Minot, ND

I am on a Mennonite Disaster Service trip with 4 other fellows from our church. It has been a good experience. I have enjoyed getting to know these brothers in more natural settings, and a week of physical labor is exhausting to the body and a great mental cleanse.
I miss my 5 girls, and look forward to being with them again.
The weather here is cold in the morning and evening, and cold in between. It is usually single digits in the morning and so far under 30 as a high. We are working for with a couple to insulate and drywall their house that was devastated by a flood. Minot is in North Dakota, which is as you can imagine, not a persons first thought for doing MDS work. Most people think, "let's go south, where it is warm." The people here are hearty folk. Our homeowner is in a wheel chair most of the time. He also crawls up ladders and drives a four-wheeler and goes hunting and does more work than many "more capable" people accomplish. They are grateful for our help and having been making a warm lunch for us each day.
I have attached a folder of pictures so far. I plan to add more to this folder as the week goes on. We will be working till Thursday evening and then driving back to Nebraska through the night.

http://ppl.ug/aqXaL-aTvhM/

A spiritual life requires human effort

That sounds contradictory. The spiritual life is about God working in me. God does the work, I respond...
But it's hard work. I'm not spiritual. I am selfish, distracted, full of worry, ambitious to accomplish, to please, to hit the home run.
Discipline is the other side of discipleship. The practice of a spiritual discipline makes me more sensitive to the small, gentle voice of God. Solitude is creating a time and place for God alone. It is a fight to keep everything else out, so that I can notice God's presence and still, small voice.
Now more than ever we have so little solitude. An endless supply of entertainment and distraction and learning is available at our fingertips (literally through touch screen devices, mice, remotes, and keyboards). There is no downtime. I must create it. My soul will shrivel to death without it. Hebrews 5:11-14 reminds us that we are called to move from milk (beginnings) to solid food (maturity in our faith and practice).  Hebrews 6:1-8 reminds us that if we don't move to maturity and instead fall away, it is possibly impossible to return. Whether that means we can never return or rather that it is extremely hard, it is better to remain in Christ and grow and produce a useful crop.
I needed this reminder. For some more humble thoughts take a listen at: http://salem.ne.us.mennonite.net/Worship under the sermon audio for "solid food - useful crop".

More on the greatest commandment

No human activity draws us more deeply into the heart of God than prayer. And no way of prayer places us more solidly into the affairs of human life than intercessory prayer. This is as it should be. Love of God, of necessity, leads to love of neighbor.They are not two commands, but one.
As we learn to love people - truly love them - we will desire for them far more than it is within our power to give them, and that will drive us all the more deeply into prayer for them. The converse is also true: the more we pray for people the more we will come to love them. Here, then, is a penetrating test of our devotion: if we do not pray for people - truly pray for them - how can we say that we love them?
-Richard Foster

Take some time to digest this thought. Then, pray. Then, do. Then, get overwhelmed. Then, pray. Then, do... Repeat, forever.

The Presence of God

Oh, God. Here I am. Where are you? Are you are in the rustling of the leaves. The gentle breeze rolling across my cheek. The warmth of the sun. You have promised to never leave me. So, in faith, I believe you are here with me. In faith, I turn my attention to you; a holy pause. I take a breath and imagine you filling me... I am overcome with a sense of peace... You alone, and no other.

Love the Lord your God, with all your heart and soul and mind and strength. And love your neighbor as yourself.
Is it possible to wrap our heads around the simple power of these two commands? Of all the commands that Jesus could have chosen, are they all summed up in those two?
If I love God with all my being can I break any of God's other laws? If I love my neighbor with the same love I have for myself will I do my neighbor any harm?
If I love God with completeness, my desire is to do only what pleases him. If I love my neighbor selflessly, I will welcome them and be drawn to meet their needs.
Brother Lawrence once wrote that he read books about how to draw closer to God, and the methods discouraged him. He found God's grace and presence in practicing the presence of Christ. He entered an intimate relationship with God, by spending time with God while he worked. That actually makes sense! I think that is the definition of this love. Let us love God and neighbor today.

Prayer for Profound and Perpetual Peace

This prayer was written and prayed by Lancelot Andrews who lived from 1555-1626. A valuable antique that is very usable today. I encourage you to read through this prayerfully, allowing the Holy Spirit to move and shape your heart. And whatever God impresses on you, take it with you through the day.

O Lord, King of all nations, strengthen all the states and the leaders of the inhabited world who have been given authority from you. Scatter all the people who delight in war. Make all war cease unto the ends of the earth.

