Overwhelmed
February 29, 2008 |
Imagine you’re Jesus on the ministry circuit, age 32. Where will you sleep tonight? What will you eat? Where along the way can you replace your threadbare tunic? What town should you and your crew hit next week, once you’re ready to move on from your current locale? And beyond that, since you know your time is coming soon… What is the end going to look like? Will you make it to the cross? How will you make your point clear to your followers and be sure they get it?
We tend to assume that Jesus, as God, was immune from this line of thinking. But I don’t think so. Since Jesus is fully human, he “has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin.” (Heb. 4:15) This means that Jesus must have felt overwhelmed sometimes by his life circumstances. He must have wrestled with the temptation to worry. He must have faced moments when he wondered if he could accomplish the work he had to do—in the big ways, and maybe also the small ones.
Feeling overwhelmed isn’t a sin, but it is a case of distorted perspective. When we feel overwhelmed, we look into the future and believe that it contains more than we can handle. More demands, more decisions, more stress. As we look past today and live out tomorrow’s challenges in our minds, we become fearful.
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 29, 2008 | Comments (16)
The Women Out There
February 26, 2008 |
Quick confession: I google myself fairly frequently. I didn’t really do this—much—until last summer, when a friend emailed to let me know she had googled me and found that I popped up as an acrostic on some random man’s website. That got me wondering what else was out there.
In addition to all the usual suspects—links to the articles I’ve written, my blog, this blog, to other work I’ve done—my name occasionally pops up in a couple of less-than-pleasing places: There’s a “Christian” site that attacks both me and the company behind Gifted For Leadership for a post I wrote last summer about Harry Potter (though I have to admit, I got a smile out of their calling Christianity Today, “Christianity Astray.” While I disagree with the assessment, I thought the word play was pretty good. I digress…) A search of my name sometimes brings up some rather troubling “spanking” sites—all because I once wrote an article called, “To Spank or Not To Spank” about disciplining your child. Never in my life did I think my name could be linked to some freaky fetish or porn sites, but alas, it is.
Finding these reminded me of something I heard a politician say at a charity fundraiser last fall. He said he thinks people hesitate to step up to the leadership plate for two reasons: One, they don’t want to bear responsibility. And two, they don’t want to put themselves “out there”—for criticism, mocking, skanky fetish site, what-have-you.
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 26, 2008 | Comments (19)
Food for Thought
February 25, 2008 |
Should crusaders strive to “stay angry”? It's a bad idea. Someone once said that staying angry is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die. If your cause is just, you would still find the energy to fight for it even without anger. You just wouldn't be self-righteous about it. The worst effect of self-righteous anger is the inner damage. It distorts your clarity about your own sinfulness and undermines your humility. Jesus told us to love our enemies and demonstrated it by asking his Father to forgive his murderers. Christians' failure to emulate such forgiveness is one of the clearest examples of G. K. Chesterton's line that Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.
Continue reading...Posted by Bonnie McMaken on February 25, 2008 | Comments (4)
Should Churches Differentiate?
February 22, 2008 |
As a show of solidarity with my seven-year-old daughter, I recently reread the classic Little House on the Prairie books and Anne of Green Gables. One phenomenon I noticed this time around (probably because I’m in the habit of thinking about church leadership) was that the books’ good, churchgoing characters didn’t have to choose between churches of various sizes and stripes. They simply attended the church in town and enjoyed (or put up with) the teachings of Reverend So-and-So every Sunday.
My, how things have changed. Along with the constant and dizzying array of choices we face every day, we have the luxury of choosing the church we like best. I know some small towns and villages in our country still have only one church. But in most of those cases, people live within driving distance of other communities and might choose to drive to one of them to attend another church. And the situation is very different where I live—in some areas I can find a church on every block. And on a recent trip to the area around Fort Worth, Texas, I thought I saw at least two churches on every block.
