Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Name

We had five students in class on Sunday.  One new student.  It was good to see all of them.  I continue to hope and pray that what we do and say is relevant to them.  

We showed the Rob Bell DVD called Name.  It was so good.  It talks about all the names and identities we go by in our life, but then it asks us to strip them all away and look at who we really are.  We are a unique creation of God, and our story, our history, is God's plan for making us who He intended us to be in Him.

So we are beginning to take a look at our story.  We want to recognize that God has been there all along, since before we were born, shaping our lives through people and circumstances and His word.  We are asking the Holy Spirit to illuminate our story by helping us to know and remember important factors in our spiritual development (John 14:26).  I told them it was like asking an artist or a musician to explain the inspiration behind a painting or song.  When you hear the story behind the piece, it takes on a whole new meaning to you.  That's what I want for their stories...greater understanding, illumination.

We're starting with their birth.  I asked them to find out circumstances surrounding their birth.  They might not realize what a miracle they are.  I told them about Kathryn's birth.  I had already had a miscarriage before I got pregnant with Kathryn.  And then early on I had trouble in the pregnancy and had to go to bed for some weeks.  I was worried that I might not be able to teach school when it started and we needed the money.  It was an anxious time, but God carried me through and Kathryn was born after a full term pregnancy.  I thought not too long ago about those days and how much I would have missed if I had not known Kathryn.  Though I don't dwell on it often I also thought about the two babies I lost.  What did I miss in not knowing them?  And I am thankful for the assurance that I will know them someday.  What an amazing thought!

Can't wait to see what they find out about their stories!  God is doing great things in our lives, and we need to acknowledge Him and give Him glory!


 

Saturday, September 26, 2009

Anticipation

I've been getting ready for Sunday School tomorrow. I ordered the new material from Rob Bell and watched the DVD today. It is amazing. So thought provoking.



Will and Phil watched it with me tonight. Will said it gave him chills. Phil liked it too. Looking forward to what God is doing. More later.

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Questions, questions, questions

I didn't post about this past Sunday's class because I've been dealing with lots of questions.  We had four students.  Wow, do I appreciate these four coming out!  When we got home Phil said, "We've got to come up with a better plan for our class.  What we're doing is not going to keep them interested for long." (or something to that affect).  So all week I've been thinking about that very thing.  How do we do a better job engaging these young people at such an important time in their life and really challenge them to think about what they believe and what their faith is supposed to look like in their everyday life?


We have to start with some different materials.  We've decided to try some of Rob Bell's Nooma films.  They are so well done and have discussion guides to go with them.  So maybe by the time October rolls around we'll be ready with that.  I am excited to give it a try.

See a sample by going to youtube and looking at the Nooma trailers.  We are beginning with the one called Name.  For some reason I could not get it to post here or on Facebook.


Last week our lesson was about difficulties we may face in following Christ.  One of these is rejection.  I know this is something that is always in my mind when I am talking to people.  Phil told about his experience.  As a teenager he spent some summers in Canada working at Camp of the Woods.  Once he and others went into town to witness to locals.  He met an indian coming out of a bar.  When Phil tried to talk to him, the man took the Bible out of Phil's hands, tore out some of the pages and threw it on the ground.  Now that's rejection!  Most of us never face anything like that, but God certainly doesn't want us to be quiet because we fear rejection.


Today I went to see an acquaintance who is very ill.  I don't know this family very well, so I didn't know what I should or shouldn't say.  That fear of rejection was very much on my mind. My fear was that if I brought up Jesus, the reaction might be anger that He had allowed this to happen.  I could totally understand those feelings.  So I was praying that the Spirit would lead me to say what was right...  Mostly I just listened. And I did tell them I was praying for them.  But was it enough?  I don't know.  I am planning on staying in touch.  This is a very sweet family that is in a very difficult situation.


Rejection is a powerful force.  It caused people in Jesus' hometown to miss out on blessings from His healing and teaching.  I want to have more of what Peter and John had..."fearless confidence."  But I have a long way to go in this department.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

He confronted the religious

The third group of people Jesus came in contact with in Mark 2 were the religious. They were upset, as usual, because Jesus was doing things on the Sabbath that they thought were against the Law. I've often thought how great it would have been to live when Jesus was around and to have met Him. But lately I've been thinking that I might have been one of those religious people who thought Jesus was wrong. I can imagine myself saying,"He can't be the Messiah. The Messiah would not be breaking the Law." I admit it. I'm a goody-goody. I like following the rules, and I like it when other people do too. I'm guessing it's a teacher thing.



Of course, Jesus taught a new way to think. The Law is a good thing, a good tool. It was designed to give us a good life. The Sabbath was intended to be a blessing and give us rest. But if we let the Law, it will bind us, strangle us. And God didn't intend that.


Which is why Jesus was always so very upset and angry with the religious leaders of the time. They didn't get it.

I don't want to be like them. I'm thankful God continues to work on me. To change my thinking. To make me see that I need to be more loving and less judging. More flexible and less rigid.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

He hung out with sinners

Yesterday I said that in Mark 2 there were three groups of people that Jesus related to. The first were those who were hurt and in need of healing. The second were sinners. Jesus hung out with tax collectors, prostitutes, and many other disreputable characters. He never shied away from people who wanted to be around Him.

