Promises

A Confession

In order to try to safe my marriage seven years ago I switched counselors and began seeing a Christian counselor after the other counselor my wife picked for me pissed her and one of the pastors at my little house church off. As a result of the switch,I read, Tired of Trying to Measure Up, by Jeff VanVonderen at the insistence of my counselor. This led me to read another of his books entitled, The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse. This one I read because I really wanted to point my finger at the leadership of the house church I was a part of. They seemed to have a nasty god-complex (they knew better than anyone what and how everything should happen). Instead of getting ammunition to fire at the leadership of this little fellowship, however. God seemed to point all His missiles at me. I was the guilty one. I was the abuser. I stood accused with no defence. I was an abusive pastor who used God as a carrot or a stick to get people to behave in a way that I wanted them to. I was guilty of coercive tactics, manipulation, stretching the truth, using guilt and shame, and all the tools of the Kingdom of this earth to move people the way I wanted them to move. What is worse I trained my staff to do exactly the same thing. One of my staff wrote to me while I was spending a month away in part to recover from the realization of my abusive nature, "I will not come down and feed with you at the pig trough." God has a funny sense of humour.

I cannot make a direct amends for my past life. I can make a living amends for it going forward, however. This is part of the road I will undoubtedly get to walk. I'm looking forward to it.

Lord Save Us From Your Followers

Last week I had the opportunity to preview the film Lord Save Us From Your Followers: How the gospel of love is dividing this nation. This is a movie that I wish more conservatives and liberals would see. It was highlighted on the Today Show and will be showing at the Hollywood Theatre in Portland, OR from June 13-19. If you get a chance put it on your calendar. You won't be disappointed. I'll probably try to see it again.

TS Elliot -- Hollow Man

The Hollow Men

A penny for the Old Guy

I
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when	5
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass	10
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us - if at all - not as lost	15
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom	20
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are	25
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom	30
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves	35
No nearer -
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom
III
This is the dead land
This is cactus land	40
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this	45
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss	50
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley	55
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river	60
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom	65
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear	70
At five o'clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act	75
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion	80
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm	85
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow	90
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends	95
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

Free Will, God's Choice and Astro-repentance

...Dad walked into the kitchen wanting to talk about the seemingly irreconcilable fact that God chooses so few for salvation throughout Biblical history. More seem to be damned than granted eternal life...

...Dr Brian May, lead guitarist from Queen and astrophysicist was on NPR yesterday. He believes the whole universe is expanding and will eventually become a very lonely place. He went onto say he hoped so cause we seem to be screwing this place up pretty badly and he wouldn't really trust us flying around the universe spreading our bile...

...Brian McClaren seems to be developing a different image of hell than the one I grew up with that corresponds quite nicely with Brian May's theory about the universe. It echoes eastern philosophy of karma and Jesus' philosophy that we reap what we sow. It does not so much make hell a place as a result of our actions and is a state of being. (My thinking on this is that his hell is the logical conclusion of our continual "becoming" in this life. Ultimately we become what we create in this life.)

Dad and I continue to talk about evangelism and how it is missing from the lives of many who claim to follow Jesus. I keep reminding him that it is missing because people are not experiencing the eternal life they have been promised. They are living hoping for eternal life but not experiencing it's reality now. The hope is merely a future event. It is not real and it comes up empty. Most are left with hardly anything to share with others from their own experience. Few seem to have truly met Jesus. Most have only read about him in an old dusty book that might make it off their shelf once a week or so. Others read about him every day willing him to be real in their lives. But it appears, very few know him or allow him to know them. They have nothing to share and so real faith remains awfully silent.

I'm struggling with this whole thing now. People who clearly don't bow their knee to Jesus seem to live more like Jesus than do people who say they bow their knee to Him but don't look like it. Who is in and who is out? What are they into? What are they out of?

People can experience real eternal life now. I am. Now that doesn't mean that life is all roses. It isn't. Life is hard. I fail all the time. But I am learning to get out of the center, bow my knees before my Creator, and give up control of my will and my life on a moment by moment basis. In so doing I find peace, life, hope, joy, contentment, happiness, faith, and love. I am also bound to others that walk with me. Michelle and I don't walk alone but amid a crowd that look like outsiders to the kingdom but whom live as if God has welcomed them.

