Random Thoughts: by matt vander wiele

Repent for the Kingdom of God is Now

2009-05-01T11:36:00.000-07:00

My life is basically consisting of a job in which I try so desperately to keep my students in the present tense, I mean there bodies are here, sitting in class or lounging on the couch, but their minds are far from them. It is interesting how obsessed we are with the future and the past, yet fail to grasp what it is that we so passionately desire: tangible, physical, interacting, stimulating, painful, and emotional relationship right now, present tense.

While I observe students at one particular place "experiencing" something they are usually on their I- phones or Blackberries or ear pieces expectantly wondering and conspiring to whatever the next best thing is. While all this is happening, life is passing them by and relationship is missed to its utter demise.

Jesus had an interesting conversation with Peter, Thomas and Philip at one point toward the end of Jesus' ministry. They were so concerned with the next best thing, this of course was the anticipation of God's Kingdom. Oh how they wanted to go with Him, to find Heaven, the next best thing, the next great future. They were so concerned about the future it thwarted their understanding of what Jesus was telling them and most importantly where is Heaven? Where is the Kingdom? Where does true realtionship exist?

Jesus announces that He must be going, going where? Away to fulfill the greatest promise that has ever been made, and thank goodness for that one, YHWH's promise to fix us and pursue us and redeem us.

Peter wants to go with him, Jesus says you can't. Thomas says, "Well if we cannot join you, tell us the way and we will come later." Jesus says "I am the way, you are standing on me". "The future you are so afraid of missing out on is right now in front of you." Philip finalizes the misunderstanding and asks, "well if we cannot come and you will not show us the way, give us a taste of what we can expect." "Show us the Father"! Jesus pulls all of the past present and the future together in one of the greatest verses in all scripture, "Philip, do you not know by now that if you have seen me, you have seen the Father."

There is only one place true relationship resides, and that it right now, present tense. There are no relationships happening in the past, they have already happened or failed, maybe due to the fact that when you were in those relationships you were always somewhere else cognitively. There are no relationships in the future, they have not happened yet. And what would our motive be for starting a new relationship?

The devil does an excellent job of allowing and helping us to comfortably live in the past and the future. When we live in the past and future we are useless in the present. This view also stems from a screwed up view of heaven. (It is called Christoplatonism, but that is for another day)Heaven, the pie in the sky, that far off place we are trying to get to, that spiritual place where we will all be in these big multi- purpose buildings with not enough chairs listening to worship music and eating papa johns pizza. (I really hope not)

According to Jesus wherever God and man reside together is where Heaven is... That is what made the Garden paradise, not the fruit, but the relationship. That is why Jesus' ministry so sweet for his disciples, the relationship. So here is the kicker, can we experience Heaven right now, present tense? What does Jesus say, "I am giving you someone that is better then me to help you now" The Helper is the Holy Spirit. Yes we can.

Right now, hey its your tomorrow, right now, come on its everything, right now, what are you waiting, catch that magic moment,and do it right here and now, right now, its right now, its what's happening...

Repent for the Kingdom of God is right now, Don't you know Philip that if you have seen me you have already seen the Father.. What are you waiting for? Relationship is right now. Present tense.

Passover revisited

2009-04-14T05:21:00.000-07:00

When I discuss communion with most Christians it is evident that the ordinance of Communion is often overlooked as being placed by Christ within the meal of Passover itself. Why didn't Jesus just wander up to the Garden with his friends with a little basket of bread and wine on the first day of Unleavened Bread and say, "Hey guys we usually celebrate Passover, but this year we are doing it differently, this year I am changing it to "communion". Instead Jesus institutes communion, (our remembering of what Jesus did for us and is about to do for the world all those years ago) right into Passover itself? Most people have no idea.

Another interesting fact is where in the meal is the "communion" celebration inserted and why? In the texts of Matthew, Mark and Luke we get a good idea of where communion was instituted. It is inserted directly before the singing of the last hymn. Singing of the last hymn was the final step in the meal after the lamb has been eaten. The Passover Lamb signifies the physical salvation from Egypt and particuarly the salvation of the First borns from the Death Angel.

Passover is the celebration of the sparing of the first born children from a PRE- MATURE PHYSICAL DEATH, the problem with this however is that although the children were saved then, (by the blood of the lamb) they will die physically later. Is Passover a celabration of the physical salvation of the first born of Israel? I would agree and say Yes. Jesus however wants to make Passover spiritual, He wants to take something dead and make it alive, But where does he do this? How does he do this?

The first major fact of importance is that Communion is instituted at the close of the supper before the last hymn is sung, see Matt 26- 26- 31. WHy doesn't Jesus institute our responsibility to remember Him before the eating of the lamb or even during it? I thnk He wants to make very certain that to the best of His ability we are reminded that communion is a celebration of what has already happened. The power of salvation is in the lamb, not the elements. I mean you could argue for some pretty convincing theology for transubstantiation and consubstantiation if Jesus had inserted the elements in Passover before the work of the lamb or even during the work of the lamb. In fact if he had done that you might even be able to argue that communion is a requirement for salvation. But it isn't.

If you remember the significance of the Passover lamb, the death angel did not fly around and look in tents and say, "oops sorry Jewish family, I will move on to the Egyptian house to kill them" The work of the death angel was not quenched by race or work of person but rather the work of the lamb. Did the tent have lambs blood on it or not? That was the deciding factor.

Jesus purposefully inserts communion, (our responsibility to remember His work) into Passover after the "work of the lamb" itself so as to never confuse that communion is a response to what has already been done for us by the lamb.

Christ is the Passover Lamb that after that night will go and do ultimately what we cannot do ourselves, and how blasphemous for us to take his institution of communion to a level of work that one does to hold up along side the work of the cross and the tomb. "thank you Jesus for all that you have done for me, but just to make sure I better take communion to ensure my place in the Kingdom." Erroneous Doctrine. We are given communion to remember so as that we will not forget the past, present and future work of the Lamb.

Happy Easter

People who sin or sinful people?

2009-02-12T11:39:00.000-08:00

Our biggest problem is ourselves, I guess you do not need a PHD to figure that one out, but maybe you do need a whole lot more education to acknowledge it. It would seem from cultural advancements and technological savvy that we have arrived at least for the most part, but I think we may all admit to some point that we do not have it all together. The age old question of course is to what point do we have it together? I mean I do not hear anyone really saying that they are perfect, in fact in this day and age a little fake humility goes a long way, but we are also admitting to some extent that maybe we are all doing ok. Of course we could be better, right? Billions of dollars on self help and exercise, diets and smiets, all to get, well, better.

Most church services I hear about today are teaching our need for Jesus as supplemental, you know like a pill you take to sleep better. I slept ok last night, but I will need to take something if I am ever going to sleep better.... I will take Jesus. Some times this comes from a misunderstanding of the Gospel. Starting with the Gospel in Matthew for instance, allows one to hear about Jesus, but misses out altogether on why he needed to come and save us. When one begins a study of the Gospel or even builds a theology on the Gospel beginning in Matthew or the NT for that matter, we miss out on why we really need Jesus. He becomes supplemental. On the other hand when you begin to see that the Gospel starts in Genesis not Matthew, you begin to see that God and man are perfect and something happens, and that something is sin.... God begins his plan of redemption to fix what we have broken and to offer us another chance (prefix re- again or second, like restore, renew, resurrect, rebirth, etc) , If you take the sin out of the Gospel you do not need a Savior, you simply and accomadatingly only need a suplement to make one who is not all that bad, maybe even good, a little better.

But that is for another blog. What I am referring to is the essence of our humanity. I have been teaching Leviticus to my college class, it is crazy, we are on week 15. Anyway it is easy to grasp why all the sacrifices were made for sin, I mean ok, we are good right? but not perfect? So when we sin we need to sacrifice(or I should say the Israelites), a deliberate sin left one unclean and unable to participate in community or being able to worship God. That makes sense if you believe that your a person who just sins.

But then Chapter 11-15 hit you. Uncleaness for things like a girl's period, emission of Semen, yeah I typed it "semen", having sex! Are you kidding, having sex makes you unclean, menstrual cycle!!! Try teaching Lev. 12 "purification after child birth" to a bunch of college girls, NICE and Awkward. But come on God this is a little much, you held it against these people that even in the emission of semen in a dream perhaps, a man was considered unclean! It does not say he sinned, but the tag line is he is unclean due to the result of sin which makes even our core humanity unclean to God. What if Lev. only taught that deliberate sins needed sacrifice. What could we say today? Well I am ok and all and I sin a little, but as long as it is not deliberate, I am in need to just become better? NO, Moses is told that even at the core of our humanity, things that we cannot help render us unable to be in the presence of God. Our own core humanity can keep us from being in worship with YHWH. That is why all of these things are mentioned, if let go and unattended they( semen and blood) will make one unclean and then the tabernacle is made unclean and God could kill you! Interestingly enough for these people in Israel they seemed fine with it, You know every day life, "Oh, Sally has her period again, Won't see her for a week", "Mary just had a baby girl, she is unclean for 80 days", "Billy had a wet dream, He will be missing dinner tonight to go wash" Seriously, The result of our humanity according to Leviticus does not render us as people who just need a supplement , We need saving at our very core... We need the Lord, We need Christ, who touched the unclean, who touched the leper who cried UNCLEAN UNCLEAN as he covered his head and left his community. The leper pronounced his own mourning, his own death, we have Christ, we do not pronounce our death anymore we can pronounce our life through Him, our reasonable act of worship, (rom 12) What a difference we see when we consider the difference between needing a supplement to make us better because sometimes we sin or the saving we need because we are indeed sinful... Consider the difference that can have on your understanding of Christ and the Gospel.

