Angry

I found the letter below (in red) on a Christian Ministry site, I won't say where, and had to post it. I might also ad that I threw up a little in my mouth as I did so. When I read this type of garbage, I'm wondering, as always, what eighty per cent of the world is thinking when they can barely survive. I'm also wondering why everyone looks so plastic and shiny with their expensive clothes and shiny cars on these "get rich" and "have faith" Christian web sites, when the goal, as stated below, is "distribution".

I guess what they mean by distribution is a consumptive, pietous approach that allows a certain group of Christians to stuff themselves with food to the point of bursting while condemning those who would dare have a drink of wine. These same Christians will get in their seventy thousand dollar vehicle, drive home after a night of feasting and "prayer" to their mansion, and look you straight in the eye when they talk about holiness.

Meanwhile, four or out of five people in this world can barely survive the day. I guess their 'faith' isn't very strong, is it? It must be their heathen ways. If only they would adopt the motto "I Am Rich". Maybe that's the answer.

And for once, could the people in North America and the West kindly shut up!!

WE ARE RICH!!!!!!!!




Dear Congregation,

It is wonderful to be back with our congregation! Pastor Terri and I had a welcome break and we thank you again for allowing us to rest. We've had some great speakers and I know you were blessed. And now, we are ready to jump into our new series, The Blessing of the Lord Maketh Rich. We've begun to study about what it means to be a "rich Christian."

We've discovered there are several things that have been holding some of us back: A lack of understanding and right teaching of biblical wealth, religious thinking, and the curse of poverty. But I would like to encourage you to dare to say "I Am Rich!" Remember, "Rich" and "Wealth" are not bad words—they are Bible words. It is as much God's will for you to be wealthy as it is for you to be healthy. He wants us to live beyond a "paycheck to paycheck," barely surviving lifestyle. He wants us to live life with the Blessing of Covenant Wealth on us.

Our motivation for accumulation is distribution. Be sure to be here every service as we continue to study about the blessing; how to receive wealth, how to conduct ourselves around it, and how to properly handle it.

Wealth is a blessing,



How this type of thinking must break God's heart. This letter, this understanding that blessing from God means being exceptionally wealthy, and yes, if you have a car and a home, you are exceptionally wealthy (you are in fact, in the top 5% of all the world in terms of personal wealth.) is a cancer in our society and a cancer in the church.

If you can not see why this letter is so wrong, if you can not see the faces of those who have so little, and if you can not see how much we truly are blessed with, than I can only encourage you to open your eyes. Kingdom living is about life, not luxury. Have we forgotten about Jesus, our (purported) Savior? What did he own? Looks to me like we have. How sad...

-Steve

Can I get a Spot, Man?

The smell of sweat and cologne permeated the air as I headed to the fountain for a drink between sets. It was relatively quiet, but in less than an hour the gym would be packed with people (mostly women) running on the endless rows of treadmills and machines, and the free weight section filled with guys grunting and shrugging and laughing and watching. Always watching. Looking for the women. Looking to see who was bigger. Looking to see if they were bigger. In fact, the only people who didn’t watch were the ones being watched: the guys who were really big, and the women who topped out on the ‘hot’ meter.

I headed back to my bench and did a quick second set. I added more weight and did some quick crunches.

I usually tried to avoid the rush, although some days it was fascinating to watch the watchers. Today I was working on my chest however, and the competition for the three benches was always tight during the rush hour. So I’d come early. Only now I had a problem.

I looked at the weight on the bar and started scoping who was there, only I wasn’t looking at the girls. If you wanted to push yourself in the weight room, you needed a spotter for the heavy weights. I wasn’t huge, by any measure, but the weight on the bar was enough that I needed a big guy to help me. The only problem was that there was only one guy big enough to help and he WAS huge. And mean looking. For a second my mind drifted back to when I was a kid. Back then I was a skinny thing, and my favourite thing to do, aside from sports, happened every day after school…

“Hey, Dave! Ready!” I said, eager to start.

“Yup.”

“On your mark, get set, go!”

I took off from the line, running as fast as I could. Dave started better than I did, but I caught him at the seventy metre mark and than passed him. I beat him by five yards.

“Let’s go again!”

