Fountains and Sponges

Do you spew out or soak up? That’s a different way of suggesting how we as Christians approach the seasons of Thanksgiving and Christmas with a variety of attitudes. Those attitudes determine what impact the seasons will have upon us individually and our communities. Fountains spew. Sponges soak. Which will you be this holiday season?

Tremendous artwork has been associated with fountains through the centuries. Some are simple and share the sound of falling water. Others, far more elaborate, are meant to be enjoyed with multiple senses. Sculptures amidst waterfalls delight the eyes. The water cascading over the artwork creates its own musical concert. The spray upon skin brings a wondrous cooling that borders on healing.

The fountain shares all this while recycling its flow to offer it all once again to every passerby. That is what a fountain does. It takes the water supplied and overflows it for the enjoyment of others.

Now your typical sponge operates in a different way. When it comes to water, the sponge soaks it up. The water disappears. You can leave the sponge in the sun and the water disappears while leaving no impression upon the observer. Squeeze the sponge and the water reappears generally in a form you would rather avoid and often as you hold it over a drain.

The water goes in, but it rarely comes out in a form that makes you want to share the experience with someone you love. The sponge draws away. It removes what you don’t want to see. It hides the past event. You really want it to impact as few of your senses as possible.

The holiday season offers Christians the opportunity to showcase the difference between the secular and sacred approaches to these celebrative occasions. A Christian and a non believer will see the same event, but experience it in radically different ways. For the latter there is a feel good experience that may prompt at its best an expression of good will toward another person. For the Christian the event is an expression of an ancient Story connecting the profane and the sacred, the mortal and the immortal, the temporal and the eternal. Humanity has become the recipient of this Story and has the blessing of passing it on to each succeeding generation.

Churches can be like sponges with the Stories of Thanksgiving and Advent. They produce magnificent presentations in drama and music. They include the smallest angels to the eldest matriarchs and patriarchs. Choirs and soloists spend months rehearsing. Thousands of dollars are spent on costumes and sets.

Who sees the results of all these efforts? By the time the families of all the participants crowd into the limited seating and the few remaining seats are taken by members of the church down the street, those who have never heard the Story find there is no room in the inn. The church has soaked up all the good news and left nothing for a world hungry to know there really is a thing called hope.

The individual Christian can seem no better. Having gone to a community Thanksgiving worship service at the local church, the individual finds little for which to be thankful when in the company of the unchurched. The music was stirring, the preschoolers heart-touching, and the drama as good as anything on Broadway throughout the season of Advent, but when that last candle, the Christ Candle, is blown out on Christmas evening, no one outside the circle of intimate Christian friends will have heard the glad tidings proclaimed by the angels long ago.

The fountain stands in the middle of the town square. Even on the coldest night it sprays its water into the air for all the villagers to enjoy. It quietly shares its beauty, a glistening dream to prompt its visitors to go to their neighbors and say, “Come and see!” May we like the fountain invite those who do not know the Story to come and see it presented in heart-transforming fashion. Brave the dark, brave the cold, but come to see, come to hear the greatest Story ever told. (John 3:16)

Hunger and Gratitude

Over the next several weeks I will probably eat too much. The food will be delicious, and the leftovers will be as good as the original dishes. My plate will be cleaned so well you would think it had never been used. I’ll thank God for each meal and each morsel.

Somewhere at some time throughout these holy days, I’ll try to remember not everyone will be enjoying the bounty I’ll have in front of me. There will be people who will wake up hungry and go to bed the same way. If they have one meal of beans or rice during the day, they will feel most fortunate. Others will not have that much and will look at their swollen bellies and those of their children and wonder about a thing called hope.

In those moments I’ll think of the bounty I enjoy and of the ways I can help others who have less or nothing at all. I will utter a prayer that they will be filled and find a way to be a part of the answer. I hope I will be so thankful for what I have I will find a way to make sure they have more than they would have had.

