Here are the things bouncing around in my head right now:

Wilson, Egypt, world powers in 1919

Translation: formal or dynamic equivalence? Gender neutrality

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Everyone Poops, The Phantom Tollbooth

Iron and Wine, Usher

Deuteronomy 7:6-9, junior highers, “Who trained you to do what you do?”

The Reformation in France — in a soothing Canadian accent

The library, the blink, Starbucks

Fog

The effects of the Intertropical Convergence Zone on India’s climate changes

Chi Alpha, prayer partners, Day of Prayer, bible study, t-shirts, loud noises

And so you see, I just can’t update. I promise to come back eventually.

So here’s the deal: I have had an excellent summer. I mean really, it’s been great. After spending some time with my family, I helped them safely move to North Carolina and then moved in with a family in Carrollton in order to stick around here. They’re so much fun, their kids are wonderful, and I just love hanging out with them. As I’ve gotten used to camp it’s become easier and more rewarding. Not that it’s less difficult — working with kids is always tiring and challenging — but, for instance, watching a little girl gleefully take in the laser show at Stone Mountain after a long day is really just beautiful. The spiritual steps we’re taking with our students are baby steps, but they’re nonetheless moving forward. And when I’m not working with camp, I’m working with the youth group. As a youth ministry team we’re exploring both the strong and weak aspects of the program and trying to figure out how we can better represent Christ to students. I get to teach this coming Wednesday, which means I’ve been able to spend a lot of really wonderful time in the Word. This summer has been not only fun but challenging and rewarding.

Now, I’m a pretty black-and-white person. Things are either good or bad. People are either kind or mean. Cereal is either crunchy or mushy and clearly you can’t have both. So when things are good, you might envision me standing in a church looking at a stained-glass window as the sun shines through it. It’s beautiful: brilliant colors which come together to form a magnificent picture. The sun is shining through so strongly that the colors are reflected across furniture in the room, making the chapel a brilliant picture of the glory of God himself.

So here’s the issue: I keep looking around and noticing shadows or even dark holes in the brilliance. Not one but two cases of long-term, committed Christians suddenly, inexplicably turning from the faith. Mourning the anniversary of one death even as I hear about more young lives taken. The faithful, tireless work of believers for the cause of Christ leading to — fruit? The hope of salvation for others? No, just darkness. Just blank stares.

On the one wrist I can see a rope tied, pulling me ever closer to the beauty and joy of the Lord. But on the other wrist the rope is pulling me in the opposite direction, towards sin and hurt and loss. This is why I’m so black and white: because the tension of both circumstances, of a loving God and a murderous demon standing in the same throne room, is too painful. Why does Job have to suffer?

I don’t have an answer and I don’t really know what to do about it. The only thing I can think of is to keep praying, because I’m certain that loving God is sovereign and that murderous demon is not. And eventually we’ll reach Canaan and, while I imagine God will not tell us why Job suffered, at the very least he won’t suffer anymore.

Working with kids is hard. Their sin is out there for everyone to see: if they’re angry they hit, if they don’t like what you say they mouth off, if their pride gets hurt they pout. They have either too much energy or no energy at all. They have attention spans of approximately fifteen seconds. I don’t have a ton of energy and by about noon they’ve got me completely worn out even when they’re on their best behavior. And on days like today, when they’re all fighting and crying and full of attitude, sometimes I just want to sit down, give up, and forget about them.

The hardest part, though, is not when they’re fighting with each other or mouthing off. The hardest part is when we’re sitting in front of them, desperately trying to explain the most fundamental aspect of Christianity, and they’re giving us blank stares.

“Do you understand?” we ask.

“Yeah, it all about Jesus,” they answer, trained by Southern Christian society that if they drop the J-word they’ll be good.

“Do you understand grace?”

Blank stares.

It doesn’t matter how much we explain the gospel. I can use the smallest words, the most creative examples, the clearest prose I can think of, and I’ll still get blank stares. Dark hearts don’t understand light. Even worse, dark hearts who grow up in the church think they understand light — and also think they deserve grace. If I can’t explain the cross of Christ, how will I explain anything else?

