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Lately I have been thinking about the future, and to be honest, it is a little scary.  The TV talking heads spend every evening talking about bad economic news.  In worship last Sunday I met a family where the dad had just lost his job.  A friend of ours just declared bankruptcy and has dropped out of church at least for now.

Tonight, I have to give a 5 minute presentation of the future of the loft.  The past certainly has been blessed as today will be as well.  But tomorrow?  While I know God is always with us, I could not even fathom a guess as to what tomorrow would look like.

The only way to really move into the future is to be open to the presence of God.  God takes us where we need to be.  As in marriage vows - richer, poorer, sickness, health - whatever comes in 2009 God will remain with us and all will be well.

Share your thoughts about your future - how do we as Christians move into what is ahead?

While writing in my journal this morning, this verse caught my aging eye, ‘ what counts is a new creation.’  - Galatians 6:15

In this letter, I have often focused on the list of spiritual gifts.  As Christians, Paul points us toward the fruits of the spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22) - but the point of these is to remake us.  Jesus is working in us to turn us, move us, rewire us into something that is new in every way.  The new Christian is unrecognizable to the person of old, even though appearances remain the same.

Over the past few weeks, my wife, Deborah, has been reconnecting with high-school friends via facebook.  Because we went to high school together, these are people that I also know.  What is funny in these reconnections is that frequently the face is the same - the same person I remember from decades ago.  But their stories have changed, in some cases drastically.  They are the same face, but a new and different person.

Jesus came to earth to give us a similar opportunity.  We need a chance to be made new.  So many times because our outward appearance stays the same, we will believe that a person is also unchanged on the inside.  What death!   As you meet people this week, give them a chance to change.  See if there is something moving on the inside that is remaking them, because, as Paul writes, a new creation is the only thing that counts.

Peace.

This morning I was out on my usual 6.5 mile run, and in a word it was tough.  Nothing came easy - the stride was off, the right ankle hurt, I got winded where I usually don’t.  To make matters worse it was warmer and more humid (in Houston of all places) and with the recent time change I was running in the light when I really prefer to run just before dawn.

About 30 minutes in I was ready to quit and the battle between the brain and the body started to escalate. After a few minutes of back and forth this thought came out - sometimes we get where we want to go by making a decision.  I have decided to finish - keep running.

As we read Revelation at the loft, I think many kept to their faith by making a decision for Jesus Christ. Physical life would had been easier if they quit, but the believers made a decision to finish in the midst of heavy persecution.  Having never directly known this personally, I am asking God to show to me what being punished because of faith is like.   I hesitate at times to speak for God, but I believe God admires people who make decisions to finish, and finish strong.

As for this morning, I finished - and 90 seconds under my usual time.  My ankle has a little tweak and the body is tired, but the satisfaction from having done so makes those inconveniences minor.Today I am praying for all those who are struggling - make a decision to finish with Jesus Christ and I pray God will show you the blessings of being faithful.

Maybe in the eternity of heaven, any struggle on our temporary earth is really only inconvenient.

Peace.

Today is election day, and for approximately half of the voters in America tonight will end in a disappointment.  Only one candidate can win an election, and for the candidate in the minority of the votes - whoever that might be - there will be passionate supporters disappointed in the outcome.

As a rule, I like passionate people.  Over the years, I have had the chance to know many with a zeal for some fantastic causes - water wells in distant countries, kids in need, orphans to name but an extreme few. People with passion who act upon it are the movers that literally bring the Kingdom in reality - and working with them is perhaps what I enjoy most.

After the election, I would encourage everyone, but especially those discouraged by the outcome, to keep their passion going.  While passion can be misguided, it is my opinion that our nation is not passionate enough.  There are not enough people willing to take a stand, or to get involved - and I discover and re-discover that the people who really bring about positive change are the most passionate about their cause.

As a last note, church should be a passionate place.  The church should be the ultimate source of positive change - and whether it is an end to sex-trafficking in Houston or putting clean water close to every kid on the planet, church should have a passion.  If you have discovered that in the political world, consider bringing your cause into the church.  Jesus is the ultimate cause, and He is always looking for those with a zeal and determination to make the world right.

I am an optimist.  No way to really explain why, but I have always believed that if thrown up in the air like a cat, I will land on my feet.  Now confessional here, this has not always proven true but I believe it nonetheless.

Tomorrow is election day.  Before thinking about outcomes (tomorrow’s blog), what a great country we live in!  It is absolutely fantastic that we as Americans have the right to choose our leaders.  Our right to vote, given to us through the sacrifice and vision of our forefathers, is one of the greatest steps a country can take toward realizing a little of heaven on earth.  In heaven, everyone counts.  In a small way, our right to vote expresses the same idea.

At the loft, we are in Revelation 1-3 this week.  In this section of the book, there is a special word given to 7 churches.  Each has a strength or a weakness, but in the churches that are falling short I wonder if the idea ‘everyone counts’ is not accepted by everyone.  Think it over, what would a church that believed every human being counted look like? What would a church that believed everybody mattered take on?  

This election day idea may speak to this book more than we know….please share a thought!

This weekend at the loft, as part of our ‘Scream’ series, we are talking about fear of death. As Christians, of course, we believe in the resurrection of the dead.  Jesus put it plainly on more than one occasion and it is one of the essentials of the church - Jesus rose from the dead and those who share a faith in him live in expectation of the same.

