School Shootings (A Lament)

Posted on February 17, 2018 by Joe Chambers

Lord Jesus Christ Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.

The voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness;
The Lord shakes the Wilderness of America.
Children have been murdered at a school in Florida.
Do not keep silent, O God! Do not hold your peace
And do not be still, O God!
O that the metal, plastic, and composite material
would be melted and ground down into seesaws and merry-go-rounds.

Parents wait for news after a reports of a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., on Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2018. (AP Photo/Joel Auerbach)

Children have been murdered at a school in Florida.
Defenders of weapons and idolaters of the sword do not weep
Nor sit in ashes.
O that the metal, plastic, and composite material
would be melted and ground down into seesaws and merry-go-rounds.
Come now, and let us reason together
Says the Lord,
Though your sins are like children’s blood,
they shall be as white as snow.

Defenders of weapons and idolaters of the sword do not weep
Nor sit in ashes.
Do not keep silent, O God! Do not hold your peace
And do not be still, O God!
Come now, and let us reason together
Says the Lord,
Though your sins are like children’s blood,
They shall be as white as snow.
The voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness;
The Lord shakes the Wilderness of America.

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Be Careful What You Say About The Church

Posted on February 13, 2018 by Joe Chambers

“Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” Revelation 21:9

The church gets kicked around a lot these days. Certainly, from those who do not follow Jesus. That even makes sense. Why would they be warm to an institution that is antithetical to their way of living? But what hurts my heart is that there are many stone-throwers who attend church and say that they love Jesus; or used to attend church and often they are the most prolific rock-chuckers.

Often, they sit at home and watch their favorite preacher on T.V. (I’m not going to say much about this approach except to say: It is about as lazy as it gets) However, many are involved in para-church organizations which have taken the place of the church for lots of Christian leaders. Recovery groups, retreat centers, discipleship ministries, itinerant conferences, and denominational gatherings have become the preferred alternative to weekly and often mundane attendance full of sinners led by the chief of sinners—the preacher.

Every congregation is a congregation of sinners. As if that weren’t bad enough, they all have sinners for pastors. ~ Eugene Peterson

Then there are the elite followers of Jesus who decide that it is better to find a small gathering of like-minded believers who really “get it” and know how to live the Christian life on a more authentic, missional, and intentional way. They even take some pride in saying, “I don’t go to church, but I love Jesus.”

I have two problems with these neo-gnostic approaches to being a Christian. First, I don’t see a good example in the Bible of retreating from the messy living and loving of one another outside of the Body of Christ.

Where does one go to devote themselves to the apostle’s teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and prayers? Do these ministries administer the sacraments? Do they serve communion? (Some do) Do they Baptize? Do they perform marriages? Do they officiate funerals? Do they take casseroles to the bereaved? Do they visit the hospitals and minister in the nursing homes? Do they go to the jails and listen, love, and pray for broken humanity?

I reckon there are some that do, and I would say they are the exception that proves the rule.

The Biblical testimony and the witness of Christian history is that the Church is the last best hope for this dark world. The bride of Jesus; the body of Christ—these do not describe Young Life, Southern Baptist, or John Elderedge’s ministry. They describe the First Methobapterian church in your town.

These ministries are important and even essential to the edification of the Church, but make no mistake, they are NOT the Church.

But another reason I have a problem with kicking the church to the curb is more personal. I wrote in my journal this morning after doing my Lectio on 1 Timothy 3:14-16 what you see in the photo:

In the fall of 1999, I resigned my Church in Colorado and moved my young family to the Pacific Northwest. I had made sinful choices that led to this upheaval. Our destination was a little church in Sumner, Washington. My brother was the pastor of the church and they welcomed us with open arms in spite of my scarlet reputation.

They had a building fund they used to move us out to Sumner and provide funds for me to go to New Life Clinic in Los Angeles for a therapy intensive that lasted three weeks.

We were unemployed and homeless. The little church provided us a place to live next door in a house they had purchased and remodeled for Sunday School classes. They gave me a job of tearing down a condemned house next door to that house so that the lot could be used for parking. They paid for Lynette and me to go to marriage counseling sometimes twice a week for over a year. They helped pay the tuition for my oldest son to attend a private Christian school.

More importantly they loved us deeply; they loved us well. They didn’t smother us. They weren’t cloyingly sweet with their affection. Do you know what they did? They made space for us. It was like they were eating a lavish and wonderful meal at a long table and we were unexpected guests. They scrunched together, got more plates and silverware and made room for us at their table. That simple act began our healing.

After about a year, they asked me to teach a Sunday School class. Not long after that, my brother had to be out of town and he asked me to preach for him. It had been about a year and a half since I had preached. I remember standing in front of this little congregation, with tears streaking down my face, saying thank you to them for the honor of preaching to them. A man from the back of the church shouted, “We love you, Joe!”

To shorten this story, in about 3 years that church disbanded. They had exhausted themselves in giving to my family and had run out of everything to stay alive except love. Do you remember that hymn that was sung in the first church found in Philippians chapter two?

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself…

If ever there was a church that followed Jesus down into obscurity in the world’s eyes and greatness in God’s, it was Christ Church of Sumner.

They gave themselves away so that my family could stay together and find healing and restoration. Because of their kenosis and agape love, my oldest son met his future wife in that little church and we have four wonderful grandchildren; my other two sons grew up in that little church and made lasting friends. My wife and I just celebrated our thirty-sixth year of marriage. God has graciously allowed me to pastor again and has given my wife and I ministry to pastors and their families.

All that is to say that I don’t take it well when Christians neglect, throw rocks, and bad-mouth the bride of Jesus.

There’s nobody who doesn’t have problems with the church, because there’s sin in the church. But there’s no other place to be a Christian… Eugene Peterson

So, let me say this as loving as I can. Stop chunking rocks at my Lord’s bride or I’ll fight you in the church parking lot.