Praise the Lord for the Spirit, for true grace, and for the love that sent Christ to the cross. Praise the Lord for the gospel, because without it there is no difference between me and these kids. And without the blessed Spirit my job is pointless. Those blank stares won’t go away without the movement of the Spirit, and if you don’t believe me, come hang out with kids for a while. Praise the Lord for sovereignty, because if I could chose my own salvation I would never see Christ. My heart is too rebellious and my eyes are too blinded to do anything else.

I’m not very eloquent today because putting words to sin is just painful. I can see myself in my students: my anger, my pride, my attitude. I just hide it better than they do. I am so, so glad that Jesus has more patience with me than I do with these kids. If Christ gave up on His bride as quickly as I want to give up, let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die! But God is love, and love is patient. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. And it never fails. Praise the Lord for that.

I think what I learned at camp today is how important prayer is in ministry. Teaching students about Christ is, of course, commanded and absolutely necessary. But without prayer, teaching can become a self-reliant waste of time, because if I believe that my words can save then I’m damning my students to hell. We must pray that the Spirit would impact the lives of our students with grace and love: that is by far the most important part of ministry. Prayer reminds us who we’re relying on: not our eloquent words or creative illustrations, but the sovereign God who saves. I will point my students to the cross as often as possible, and when I can’t do that, Father, give me grace to remember to beg for their souls.

Please, brothers and sisters in Christ, remember prayer.

This morning, after a long and restful night’s sleep, I woke up to sun shining in my window. I took approximately 20 steps and found myself in the kitchen, where Mom was baking crumb cake muffins. I got myself some real, delicious coffee and stretched out on the couch to watch mindless TV and eat breakfast. After breakfast I settled on a channel and watched a few hours of baby and adoption stories. Eventually I got up, got ready for the day, and spent a little time in 2 Chronicles and Matthew 6.

Around lunchtime Mom and I jumped in the car, got Dad some lunch and brought it to work for him, and went to pick some stuff up at the store. Mom paid. At home she made me a sandwich and I facebooked while the sports channel played surfing and soccer. About mid-afternoon Mom went to take a nap and I went for a bike ride — only 20 minutes, but the hills in my neighborhood proved how incredibly out of shape I am.

Shortly after I finished my bike ride, Peter showed up and we played guitar and ukulele together until dinner, which my whole family (minus Vincent — no one actually knows where he is) enjoyed together, and we discussed the possibility of me actually being able to drive a car this summer (yay!). After dinner Peter and I went outside and played a little Badminton until the bugs came out and started biting, and then we went inside and watched Jeopardy while we enjoyed dessert: pudding cups.

I. Love. Summer.

Yeah, pain sucks.

I’m sure I’ve discussed the particular topic of pain and suffering before, but in this pre-Revelation 21 existence it pops up repeatedly, so I feel like it’s alright for me to repeat myself a little. As I’ve told many of my friends, it takes a couple times for truth to seep through my hard-headedness and I figure that’s probably the case for some of you too.

In 2 Corinthians 12 Paul says the following:

“To keep me from being conceited because of these supassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’”

I haven’t studied Paul’s thorn very much. I’m pretty sure it’s a metaphorical thorn, some kind of sin or temptation or something like that, but when I was little I thought it was a real thorn. I imagined Paul limping along with a huge rose thorn stuck in his ribs, impairing his breathing and forcing him to bend a little, one hand always clutching his nasty wound.

I didn’t understand any of what Paul was saying, so I didn’t understand why God wouldn’t take the thorn away. What does “My grace is sufficient for you” even mean? Some kind of strange, unseen feeling was supposed to take away this very real, very painful thorn? What are you talking about, God?

I like the way I used to envision Paul’s thorn, because I think it’s an excellent picture of what our suffering looks like. Often we show up in our Christian circles wearing huge black trenchcoats and happy-face masks to disguise our bloody wounds and the pain that seeps into our faces. We try so hard to stand up straight when in reality our backs are stooped from the pain of the pointy thorn stuck right between our ribs. We try to laugh but our lungs are just too pierced by that thorn. We’d much rather curl up in bed and not get out anymore.