6 is so young and 6 is so old.....

2009-02-06T07:10:00.000-08:00

I love you Molly, 6 is so young and 6 is so old, Little tears to big smiles, drama to dreams, laughing to crying within a matter of nano- seconds, girly girl things and treasures in your purse, making me realize how impatient I am, eyes like your mom, dance moves like your dad, a heart that breaths sacrifice, 3 stuffed animals in bed with you, a blanket named bubby, no front teeth, the love of my life, My favorite time of day: Our ride home from school, 20 questions about life, Daddy do I have to take a nap?, tangled hair, your sweet face, hide and seek upstairs, experienced all the firsts with you, little hands that hold onto mine, You always, I never, intelligent like mom, I can still pick you up, dance with me on the counter?, sing with me in the car one more time, your so big now, your so young still, Can I marry you Daddy?, Of course you can, Hurt feelings, sweet laugh, I remember when you were born, stories and lessons learned, you see me fail every day and you still love me, unconditional love, You are so special, marry someone better than your dad, promise me my love, 6 is so old and 6 is so young, dates to the mall, coloring animals at bob evans, bike rides to the pond, summers in heaven, crayfish creek, I played there too, walks to the playground, my monkey bar girl, little black golves with the fingers cut out, little girl smiles, big girl dreams, Mommy's pride and joy, a heart of gold, big sister now, our baby back then, our little stranger finally here, time flys, time stays, please stay, 6 is so young and 6 is so old, I am cool now to you, but soon you will be old, I will be older, For now I am your husband, for know I am you hero, for now you are so young, the future is coming, I can only imagine, you break my heart, I break yours, Love is what happened. happy birthday Molly, I love you, Dad

The Dark Half

2009-01-27T05:15:00.000-08:00

In the early 90's I read a book that Stephen King wrote called the Dark Half. It was a book about a man who somehow, in a way that King could only make you believe, and scare the Ba-jeepers out of you at the same time, had absorbed his twin into him when he was inside the womb. Of course their are you classic moments in the book when he finds finger nails in his skin and parts of his twin, (have I lost any of my two readers yet?) and so on. Understanding that this actually happens, what sits with me still today about that book is the dual personality this guy had, like he was jekyl and hide, like he had this split personality, like he was me. He had an evil side, His twin was controlling him! or he allowed his twin to control him.

The flesh wars against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh. (Gal.) Continually day in and day out, I am wrestling with this twin, and he usually wins. Sometimes it is not all that bad, but sometimes it is real bad. For the most part it is this struggle of relationship vs. works. or Lust and Love, Why am I so eager to do something? Why is doing easier than being or relating or investing?

I started thinking about the Garden, you know Eden, I started thinking about what God gave to Adam and to Eve. Although we see it demonstrated to Adam and assume that Eve has been given this dual blessing as well. The dual blessing is 1. the perfect relationship and 2. the perfect job. Now what is interesting to me is that upon the entering of sin into the world by yours truly or Adam, whatever your theological fancy, Both of these blessings changed because of our choice to sin. The relationship changed because we tried to fulfill ourselves with someone other than God, and that would be us, The created tried to fulfill itself with the created, The created can only be ultimately fulfilled by whoever created it. Our self worth comes from this, it comes from the relationship with the creator. However, we got this idea somewhere along the line that we get our ultimate fulfillment from our job or our wife or sex or whatever rather than the creator, So we are like this huge glass that if we let the creator fill it, with his huge "symbolic pitcher" he can fill it, in fact the Bible says our glass will overflow out of the abundance of the creator. Or we have this little lame pitcher we try to fill our own glass with, and we are always wanting more, fill me up. please

So this perfect job has changed and the perfect relationship has changed, the problem is the job was only ever secondary to the relationship, Adam had the relationship with YHWH before the job, right? But from then on to 2009, we are primarily interested in the job, no wonder we wrestle with the evil side, we are really looking for that relationship, that big pitcher to fill us, when we get the realtionship right again the job will follow, and here is the kicker, the job was allowing the creator to fulfill the created too, but in a little different way, a way that the created could use the specific unique gifts that the creator gave the created, so now throw on top of all this the idea that instead of being able to do whatever you put your mind to, maybe we are so unsatisfied because we are not allowing the creator to teach us and show us what he made us specifically to do, we miss the relationship, we miss the job, we miss the job we miss the fulfillment.

The creator has gifted us uniquly to know what it is that he has made us to do, 1. have relationship with him and secondarily have worth through him as we bring glory to him through whatever vocational gifts he has made us to do. The moral infrastructure of our glass is cracked and cracking. We are to focused on our job, our spirit is dualling against the flesh.... we need to be filled by our creator, Relationship first vocation second.......

Membership Meetings and the need to feel Important

2009-01-26T04:39:00.000-08:00

I have recently attended the last two membership meetings at my church. It is so interesting to see people and how they function when given a microphone, Some hold it as if it is this foreign object that they have never seen and act surprised when their voice is magnified when they speak into it. Or the person that just comes to really just raise havoc, whether they mean to or not, or that guy that asks the question that is totally out of place in regards to the context of the discussion going on, "Are there any questions for the staff"? Yeah uh, What about the pond, what are we doing with that? Stocking it with fish or what?, You have all probably been there.

Interestingly enough i have noticed something, or rather have been reminded once again about the nature us humans. We all thrive for acceptance, to trust, and to feel needed. Years ago when I worked in human services in NY for an organization that provided care for folks with Developmental Disabilities, I was meeting with my boss discussing why people leave their jobs, or do not show up for work. ( I was a manager in charge of schedules and appts. so I was blowing off steam about my employees to my supervisor) what he said next really has influenced me. This Guy was not a believer in fact he was a Jewish Rabbi that i have had many sweet talks with, but anyway he asked me what I thought was the number one reason people leave there job or do not show up for work. Of course in all my business experience I said, "They want more money or they are just lazy."

He began to tell me that the real reason, the number 1 reason people leave their jobs or do not show up for work is because they do not feel appreciated and that they do not think that they matter......

Now of course I am thinking this is pooey, I mean come on everyone leaves because of money..... But then I got to thinking of the jobs I have left due to money vs. relational issues.

I say all this as back ground for the last two meetings at my church I attended: The first meeting was in regards to passing a amendment or changing the constitution in regards to how much power or "say" the elders had. Our church has been through a lot in the last 5 years, and the trust factor is obviously down, people are feeling unappreciated and do not trust the leadership to have any more "say then they already do". This is a relational issue, the "bill" "vote" whatever was not passed by about a third maybe, enough to be a reminder of the need for people to feel safe and know that they want to be heard. This is an issue of self worth and control, and a need to be heard. The meeting brought heated discussion, hurtful questions, character attacks, people are scared, they lash out, they feel inferior, they thrive on relationship

Last night was a totally different story, This meeting was about money and the budget, Now what I find interesting is I am expecting this same group of people to be even worse, you know what, Unanimous, Unanimous in favor of all the budgets! What I mean this is money we are talking about, in fact a bigger heftier budget than last year, Passed it, no problem, People are not primarily concerned with giving their money as they are with knowing their money makes a difference, they have control over it, (so we think) we can see it put to use, we can say, "I matter, my money helped". I left the meeting once again surprised, but already knowing this concept this truth, that we are communal primarily and when we fee worth and security, we will give to anyone for any cause.

We just want to be appreciated, maybe for the wrong reasons, but we do, If we try to fill that with finding our self worth with something other then God we are left stripped, Naked, like Adam and Eve. The Creator is ultimately fulfilled by the Creator only.

People need to feel important, people thrive on relationship.

solutions to virtual laziness

2008-11-24T15:56:00.000-08:00

I would like to offer some solutions to the recent post in regards to my response to Zondervan's new soft ware known as "the city". Throughout my short ministry experience I have realized (either on my own but more than likely from my wife or friends) that gving an opinion is great, but you know, everyone has one, you know like noses, everyone has one. Below are some positive, (as positive as I can be), thoughts or solutions in regards to some of the problems I have brought up in regards to the lack of effort put forth by church attenders, lack of serving and overal laziness in the body. I also have added a few suggestions for church leaders in regards to some things we tried in my church in NY.

How can church leadership begin to empower the body to have more of a "giving attitude" as opposed to "taking"?- Goal- get the body serving....