Meanwhile, others choose to serve themselves and the god's of this world. They find themselves creating an existence that shuts people out and is full of self serving and self appeasement.It's course seems to be the course of the universe. People drift further and further apart until they are left being isolated islands -- alone and serving only themselves. They still get what they want; it is simply not what they were created for.

The chosen though, often give up what they want in order to become what they were created for. They find it leads to an existence of interdependence and connection.

I guess that's what Jesus meant when he said, "If you want to save your life, you must lose it..." By being chosen I live a life that seems to me to be harder than those not chosen to this road. However, as Dr. Brian May also stated, it is possible the outward movement of the universe could reverse and everything be drawn back into the center where it all started. Maybe that is astro-repentance.

Distancing Oneself From Jeremiah Wright

The cynic in me wonders how much of this is orchestrated... But for what it is worth...

When the story of Jeremiah Wright first broke and Obama gave that incredible speech on race in America. I stood up in front of my TV and cheered for him much in the way I stood up in my living room when Senator Mark O Hatfield stood up before the Senate proclaiming, "I will not vote for war now, nor will I vote for war later..." and was the solitary vote against the first Gulf war... Obama's gutsy move in that speech had the same effect for me.

From the first clips of Wright saying, "God damn America..." I couldn't figure out what the issue was. After all he was giving voice to the African American experience of this nation.

While the pilgrims were trying to create, "a city on a hill," or "a new Jerusalem," Africans were being imported as slaves to build our pyramids. An African American theological image is not of a city on the hill but of the Exodus and God calling the people out of bondage and slavery. An African American pastor as prophet and preacher needs to call the evils of the enslaving society into the open Wright did that.

I don't agree with Wright about Aids or Farrakan, But I don't despise him either and wouldn't repudiate his words as Obama has done -- at least not publicly.

Is what Wright said so much different from what Falwell and Robertson said about God's judgment and 9-11? He is  giving voice to a minority opinion. Lets not crucify him for it. Instead lets try to heal the wounds which caused him to say it in the first place.

This I Believe...

...The faith of my youth and ministry was a pseudo faith. It was a faith in a creed and a doctrinal statement. It was a faith in the concrete and the known doctrine of the church. It was a faith of being right, the jot and the tittle. It claimed personal relationship and came back empty. It was a faith of templates and "if / then" statements. It was a faith that demanded God fit into a box of our creating. It was a faith in a god made in our own image. It was a faith that demanded conformity. It was a faith that demanded certainty. It was a faith grounded in fear. It was all encompassing and it nearly killed me.

...Many people find real faith in the midst of the pseudo faith I believed and proclaimed. Many people found / find real relationship in the same environment that brought spiritual death to me. Many people discover life, mystery and wonder. They discover God to be YHWH. They really do meet a man from Galilee. For them the "IF/Then" statements work.

...For me the faith of my youth turned out not to be the faith of my Father. It wasn't that simple. "Mystery explained is no mystery at all." (I can't remember who wrote this but love it nonetheless.)

...For me God was not to be found in a Creed (though He exists there). He was not to be found in the Bible (though they are his words). He was not found in the churches I attended or started (though He indwelt them). He was not found through all the prayers cried out in the darkness or the light (though He heard them).

...For me God is found at the end of myself when I throw up my arms in surrender. God is found in defeat and despair. He is found in failure and brokenness. He is found in the darkest night; the most troublesome of times. He comes alive in my soul as I die. After all, wasn't it Jesus who came to cross out the "I" (Helen Rosevere, Urbana '87)

...When life is throwing me its worst, I find God to be at His best. When I all I want to do is crawl in a cave and die cause I simply can't go on, but I keep going on cause I believe, God becomes the prince in the fairy tale; He becomes the knight in the fantasy, or the hero in the modern film.

