the Steadwich

This quarter is off to a great start. Great meetings with mentors, great INN stuff is moving forward, all is well, and things with Sarah are great. The only thing I’m wishing for right now is that I was in Genesis and less behind in general. That’s not too big of a wish though, because God is showing me some great stuff here in John that has been incredible.

In the ten chapters I’ve read of John so far, I’ve been blown away. Firstly, by how different this gospel is in style than the others, and secondly, how some of the events just have a radically different perspective. There’s also more of an overall spiritual feel to it. Well, they all have that, but maybe more of it in John is sticking out to me.

I had a few verses that I wanted to write about, but the section that grabbed me and wouldn’t let me put it down is this: John 6:66-69:

From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him. “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve. Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”

This section says a lot. Immediately before this, the disciples are grumbling about how hard Jesus’ teachings are. It seems to be a “when the going gets tough situation”, and a lot of the disciples decide to not follow on account of these “offensive” teachings.

What about us? When Jesus actually challenges us, do we stay and listen, or take offense and run away? If we’re sitting in church and something offends us, do we pack our bags and leave that church? In our culture today, we seem to be offense-adverse. I know, that sounds obvious, who likes to be offended, right? No one. But I have to admit that I would like a little more offense in my life. I’d like more people to teach, guide, and correct me. I’m surrounded by lots of people who have plenty of advice to give, and life guidance who are much wiser than I am in many places (many, many people!). In many cases, I wonder if someone isn’t commenting on what I’ve done or what I believe because they’re afraid to offend.

Of course, if I get my wish here and people start commenting on everything I say, do, or believe, I may be more careful with what I wish for in the future

I’m part of it though too. Even at things like church or the INN, a few words that might be offensive to others make me cringe. I start thinking who might be offended, who won’t ever come back, or who’s going to walk away with some skewed version of who we are. While it’s probably good to be a little mindful of these things, I probably need to chill out and trust that the Holy Spirit is doing something in listener’s hearts that I can’t see and don’t understand.

I find the second part of this verse even more profound than the first. Disciples are leaving, and Jesus asks the rest of them if they’re going to leave too. Peter’s response only adds to how much I already like Peter. Peter asks where else they would go, acknowledging that Jesus has the words of eternal life and is the Holy One of God.

It strikes me that Peter is someone who has looked other places for the hope and life he had found in Christ. He knows what else and who else is out there, and is putting his faith in Jesus. In the same way, I know what else is out there too. I’ve walked away from my faith before and filled my life with other things, only to discover that they don’t satisfy. Only a relationship with God through Jesus Christ has ever allowed me to live life to the fullest.

As we minister to students on campus, do we believe that there is no other place to go for the life that we’ve found in Christ? In a world that pulls students to place their time in a thousand different activities on campus and a culture that tells us to forget our faith, learning to articulate the unique relationship with and life that comes from following Christ is of huge importance, and unavailable elsewhere.

There’s so much more to be said and thought of about Peter’s response. I’ll be talking about this verse with people for a while! What do you think?

Back at it! Whatcom Community College started classes yesterday, and Western Washington University starts classes today! I’m starting classes again today as well!

I didn’t make as much progress through the four Gospels as I hoped I would during fall quarter. Or maybe I made just as much progress as I hoped. I didn’t meet my schedule by about 25%. But I also took it slow through some sections to examine more, think more and blog better. With that in mind, I don’t really view my slowness as a failure. Although, perhaps 15% of my slowness could be attributed to regular laziness/needing a mid-quarter break, which is a pattern that I saw in myself during my regular academic career. In that case, I suppose I could add the two, and claim that the Stead Halstead School of Biblical Literacy is 90% doable. That sounds pretty good.

Anyway, digging into John today, the very first chapter struck me as amazing and hope inspiring. Specifically two sections stood out to me.

In John 1:5, it says, “The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.” This little verse captures what I have felt like recently in trying to understand how to effectively share my faith with the people around me, but INN folks and friends not connected with the INN. To say that God is doing a lot in my life right now would be too small of a statement. Things are great right now. I’m learning new things, seeing new things, and discovering new things as I continue as part of the staff at the INN. I have an amazing house. Great roommate(s). A nice lady friend. All those things are great.

And in the midst of that, as I sit on campus this morning, I’m watching people walk by in the commons. What does it mean for Christ to be shining in the darkness? As for the darkness on campus not understanding it, I understand that.

