God, the Rock and Me

I was in junior high the first time I heard the question. And, it kind of shook me. I knew it was sort of a joke …sort of.  But somewhere along the way I had gotten it into my head that it was my job as a Christian to “always have an answer” to these kinds of puzzling questions.  So I wracked my adolescent brain to come up with an explanation that would leave no doubt in anyone’s mind (especially my own) about the existence of God.

So, what was the question?  Here it is, “Can God make a rock so large that He himself cannot lift it?”

That’s it. This was the cause of my early-teen spiritual angst. It has been called the omnipotence paradox. I knew it wasn’t right, but somehow it still troubled me. I think it inadvertently brushed up against my own deeply hidden spiritual disquiet. Beneath the surface of my normal Christian life was an emerging harvest of questions and doubts that would eventually blossom into a period of atheism in my life. It wasn’t the question itself that bothered me as much as the niggling awareness that many of my answers did not even really work for me. 

“Is God powerful enough . . . ?”  Hidden in the question is the subtle implication that, “if He can’t do everything, then perhaps He can’t do anything.”

It is, of course, all word-play. God is all powerful. “All” is all encompassing. If there is something more than “all” then “all” is no longer “all.”

The question is an attempt to find a limit to God’s power. What it reveals is the limit of our logic and language. There is no end to God, but we can very quickly reach the end of ourselves. Our ability to comprehend much of the world around us is really very limited. All of us, on most subjects, are two or three questions away from, “I don’t know.”  The “I don’t knows” of our life create a tension between all the things we think we know and the gaping holes of uncertainty that tell us we really don’t.   And so, we are led to an uncomfortable and yet inevitable need for finding peace with mystery.

If there is a god he must necessarily be shrouded in mystery. Any god that we could completely understand would not be much of a god. So, by his very nature, God is beyond our reach. This is why the story of Jesus’ incarnation is such a surprise. God chooses to reveal His unknowable nature through His Son.

John 1:14 says, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.”

God reveals Himself to men by becoming a man. If this makes sense to you the first time you hear it, then you are not paying attention. The mystery of how God can become a man . . . must stop us.  We have no way to make sense of this.  The idea that the God who made everything, would write himself into our story and then for a time be both within while remaining outside is literally incomprehensible.  We have no way to make sense of such a mystery.

The Christian faith is not really about making things understandable.  It is about making God known. How God does what he does is not explained, but who he is, is literally fleshed out. The particulars of God remain mysterious but he chooses to pierce through the mystery and reveal his heart through the story of Jesus.

“For God so loved the world that gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” John 3:16-17.

The important part of everything is that everything was created by a God who loves. God’s love moves Him to act. And, the action He takes is to sacrifice himself through Jesus so that we, His creation, can have life and be rescued from perishing.

My journey out of atheism was not about answers. I found my way back to faith by asking “the God that I did not believe in” to reveal himself to me. And he did. I know that sounds like the end of a bad Christian movie, but it’s what I experienced. I encountered Jesus and he began to change me. I still don’t have a good explanation to lots of my questions, but I do have an answer.

Jesus is the rock of our salvation. God lifts him up and he draws all of creation (including people like me) back to himself. God’s love, as demonstrated through the story of Jesus, changes everything. Jesus is the ultimate omnipotence paradox.

As you embrace this Lenten journey ask, “God, let me see you.  Reveal yourself.” If we seek, we will find, and we will be lifted.

(Copyright 2014, Sam Howard)

All Things New

And Another Thing . . . All Things New

“Look, I am making all things new.”

Revelation 21:5                               

The Greek word used here for “new” is kainos (kahee-nos) and in addition to meaning new, it also means fresh. Fresh is similar to new, but there are some differences that are unique and important.

The ideas of “new” and “old” are tied to time. Time makes new things old. A new car is valuable because it does not have any miles on it. The paint is shiny, there are no dings in the doors, the tires are full of tread and the motor hums.  The more a car is exposed to miles and roads it begins to change, to fade, to diminish. Suddenly, the “new” begins to morph into something else. The time and use begin to take a toll on the vehicle.  If it is kept long enough, things will begin to break and in the (notice this key word) end it will be scrapped.

The words “new” and “old” are related to “beginning” and “end.”  New things are found at beginnings, and old things are, for the most part, found at the ends.  The words “fresh” and “rotten” frequently correlate to new and old, but not always.  Sometimes, things can stay fresh in spite of being exposed to time.  For a bit, the effects of aging can be postponed. Freshness can be infused and the process of decay delayed.  But in this world, death always wins.

