Spiritual Formation Retreat (Day 3)

It’s day three and I have no idea what day it is!  This day has been a tremendous reminder of just how much I am in desperate need of the community.  There is no freedom apart from the community (i.e. the body of believers, which fosters confession and communal putting to death of the flesh).  My wife and I are all caught up on sleep deprivation.  It is really hard for me to think of catching up on sleep as obedience to God.  But it is!  If I am called to be ready for whatever God has for me for the day (and it probably has something to do with being an attentive and present listener to another person), then I must be operating at optimal health.  I must eat, exercise, rest, and repeat so that I am at optimal health.  And that is what we did this morning.  We caught up on sleep.

It wasn’t too long into the day before I felt my flesh start to kick.  That silly old enemy told me to become angry, but I preached the gospel to myself and renounced that old idol of control and conform.  This half ounce of anger in my heart was a distraction in the morning worship.  I dozed off for a second during the reflective music portion.  By the time we transitioned to the male/female breakout prayer session I felt that my attention was back in tune with the Spirit.  I was focused.  I said to myself, “I’m back.  Here we go, thank you, Lord, for your forgiveness.  Let’s do this!”  We were guided to form a circle and silent pray for the brother on the right.  No words were spoken, just prayer to the living God for 1-2 min and then to move to the next person until all the men were covered.  The words came to me for each brother.  The Spirit was at work in my soul and giving me exactly how to pray.  

This morning session enabled me to experience the “Kairotic time,” which was explained to us as a mix of kairos (appointed time/season) with chronological (sequential time).  A kairotic time is a time where heaven and earth intersect.  Hence, a time “here on earth as it is in heaven!”  I love this idea because it is a reminder of what the Gospel is; namely, experiencing the freedom that we can look forward to in heaven, but here on earth. Where in the world did we get the idea that I have to die in order to experience freedom?  Does not the gospel mean that I can experience heaven here on earth?  I think so.  I think the gospel is that “good.”  We don’t have to wait.

There was a portion of one of the sessions where we covered many Bible passages and even broke them down exegetical/hermeneutical style.  I have to admit, I get excited when we tap into disciplines with which I am familiar.  I’m a bible study junkie and trained in systematic theology.  But the phrase that knocked me upside the head was, “It’s not whether or not you know these things, it's whether or not you are living them out.”  Wow!  How easy has it been for me my whole life to be comfortable in knowing versus living/application?  

Throughout the discussion on getting to root causes and breaking down common lies that the enemy feeds us all: The fear of exposure, the fear of failure, the fear of rejection, the fear of condemnation, and the fear that nobody understands are all mitigated with truth.  The exercise included taking a sticker dot and placing it on ourselves for every lie that we have believed.  For every lie mentioned in the lecture, we were to put a sticker on ourselves if we had ever believed it.  I was covered in stickers!  Then we listened to a reading of Max Lucado’s “You Are Special.”

After the exercise, we broke into two groups - men and women.  As the contemplative music played in the background we began to pray for each other and, as priests, took off each other’s dots.  As I took dots off my brothers I declared truth!  “you are holy…you are clean…you are healed…you are a child of God…you are perfect.”  As the men finished up I looked over to the women and rejoiced at the sight of women surrounding my wife and with tears in all of their eyes, embrace each other celebrating and rejoicing in the truth that there are no more dots!

This is what community should look like.  Kinda like the Wesleyan group method of gathering and simply discussing the condition of the soul.  How are you doing? is a very powerful question in a roundtable of believers who are not afraid to be broken with others.  And Spiritual Direction is embedded in the true community.  Unfortunately, post reformation, the reality of spiritual direction began to dwindle.  Not to mention the fact that the advent of the printing press/Gutenberg press privatized Christianity.  Pre-Gutenberg, communities had to gather to collect and hear stories of how the Lord was working in and through each other.  I can imagine the revelation that came as a result of the printing press (yes! Now I can have my private devotional time anytime I want!  This is great!).  Little did the Church know what impact the convenience of a printed book would have on the “gathering” of the saints.  But God can redeem and revive community for today. Amen!