And remember especially our divinely guarded king, and work with him more and more. Prosper his ways in all things; speak good things to his heart for your Church and your people. Grant to him profound and perpetual peace, that in his tranquility we, too, may lead a quiet and peaceable life.

Grant unto farmers good seasons. Grant unto the fishermen good weather. Grant unto the tradesmen a desire not to compete with one another. Grant unto all merchants to pursue their business with lawful integrity.

O Lord, you have called us to overcome evil with good and to pray for your enemies. I ask, Lord, that you have pity on my enemies, just as you have pity on me. Lead them, together with me, into your kingdom.

Amen.

Bringing the heat

It has been a bit hot lately.

Actually, it got hotter than this as the afternoon rolled on. The wind blew strong, but also very hot. It was like sitting in front of the heater blowing hot air.
Courtney has had Softball tournaments this week. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday Nights. And they are done now, we are proud of the way the girls and coaches have played and conducted themselves. Did I mention it was hot tonight?
Looking forward to some good stuff this weekend at Central Plains Mennonite Conference Annual Meeting at Henderson, NE.

Nebraska, the good life!

Did you know that Nebraska was ranked as the happiest state? Check it out. And I would have to vouch for this, unbiased of course:)

Sometimes we say, "God is good." I wonder if we mean, "My life is going the way I want it to."

Fair enough, but why blame God for that:) Is it really God's fault, that I am getting what I want? Can I say, "God is good", when my life isn't going the way I want it to? Do I recognize that goodness is God's character? God can't be bad. God's work in our world and in our lives is for goodness, not happiness nor freedom from problems.

Recently, I read an excerpt from Julian of Norwich. She actually prayed for a bodily sickness that would come so close to death that she would expect to wake up in Jesus' presence in Heaven! Her reason was so that through her experience she would be drawn into a deep understanding of the goodness of God. She got what she prayed for. This helped her to see the goodness of God, even in "lesser" things like discipline, obedience, and suffering.

Oh, that we would desire to know the goodness of God, rather than just live "the good life".

Be Lucky!

Are you good at praying? Is your prayer life a great one? What tricks and shortcuts do you use?
If you said you are good, then you probably have a lot to learn, and a lot to practice.
If you said its a great one, then you probably have learned a lot and practiced a lot. And you've struggled; prayed when you didn't feel like it. Prayed when you wondered if you were just talking to yourself. Prayed when you wanted to think about something else.

Where's Shawn?

Tricks and shortcuts? Well, I'm not aware of any. Its a relationship; talking and listening. Spending quality and quantity time. And yes, some things like Spiritual Disciplines can help. Spiritual Disciplines allow us to do something which puts us in the mindset, posture, and occasion to notice when God speaks.
I had a soccer coach in college who told us to "be lucky". What he meant was, do the work, practice, and set yourself up to be in a position to be lucky when the ball gets deflected.
The more prepared we are to encounter God, the more likely we will be to notice.

Soul health

Consider your mind's ability to protect your body: Place your hand close to a burning fire. Now pull it back before you get hurt. Not so hard, eh? In fact, you could do this a thousand times and be successful.
Consider your mind's ability to protect your self: Place your self close to a burning temptation. Now pull it back before you get hurt. Not so easy, eh? In fact, each time you do this it becomes harder for the mind to keep the self from leaping into the flames.
Protect your soul. Nurture its health.

God's love flows

Vacation Bible School at Salem Mennonite this week. Theme-Take me to the water: God's love flows. I shared from John 7:37-39 on Sunday. When we believe in Jesus, a river of living water flows from within us. An EMT took me aside afterwards and said, "I would consider that a medical emergency, if rivers of water were flowing from someones body."
How right you are sir! And as dramatic as that would be, I think we could use a little more drama in our lives. To let the Spirit fill us and spills and create a stir; a mess; an inconvenience. Flow river flow!

The Joy of the Lord is my Strength

What are the joys of the Lord?
The joy that comes as the power to do the right thing grows in us.
The joy that comes from having a peaceful conscience.
The joy that comes as we see the light grow in our hearts.

What would you add?

