I was listening to the Sean Hannity show tonight as I cleaned the kitchen after a big ol’ party at the Campbell home, and I thought something he said was interesting. He was talking about the “mainstream press” coverage of the Iraq war and the formation of their constitution and said, “Can you imagine the 24-hour news cycle in 1787? [They would be saying] This is taking way too long!”

(OK, so that was a poor quote, but, you get the flavor)

It was an interesting commentary on our microwave popcorn, life-in-a-high-speed download second society. We want news, we want action, we want results… and we want them now!!!

Perhaps there are actually downsides to technological advances as well?

While researching the background of the cantaloupe this week, I learned that all cantaloupes are musk melons but not all musk melons are cantaloupes.

If you’re as fascinated by that as I am… click here

🙂

I had to post this… it’s just too funny.

Lip syncing is now a crime | News.blog | CNET News.com

Last week I was chatting with a friend online who was writing up a report for some sort of governing board for their church. She has been challenged by the way we “do church” these days in ways similar to us. She is still however, the pastor of a church, so there are obviously more issues to deal with than we have at the moment. 🙂 She mentioned she was trying to present some of the things God was working in her and their church and still present a report that was close to what was expected. That was a challenge as well. When asked if I could give it a look, I was definitely curious to see how she might tackle it.

As I read the main thing that stuck out to me amongst the reports of the great stuff God was doing in and around them was the numbers. Everything was numbered. This many people were at this event, we had this many events, and so on. The emphasis was not necessarily on the quantity, but it was a strong presence throughout the report.

And this week, as I was updating this website, I noticed that sometime soon I would be writing the 500th blog. Five hundred. That’s a lot of writing. What a cool tool the internet is for people to communicate and share information and ideas. So, with that benchmark approaching, I tried to think how I would celebrate it… what could I do to commemorate the occasion? How could I make it special? What in the world would the topic of my 500th blog be?!?

How about, our fascination with numbers?

You see, David had a similar fascination. When God had brought him from the young boy who would be king, through a long, hard stretch of time where not only was he not king, he was on the lam from the current king – who wanted to kill him! But through all of that, God was faithful. God was a refuge for Dave. He had peace even when his world was insane. God began to give him visible victories. He became famous, even as a fugitive, for his victories in battle, and how God was so evidently with him.

Eventually, he became king over a very powerful nation. It seemed nothing could stop David and the entire Kingdom of Israel from doing anything they wanted. Their army was nearly invincible. David sure felt invincible. He was feeling so great about himself and his power that he had his chief army guy take a complete census of all their troops.

Well, being the good listener that he was, Joab reminded David that God had said not to take a census of the troops, but David was pretty sure it was a good idea, and made him do it anyway. Joab should have listened to his gut, as David’s pride and obsession with numbers got a good number of the Israelites were killed by a plague. Not good.

You see, God also says that we’re just like that. Men look on the outside, but God looks at the heart. Samuel said that about David, actually. (1 Sam 16:7) Everyone looked at Saul, a tall, handsome, strong man and thought, “Now, there’s a leader!” But God, looking at the world the way he does, saw scrawny little David, with the big heart and big Kingdom eyes and said, “Now that’s my leader!”

He just sees it so differently than we do.

Recently my boys and I were reading in Mark where Jesus says the yeast of the Pharisees is a dangerous thing. It’s kinda cryptic, that little section, but I think I get it. He was talking about the Kingdom, and specifically referring to what had just happened in their recent past. First he fed 5000 people with 5 loaves of bread and two fish. That fed everyone and produced 12 baskets of leftovers. Then he fed 4000 people with 7 loaves of bread and a few small fish. That fed everyone and produced 7 baskets of leftovers. As Jesus was talking with his friends in the boat about the yeast of the Pharisees, he quizzed them on these numbers. I think it was because they still didn’t get it. It’s not about the numbers.

See, those numbers don’t add up. You can’t end up with more than you had to begin with after using way more than you ever could have possibly had in the first place. That just doesn’t happen. That is the way of God’s kingdom. With God, all things are possible. Through faith in him, nothing is impossible. The numbers in the kingdom are irrelevant.

But not in our kingdom. We want to see results! We want to know what the average attendance was for the months of July and August so we can chart the per capita giving over that time table vs the budget needs and actual expenses. We need to know which programs reach the most people so we can maximize our results and streamline our efforts. There are only so many resources to go around, right?

Wrong. So completely and totally wrong.