My father in law, a committed Christian, had a great line about death that surprised me a little, he said, ‘it is not death that I am afraid of, it is the dying part of it that has me a bit concerned.’

He is right - it is the dying part that is difficult, and when it comes to dying I cannot think of anything that I look forward to or eagerly await.  Death? Yes, a finality a peace and ready for the resurrection.  Dying? Hmmm….pain, suffering, physical failure…ugh.

Yet, as I think further isn’t it the dying that Jesus asks us to embrace?  Baptism is dying to one life and rising to another.  If we pick up our cross, as Jesus asked of us, isn’t it dying that Jesus asks us to take on?

Another way of looking at this is to recognize that Christianity is painful.  Part of our living for Christ is going to be the painful removal of sin, ego, pride, and all those invasive adversaries of God that parasitically find housing within us.

As it did for Jesus on the cross, faith hurts, and what Jesus asks of us in dying to take the pain and embrace it.  What do you think?

It’s certainly criticizable, and to be honest I am a little surprised I have not heard at least something.  But Friday night, the loft debuts its first and perhaps only mini-movie, The Terror.  It is a B-Grade movie, especially in certain people-to-be-kept nameless-scenes.  It will be shown after dark this Friday night.  There is an opportunity to also camp over night and have dinner and smores and all sorts of stuff - if interested register at www.gracekids.com . 

What surprises me a little is that I have not been asked - why is the church doing this?  As Mike Sims, our Communications Director, asked incredulously, ‘what church does this?’  Answer - we do.

The reason we pushed this project is because I expect to see churches enter the film business in a big way. It is already happening with Fireproof (www.fireproofthemovie.com) which was produced by a Baptist Church.  I expect that this trend will continue and we will discover that the next major evangelism field that God is directing the church toward is the movie screen.

Hence, the loft is trying to put us out on the wave God is on.  So what do you think?  Will the next wave of churches have production studios?  Do you think this is the church’s battle to fight?  Have you ever watched a ‘Christian’ movie?  Is this where the church is headed?

As always, when it comes to your thoughts, dare to share.

Hey lofters….this week we start a new series called ’scream’.  We usually plan these things in advance, and our thought originally was to talk about things we are afraid of as Halloween plays out in the culture.  Now, it turns out there are few events out there that are scaring a lot of folks.

The stock market is tanking.  Governments across the world are talking about buying banks.  I heard today that Britain may sue Iceland because an Icelandic bank collapsed which held deposits from many thousands of Britons.  Wow…and people are afraid.

What a scary time to be a retiree or poor.  What a scary time it can be if people wonder if their job is the next cut.  Life can be very scary, and I imagine that many of us right now when we close our eyes at night are encountering pure fear.   First a hurricane, now this.

I was at a meeting this week where this fact was brought up.  During the Great Depression Americans gave away MORE of their income on a percentage basis than we do today.  Did you get that?  When times were toughest, we were more generous.

While the times are tough - they have a way of reminding us what really matters.  Fear can set us straight as to what really matters - I pray that this might occur to many of us while we also keep our eyes open for our neighbor who really is scared, and in need.

Over the last several weeks I have had many conversations with people who I would describe as suffering from a faith that has grown ’stale.’  These people are believers, even active church attenders, but while having what I take to be a genuine faith - at the same time their spiritual life has grown stale.  It has gone flat.  They are looking for something more.

One one hand, I understand that this may be part of everyone’s life.  Mother Teresa made the news posthumously, when her diaries were made public.  Within her writings were confession of doubt, even despair.  Her life reveals what is true for all of us, that every moment is not a Mount Sinai or burning bush - sometimes faith goes flat.

At times like this I am reminded of the conversation Jesus had with the woman at the well, where in the conversation he invites the woman to drink a kind of water that will quench thirst forever.  Of course she wants to know more - and Jesus tells her that He is that water.

To overcome a stale faith, maybe we need to experience Jesus directly?  Rather than take the pastor’s word for it, or the church’s, directly engage in the types of actions Jesus engaged in.  Give water to the thirsty - and see if these efforts not only quench thirst but also refreshen faith.

What do you do when faith goes stale?

The financial markets are a mess.  Down 7 percent yesterday, up so far today.  I have not been on a roller-coaster like this since riding the Tony Hawk coaster at Six Flags outside of St. Louis.  Up, down, spins, crashes - skateboarding and financial investing have much in common save the fact that skateboarders dress better and have a cool factor that Merrill Lynch can’t touch.  Or is it Bank of America now?

In listening to news commentary on CNBC about the BofA purchase of Merrill I actually heard the following line, ‘the purchase of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America will create a financial colossus that is too big to fail.’

Really?  Us theological types know a thing or two, and when it comes to anything or anyone thinking they are too big to fail, watch out.  God relishes bringing down the invincible.

Case in point?  Goliath.  The too big to fail insurance policy that was a guarantee to defeat any army, much less lowly Israel.  Can you see the smirk on the Philistine commander’s face as Goliath entered the battle field to take on David.  He knew that this guy could and would win.  This was Kimbo Slice verses, well, a guy like me.  

God, however, acted through the little guy, and Goliath - the too big to fail Philistine - failed. In fact, he died.

As we go through a rough economy, it seems to me that some humility may be needed in our day.  There is no such thing as too big to fail when it comes to entities of our creation.  The only fail-proof anything out there is Jesus.  Maybe its time to invest in and put a little more stock in Him?