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Sacred Companions

Posted on January 29, 2018 by Joe Chambers

Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul. 1 Samuel 18:3

Jonathan’s love entered David’s heart in a way that Saul’s hatred never could. –Eugene Peterson

Of all the forces that mark us, I believe none are more important than people. And no people are more important than those we call by the title “friends.” I think there’s no wonder like the wonder of friendship. I think that’s one of the most powerful words in the world — “friend.”

I asked a man one time, “What is it like to be my friend?”

Here is his email response:

Joe, you have a thoughtful, caring conscience. When I’m with you I get opportunity to shed posturing and to get real at any moment. You value knowing the vision of God’s work in the center of my life as being of greater concern than any other work or personal accomplishment.

Knowing there is someone willing to call me on the need for taking personal responsibility for a necessary step in my journey with Jesus rather than merely affirming a stated intent is marking my life.

I love you, Joe.

When a friend does that for a friend, it gets way down into your soul. I’ve read that and re-read that several times in the last few days. Friends that take the time to say words like those are golden.

I had lunch with a man my age a couple of years ago who is struggling with his life. As I sat across the table from him and looked at him and said, “Bill, I just want to be your friend.” His eyes brimmed with tears and he looked down at his Won Ton Soup and said, “I really need a friend. Thank you, Joe.”

What’s the difference between a good friend that happens to be a Christian, and a spiritual friend? A spiritual friend is an intimate, life giving friend who helps me pay attention to God.

A spiritual friend will say to you, “How is God speaking to you in this? How does God want to be at work in your life through this? And how are you responding to him?” They help you pay attention to God.

If you find someone you might want to be a spiritual friend, don’t schedule a lunch with that person and say, “I want you to be my spiritual friend. I want to meet with you and be shaped by you and be committed to you every day for the rest of my life.” Because if that person is healthy at all, they will run out of the restaurant. And if they’re not, you’re going to end up in worse shape than they are.

Test the water, go slow, be patient. Test the relationship by taking little relational risks. Move beyond polite conversation.

Polite conversation is built on trying not to hurt somebody’s feelings. And that’s not a bad thing. Spiritual friendship is different. You might begin by disclosing some area of struggle, not the deepest one in your life, but a significant one.

  • Is there a level of empathy there?
  • Do they listen well?
  • Or do they only want to focus on talking about themselves?
  • Are they wise and discerning in their response?
  • Is there kind of a judgmental spirit attached to them?
  • Do they honor confidentiality?

I have been going through a dry wilderness time in my soul these days. There is nothing in my life that is especially difficult. No hidden sins, no relational trauma, no professional failures. My health is good. My marriage is good. My Church is good. And yet my heart is lonely.

Facebook says that I have over one thousand friends, but that is a lie. Most of them have unfollowed me and I have unfollowed many of them.

I was driving across the great expanse of South Park towards Colorado Springs last week to meet a friend for breakfast. As I drove through that treeless and big sky valley a song came on my sound system by U2 called, Sometimes You Can’t Make it on Your Own.

Tough, you think you’ve got the stuff
You’re telling me and anyone
You’re hard enough

You don’t have to put up a fight
You don’t have to always be right
Let me take some of the punches
For you tonight

Listen to me now
I need to let you know
You don’t have to go it alone

Maybe it was the emptiness of the road or the large Colorado sky, or maybe it was the ache in my heart, but when that song came on and I began to sing along, my eyes burned with tears and my voice broke.

I stopped singing and listened to the song wind down. When it was over, I said to myself, “I can’t wait to see my friend this morning.”

When I met with my friend, he didn’t necessarily give me deep words of encouragement or warm words of affirmation. We shared a meal together and it became a sacrament of grace for my soul. It was the simple act of me being aware of my ache and sitting with my friend at breakfast that thawed out my cold, cold heart.

I drove back across that mountain valley and felt the heaviness lift. My heart was strangely warmed, and I whispered to the friend who sticks closer than a brother, “Thank you, Lord. I am a blessed man.”

I’m not sure that anyone can have a great deep friend and be called poor. I’m not sure that anybody could lack having a great deep friend and be called rich.

There is nothing like the wonder of a friend.

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Killing Giants

Posted on January 22, 2018 by Joe Chambers

 “Sometimes fear does not subside, and we must choose to do it afraid.”  ~Elisabeth Elliot

When have you been most afraid?

I could tell you about breaking my leg in the wilderness and lying on the ground for two days waiting to be rescued. I could tell you about when the school thug/bully promised he would kill me because I was dating his former girlfriend. I could tell you about being in some alpine caves and having a panic attack inside the cave, 300 feet from the entrance to the cave. I could tell you about leading seven friends up Broken Hand Mountain and all of us nearly dying of hypothermia when we got caught in a summer storm.

But one of the most frightening moments of my life was far more pedestrian than those. About 15 years ago I had been out of ministry for a couple of years in order to rebuild and restore my marriage. I dared to attempt to interview for a pastor position down in Alamosa.

I drove down from Poncha Springs where I was staying with my father. I got to Alamosa early and went to a coffee shop where I prayed. The devil was screaming in my ear that I didn’t belong in ministry. That I was a loser. That ministry would finish off my marriage. That I was washed up and useless to God.

I sat in that coffee shop waiting, as if for my execution, with every muscle taut. My legs were bouncing. My tongue was cotton-mouth dry. My heart was racing. I couldn’t breathe. It felt like a piano was sitting right in the middle of my chest. I couldn’t make spit to talk.

I remember hearing God say to me, “Son, why are you so afraid?”

I muttered, “I’m afraid of being rejected, Lord.”

God said, “By who?”

“By this church.”

“But you are my son.”