There are a lot of people on this campus that Jesus shines through. I’ve seen people serving others this morning, friends opening the doors for each other, great conversations happening, and more. INN students keep walking up to my table on their way to classes and meetings, and we both get excited about sharing about our time over Christmas break. I’m sure that Jesus shines in the small things.

And that’s what the darkness doesn’t understand. In a world that’s all about making sure that I’m alright, and I’m well taken care of, and I’m getting what I deserve, how can someone understand a selfless act of service? How can it be looked at as anything but totally foolish and throwing life away?

In verse 9, it says, “The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world”. What a great hope! Sure, the darkness doesn’t understand the light, but Christ has come to be the light! Not only that, but to every man.

This is exciting, on so many levels. This is a great message of hope.

On this note, I’m excited to dig into this quarter. I’m excited to see what other things John holds, as well as to dig into the Old Testament and see what I’ve been missing. Thanks for sticking around!

I’ve felt like I’m falling behind recently. Part of that I think is that this chapter should have been blogged on two weeks ago. Lots of things have changed recently, though. Probably the largest change has been that my position at the INN has become full time. The way this came about was incredible timing and more was going on behind the scenes that I will probably never know about, but I am thankful to be able to give more of myself to this place more consistently.

What then of the Stead Halstead School of Biblical Literacy? Originally designed as a proactive use of my part-time status and a orderly way to fill my hunger for scripture that has been developing over the last few years, being full time would seem to get in the way. Not so though! My additional 20 hours a week are funded by the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust, granting me title of “Second Year Intern”. One piece of the Trust’s desire for the interns that it supports is that they would be going through some sort of training program. The “Bible School” fits exactly that. Perhaps that’s why I had to put this thing together all along. God knew.

I’m still working out the details on how the school fits into the weekly INN schedule, especially since my primary study time used to be during staff meetings, which I now attend. This has caused the small delay and various hiccups in my planning, but I’m getting back on it. Digging into Luke today, I found myself reading and reading, and without even thinking about it, shooting straight past my target reading. I’m fine with that, but I was excited by how quickly the time passed, and how consumed I was by the reading. I had to get up and go though, only because it was time to be back at FPC getting ready for the INN tonight.

In particular, Luke 3:7-16 jumped out at me. People are gathered to be baptized by John the baptist. What seems like out of no where, John starts laying into those gathered, with insults about being a brood of vipers, their lineage, and that trees not bearing fruit would be cut down. Yikes! Tough words to swallow.

John doesn’t turn away after this verbal lashing though and leave the people to do whatever they wanted to do. If it were me dispensing the harsh words (from God, even), I think I’d want to get them off my chest and get out of town.

God has a different way though, and one I should take a lesson from. After John has said what he has to say, the people ask him, “What then should we do?”, and John answers. In so many ways, this is entirely more caring than I would have been. It reminds me that God’s message is both a reminder that I’m broken, as well as an affirmation that He is using my brokenness and with me through it.

Also amazing to me is the question, “What then should we do?”. It probably shouldn’t be so amazing, either. That’s the question I should be asking every time I read scripture. I think that it’s a question that my generation is missing and forgetting to ask. This question digs for application of scripture to our lives. It’s more than a, “So what?”, but still seeking to understand how to go forward with what we’ve learned.

Woah! I’m already at the end of Mark. Not only is the reading pace faster in this book, but it’s shorter than Matthew too. It was interesting to see what was and wasn’t included, and the depth of the things that were included.

Two chunks in this section struck me as I was reading through this morning. In Mark 11, as the disciples and Jesus are walking to Jerusalem, Jesus tells two of the disciples to go into the next city and as they enter, they will find a colt tied up (that has never been ridden)  and bring it back here.

In this bit, this sequence of items seems strange to me. A little bit of a random list. It’s like, go around the block twice, then you’ll find a man with a trenchcoat. Tell him that you love Taco Bell. If he responds with five words, ask him for whatever you need. Weird, right?

This is a reaffirming moment for me that God knows everything. How else could Christ have known that there would be a colt tied up, let alone one that had never been ridden?

Similarly, in Mark 15:12-15 it happens again!

‘So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. Say to the owner of the house he enters, ‘The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ He will show you a large upper room, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.”‘

Wow. This is such an incredibly simple moment, but so amazing too. How did Christ know that there would be a man with a jar of water? How could he have known that this man would take those disciples to the specific room big enough for 13 of them?

