All Hands on Deck

All Hands On Deck--January 18, 2017

"And we urge you, beloved, to admonish the idlers, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with all of them.  See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all." [1 Thessalonians 5:14-15]

Look, if you are on a cruise to the Caribbean, no one would expect you to take a shift washing dishes in the kitchen, comparing navigational charts on the bridge, or spending your night in the engine room keeping an eye on that number two pressure gauge.

On the other hand, if you are on a more modest craft--say a sailboat with a crew of two or three--then let me be clear: everybody is a part of the crew.  Everybody has a role (or two or three).  And everybody is needed.  And if you are a part of the crew rather than a tourist on a three-hour tour (a three-hour tour), there is no option of just putting your feet up while someone else does the work.

So here's the question, plain and simple: which are we--we followers of Jesus, we members of the Body of Christ, we who are part of God's Movement of Mercy--are we on a behemoth pleasure cruise ship with an all-night buffet, or a sloop that needs all hands on deck?

Well, if you ask the New Testament, the answer you get is rather clear: we belong to a community in which everybody has a part, and in which all are called to work shoulder to shoulder with each other.  There is no lido deck.  There is no bad Elvis impersonator or show-tune medley to watch while others keep the ship on course.  We are all called, and we all belong to the crew.

More specifically, we are all called to the specific work of living out the Kingdom-life, the way of life of the Movement of Mercy.  All of us are called to be the ones who stop to look out for the people who have been forgotten or left out.  All of us are called to be the ones who refuse to return evil for evil.  All of us are called to do good to the people around us--not just other Christians, but everybody.  And all of us are called to embody the radical grace and surprising justice of God.  This is not an option.  This is not just for church council members, committee chairs, "really religious people," pastors, missionaries, or people with lots of free time.  It is for you.  It is for me.  It is the calling of the crew, and we are all crew.

On the other hand, if we look at the actual practice of a lot of us--at least a lot of us in the relatively comfortable setting of North America--you might think that Jesus had commissioned a Disney Cruise ship after his resurrection.  We have a way of living as though the "Kingdom stuff" is for a select few--that feeding the hungry is just for churches in the inner city that (we might assume) must have greater needs than folks in suburban or small town settings.  We tend to think that actually sharing a table with a homeless family is sort of an "extra-credit" thing that only the really devout do, but that most of us just don't need to prioritized, because, well, we have to get the kids to soccer practice after all.  We have a bad habit of doing a half-decent job on the maintenance stuff in our churches and congregations (give enough money to pay the electric bill, serve on a committee when it's time to call a pastor, help out at Sunday School when your own kids are in it...) but thinking that anything beyond maintenance is optional... or for some other day.  But think about it--that's really not any more than being a guest on a cruise ship and making sure you have picked up your dirty socks off the floor when you leave your cabin in the morning... so that the housekeeping crew won't step on them when they come to tidy up.  That's not doing the work of getting us where we are going.

Of course, if you ask a vacationer on a cruise ship if they want the ship to get to its next port of call, well, sure, they'll say yes.  ("That's what I paid for, after all, right?")  But to be honest, the attitude of the customer-guests is pretty passive: yes, someone should keep the ship moving, but I'm not really supposed to get involved with any of that stuff.  Like I say, if you are actually on a literally cruise ship, fine--be a customer if you wish, and put your feet up.

But let's not pretend that the New Testament writers, nor the living Spirit of God, have that picture in mind for the disciple-community.  We are all called, not only to pick up our dirty socks off the floor in our cabins, but to work in our varying roles to actually move the ship along--to actively embody the Kingdom life toward which God is bringing all creation. And if we are just passively supportive of someone else doing the work... or suggesting that we will just coast into our destination, we may be doing greater damage than we realize.

I am reminded, especially this week, of a passage from Dr. King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail, in which he calls to task all of us "religious folks" who have not felt the urgency for action but who wanted, rather, to have a wait-and-see-if-things-get-better-on-their-own-just-give-it-a-chance attitude.  Addressing the wrongs of segregation in 1963 in Alabama, King says:

"I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection."

Wow.  All of a sudden, it dawns on us that our own passive attitudes ("Sure, in theory we want to see all people fed, and no children living homeless in cars, but can't we just let someone else do that?") are part of the problem.  If I act like a customer because I am actually a paying guest on a cruise ship, that's one thing--but if I am supposed to be on the crew... and actually helping us to get where we are going... and all I do is complain about the lack of crab puffs, well, I'm hurting the rest of the crew on board who were counting on me to do my part.