“Steve, man, I’m pooped. We ran ten of them. I’m going home.”

My blond friend popped me a quick high five and I stood at the start line, listening to the sounds of some of the older kids playing basketball on the court behind the school. Well, I’ll run a couple more myself, I thought.

I ran two more sprints and finally called it a day. Mom would be waiting. I walked to the store next to the school to pick up a Mr. Freeze. On the way back I noticed two squirrels chasing each other, and I watched them for a while until the brown one finally got away. I’d always liked team sports, but there was a part of me that never minded spending time alone. I especially liked running. It was fun for one thing, and you never needed to ask anyone for help either. Everybody knew how to run. I liked the team sports though. All you had to do was what the coaches told you to do, and for me at least, all the sports stuff seemed pretty easy.

“Hey, mom!” I yelled as I banged into the house. I gave her a kiss and headed to my room.

“What you do today?” She asked when I came back into the kitchen.

“Ran sprints with Dave. Brandon couldn’t make it. Won seven of the ten races.”

She smiled.

“I’m glad you think running is fun.”

“Mom, running’s easy! Nobody tells you anything and you can do it all by yourself. Of course it’s fun!”

I smiled at the recollection, as I thought back to the arduous five kilometres I’d ran the day before. Yeah, running is a real joy. I stretched my arms and looked to see if anyone else had come in the gym who could give me a spot. Nope.

I stood and slowly headed over to the shoulder press. Most people didn’t realize it, but there was a hierarchy in the weight room. When I’d first started lifting seventeen years ago, I’d learned to be deferential around the guys pulling the most weight. And while it was true that some guys ignored the hierarchy of respect, most of us looked at them like they were idiots and intruders anyway.

The big guy had just finishing putting 250lbs over his head on the shoulder press. Man, he just looks mean, I thought.

“Hey, man, can I get spot?”

“What?”

He pulled the earphones from his ears.

“Can I get a spot?”

“Sure.”

He followed me over to the bench.

“How many do you want?”

“Four or five, but I die pretty quick.”

It was the reason I needed such a strong guy for a spot. My muscles tended to seize and collapse quickly.

I pushed the weight up, and he kept his hands just below the bar, encouraging me. I got to five, was about to die when he took the bar and easily lifted it into the rack.

“Thanks.”

He smiled and went back to the other side of the gym. I wasn’t sure why I’d made such a big deal of the whole thing. I shook my head and removed twenty pounds from the bar. I hadn’t thought of it before, but in thinking about my younger years, I realized that I wasn’t really great about asking for help or how difficult that could be.

After a couple of minutes I laid back down to do another set. I lifted the bar off the rack, and suddenly the big guy was looming over me, his hands beneath the bar.

“C’mon, pal. You can do it.”

With his help I managed to squeeze out an extra couple of reps.

“That was great, thanks.”

He nodded and left. I sat there for a while and as I finished my workout, I couldn’t help but think I complicated I made things sometimes. And how I judged people simply because I refused to connect with them. Here I’d been afraid to approach someone because of my perception – he was mean looking – and yet he’d turned out to be both encouraging and helpful. It also struck me that asking for help, as difficult as it could be, could be pretty liberating.
I finally finished my workout. On the way out, I noticed the big guy headed to the fountain. I stopped and introduced myself.

“I’m Steve, thanks for the spot.”

“Junior. No problem, bro.”

I was still smiling when I got to my car. Yeah, I thought. No problem at all.

-Steve

I'll Speak Anyway

Fellow writer and thinker Mark Groleau wrote a terrific article this past week on loving without an agenda or a watch, called Blackberry Jesus. This Spoken Verse is a tribute to the first anecdote of his article, Christians who leave pamphlets indicating they want to get to know you, who want to help, and what happens when you realize that they're lying. What they really want, is to expound on their agenda...

(This is Spoken Verse, intended to be read in the same manner as The Woman at the Well video on the side of my blog)

I'll Speak Anyway

I know you can't hear me but I have to tell this story. I'll speak loudly if not surely, and if you still hate me don't worry...

I'll speak anyway.