1. Any good leader realizes he is only as good of a leader as the people in which he puts himself around. Meaning a good leader puts leaders around him. People that know him, that are different then him, that know how to steer him and direct him, and hold him accounatble. This act of leadership allows others to see the transparency of the leadership that they are told to (biblically) submit to. This tranparency should trickle down from the top, senior pastor, elders, to the deacons, to the body. The problem however is that when the leadership is not transparent and is not willing to lead by being transparent an attitude is shown, whether intentional or not, that the leadership has it all under control, it does not need any help, or worst of all, has it so much together that they may not even need our prayer. This type of leadership is often led with selfish motive. the result, twofold: lack of trust from the body and a false sense of what is genuine worship and service as a body. If the Body thinks the leadeship can do it all they will let them. If the leadership allows the body to think this, then we have an unhealthy body, an engine not functioning on any cylinders.

2. A good leader knows how to empower. Any good leader is secure enough to empower and develop the next batch of leaders. We have too many people sitting around doing nothing, particuarly young to middle age people. This can stem from the same old problem Timothy had in the Bible with Old people despising the youth. So much concern over the history that they had in Judaism or whatever, that there is a false philosophy painted that one must be over the age of 50 to serve properly. A leader must empower. Church leadership must empower the body to as Paul says, not let a part say to another, "we have no need for you" all parts need to be functioning. So transparent and empowering leadership is the goal.

The Body:

How do we empower the body to serve?

1. Teach Biblical Worship from the pulpit. Biblical worship today has been lost in the age of Grace. Jesus paid it all, and that is true but that does not deliniate us from responsibility. I guess I mean we have lost the "service" aspect of worship. Biblical Worship never existed without service. When Satan asked Jesus to bow down and worship Him he did not know what he was asking, Jesus knew worship was more than just a one time deal, worship involved service, work, responsibility and although satan would have been happy with Jesus one time act of worship whether kneeling down or whatever, Jesus calls him on it. He basically says you cannot have one without the other, for Jesus to worship satan would mean he would serve him too, and that is reserved for YHWH only, sorry man, no can do. Most people have no idea what proper worship and service entail. It is a good thing God gave us some gifts, or gift whatever your theological fancy. The problem is most people do not know what their gift (s) are. I recommend 2 things:

1. Know what your object of worship is- When Jesus meets the woman the well to discuss salvation and later worship, he meets her in an interesting place, right in between Mt. Gerizm, her place of worship and the Temple in Jerusalem. he meets her at Jacob'e well to make a point, this is where my Patriarchs worshiped me, out here in the sand, nothing made with hands. See the Samaritans worshiped in Spirit and the Jews in truth. The jews knoew the object of their worship but their hearts were not in it anymore. The Samaritans had the opposite problem, worshipping with their hearts, but the object of worship was false Gods. He meets her in the middle to say, both are wrong, someday the true worshipers will worship in spirit and in truth. part of me wonders how much true worship is going on, and worse I am afraid we have lost sight of our true object of worship and replaced it with efficiency.

2. The Gospel must be included in worship- Jesus redirects the woman at the well to remind her Salvation is a life altering change, She says she wants the living water but she does not know why, she thinks it is so she can be accepted back into her culture, she is not yet ready to deal with her sin. Jesus holds back the Gospel and encourages her to go get her husband and deal with your sin. We have lost focus of dealing with sin and seem to be too wrapped up in making the Gospel efficient and friendly.

Two more thoughts:

1. Spiritual gifts teaching from the pulpit

2. Spiritual gift test

You know as much as I do that there are people in the church that are practicing "gifts" that maybe they think they are the only ones "gifted" in that area. They will only learn if we teach them, They will only learn if we empower them.

In regards to social networking I stand by my argument that this should solely be for the use of supplemental purpose only. Now show me a church that is so far ahead in the biblical model of worship with service, where they have it so right, they are saying, 'ok how can I make this more efficient now, how can I do this better and faster', In that case maybe they are ready for "the city", but when you are not there yet as a church, physically, when you are not utalizing your gifts, when leadership is not empowering the body and the body is sitting there with ther arms outstretched wanting more "milk", maybe it is time to reconsider what is really the issue as opposed to covering it with more facilitation of laziness.

Please do not think that i am opposed to the usefullness of the web, but if I think if we were honest, we have a lot more work to do..

virtual laziness- social networking arrogance

2008-11-20T07:19:00.001-08:00

Nice Title, I know, and before I start, I want to note that here I am writing on an Internet blog, arrogantly thinking someone will want to read this, so I am guilty of this as well, My concern however is true and I should probably right now be having relationship with someone on the phone, or more importantly taking time out of my life to go visit someone, but you know what? I think I will just text them. Below is the recent article in regards to Zondervan's new software called "the city" that allows people to, well, do more on line networking, but it is more than on line social networking, it is church on line life, well trying to do church stuff anyway. Email, small group forum interaction, prayer chains etc. and while I am thankful for the Internet and the ability to have 600 friends that I am so enthralled in their lives that I tend to neglect my own family, I am sad to say that I think we are mistaking this new age of communication with good old fashioned Laziness. Having a been an associate Pastor and now teacher I am aware of people's problem's in "getting involved" physically, I mean in serving, I mean in good old fashioned worship and service in regards to church. It is a two fold problem, First church Leadership does not help because it gives off the vibe that we are running things and you can just come and sit, so in the bodies defense it may feel like they are not needed or more commonly, "I do not have to do anything, it is done for me", On the flip side you have the lazy church attender, (which in my opinion is the major culprit) Lazy Church attender can not even sign up for a nursery, or utalize any gift whatsoever that the Lord has given he or she, They miss out blessing after blessing due to their uncommittal Nature to anything church related. In other words coming to church with an attitude of what can I get rather than what can I give. This has been a problem for years, forever. Has it improved?, maybe in some areas. But now let's add more lazy to the mix, with what I think is worse, giving the impression that we are "doing our part". The social networking monster has almost totally replaced social physical interaction. You do not want to call, then email, you do not want to email, then text. But now we reward this with soft ware that allows us to have small group from the privacy of our own home without even getting out. My best friend recently said after my wife threw his wife a baby shower, "I cannot believe she did all that by phone, no emails". It is true, now adays everything is done through email. Now rightly so to some extent, but church stuff, interpersonal relationship? i am not ready for that, i am not ready yet to feel more "special" getting a text rather than a call.

Another thought is the popular "Twitter" where people think so much about themselves that every hour or so they update their face book or twitter from their phone, "Hey world, I just took a dump, thought you might want to know", Hey world, I am spending time with my family, but not really, because I am updating my face book right now so you know what I am doing". 1. (like I said I am guilty, here I am blogging, )But number 1. is it not arrogant to think that the world needs to know what you are doing 24-7? and 2. What kind of person has the time to follow other people's actions everyhour, or check 600 friends on their face book? How much more could we be impacting God's Kingdom if we, instead of talked about it. just did it. Why do we want to succumb to the laziness of the social networking industry by making software for our churches to nurture the unrelational cyber communication world? I use internet all the time, I text, but folks, the age old issue of people not wanting to get involved is not going to be solved by now making it more accessable from their computers? Just because we are doing something doesn't mean we are getting anything done.

Worship and service has been drasticly altered since the OT sacrificial period. If you wanted to worship God there was service involved. There was never any confusion in who you were worshipping and what was required. If you wanted to worship you served. If you wanted to worship, you did not just go in the building, sit down, stand up for some songs , critique the service and then leave wondering why you did not feel like you did anything or worse did not worship God at all. In regards to the sacrificial system if you wanted to have "fellowship" with God, you brought an animal, you killed it yourself, you cut it up yourself, you and the priest put it on the altar, you got to eat some of it. You worshipped, but you served. We have a hard enough time serving in our culture, I mean hands on worship that involves service, easier soft ware to accomodate our lazy culture might seem like a great fix, but I am afraid this is a temporary band aid. In fact who are we really accomodating? Ourselves or are we really bringing God His due Glory?

A final thought, I am not saying ignore the culture, we need to live in it and thrive and proclaim as living sacrifice's the major reason why we are alive and not dead. We were and are made for relationship, personal physical interaction. I do not think we can forget that, to forget that is to reject whose image we are made in.

We see this in our kids who in our youth are more prone to solitude than ever, "no friends", "no one understands me", "I feel disconnected" HMMM interesting, those are major concerns i hear now from Seniors, (Troy you will agree with me), who have had adults invest in them for 8 years, and now when it seems like the time for the seniors to be investing in the younger, they selfishly decline and want more "milk" or in thie case "meat", or selfishly more for "ME" Yet they will go home and spend countless hours on line interacting with whomever they want, and seeking "relationship" with thousands of "friends", but are still empty....

Don't thow the baby out with the bath water, but there must be some balance in this as we move forward with the Gospel, the real, physical, life changing, personal, tangible Gospel..

