Stop living only for this coming weekend, stop living only for the next holiday,
but start living for the only moment that is truly ours, right here, right now. Make these seconds count more than the thoughts of a future that is not yet yours.

I know, i almost died… face down in a river.

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” (James 4:13-15)

“2 farmers pray for rain but only 1 of them goes out to prepare His field. Which 1 do you think trusts God…. ” – Facing The Giants

Seems like im finding myself standing at my field, being reminded by God & my peers, to not turn away but to keep sowing with an expectant heart…

Though sometimes we get so fixated on staring at the ground or other people’s fields, waiting for the seed we want to grow, that we forget to look up at the rest of our field & see the endless sunflowers that we planted a while back but are now waist high 🙂

I’m convinced that seeds take longer to grow when we stare at them 😛

We cant bear fruit until our trees are grown.

So my outlook has changed. Sure i cant walk… yet 😉 but i have more now then before my accident & that’s thanks to having learnt (& still learning) how to reevaluate all i see & have through a different filter….. eternity.

We’re all different & there’s different ways to do things BUT its all built on a universal Truth & there’s no changing that.

Uel Maree 

“Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.”

[You can join the Pray for Uel Maree group on Facebook to stay in touch with his progress and more importantly his wickedly good sense of humour]

Time for a [Common] Change?

a friend of mine is in serious need of dental surgery… another friend who has a really tight budget has a car that is in serious need of tyre replacement before something goes horribly wrong… someone else i know has their house taken down by the latest hurricane to hit the states and are just needing a bit of a boost to pay a deposit and first month’s rent on an apartment for them and their child… a couple who are having quite a tough time due to the regular circumstances of life could really just use a bit of a weekend break away to be able to focus on their marriage…

as someone who is operating on a fairly tight budget, what do i say to these people? what can i do?

“I’ll pray for you.”

Not that praying for someone is wrong or bad, but if it is all i am able to do, then it does feel somewhat inadequate.

Especially if i can do much more. And the book of James in the Bible seems to suggest that we should:

15 Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. 16 If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. [James2]

Enter Common Change… the non-profit tbV and i work for… and the group we have been a part of for about a year and a half.

The needs mentioned at the start of this post are all ones that have been met by the group we are part of. Although not necessarily all personal friends of ours, we got to play some part in empowering their friends to walk alongside them as some or all of their need was met.

Here’s how it works:

# you register to Common Change and then either create a group [with a bunch of mates, work colleagues, small group at church, indoor hockey teammates] or join an existing group and start contributing usually a monthly amount to the group common pool.

# when someone in the group knows someone [one degree of separation] who has a need they present the need to the group on behalf of their friend.

# members of the group then respond by giving creative suggestions or asking deeper questions to try and figure out the best way to get involved in meeting the need [so drawing on the wisdom of the group]

# when the group has weighed in, a gift is sent to the person in need and the person who shared the need with the group is encouraged to walk the journey with their friend

it is that easy… and it can start small [ten people each giving 10 dollars suddenly have 100 dollars to be able to put towards a need] or be really huge [some people give fixed amounts, others give a percentage of their salary]

the aim is to eradicate economic isolation – instead of simply throwing money at needs or at organisations we are committing to get personally involved in relationships we already have where need exists and hopefully be part of making a long-term difference in someone’s life.

sound doable? interested in learning more or getting involved? email me at brett@commonchange.com and we can get this ball rolling…

Also, if you like the idea it would be great if you could share this link via your social networking vibes… thank you.

CCDA day 4 – last meeting – so i’ve figured at least one of the C’s stands for Cry [and now!]

so yes, i thought CCDA stood for ‘Christian Community something something’ but after last nite’s session and God speaking to me after last nite’s section and just the general worship vibes here and then this morning’s session, i have to conclude that at least one of the C’s has to stand for ‘cry’ – i have been on the edge of emotion for these last powerful 24 hours and wish all of you could have been at this last session with me cos words are going to horribly fail to convey much of what happened.

Lisa introduced the session by mentioning a book she had recently read called ‘Everybody poops’ which sums up so much and which i’ve been saying for years [your poo is the same colour as mine, whichever power-hungry attention-seeking celebrity you are] and was a great way to level the playing field.

today’s focus was young leaders and specifically emerging marginalised leaders so we had mentors and young people on stage as a panel and they shared testimonies and were asked some questions. and after last nite’s proclamation that i pretty much mostly only stand up for Jesus, i was the first one on my feet after Daniel who has cerebral palsy finished his speech… yes, speech, a guy who battles to speak coherently introduced by a beautiful spirited african american woman who began by telling us to “Stop what you’re doing and listen!” – put your pens down and your cellphones away and just concentrate and you will begin to understand what Daniel, who struggles to speak in a way we can clearly understand, is going to share with us.