...A long time ago this journey started for me. My students were experiencing charismatic revival. I couldn't figure out why I wasn't included. They were speaking in tongues. They were finding joy unspeakable. My world was utterly dark. They prayed for me because something must be wrong with me. There must be some sin or some "block" in the way. Maybe they were right. Or maybe God had something else in mind for my journey. I told them then that I knew Him better than they did because they followed because they "felt" and "experienced" God. I had no such experience or feeling. All I had was darkness, but still I believed. I believed in the unknown /unfelt God who nevertheless had to be. And as dark as I thought it was... one by one the stars blinked out, and I grew tired. Eventually I found that I couldn't keep going and finally gave up.

...It was in the giving up that God started to act. It is in the giving up that He continues to act. He really meant it when he said, "If you want to save your life, you must lose it." He wasn't kidding, you know.

...this week when all hell has broken loose around us; when the fury of brokenness threatens to engulf us and even my wife needs answers rather than questions; when I give up; He comes. In the midst of the fury of the unknown I find that the safest place is on my knees. God simply wanted to spend a little bit more time with me.

You get what you ask for

Every great adventure needs adversity...

Shell and I need to remember that.

Staying in the Fight

Much of my life has been driven by fear. I have lived under the weight of a hundred forms of fear. Gratefully in the past few years some of that fear has been transformed and the weight taken away. I am noticing a new kind of fear and I'm still not sure what to do with it all.

I have a wife now, so now, instead of trying to fight for myself I grab on to fight for her. I don't just fight for her though. I think I am experiencing the panic of Adam in the garden watching Eve eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, unable to stop her and scared to death he would lose her and be alone.

Shell is not "eating of the fruit" per se, but the fear of losing her for any reason is as equally distressing.

I am a personal pacifist. You can beat me up. You can kick me in the teeth and pretty much get away with it. However, if you mess with my wife, my Dad, my kids or my dogs and I will go off and it won't be pretty.

So what happens when two people I love can't seem to make it work? That situation confuses me. I am called to honor my father and love my wife, but my dad, in the confusion of his old age, and under the influence of well meaning friends, crosses wires, misplaces facts and time lines and blames Shell for things for which I should get blamed. The trouble is even when I tell him the blame lies with me he won't accept it, forgets it and insinuates to the next friend he talks to that Shell is to blame. It is not pretty. History is re-written in his own mind and he shares it with his friends and in the process hurts her unfairly and unjustly. He makes assumptions coming out of his confusion and shares those assumptions with his friends, assassinating the character of the woman God chose for me. How am I supposed to deal with that?

It is not his fault. At 85 years of age he can't keep it all straight. I need / want to honor him. But equally, I need to protect and love Shell. This is a fight I don't know how to fight. It is a fight that shouldn't need to be fought. I'm the one who screwed up and he only wants to blame her. I wish he could see it. I wish he'd put the blame where it belongs and leave Shell out of it.

I tried my best to take care of my Dad and failed. He blames her or at least indicts her with his words to his friends, when he should be indicting me. it was my failure to keep track of the details and just assume everything would work out that is costing him now. Shell helped me implement the plan and repeatedly urged me to pay attention to the details but I did not heed her counsel and now my failure costs two people I am responsible before God to protect. How does that work?

I am glad that the God I have come to understand recently understands my plight, forgives my character defects and will ultimately protect my wife and my Dad.

Surrendering Dad and Shell to His care is much harder than surrendering my own life. I can trust my own life to Him because of the road we've walked together. It is much harder to trust their lives to Him.

But I am tired of this fight. Just like with everything else I need to surrender. God never seems to want to let me win when I wrestle with Him. Instead of fighting, I need to simply do the next right thing, and surrender it all to Jesus, trusting Him with the results. That is a bitch and I suck at it, so I get back on my knees and tell Him I don't know how to surrender when I have been fighting so long and I need His help to give it up. He will hear and He will answer.

A link

Here is a link to my insurance website...

I think Solomon Was Wrong

OK... maybe he wasn't wrong; perhaps he simply didn't choose wisely...

I was spending some time thinking about the king of ancient Israel, wondering how such a wise man could screw things up as badly as he did. I began wondering what I would ask G-d for if He offered me anything in the world. (I think someone just told me a genie joke.)

