Growth is Pain

I have one teen age son and a pre-teen daughter. The son is constantly growing these days. It seems that he wakes up in the morning an inch taller than when he went to bed.

The thing about growing is that it hurts. Knees, elbows, hands, legs, arms, and feet all hurt. Growing is painful.

I am not a gardener. However, to be good neighbors we had some landscaping done. To care for our plants we have to prune them. Pruning is that practice of cutting something off so that something new can grow.

Growth hurts. There is simply no way around that reality. If we are going to experience growth in our personal lives or in our communal lives we will experience pain.

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The Need to Read

I am convinced that much theological debate would be ended if people were better readers.

As a pastor I get everyone's questions about the Bible and theology. I love these questions and I am grateful to have the opportunity to speak into the lives of people.

Then there are the people who want to debate theology. The problem is that, often, they "don't read so good." Reading well requires us to pick up more than individual sentences. It requires us to place these sentences in their broader context and remembering how they fit in the broader scope.

Yes, if we simply read better then many debates would simply fade away.

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The Fascination of the Unknown

Left Behind, the reboot, is coming. The poorly written books which were made into poorly done films are being rebooted by Nicolas Cage.

A certain set of Christians are really excited.

Why? Because we don't like the mundane, the normal, the every day. We want to live the life fantastic. The Bible teaches things like loving your neighbor and entering into the every day life of the community.

That's so boring.

So, some grasp onto the excitement of a magical experience of Jesus coming to Earth, waging war, leaving Earth, returning again to reign, and then leaving, and then returning finally. They embrace the escapism that is inherent in this perspective. It feels like being in a comic book.

The alternative is lame. Jesus returns once, renews all things, and we get back to work, forever.

That's the thing though, following Jesus is about the every day, the small stuff. It's about being present in the here and now. It's about loving well. It's about suffering well. It's about taking the next step in the next moment.

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The Necessity of Mundane

We love dramas. Television, movies, or books. We love dramas.

The reason we love them is that they seem exciting. They create in us feelings that we desperately want to feel.

Dramas are not real.

The every day, the mundane, it is real. It feels boring. The people who are remembered are the ones who embrace the necessity of the mundane.

Every day the choice must be made to set our eye on the here and now and our heart on eternity.

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