For us today, we need to be clear, you and me and all of us who wear the name of Jesus--what kind of a boat do we think we are on, and what are we doing to get us where Jesus has it in mind to lead us?

And, to be really, really honest--doesn't it seem like a better adventure to be a part of the crew and actually experience the wind and the smell of the salt air while we trim the sails than to be lazy customers on a floating mall?  I think I would rather be exactly where Jesus has called us--to be members of the crew, living out the Kingdom life beyond maintenance.

Lord Jesus, call us to your side, and hand us the rope.  Let us work alongside you and your people as we seek to embody the Kingdom life you are calling us to.

Leaving No Towers

Leaving No Towers--January 17, 2017

[Paul said, before leaving Ephesus:] "...And now I commend you to God and to the message of his grace, a message that is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all who are sanctified. I coveted no one's silver or gold or clothing. You know for yourselves that I worked with my own hands to support myself and my companions. In all this I have given you an example that by such work we must support the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, for he himself said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive'." When he had finished speaking, he knelt down with them all and prayed. There was much weeping among them all; they embraced Paul and kissed him, grieving especially because of what he had said, that they would not see him again. Then they brought him to the ship." [Acts 20:32-38]

I hope that at the end of my life, my name will not be etched in stone or erected in big gold letters anywhere.  I think, if I am reading the New Testament right, having one's name in big gold letters on a building is a sign of missing the boat, or at least missing the point of Jesus' movement of mercy.

The point of being a part of God's Reign, God's "kingdom," is not to leave our own names on impressive buildings or majestic structures, but to have left soul-prints on the wounded and tender hearts of others whom the Spirit sent across our path.  Less gilded lettering, more gentle love.  Fewer granite facades, more graced faces.

That is one of the reasons I love this powerful scene from late in the book of Acts, as bittersweet as it is.  Here is Paul the apostle--ironically, someone whose name gets chiseled in stone and put up in golden letters on church signs around the world... probably much to the chagrin of Paul himself!--ready to get on board the ship that will take him to Jerusalem, and on to an arrest and a trial and sentencing in Rome for being a threat to the empire.  Paul has spent three years in Ephesus--the longest stay Paul had in a single location during the course of his missionary years, actually--and now he knows it is time to go.  Tearfully, Paul now says his goodbyes, knowing that all he is leaving behind... is people.

They are changed people, to be sure--because since Paul's coming with the freeing news of Jesus, their lives have been turned inside out with the grace of God.  They have belonging when they had been outsiders.  They have love for those who had been unacceptable and estranged. They are turned inside out, no longer bent solely in on themselves but oriented outward to everyone around them--neighbor, stranger, and enemy alike.  The people have been changed, but there is no monument, building, or edifice to commemorate that Paul had been there doing it.  There is only the story, handed down from those first believers, on through the centuries, in what we now call the book of Acts, and there were the lives that were changed themselves.  But Paul left no towers behind--my goodness, the early Christians were all just meeting in each other's living rooms and then in the catacombs before anybody ever built a building for a church to use! 

And yet, that is exactly how it is supposed to be for the people of God.  We are part of a movement, not a structure.  Jesus intention is to draw all people together into his ongoing unfolding movement, not to build a really cool skyscraper or cathedral.  Neither Jesus, nor Paul here in Acts, leaves any towers behind or any record of their names etched in stone to "prove" their "importance."  Instead, you and I are the evidence of the revolution Jesus began, and that Paul ran with.  You and I, who at some point along the way were brought into the mercy of God and have never been the same, we are the tracks left by the wounded feet of Jesus on the history of the world.

I am reminded of a line attributed to William Faulkner that goes something like this: "Life is not about making monuments, but instead, making footprints. A monument only says, 'At least I got this far,' while a footprint says, 'This is where I was when I moved again'." 

That's what Paul gets--and what he learned from the Spirit of the living God.  He is literally getting on board a boat, but in a sense, that's a snapshot of what the whole Christian life is like--a movement in process, an action, a lifetime of love poured out moment by moment, but ultimately observable in the end the way a boat leaves ripples in the water behind it, but no engraved plaques in its wake. 