I am not saying that we should not be wise with our money and our possessions, and yes, our time. We do in a way have limited resources, and it takes wisdom and self-discipline to manage our limitations. But God is not limited. And if he is doing something, in his Kingdom, numbers are irrelevant. Completely.

I don’t know how we could ever not look on the outside. It’s not just applicable to our church attendance, or the strength of our kings. Racism and other forms of favoritism come from our tendency to measure by the outside, visible, quantifiable things we see. The measurable world definitely exists, and is a gift from God, but it can be such a barrier to a healthy understanding of the true Kingdom. The true Kingdom incorporates these things together into a world where God is in control, and does things that are not possible. He’s more than we could possibly imagine.

I love that! That’s exciting! I don’t want a world I can completely predict! Science has always fascinated me, and I love it, but I also love that we don’t and can’t know everything. You can’t get 12 baskets of leftovers after feeding 5000 people 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish. You can’t. But God can.

The Kingdom is not quantifiable. It can’t be measured as we measure. It shouldn’t be. God doesn’t want us to or need us to. The Pharisees took pride in their achievements, and that little bit of yeast spread through the whole batch of dough and ruined their whole understanding of the kingdom. It’s not about us, or what we do, or what we have done. It’s not about quantity.

It’s not even about 500 blogs.

It’s about Him, and Him only. Focus on knowing and loving him, and all the rest falls into place.

Oh wait… I think I have heard that before…. 🙂

People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

Matt 6:32-33 (MSG)

OK, I admit… I’m nervous. A friend asked me yesterday if I was, and I said, honestly, “No. I guess not.” I was not then, but last night as I told a friend we had our first appointment today with the doctor… I was nervous.

It’s been 9 months now. Seems long enough, and in many ways it is. Much of the hurt has passed with time, helped in some way by the hope we now have. But occasional sights or thoughts will trigger a twinge of pain and a memory of something hoped for.

The last time we put the doppler device on Jen’s belly, there was only silence. A heart-wrenching, lifeless silence. There were hints that we might experience that outcome, but hope can reach beyond realism. And then, hope dissapointed can produce a significant crash.

Today, we will once again listen for life. The rapid, rhythmic pulse of a newly beating heart. The signs of life this time have been only positive. Everything seems to be going as it should, which is very different from the last time down this path. And yet, I dread the moment we will try to listen for the heartbeat.

Perhaps it’s like returning to the lake where a child drowned, or the scene of the accident where your loved one was lost. I don’t mean to minimize the loss of someone you have shared life with by comparing them to someone I never met, but the hurt from our experience is at least in the same genus, if not the same species.

So, with a very strange combination of excitement and dread, we will meet with our friend and our doctor today to verify by modern medicine that the life growing inside of Jen is in fact a life and growing.

I will let you know how it goes.
===========
I saved this post till after we got back. The moment came, and I was not really at ease about it, but I knew whatever outcome, God is good and is with us.

When she first put the little thingie on Jen’s belly, we heard nothing. The doctor told us that it’s only about 50/50 at this point that we can hear a heart beat, so she tried to reassure us… but that is exactly not what I wanted to hear. I was already trying to prepare myself for how to deal with losing another baby.

But, the doctor thought perhaps we could try a different angle, so she tried.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.

Wow. Relief. Peace. Joy. Excitement. Smiles. Gratitude. There’s a thriving, happy baby in there. 170 beats per minute. Very … normal.

We are relieved and excited. Taking steps all the time to really enjoy and soak in the greatness of another life God has added to our family.

Amazing.

A few months back, I wrote about our culture’s fixation with knowledge. I called it Information Exchange. Well, I have revisited those ideas again recently.

It seems everywhere I look, the more noble goal, the thing to most strive for in life is knowledge. We paint scientists and teachers and other fact-based professions as the most honorable, and wisest professions. And then there is our obsession with experts. As a society, we would much sooner trust a person who spent decades of their life in a classroom than we would a person who has been a close friend for years.

Knowledge reigns supreme.

And we see this even in the church. The place where the wisdom of the world should have no hold, but in fact it does. Our entire concept of church is much more like a university than a family. This should not be. The church is not an educational institution. Jesus did not set up 90 minute classes offered Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings in the Temple courts. He didn’t establish the School of Jesus, or Nazareth Christian Academy. He just loved people, and revealed truth about life through stories, and through life lived with a few close friends. You’d think if knowledge were indeed supreme, Jesus might have been more intentional about it.