A while ago some neighbours moved in, they left a pamphlet in my mailbox about helping and doing what they could what they can,
they made an impression so I called but I wasn't impressive to them,
I was less than they had thought.
I wasn't enough, my habits weren't right and my beliefs needed correction
So they didn't want to help unless they could change me, but what I needed was connection
I realized then that they were looking for a sale. A garage sale or flea market or boxing day special with no returns, or reviews or information
The topic was important my salvation or so they said,
I gave them my book, but they never read ...or discussed or conversed
or hoped or loved, well if it was love it was perverse
And by perverse I don't mean sexual, I mean twisted warped bitter they had an end in mind, that's my end not theirs, they didn't even know that I was there
So what began so hopefully is just another day in the market. I'm a customer, consumer, shopper, a patron. If Wal-Mart calls with a Jesus sale I may listen, they know I'm their target.
My friends tell me I'm crazy to even think like this, think like what?
like there's hope, like the world isn't an abyss.
But it is, or so I say, and I say it with a sneer, it's not cool to hope too long for anything but bliss, that's anywhere but here.

I'll speak anyway.

The truth is I don't trust you anymore, You sell Jesus like He's made you better somehow, you belong to this club and now Jesus loves you more because you're in and I'm out
but why does that matter if I don't want in, if I don't think your product is right or the price is wrong or is it just wrong to have a price
The pamphlet looks thoughtful. It makes your shadow seem gentle, like your reflection is truer than you, truer how, truer as if now you can say that you offered
but if I called you late or called you wrong, if I wouldn't sing your song than what? Can I get through to you or am I through to you, now that you know I don't want you. I may need you, that's true, but you're not ready to give me you. And until you do, I'm not interested.

I'll speak anyway.

So keep your pamphlet. Keep your nice words and phony phrases, I know why you called. Called me yes you did though you didn't listen or read what I read.
So I know about you, but you're a fake you see. At least to me that's what it is when you sell Jesus on the corner like you're handing out fizz.
One last time please listen, I'll tell you who I am. I'm your neighbour. I'm not rich I'm not white I'm not black I'm not thin. I wait at the bus stop every morning for my ride to work. You've seen me there when you drive past, or didn't you know, you're in a hurry, you have to get ahead to be first, don't worry I'll be last. I've made some choices I regret,
not the choosing because without choice it isn't really me, is it? And yet,
I know there's something more... much more I believe it, no matter how many sales I find I hope you meet me there and if you're still not listening

I'll speak anyway.

The Pursuit of HappYness and the Reason Dreams Die

It’s happened more than once. I’m sitting at a café or restaurant, and the people at the table next to me start complaining. Sometimes it’s little things, their marriage or their family, little squabbles spoken with a smile and a laugh. Often times, however, it isn’t small. The laughter is there, but it’s forced, the smiles a weak attempt to cover their pain. It happens so often that there are days I become angry at the conversation, at all the complaining and arguing over subjects that seem to have little to do with their pain. People are not helping the poor like they should. Global warming is not being taken seriously. Government is not doing enough to help single mothers. It shouldn’t be like this, I think. People should be more thankful about what they’ve been given and stop arguing and complaining so much. That’s when I realize that I’m sitting at the table. That I’m the one complaining.

When I was a kid, I dreamed about making a difference when I was older. I dreamed about being someone who helped make the lives around me better. I wasn’t sure exactly how I would do that, but what I knew is that my life would matter. That I would matter. It was evident to me, even as a kid, that our world was in big trouble. Not, as many people reasoned, because governments were corrupt or because democracy was broken or because there were too many lazy people. Mostly it seemed to me, because there were too many people working very hard for very little, and too many people working very hard for everything else.

I could say all I want about the family next door with three cars and the nice home, but even as a kid I saw my friend’s dad coming home late, working extra hours at the office to afford such a rich lifestyle. I had friends who rarely saw their parents because they were always working. The question wasn’t laziness, it was something else entirely. But until we address it for what it really is, it’s time to stop mocking people who make money. It won’t win our world back. And it won’t bring the Kingdom to those who need it.

“It’s too much. The money should go somewhere else!” I said, unable to hold back the big sigh from escaping my lips. I was tired of the Benny Hinn’s of the world collecting millions of dollars without being accountable. Had we become so entranced by Western living that we’d completely forgotten the poor? Just thinking about it gave me a headache.