You and I are indeed called to leave the world a changed place because of the love God poured through us as we have made our way through the waters, but the change God cares about is in lives rather than buildings or monuments or--God forbid!--monstrous gold letters on towers.  People will have known they were in the presence of Christ's people, not because they read the names inscribed on a cornerstone, but because we will have shared a table with the hungry, welcomed those who were told they did not belong, and shared the news of Jesus cross-shaped love with people.  Their lives will have soul-prints left on them, not gilded signs saying, "Steve was here." 

It's not only "ok" that we won't leave behind our names etched in stone--that is how God would have it.  After all, God's preferred way of showing up with the people throughout history was the moving (moving!) pillar of cloud and fire that went with them on the way, rather than the stationary, fixed walls of a Temple.  If God isn't interested in stone structures or gold-leaf inscriptions, it's a pretty good sign that we don't need to fuss with those, either.

Today, don't worry, not one bit, about leaving a tower behind to prove you were here.  Today, like Paul showed us before, leave lives that are marked forever with the audacious grace of God, and then get on board for the next day's voyage.

Lord Jesus, let your love leave fingerprints on the lives of others, and lead us to look for ways your to make a difference in the ways we act and speak and love.

Pushed by the Same Wind

Pushed by the Same Wind--January 16, 2017

"...with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all." [Ephesians 4:2-6]

This is going to sound like I am shamelessly riffing off of the first verse of the Beatles' "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," but... picture yourself on a boat on a river.

Well, make it a boat leaving harbor on the ocean, or large lake.  Picture yourself on a sailboat leaving port, and several other sailboats putting out to sea at about the same time.  You know your destination, and each of the other boats around you is headed to a different destination, as well.  From close up, it may well look like each boat is entirely unconnected and separate from the others--some are headed more north, and others more toward the south, and some are pointed due east.  And if you were to zoom in even closer, just to the crew on board your little craft, you might think it was even more disorganized.  There's someone up at the front of the boat, and there's someone at the back, each facing opposite directions!  How can they be working together, right? 


All of this is to say that, to an untrained observer looking very close up, you might think you were watching chaos unfolding.  Even a single boat's crew is a flurry of action in different directions, and when you look across the bow of your boat to see someone else's boat headed on a different course from yours, you might think you have nothing to do with them.


And you would be wrong.


Zoom out one level further, and if you could visualize the wind somehow, you would see there is a common thread across every ship headed out to sea and every member of every crew.  The same wind has a hold of them.  Each boat is tapping into the same energy, the same source of direction, the same power of moving air.  They are all getting their motion from the same wind, even if they have aimed their sails in different directions to take them on different headings.  This, of course, is the difficult work of operating a sail-boat as opposed to a motorboat or jet-ski--you are, in a very real sense, at the mercy of the wind, in both its strength and its direction. And then it is your skill that allows you to harness that wind to move in a particular direction within that broad, sweeping motion--say, to nudge your boat northeast even when the wind is blowing due east.   But all the boats in our little imaginary scene are being driven by the same energy, pushed by the same wind.


Now hold that thought.


When you see the word "Spirit" in the Bible, think "wind." Think "moving air." Even think "breath."  That's literally true, because in both Hebrew and Greek, the two primary languages of our Bible, the word "Spirit" doubles as the word for "breath" or "air" or "wind."  It is the "wind from God"/"Spirit of God" that stirs over the waters of chaos at Creation.  It is the "breath of God"/"Spirit of God" that gives life to the lump of clay that becomes a human being.  It is the "rush of a mighty wind" that signals the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.  Again and again, the writers of the Bible feel the force of wind and hear the sound of breath when they think of the Spirit of God.


Now picture that as the letter to the Ephesians talks about how we live with one another as followers of Jesus who all belong to the same movement.  There is one "body" of people, even though we have an awful lot of differences between us, and there is one "Spirit," that, is one common wind filling all of our sails.  That idea is key to making sense of how each of us may be following Jesus but how it looks different in each of our lives.  One person on our boat is manning the rudder or steering at the helm, and another is attending to the sails, and maybe yet another is up at the front looking ahead.  All doing different jobs, jobs which might at first seem unrelated and pointed in different directions, but all are really doing their own work in the bigger project of getting the boat to its destination.  Zoom out a bit further and that helps us make sense of the way that our boat here might be doing something slightly different than your boat over there--we are all powered and directed by the same wind, but we are each harnessing it for different purposes.  You are going fishing. We are transporting something to the other side of the lake.  Someone else's boat is just going on a sight-seeing tour.  But we are all tapped into, and pushed onward by, the same wind.


