Last night was round two of the D&D book club. It grew. By one. Fabulous! Recently I went to a "Get Motivated" seminar (got enough material for about a hundred posts). Zig Ziglar was a main speaker and talked about his "Wall of Gratitude". Anyway, I'm starting one and both the D's get a spot on it. These guys, and also Nick, are becoming such good friends.
Often times my humor is described as dry, cynical, or even recently, "tight-fisted". I thank God for allowing me this space with these gracious guys who put up with me. Often my venue for processing thoughts is by "decontructing" them to the lowest possible sarcassic denominator and then putting them back together from there. I just need to thank these guys for tolerating me.
So the Peter Rollins book was our launching point for discussion. I was so relieved that I was not the only one who felt largely uncomfortable with parts of the book, and also that I was not the only one who neglected to finish the book. Oh how misery loves company! Two things that struck me from our discussions and I can't stop thinking about them; First, the importance of relationship. Second, the aroma. In order to love people, we must be in realtionship with them. As leaders, there's always this fear of, "What if I'm wrong?" and, "What if I take others to the wrong place with me?" I was so encouraged by Nick's Comments expressed towards Damien. "You were there." And you told me, "The spirit won't jack you!" I was once again reminded that more important than our theologocial leanings or even our prefered program possibilities, it is friendship that allows us to trulely minister to others. Also, it's the Holy Spirit, not us, that does the real work, and The Spirit will never take people to the "wrong place". I know, that I know, that I know this, but it was good to know it again.
Yesterday I was driving a bus to pick up some steel with our spanish pastor and my four year old son. I know, I was probably the only person on the planet yeaterday driving a bus to pick up steel. Isaac, my son, has not been feeling well, so he was laying down in the seat behind me. We were stopped, in the front of the line, at a red light, when we sits up, looks all around and says, "Dad, I smell chicken!" Being near some of my favorite sit down restaurants, I made some suggestion about where the smell was coming from and then took off as soon as the light turned green. By the next stop light, this little prophet behind me says, "Dad, I'm hungry". And by the next light he's insisting "Take me to a place where they have food!" By the time I took him home, we was a little bit frustrated. He tells his mom, "Will you feed me, Daddy won't."
Peter Rollins talks about living out our faith so it's not just a pleasing aroma to others. He talks about being the kind of Aroma that makes people hungry. How often do people who hang out with us, sit up from their rest, forgetting about their own sickness and issues and say "I smell Jesus"? If this question wasn't disturbing enough... How often does it last to the next level where they are tapping us saying "I'm hungry... for Jesus"? Does it ever reach the point where they are pulling our shirt shouting "Take me to where I can find Jesus!"? And if it does, how often do we just stick to what we "have to get done", and take them home with out ever feeding them?
Adventures in missing the point? I know I've been guilty.
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