I decided that though wisdom was a good thing to ask for and God commended Solomon for it, it was not the BEST thing to ask for. If God came to me granting me any gift;  I would ask him for the gift of acceptance -- the ability to accept the world as He gives it to me.

It wasn't until many months later that I realized He wanted me to pray for the gift to be given me and so I began to ask Him every day for the gift of acceptance. Ever so slowly I began to realize that God was answering my prayer. I was able to accept the world as given more often than not. But  even as I type this post, today acceptance don't come easy.

I called Michelle today and asked her, "Is life really as overwhelming as it feels right now or is it just me?" She assured me that it really was as overwhelming as I'm feeling. So I guess God wants to spend some more time with me and I need to spend some more time on my knees asking Him to help me accept things the way He's handing them to me; to remove my fears; to give me the courage to do the things I need to do even though they scare me to death; to help my lacking faith and give me the ability to believe in Him, his goodness, and His Kingdom so that I can lead my family through the storms (and there are more than one) that seem to be brewing around us, making even the storms on the Deadliest Catch seem small.

I believe that He will hear and He will answer... This is my faith it is what I believe.

The Black Sox

Props to the Coaches

My son is fortunate to have some men involved in his life for the past three years that give of their time and their lives to love kids well by coaching. They impress the hell out of me.

Three years ago Thomas knew nothing of baseball. He had no clue how to throw, hit, catch or play the field. On more than one occasion his first season I had to talk him into keep playing, assuring him that he only had to finish out the season honoring his commitment to his coaches and teammates. Then he could choose to never play again. His second season was better. And now I am aware that he has skills that I never had. He has learned things that no one ever taught me. Maybe had these men been coaching me I might have lasted a little longer in the game. They have taught my son to play a game that I never could.

His coaches not only teach, they patiently teach. He continues to get better and better. So here is to John (on the right), Ron (closest to the camera), and Aaron (with his eyes shut against the cold) who love these boys in ways they will never forget; who take the time to care for and mold them on their journey toward manhood. There is no real way to thank them for what they are doing. I'll leave that up to God. But I know that He looks at these boys swinging bats and catching balls and smiles at them and their coaches. He is well pleased... I can't  say thank you effectively enough.

I love Football, but love my son more

I was a big slow kid... But while attending my junior year of highschool in England I discovered that being a clutz on some athletic fields is a plus. When I returned to America I played football and was good... this is mainly cause I would trip and knock people over. My coaches loved that.

I realized that had I started earlier I cold have been a very good football player. It is a regret that I carried for a long time.

My son is a better athlete than I ever was. I was quick and slow. He is plain fast. I had very little co-ordination. He has a lot. He can hit a baseball (I never could). For a long time I really wanted him to play football. He'd be good. He'd be really good.

But... modern day football scares me. I listen to 1080 the fan and they have an ex-football player as one of their hosts. He was clear that he wouldn't want his children playing past high school. After listening to Leigh Steinberg yesterday, I don't think I want my son playing at all -- his life and health are too important to me.

Check out this website for more info on part of the reason. And this website only points out one of the potential issues with playing football. I have arthritic hands from one year of football.

So this next year I will coach his age's soccer team and he will play for me. It is his choice what sport he plays, I have told him the truth that though I love football and would love to see him play; that I think he'd be really good; I don't want him to. He is not mean enough. He has too much going for him to risk for a game of violence.

Do you...

...ever feel guilty cause you know what is right and you know what is easy and the two don't seem compatible? I often want both and feel guilty for wanting the "easy for me" cause I know it is the worse for someone else. If I don't talk about it, I get mad at God for making me choose and lose no matter what choice I make. Somehow it doesn't seem fair to choose knowing that you are going to lose. But maybe that is the problem. I don't trust that in the end God and His Kingdom win...

Imagine...

...a world where the USA didn't feel the need to maintain a military presence in every corner of the world, where we called our girls and boys  home from Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, South and Central America, and any other corner of the world we maintain a base.

Imagine the money that would be saved and the good will that would be earned. Imagine the hatred dissipated because we were no longer seen as meddlers, or saviours, or bullies bending the will of the world to our way of thinking and behaving. Imagine what it would be like if we let the world be the world and focused on America...