It can be difficult for us as the followers of Jesus to deal with difference.  After all, the world around us wants to put everything into neat and tidy categories, and if you don't already fit into one, it will force you into one.  But taking Jesus seriously means allowing that the Spirit he sends is going to be stubbornly like the wind--giving us all direction and energy, but also allowing us each to move on slightly different courses even though it is the same wind in each of our sails.  Sometimes it happens in churches looking across the waters at one another--why don't we have screens and a rock band like they have? Why don't we have Gothic stone columns and a gigantic organ like they do?  Why don't others pray or sing like we do?  Why don't we have a food pantry like them, or they have an after-school program like us?  We have this tendency to want to judge who is "winning" at church by comparing ourselves to one another.  But maybe that misses the point.


In fact, I'll just come out and say it--that misses the point. 


Let's assume for a moment that the Spirit of God is at least as smart as you are (a safe assumption, no?).  You can see how different boats all pushed by the same wind might each go in seemingly different directions to accomplish different purposes, even though they are all propelled by the same east-blowing air currents.  You can see how each might tap into the wind in different ways to do what they are supposed to do.  And beyond that, you can see how each person on board any given boat might be doing exactly what they are supposed to be doing even if they are pointed in the opposite direction of someone on their very own boat. 


Well, if we can see how that might be true with sailboats in the wind, could we allow that the Spirit of God might just be clever enough to be doing many things at once through you... and the person who sits across from you in church whose life and attitudes often look very different from yours... and also be working through the congregation down the street that does things very differently from yours... as well as the congregation half a world away?  Could we allow that the same wind--the same Spirit--could be powering each of us, while reserving the right not to make us all identical?


We can be so bent on uniformity that we forget that God could be smart enough to be juggling a lot of chainsaws at the same time--and even though it is true that one is headed upward while another is headed down, they are really all part of the same motion.  We can forget that God reserves the right for the Spirit's motion to include people praying with candles and hymnals over here... AND people welcoming the outcast, who still has wounds from being told they are unacceptable, with arms wide open over here... AND people throwing themselves in harm's way out of Christ-like love over there... AND on and on and on.  A god of our own invention--and idol--will only be able to handle the level of complexity that our own brains can process.  But the real and living God is clever enough to be using the same Spirit's breath to move you in your world today... and me in mine... even if the actions we take today by the Spirit's prompting look very different if we held them up side by side.


Today, let us dare to allow the possibility that the Spirit of God is doing a lot of things at once--and instead of criticizing the people in the fishing boat for not getting all the way to the other shore (when that is not their purpose in the first place), what if we simply put our own hands to the tasks we have been given on the ship where we have been placed, and leave it to the wisdom and power of the Spirit to get us each to the place we are meant to be....


Lord Jesus, humble me and embolden me enough today to see how you can be moving in my life and world in one way and in a different way in someone else's world... and yet be the same one Lord over and with us all.

"Come and See" (On John 1:37-38)

When Jesus turned and saw them, following, he said to them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which translated means Teacher), “Where are you staying?” He said to them, “Come and see.” (John 1:37-38)

 

“Rabbi, where are you staying?”

The experts say

the question has

the thrust of asking

“Where do you stand, Jesus?”

“With whom do you side?”

“What positions do you take?”

 

His answer is perfect.

“Come and see.”

No dodging.

No hiding.

No changing of subjects.

With three words,

he invites

and dares

and overturns tables.

 

Whatever they expected about

who is worthy

    to house a respectable rabbi,

what rules

    he ought to follow

what boundaries

     he would not cross,

whatever they assumed,

the crafty Jesus

pries those certainties from their hands

to make them complicit

in his conspiracy.

 

Now they will go where he goes,

share bread with his chosen company,

stand where he stands,

and with whom.

 

Now they will stay,

at table alongside with

Zacchaeus and Simon,

the sell-outs and scandalous,

drinkers and hookers and sinners,

oh—

and the spotless Lamb of God.

 

“Come and see,” he bleats,

and already they are

captivated,

his gravity like the sun’s.