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Zondervan-Acquires-Online-Community-Building/story.aspx?guid=%7b57A05E7B-FDDA-4C24-B774-2C8AC5A9A82E%7d

Present Day Sanctification

2008-11-14T06:52:00.000-08:00

For this is the will of God your sanctification.... I Thess. 4. 3a. Selfishly when I interpret this verse I have a tendency to think, for this is the will of God that I am sanctified. I have been reminded once again that I am not sanctified but rather am in the process. Paul is adamant in regards to the terminology that he is using here. God is adamant about the terminology that he revealed to Paul. For this is God's will, His general will, here it is are you ready... "that we recognize that we are in a process. I think we forget this, I don't know about you, but I am not crazy about processes. Rightly so when I hear teaching on sanctification it is most often discussed in the terms of a process rather then lets say a system. Now a system, that is something I can handle. You know I do a then b then c then d, and the system flows nicely, in theory that is. In a system you would never want to go from f to b or from c back down to a. That type of thinking fits better with a process, a process allows some learning, it is like we are not done yet, we have not arrived. For this is God's will that we are sanctified? Yes but are we there yet, no, so maybe if I focused more on the process and the present rather then envisioning the finished product, (super me), I would be able to fair better in this process, See our terminology plays a big role in how we think and feel in regards to how we are doing in our sanctification and theology in general. If I believe that I am sanctified then I maybe might spend too much time living in the future or maybe the past. That is where we spend most of our time. We live in the past and the future. What if it was God's will for us, after justification, after the recognizing the work of Christ, after being set free, what if it is God's will for us to now realize what we may have gotten ourselves into by following Christ. For this is God's will, your sanctification, almost as if it is God's will for us to recognize that we are in a process now, and it is not tme to take the armor off, it is time to put it on and leave it on. And sometimes it is not pretty, victories are few, failures are many, (thank goodness my justification is not based on my victories and failures) maybe God wants us to try, if we can, to think outside the box, recognize some things outside of time, you know where He is. What if God wants us to remember that the process we are in right now is past present and future and he sees it all at once. For this is God's will, our process, our journey with him, not earning, but giving effort, like any good relationship should.

This thinking whether you buy this mumbo jumbo or not helps me to live in the present, today now. The past is only good for reflection, regret, pride, lust; the future only good for selfishness, pride and mostly worry. If we spend all our time living in those two: past and future, we are useless for the present( by the way the devil knows this too, helping to convince us to render ourselves useless today), and do you know what takes place in the present? Everything..... Relationships, smiles, love, acts of kindness, sin, lust, touch, sex, honesty, manipulation, hot, cold, my wife, my daughter's kiss that I covet like nothing else, my sons cry, as it seems to change daily, my forgiveness, my temper, my hate, my insecurities, my addictions, my turmoil, His grace, His name, my identity, my interations, my reality, my life. For this is the will of God that you recognize that you are in this process of sanctification, right now this moment till we are all one day perfect and mature lacking nothing..... then we can take the armor off, then we can think about the past and future, but by then we will not want to, for we will know better...............

Death of a Father

2008-11-13T04:53:00.000-08:00

Two of my sophomores lost their dad last night. I guess it was pretty quick. I guess it was a siezure and shutting down of organs. It happened fast. I got a call at 10pm. The next morning I found out he had died at 12 midnight. So while I was on the phone listening to my messages about a father of two of my students at 10pm, he had only two hours left on earth. In my class I am teaching about God's will for our lives. Most people do not know God's will for their lives because they want to just know his specific will for their lives like, who do I marry, what job do I take, what college do I go to, should I have more kids. I do not think God cares, I think he wants us to pick, I mean if we are seeking him first, His general will that is, if we know and strive for his general will, I think he wants us to pick our specific will, give us the desires of our hearts. But we do not want to take the time to learn what His general will is, we just want specific, we just want selfishness, it is all about me. God's primary general will is found throughout the Bible, it is the same for me as it is for you. It is God's general will that we all know Him. Now we all will not know Him because some will choose His pursuing and others will reject Him, but this is the will of God that none should perish but have everlasting life, (Timothy). You can then find general wills like "it is God'e will that we are living sacrifices" (Romans) That we proclaim what he has done for us, we worship Him, Also, that we are sanctified and that we recognize that we are are in a process of sanctification, and that in the process we will face battles with sexual immorality, but that we should abstain (Thessalonians)

So you get the idea. Anyway I was thinking about funerals, all different kinds of them, Christian, methodist, Catholic, non religious, you know you have been there. I started thinking about how at a non- christian funeral I always seem to hear alot about the person, alot about what they have been doing, like what a good person they were, and "she was a saint", anyway at the end of all of them there is like this awkward statement like "And we trust and pray, or and we hope and pray that we will see them someday again" as if there is a chance that they do not know where the person is. And honestly they do not. The Christian funerals as you know are different. The service is centered around God and Christ and not the person, they know where the person is not because of what the person has been doing for the past 40 years, but because of Christ. And it is a celebration to some extent.

I started thinking about my students dad that died and how he presumably new the Lord. I started thinking about God's general will for our llives is that we know Him, and how that is what I think that you are thinking about right before you die. I doubt you are thinking about your car or your money, or even your family, but whether or not you understood and have accepted God's general will for your life. It is not a coincidence that before you die, in your last thoughts you are thinking about, (probably) what God's general will is for your life, the question is are you thinking about it with comfort because you have accepted it or are you thinking about it because it is too late...

Fallen Prey to Nicknames

2008-10-16T10:58:00.000-07:00

You know I have always been one of those people that was never a big fan of nicknames, I mean everyone has them, the problem is that they are not your real name, they are some stupid name that has evolved due to some prominent story or happening ones life that results in a nickname, My great friend Carlos for example, his name (nickname) is Bumper, I mean that is how most people know him, I love that name, I only know one bumper. Here is a kid who bumped his head alot as a kid, so his loving parents Carlos and Martha or maybe it was Jay or Michelle decided to call him bumper. But what about those stupid names that we give our kids, Here is where I have fallen prey to the nicknames. We spent hours trying to come up with the perfect names for our kids, like names that are significant to us, and I have found that we call them not by their names any more but by ridiculous names, in fact there may even be a way we say the nick name by like raising our voice or talking in a baby voice, I am so guilty of this. Any way here is a break down of what I have been guilty of in regards to nicknames.

First of all My oldest daughter Molly has the nick name Rooter, Now this nickname was cute when she was 3 months old, (due to the fact that she always would "root" for food, those of you that understand know what I mean, she breast fed, so whenever you would touch her cheek she would swing her head around in that direction and well, root for a breast, ya know, boob, milk) anyway we still call her that and it is so funny. Hey Rooter! I mean what are we really saying when we call her that, "Hey are you looking for milk still"! You get the idea. A few others have been: Molly Mc Butter, Molls, Squirrel, Molly girl, etc

Maggie is our second oldest, her nick name is scooter, she used to scoot around on the floor, that name is not so bad but we most often call her "The Magster" like a title, Like "Hey how is the Magster today" as if she is some object of deity or something, Hey little Magster. Next it has morphed into "Magpie", so we are very guilty of nick names

Last but not least is Ezekiel, His name "Zeke" is based after my Grandpa "Clarence" who (get this) has the nick name Zeke, so my son's name is Ezekiel but we call him Zeke named after my Gramps who is Clarence. His nicknames are out of control because my daughters have given him an enormous amount of silly names. One day watching Cinderella, during the song that says, "Cinderelli Cinderelli night and day its Cinderelli" (THis is where the mice are singing etc.") My daughter starts to call Zeke "Monkatelli" MONK- A- Telli, I asked her what is that from, she answered, "the song on Cinderelli that goes, Cinderelli Cinderelli Monkatelli Cinderelli" So there you have it Monka telli was born, Now Monka telli has morphed in to just "MONK" and then "MONK MONK" and now "Tellamonkey" and finally "Monkey", last but not least and I hope this is the end of this but we have managed to morphe this name finally to just "Telly"

You may ask why all the nick names, but honestly it is probably not the nicknames themselves but rather how we pronounce the nicknames in stupid voices, High pitched baby voices that we would probably think are totally appropriate in the confines of our house, but I ask you, would you be caught dead singing that voice in public or around your peers? My wife will often say. "Matt sing the new song you made up for telly"! Are you kidding!!!

I never thought I would say this but I have fallen prey to the nicknames...