It’s easy to feel blessed and be grateful when the table is full. It’s easy to look to God and be thankful when you have enough for leftovers. It’s easy to be thankful when things are going well in a dozen different ways.

We could use a few lessons in being grateful when the times are not so good. If we can’t be grateful, we at least need to learn to keep our eyes focused on our only source of hope and be glad He is there. Sometimes we need to be reminded the greatest blessing we have is the relationship we share with God.

A common translation of Job 13:15 goes like this, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him.” (NASV) Job laid it all on the line in his blunt argument with a silent God. He declared his innocence. He wanted God to explain what all this pain and suffering was about. At the same time he acknowledged he had nowhere else to go. He was making demands of the only One who could deliver him, the only One who offered hope.

Job was not the only one who was able to find hope and thus a reason for gratitude when things looked rather dim. The prophet Habakkuk ends his brief set of prophecies with one of the greatest statements of hope grounded in faith in the entire Old Testament. He declares the barren fig and olive trees, the fruitless vine, the wasted fields, and the empty livestock stalls will not keep him from celebrating the relationship he has with God. (Habakkuk 3:17-18)

The finest example of gratitude that moves beyond circumstances is found in the moment Jesus can say to his Father, “Not my will, but thine be done.” (Luke 22:42) Jesus could never be described as thankful for the cross that awaited him. He could, however, be grateful he was looking to a Father whom he felt had all things under control. The best would win out.

Job looked to a relationship he believed was present even in the midst of his suffering. Habakkuk celebrated a relationship that wasn’t measured by material wealth. Jesus depended upon a relationship that would be there even in his darkest hour. Though he would face that hour alone, his faith in the relationship he had with his Father made our gratitude possible.

Be grateful for a plate full of food. Be grateful for family and friends who share your table. Be grateful for the One who left heaven to bring us a hope the world can never offer. And go share your gratitude with someone whose heart and stomach need it.

To Dream Again

Over three decades ago, Robert Dale wrote a book entitled To Dream Again. Later he wrote its sequel, Keeping the Dream Alive. The books targeted churches facing a plateaued and declining spiritual energy. The premise was a church did not have to decline into ultimate death. It could make decisions, perhaps both costly and painful, that would lead to renewed life and a strengthened focus upon its primary mission. It revolved around remembering the initial dream of why it existed and the possibility that dream could live again.

I am getting older (big news there!). Within the next decade I will have become enrolled in Medicare, moved from full time to part time employment, and hopefully moved beyond a mortgage. During that same time I expect there will be health changes among the family, perhaps even the loss of members of the older generation. Though I will do what I can to slow my own aging process, stopping it is not one of my priorities. Continuing to live out my dreams is.

I have already taken that first step in daring to dream again. Sure, I have a bucket list, and it contains far more than I would ever be able to accomplish even given another 100 years. The list contains getting additional education including learning to speak at least one foreign language fluently. I would love to spend multiple weeks on archaeological digs and explore the prominent sites of early American colonial history.

I want to read the collected works of our nation’s founding fathers and the primary writers during the Civil War. The presidency of Harry Truman fascinates me as he dealt with issues of ending World War II and the conflict between civilian and military power involving General Douglas McArthur. Reading only one Shakespearean play since high school is a tragedy, and as everyone knows reading The Lord of the Rings only ten times is not nearly enough!

Dreams must never be restricted to the fancy of children or to starry-eyed, young lovers. We grow old, as one sage said, only when our regrets begin to outnumber our dreams. Living under the control of the One who is true life will lessen our regrets. (John 11:25-27)  Living with his promises as our foundation will keep our dreams alive. (Matthew 28:20; John 14:3, 15-18, 23)

Recently I put my first literary contract in the mail, signed and dated. For many years I have considered putting my dreams into a form that could be shared with others. In 2014 it may actually happen. The size of the book and its expected total readership will keep me humble. Pride is not on my bucket list. I can say, however, I kept my dream alive.