Continue reading...Posted by Amy Simpson on February 22, 2008 | Comments (10)
Why I Like Conferences
February 19, 2008 |
I’m headed to a conference today – thankfully, one in a much warmer climate than the near zero temperatures of Chicago right now.
I’m usually a fan of conferences. I enjoy the opportunity to hear great speakers, share insights with comrades in the field, and get inspired for another season of ministry.
With the 2008 conference season underway, I thought I’d put together a little top 10 list—the Top 10 Reasons I Like Conferences…
10. A hotel room—no laundry, no mess, no cooking!
9. Round tables—I love conferences that invite you to talk with other attendees. It always seems like the best encouragement and the most practical ideas come from round table discussions.
8. Worship—it’s exhilarating to praise God amidst a body of believers devoted to a similar calling and ministry focus.
Posted by Roxanne Wieman on February 19, 2008 | Comments (4)
Food for Thought
February 18, 2008 |
When I tell people I’m a recovering alcoholic, I get a variety of responses. Some say, “Good for you!” Others say, “I always knew there was something weird about you.” Some Christians say, “Isn’t God capable of curing you? Why do you have to label yourself so negatively?”
My answers are simple. I’m neither hero nor victim. I don’t deserve a badge of honor for remaining sober. It’s merely part of my daily Christian walk. I wish I’d been smart enough to avoid the problem altogether. I pray my children will be.
Posted by Bonnie McMaken on February 18, 2008 | Comments (4)
Too Busy to Wave?
February 15, 2008 |
There is a person in our neighborhood that defies and therefore defines our hustle-bustle culture. He is seen during my normal driving route that takes my son to and from school.
I call him Waving Man.
He is a tall man in his late 30s. Judging by the expression that is always on his face, he was born with an IQ that falls short of society’s acceptable standards. His behavior also reveals that he is different. He stands on the street and waves. He waves at the cars that go by. He stands in the same place, next to the mailbox just outside the house in which he lives, usually wearing a shirt with evidence of spilled food just under his chin. He stands there in the fall and when it snows. I have even seen him standing in the rain. Always waving. The first few times I saw him I thought he was selling firewood. Then after seeing him a hundred times I decided he just likes to wave.
Typically, traffic would whiz right by him but today the traffic was bogged down and going slow enough for passing drivers to see him. About three cars ahead of me I noticed something. I saw the driver wave back at the man. Two cars ahead of me, same thing. One car ahead of mine, the woman waved.
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 15, 2008 | Comments (7)
Group Solitude
February 12, 2008 |
Macrina Weidekehr, in her book The Song of the Seed, tells of when she was young how she used to enjoy sending coded messages to her friends by typing letters without using the space bar. Without the spaces the words were hard to decipher. The spaces were needed to make sense of the message. She makes the comparison that the same is true in our lives, “It’s the spaces in between that help us understand life.”
I have found that one of the most powerful tools God has used to sculpt me in my spiritual life has been solitude, extended times set aside to be just with God. It was nearly 15 years ago that an older woman at the church I attended invited me to join her and others going to a park to spend a half day in prayer. I remember thinking I was pretty sure I couldn’t pray for that long, but still, something about it drew me. Perhaps it was the compelling, gentle spirit of the woman who invited me.
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 12, 2008 | Comments (3)
A Deeper Spiritual Issue
February 11, 2008 |
My name’s Marshall, and I’m a male and I enjoy reading the “GFL” e-newsletter. (I feel like everybody in the room just said in unison, “Hi Marshall.”)
No, this isn’t an AA meeting. But yes, it’s sort of a check-in. Sort of a confession. Sort of just who I am—a voracious reader, a colleague of the people who write GFL, and the husband of a staff pastor that GFL describes really well.
Last week’s piece by Caryn got to me when she talked about how women don’t feel like they fit in at church.