On one hand it sounds selfish... on the other hand healthy... maybe America as a whole needs to go an Alannon meeting in order to give up our god complex...

Insurance Info...

It's funny how I don't write much about the industry I'm in...I'm noticing that people don't know much about their insurance coverages or even what they are looking for so here is a glossary of terms you should know:

1. Premium -- The amount you pay out of pocket to the insurance company to be insured.
2. Deductible -- The amount of money you must pay before the insurance company starts to pay. Typically a family has two deductibles: an individual deductible and a family deductible. If there is no family deductible each individual must reach their own deductible before the plan will start to pay...
3. Co-pay -- An insurance company scam. The amount of money the insurance company demands you pay before you see your doctor for routine visits. They will typically waive your deductible for these visits. Let me give you an example as to why I think these are a scam. If you buy auto insurance you do not get a co-pay for maintenance for your vehicle (oil changes, tire rotations, etc...) Everyone has to do these things to keep their car running and insurance companies have never been in the business of giving away money. In the health insurance industry, however, someone had a great idea: " We know people will go to the doctor for routine 'maintenance' so why not let them think we will waive their deductible for these services by putting a pre-payment plan into place. We will charge them higher premiums and get their money earlier and then contract with their doctors to pay them less than the people would pay on their own. Co-pay programs drive the overall price of insurance way, way up... and rarely pay off in terms of total out of pocket expenses.
4. Co-insurance -- the percentage you will pay of a medical bill after your deductible is met. Typically percentages are 70/30, 80/20, or 90/10. Some are 100/0. The first number is the percentage the insurance company will pay. the second is the percentage the  insured will pay. Many times there are different co-insurance levels for different insurance procedures.
5. Internal limitations -- This is the fine print. This is where the insurance company spells out exactly what they will not cover. One insurance company states they will only pay out $5000 per year on prescriptions. Another limits what prescriptions they will pay for. Another limits how much they will pay for a transplant, for maternity benefits or even a simple colonoscopy. In these instances, especially on the more common ones people receive a bill long after the event occurs and have sticker shock about how much they owe...ouch.
6. Maximum out of pocket -- the maximum amount of co-insurance a person will have to pay after meeting their deductible. It does not include the internal limitations in the policy.

To truly get the maximum out of pocket number the formula is simply this:
Total premium + maximum out of pocket + any additional expenses not covered due to internal limitations.

As you can see it is really easy for insurance companies to twist and shape things and many people are left thinking they have great insurance and only discover too late, when something has really gone wrong that their great maintenance policy sucks when it comes to covering their medical expenses when they really need them.

I'm in this industry cause I think I can make a difference. Not all insurance companies are inherently evil. Not all plans leave people gasping for breath after they have already taken a huge medical hit. But the consumer has to have an agent that really has their best interest at heart and is willing to take the time and explain the policy they are purchasing, what it does and doesn't do so there are no surprises when the sky falls.

An insurance question

In Oregon all insurance policies are required to cover maternity benefits. In other states you add a "maternity rider" which costs extra...

So here is my question. Should a single man, a gay couple, an older couple, an single post menopause woman in Oregon be required to purchase maternity coverage in order to spread the cost around and make it more affordable for those who would like to have children...?

Without the law insurance companies can play all sorts of games. One insurance company I represent (which offers good coverage in most instances) in Missouri offers a policy that only offers maternity benefits to husband and wife, not their children... so what if one of my clients' 16 year old daughters' get pregnant?

Ethics and government interference or regulation (depending on your perspective) of commerce gets tricky sometimes...

Faithfulness

It was a fluke; really… at the last minute my daughter requested we change up churches on Sunday (we were planning on being back at Evergreen).

 I called an old friend and found out what service he and his wife attended and showed up at some ungodly hour (9 am) with Thomas and Maggie in grudging tow (it was too early for them too). I wasn’t really ready for all that followed.

I need to share some history here. My old friend used to take care of my brother and me while our parents traveled. He was perfect for us: an Englishman studying at Multnomah, Timothy and I loved him. He helped us set up our slot car track. He played Risk with us. He went to Portland Timber games with us. He and his brother really became a part of our family, even going on vacation with us.