It’s comforting knowing that God knows all of these things. It’s comforting that God is big enough to know them, and comforting that God is small  enough to care about them.

That’s all for now. It’s INN staff play day today, so that’s where my mind is going now. Woo hoo!

Mark is a different book than Matthew. This sounds pretty obvious, but I think I’m finding it to be different in more ways than I expected. For better. One overarching thing that I’m learning through these studies is that I’ve been missing out on a lot. These readings have changed me internally on a basic scale, having more knowledge of the scriptures, but also started developing a passion for the story and stories contained within the bible. Externally, this is adding a depth to my conversations with people, especially within my INN discipleship group. I love it.

Today I was hit by Mark 9:38-41. The scene looks a little bit like a team meeting to me. They’ve just arrived in Capernaum. On the way there the disciples have been arguing about who is greatest. Jesus calls them all together in the house and they sit down for a bit of a chat and Q&A session.

Then there’s a question that I think I might come up with if I were part of the early startup of this thing. The disciples said, “Teacher, we saw a man driving out demons in  you rname and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us.”

While, I expect to hear Jesus say, “yeah, that’s fine”, He brings much more than that. He instructs his disciples not to stop the others,  and later says “whoever is not against us is for us”. Whhhaaaaat?

In the middle, Jesus says that no one who does a miracle in his name can then say anything bad about Jesus. I wonder if this has something to do with the faith of the person doing the miracle in Jesus’ name. If faith in Christ were a requirement to perform the miracle in the first place, I guess this seems logical.

If this were true, then the disciples statement in the begining takes a new shape. There was a man driving out demons in Jesus’ name. It was working. Following what Christ said, since it was possible to drive out the demon, the man must have had faith in Christ and therefore was on their side.

This one left me confused. I’m not sure writing about has helped me. I’m going to keep thinking about this one today.

Immediately in Mark, I’ve noticed a dramatic change in pace. One mentor described Mark as all action, and he’s absolutely right. The first five chapters are filled with healings, the first disciples being called, temptations, and driving out evil spirits.

In all of this, I am caught by Mark 1:35-39. In this chunk, Jesus gets up early in the morning and heads off to a place to be alone and pray. Later, Simon and a few others went looking for him.

If I were Simon and the others, I would be worried. Probably a little mad and afraid too. Earlier in this chapter, Simon had been called away from his boat to become a “fisher of men”. After that, they went around and Jesus taught, drove out an evil spirit, and healed many people until late in the evening. Through this, if I were Simon, I’d be getting excited. In the beginging, when Jesus called me off my boat, and away from the life that I knew, I’m sure I would start wondering what I had gotten myself into as soon as the healings started.

But then my attitude might start to shift. As I listened to the teachings of Christ firsthand, and had the opportunity to interact with him and see how the teachings were lived out, I would begin believing more and more. By the end of a week of teachings, healings, and following Jesus closely, I would be committed. I would believe the things he was teaching and know that I was getting behind something incredible. Maybe the status would start to go to my head.

And then waking up, Simon finds that Jesus isn’t there. What the heck. Has he ran away? Left for good? Was this a quick scam? Something I had fallen for whole heartedly has gotten up and left me without explanation. In a small way, this fisherman had become less of an everyday laborer to the world and kind of an important guy as a Disciple of Christ. But he’s gone.

He’s gone.

So Simon does what I would do too, he goes looking for Jesus. I would imagine this is a bit of a frantic looking, like a parent looking for a lost child in the supermarket, “and when they found him, they exclaimed: ‘Everyone is looking for you!’” When I read that, I hear my parents saying the same to me as a kid. Something like, “Where have you been! We’ve been looking all over for you!”

And Just as Simon might be starting to think that they’ve found Jesus and can return to the city to continue to grow in popularity together, Jesus suggests they go somewhere else. Not just another big city though, but to “nearby villages”. We don’t get to see Simon’s reaction to this, but maybe he just went with it, happy to have found Jesus.

At any rate, it’s clear that Jesus wasn’t in it for one city of popularity or sitting in one place and waiting for people to come to him. Instead, he goes out to villages in the area and preaches there as well.

How often do I wait for people to come to me? What a challenge to not just sit down in FPC on Tuesday night for the INN and wait for people to come to us, but instead also being up on campus meeting with people, being downtown, serving locally and connecting with people in the dining hall. This isn’t saying that I don’t think Tuesday nights at the INN are valuable. They are. I actually really dig Tuesday nights, but I have to remember that it’s only part of it. That as diverse as the crowd is that wanders down on Tuesday nights, there is still so many others in different circles up on campus and around town.