The day concluded with the “Family Sculpture” exercise.  Several of us formed a live sculpture of our family background.  I had several people play a scene that is taking place in my family right now.  There were three family members on their knees facing the cross with arms around each other.  There was one family member about to join the group before the cross and there were others in the background.  It was a picture of imminent revival that is coming to my family.  It is a picture that briefly mentions brokenness, but quickly highlights divine redemption and restoration that takes place when people are obedient and postured to allow God to have his way.

This is always explained better over a cup of coffee :)

Spiritual Formation Retreat (Day 2)

As I reflect on today’s experiences, I sit next to my wife on the couch in the lobby of the retreat center, listening to, “Lay It All Down” by Will Regan and United Pursuit from their latest Album “Tell All My Friends.”  I’m rocking out, stepping back from my computer, entering into worship and surrender, then going back to reflection and typing!  God has changed my spiritual DNA and I rejoice the fact that I can do this in front of my wife.  God has been reminding me of my past and the first seven years of marriage where I did not see a place for worshipping Him in front of my wife.  I felt it was “for the birds” to be “mushy for Jesus” in front of my wife.  Thank you Lord for being patient with me and allowing me to grow.  I choose to take on your mindset for those around me, especially the ones closest to me.

The morning began with a walk in the rain with my wife around the pond.  I took out my voice recorder and captured our 2nd ever audio prayer journal.  I like to think of it as a prayer journal and become more and more comfortable with capturing authentic reflection on “tape” and sharing that with anyone in which God wants to bless.  Moreover, I believe God is teaching me to be the conduit for his loving gracious and ever present attention towards my wife.  When I talk with my wife  I want her to experience how much God takes interest in her through the way I listen.  This is an ongoing lesson.

My first confession of the day came at breakfast.  One of the ladies from the “quilting retreat” (I’m totally assuming it is a quilting retreat!) told me, “you’re a healthy eater!”  I had oatmeal and fruit on my plate.  Pride started to creep into my mind.  I started thinking how people should eat like I eat.  But I rejected those thoughts of thinking people should be like me or the lie that I am better off than someone else.  This is a new way of thinking for me.  In that past I would keep those thoughts going and even gossip.  I desperately desire to have the mind of Christ for all people and I reject the lies of the enemy, which is pride and insensitivity to other’s situations in life or backgrounds.  I choose to view others though God’s loving and accepting eyes.

As we entered into the next phase of the morning, which was morning worship, my heart was postured to receive whatever truth God had for me.  My brother Robert shared what God had given him in regards to his position in Christ as one who is justified and one who is called by God.  And it immediately reminded me of God’s attitude toward me; namely, that He desires conversation with me and that there is no possible way I could be bothering God because HE IS THE ONE WHO CALLED ME!  We also incorporated a time of worship from the Taize song, “Jesus Remember Me When You Come Into Your Kingdom.”  I think about that cry of desperation from the thief on the cross and how he was crying out to Jesus to save him.  That is where I am.  Lord, save me.  Remember me.  I am in need of you right this moment.

My favorite part of the morning was receiving truth during morning worship and accepting prayers and hugs from my brothers.  We prayed for each other and when it came for me to receive prayer.  I got up out of my seat and knelt on the floor with my brothers surrounding me.  I confessed my brokenness and my idol of control that often hurts my wife and children. I let the confessions roll off my tongue then followed that with thanksgiving for God’s forgiveness, acceptance and grace.  I am not afraid to receive laying on of hands, prayers, hugs, and truth from my brothers (and sisters) in Christ.  When I got off the floor a brother helped me off the floor, gave me a hug and gave me truth: “God’s grace is sufficient and made powerful in weakness” (paraphrase mine).  Yes!  I accept that truth!