Naked

2008-10-13T05:23:00.000-07:00

Sin is alive and well, and before I begin I am not one of these guys that is all about sin and salvation for just a future place in Heaven, as if I have purchaced, (through Christ) my ticket to Heaven and now I am just waiting around to get the "prize". I believe that we are to some extent able to experience a little taste of heaven right now, as we grow in our sanctification as we struggle and wrestle with this relationship. I do however, think we are not takinig sin seriously enough in our christian culture today. It is almost as if we have begun on this new post modern quest for an old school "works based salvation", I mean it is like we are trying to pull Justification out of the Gospel. It is like we have forgotten why we primarily need Jesus. Why do we primarily need a savior? Well our culture would tell us that we need "Jesus" so we can be more like Him, or so we can learn to love like Him, Or be like Him, I mean what would Jesus do right? Or we need him to show us that we need to be taking care of the world. Now do not get me wrong, All those things are good but let me ask you, when can we really experience those things? Well in our present state, at least according to the Bible, we cannot do anything like Jesus due to a little thing we posess that separates us from God the Father, this is called SIN. This sin saparates us from a realtionship with God, in fact the Bible is pretty clear that we are not doing ok in our present state, but are in fact dead in our sin. Not flopping around reaching out for good, Not doing ok, and needing Jesus to make us better, but rather dead, (ROmans), SO how can we think that we primarily need Jesus to begin to do things that can only take place after we have been made right, How can we love like Jesus when we are dead, how can we learn to love like him when we are dead. How can we begin to be like Him when we are at war with His Father? This new thinking is becomoing very popular but if you look at the heart of it, this thinking is nothing more than a new and improved works based way to "find favor" with God. Our works are superseding our need for our relationship to be made right with God. Our works dictate our "primary " standing with God. I am all for learing to love more like Jesus, but lets face it, we are not Jesus, and any possible way that we are capable of being like Jesus is through His spirit, not our works, but his fruit. And that can only come after we have been made right by having Christ's work ont the cross claimed in our lives as being a sinner. Recognizing our need for a savior is crucial to the difference between Justification by grace through faith ALONE, or Sanctification by works, without Justification.

We are becoming experts at moving out from under the work of the cross ad resurrection, as soon as we stop living out from under the cross and ressurection, something will take its place, that something is us, our works our love, our wells dug in africa, our words, etc. These things in context of the process of sanctification are fine, but they are dirty rags in and of themselves.

What is our primary need for Jesus? Do not be so quickly fooled into thinking it is other things. There are many secondary reasons for Jesus, do not get me wrong, but if we get Justification wrong we are nothing more than a religion- Religion- What I do for God......

Adam was afraid because he was naked...... Stripped of His self worth because he had fallen short of the glory of God, separated from God due to his sin, not because he did not love like Jesus or God, not naked because he was not loving others the right way, but because of his sin, his choice to try to go up on God's level and be fulfilled with himself rather than God. The created trying to be fulfilled by the created, not the creator...

God must have taken sin seriously enough, if it was just a matter of learning to love better or be a better person, he would have told Adam to do just that, but He does not, he takes it so seriously, He promises to fix what we cannot fix, to give His son to fix our mess, He holds back man's rightfull curse and gives it to His son, (Gal. 3). If God takes sin seriously we need to get back to that. Deal with our sin and move on but don't right it off... Don't make light of it. We need Jesus desparately to forgive us of our sin, so we can move on and love like Him, learn about Him, love others, etc...

It has been a while

2008-10-06T06:33:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I have written, gosh, a year? Maybe more, it just goes to show how big the internet is if it can manage to afford to keep this blog on line and not mind that it is basically useless. I have been teaching this year at Heritage Christian again, (this by the way is the only job I have kept for more than two years) so I am excited. Maybe brealing the norm is on the horizon.

My parents are coming this week, this is always a treat, Just hanging out with them and learning fromt hem and enjoying them as they enjoy my kids. My Son Zeke is probably the newest edition to the mayhem at my house and although i have 3 kids, a son is much different then the girls. He has been sick and unlike the girls he needs extra care, he is so helpless and dependent when he is sick, My wife says that that is a "boy thing", She notes that when I am sick, I am helpless too. Our daughters on the other hand are much more independent.

What I have been finding out though is justhow much I love this little guy. I mean he is the cutest boy in the world. But really I have noticed that I am understanding more and more about how much God not only loves me but how much he loves His son Jesus. I would easily die for my son in a second, but your son? I don't think so, So I would die for my son in a second, but think of this, would I let my son die for one of my daughters? i do not know, But I do know this, I would nnot let my son die for you, no offense to all 3 of you who read this, but let's face it he is my son.

God let His only son die for me, not even Himself or He for His son, but He let His son die for me.... And it is not even like I appreciated it. I maybe could begin to think about letting my son die possibly for someone who appreciated it, But in reagrds to a generation that is perverse and rejecting of what I am considering to allow happen to my only son, no way.

I also know that God allowed His son to die for me when I did not even love Him. As I look down at Zeke and see him and wonder about the man he will become, I bet God was thinking about that in the garden so long ago. "What shall we do lest they become like US and eat of the tree of life and live forever", God has this talk with himself and decides that day to fix what we broke, what man and woman broke. As for me if I was Elohim I would have to pass, I would possibly destroy them and start over, But God promises the man while he is cursing the snake that he will send a "Seed" through the woman to fix what had been broken. That day God made a promise to break that sweet perfect relationship with Himself and allow his son to be killed, But the Son went willingly. He went willingly. I understand so much better now how much God loves me and His son, and my son as well.

Part of the plan

2008-01-17T04:40:00.000-08:00

I think we make this whole Gospel thing about us and not about who it really is about, Obviously God. I was reading the story in the Bible about when god gives Moses His Mission in Exodus about freeing His people, what kicked me in the butt, is that when god tells Moses what God is going to do it is different then what he asks Moses to be a part of, or should I say, Moses is only aloud to participate in half of it, the crappy half if you ask me.

God says He is going to do a two fold mission, 1. Rescue his people from Egypt and 2. Deliver them into the Promised land, two fold, two parts right? Well his mission to Moses is only to include Him in half of it, the resuing part, and why does God not allow Moses to experience the other half, the "promised land part", If you read ahead you find that Moses goes on to treat God's people badly, he gets mad at them for whining about no water again, he thinks his ministry is a failure, he thinks it is his ministry, He hits the rock, and does not speak to it like God says to, he is frustrated with God's people, He gets frustrated with God's Bride, What he thinks is a failure is not to God, it would seem like a failure to me I mean come on they wandered around for 40 years, so all those years ago. All those years ago God knew Moses would elimainate himself from the total missiion, God did not include Him, because God sees the future.

Moses made the mission about him and not about God..... the Mission is always about God, we are lucky to be a part of it, let's just not forget who is running the show............

New Baby

2008-01-08T08:24:00.000-08:00

Well my wife did it again, 3 for 3. Our newest Vander Wiele was born yesterday at 5.45pm, Ezekiel Alan Vander Wiele, 8 lbs. and 12 oz! he is a big boy but a little shorter than the girls. My wife is amazing. She was induced in the morning of January 7th and that evening had the little screaming boy.

Everytime I witness the birth of one of my kids, because (I mean come on what more am I than strictly a witness) I am amazed at how much my wife and by the way her body has to go through. As we walked laps yesterday to help the baby drop, I had the nerve to complain about being hungry, I told my wife I was so hungry that I understood how those starving little Ethiopian kids felt. She had not eaten since the night before. I went down to the diner for lunch yesterday and had pizza and a steak burger, when I got back to the room, I did not tell my wife that i had so much food, because when I came in she was enjoying a cup full of ice chips. I am such a jerk.

As I watch the baby deliver I am always amazed of creation and the miracle of this little thing who has been overtaking my wife's body and soul for so long. He is so dependent on her body and her soul. I mean if she doesn't care about him she will not take care of her body to help him grow, and then by the time he is born she loves him so much already.

I think that is how God feels about us, we are so dependent on Him, we are dependent on His body and His soul for our survival, we are like little parasites, but that seems to be ok with him. We need His soul to Pursue us through His spirit and we need His body to do the ultimate care for us. That little guy needs his mom so much right now, he is so dependent on her.

It is always easier for my wife to love the kids so much after they are born, she already has had that bond spiritually with them. For me it takes a little longer, I have to experience him. I am glad God loves me unconditionally.

We will now embark on the ever not fun baby stage as we call it, 2-3 months of hell on earth of late nights and feedings. It is a blessing.... I am ready, so I think

parent teacher conference

2007-11-01T07:05:00.000-07:00

I was nervous going into my first PTC as a parent and not as the teacher. I was nervous, I mean I know my girls are the smartest, prettiest, most well behaved girls in the world, so what did I have to be nervous about. As my wife Abby and I sat down with my daughter Molly's pre-school teacher Mrs. Boltz we began to discuss things like "wandering" and attention spans and developmental ability. All of the things the teacher said were good, only a few improvements. I know now how hard it must havebeen for my parents to sit year after year in my PTC meetings hearing how I needed improvement inthis or that area, like "Matt is a jokester, Matt is disruptive, Matt got caught cheating again, Matt was smuggling crack cocaine in again to class" you know the basic stuff.

I think what I realized today was very simple, the apples do not fall far from the tree. Molly is a product of two oldest children, enough said. My hands were a little sweaty, as we began to go through the report card, All was well, just a few improvements, no big deal, before we knew it we were out of the room and on our way. It was not so bad. I also realized that my kids are not perfect, at least most people have not realized it yet..