Now, even a quick study of the book of Proverbs, and the Psalms and even Ecclesiastes and Job (we call them the books of Wisdom) shows what an emphasis the people of God and God himself placed on knowledge. When you read those books, and the verses that specifically mention knowledge, it’s quite evident that knowledge is supreme over all else. It is better than the choicest gold, it will deliver the righteous and, knowledge and understanding come straight from the mouth of God. So, it’s quite obvious that God places a premium on knowledge.

But as I continued to read, one scripture after another about knowledge, something struck me. I have grown up in this culture, and so I first think of knowledge as the stuff of trivia – life deconstructed into lifeless fact and ingested and regurgitated by rows of mindless sponges soaking up so called “knowledge”. We have cheapened knowledge into what in Spanish is called Saber. (Yes, I know, that’s the verb…)

You see, in Spanish, there are two words for the verb, “To know.” (From whence cometh the noun, “Knowledge”.) The word saber means to know stuff. It means I know that my name is Greg. I know that I have three kids. I know that I live in Palmyra, NY. Yo sé. I have learned and can repeat to you those factoids.

The other word would also be translated “to know” but has an entirely different meaning, and a different use. Conocer means to know, and it is more intimate. It is how I know Jen, or my kids, or anything with which I am very familiar, especially people. Yo conozco a mi hjio Ian. I know my son Ian.

In English, the word looks the same. I know the Bills won this weekend. I know my son, Ian. But in spanish, if I said, “Yo conozco a mi hijo, Ian” and then said, “Yo sé mi hijo Ian” – using two words that could both be translated “to know”, I would end up saying very different things. The former would convey an familiarity with Ian… that I know him personally and intimately, that we have shared life together. The latter would be more correctly translated, “I know of my son, Ian.” It is detached, informational, intellectual knowledge. Personless. Lifeless.

And that’s exactly what we have sometimes. We have switched the words and forgotten to check the meaning. When we see that we need to strive for knowledge, when we understand that knowledge is the commodity we must seek, we are thinking the kind of knowledge that is taught in classrooms. So, we set up lectures and series of lessons and we create study guides and study Bibles and study groups and all sorts of tools to fill our minds with the “knowledge of God.” But Paul says in his first letter to the Corinthians:

“Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies.”
1 Cor 8:1

And later, in 1 Timothy, he states:

“[avoid] worldly and empty chatter and the opposing arguments of what is falsely called ‘knowledge'”
1 Tim 6:20

Paul knew that there were different kinds of knowledge. One that builds up and should be sought after, and one that isn’t even knowledge at all, and only serves to build up the ego of the person who possesses it.

Consider what Jesus said to a group of people who loved to learn about God and took pride in their knowledge of Him.

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life.”
John 5:39-40

Jesus points out to these guys (to whom I happen to give more credit than we usually do in Christian circles. It’s too easy to think of the Pharisees as ugly, grumpy old men who always walked around with a sneer on their faces, pointing and laughing at people for their spiritual inadequacies) that even though they pour through the Scriptures, and read all about the One who is life, they refuse to actually come to HIM for real life. They are satisfied with saber God rather than conocer God.

Jesus said, in probably the verse I quote the most of any that I know – John 17:3 – that eternal life is to know you, the One true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. That’s it. Not know about him… or to know all the stuff he said or did, or even to know what he wants us to do. Eternal life IS to KNOW GOD. Conocer. Not saber.

Hosea said it like this:

“For I delight in loyalty rather than sacrifice, And in the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.”
Hos 6:6

God doesn’t want us to know about him… he wants us to know him, and to be like him. We can never achieve that on our own, but as we hang out with him, and get to know him, it will be a natural outcome of our relationship with him. As we know him more (again, not about him more) we will be transformed in his likeness.

We hear at most every Christian wedding the famous cadence of love from 1 Cor 13. Love is this, love is that, love is not this, love is not that. But at the beginning of the famous part, Paul says very simply that if we have knowledge, but don’t have love, it’s worthless. (1 Cor 13:2) We say the words, but don’t heed their meaning.

I am not saying that all of our learning and information dissemination based infrastructure is devoid of love. Obviously, the heart of most every Christian leader is to impart (out of love) the knowledge that they have gained of God’s insane love for us. The motive is not in question, just the method of delivery.

Perhaps in all our desire to have “knowledge” we forgot that there are two ways to “know”.