The sessions on stress and burnout connected me with lies that I have believed in the past; that is, that people who sleep or stop working are lazy.  That is a lie and I reject that type of thinking not only because it is a recipe for stress and burnout, but it is so unlike the Savior who consistently looked for opportunities to withdraw, retreat, and refresh via intimacy with his Father.  

Stress has a way of brining out all that is inside.  Squeeze a lemon and lemon juice comes out.  Squeeze an orange and orange juice comes out.  Squeeze a pastor or chaplain and what comes out?  The answer is, “whatever that person is filled with is what will come out!”  Stress will bring out what is inside that person.  When I get home I will continue to retreat through surfing and running the the wilderness and not feel guilt about it.  For me, workaholism is the easy way out.  Rest and the cessation of working is extremely difficult for me because it challenges what has become normative for me.

I’ll end with the most thought provoking question of the day: “What is it about my ministry that compels me to do more than Jesus did?”  If you’re like me, you’ll chew on that one for a while…

Put the Animals in Their Place

In his book, Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis painted an image that will forever be etched on my heart:

…the real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not usually look for it.  It comes the very moment you wake up each morning.  All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals.  And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in.  And so on, all day.  Standing back from all your natural fussing and frettings; coming in out of the wind.1

My mornings have never been the same.  Every morning when I wake up I can imagine a pack of wolves storming my room and my immediate task is to push those animals back outside.  My alarm is set for 0530.  As I awaken in a drunken stupor, a stagger towards my phone “cock-a-doodle-doing” in the living room, down the hall.  I’m moving as fast as I can so that the kids are not awoken from the annoying farm animal noise!  In the 30 yards I travel these thoughts came to my mind:

“…I wonder if I got an email…”“…should I brush my teeth or shave first?”“…man, I really need to put that pile of clothes away.”“…maybe I should do some push ups right now.”“…I feel like picking up my phone and checking for text messages.”“…should I heat up my oatmeal while I get ready for the day.” “…should I read my Bible first or my devotional classics?”“…maybe I should brush my teeth first to wake up…”

And this is all within the first two minutes of the day!

So here’s how God has given me a vision in order to shepherd my family and encourage those he has placed in my life; I live to demonstrate what it looks like to constantly re-direct my focus from things below to things above.  When the “things” of the day start to fill my soul with worry I want to take the proverbial knee, face outboard, and redirect my focus by telling myself, “Lord, what are you doing in this moment?  I just want to do that.”  Lewis also captured this vision by boldly stating, 

“…the Church exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs…God became Man for no other purpose.  It is even doubtful, you know, whether the whole universe was created for any other purpose.”2

The struggle I face is straightforward; namely, giving all areas of my life to God.  And right when I confess this to my friends and family, they are given a dilemma: to admit or deny that reality. I think its best if everyone just join the club!  This week I’ve been struggling with desiring the control of my wife’s emotions.  If Christ wants all of me, including these desires to control/regulate my wife’s emotions, I must confess (out loud) and renounce (out loud) that temptation.  

I want the desires of my heart exposed in order that it loose its power and a life of constant and complete surrender is demonstrated for all to see; first in my house, then out and about in my daily life.  I choose to live not only transparently, but in vulnerability - and there is a difference.  I simply don’t want to be known, I want to be fully known.  How else can anybody pray for me if they are in the dark concerning my real struggles?  They can’t.

One of my favorite quotes from my wife is, “Lazy people work twice as hard!”  She told me that years ago and it has been playing in my mind like a broken record.  Lewis is certain that the hardest road we can take in life is the one that appears as the easiest.  For the first seven years of my marriage I was convinced that keeping secrets was a good thing.  This poisonous mindset was reinforced by my theology and my like-minded friends who re-reinforced it.  I heard a sermon in Bible College Chapel that reinforced it too (or so I heard it that way), “It’s good to remain a mystery in your marriage.”  