God'sWill

2007-10-30T09:18:00.000-07:00

Well for many of you it has seemed as if I have fallen off the face of the earth. I went to NY for the summer and then returned and have yet to update this thing called "blog". I have been spending a lot of time with my family and studying for my classes. I signed on to another year of teaching at Heritage Christian school again, I was asked back and that is always a good sign.

I have been teaching "God's Will" or better put the topic of God's Will in my classes. If you were to ask just about anyone what God's will is for their lives you may get answers like, : "It is God's will for me to glorify him, or Serve others, or minister to others, lead others to Him. All legitimate things. But a thread that i found that runs through all of their answers is that the question arises "how do you do that" I mean how do you glorify God as a 16 year old let alone a 31 year old, or how do you serve Him?

What if we were too concerned about a "specific will" for our lives from God and ignored all the general wills He gives for us as believers in His word. What if we focused more on the general wills for our lives as believers, (and by the way pick one to work on and it will take you all of your life) and not so much on the specific will for our individual life. It is interesting but the Bible does not lay out "specific" wills for our lives, I do not see my name in there, do you? What I do see is a plethora of wills that are general for all believers, you know the same for all, the same for everybody.

What if the general wills were "prerequisites" for the specific will, what if to find the specific will for your life you needed to take the prerequisites course work first. I mean it makes sense. how can you walk before you can crawl?

What if we put so much emphasis on "specifics" and no emphasis on generals that we made the specifics more difficult than they really were.

If my daughter and I went into a candy store and she said "dad can I have some candy?" what do you think I would say? She might say, "I do not know what I want, snickers or reeses?" I would say, "get whatever YOU want", What if God's specific will for was the accessibility to anything our hearts wanted if we took the general wills more seriously. I would not say, "Oh you want reeses? Here, here's a snickers, and your eating the wrapper too!? " No I would get her what she wanted, why would God give us a stone if we asked for a fish or some bread?

What if God's word is true when he says, seek my kingdom first and all the detailed specific stuff will be added to you! What if God was like, "I do not care which college you go to, " pick one, "which one do YOU like"? I mean if you have been seeking him through the general wills any way, would you not be in tune with him anyway?

What are these general will s anyway, well 1. God wills for all to believe and know the truth, we call that in our culture, "getting saved" (Timothy), interesting I wonder how fogged up God's will could be for us if we thought we knew him and we did not!, or 2. it is God's will that we are "living sacrifices",(romans) or 3. This is God's will you Sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality, (Thess)4. it is God's will to submit to authority(Peter), 5. It is God's will to be filled with the Holy Spirit! you get the point(eph)

What if God's specific will for our lives could be whatever we want if we take the prerequisites first, seeking his kingdom and obeying, then the detailed decision would be added to us. Now go decide!

Dead Stinks

2007-05-23T05:58:00.000-07:00

One of the only things about Indiana that I like in the area of travel is that there are still quite a few farm roads in which I can take as alternate routes to school in the morning. Some days I ride my motorcycle and other days just cruise in the car. I have yet to experience a full summer here and I have heard that it gets pretty hot. As you know Fishers Indiana is in the top 10 fastest growing cities in the country, which means, CONSTRUCTION everywhere. Homes going up like crazy. Track homes side by side by side. Woods and farmland being bought by the hundreds of acres and "developed".

Now as I said I have not experienced a summer here yet, but the other day I was driving and had my window down. I was experiencing the smells of summer. Cut grass, farm animals, flowers, and then it hit me like bat right in the sensory region. Dead Carcass.... You know that smell, it hits you and gets into your car and in your vents and on your skin.. I see up ahead in the road a dead animal. Now earlier that year I have noticed many raccoons right in this area, and everything is waking up from the winter and for whatever reason heads right for the road.

All that woods, nope heads for the road. So you know the scene, Bloated little animal on its back, little legs straight up, you know the whole nine, no literally nine yards of intestines strewn across the road, I could tell what the little guy had for dinner the night before, CORN? no I think Walnuts, is that some fruit. So I drive on and eventually the smell goes away. The next day I noticed something strange. As I approached the same spot, I saw the dead little raccoon who by now had bee flattened like a pancake and it was evident that he was dead, the funny part was there was another dead animal next to him. All that road to die on, and two animals in the same spot. As the smell permeated my car and vents and face I had my nose in my shirt like you did in 3rd grade when teasing someone that they smelled, I saw that it was a opossum. As I thought about what I saw I realized the opossum was more than likely drawn to the death. Dead Stinks but it attracts us. Things that kill us spiritually and physically attract us. Lust Anger Porn Gluttony Envy Hatred.

I heard a story once of a boy and His Father. They had some trouble with rats so the father and the boy set up the big rat trap in the barn. They waited all night. In the morning the boy told the father the trap had caught a rat. It had taken the bait and Whammy. The boy quickly started to reset the trap. The father spoke up, "Son you need to clean all the blood off of the trap, if the rat smells death it will not come for the bait, the trap has to be perfectly clean." As the boy cleaned the trap and reset it he said to his dad, "If only humans were that smart"...

Dead stinks, so why am I drawn to it. John tells us to take off those dirty clothes and put on Christ, I am big fan of hamper fashion. I go to the hamper and just wear dirty stuff. My wife says take it off it is dirty. I am so quick to put on that stinky dead stuff that only kills me in the end. I have many times been that opossum looking for pleasure in the Dead. For we are dead in Christ and have been raised with him. Dead stinks. I hope it does not kill me or trap me. I need to stay away from the road.......

Last Day of School

2007-05-22T05:30:00.001-07:00

I have had an opportunity to teach Bible again at one of the largest Christian schools in the country. Heritage Christian is your typical prep school that has all of the cool stuff. A million dollar football field, I mean the kind of field that the pros use, you know the rubber field that when you make the great Harrison catch near the out of bounds line you drag your foot to stay in side and the black beads fly up out of the rubber grass. Semi pro teams rent the field to play on it. Heritage is a classic Christian school that still has not separated the idea that just because it is a ministry to teach there, I mean isn't every place a ministry field?, they still pay pretty poorly. So I did not sign up for the money obviously. I signed up for the kids. These kids are rich too, well there parents are rich anyway. I pull into school in my 01 Jetta and these punk 9th grader are driving Lexus, and Rovers. You know the old song, Novas to Hondas to Lexus to Rovas', well these kids skipped the novas and Hondas part and went right to Rovers.

I am finding myself sad to see this class go. They are tenth graders, and I remember when I was in 10th grade, and I really did not care about how to do a geometry proof, let alone Bible class. It was social life and the "Ladies". As I have gotten to know all 150 of these sophomores I have realized that I am still a sophomore at heart. Those of you, you three, that read this and know me might even say that is pushing it. But aren't we all just sophomores who have for whatever reason decided to grow up by acting mature. Yet we all still laugh when someone farts. We would never claim to be sophomores anymore. Maybe we should claim to be sophomores again. Have we forgotten what it is like to have our hearts broken or to be rejected by that hot chick that you liked for so long, or raging hormones that almost seem uncontrollable? Am I really that different now? Or does culture tell me to be different? All grown up so to speak?

Obviously we need to be mature, but really what is the difference? I think I like these kids so much because they are real, or at least struggling to be real. Maybe they have experienced divorce or abuse or illness or death, these kids will be those same kids 15 years from now.

Do you ever see an older guy or girl and think about how they probably were as teenagers? You probably might not be that much off. I mean I am basically the same guy, just hopefully a little smarter, a lot more cynical, and a whole heck of a lot heavier(fatter that is). Most parents have forgotten what it was like to be 16. I pray I never forget what it was like to be 16. It is only high school right, Can I say that as a teacher? It is only high school...

So the year went on trying to get to know 150 kids every day, they learned my weird idiosyncrasies and I learned theirs. Now the year is over and I feel like I have just gotten to know them. They are moving on. My prayer for the year was to show them that Jesus loves them and that He wants to give them a life more abundant right now. There is so much pressure out there today pressure I did not have. I just found out one of my girls, 10th grade girls, was sexually harassed yesterday at the park trying to study with her friend for my freakin final, I mean come on the park? I guess he exposed himself to her. I was furious. I thought of my girls(wife and kids) and I realized how much I care again for these kids. I say this again because I have not taught in a school setting for many years, and being back I realized why did I leave?

Thank you Sophomores for your honesty, your emotions, your mood swings, your compassion, your teasing, your respect, your hope. Maybe that is why Jesus became so annoyed with the disciples when they told the children to stop coming and "bothering" him. I believe that it probably was the most relaxing time of the day for Jesus, maybe. He had a chance to let the politics go, to have a real conversation, an honest conversation, a transparent conversation. He got to be a sophomore again. He got to have a little fun. I have heard some teachers say the kids drive them crazy, I find them intoxicating, almost like it brings me back to what is real and important, so the question is when I leave the classroom and get in to the "real world", what is so real and genuine about being an adult?