4 stages of love

Have you ever contemplated the object of your love, and the reason for your love of that one. These stages have been a helpful understanding for me of myself and others. We find many people responding to Christ in stage 2; and rightly so. Our hope is that we all move to stage 3 as we experience God and the world more fully.
1 - I love myself for my own sake. The most basic kind of love. I cannot have an interest in anything that does not relate to myself. I love myself; looking out for my needs, and seeking my own pleasure. However, I begin to see that I cannot make it on my own, nor can I survive without something beyond myself.
2 - I love God for my own sake. I begin to recognize that God protects me, and provides for me. I worship God for his love for me. Little by little God becomes known to me by experience. I taste and see that God is good to me, which leads to tasting and seeing that God is good (period).
3 - I love God for God's sake. Whether or not things go my way. Whether I live in plenty or in want. When trials come, I don't wonder how God could let this happen. Instead, I lean into God. Knowing that God is good! As I cultivate this relationship, it is one that grows steadily for a long time.
4 - I love myself for God's sake. This is where my own self get's completely lost for a time. Spending time with God, and not knowing I am there. According to the "spiritual greats", this only happens for short times, before we are reminded of the fallen world we live in.

Spend some time in 1 John 4:7-21, and work some of this out.

How does it make you feel?

Sometimes you couldn't get anymore excited even if you tried! Rain can bring out the best in us:) Here in Nebraska the wind blows for weeks at a time, but rain seems much more sporadic. It comes in big bunches, but not very often. So, I guess when it comes you enjoy it; splash, play, take pictures, pose, and get wet.

Sometimes our Spiritual experience is more like wind and other times it is more like rain.

How do your devotions make you feel? During and After? Does it improve your mood? Does it give you consolation and a sense of well-being?

Yes, and that is why you keep coming back. Your hooked on a feeling, High on believing... Would you spend time in prayer, reading, reflecting if you didn't feel better afterward? How about if it made you feel worse? What if our feelings aren't the purpose of devotion? What if devotion is the purpose of devotion? What if God is trying to cleanse me of using devotions/spiritual practices as a "self-help" tool? As a way to feel better about myself? What if God wants to lead me to a place of utter dependence on him, obedience, humility?

And what if I don't want that...

"A soul will never grow until it is able to let go of the tight grasp it has on God." -John of the Cross, The Dark Night of the Soul

Discouraged devotion

Devotion=a series of religious duties to add to an already over-committed schedule.

No wonder we are so unlikely to stick with them if we even attempt to do them at all. Aren't we busy enough? Why would we be interested in being busier? What would we drop? Here is the thing: What are we busy doing? Are we busy serving ourselves? Or are we busy doing good to all people?

What if devotion is a head-over-heals, white-hot love of God? A pursued relationship of intentional lifestyle! And what if that white-hot flame strips me of selfishness, and creates in me a pure heart? Would this pure heart lead me to joyfully do good?

Romans 13:8-10

Not a care in the world

Is this your response to the Spirit of God?

What moves you to action? What trigger launches you out of your seat and into the foray of life? Why do you do anything at all? Could it be affections?

Newton's first law of motion suggests: An object at rest will stay at rest unless the object is acted upon by an external force. Nolt's first law of action suggests: The nature of human beings is to be inactive unless influenced by some affection.

Our affections (love, hate, hope, fear, desire, etc.) are the force that creates actions in our lives. We can try to do the right actions. But we don't really want to unless an emotion stirred by our affections tells us to. If certain people or their actions stir uneasiness or hatred in me, than I will have a hard time willing myself to show them love. However, if certain people and their actions stir love and confidence in me, than I will find it hard to hate them.

So, is it possible to be stirred with love for those who previously (or presently) stirred hatred in us? Yes, but not through forcing our will. Instead, through giving up our will, and taking on Christ's will. When we receive Christ, we receive the Spirit of God, and we have the power of godliness in our heart. This power will incline us to seek the things of God. But this power must be exercised. When we seek the Spirit and respond to the Spirit with affection and not just our heads, our sensitivity to the Spirit is increased. When we resist the Spirit, we notice it less. Our lack of desire creates a lack of noticing.

Lord, I pray that you would stir the fire of the Spirit in me, and may I be burnt till all that is left is you in me!

Disconnected Disciple

The disciple of Christ desires above all else to be like him. Sometimes I feel like a disconnected disciple. Disciples follow their teacher. You're sitting in class, working hard on your assignment, learning the material and taking a fascination to the exercises in the book. All of the sudden you look up and the classroom is empty, the teacher has gone somewhere else. The rest of the students have followed him. Panic strikes. Where did he go? How could I have missed the movement?

Many pastors and others who teach and preach in congregations have expressed this same scenario. We spend so much time preparing sermons, learning theology, setting up lessons using the text book (Bible); that we find it easy to neglect the Bible as a revelation of who the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are and what they are doing.