So here’s the thing. Old and dying are not part of God’s perfect plan.  God is only in the business of new, in the business of life. Death came with the enemy and the Fall. In the Garden of Eden everything was eternally fresh.  When Jesus speaks at the end of Revelation and tells us to “watch” as he makes “everything FRESH” again.  God wants to restore His natural order.  He sent Jesus to insert an extravagant, invigorating, revitalizing, reviving, restoring, fortifying, enlivening, story into the tale of humans that altered the storyline away from destruction and toward redemption. 

Jesus was a breath of fresh air blown into a world suffocating from a long fall in the wrong direction.  Isaiah tells us that “the people walking in darkness have seen a great light.”  John tells us “and that light was the life of all mankind.”  Paul tells us that “the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.”  God is the source of life.  Sin is anything that separates us from God.  When we are far from God we begin to decay and die.  When we “draw near” to God we find life and become fresh.

So in this New Year let’s resolve to “be still and know that He is God.”  Let’s find ways to set aside time to draw near to God so that life can become fresh and new.  “His mercies are NEW every morning.” “His love never fails.”  Everything touched by God comes alive.  It started in the Garden and will never end.

God is making everything new.  Even me.  Even you.

Happy New Year . . . and that’s all I have to say about that . . . for now.

And Another Thing . . . Passion week.

Jesus replied, "Now the time has come for the Son of Man to enter into his glory.  I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone.  But its death will produce many new kernels--a plentiful harvest of new lives.  Those who love their life in this world will lose it. Those who care nothing for their life in this world will keep it for eternity.  Anyone who wants to be my disciple must follow me, because my servants must be where I am.  And the Father will honor anyone who serves me.  John 12:23-26

Jesus most likely said this the day before his big deal entry into Jerusalem. He is about to ride in to the city knowing he will lose his life. The city is full of stories, as the film noir movies say. Most in the city are trying desperately to keep, horde, survive, preserve, stabilize, improve, or win in their stories. Jesus was going to the city to die and be the kernel that would produce a “harvest” of life.

I wonder, though, if most people in the city were too busy to notice.

This is the week of Jesus’ passion, as it is called. Perhaps it should be called the week of his crazy love. This is the week his love drove him to do crazy things to save the ones he loved. This is the week when for love’s sake he decided to intentionally walk into pain, shame and death. He loved us so much that he “despised the shame and endured the cross.” He loved us so much that he allowed himself to be abandoned by everyone . . . even God.

You probably know the story.

I woke up this morning thinking about how busy I am. And then, “oh yeah, this Sunday is Easter.”  Now I have been thinking about my Easter sermon, but that is different than thinking about Easter. So I am sending out this little note to encourage us to notice what God did in this week all those years ago.

I am frequently haunted by the thought of missing God. Not in terms of going to hell, but in terms of just missing what he is doing all around me. I wonder if the people two of three streets over from Jesus’ “Palm Frond” entry into their city had any clue that the messiah was just a few blocks over. Maybe they were invited to the parade but felt like they were too busy. So they kept doing their small things and missed a really big one.

Don’t miss Easter this year.

Don’t miss it right now.

Take a moment and notice God.

Think about what He did in that ancient Spring.

Think about what he is doing right now.

And that is all I have to say about that . . . for now.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas. . . . no, really, Merry Christmas. Put down the “to do” list and take a moment. 

Stop already. 

Jesus Christ has come. 

Jesus is the reason for the season. 

So, stop scurrying and take a moment and . . .

. . .be still and know that he is God.

God so loved you that he sent his only son, Jesus, to save you and make you new.

Jesus Christ is born!

Jesus lived among us for a time.

Jesus came so that we could have life and have it to the FULL.

Jesus died . . . was buried . . . resurrected . . . ascended . . . and is COMING AGAIN!

Woo-Hoo, or Hallelujah, or fist-bump, or some other culturally applicable expression of joy. (Do your version now. Go ahead already!)

So be still. Know. Bow. Worship. Rejoice.

Merry Christmas.

It is the end of the year and if you want to help out our little church with a financial gift we would greatly appreciate it. But only give if it comes from a place of Joy. 

Each new church is prayer for revival and a place where we hope Christ’s Kingdom will flourish and be born all over again.

Please give if you feel led. 

We are close to having a 24/7 space (please join us in praying for this).

Our small group has committed to give $5,500 monthly—this is 10% more than our budget. But our budget does not include any extras. We are asking the larger community of Gathering watchers to help us get some equipment, supplies and budgetary margin to accomplish some outreach activities. 

Thank you for praying for The Gathering as we chase our vision to change life as we know it through the love, loyalty and friendship with Jesus.