Choosing a life of secrecy and emotional insulation or isolation is the “easier route” that leads to destruction.  The lies that I believed and that the enemy continues to whisper in my head sound like this, “Just maintain the peace and keep this one to yourself.  Your wife doesn’t want to hear about this again!  If you confess this one, you will definitely pay for it and there will be chaos, hate, and discontent in the house.  Just keep this one to yourself.”  But I reject that voice because it is from “the enemy,” which I don’t limit to the Devil.  I believe my enemy is either/or, my flesh, the world, the Devil, his demons, and sin itself.  Since they all exist to flood my mind with thoughts that take my focus off of God, they ARE my enemy.  I am my worst enemy because I am the reason why I believe all of the lies that I believe; namely, to keep a few secrets.

God tells me the opposite. Be fully loved by being fully known.  To be 99% known is NOT to be known.  So, as my favorite Dustin Kensrue song, “It is Finished,” proclaims: “…and go bravely into battle knowing HE has won the war.  It is finished, lift your head and weep no more.”

The cost of discipleship is crystal clear.  Luke 14 says,

25Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, 26"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 27Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. 28For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30saying, 'This man began to build and was not able to finish.' 31Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

Following Christ has cost me my comfort, my longing for power, my desire for approval, and wanting control of people and circumstances.  At any moment of the day, these four animals tug at my clothes and I have to smack them in the nose with a rolled up newspaper and put them in their place.  I do this through confession to God while people are listening.  There is nothing that I confess to God that I have not confessed to the body of Christ.  Sounds weird right?  So, let me say it this was.  I trust God by trusting the people he has put in my life.  I am called to “do life” with other people.  So I am constantly reminding myself, “If God knows this secret, why am I afraid to share it with Andy, Chad, or Nicholas?”  Here goes my comfort, control, and approval Lord…

And the result every single time is grace and peace in my soul.  Thank you Lord for delivering on your promise.  The Gospel truly is Good News - a goodness that only comes by being fully loved by being fully known.

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1. C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952; Harper Collins: 2001).  pp. 198-199; Richard J. Foster, Devotional Classics: Selected Readings for Individuals and Groups.  Harper: San Fransisco, 1993. pg. 9.  
2. Lewis, p. 171; Foster, p. 10.

Fasting from the Internet...

I just finished a week-long fast from the internet. It was refreshing.  Especially this last day, which ended with a 24 food fast.  Fasting from the internet is always shocking because I realize how much I jump on it.  First thing in the morning, a few hundred times throughout the day and last thing before I sleep...that's called an addiction!  But thank God for a refreshing fast to re-orient my heart and mind.

There's something about the feeling of weakness in the knees and a glimpse of what it's like to miss a few meals.  But I did this as a reminder to be in constant prayer.  I'm praying about whether or not I'm going to participate in ministry X vs. Z, or both, or none, etc..  Both ministries are awesome, but I'm not convinced that awesome is always appropriate all the time.  So, I'm praying for wisdom and clarity on the issue.

God is good, and he answered my prayers with clarity.  I don't want to and cannot do everything. That is not wise.  I also don't want to be "comfortable" because I know life is short, and the Lord is coming.  I want to be moving in ministry with a sense of urgency.  I also know I want to increase the giving of my time, energy and resources to the point of "sacrificial giving;" That is, giving to the point that something else has to go.  Perhaps less visits to the Sushi bar and Starbucks.

I also realized that I've always struggled with prayer.  I've never had a consistent prayer life and beat myself up for it for years.  This week I had a thought.  Why not fast from something every week.  A week without internet.  A week without coffee.  A week without Ice Cream. A week without music, etc.  I'll sacrifice something to help keep my weak little ADD mind on Him.

Catching glimpses of being weak, frail and small is a great feeling.  To know that the world is not about me is so freeing.  To know that I live like a King every day simply by the fact that I eat well every night reminds me of how blessed I am to have been born in the U.S.