 

Naming the Love (On the Baptism of Jesus)

Naming the Love (On the Baptism of Jesus)

January 2017

 

“This

is my

Beloved.”

And with that,

Jesus learned

the surprising satisfaction

of hearing

Love’s prior claim

made public,

the unpredictable delight

of knowing,

not only that you chosen

(that, you knew already)

but of

the saying-so for all to hear.

It makes a difference,

that saying so,

in the wonderful sense that it doesn’t:

the Love was there already—

between you

already,

Father for Son,

First Person for Second,

I for You,

Lover for Beloved—

and would have been so

still

even if Heaven’s voice had never spoken

to the crowds gathered ankle-deep

around the Baptist.

It would have been true already,

the love, the choosing,

eternal and unchanging,

without a word aloud.

It was, in that regard,

an unnecessary profession,

and thus, in another light,

all the more precious precisely

because it was not news to Jesus’ ears,

but was instead

the spontaneous outburst of the divine,

exclaiming and naming the Love,

simply for the joyful release

              of putting the words in air,

              of dispelling any shadow of secrecy or shame,

      and of not caring what anybody else thought when it was spoken.

I’ll bet the Lord blushed a little to hear it.



Disregarding Frank

Disregarding Frank--January 13, 2017

"We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people's trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ..." [Ephesians 4:14-15]

No disrespect to Old Blue Eyes, but I do not believe there's any phrase that rings in my ears more childishly than the two-word exclamation, "My way!"

Goodness gracious, even just typing that phrase and reading the words on the screen makes me scowl.  In these days of having a five-year-old and a three-year-old running around our house, I am getting used to hearing that kind of talk plenty.  "Don't zip my coat like THAT--I'm doing it MY WAY!"  "No, don't put the ranch dressing THERE on my plate--I'm going to squirt it on exactly a quarter-inch to the right of where you wanted it--I'm going to do it MY WAY!"  "You can't tell me to wash my hands before dinner--I'm doing this (wait for it... wait for it) MY WAY!"

The kicker, to my ears, in all of this "My way!" stuff from my own kids is that my children have no consistent principles as to why they want their coat zipped one way today, or the ranch dressing where they want it, or their hands unwashed--it's just sheer, petulant, childish self-absorption.  And because there is no inner logic to it, other than plain old immature selfishness, they will end up saying contradictory things from day to day, yet pronouncing them with fiery certainty that they have always thought that way.  (If I point out to my daughter, for example, that yesterday, or even literally five minutes ago, she wanted help with putting her shoes on, but at this instant she is in a mood to do it herself, well, she gives me this intensely serious look in her eyes like the world depends on her next words, and she says defiantly, "No, Daddy!  I don't want your help!"  If I offer her ketchup for her tater tots at dinner, which she begged and pleaded for last time, she may well be in a mood today to say, "No!  I never liked ketchup!" if it doesn't feel like she is getting "her way" in the moment.  There is no consistency with such childish logic--there is only the repeated shouting for "my way."

Now, in all fairness to my children... they are five and three.  This is the age for petulant selfishness masquerading as independence.  This is the time of their lives for being ridiculously inconsistent, and just lumping all of their contradictions together in a pile and chalking them up to childish hypocrisy.  That's part of childishness.... which is part of childhood.  We don't have to be proud of the fact that each of us went through that phase... but we probably should all at least admit we did have that phase.

The real trouble comes if we never leave it.

It's bearable, maybe even an inescapable part of development, for my young children to have the words, "My way!" on their lips so often.  But coming from the mouth of an adult?  Well, for my money, there is nothing more sad and pathetic than hearing Frank Sinatra try to give some dignity to that petulant creed, "I did it my way!"  It's almost like Old Blue Eyes doesn't hear the audience all laughing at him when he sings such a childish anthem without a hint of irony in his voice.

Children may be childish as a part of growing up.  But the New Testament calls us to wake up and snap out of it.  We are called to a way of life beyond the random whims and bundle of contradictions that get justified under the heading, "My way!" We are called to see through the snake-oil sellers, liars and hucksters telling us things we want to hear so that we can try and cling to the idol of "my way." We are called to keep on course in the face of the countervailing current--as the letter to the Ephesians puts it, to keep from being "tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine" that tells us what we want to hear.  Followers of Jesus are called to a different way of living and thinking--one that is consistent in the self-giving love of God, rather than the contradictory whims of the day that children feel.  It is God's intention to grow us all... to be like Jesus.  It is God's mission, God's project, to pull each of us beyond the childishness of "My way!" and all the winds that blow every which way in the name of "My way!", and to turn our sails instead into the consistent wind from the Spirit, who always and without fail leads us in the direction of love for the other, mercy for the brokenhearted, embrace for the excluded, and restoration for those who have been stepped on.  We are led, always, consistently, and faithfully, to give ourselves away in love the way Jesus did.  We are drawn, like we are being pushed by an unrelenting breeze, toward the path of servanthood and humility, of forgiveness and reconciliation.