“Okay.”

I stepped outside into the crisp air, took a deep breath and went to the interview with those words ringing in my ear—“You are my son.”

To shorten the story, the interview went well. The little church said they wanted me to be their next pastor. I went home, and Lynette and I prayed and finally decided the best thing for our family was to withdraw my name as a candidate.

Turns out that was the right decision, but I’ll never forget that intense moment of fear waiting to go to that interview in Alamosa.

What is the most frightened you have ever been? What has caused your knees to buckle?

Do you know what the top fears are in our country? On most lists you might find, fear of death hovers right around number five and the number one fear in America is typically the fear of public speaking.

So, let me get this straight, some of you would reading this blog would rather die than do what I do week in and week out? One strategy I was told in speech class to help with being nervous in a talk was to imagine your audience sitting in their underwear. As a pastor, I want to assure you that I have never done that. I never will!

Being intimidated by an audience, or scared by a spider, or battling the fear of rejection can be debilitating. It can cause us to run for cover. It can cause us to make poor decisions. What do we do when we are faced with an overwhelming fear?

When you read the ancient story found in 1 Samuel 17, you discover a conversation between the brothers and Saul, all of them had a Goliath-centered view of what was going on. Only David had a God-centered view of the situation—only David managed to see God.

There is an interesting word usage in the David and Goliath story that I want to show you.

And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath.

The word “champion” is a Hebrew word that means the man in between. It is used to describe someone who is a representative fighter. The champion is a brother of the tribe; often the captain of the army and sometimes even the king. And he fights on behalf of the rest of his people.

Who should be Israel’s champion? Saul should be Israel’s champion, but he is doing his best imitation of Don Knotts hiding in his tent.

So, here David, the least of his brothers, comes out to face Goliath as the captain of his people and eventually the king.

I love the way Eugene Peterson put this in a poem called Smooth Stones,

Odd shaped pebbles roll
And tumble ‘round the Rock which
Smooths them into five smooth
Stones
One of which will
Kill a giant

This is a three-thousand-year-old picture of the victory that you and I will have fought for us by the Son of David on the cross of Calvary. Jesus faced down the ultimate giants that have haunted mankind since we were kicked out of Eden. The giants of sin and death. And Jesus didn’t face them at the risk of his life, but at the cost of his life.

Only when you have your eyes on Jesus—your brother, captain, and king—can you actually deal with your giants.

At the end of the first of the Lord of the Rings movies there is a powerful scene. Boromir is the son of the Steward of Gondor. He has strong ambitions to be the next king. But he knows this will only happen if he gets his hands on the one ring that Frodo is carrying and can take it back to Gondor.

Boromir tries to take the ring by force and in the struggle Frodo slips the magic ring on his finger and disappears leaving Boromir flailing about.  It is here Boromir’s rage and passion dissipate and he “comes to himself” only to realize that he has failed the temptation to resist the seduction of the ring.  He weeps and is filled with shame and regret.  Meanwhile Frodo and the ring are gone.  Suddenly other hobbits in the fellowship are in danger and Boromir rises to fulfill his heroic calling by defending the lesser characters to the death.

As he lies dying the once and future king—the true king of Middle Earth, Aragorn, rushes to his aid and fights off the Orcs and goblins. When he has won the field, Aragorn kneels down to lend comfort to the mortally wounded Boromir.

In Boromir’s death scene he looks into the face of the true king of men, Aragorn, and says, “I would have followed you my brother, my captain, my king.”

It is my prayer that as you face whatever giants await you that you will open the door of deep faith to Jesus your deliverer—your brother, captain, and King.

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How God Sees

Posted on January 15, 2018 by Joe Chambers

The Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. 1 Samuel 17:7

People have always wanted to be like everybody else, to do the popular thing, and the Israelites were no exception.

“We’re tired of worshiping an invisible God. Everybody says, ‘Where’s your king?’ And we have to say, ‘Oh, he’s in the heavens.’ We want a leader here on earth, Samuel. We want to be like all the other nations. Look at the Philistines, and the Moabites and the Jebusites and all the other nations. They’ve all got kings. We want to be like all of them!”

They didn’t say, “We want to wait on God to provide what we need.” This broke Samuel’s heart, and so he went to God in prayer about it.

So, God let them have exactly what they wanted. Did He ever!

The man they chose, Saul, was tall, dark, and handsome. That’s how people choose kings. They go for someone who looks good. “Wow, he’ll be a good image for Israel. Saul’s our guy. Saul’s our hero.”

So Saul came on the scene and swept them off their feet. He had a measure of humility to begin with, and he seemed able to rally people around a cause. He had enough moxie to get an army together, and before long the Israelites thought, “He’s the man for the job.”

But guess what? Even though Saul was forty years old when he started to rule, before long he became thin-skinned, hot-tempered, and given to seasons of depression, even thoughts of murder. Some hero he turned out to be.

So much for the man who was the people’s choice.

David was born about ten years after Saul became king. Talk about being born into volatile times! The people of Israel were on a long drift from God, and now, to make matters worse, they were becoming disillusioned with the leader they had chosen.

But what do you do when your king doesn’t walk with God? What do you do when you’ve gotten your own way and it’s all wrong. It’s the most disillusioning, insecure feeling in the world, yet you can’t put your finger on what’s wrong.

But graciously, God does not abandon His people. Through Samuel, He intervenes.

God always knows what He’s doing. So He says to Samuel, “You go to Bethlehem, and there you will find the man I have already chosen.” This is the first Samuel has heard that God had already zeroed in on a man to replace Saul.

God says, “I’ve selected a king for Myself. The people haven’t chosen this man. He’s My man.”

What a person is down in their depths, down underneath the clothes, skin, intellect, beauty—this area the bible calls the heart—is what will determine the life of a person. And yet for most of us this is the very last thing that we look at in another person.