Jenny frowned and then smiled at me.

“I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.”

I nodded and gave her a hug goodbye. We’d been arguing for an hour. I strolled back towards the café, the sun warm on my back. Summer had arrived, but this year it’d been unusually mild for Ottawa, and I lingered in the parking lot, wandering to the edge of the lot among the trees. How could we do that? How could we be so greedy and still call ourselves Christians? It was all I could do to get my head out of my argument. When I finally strolled back inside, I was too tired to write. I’d used all my creative juice in my argument. I wandered around the bookstore for a while, picking through magazines and assorted books off the shelf. Summer was a quiet time for me, and even this year, transition that it was, it afforded a great deal of time towards writing and reading. I’d scheduled myself to finish an article today, but I didn’t have anything left. Instead, I took my coffee and bag and headed back out to my car. Maybe if I went to the gym for awhile I’d find some more energy.

Two hours and a good workout later, I was still in no position to write. No position to pursue my dream. The lack of production was discouraging. As long as I could remember I’d wanted to be writer. I’d taken a job with the school board specifically so that I could write during the night and summers when school wasn’t in session. And yet, the day had passed and I’d spent all my energy arguing with a friend.

On the way home I'd stopped at the corner store and rented the Pursuit of Happyness with Will Smith. I'd seen it before, but watching again how this man pursued after his dreams only reminded me of how easy it was to forget what life was about. It was hard not to admire a man who'd gone through so much to become successful. There was a certain sadness however, as I watched the film. Happiness was indeed something worthy of our pursuit, but what did happiness mean? Who defined it? Was it a million dollars? Was it providing for our family? Or was it something more? So many people had pursued their dreams, worked very hard to become successful. Large houses. Lots of money. But what if we were buying into the wrong kind of dream? What if God wanted to give us even more, by showing us how to give it all away?
Either way, arguing was simply not the answer. We spent far too much time wasting our energy on argument instead of action, a laity of lawyers who did not realize what they were doing.
When I’d first started writing at a nearby Starbucks, long before it became my home base, I hated the coffee. It was too strong. Too expensive. Too… everything. It took me six months to get used to it, but when I did, I found I couldn’t go back to the mild, cheaper Tim Horton’s of my youth. And when people asked me about it, I knew I couldn’t explain it. I didn’t try. I would smile at whatever they said, even when some of my old hometown friends ribbed me about being a snob, and shrug my shoulders. I preferred Starbucks, or equally good coffee. Even if I had to pay extra for it. I didn’t bother arguing because there was nothing to say. And yet, I know many people, including my dad, who have switched to Starbucks. It wasn't my logic that changed his mind, but my passion.

I thought about my discussion with my friend earlier that day. Although I’d argued eloquently, or so I imagined, it hadn’t changed a thing. And yet, for the rest of the day I was useless. Jesus taught his disciples to pray “give us this day our daily bread.” Our daily bread. Although He was talking about how God provided for our daily needs, I wondered if God wasn’t also talking about our daily limits. In the West, because of the Greek-Roman influence, we often equated talking with doing. Or perhaps it was human nature. To talk about something was to do it.
Maybe the issue wasn’t that we working hard enough, or that we didn’t care. Maybe we were simply talking too much. Maybe we let our dreams die because we spent all of our time talking about them instead of acting on them. We had a million reasons not to act on our dreams. It wasn’t practical. It wasn’t the right time. It didn’t fit our schedule. But none of those reasons gave us any satisfaction. What they did was leave us sitting around the table, arguing instead of acting. Telling stories about what should be instead of living the life God called us to live.
I believe that inside of every one of us burns a lingering fire, a hunger for the life that we were called to, the one that says work hard, work to be happy, but work for the better of those around you.

More and more I am convinced the West is not rich because it is lazy and lucky, but that it is rich because it works for the wrong things. I am equally convinced that the scourge of loneliness and depression, among other things, is a direct result of our misunderstanding of what we should be working for. God has called us to something better. Something more.

I pray this week that God may reveal all that He has planned for us. That He will show us just how much we can make a difference, not in words, but in action. And that in doing so, we will achieve the fullness of life He so desperately longs for His children.

-Steve