Send checks to:

The Gathering in Carmel

484 E. Carmel Dr., Ste 285

Carmel, IN  46032

Blessings and Merry Christmas,

The Gathering Team

Sam & Kim Howard

David & Amanda Foust

Marc & Amy Imboden

Abraham and Waiting and the Times In-Between

And Another Thing . . . Abraham and Waiting and the Times In-Between

I am writing this blog a little before 7:00 on election night 2012. I have decided to not look at news for a few hours and let the frenetic energy settle a bit. It is an odd thing waiting for news that will potentially change your life. Elections can feel that way, but many other things do as well.

For many years I worked for a large pharmaceutical company. During my tenure, there were three or four times when my company “downsized” their number of employees. The “deselection” process was always varied and always somewhat harrowing. Each time I had to sit by a phone and wait to hear what others had decided about my fate. I remember sitting in my office waiting for the phone to ring. The question was always, “Will my life change a little, or a lot, or not at all?” In those in-between times, I remember wondering what the people evaluating me were saying. Did they see my worth? Did I have any worth? Do I even want this job? What will I do if I lose my job? Why aren’t they calling? I wonder if we have any cookies. And on and on it would go.  Anger. Fear. Hope. Frustration. Assurance. Resignation. Impatience. Confidence. Doubt. Repeat.

Then the phone call came and fortunately for me, I was always retained and life resumed. Life is full of in-between times.

As a pastor, I have often sat with a family and friends in waiting rooms while people with grave conditions were being treated or operated on. I have heard life stories, philosophical meanderings, silly reminiscences, bad jokes and even mundane anecdotes all while waiting for news of a potentially life altering event. I have made new friends while waiting to hear if another person is going to make it. Life is mostly made up of the little moments that lie in between the big ones.

When Abram was 75 he had an incredible spiritual encounter with God. He heard God speak instructing him to leave everything and go to a land of promise. God told him that he would turn his descendants into a great nation. This was big news since Abram had yet to produce a child. As outlandish as this was, Abram obeyed.  He left everything. He followed God.

So Abram began his sojourn. Twenty-four years passed and there was still no child. I wonder if Abram ever felt silly. I wonder if he ever had a “what was I thinking” moment. We know that Sarai doubted. She forced the issue and Abram got a son from her servant. It was a mess. There were lots of stories in his in-between days. Twenty-four years of days without much news from God. Abram kept following. The odds kept getting longer. He was nearly 100 before he heard from God again. When he spoke, he said the same thing. “Great nation.” “Blessings.” Oh, and “circumcision.” “And, while you’re at it, change your name to Abraham” It just kept getting crazier. 100 years old and Abraham is still all in. He obeys, and low and behold, he gets a son.

God kept his word, but there were lots of days of silence before the promise was realized. There were lots of in-between stories. Twenty-four years of the odds just getting longer. Twenty-four years of being tempted to believe he got it wrong. Twenty-four years of waiting for faith to become sight.

God did keep his word. And all these years later, Abraham’s name is still known and his story is still told. The book of Hebrews says this of Abraham.

Hebrews 11:8-12  By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

What a huge ending God brought to this slow and plodding beginning. Eventually this humble story turns glorious. Abraham’s sojourn established a foundation for the beginning of the Jesus story. In his in-between days, although sometimes he stumbled, he remained faithful and God through him did more than anyone could ask or imagine.

So, while I wait to hear the end of this election story, I know that the big picture belongs to God. The big news of this election night may wind up being a big deal, or perhaps it will just be a footnote. Either way, God will do good things through his people if they choose to remain faithful in their in-between times.

And that is all I have to say about that . . . for now.

Adam & Eve, the Apple, the Snake and the Apartment Kids

And Another Thing . . . The Perished Kingdom

We have started to tell “The Story of God” at church on Sunday and at a local apartment complex on Thursday nights.  We sent postcards to everybody in the complex, around 200 units. I have heard in church-planting circles that such mailings typically elicit a .5% response, which is exactly what happened. One person from the complex showed up. A few of our people gathered with this individual and we had a great conversation. That was week number one.

Tonight was week number two and our lone respondent returned. Then, as we got ready to begin our discussion, one of our crew noticed a bunch of junior high kids playing outside the clubhouse. He invited them to join us—and amazingly, they did. I asked them their names and a little about themselves. Most did not go to a church, some did not believe in God, and most had never heard the Bible story of the creation and the fall.  A few knew about Adam and Eve and a little bit about an apple. One said, “Maybe there was a snake.”

So we told the story. We told about how God created the world, about the garden, Adam and Eve, about the snake—the temptation by the devil. We spent a little time talking about how God immediately promised to send his son to crush the serpent’s head. I was amazed at how many of these kids stayed engaged.

They listened. Asked questions. Wondered if we’d be back next week. 

Oh yes, we absolutely will be back next week. 