In the cultural moment that we live in, we are obsessed with the outside and we almost completely ignore the inside of a person.

In an October, 2011 article of the Wall Street Journal there was an interview about this…

Daniel Hamermesh, an economics professor at the University of Texas in Austin, measures out the benefits in his book, “Beauty Pays: Why Attractive People Are More Successful.”

According to his research, attractive people are likely to earn an average of 3% to 4% more than a person with below-average looks. That adds up to $230,000 more over a lifetime for the typical good-looking person, Dr. Hamermesh estimates. Even an average-looking worker is likely to make $140,000 more over a lifetime than an ugly worker.

I searched the article and could not find a dollar value for humility, patience, or gentleness. We tend to fixate on the outside, when God pays attention to the inside.

How will you see those you come in contact with this week? The spouse you quarreled with last night. The co-worker that is mildly annoying to you. The neighbor that has a dog that just won’t stop barking.

When the Bible calls David “a man after God’s own heart” what in the world does that mean? Well, it certainly cannot mean that David has some kind of squeaky clean moral perfection. This man is a piece of work. Hardly hero material. One writer said that when you look at David from only a human point of view he looks like a “blood-thirsty, over-sexed, bandit.”

I like the way John Calvin put this.

“Let us therefore remember that David is like a mirror, in which God sets before us the continual course of His grace.”

The David stories are not stories about how we should live; they are a mirror of how we do live. And how God’s grace works and operates in our broken lives. In David’s story there is very little morality, absolutely no miracles, but there is a lot of mess.

I find comfort in that. It tells me that my failures in life do not push me out of reach from the God who says He loves me. If God can love David, maybe, just maybe, he would love me too.

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and put a new and right spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
and do not take your holy spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and sustain in me a willing spirit.

We see David talking to God in all of the moments of his life. Through his working and his playing. Through his betrayals and his faithful friendships. We see David talking to God in his innocence and in his deepest guilt. In the best moments of his life and in his most desperate moments.

That is a person after God’s heart. Someone who turns their imperfect life towards God’s presence. Someone who lives their flawed life deeply with God. God wants us to live our lives, messy as they are, with Him. And that makes God the hero of our story. 

I love what former Watergate conspirator and Nixon hatchet man Chuck Colson said before he died a few years ago:

“The real legacy of my life was my biggest failure—that I was an ex-convict.  My great humiliation—being sent to prison—was the beginning of God’s greatest use of my life; He chose the one experience in which I could not glory for His glory.”

Is it possible that, as you move into the messiness of your life, that that is exactly where God will meet you and restore you to who he intended you to be when he thought you up before he created a single particle of dust?

Let God be your hero. That may not be the popular way, but it is the Jesus way.

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WANTS for 2018

Posted on January 4, 2018 by Joe Chambers

I went to bed on New Year’s Eve at 9:00. I heard no fireworks out here in the woods, but I assume the new year came in with a bang. So, happy new year and all that jazz…

I read a few predictions for the coming year and they were fun and interesting.  I’m not good at that stuff so I am going to set down a few of my “wants” for 2018.

10. That I will hold in my hand a finished and printed copy of my book, “Field Notes on the Jesus Way.” And I want to make significant progress on my cowboy novel.

9. I want to hike from Kenosha Pass to my backdoor here on Mt. Princeton. And I want to bag a couple of fourteeners along the way.  The wilderness calls my name.  I love the sense of accomplishment and the simplicity of the trail. Not to mention the fascinating people you meet and become friends with.

8. I want to participate in 10 people coming to faith in Jesus and becoming an apprentice of his way of life.

7. I want to see Mountain Heights Baptist Church establish an aggressive out reach ministry to the early retiree’s that are moving to our valley.

6. I want to launch and lead two soul care retreats for ministry leaders with my dear friend Mike Atkinson. One in Breckenridge and one here in Buena Vista.

5. I want to help Cross Roads Church in Poncha Springs find her next pastor.

4. I want to read more poetry this year.

3. I want love and serve my wife in such a way that she thinks that I finally got religion and she feels deeply loved down to her bones.

2. I want to develop my Galilean accent so that with every laughter, conversation, prayer, lament, and sermon I utter will cause folks to wonder.

1.  I want to live my life in such a way that my friends hunger and thirst for more of God.

I can’t predict if any of those things will come true, but I will arrange my life in such a way that they have the best possibility to occur, Lord willing.

#ComeAtMe2018

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Joe and Lynette’s eHarmony Epic Failure

Posted on December 29, 2017 by Joe Chambers

In spite of ourselves
We’ll end up a’sittin’ on a rainbow
Against all odds
Honey, we’re the big door prize
We’re gonna spite our noses
Right off of our faces
There won’t be nothin’ but big old hearts
Dancin’ in our eyes. — John Prine

Lynette and I tease each other that if we took that online match-making test, the results would tell us to run away from each other as fast as we can.

Nearly four decades ago Nette and I started dating as she graduated from Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, Oklahoma and I was pouring concrete and building storm shelters….and we could not have been any more different.

Here is an excerpt from a talk on marriage we gave a few years ago:

Joe: She listened to pop 40 music like Bread, The Carpenters, and America.

Lynette:  He used to listen to twangy country music like Conway Twitty, Elvis and the Oak Ridge Boys.

Joe: She was Miss Preppy.  She looked like the poster child of perfect Southern Baptist deacon’s daughter who will be an elementary school teacher. Tied her sweater around her shoulders.  Said her prayers before her meals.

Lynette: Joe wore starched wrangler jeans, cowboy boots and a Stetson.  (Joe drove a 1963 burgundy Oldsmobile he named “Ol Blue.” Who names their car a color?)  He also drove a big motor cycle, wore sleeveless shirts and wore his hat backwards.  He looked like a biker.  Chewed tobacco and lived in mobile home behind the skating rink.