Thanks Jerry

2007-05-15T11:35:00.000-07:00

I found out today that Founder of Liberty University Jerry Falwell died today at 73. I guess they found him at his desk. Maybe he died working or maybe praying. I remember the first time I met Jerry Falwell at the notorious Liberty University, (go flames) that I remember thinking this guy seems pretty cool. He always had time to talk to students as he walked around in his suit and tie. Interestingly enough he always thought the music and clothes we wore was ok and never had an issue with it. He was a traditionalist in every sense of the word but never a legalist. He had a funny habit of seeing you walking around campus as he was driving and he would swerve at you with his huge black SUV. I remember hearing him in chapel, He loved the Lord. He loved his family and He loved his school.

He has for obvious reasons not been very popular with people who are against what he stands for and I guess he has rubbed people the wrong way in "blurting out" what he thought. He was always judged for that, but always managed to apologize if needed. He was anice guy, a true evangelist in every sense of the world.

The years I spent at Liberty was in my opinion some of the best times in my life. I met my wife there and enjoyed school. I did not know the man well, but actions speak louder than words. He has done some great things and although he has messed up, like all of us by the way, I know there is a party going on in Heaven right now, and Our Lord has welcomed a hero of the faith home, home for good....

Thanks Mom

2007-05-14T06:13:00.000-07:00

I called my mom up yesterday to wish her "happy Mother's Day". her voice sounded so warm over the phone and excited to hear me. We moved away from "mom" almost two years ago, and one of the hardest things about moving 15 hours away is that not only can I not see her but my kids miss out on too. They miss their "Grammy". I guess it says alot about a mom whose kids think she is the best. We all want to be by her, even my wife wants to be by her, she is a great mother in law. I remember my mom and I not always getting along growing up, you know she would not always be happy with some of the choice girls I would bring home, the truth was it was me she had to worry about, not the girls. We budded heads some times, but the truth is I think that we are the most alike out of all of my siblings. I always wondered where I get my opinionated ability to tell it like it is, obviously the three of you that may read this blog know my dad and I surely did not get that trait from him. But when I called my mom yesterday for her special day, I am sure the highlight for her was not getting the "flower: at church that the elders pass out at church with that cheesy smile, I am sure the high light of her day was not even talking to me, but maybe it was just the high light of her life and her kids, and dad. All of my siblings have grown up well, married well and are now trying to raise kids like we were raised. My mom seemed tired on the phone, she sounded older, she is 54 now. I remember seeing pictures of my mom in the seventies and teasing dad saying, "wow, mom is a nice piece of.... slap, Dad would cuff me in the head and then laugh and say "you know it!!!"

Mom is older now, older from raising not only us four kids in which I gave her the most trouble, but older from investing in my kids lives as well. See my mom and dad too are not these kind of Grandparents that just expect my kids to come to them, they go to my kids. My mom has invested so much time into my kids.

Moving was hard, like I was whining about before. I miss those summer afternoons of sitting around the kitchen playing scrabble and drinking tea or coffee, you know whatever was our fancy that day. Running relay races in the yard, going skiing on Sunday, when all the "fundy's" judged us for having family time like that on Sunday, hiking etc.

Later in life we all got motorcycles, mom and dad got Harley's. I have a triumph, a rice burner so to speak. Some of my favorite times was when myself, mom and dad would go for those bike rides. We would cruise around upstate NY and stop after about 30 miles to get something to drink, Mom would always treat me to a YOO-HOO. We would sit and talk about life, about the kids. It was like for a small moment in time mom got to be more than a mom, I mean really what is more than a mom, what could possibly be more than a mom? Maybe being more than just a mom comes when you your kids become your friends, there is that transition, that cross over in which, that person who bore you, who changed you, who spanked you, who was wiling to have you hate them to make you better some day, to stick to their guns, can now experience the fruit of their labor for just a moment, maybe it is nothing more than a short talk on the picnic table with her son while we have some YOO-HOO, Maybe it is nothing more than a walk down to the river with the dogs, or maybe a game of Dutch Blitz, maybe painting together, or just a quick trip to Wal mart that always ended up with mom paying for lunch at McDonald's. Maybe being more than a mom is just that, I think there is one more thing that is more than being a mom and that is being a Grand-ma. Now all of those things I did with her, I get to watch my kids do that with her, but I see it from a different angle, I get to see it from the angle that she saw it with me so many years ago, I get to watch her be a mom again, but now I get to peak in, like a third party getting to experience bits of her being a mom to me through watching her with my kids. I guess maybe I am the one really being blessed, Thanks mom, I love you.. Hey mom do you want to play Scrabble?

Like Father Like Son

2007-05-02T06:02:00.000-07:00

I had the priveledge of teaching up at Word of Life this last weekend at the annual Father/Son Conference. I felt a little out of place when my friend called me and asked me if I would speak. I do not have a son, but I have a Father and I am a son, so I said yes. My friend Troy and I arrived in NY on Thursday night in Albany International Airpory and my friend Chad and my Dad met us there. I do not get to spend as much time with my dad as I would like, since I have moved away. He is the kind of guy that everyone wants to be around. Growing up my friends thought he was cooler than me. He had long hair, which eventually evolved into a mullit and than back in to one length, ( we have all been guilty of long hair short hair) But anyway he could barefoot ski, and rock climb and fix everything. As I thought about what I would say to this mish mash of evangelicals and one Catholic, I thought about God the Father and how His Son is just like Him, Like Father like son, right? I could see the relationship of my Dad and I and how I was very much like him. The way he laughs, his sense of humor, How he treats my mom (which is great), all of that. I was realizing that Jesus was very much like His Father. Everything that he said was a reiteration of something His Father said out of His word written by Him so long ago. Little things like when the devil was tempting Jesus and all the devil wanted was for Jesus to bow down and worship Him. Jesus knows that His Father taught Him that, "You shall worship and serve the Lord your God only." It is interesting to me that Jesus quotes it correctly, he does not leave out the serve part. The serve part is always left out today. We think that we can worship without service. The devil thought that if Jesus just gives him this "lip service" worship once and that is all than He can have all the kingdoms.

Jesus corrects Him with His Father's words and says basically that you think that you can have true worship without service but you cannot according to my dad. Like Father like Son. What if Jesus usurped God's word, what if he was not like his father, what if he left out the details and made the verse what he wanted. What would have happened I think, is that Jesus would have jumped off the temple during the other temptation and the angels would have caught him and he would have mande that graceful landing in the courtyard by the temple. I think that if he had done that they would have worshipped him and they would not have, (this is totally specualtion), crucified him. He would not have died, Satan would have one, just the same way he won with Adam. Like Father Like Son, Jesus knew His dad enough to know that His obedience was crucial to our salvation. What if Jesus had not known God's word well enough and when the devil said, "worship me" without service, Jesus would have just worshipped him? Jesus knew that true worship goes hand in hand with service, because that is what His Father said.

My knowledge of my dad is not as profound, but we both like to play jokes, but I will tell you this much, I remember the important stuff he taught me and when I choose to forget it, I am in a bad place. Like father like son. My dad, grandpa, and two brother in laws were at the meetings to support me, and I told endless stories of the lessons I had learned from my Dad. Like Father Like son. I am glad to be like my Dad...

all grown up....not really

2007-04-26T07:17:00.000-07:00

I am leaving on a jet plane tonight for NY, Schroon lake NY to be exact. This little town hidden in the Adirondack park in Upstate NY is the place where I called home for 30 years. Throughout those 30 years I have had some unimaginable fun, whether it be in the summer skiing or riding horses or saving two people from the river in which they capsized their small canoe. My friend and I heard someone yell, "Little help here!".

I also went to school there, middle school, highschoool and one year of Bible college at Word of Life. Now Word of Life for those of you that do not know could be characterized as a medium security prison at times mixed with some Military school tactics for good cheer. I was one of those local kids who at one point was called to the Dean's office and honestly did not know if it was for, having physical contact with my girlfriend, going to movies, going to high school dances or other things. The Irony of it now is that recently I was asked by one of my friends, who is now the Dean of Admissions, to speak at the annual Father Son Banquet. It is so interesting becasue I am going back there, that place where one could recieve "demerits" for walking on the grass, so to speak.

I wonder what it will be like, my friend already told me that the numbers seemed low due to the weather. I emailed him and said, "maybe they are low due to who you have chosen to speak."

I am a little nervous about going back, I am much different now. I would not say for the better, but maybe not the worst either, just different. Everyone has a philosophy, and what I like about that word is people say it like it is this "absolute", like one might say "well our philosophies are just different, we do not allow long hair at our college, it is just our philosophy". The funny thing is a "philosophy" is just an opinion, but that word sounds a lot more "absolute" or mystical or spiritual.

My philosophy is much different than the folks I will be coming into contact with this week. I am not even sure what the dress code is yet! I brought a sport coat to be safe. The last time I was on this property My friend Bumper and I worked there. He was the camp's assistant director and I was just a life guard. Some of the fun we had I will save myself the embarrassment of letting all the viewers here of it, but it is amazing to say that least that after all these years and schooling, for some reason I am qualified now to "educate" these fine men and their sons.