We can know about God, or we can actually know God. We can spew facts crammed into our head in late night fact ingestion sessions, or we can breathe the familiarity that comes from daily life with our Maker. The choice seems simple to me. You get to choose how you define knowledge. You can pick what you will strive for.

So what will it be? ¿Saber, ó Conocer?

I have noticed recently that some in the corporate world have taken to calling their sales reps “Evangelists”. At first I chuckled at this idea, thinking it was rather appropriate. The first thoughts that come to mind when you think of an evangelist is someone who is passionate about the product they are selling, who love talking to people about it, and even structure their entire lives around propagating their product to the masses in any way they can imagine. Evangelists are typically associated with Christianity, as over the years, Christians have sent out folks (or just hired some to come and speak at their weekly gatherings) to preach the good news, the Gospel (which in Greek, the language of the New Testament, is Evangelion). Just like any useful product, a well-satisfied customer is often the best person and most likely to pass it on to the masses.

Well see… the problem is… the Gospel is not a product.

The term was interesting, and applicable to corporate sales, only because for so long, WE have gotten it wrong. We are not peddling a product, or a service, or anything remotely tangible. We have appeared as though that has been the case. We have presented life with Jesus as 12 steps to a great life. But, that’s not what the Kingdom is all about.

Life with Jesus is just that. Life. You can’t package it up. You can’t layout the perfect plan to follow so that you can have it. You can’t sell it, promote it, market it, label it, franchise it, brand it, advertise or really even pass it along. Just like I can’t pass along the relationship I have with Jen to anyone else, I can’t do that with Jesus. He and I have a unique relationship that you can’t have with him. Sorry… but it’s true. 🙂 He wants a better one than that with you. If you try to do life with him the way I do, it probably won’t work. It might for a while… but you’re just living a copy. He knows every intimate detail about you, and wants to relate to you personally and intimately. Sharing every bit of life with you, not just a few moments here and there, and a special dress-up occasion on weekends.

I know those words sound harsh, but at times it’s just so frustrating to me. We have messed it up so much that people in the business world think that they should call themselves evangelists. They sell a product. They offer a service. And, apparently, so do Christians. And, with zealous conviction, they keep pounding people until they convert. Until they buy in to The Product. And what we end up with then are usually CEOs running boards of directors who maintain an ever growing enterprise moving ahead with 5 and 10 year goals and all sorts of quantifiable results and charts and stats on where they are successful and where they are not.

How sad. How off the mark.

The kingdom is not quantifiable. It’s not measurable or knowable in that way. The kingdom is so much more. So different. I want to spend some more time on that, so I will continue that in a future blog. But the plain truth is, we’re not peddling a commodity. We are living in the reality of life in Jesus. Real life, not something we make up and repackage every few years or so. Real life with ups and downs. Real life with a real God.

You can’t put him in a bottle, or a box. And when we try, we only look foolish.

Or, like corporate America.

I need to expand on the idea of the Real Kingdom… stay tuned.

And until then, if you consider yourself an evangelist… please think about how you are presenting yourself, and your message. Are you offering a product, a neat set of ideas, beliefs and behaviors that can be reproduced and passed on to the next person… or are you living life with a real God, and allowing his life in you to spill over to other people, so they can experience him in a fresh and personal and real way just as you have?

I’ll take the latter.

I found an interesting opportunity for you author types out there. Still checking into it, so don’t take my word completely on the quality of their product yet but…

This place allows you to publish on demand, like my current publisher, BUT… it’s a bunch more.

There’s much more control over the content. Basically, you do the layout, and they print it. There is NO set up cost!! That’s incredible!!! I still can’t believe that!

AND, perhaps best of all… the pay stucture is completely upside down from the rest of the industry. In most cases, the author gets 10-20% royalty per sale of their book (iUniverse gives us 20%) LuLu is set up to benefit the author, and so the author gets 80% of the sale, and LuLu gets 20%. NICE!!! That’s so amazing.

So, I am deifinitely checkin’ into this. The second book is currently in progress, and we may just be switching publishers….

Cool thing is, LuLu is less a publisher, and more a printer. The publisher would be me. Lots more control to the author this way.

So, check em out: LuLu.com

This is another cool thing in the way of self publishing. Just like podcasts and web video casts … on demand publishing is another way for people to independently publish their work for an amazingly affordable cost.

What a cool world we live in. Technologically speaking. 🙂

When did I turn into the King of Lists? Check out 3 of the past 4 postings… 🙂

(was that a list right there???)