As everyone got older we drifted a part. He got married and joined the leadership at Community Bible Fellowship. He had two little girls. Then tragedy struck and his wife had a series of strokes and other medical issues that left everyone wondering if she was going to survive. Through it all my friend loved. I don’t know much of his story from this part of his life. His daughters are now 20 & 23. He is a lot greyer and wears the wrinkles of a hard life.

Three and a half months

and I still think I am the luckiest man alive that such an awesome, beautiful, fantastic, funny, engaging, challenging woman should fall for me...

The Atonement

While in England a year ago I discovered that a divide was ripping apart the church. Many of my friends were on the "conservative side" of the battle. My family seemed to be on the "progressive side". Neither Dad nor I fully understood the terms of the battle, but we knew it was divisive enough for people to not share fellowship of any kind. I wa having flashbacks to the old charismatic / evangelical wars of yesteryear.

Since that time I spent some time reading more of Brian McClaren and also hope to pick up Scot McNight's book on the subject.

The "propitiationists" argued that new thinking on the atonement, took away from the Truth that a price had to be paid. McClaren and company argued that a god that needed to be "satisfied" was not worthy of worship. All hell has broken loose.

Preaching

Good preaching is hard to find. I have always been attracted to good preachers. But recently I've begun wondering again about what makes a good preacher.

Here is my working definition of good preaching: "Proclaiming in the power of the Spirit the Word of God to move people to take action and move closer to Jesus."

Good preachers are not always good people. I was considered a good preacher even while I was living a secret life of sin. Yet, I still have former students whose lives were changed through my preaching living out the gospel as missionaries in distant lands. Three faith communities exist where there were none before I began preaching in the community. Another faith community is still thriving in part because of my preaching when the small church was nigh unto death. I don't say those things to bolster my ego; quite the contrary. I say them to point out that good preaching is not necessarily connected to good or Godly character.

One of my favourite preachers in Portland is someone that I think should be barred from pastoring (God evidently has other ideas) and someone I would try to avoid sharing the same space with. He has anger and control issues and his church has split time and again because of his sin. At the same time his preaching changes lives. Why God chooses so often to speak to his people or those he is calling to be his people through the lips of an ass is beyond me, but he seems to like to do so.

Having said all that, good preachers always proclaim the Word of God. They are more often than not expositors of the Bible rather than topical communicators who seem to see the Bible as merely a launching pad to give them a boost to say whatever it is they have to say.

Good preachers have an anointing that gives their words power to change lives. They speak not only to people's minds, nor to only their emotions, but to their entire being. The anointing comes from the Holy Spirit. It is miraculously not dependent upon holiness or sinlessness on the part of the preacher but only upon the work of the Spirit indwelling the words proclaimed.

Good preaching always moves people to take action in the Kingdom or toward the Kingdom of God. It is not mere teaching designed to impart knowledge, it is not mere emotion designed to illicit feeling and a large offering (please take note Carmen). A good preacher crafts words to move people to make decisions, and to act and follow through on those decisions.

Ahhh

Another Farewell of a Different Sort

Today Michelle, Sam and I went back to St Matthews to say good-bye to the Bishop of Oregon, my confirming bishop, the Rt. Reverend Johncy Itty. He is leaving to go back to New York after a relatively short stay here.

It was good to be back at St Mattie’s on Palm Sunday. There is a glory to the pageantry of the Episcopalian remembrance of Passion Week. The addition of our departing Bishop in full regalia only adds to the experience, especially when he sings the Eucharist, and preaches to his community in our very midst.

There is a very real comfort given to me by the Holy Spirit in the Episcopalian liturgy. No matter how good or poor the sermon, the gospel literally oozes from beginning to end of an Anglican service: three Bible readings, and a sung Psalm, prayers that have withstood the onslaught of time, and readings that expound the historical truths of the gospel.

