Day 59 - still looking.

Day 59 and I'm thinking about my closing prayer at the end of this mornings services.
When we finished thinking through St. Paul's incredible statement "For me to live is Christ, to die is gain." I prayed that we would come to know the depth of Paul's character because I'm tired/we're tired of being shallow.

This afternoon I read about Louis Agassiz's teaching methods:

Louis was a 19th century paleontologist and Harvard professor who had a unique method of teaching/learning. One of his students Nathaniel Southgate Shaler, wrote in his autobiography about one of Agassiz's assignments. Agassiz pulled out a specimen jar and said "take this fish and look at it; when you think you're done I'll question you." After and hour or so, Shaler thought he'd observed everything there was to observe, but Agassiz didn't question Shaler that day. He didn't question him the next day. In fact, it was a week later that Agassiz said "tell me what you've seen." During that time, Shaler, who thought he'd seen everything there was to see, began to notice new things about the fish: the symmetry of the scales, the number of teeth, the positions of the gills, the paired organs. Shaler shared his observations, but Agassiz still wasn't satisfied that Shaler had seen everything there was to see.
He spent another week of ten-hour days looking at that fish from every angle imaginable. Shaler wrote in his autobiography that by the end of two weeks, he had made observations that astonished himself and satisfied Agassiz.

My intentional follow of Jesus Christ ....having studied Philippians 1 for a week, having preached it this morning .....I'm still looking at it, studying it, learning it.

Hopefully others are too.

Day 58 - the shortest yet

Day 58 and here's my intentional follow ...7am on a wet and windy morning up for Bible discussion on greed!

That's it folks.

That was after staying up way too late watching Winter Olympics!

Tired - but committed.

So excuse my shortness........got to finish tomorrow preach!

Day 57 - took Jesus to the bank with me today.

Day 57 .....but only the tenth day of Lent ....I'm dying for a soda!! Of course my phraseology is rather ironic considering what Lent is preparing us for!
Think about it!

Today's intentional follow of Jesus was/is real practical. I cashed my pay check.
This is how we live.
Cash.
Not credit card, not even debit card - cash.

We are deliberately avoiding the 'no problem I'll put it on my card' route to debt and money mismanagement.
For just about a year now, we've lived (like many others in our church) on a cash only basis.

It works - you spend less.
You have more.....so you can give away more.
No credit card and no debit card helps you become a generous person.

I'm not saying we're where we want to be yet - but we are much further away from where we don't want to be.

It's following Jesus.

Day 56, thanks John, but even more "Thanks Jesus".

Day 56 was a day spent learning more about grace.
John Ortberg was the teacher and as usual one of the premier teachers in N. America brought insight, emotion and new though to his teaching.

He quoted a line from his mentor Dallas Willard which stuck "Saints burn more grace than sinners ever will."

The idea is that saints live daily in grace and therefore, we burn grace like a rocket burns fuel. It is the fuel that we live off of.
For me - yep I use a tank of grace a day!

So, intentionally today, I enjoyed grace.

It's good to follow Jesus.

Day 55 and my dermatologist confirms my intentional following of Jesus

Day 55 and it began with a visit to my dermatologist! Ouch ...dry ice stings.
He burned 6 things off my head and prescribed for me 6 weeks of my head breaking out in bright red blotches as we try to find more things to burn off. Yep - truly a tomato head for a few weeks.

Now I'm young to have all this done .......but ....if I keep being diligent then in later life I won't have to half my ear or nose cut off!! In fact, he told me that some people can ignore the little lumps of precancer growths because its either too much of a nuisance or too little a lump and 10 years later they need to have huge lumps cut off!!

We both agree there was a biblical analogy there about something called 'sin'.

But as look forward to 6 weeks of blotchiness it got me thinking about my intentional follow of today - I am staying/living where God wants me.

Forget the fact that I don't like small towns; forget the fact that it gets way too hot here; forget the fact that I'm 6000 miles from home; forget the fact that I carry a green card and it tells me I am an 'alien' ........my color of skin, my blue eyes, my freckles should force me to leave!! I am a firm candidate for further skin issues and surgery. People my shade should not live here.

But - God has us here.

I've tried to leave.
I've had opportunity to leave.

But intentional follow - I want to be where God wants me to be. Even although I have a more fluid theology of how God might lead and the role of choice in it ....I believe in feeling His presence and knowing this is where God wants you.

So today's visit to my dermatologist reminded me that I live here only because I'm following Jesus.

Day 54 - follow Jesus via the BBC World Service.

Day 54 and quite a day.

The Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Colombian President Alvaro Uribe clashed at a Latin America Summit. President Uribe told President Chavez to "be a man"; and President Chavez retoted by telling President Uribe to "go to hell!"

In Germany the first female Bishop of the 25 million strong Evangelical Church of Germany Bishop Margot Kaessmann pleaded guilty to drunk driving and jumping some red lights!

And in Kenya, the two bitter rivals President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga - have actually sat down and talked!!!

I listen into world news with the BBC and I learn not only the big news that all newsrooms carry, but the BBC helps me hear a wider global news - a global news that reports on the smaller stories globally that most other newsrooms miss or only local newsrooms carry.

For me - this is an intentional follow of Jesus. The entire globe is His world. All people's are made in His image and when we become narrow in our news we become narrow in our worldview and when we become narrow in our worldview we end up having a narrow Jesus.

So for Jesus' sake .....tune in to global news.

Try www.bbc.co.uk

Day 53 - late, but Jesus would be glad I was late.

Day 53 ....and I know its slightly late but I began working on my taxes - you know how that goes.

So my intentional follow of Jesus on Day 53.
I received an email from someone expressing some strong thoughts about something, and let's just say the thoughts weren't compliments.
As I read their thoughts my first reaction was sadness and fear that I had stumbled someone, and maybe more than them. As I engaged with the email I began to more and more question the writers interpretation. I then asked others if they felt the comments were right, and as the people I asked disagreed with the comments my reaction then began to grow towards defense and putting the person right. I wanted to get to my emails and write a reply that would have defended me.

But the I remembered the words of Jesus' half brother. "Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry." James 1:19.

So I have let the email sit unanswered, but not unprayed for the past 36 hours. Today I'll write a reply ...but hopefully I have listened - not only to what the writer was trying to express, and not only what some valued opinions have expressed, but hopefully I have listened to Jesus .

So yep ...Day 53 was delayed by taxes, but it was also delayed by James ...who I guess learned a lot from his brother!