We will see. My dad is going with me, and it is funny but I am the speaker and he is my dad. It seems like it should be the other way around. I am going to be 31 soon and it seems like yesterday I was at Word of Life running from the security or dressing up like snowcampers and raising hell on the staff. With our full face snow masks we attacked people, launched snowballs and through people in the snow. The word was out for the "tall campers who were causing trouble". No one could see their faces, no one knew it was us. As I sat in the counsellor meeting and heard what we needed to look for to stop this attack I laughed to myself thinking about when we would strike next.

I am speaking on the issue of "Like Father, Like Son" . I will try to integrate the idea that although our culture paints God the Father as this "town sheriff" in the OT who judges and condemns and His Son comes later and balances things out with his love. I want to point out 2 names for God in Genesis, Elohim and Yahweh. Elohim is this strong creator in Gen 1 and he is all-powerful, but then in Gen 2, we see a new name for God "LORD God"- Yahweh, A God who is faithful, a God who comes to Adam and Eve on there level, "Walking in the cool of the day" He could have pulled an "Elohim" on them, you know like, "Oh , You want to disobey me? Zap you are gone man, Oh I see you hiding over there, zap, now where are your legs?, Oh they are just bloody stumps, etc." But he doen't do that he wants to be known to them as Yahweh, A God who is faithful. We see this when he sends Moses to Pharoah, He does not want to be known as El ohim, that is already how the Jewish people view Pharoah, see El was not a knew name for God it had been around a long time and meant other Gods too. I wonder what kind of Dad I am, Am I an Elohim Dad or a Yahweh Dad? As I prepare to leave today I hope that maybe God will use me. I have been humbled alot in the last 10 years since I stepped foot on that campus. We will see, and hey it is not like they have to ask me back next year..........

Married Life

2007-04-24T05:57:00.000-07:00

My wife and I recently celebrated our 8 year wedding anniversary. I could not believe it has been eight years. For fun we went to the Cheese Cake Factory and then to see the notorious Blades of Glory with Will Ferell. I am not sure how to spell his name. Anyway when we got home we got out the big box of college pictures. it was so funny to see our lives as we were so young and carefree, no responsibilities except whether or not we would go to our classes the next day or sleep in and what party to attend on the weekend. It was a hard life. We laughed as we stumbled upon some pics of an "eighties party" that we had and all the funny outfits and dancing to Depeche Mode and Def Leopard, (if you can dance to that). We laughed as we saw old friends and how young and skinny I looked.

I found some pictures of Abby and I when we were dating and how innocent she was, (now totally corrupted by me) and how easy things were. I realized again how college is just not real life at all. It is this serene adaptation in which everything is almost as close to perfect as it can get. People have not really known each other long enough to know their secrets, to know what their addictions are and struggles. You can almost mask them the entire 4 years and know one will really know. John Mayer says that dating and college is like an "A" movie. You show all your "A" movies first to people. Like maybe the first Die Hard, or Titanic, or Raiders of the Lost Ark, but sadly given enough time some of those B movies will come out. For instance given eonough time a "Police Academy 7 will slip out". Real life I think is what my wife and I experienced while we looked at those pics. We have been through a lot in those 8 years. She has found out alot about me, how selfish I am, How I have a very addictive personality, how I have a temper, how mean and selfish I can be. I have found out alot about her like how strong she is having lost her mom to a drunk driver when she was 11 and how she has dealt with that. At first I thought I wish that she had never found those things out about me, and that it could be like college and fun and utopian. But then I realized that is the fake aspect of life, and it is not real life at all. Real life is struggle, relationship, true relationship is work. It only happens when all the cards are on the table, and even though all through college I may have appeared to have a full house, all I really had was a 2/9 off suit, or if I was lucky "a pair of twos".

Real life is having kids and being able to not lose my temper with them when they are doing what it is that kids do. Relationship is loving my wife as Christ loves the church and trying to make a covenant with my eyes every day. Married life has really been an eye opener for me. After 8 years I realized that for one I have not been married that long comparitively speaking to that of my grandparents who have 55 years under their belt. But I have learned that real life is not college. Married life as Paul says is the mystery of Jesus and the church. That tension, that struggle, that love, that committment, that self-lessness, that sacrifice, that daily sacrifice. As my wife and I looked through pictures we laughed and we cried. In a sense we missed the old times, but not as much as we love the new times..

the weekend

2007-04-20T04:37:00.000-07:00

I always feel good when it is friday, I think maybe it is because I am able to get out of my routine. I do not have to follow the guidelines, I can assume to be surprised, I can assume to not have any plans. Now of course my wife always has plans for me on the weekend, but for the most part I do not have plans except to spend time with the kids and work on stuff. I have that option to accidentally fall asleep in the chair, or accidentally fall asleep on the couch, or accidentally fall asleep out in the grass, or shower, or just some random place on the ground, but seriously I often wonder if this was what the Garden of Eden was like all the time, (not random nap places) I mean yeah there was some work to do like naming the animals, but schedule? it seems as if before there was sin there was not routine. I am sure to some extent there was but maybe a schedule that was much more similar to that of a weekend schedule. Now this is clearly speculation but Adam's work that he did in the garden was "good" according to God so I would assume that it was the kind of work that one would like or love. In our world today very few people love their job, they therefore work for the weekend, as Mr. Lewis and the News said it best. Is it possible that if you love your job, which few people seem to do, then maybe we share that kind of "good" work that maybe Adam did? Tainted with sin in a fallen world granted, but I think that if you are satisfied with work as much as you or I look forward to the weekend, Monday does not seem so bad, It could in fact be good?

Passover

2007-04-16T11:26:00.000-07:00

I am in the midst of teaching the Passover from a Jewish perspective in my 10th grade Bible class. As I taught the same thing over and over all day long I was pleasantly surprised by new things that the Lord brought to my mind as i read and studied. Jesus said to His disciples, " I have fervent desire to eat this last meal with you." That is pretty strong Greek. The more I thought about it, the more I could not let the idea go that there is/was a pretty high, positive attitude from our Lord as He prepared for the Passover knowing that He would die the next day, yet He remained in good spirits. The event of the Passover can really be broken down into two things: The event and the remembrance (meal). As we know the event is the time in history when The LORD had promised that the death angel would come and kill all the first born kids, despite race, and the only way to live was to make sure that you have the blood of the lamb on the door, I mean death really surrounded this whole plague, Death, for the wages of sin is death. Then comes the celebration, the feast of Unleavened bread, the celebration in which much of the emphasis if not all is put on the fact that the Jews first Born got a "get out of dead" free card, but than I took a closer look, they really did not get out of death, they just got it prolonged, a prolonged death, a prolonged physical death. This celebration is in the midst of an event in which its emphasis is on a prolonged death and physical freedom from death, but physical freedom is not enough, in fact wasn't physical death a blessing to Adam, "What shall we do lest they eat from the tree of life and live forever?" God banished Adam and Eve so they could die, if they lived forever we would not be here. So Jesus institutes something special in the heart of the Feast of Unleavened Bread that He is so excited to share with his friends. So many years earlier when Adam and Eve sinned they should have been cursed, instead they were judged, the cursing went to the serpent and the ground, man's curse, well let's just say God has been holding onto it for a long time. Jesus is fervently desiring to eat this meal with the disciples because He is about to take something that is saturated in death and physical freedom only and turn it into life and spiritual freedom, a Passover like none other. He then makes a promise, "I will not drink of the vine again until we are in my father's house. See next year Passover will be celebrated and the year after and the year after, just like it always had. But that passover was different, there will not be one like it until we are with Jesus in Heaven, he is not eating it until he comes to get his bride. The groom goes to prepare a place for his bride but he is not at his dad's house eating the wedding cake, He will eat that later after he comes to get her, his bride, us. God has been holding onto that curse for a long time, Jesus is fervent with desire to eat this with his friends because he is bringing death to life. The event of the Passover is followed by the remembrance of the Passover feast, incorporated in that is the event of Christ's death burial and resurrection, the real remembrance of that will be, not when we take communion again, but when we have that feast again at the marriage supper of the lamb. God has been holding that curse for a long time, he is going to give it to someone finally on good Friday, he should have given it to Adam, he should have given it to me, but he held it and blessed me with death so to speak, a physical death, so that I can have spiritual life in him. Adam fell to the sin of pride, he died, Jesus was tempted on top of the temple by the devil, "jump off the temple, let them see that you are God" What if he had done this? What if they had seen him descend and angels carry him to the ground, I believe they would have called him Lord and you know what? I believe that they would not have crucified him, Satan would have won. Jesus beat the devil in the desert.

Jesus was pumped to eat this meal for the first time with his disciples, because it would not be the last time that they did this, in fact, it is not the beginning of the end, but rather the beginning of the beginning of the beginning. Jesus was pumped to eat this with his friends because he knew He had made it, he made it to the end, He made it the point in which he would in hours beat death, He made it further than Adam, He made it further than me. He offers more than a supper representative of prolonged physical death, he does not represent anything, He is.