Please pray that we would always be challenged to get out of our comfort zone and get up on campus and wherever we’re called to be. Also, think about how Jesus might be calling you to take his message to others outside of the current “city” you’re in. Sharing the Good News with those we are initially uncomfortable with is not only what we are called to do, but also teaches us about different aspects of God’s love that we are incapable of learning outside of the diverse community of the Kingdom of God.

As I wrap up Matthew, I ran across one of my all time favorite parables. I would point to this parable as one that started on a path of fiscal responsiblity and stewardship in my own life. I very much enjoy the ever famous parable of the talents.

In Matthew 25:14-30, Jesus shares the parable of the talents. This is the story of a man going away and giving three of his servents bits of his property to take care of. The first gets five talents, the second two, and the third  gets only one.

The first two invested the money in some way. The third dug a whole in the ground and hid the money. The two that invested ended up with more, and the third servant had the exact same amount. The master expresses how pleased he is with the first two, and to the third he says, “You wicked, lazy servant!”

Ouch.

One thing that I paid closer attention to on this reading of this parable was the wording of the master to the two servants who had invested. It’s exactly the same. Copied and pasted. Tape recorder playback. Broken record. The only difference in this interaction is that the servants were entrusted with different amounts. All of the servants in the story are given something.

I am convinced that if the servant that was given one talent would have also gone and invested it, the response from the master would have been with the same pleasure and celebration that the other two received.

Some of us have a lot, others not much. Whether we’re talking about money, possessions, influence, anything. It’s important to remember that these things have been given to us by God. That alone shifts our thinking about what we have. I’m always more careful when I’m taking care of something that belongs to someone else. There’s nothing worse than breaking something a friend has lent to you.

Beyond realizing that it all belongs to God in the first place, we see in this story that keeping what we’ve been given to our selves isn’t enough. We need to use it, multiply it, produce more, or share it.

So, what have you been given? How can you use it responsibly and increase it for the purpose of the Kingdom?

I don’t think the return needs to be in the same currency as the gift either. I am fortunate to have a car. It wouldn’t make sense for God to have given me a car with the expectation that I multiply my car ownership by his return. Instead of “How many cars do you have for me now?”, I think he is and will be asking, “How did you use that car to advance the kingdom?” or “How did allow that car I gave you that rusts and falls apart to participate in everlasting kingdom moments?”

I hope that with what I’ve been given, I will be responsible, not just for the sake of taking care of what I’ve been given, but also to increase the Kingdom of God in Bellingham and on the earth.

Continuing on through my trek in Matthew, things are going well. I’m already a little behind of the official schedule, but I feel good about what I’m getting out of the text that I think I would miss if I had actually read 1/4 of Matthew this week.

This has been the hardest weeks to blog and focus. I’m not sure why. I’m making a habit of spending Wednesday mornings in “class” up on campus in the library. During this time I read the text, think and pray about it, and possibly even get this blog written. No luck today.

Now that I’m at home and the day has settled down a bit though, these chapters are speaking a lot more to me. There’s so much in here! I know I say that in every blog post, but I really am blown away.

I am particularly struck this time by the story of the temple tax in Matthew 17:24-27. It starts out with the disciples and Jesus arriving in Capernaum. I imagine the disciples maybe felt a little bit like I do sometimes on arriving to a destination on long trip. A little tired, a little weary, ready to just kind of hang out and do their own thing for a bit to recharge. They’re in the middle of seeing some pretty intense stuff, and are traveling around on foot with the same guys for who knows how long now. I’m sure they’re not in really great moods.

As if traveling long distances in the desert on foot wasn’t enough, in the previous verses, Jesus tells of his betrayal, “and the disciples were filled with grief”. I imagine the walk from Galilee to Capernaum was a quiet, awkward walk, with most everyone wondering if they were to Capernaum yet.

Peter then is hanging out when some temple tax collectors come to him and ask him if Jesus pays the temple tax. Peter responds that Jesus does. Peter then goes into the house where Jesus is, and maybe is going to confirm his answer, when Jesus asks him first about the temple tax. He says, “from whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes–from their own sons or from the others?”

Peter answers, “From others”.

And Jesus responds further by saying that the sons are exempt. Of course sons aren’t going to pay the tax to their kings. In the same way, Jesus probably shouldn’t have to pay a tax to his own father.