Joe: She always went to class.  Never got in trouble in school.  Academically, she made the Dean’s List and the President’s list.

Lynette: Joe read a lot but had dropped out of college because he never went to class and tended to argue with the professors.  He was a prankster in college…he was on the Dean’s list but for delinquent reasons and was always on probation.

Joe: She liked cats.

Lynette:  On our first date he told me a story he calls “Operation Kitty Hawk” about a secret mission in which he and his brother-in-law created a parachute out of a beach towel for his sister’s cat that they would throw out of the brother-in-law’s airplane.  He told me this story on our first date!

Joe:  She grew up in the suburbs of Denver and was a city girl.  When her family went camping in always had sign that said KOA at the gate.

Lynette: Joe grew up in the mountains 9 miles from a town of 500 people.  When Joe went camping with his family there was a sign at the trail head that said, “Wilderness Area: Enter at your own risk.”

Joe: One of us is a Night owl.
Lynette: One of us falls asleep in his chair at 9:00
Lynette: One of us is daring, impulsive and careless.
Joe: One of us would rather their legs grow together than try something new.
Lynette: One of us talks even when he has nothing to say and then takes notes on himself.
Joe: One of us is the queen of rule keepers and would turn herself in to the authorities if she accidentally removed the tag on the bottom of the mattress.
Lynette: One of us spends money like there was no tomorrow.
Joe: One of us likes to cuddle.
Lynette: One of us likes to NOT cuddle.
Joe: One of us is on time, while the other will be late for her own funeral.
Lynette: One of us is neat
Joe: One of us has a tattoo.
Lynette: One of us likes conflict, looks for conflict, creates conflict…
Joe: One of us avoids conflict at all costs.

Joe: Her favorite movie is An Affair to Remember; a sappy movie about Cary Grant and Debra Kerr who are engaged with someone else but who fall in love with each other, then they are to meet at the top of the Empire State building but she is hit by a car and paralyzed.  Doesn’t make the lovers rendezvous.  He eventually finds her and loves her anyway and they live happily ever after.

Lynette: His favorite movie is Slingblade, a movie about a mentally disturbed man who had hacked his mother to death when he caught her cheating, spent 25 years in a nervous hospital, gets out makes friends with a little boy and eventually hacks abusive Dwight Yoakum character to death with a lawnmower blade and has to go back to the mental hospital.

Lynette:  “I knew I was marrying Mr. Right but I didn’t know his first name was Always.”

Joe: Are you saying that I am an idiot?

Lynette: Some things go without saying.

Lynette and I fought for years over these seemingly silly differences…now we laugh at them and even make allowance for them to the degree that part of our affection for one another is found in our profound differences.

Here is the secret:

 “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.” – Saint Paul

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Interruptions (A Christmas Sermon)

Posted on December 25, 2017 by Joe Chambers

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord iswith you; blessed are you among women!”

But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was. Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.”

Then Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I do not know a man?”

And the angel answered and said to her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God. Now indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son in her old age; and this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren. For with God nothing will be impossible.”

Then Mary said, “Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.  Luke 1:26-38

This is God’s Word.

I believe that one of the bravest people in the bible was a young girl named Mary. God comes to her with this incredible request: “Will you be the mother of the savior of the world?”

This isn’t, “Can you do me a little favor, Mary?”

This is a big ask.

And she says, “Yes.” Even though it comes as a huge interruption to her plans. She’s engaged to get married to Joseph, which means she’s about thirteen years old, that was the time that girls got engaged in that culture, and she’s got a lot of plans.

She’s got a wedding to plan and all kinds of stuff. But God interrupts those plans and says, “I’ve got a great idea, Mary. How about if, before you get married, you get pregnant, only Joseph, your fiancé, he won’t be the father, I will. What do you think, Mary?”

Talk about messing up your plans. When Joseph finds out he’ll probably cancel the wedding or worse, because in that culture the penalty for being unmarried and pregnant was death by stoning.

But Mary says, “I am the Lord’s servant, may it be to me according to your will.”

What a brave sentence. What a courageous girl. How many of us, when God asks us to do something, obey his commands, serve in his name, tell other people about him?

How many of us can say to God, “If you say so, Lord, I will, even if it interrupts my plans.”

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like to have my plans interrupted.  For I know the plans I have for me, plans to make me happy, very happy, and I do not want those plans interrupted.

The problem, though, is that life is filled with interruptions, isn’t it? Some of them wanted, and most of them not.

  • We get a health crisis,
  • or we get laid off,
  • or we don’t get married when we want to,
  • or we don’t get the promotion that we went after.

Now God doesn’t cause those kinds of interruptions, but they’re still interruptions.

But then there are the kinds of interruptions that do come from God. God asks us that we obey his commands:

  • Such as observe the Sabbath
  • Save sex for inside marriage
  • Avoid gossip, and that interrupts our plans to do exactly what we want when we want to do it.
  • Be reconciled with people that we are mad at:, and that interrupts our plans to stay mad, and nurse a grudge, and feel self-righteous and bitter, and die of a heart attack because of the stress of it all. It’s a bad plan, but it’s ours, and we don’t want to let go of it.
  • God invites us to participate with him in redeeming the world by serving in some way, maybe just caring for a neighbor, and that interrupts our plans.

But Mary seems to understand a couple of things about interruptions that we don’t, and that allows her to say yes to God…

  1. God is our Discomforter, as well as our Comforter.

God is definitely moving Mary outside of her comfort zone, but she knows that that is a good thing. We often think of Jesus as our comforter in times of trial, and he does do that. But Jesus not only comforts the afflicted, he also afflicts the comfortable, for our own good.