and it was so completely powerful, and i definitely needed the introduction that called me to listen and validated his voice as someone speaking for the physically challenged [i am so over PC’ness and can never remember which term or label is okay so sorry to whoever i may have offended if i did but get your head out your ass and can we just see people already – enough with the labels! and the constant microscopic dismembering of them. rant over.] but i stopped and listen and heard [a lot, not all, but a lot] of what he had to share and to hear Daniel talk about his ministry and his mission and his gifting and how he takes opportunities – flip it just blew me away [i later wrote in my notes ‘i want to be a person who really listens to people’ – i think i am a fairly decent listener of people but i don’t know that i would have ever recognised that Daniel even had a valid voice – largely cos of my fear of what if i don’t understand, what if this becomes awkward or embarrassing? you know what? so what? work through the awkward and embarrassing together]

so yes, i stood up and applauded loudly and was deeply moved by him, and the lady that so lovingly introduced him and helped validate or give foundation or invitation to his voice… 

and then they followed it up with this young woman [well young to mid thirties maybe] whose name i missed who started by saying a picture often speaks 1000 words and showed five pictures of herself looking pretty hectic which i only realised later were her five conviction police line-up pictures. She had gone to jail five times for stealing and had done a bunch of drugs “I spent 20 years with a needle in my arm” and was just a complete mess, until someone took a chance on her and made her head of Restorative Justice in some organisation and when she said she had no clue how to do it, her mentor responded with ‘learn. google it. read. figure it out.’

she is now the director of Restorative Justice and two semesters away from getting her degree and about to be married in January – a whole bunch of stuff she thought she would never be able to do because of who she was and what she’d done and the addictions she had been involved with and in.

she shared how at one point she used to live on the second floor of a building opposite a church and on Sundays she would sit on the balcony with a beer and look at all the pretty people going off to church and she wanted to cross the street and go with them: “I didn’t know how to cross that street. I just wanted to get across that street!”

she reminded us that “you’re dealing with a lot of young people who don’t really believe in themselves” [echoing the Unconditional Love we were reminded about last nite]

she told us that when she met her fiance who was brought up in a Christian home and had a faith background he didn’t want to know about her past in terms of letting it define who she was but was more interested in who she was now and who she was going to be.

She finished off by telling us that if we see someone in the street we should extend the hand and offer to try to lift them up. It might be hard for them. It might be hard for you. But just do it. Cos that’s what we’re about, right? Being our brother’s keeper? 

i finished the session by writing this in my notes: I want to stop being afraid of people I can love/help because I might “do it wrong” or not be able to understand them or know how to help.

man, this account doesn’t even start to capture today at all. just imagine a really emotional and really profound experience of viewing lives that had been touched and changed by other people who took the time [and often it wasn’t easy and often the stories don’t end like these ones] and energy to build into their lives – to love them and believe in them and offer them an opportunity to live and thrive and have another chance at being a world transforming person.

every person has value. do we see it? 

[To see the start of this series of talk summaries and moments, click here]

what will you celebrate as your head hits the pillow?

one day you will be old. and then dead. hopefully in that order. preferably without skipping the first part.

and a lot has been said about that… like the much shared list of top 5 regrets of the dying according to a nurse who hung out with a lot of dying people and got to hear a list of their regrets apparently [no Patch Adams noodle baths from this fun lady it seems] and these are the top 5 that emerged:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

we were also given that Baz Luhrmann ‘Sunscreen’ song/speech that reminded us of the long term benefits of wearing sunscreen, which contained such gems as:

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts, don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly.

Be careful whose advice you buy, but, be patient with those who supply it.

And then one of the most classical of them all:

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum.

And on it goes – lists about climbing more mountains, picking more flowers, taking less photographs and living more in the moments you are capturing and so on…

Which is all great and important and true but can end up being another overwhelming set of ideals and wish lists and if onlys that you never actually really get to and will one day end up on your regret list.

So what do i want to suggest?

2 simple things – CELEBRATION and GRATITUDE:

The title of this post is ‘What do you celebrate as your head hits the pillow?’ – I remember one year where i kept a journal for a whole year and all that i wrote in it was at the end of each day one thing that i was grateful for from that day. From as simple as a friendly note from a friend on Facebook to something more powerful like witnessing life transformation in a friend or an answer to prayer or being able to resist temptation in a moment. Being intentional about taking a moment to stop in your day and celebrate a win or a thing to be grateful for. There is always one thing.

The second one has been noticing in tbV’s Facebook feed this last week or two what has felt like an intentional daily or close-to-daily moment of ‘Today i am grateful for…’ and usually a list of two to seven things that she has gratitude for on this particular day. i have found this so encouraging and it spurs me to consider my own list every time.

Regret is such a useless emotion/feeling/state because it accomplishes nothing except making you feel like a tit. And i don’t know anyone who enjoys that feeling particularly. So rather replace it with celebration and gratitude, even just of the small things that are worth celebrating and you might be amazed at how the bigger picture starts to be affected as well.

What will you celebrate tonight as your head hits the pillow? Take a minute and share one thing below in the comments that you are grateful for. Let it start here.