I understand better now what God’s response to Paul meant. Paul begins his explanation with, “To keep me from being conceited…” And if that’s a good enough reason for Paul, it sounds like a pretty solid reason to me. Pain forces God’s children to forget about themselves and run to him. It makes us realize that we’re not in control, but we follow a God who is.

At a Covenant basketball game last year, our boys had been dominating up until the fourth quarter. As they got tired and perhaps a little cocky, the opposing team began catching up in points. The timer ticked down and the other team kept scoring. Nonetheless we Scots were standing in the stands, cheering for our boys and at times harassing the other team.

With three seconds on the clock, the Scots had the ball and were throwing it back into play right under the opposing team’s basket. The boy with the ball threw it across the court in an attempt to get it as far away from their basket at possible. But, misjudging the distance, he tossed the ball too high. It bounced off the bottom of the other team’s backboard and landed right in the middle of three defenders, who immediately scooped it up. They ran towards their basket and shot as we tried desperately to block them. They missed, but with less than a second left they shot again and made it. They won by one point.

The packed stands stood silent, mouths hanging open, completely shocked. We had been winning for literally four quarters and they snatched it away from us. No one moved for probably thirty seconds.

When pain comes and lops you upside the head like that, you really don’t know what to do. You stand there and wonder what happens next. You wonder if you can keep going, or if you should just give up now. When death shows up unexpectedly, how do you keep putting one foot in front of the other? When your heart aches and it won’t go away, how do you put it out of your mind and write a research paper? When you can’t fix anything, what in the world do you do?

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” There’s only one thing to do: run to Jesus. “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” Pain forces us to realize that it’s really not all about me, it’s about my Christ. When the thorn digs so deeply into my flesh, I have nothing to boast about but the Lord. I get out of bed because of Christ; I keep moving, despite my inability to fix anything, because “when I am weak,” through Christ’s great power, “then I am strong.” If suffering points a sinner to Jesus, then bring on the suffering. If, as C.S. Lewis said, “Pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a deaf world,” then pain we must accept. And if such accute hurt will draw me closer to the only God who can save me from it, then I will limp to my Savior and let Him hold me. It hurts so much, but the reward is greater than we can imagine.

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.  … So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God — through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Romans 7: 14-15, 19-25

Over the past few weeks I’ve had an up-close encounter with what we theologians here at Covenant call the antithesis which runs through all people. As even Paul said, every Christian is in a constant struggle between the good we’re called to and the evil we were born into. There’s no escaping this evil, at least on this side of Revelation 21. And to be perfectly honest, it completely sucks.

For instance, I love to talk to people. I love to hear their stories and share my life and hug them and feel those relational warm fuzzies. I do not, however, like to make presentations. In fact, I happen to be avoiding writing a presentation at this very moment, partly because the thought of giving a presentation in front of a class full of those juniors I always look up to is enough to give me a minor heart attack. I also like to translate Mark from Greek to English, which is what I’m doing in Greek this semester. I even like to discuss the author’s theological implications in class. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, however, I dread when 2pm comes around and I have to go to said class. I practically avoid it at all costs.

After every exam I’ve ever taken at Covenant I think to myself, “Next time it’ll be different. I’ll start studying a week beforehand, or at least three days, and I’ll feel prepared when I go into the room.” Nope. I’m always studying the night before or the morning of.

Why do I do this? I mean, I know not wanting to go to class is pretty shallow in the scope of potential problems, but my little “c” calling is to be a student right now, and I’m not doing a great job of it. I want to be a good student, but somehow facebook, C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia, and “America’s Next Top Model” are always more appealing.

Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.

This quote directly follows the one I opened my post with. Paul doesn’t really give an answer to why we must struggle with this nasty antithesis — a question I’ve been asking almost constantly. But he does tell us how to deal with it: Jesus. He is the only way to be free.

I don’t know what that looks like. I think sometimes I have a hard time even believing it. But we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disapoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. Romans 5:3-5

My biggest struggle right now is not really whether or not I’m going to class, but it’s a good enough example for what I want to say. “Hope does not disappoint us.” There is a reason to hope. Not because I can make it if I try harder, or because the sun’s going to rise tomorrow morning, or because I know I have good friends to lean on. There is a reason to hope because God loves us. As sinners he loves us, and through his Son’s righteousness he loves us. When I screw up he loves me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

I’ve been a sophomore for almost two months now and I’m happy to say I’ve learned a few new things. Let me share them with you.