In telling this story to kids who had barely or never heard it reminded me of how foundational Genesis 3 is to the whole Christian faith. The seeds of all that will follow are in this story. The beauty of creation is broken. God’s intended kingdom perishes and is replaced by death, pain and lies. The world that humans were created to inhabit is lost. They are exiled from the garden of God. The potency of the adversary’s lie changes the story arc. Man is aligned with a new father. John 8:44 says, “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.”

Before we swallowed the forbidden fruit, humans lived in a world of clarity. With the knowledge of good and evil came confusion. Before the Fall, man’s perspective and God’s perspective were one. There was no such thing as doubt. Satan asks, “Did God really say . . .” and doubt emerges into the world. The forbidden tree’s name, “good and evil,” implies choice. With choice comes confusion. When humans separate from God everything gets murky. Paul says, “. . .now we see through a glass, darkly. . . .” Now humans must choose. In a world where lies exist, every truth becomes suspect. 

The good news is that, in Genesis 3:15, God promises that man’s new father, the father of lies, will one day be crushed. The first hint of Jesus entering the world to save lost humans is predicted within minutes of the Fall. God moves immediately to rescue the world he loves. 

When Jesus appears on the scene he challenges Satan’s rule. In John 10:10 he says, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” In John 10:15 he says, “. . . I lay down my life for the sheep.” And in John 14:6 he says, “. . . I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Truth is the way to life; the way to the Father. God overcomes the lies of the enemy with the truth of his son sent to crush the serpent’s head. Second Corinthians 5:19 says, “For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people's sins against them.” 

God undoes all that Satan did in the garden.

In Genesis 3 God promises to rescue man from the destruction of the Fall. In Revelation, at the end of the story, Jesus declares, "Look, I am making everything new!"

I hope our new friends at the apartment complex will be back to hear the rest of the story. It’s a good one.

And that is all I have to say about that . . . for now!

Of Politics and The Intended Kingdom

And Another Thing . . . The Intended Kingdom

In the midst of a political season, it is interesting to think about God’s intended Kingdom.. Politics can be nasty and divisive (especially in October of a Presidential election year), but at democracy’s core, I believe there is an underlying desire to make things better. We want a government that lifts burdens and inspires hope while facilitating opportunities for prosperity in a just and unencumbered way. We want our society to reflect the good place we imagine in our head. Inherent in all of us is a sense of longing – a feeling that we have been displaced from our intended dwelling. As C. S. Lewis wrote in Till We Have Faces,

“The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing — to reach the Mountain, to find the place where all the beauty came from — my country, the place where I ought to have been born. Do you think it all meant nothing, all the longing? The longing for home?”

Eden was God’s vote for what life should be like. It was perfect. All of the painful issues that rage against life were absent.  There was no death or illness. No hunger. No war. No religion. No sorrow. No politics. No racial divides. No classes (social, economic or otherwise). No lack of understanding. We were in perfect harmony with God and with nature and with one another. I can only imagine.

God, the three in one, chose to make humans “in our image.” God’s three members are perfectly distinct and perfectly one—each separate and yet connected. This connectedness is an essential part of creation. God is connected to everything in the beginning and in Eden all of God’s distinct creation is harmoniously married to the Creator and to each other. This is our intended natural state and it still exists as the quiet longing that is at the heart of all of our striving.

We see injustice in the world and intuitively know that this is different, somehow, from the way it was supposed to be. We see suffering and something in our gut tells us that only a broken system would allow this. We see abuse and react with incredulity and an impulse to set it right. As Joni Mitchell sang, “We’ve got to get ourselves back to the garden.”

East of Eden the clarity of the garden gets fuzzy. God pronounced everything in the garden “good.” Outside of the garden people pronounce all sorts of other things “good,” and pursue them with a noble passion. In his book Orthodoxy, G. K. Chesterton puts it this way:

“The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered . . . it is not merely the vices that are let loose. . . . the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful.”

Chasing after virtues is an attempt to get back home. We were intended for perfection. So we struggle to make the world right, finding that the task is too much for us, but it is not too much for God. Second Corinthians 5: 19 says, “For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.” 

The whole story of God is about God’s love creating a perfect place for his creation and then sacrificing himself to get us back to the life he designed for us. “For God loved the world he gave . . . .” 

So God is reconnecting people to himself through the gift of his son, Jesus. Through Jesus he is making all things new. God is fixing the mess we made of things. 

In the meantime, here is some advice for surviving this political season. 

“I met those of our society who had votes in the ensuing election, and advised them, 1. To vote, without fee or reward, for the person they judged most worthy: 2. To speak no evil of the person they voted against: And, 3. To take care their spirits were not sharpened against those that voted on the other side.”  

                                 John Wesley, October 6, 1774

And that is all I have to say about that . . . for now!