My friend Bren summed up the principle here so well. "We are not to isolate ourselves from sinners, but we are not to adopt their lifestyle for our own." This is true, but it doesn't help with some of the decisions we make in this area. For instance, there is the whole area of Christian education. Some people choose Christian schools for their kids, others home-school and still others send their kids to public schools. Of course there is nothing wrong with any of those choices. We have to evaluate ourselves and our children and know them well enough to decide where they are able to be with others and yet not adopt a lifestyle that we know is contrary to God's Word. And that's different for everybody.

One of the choices I've made in the last few years is to cultivate some relationships with people who go to different types of churches, or who don't go to church at all. It is very easy to insulate myself and only have relationships with other Christians. By stepping out, I have been enriched by those friendships, and those friends continue to challenge me by asking me questions and making me define what I believe for them. The people I reached out to were people that I liked and "clicked" with, people who I enjoyed getting to know. But it takes time and committment, especially when they are outside your normal sphere of interactions.

The people Jesus knows

Even though we had but one student in class today, the lesson was very good and blessed my heart and mind.


The question we addressed was, "How did Jesus relate to the people He met?" In Mark 2, He showed how He related to three groups of people. The first one was those who are hurt and need healing. The story is one of the most familiar in the Gospels: the four friends carry the paralytic man to Jesus and have to let him down through the roof. Even though I have heard this story and told it over and over, I wondered about things we are not told. Whose idea was it to go to Jesus, the man or one of the friends? How hard was it to persuade the others to participate with them? Whoever's idea it was to go to Jesus, it was the faith of the four friends that lead them to persevere the many obstacles they faced once they got to the house where Jesus was. They could have told the man, "Hey, we're sorry, but this is as far as we can go. There's no way we can get past this crowd." The man himself was at their mercy.


Now think about these men faced with this great obstacle. They could have given up but instead they became creative. Hebrews 10:24 (The Message) says "Let's see how inventive we can be in encouraging love and helping out..." They had to press through the crowd to climb to the roof. Were there stairs? If not, I'd say there would be quite a few people who would think that carrying this man to the roof would not be a good idea. And then they had to wreck the roof. Who's going to pay for that? The man's faith might have gotten his friends to bring him, but it was their faith that overcame the obstacles. They were willing to face the crowd, endure criticism, and pay for the roof. That's why it says in verse 5 (The Message), Jesus was "impressed by their bold belief..." Wow! What would it be like to impress Jesus?


What are the implications of this story for you and me? I think about how little an obstacle it takes to deter me. I could have easily quit when I saw the impossibility of going any further. But I don't want to be that way; I don't want to give up easily. I just watched the movie, "Gran Torino," with Clint Eastwood. I can't recommend it because it has way too much profanity. I hate that. But there is a priest in the movie who tries to make friends with Clint's acerbic character. Now the first time Clint talked to me the way he talked to that priest, I would have been done. But this priest kept coming back and coming back. And in the end, he won Clint's respect and confidence. It was a good lesson for me to watch.


I hope that the next time I share my faith or try to meet another's need, I remember this lesson and press on. I want to be creative and inventive in looking at the situation. And I want to have the "impressed-with-their-bold-belief" kind of faith.

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Our First Class



       Phil & I had our first class today.  We had 4 students.  We were so glad to see all of them.  God was gracious in sending them to us.  
        We jumped into the lesson which asked, "Who is the Real Jesus?"  We talked about how Jesus is the unique Son of God.  Jesus believed that about Himself and those around Him came to believe it too.  I think it's really important for young people to start understanding why we believe what we believe.  I know that when they go out into the world they will be faced with people who don't believe, and they will need to be prepared for what others may say.  
Growing up and living in the South, knowing and accepting things from the Bible is pretty natural.  We live in the Bible Belt, and it is part of our culture.  When you leave the South, however, people question your beliefs and say that you believe these things solely because you have been raised in that culture.  The Southern culture is also stereotyped as being less educated than other sectors of our country.  Young people may not have been exposed to any well-educated people who believe what they believe, and that could be a stumbling block for them at times.  We discussed that there are many scholars from all across the country and world who have made it their life work to explain why the claims of Christ are trustworthy.  
Our church library has the book, The Case for Christ, by Lee Strobel.  Lee was an atheist whose wife accepted Christ.  His job was being an investigative reporter, so he applied his work to his objections to the Christ and interviewed scholars about all the problems he saw with believing in the Bible and what it had to say about Christ.  His intent was to prove to his wife that Christianity was foolishness.  In the end, he came to accept Christ, and his finding are published in this book.  It is a great resource and an easy read for anyone who wants to really dig into the truth of our beliefs.
          We are off to a good start.  How can you go wrong when you begin by affirming that Jesus is who He says He is?  It can only get better from here.


          


Saturday, September 5, 2009

Beginnings are exciting!

Tomorrow Phil and I will begin to teach the college/career class at church. I am excited, but also a little bit nervous. It is entirely possible that no one will show up for this class. I am prepared for this possibility and have prayed that God will bring out those who He plans to be there. So I'm finished with that concern. I am also extremely focused on a desire to make this class relevant to where these young people are in their lives. That's why I'm creating this blog. My intent is to make the lessons we discuss accessible to them wherever they are. It also allows them access when it is a good time for them to give their attention and concentration.

I called the blog "Drinking From the Well" because God has really been speaking to me about having a greater desire for His word. I want it in my own life. I also want it in the life of my church and its members. So I want to be thirsty for the knowledge found in the Word and going regularly to the only Well that can satisfy my thirst.

So here we go. We're launching out on a new adventure. I'm anxious to see what God has planned.