1.) I’m really not much cleaner than the freshmen, I just want to think I am.

2.) Switching buildings is extremely rewarding and a good idea for nearly everyone.

3.) Taking a third semester of Greek is stupid, but you do learn a lot. And I can translate the Bible!

4.) Freshmen have WAY more energy than I do.

5.) Making awkard conversations less awkward is a learned skill and takes practice — but it’s dire.

6.) First impressions suck. I’m really not as rude or cynical as many unfortunate souls think I am.

7.) Sophomore work study and practical service positions are 1,000 times better than the freshman positions.

8.) Hall unity is really important, especially early on.

9.) Exercise is also really important. Take the stairs, lazy bums.

10.) I know what professors to take, where everything is, how to avoid things I don’t want to do, and what every hall and event is about.

What more can I say? Being a sophomore is excellent.

This afternoon the House of Representatives rejected the economic bailout plan for the financial industry. By a vote of 228-205, the $700 billion plan was turned down and stocks promptly dropped, the DOW falling by more than 400 points. American stability has officially come to a halt.

I just read an interesting article from the Burnside Writers Collective entitled Why We Need To Hit Bottom, by Melanie Benedict. She opens by discussing an Ethiopian mother of six who is dying of AIDS, has been abandoned by the husband that gave it to her, is shunned by society, and lives in a room the size of a double bed. Then she discusses our own economic crisis:

“I wonder what it would take for us to understand that kind of poverty of those families in Ethiopia. They are desperate for God in every way: for their health, their food, their safety, their children’s future. They are in a position to depend on God alone that we, as Americans, can’t begin to comprehend. As strange as this may sound, I can’t help but wonder what would happen if we were to embrace the falling economy rather than fight it.”

What a ridiculous thought, right? Embrace the falling economy? Resign ourselves to such a horrific financial crisis? Lose that much money?

What about our cars, our grossly expensive schools, our huge houses, our Starbucks, our leisure life? What about weekends out? Splurging on ice cream, clothes, jewelry? What about the money we’ve spent our lives saving up, the money we rely on to get us through the week?

“What would it do for our nation if we could live for even a few days in poverty akin to the daily experience of many around the world? Would we start to look at things a little differently? Would it be as important to own houses that are bigger than we need or can afford? Or would we begin to thank God for the cool breeze of the day, for another day of life to spend with our children, for a soft blanket, or a meal shared in love?

What we seem desperate to stop could potentially be the best thing our nation could ask for. As Christians, wouldn’t the wisest thing be to get on our knees and beg God to save us, not from financial devastation, but from our love of money? If the answer is yes, the daunting question then becomes, are we willing to suffer the consequences ourselves?”

Matthew 19:20-22:

“All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.

At church this morning, the pastor talked about Gen. 1:1-2:3. When I saw in the bulletin that this was the Scripture reading, Prideful Pharisee Liz immediately said, “Really, the creation account? What am I going to get out of this?”

As we all know, God has a wonderful sense of humor.

The pastor began by discussing Moses’ purpose in writing the creation account: not necessarily as a scientific, historically accurate picture of exactly how God made the universe, but as a depiction to the Israelites of the God they serve. For the Israelites, when times were tough and rain wasn’t coming to feed their crops, it was very tempting to follow the ways of the cultures around them and pray to the rain god in the hopes that he would bless them with rain. But Moses is suggesting, why pray to the rain when you can pray to the God who made the rain? Why pray to the sun when the Creator of the sun has revealed Himself to you?

For us rich, upper-middle class Americans, the only thing that worries us about the rain is what to wear to keep it off of us. We have a stable government, a good healthcare system, and homes that shelter us in both heat and cold. Our temptation is less about running to other gods and more about simply pretending God doesn’t exist, or doesn’t matter. Are you sick? You see a doctor. Are you sad? You go to counseling. Are you in darkness? You turn on a light.

James 5:13-14  “Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise. Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord.”

How quickly we rely on the created instead of the Creator. How often we forget him and turn to fallen man to heal us. Of course, I’m not suggesting doctors, counselors, and electricity are a bad thing. But if we rely only on these man-made solutions and forget the God who created us, we turn our backs on the Beloved. So, remember His power today. Remember how He created.