For probably a lot of reasons though, Jesus tells Peter that they’re going to pay the tax anyway. Maybe because it would be so offensive for him to not, that it would close doors for future ministry. I think this is a great example of Jesus knowing the truth and still being in the midst of the culture to reach the people he was ministering to.

Lastly, and I’m not sure what to make of it, Jesus tells Peter to go fishing and that the fish he catches will have the coin in its mouth with enough to cover both of them.

Where’s the good news in all of this? Jesus came down to us, and not only became human, but participated in our everyday things like paying taxes, but also used these things to teach us while revealing more about himself and the Kingdom of God.

To help fix a small portion of my scope issue, I’ve limited this week’s studies to Matthew 12-15, instead of Matthew 12-23. I’m not sure what I was thinking with 12-23, but that’s a huge chunk. 12-15 alone is huge and has a lot to process.

In my first pass and study of this set of chapters, I notice that Jesus is performing a lot of miracles and sharing a lot of parables. Lots of accounts of Jesus teaching, performing miracles and heading on to the next city. There seems to be a pattern going on, but then I ran across Matthew 13:54-58. In these verses, Jesus returns to his hometown and teaches and people were amazed. Up until this point, this story looks very similar to the other accounts.

There’s a little twist though. Because this is Jesus’ hometown, people know his family. They start questioning where Jesus could have gotten this knowledge from considering what they know of his family members. Kind of a, “Woah, woah, woah, you’re not who we remember you as!” Then, “they took offense at him.”

Last night at the INN, Lisa spoke on boxing people in. What assumptions we make about people based on how they’re dressed, where they come from, or the assumptions that people make about people who claim christianity. This seems to be a pretty good case of boxing in Jesus. These people think they know him, based on his family, his childhood, and who knows what else. Despite the fact that they were amazed by his teaching, they closed themselves to it because it didn’t fit in the box that they had placed Christ in. It’s some form of doubt they have in him, not believing he is who he is claiming to be, or qualified to teach the things he’s teaching.

Then, the story takes a bigger turn from the other accounts in other cities, because Jesus didn’t perform the all the miracles, or as many anyway, because of “their lack of faith”.

Which makes me wonder what the starting point is then for a miracle. The “I’ll believe it when I see it” mentality doesn’t fit here. Because they didn’t believe it, the weren’t given the opportunity to see it.

Maybe I spend too much time waiting to see something big happen before I believe. Maybe instead I should just believe that God is at work, whether or not I see the signs. Instead, having faith, continuously trying to seek God’s will and continue to look for him at work.

Carrying onward with enormous scope, I’ve been reading Matthew 7-11 this week. To keep in manageble, today I’m looking at just Matthew 9:9-13.

There’s a ton in this chunk of verses. Lot’s of stuff that I’ve heard talked about before, and lot’s of things that could be drawn from the text. In this section, Jesus has called Matthew, the tax collector. Matthew is just hanging out at a tax collector’s booth. Maybe he’s collecting taxes, or maybe he’s taking a break and just hanging out with the other tax collectors. No matter what he’s doing though, Jesus says, “Follow me”, and Matthew gets up and follows him.

The next scene takes place at Matthew’s place during dinner. There are other tax collectors and “sinners” present that are also eating. The Pharisees see this and start asking the disciples why Jesus would eat with sinners. Of course, Jesus hears this and responds with, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

My biggest observation on these verses that I hadn’t noticed before is that Jesus calls Matthew away from the tax collector’s booth, and what I would expect to happen next is to have Jesus and Matthew head somewhere else. Somewhere away from Matthew’s regular, everyday, life. Something like a retreat. You know, a good, solid place to start learning from this great teacher.

What does happen though after Jesus tells Matthew to follow him is that they head to Matthew’s house to eat with Matthew’s regular crowd. This isn’t really an escape at all.

Maybe in the same way, when Jesus asks us to follow him, it doesn’t as much mean turning away from the everyday regular life, but instead allowing new hope and learning to enter into those situations as well. There is a little bit of turning away, demonstrated by Matthew getting up and leaving his tax booth, but I wonder if this dinner was too different from Matthew’s regular dinner situation.

And even in what may have been a regular dinner situation, Jesus finds a teaching moment to make a statement about why he had come.

The more I look at these verses, the more I realize there is, and what it might mean. I’ll be thinking about this more through the weekend.