Because we need to get out of our comfort zones from time to time, otherwise we get stuck in life and we don’t grow.

You’re probably bored. Probably looking for some kind of artificial thrill like…

  • Substance abuse,
  • or pornography,
  • or workaholism,
  • or just buying more things for the thrill of the purchase.

God will often take us out of our comfort zone in order for us to begin to grow and to have life again.

When you’re green you’re growing, when you’re ripe you’re rotting.

If you want a spiritual rush in life, pray this prayer, “Lord Jesus, take me out of my routine, stretch me so I can experience you in a new way.”

Just pray that prayer. I dare you. I double dog dare you, because God will answer it, and will give you an adventure that will light up your life.

God is our discomforter, as well as our comforter, and that’s a good thing.

The second thing that Mary understands about interruptions that allow her to say “yes” to God, is…

  1. With God all things are possible.

God’s request to Mary seems impossible, and she points that out. “Lord, don’t mean to nitpick the details here, but how am I going to have this kid since I am a virgin. Don’t mean to be fussy, but that seems like a problem.”

The angel says, “With God all things are possible.”

Often the interruptions in our lives seem impossible to handle.

  • A health crisis,
  • A financial problem
  • A relationship problem seems impossible.
  • Or the things that God asks us to do seem impossible.
  • It seems impossible to serve in his name, impossible to obey his commands.

We often think,

  • I don’t have the time,
  • I don’t have the talent,
  • I don’t have the resources,
  • I don’t have the discipline.

But with God all things are possible.

A while back I was feeling a little worried about some challenges I was facing.  So, a few weeks ago I was sharing deeply from my soul about this, AKA whining, to a friend of mine, and you know what he did? He mocked me. He mocked a pastor. I don’t know where it is in the bible but I’m sure that that is a sin. I’m sure it says somewhere “thou shalt not mock thy pastor.

He said, “Yeah, God created the universe out of nothing, he parted the Red Sea, he raised Jesus from the dead, but Joe, you’re right, your problems, he can’t handle those, those are too big for him.

In fact, God is up there wringing his hands right now saying, “Man, I’ve held the universe together for all of eternity, but Chambers’ problems,— they’ve got me stumped!””

I indicated to my friend that he did not have a future in pastoral care. But he did have a good point. Do we trust? Do we trust that the God who is big enough to make the universe out of nothing is big enough to handle the interruptions and problems in our life?

God brings life in the interruptions. God is our discomforter, for our own good. With God nothing is impossible.

The third thing that Mary understands about interruptions is…

  1. God’s plan is sometimes harder, but better.

When the angel greets Mary he says what I think is a very ironic thing.

He says, “Greetings, you who are highly favored!”

Highly favored? And what is this great privilege that Mary gets for Christmas?

  • She gets to be pregnant and unmarried, the penalty for which was death;
  • She gets to give birth in an cave around dirty animals with animal stuff everywhere; then
  • She has to flee to Egypt as a refugee so the insane King won’t kill her son; and then
  • She has to be the mother of Jesus, which I think would be pretty hard, not because he was bad, but because he was perfect.

(Can you imagine how irritating a perfect child would be? You can’t send the son of God to his room, he sends you to yours. And you’d have to go.)

  • She has to watch her special gift from God die on a cross.

And this makes her the “highly favored one?”

And yet…and yet that first Christmas night…

  • She gets to hold the God who made her in her arms, and ponder the mystery that the child that she just delivered will soon deliver her from her sins.
  • She gets to see her son turn water into wine.
  • She gets to see him raised from the dead on Easter morning.

God’s promise to her is that she will be called “blessed” for generations, and that’s what has happened.

For 2,000 years she has been revered as one of the greatest heroes of Christian faith. Sometimes a little too revered, but nevertheless, a genuine, authentic hero.

“Hail, O favored one,” indeed. God’s interruptions to our plans are sometimes harder, but always better.

Mary was planning a nice peaceful life: get married to Joseph; have a couple of kids; maybe move out to the burbs. But God said, “Mary, I’ve got so much more for you than that.

  • I don’t want you just to have a kid; I want you to have a king.
  • I don’t want you just to raise a son; I want you to raise a savior.
  • I don’t want you just to have a family;
  • I want you to have a faith that’s worth dying for, but more importantly, a faith that’s worth living for.

God interrupted her plans, but in a glorious kind of a way.

The last thing that Mary understands is…

  1. God brings life in the interruptions.

John Lennon said that “life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.”

For Mary this is a huge interruption, but there’s life in that interruption. She gets to be the mother of Jesus, that’s life.

I love what Henri Nouwen wrote in, Reaching Out,

While visiting the University of Notre Dame, where I had been a teacher for a few years, I met an older experienced professor who had spent most of his life there.  And while we strolled over the beautiful campus, he said with a certain melancholy in his voice,

“You know…my whole life I had been complaining that my work was constantly interrupted, until I discovered that my interruptions were my work.”

29 Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be.

Part of what might have troubled Mary besides having an angel appear before her—that doesn’t happen every day—is that inside her womb would be life that was not there yesterday.

That is an interruption of eternal significance.

In 2011 I planned to go backpacking for a week. But my plans were interrupted when two days in to my trip I broke my leg.

I was in an isolated place in the mountains, by myself, and without cell phone coverage.

I had slipped on some wet grass and the torque of my fall broke the fibula in my right leg. I endured severe pain for several days as I waited for someone to come along and send for help.

My rescuer was a young man named Boris, who volunteered for Search and Rescue. He was hiking on his day off when he found me and radioed for a helicopter to come to our location. While we waited, we talked. I found out he was born in America and moved with his folks back to the Netherlands when he was quite young.

I asked if he was married and he said he was going through a divorce.