Psalm 96:

Sing to the LORD a new song;
sing to the LORD, all the earth.

Sing to the LORD, praise his name;
proclaim his salvation day after day.

Declare his glory among the nations,
his marvelous deeds among all peoples.

For great is the LORD and most worthy of praise;
he is to be feared above all gods.

For all the gods of the nations are idols,
but the LORD made the heavens.

Splendor and majesty are before him;
strength and glory are in his sanctuary.

Ascribe to the LORD, O families of nations,
ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.

Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name;
bring an offering and come into his courts.

Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness;
tremble before him, all the earth.

Say among the nations, “The LORD reigns.”
The world is firmly established, it cannot be moved;
he will judge the peoples with equity.

Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad;
let the sea resound, and all that is in it;

let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them.
Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy;

they will sing before the LORD, for he comes,
he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples in his truth.

During the course of the lesson my youth pastor taught last night, we looked at the following passage:

Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

We all know that verse. As soon as Jason said, “Turn to Jeremiah 29. This is a very popular verse,” one of the students rattled off, “For I know the plans I have for you…” And often when we think about this verse, we think, “Excellent! God’s going to take good care of me — he’ll ‘prosper’ and ‘not harm’ me, just like the verse says!” Then, when bad things happen to us, we look at God and say, “What is this all about? You promised!”

But last night, for the first time ever, I read the preceding verse, Jeremiah 29:10 – This is what the LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place.”

Yep, that’s right. The Israelites were in exile, forcibly removed from their promised home by their archenemies, the Babylonians. The Israelites were smack-dab in the middle of the saddest and most difficult time in pre-Christ history. And while sitting in slavery, God says, “I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you.” What does this mean? What is God saying? It can’t get any worse than this!

God doesn’t promise a perfect life for his believers. He doesn’t promise the things the world desires — wealth, a good house, a perfect family, constant happiness, or even complete freedom. What He promises is that He will provide the Israelites with everything they really need. What did the Israelites need that God wanted to provide for them? Himself.
2 Kings 17:14 – But they would not listen and were as stiff-necked as their fathers, who did not trust in the LORD their God. Nehemiah 9:29 – You warned them to return to your law, but they became arrogant and disobeyed your commands. … Stubbornly they turned their backs on you, became stiff-necked and refused to listen. Jeremiah 7:26, 17:23, 19:15 – they were stiff-necked … they were stiff-necked … they were stiff-necked.

Do we see a pattern here? Israel constantly refused to submit to God or listen to His prophets. Israel would turn to God and fall, turn and fall, turn and fall. And God warned them over and over that if they would listen to Him, He wouldn’t hurt them. Jeremiah 41:10 – “If you stay in this land, I will build you up and not tear you down; I will plant you and not uproot you, for I am grieved over the disaster I have inflicted on you.”

But as we know, the Israelites refused to listen. Again and again, they would not submit. So God punished them as He promised, but not necessarily to hurt them. What better way to learn that we need God than having all control torn from us? While in exile, the Israelites had no way to free themselves or change their circumstances. There were only two options: run to God and trust HIs promise to protect them, or ignore Him forever and accept their fate of death.

We find the same ultimatum when we face difficult circumstances. We cannot change the death of a friend of family member. We cannot reverse the stupid decision we made that hurts our loved ones. We cannot make other people see truth and stop destroying their lives. But we can trust God. We can rest on His promise: “I know the plans I have for you … plans to give you hope and a future.” God knows what He’s doing. He knows why He has allowed death and destruction to enter our lives, and He knows that by doing this, He can break our self-righteous legs and force us to rely on Him. It is not the sadistic act of a god who wants to see us hurt. It is the relentlessly loving, passionate act of a God who loves us to death — even to His own death.

Wealth, happiness, temporal security — they’re nice, but they’re nothing compared to knowing God. Philippeans 3:7, 8 – But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him.

Just like the Israelites, we can be secure in the slavery, that lack of control, that comes from hard circumstances. In easy times we rely on ourselves; in hard times we run to our Savior. And there is nothing better than that.