People stop living when they stop dreaming. This is not deeply philosophical. We dream of planting flowers when spring arrives. We dream of picking that first ripe tomato of the summer.   We dream of the beauty of trees aflame with color with the arrival of autumn. We dream of the wonder of a white Christmas. Call it anticipation because it may be out of our personal control, but such thoughts still give birth to dreams that make us feel alive.

Churches are no different in this respect. Dr. Dale understood that churches grow older, but they don’t have to die. Aging brings changes in a church, but death need not be inevitable. Churches can dream again. Churches can return to the vibrancy of their youth. They can return to the times when taking risks were to be eagerly anticipated with faith in God instead of avoided as being “impractical”.

Each day is a gold mine guaranteed to produce riches if we are willing to go into the mine and put in the work, take the risks, and use the resources God has provided. The surprise may be in that we do not find gold, but rather precious stones. God allows us to dream and will work with us to fulfill the dreams that match his own for us. There we find the true fulfillment, when we learn to dream the dreams he has dreamed for us. (Jeremiah 29:11-13)

Practicing Stewardship During the Holidays

You can bet there will be a lot of money passing through many hands in the next couple of months. Money, however, is not the only thing that will be passing. Time will also be passing. Relationships will be progressing for better or worse. Some folks will be passing away and these holidays may be their last. Then there will be the decision to use what you have and for whom you will use it before it passes away. All of this involves stewardship. It is required of a steward to be faithful. (I Corinthians 4:2)

So, how will you be a faithful steward over these next two months? The first place we consider, but perhaps not the most important, is the stewardship of our finances. A good steward will get the most out of every dollar, making Washington scream from the stretch. A good steward will know where to invest each dollar, understanding where it will provide the most benefit. The faithful steward will recognize sometimes a dollar spent on non material things brings more benefit than material objects.

Many if not most of us will do comparison shopping in person and online. We’ll check the balances in our bank account and be semiconscious of our credit card debt. We’ll decide who is worth an invitation to our Thanksgiving dinner, and what gift at what cost is deserved by whom for Christmas. A consciousness of money will be our constant companion at some level. Stewardship involves both spending and saving. (I Timothy 6:10)

Money you can keep. Time you cannot. Like money you can invest time, but once you have spent that hour, it is has passed out of your control. An anonymous author has written, “Lost, yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward is offered for they are gone forever.” (A Treasury of the Familiar, 1942)

A good steward will use time wisely. Though we may not know how many days we have, we are responsible for the moment we have now. We have one chance to use it before it becomes the past. The past is irretrievable and the future is never guaranteed. We each have the present moment. We alone are responsible for how we invest it.

We must be good stewards of relationships as much as we are of time and money. The truth is there is no greater place to invest both money and time than in relationships. We thrive on relationships and die a miserable death without them. We are like the Lego blocks used in many seminars. We pick the blocks that most suit us by the number of connecting knobs each piece has. Some have only one. Some have twenty or more. We may closely relate to only one person, or we may have many diverse relationships. Still we connect somehow to some other part of humanity.

In those relationships we both give and receive. We grow and enable others to grow. We learn and we teach. In the best scenarios we see our world expand as we become an integrated part of it. The world becomes a better place in which to develop relationships because of how we have added to it.

In those relationships grounded in a faith in God, we experience the profound truth of the Body of Christ. (Romans 12, I Corinthians 12) In relationships governed by the Spirit of God, we grow through mutual dependency and support. Our need for each other becomes our strength to face life. Our true selves are revealed in relationships. The greatest vision of ourselves comes through our relationship with God through his Son Jesus Christ. (John 10:1-15, 14:6)

Over the next two months, we will have many opportunities to practice stewardship. The question we will have to answer with each decision will be what is our motivation. Our motivation includes deciding to whom we will be answerable. Whether it is a dollar, an hour, or a spiritual gift, we have to decide who will be the ultimate beneficiary as we use it. Make it count for eternity!