The Search and Rescue helicopter arrived, and I said goodbye. I yelled as loud as I could over the sound of the chopper blades, “Thank you, Boris!”

End of story, right?

Wrong.

On Sunday, September 1, 2013, I stood up to preach in my church, and sitting in the congregation was Boris. I announced his presence to the congregation and they gave him a hero’s welcome. What Boris didn’t realize was that it was the anniversary of the day he had found me in the wilderness two years before.

I invited him to our house for Sunday lunch and asked him why he had come to church that day. He said many things, but the one thing that stood out to me was that he said he was missing something in his life and wanted to explore Christianity. We made plans to go on a hike together later that week. Then he came to church again, and we met for coffee and talked further about issues that had prevented him from embracing faith in Jesus.

After answering as many questions as I could over the course of several conversations, I finally asked Boris if he wanted to become a Christian by pledging his life to Jesus. He said yes and was converted

Boris was baptized on September 19, 2013, in an alpine lake in the Northern Cascades of the Pacific Northwest. We stood waist-deep in icy water and I recited words that I have said hundreds of times in my ministry: “I baptize you, my brother, in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.” This time, my voice quivered not from cold, but from the mystery of how God accomplishes His will.

The rescuer had been rescued. It was an interruption that brought life…eternal life to a lonely man named Boris.

  • When I broke my leg, that was an interruption.
  • When Boris had to cut short his day hike to rescue me, that was an interruption.
  • When Boris came to my church and then to lunch at my house that Sunday (which was my wife’s birthday), that was an interruption.
  • When Boris prayed to become a follower of Jesus, that was an interruption to the life he had planned.
  • It was an interruption, but God brought life out of it.

Question

If tonight God came to you just like he came to Mary, and he said, “I want to be born through you. I want to use your body to bring the savior into the world.”

What would you say?

The fact is, God is asking that of each one of us. He asks each one of us,

  • Will you be my hands?
  • Will you be my feet?
  • Will you be my voice?
  • Will you show who I am to a hurting world?

It can simply be caring for a neighbor or coworker to show them who Jesus is.

He doesn’t force us to do it. He didn’t force Mary. He simply invites us into it.

So, what are the interruptions in your life? And whether they’re just the normal part of life, or the ones that come from God, this week, can you pray, “Lord, show me how you want to use these interruptions, to bring life, to get me out of my comfort zone.”

Pray that prayer, knowing in your heart that with God, all things are possible, and that even if it’s harder, with God it’s always better.

And then ask, “how can I begin to live a life that is interruptible?” so that you can follow God in those interruptions into a deeper, more fulfilling life than you could ever have planned on your own?

He promises us that, and he always keeps his promises.

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Feeling Alone and Unloved This Christmas?

Posted on December 18, 2017 by Joe Chambers

Madelyn Murray O’Hair, the outspoken atheist who was instrumental in getting prayer removed from public schools seemed, on the surface, to be tough as nails. Yet recently her journal was uncovered and numerous times she had written, “Somebody, please love me.”

People will do just about anything in order to feel loved. Some people think, “If I succeed enough, people will love me,” or “If I sleep with this person, he or she will love me,” or “If I am pitiful enough, people will feel sorry for me and begin to love me.” The problem is, none of these strategies work. Those who pursue love by means of success usually end up feeling used and unappreciated. The same can be said for those who try to trade sex for love. Those who use a pity as a means of earning affection usually find that pity soon turns to contempt, and they end up feeling alone and abandoned.

I have discovered that most people who feel unloved have a distorted view of reality. They aren’t really completely unloved–they just don’t recognize the love that is in their life. Their emotional pain blinds them to the fact that they have friends and family who love them very much.

I want to say this to you: If you sometimes feel unloved, or if you really are in a position in life where there is no one at all that loves you, there is hope for you today.

Most of you have heard of Kurt Cobain. He was in the band Nirvana, and he single-handedly started a new trend in the world of rock music–it was called “Grunge” music. He sold millions of albums, he had millions of fans, and the critics loved him. He had a beautiful wife and a daughter. And then, on April 5, 1994, he committed suicide. After it happened I saw an interview with a psychiatrist on CNN, and the question was asked, “How could a man who was loved by so many reach such a level of despair?” The psychiatrist said, “The adoring fans were a very small part of Kurt Cobain’s life. His misery was caused by the fact that he felt estranged from the people that mattered most.”

If you feel unloved, there is a hope I can offer you today: There is someone who loves you, and he matters very, very much. And he has gone to amazing lengths to prove it.

God loves you. Most of you have heard that statement thousands of times throughout your life–maybe so many times that the statement has lost some of its impact. Some people think, “Yeah, God loves me. So what? He has to–he loves everybody.”

I want to make something clear: God loves you with all of his heart, and it’s not because he got stuck with you. He doesn’t love you just because you’re part of the big mass of humanity. He loves you individually. He loves you as if you were the only one in the world to love. No matter what you have done, or no matter what your life has been like, God loves you. He wants to share his love with you.

The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; but because the Lord loves you… Deuteronomy 7:7-8

…the Lord loves you.

Need proof?

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13

Look at the cross.

Beyond this God cannot go.

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The Peaceable Kingdom

Posted on December 11, 2017 by Joe Chambers

The wolf shall live with the lamb… and a little child shall lead them. Isaiah 11:6

There is a movie that I enjoyed a few years ago called “Grand Canyon.” And one of the characters in that film is an attorney named Mack and he is locked in an L.A. traffic jam. He takes a short cut through a part of L.A. that is notorious for its street gangs. He moves deeper into bad neighborhoods until finally his fancy sports car stalls in a sketchy looking neighborhood.

Mack calls a tow truck, but before the truck could arrive a low-riding car with base-pounding music pulls up behind Mack’s car. A group of neighborhood street thugs start piling out of that low-rider and move towards Mack and his nice car.