What's the fix? It's not quick. It's a lifetime of learning. It's following Christ; becoming a disciple. It's leaving all that we love, and following; dropping the nets, leaving the tax table, walking away from the family business, leaving the homeland, having no place to lay your head, taking up your cross, loving your enemies, praying for those who curse you, turning the other cheek, welcoming the little children, visiting the sick, those in prison, giving a glass of water, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, staying on the vine.

Harder and Easier

In my last post, I shared that my relationship with God/Jesus needs improvement. So, I should just try harder, read more, pray more fervently, and beat my will into submission.
Yeah, right! That is a recipe for discouragement, failure, and deeper loss. Instead of trying to do the "hard" work of disciplining my natural tendencies and selfish nature, I need to do the "easy" work of killing it. There is no way to control it. It must be put to death!
Then, we ask Christ to give us a new self. He gives us His-self. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. Galatians 2:20.

Hello! Anybody still here?

My dad pointed out recently that it has been a while since I have posted here. He is right. A lot has happened since that last post on March 23. I passed the National Registry, and have my EMT license. I now have an extra 9 hours a week to get back to normal. The interesting thing is, it is hard to be normal again.
Follow me on this: Take everything that you are doing right now; work, family, hobbies, religion, volunteering, school, etc. Now add 9+ more hours of activity, which really removes 12+ hours a week that you have to do the things you were doing before. Do that for 4 months and it becomes the new normal. Now stop doing that added thing. What have you lost? What needs to be renewed or repaired? How do you get back to being yourself?
For me I have lost healthy things like leisure, spiritual disciplines, and I now feel guilty for taking a walk, or resting. And I know my work and personal life have suffered because of this.
Now my desire isn't to get back to where I was before the EMT class. And I would do it again; the class wasn't the problem. How do I move to a healthy place of balance again? How do I feed my soul? And I know everybody else has been or is in this place. So many good things to do and experience; people to spend time with and invest in. No answers today.
Follow this link to read a fellow pastor's reflections, which inspired this post:
http://blog.chron.com/thepeacepastor/2012/05/spiritual-energy-source/

Book'em

Finished! I read it!!! I have read all the chapters in the EMS book for my EMT class. That's 41 chapters, 1,097 pages. Only 4 more classes for a total of 160 hours. Lot's of practicing practical assessments. Preparing for the written Final. Final written exam. Final practical exam. Then, if I pass all that... I get to take the National Regestry for EMT.

It has felt like I've been at this forever, but it's only been since December 3. At the same time, I can hardly believe we're almost done!
I have met many wonderful people in class and on the voluntary fire and rescue department in Shickley. These people give so much of themselves for their local communities. Time, sweat, tears, pain, safety, and sometimes their lives. Thank them and support them. Be willing to grow, try new things, volunteer, stress yourself, read something worthwhile.

March

That is all.
Can it be March already? Oh how life has changed since last March! I love that change:) She is beautiful... I am wrapped around her finger. There is no resistance...

Snow is awesome

This last week we had temperatures above 70 and lots of sunshine!
Today....

It began with rain Friday morning (and lots of wind), and then at 10:30pm it began to snow. I woke up at 5am to get ready to go to class, and decided it was better to be at home. You know what? It is amazing what all you can get done on a Saturday morning when you don't have class! I a looking forward to having free Saturday mornings again; it's like having an eighth day in the week.

How about another beautiful shot of snow>

Now I know many people who live in and around this town don't like snow, but it is quite beautiful, isn't it?
Calling for some more snow tonight, we'll see about church tomorrow morning. I hope we have it. It is good to see the saints and sinners, and to worship God together.
Ohio, enjoy what's coming your way!

Back in Nebraska... again:)

The last several weeks have seen a slew of miles added to our van. We went to Ohio for Christmas. Suzanne's Grandpa Hill passed away last week, and the funeral was Tuesday. We made a "quick" trip to Shipshewana, IN about 11hours and 30 minutes drive. We were gone 43.5 hours and on the road 23 hours.
It was well worth it though! It was good to be with family, the funeral service was meaningful, we had great hosts overnight, the girls traveled great, roads and traffic were good (except for the 2 hours that Suzanne drove in snow on Indiana Toll to Chicago), and it is good to be home again. Lots to do so this is the end of this p...

For real

This photo is not photoshopped. It is for real. On the way home from Ohio to Nebraska, we stopped in Illinois at this over the road restuarant.
It was good to get out of the van and eat, and play, and hug each other:) We left at 5:30am (EST) and got back to Nebraska at 8:47pm (CST). The girls traveled well, even Gloria! It was good to be in Ohio with family, thanks for having us. And it is good to be back here. Now to get working, again.