Again, to my ears it's almost comical the way Sinatra used to sing the supposed glories of doing things "my way" and scorning "the one who kneels", when the way of Jesus rises above the childish contradictions of "my way" and at the same time kneels low to wash the feet of all... even Judas.  Jesus would never be caught dead singing the lyrics to "My Way," and instead his resurrection power keeps offering itself to others, and his Spirit keeps offering an alternative wind than the unreliable "winds of doctrine" of those voices out there that just say things we want to hear.  To be frank about it (no pun intended... well, maybe a little), Christians will not have the song of Sinatra in their ears, because they are learning to disregard Frank in order to listen to Jesus. 

Maybe this whole journey of the Christian life is lived out as an exercise in disregarding Frank, and instead listening to the needs of our neighbor.

So today, hear the New Testament offer us two ways of driving the point home:  instead of being like immature children who will hold any side in an argument they like if it seems to suit them at the moment in their pursuit of "my way," we are called to be mature grown-ups who put God's Kingdom priorities ahead of whatever might be momentarily good for my self-interest.  And then the other picture to get the same idea across: instead of being like a boat that gets knocked around by winds that blow in every direction and don't get us anywhere, let us allow the Spirit to blow like the winds at creation, to fill our sails, and to lead us in a new direction. 

Either way, the dare in front of us is to move beyond the childish whims that come with the refrain, "My way!" and instead to learn to pray--yes, even kneeling--"Not my will, but yours, O God, be done.  Not my way, but yours, O God, be my path."

Let's start the new day mature enough to be done with singing Sinatra at his worst, and instead to pick up the strains of the Kingdom's song as we turn our sails to be filled with God's Spirit.

Lord God, NOT my way.  Not MY way.  Not my WAY. But yours, yours, yours.... into love and justice for all.

A Long Obedience

A Long Obedience--January 12, 2017

"I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Now that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own." [Philippians 3:10-12]

Look--I am the last person you would want to consult for nautical advice, generally speaking.  I will grant that.  But here's something that's obvious to even a landlubber like me: you won't reach the other side of the lake if you are turning 90 degrees to starboard every five minutes.  That's a recipe for going in circles--or, I guess, literally, tiny squares in the water.

That is to say, if you are seriously trying to traverse the straight line between Point A on this side of the lake and Point B on the far side, what you need is a persistent push and consistent compass-orientation.  You need, as (of all people!) Nietzsche called (and which the brilliant Eugene Peterson later riffed on) "a long obedience in the same direction."

That's the key for getting somewhere--anywhere, really.  You keep going, not just in any old direction, but with faithfulness and diligence to keep aimed in the same direction.  The only way we grow in our faith is keeping at it.  The only way we get to be more Christ-like... is to keep letting Christ make us like him.  The only way we come to reflect more and more fully the character of God's Reign in the world... is to let God's priorities and values shape us.  You keep at it, and you keep going in the same direction. In Saint Paul's words, you "press on."

This Christianity thing is not simply having your name on a list of members somewhere, or written in God's golden book up in heaven.  It is about movement--constant movement, but also movement in a constant direction.  We have struggles, to be sure, and we have days and times when we slow down or seem to come to a grinding halt.  But we keep at it.  It is, a long obedience in the same direction, not a distraction every few minutes that turns us every which way.

If we are committed to following Jesus with our lives, and if we are invested in bringing Jesus' Movement of Mercy to all people, then we won't be satisfied to have "done enough yesterday."  We will keep at it today, and tomorrow, and the next day, too, because we are looking to let Jesus remake us all the way to our core.

Today, what are the distractions in our lives that pull us away from forward momentum? What are the places in our lives that we most deeply need "a long obedience in the same direction?"

Lord Jesus, keep me on course today.  Keep me on course.