They surround his car and begin to hassle him and just about that time the tow truck pulls up and out steps an earnest and serious looking man named Simon (who is played by Danny Glover).

All of the street thugs start to protest and threaten both Mack and Simon until Simon takes aside the leader of the street gang and says this:

Man, the world ain’t supposed to work like this. I mean, maybe you don’t know that yet. I’m supposed to be able to do my job without having to ask you if I can. That dude is supposed to be able to wait with his car without you ripping him off. Everything is supposed to be different than it is.

That is a graduate ethics course on a street corner. Simon’s street-side speech is a summary of what all of us experience in this world. Everything is supposed to be different than it is.

What we see on our news, what we see in our cities, what we see in our own community, and what we see in the mirror every morning is not the way it is supposed to be.

When you go to your kitchen faucet and fill a glass of tap water and then turn on the news to learn that every year in our world 3.4 million people die of simple, curable water related diseases…you might think to yourself, Everything is supposed to be different than it is.

When you think about the fact that most of us in this room grew up in a family that supported your education experience so that you can read, write, and do basic math— you will have exponentially more opportunities in life than many of the kids that grow up in the inner cities like Denver and Dallas. If you are honest you will say to yourself, Everything is supposed to be different than it is.

When you open the first pages of the book that we love we see a story of a Creator who fashions the cosmos, galaxies, worlds and a human family that is deeply good. God creates the world as an interwoven tapestry of relationships and goodness that is woven together in beauty and delight.

God creates a world that is good, just, and kind. It is swollen with possibilities. But early in the story our primal parents turned their backs on our Creator. And as that happens the fabric of the tapestry of God’s good creation is torn and begins to unravel.

The unraveling that sin has brought into this world tears at families, societies, and even the molecular structure of creation itself. Everything is supposed to be different than it is.

No other approach to God is like the Christian story. Lots of other religions talk about God’s compassion for the poor—but only the Christian story says God becomes poor. When Jesus came to us in that manger, God became the poor and the powerless. God suffers injustice to draw out its sting, undo its power, and begin the work of restoring his world.

As we see what God has done for the weak and poor in Jesus, we who follow him—if we follow him close enough for the dust of his sandals to get on our clothes—then we will follow him down into obscurity, weakness, and poverty.

If you want to do the works of the One who is high and lifted up, serve the ones who are low and leveled down. ~ Beth Moore

This is why it is hard for some of us to understand why so many “Christians” are so supportive of policies in local, state, and national governments that seem to do so much harm to the poor and the powerless of our society.

If we follow closely the Jesus described in Scriptures, He will lead us to places that He would go and do the work that he would do. Honestly, I’m not certain that is where the majority of Christians in America want to go. They want to stay insulated and away from the poor and marginalized.

It is customary for self-righteous preachers from pulpits and Christian celebrity wags on television to whine and complain about how commercialized and materialistic Christmas has become. The war on Christmas that so many are concerned about is about getting back the true meaning of Christmas that does not include materialism.

But may I be so bold as to say that I think just the opposite is accurate. Christmas is a very materialistic celebration. Because the Christmas story is a narrative of a God who came to inhabits cells, sinews, and sinuses—and to do something about what is wrong with this material world.

What this means is that was we walk closer to our rabbi and Savior, we will learn how to have a more materialistic Christmas. Christmas is good news for this material world. And that means that you and I ought to be diligent about how we can address the tears of this world.

So, go out and tell your family and friends that your pastor told you to go out and have a more materialistic Christmas. Maybe instead of singing “Have yourself a Merry little Christmas” we could adapt those lyrics to say, “Have yourself a materialistic little Christmas.”

How do we do that?

When you look at the life of Jesus, you don’t see him standing up for the poor out of anger or paranoia. But out of the deep communion with the God he calls Father. Out of a deep interior life of love with the one he calls Abba.

When you look at Jesus you see someone who is brim-full with God’s Spirit; who delights in the presence of God. All of Jesus’ preaching, teaching, and ministry comes from those deep wells of communion with God in prayer.

We pray and then we act.

When you look at Jesus, you are actually looking at God getting dirt under his fingernails in the pain, suffering, and wrong of this world. And God invites us to be like Jesus and actually do something about the wrong and neglected in our community.

You could start by noticing a neighbor who looks lonely and begin a relationship with them. You could start by opening your home to someone who needs someone to talk to.

Start somewhere, start small, and do something.

There is a “Now” that God has accomplished in Jesus in the manger in Bethlehem, but there is a tomorrow that is not here yet.

Maybe you have seen the artist Edward Hicks depiction of this scene in a painting called The Peaceable Kingdom. Edward Hicks was a 19th century Quaker minister and painter. During the course of life, he was fascinated by this vision of a healed world and actually, painted this vision at least 62 times.

As he painted that scene over and over again in his life, the painting morphed as did his understanding of life in this world. Towards the end of his hard life, disillusionment began to creep into his faith so that one of the last versions of Peaceable Kingdom shows a darker scene. The child is still there but the animals have changed so that they all look more predatorial. Their claws are showing, and their fangs are bared.

If we are honest, you and I still live in a claws-out, fangs-bared kind of world. So, this “Not Yet” half of Isaiah’s vision invites us to discipline of waiting.

I find it interesting that in our world that is allergic to waiting, we Christ-followers still have to endure bared fangs and claws as we look out our windows towards the eastern skies and wait for the coming of our Lord. That is the day when everything that is supposed to be different—is different.

In the meantime, we are called to wait now—for a great future in which God will make all things new. Waiting is holy not-doing. It is disciplined looking ahead with your mental and emotional energy, your imagination, and your deep yearnings for that NOT YET day.

And so, my friend I hope you have yourself a materialistic little Christmas this year.

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