For what it’s worth, most times I talk with men at church (even some pastors), the very same feeling is expressed, “I just don’t feel like I fit in.” Men are more relationally-challenged, perhaps, and find most social gatherings hard to “fit in.” Lots of men these days tend to say the church is too “feminized,” whatever that means. Often I suspect that’s just another way of saying, “The women around here seem to have closer friends than I do. I wish it were as good for the men here as it appears to be for the women.”
Continue reading...Posted by Roxanne Wieman on February 11, 2008 | Comments (11)
Food for Thought
February 11, 2008 |
A look at current social trends bears out the experience of churches: today’s women are complex. Studying these trends also provides information that can help churches design effective women’s ministries.
Consider just two trends that affect most church ministries:
Continue reading...Posted by Roxanne Wieman on February 11, 2008 | Comments (0)
Prodigal in the House
February 8, 2008 |
Have you ever tried to wake up from a nightmare only to find that you were awake? That’s how I felt when our “perfect” daughter became a strong-willed, rebellious teen. The transition seemed as quick as switching TV channels. It caught us totally unprepared.
Although we made many mistakes during our five-year ordeal, we learned a lot. As a pastor’s family, we faced the added pressure of being the role model for our church on how to handle this. Actually, we were clueless. We didn’t know to buckle in for what seemed to be a long roller coaster ride in the dark.
We learned many lessons and gained new perspective the hard way. My husband, Charles, and my daughter, Heather, wrote about our adventures in Daughters Gone Wild, Dads Gone Crazy. We certainly don’t claim to have all the answers, but I share from the vantage point of having lived through it and survived, even in the fish bowl of ministry. Here are a few lessons I learned:
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 8, 2008 | Comments (16)
What We Deserve
February 5, 2008 |
As a parent, it seems I spend the vast majority of my day telling my children “no.” After consistently receiving this response, they mope and moan until eventually my four-year old reminds me that he deserves certain perks because he “has been a good boy.” As a preschooler he already has a sense of entitlement that will carry over into adulthood, as did most of us.
Blame it on our parents, history, or that good old Protestant Work Ethic we inherited, but ours is a culture that believes if you work hard you will be rewarded. We participate in a system built upon incentives, praises, and bonuses. According to the UN International Labor Organization, on average Americans work 1,978 hours per year. This is 100 hours more than our Canadian and Japanese counterparts, 250 more than most Brazilians, and 500 more than Germans. Americans average two weeks of vacation per year compared with Europeans who receive four to six. At the end of this extravagant workload is the expectation that our efforts will pay off; we would be naïve to miss the reality that our obsession with reward transfers into our spiritual lives.
So how do we lead when despite our best efforts God says “no” to the reward?
Continue reading...Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 5, 2008 | Comments (4)
Food for Thought
February 4, 2008 |
Working through winter may not be “fun” or “exciting,” like sledding down a steep hill or a ski trip to Vail. But when couples persevere and take positive steps to improve their marriage, they emerge stronger, more committed, and better able to work through their differences. By extending peace, even in the midst of pain and alienation, countless couples have discovered deep healing and even deeper intimacy. When two people choose to love again, the melting ice of winter will water the seeds of spring.
Continue reading...Posted by Rachel Willoughby on February 4, 2008 | Comments (3)
When A Woman Finds Her Voice
February 1, 2008 |
I can’t recall an election year that has generated more interest and excitement than the current one. One of the “moments” that captured a lot of attention (as well as considerable flack) was when Hillary Clinton, campaigning in New Hampshire, dropped her professionalism and her stump speech to speak simply and transparently from her heart. You can see what happened here.
Looking back on that moment, the senator in her primary victory speech reflected, “Over the last week I listened to you; in the process, I found my own voice.”
Whatever the pundits may be saying about Hillary finding her voice in New Hampshire (and many believe it turned the election in her favor), I am personally fascinated by what happened to her and troubled by the notion that it is actually possible for us, like Hillary, to do a lot of speaking, teaching, writing, communicating, not of politics, but of the gospel without finding and employing our own voices.
Posted by Caryn Rivadeneira on February 1, 2008 | Comments (29)