Bishop Itty is an amazing Bishop. He is a true Liberal in the best sense of that word. He thinks that his lone reformed congregation should be left to be as orthodox as it chooses to be. The Diocese should not interfere. In addition he has pushed for Diocesan emphasis on Discipleship, Mission, and evangelism. He angered the leftist establishment in the diocese by refusing to throw diocesan support behind Gay Marriage, noting that there is nothing in Church history or polity that allows for it.

No one knows for sure, but I cannot help but feel as if part of the reason for his early departure is that same extremist faction (which could very well hold a majority position in our diocese – it is only extreme when held up against all of the Anglican communion world-wide) that made Bishop Itty’s stay in Oregon unbearable and sent him packing to leave for New York.

I always said of Bishop Itty that though I was never quite sure of what he was saying when he preached, he said it well. As I sat and listened to him today I realized that there is something very comfortable and necessary in the liberal voice in the church. It needs to ring out more loudly than it often does. Perhaps it is incapable of the bull horn that we evangelicals use ever so freely, but it is the same voice that reminds us that Jesus rode a Donkey into Jerusalem on this day 2000 or so years ago. He came not as a conquering King – the long expected vanquishing Messiah, but rather as one asking for peace on the back of a never-before ridden ass. It is a call to live the Sermon on the Mountain out as the people of God on a journey together. It is a voice that calls people to something rather than scaring them from something. It is a soothing voice that I wish I heard more often.

Farewell to Larry

I read the news last week and my mouth dropped open. It was only about a year ago that I sent Larry a note thanking him for the role he played in my life. This is what was posted on the front of his website:

Larry Norman
4/8/1947 - 2/24/2008

Our friend and my wonderful brother Larry passed away at 2:45 Sunday morning. My wife Kristin and I were with him, holding his hands and sitting in bed with him when his heart finally slowed to a stop. We spent this past week laughing, singing, and praying with him, and all the while he had us taking notes on new song ideas and instructions on how to continue his ministry and art.

Saturday afternoon he knew he was going to go home to God very soon and he dictated the following message to you while his friend Allen Fleming typed these words into Larry's computer:

________________________________

I feel like a prize in a box of cracker jacks with God's hand reaching down to pick me up. I have been under medical care for months. My wounds are getting bigger. I have trouble breathing. I am ready to fly home.

My brother Charles is right, I won't be here much longer. I can't do anything about it. My heart is too weak. I want to say goodbye to everyone…

My plan is to be buried in a simple pine box with some flowers inside…

I'd like to push back the darkness with my bravest effort. There will be a funeral posted here on the website, in case some of you want to attend. We are not sure of the date when I will die. Goodbye, farewell, we will meet again.

Goodbye, farewell, we'll meet again
Somewhere beyond the sky.
I pray that you will stay with God
Goodbye, my friends, goodbye.

Larry

I saw the news in the Oregonian.

A few days later as I put together a CD for some of my friends, two of Larry’s songs were included. A few days after that I sat with one of those friends listening to the CD I had burned for him. I didn’t think he’d know many of the artists. When Larry’s song, Lonely by Myself came on, he asked about it. I told him about Larry and the impact he played on my life.

He then told me his Larry Norman story: Flying to Boise he sat next to this older guy with Long straggly graying yellow hair. As they talked Larry told him his story and gave him a CD. I skipped ahead to, Its Only Today that Counts. We listened in silence to Larry sing the Truth. My friend’s words were, “He was the nicest guy…” Larry moved my friend one step closer to Jesus.

Larry, you had a habit of doing that. Your song, I am a Servant¸ was the song that got my attention and forced me to my knees, “letting Jesus know I wasn’t going to play games with him anymore…I was going to lay it all down and give up control.” When I’m pissed at the church for whatever I will often listen to Shot down.

You may be singing in heaven’s choir now… My guess is that the amplifier does go to eleven up there and you’ll be jamming like you did back in the day, but the songs you left for us … the song that I heard God calling me through… the song that you wrote that played while kids steamed up the aisle in Scotland after hearing our God’s call…all the other songs which touched the addict, the outcast, or simply the rebel are going to keep playing in my heart, my mind, my soul and loudly on my stereo. For those I am grateful. Thank you.

Hillary have botox?

Me thinks she did... Her forehead wrinkles no longer exist... Why didn't any of the other candidates?