Teeter Totter

    It is amazing what you can learn from the simplest children's games. Looking around in a children's toy box or at the local playground, you can learn so much more than just how the game is to played. You can see life lessons all around. If you look, you can find out how to share, how to play fairly, how to win or lose graciously, or even how to wait for your turn.
     For me, life is like a teeter totter. On one side, you're dreaming with your head in the clouds. On the other, being grounded too long makes life stagnet. There must be a shared push of give and take. When both sides are trying to live in the clouds, each side cannot live in harmony (balanced) with the other side. When you look at the major and minor arguments in this world, each side wants to be grounded in their beliefs.  When each side starts to fight to be grounded on their side of the teeter totter, the teeter totter beaks in two. After that no one gets what they want. The ideal is to take turns dreaming and being grounded. To compromise is the only way for both sides to continue to play (survive).

A Holy Hunch

   I am so amazed by the people I know and have read about in the Bible who can risk everything on a Holy Hunch. Peter walked away his job and family to serve Christ. He did not even know Jesus was the Christ until much later. In the end, he gave his life for something, for someone who he knew was worth losing everything.

   I sit here looking at three months before my last semester of divinity school. I will graduate in December with a Master of Divinity. I have now spent seven years of my life being educated to work for God. I am still not sure if I should.

   As I go through the many weeks of school and look for the job that God wants me to serve in, I look toward my family. I have put them through so much to follow this path. The path so many others like to name “The Calling.” I have trouble using that phrase, not because God is not working with me, but because too many tele-evangelists have used it. Holy speak does not make it holy. I struggle daily for a better understanding of my “call” not because I do not think I have one, but because what is in front of me is so small and my family means so much.

   I am not strong enough to lose my family for the sake of ‘The Call.” Maybe my biggest problem is my call is more of a holy hunch. I believe I should follow the path that I think I see. I have yet to get an email from God or even a text message. I have never been a betting man. To risk so much today feels impossible.

Government Shutdown, Really?

The news for the past week has been the threat of a government shutdown. Really? Technically, they have been delaying since October. The big fight today is how much to cut what they have been spending for the past six months?

The entire country is much the same way. Americans have huge credit card debt. The average credit card debt per household is $14,750. The same website stated there are over 600 million credit card in the U. S. alone. Foreclosures are at an all time high. Americans are still trying to figure out what to do with what they did six months ago, or should I say what they did many years ago?

Job 24:9 NIV The fatherless child is snatched from the breast; the infant of the poor is seized for a debt.

If life in Job's time was today, we would have a lot of babies being used for collateral. Actually, in North Jakarta there was such a woman last February.

Life as a Christian in a country of debt is hard to live. We are called to be without debt. As I plan for my last semester in divinity school, I keep asking myself how is that possible in today's world?

Scheduled Nap

Matthew 26:40 Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. "Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?" he asked Peter.

As I start my morning with CNN in the background, I hear of yet another Air Traffic Controller asleep at work. This time there is a twist. He was taking a "scheduled" 5-hour nap, as another controller landed seven plans. This time is different from last time. He knew there was someone else to land the planes. Last time this type of story hit the news their was no other person to help the pilots land their planes.

Have we arrived at a place in America that pride in our workmanship is so low that we rather take a nap than make sure of the safety of others? Build in America is no longer possible to take pride in. It is hard enough to find enough items to build a simple house with American made products. We don't want American. We want inexpensive. We don't want a good job. We want an easy job.

When I think of these stories, I think of the disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane. The disciples asleep at work.

We live today as Christians many times alseep at work, should I say asleep in the pew. We are called to spread the Gospel. We are called to show God's love, but many of us are asleep. We think God will take care of it, and we will help later. We are called to "go ye therefore into all the world," not go ye therefore after you take a nap.

Help! They're kidnapping me!!!!

As they carried me to the back of the ambulance, I kept screaming, "They're kidnapping me!" I thought the people there to help me were there to do me harm. My wife and daughter could do nothing, but stand and watch. It wasn't until the last mile that I finally came to my senses and was able to answer their questions.

It is an odd feeling to wake half way to the hospital in the back of an ambulance. That happened to me last December. It was the week after finals. I had spent the last four weeks staying up late and waking early to finish papers and study for tests. I was trying my best to be a college student at twice their age.

There are many times in life where help looks like an evil thing. We all deal with those times differently. A young child thinks that mommy and daddy are mean, when they are trying to keep hiim from eatting all of the M & M's. The teen thinks her parents are evil when they tell her not to stay out all night. The college student thinks the policeman is evil when he is pulled over for a DUI. We as adults think God is evil when he stops us from doing something we think is enjoyable, like drinking and smoking.

Good things can look evil from the wrong side of the event. Looking back we see that it was a good thing that these people stepped in when they did. We later find out that God is good by seeing what we were kept from doing.

And then there was one… less

For the past few years, my friends and my family have lost something very important. First, my best friend growing up lost it. Then my brother called and said he too had lost it. But I guess for him it was a little easier. It only took three months for him to lose what he held so close, while my friend lost his over a period of a year. Well, maybe he lost his many years ago without being aware.

This week yet another friend lost it. She called my wife and told her it was time. She was not going to make a huge deal about it, mostly because of her daughter. She was going to move in with mom as soon as she made it official.

For us, we are trying hard to keep it close, but I can see how it is easy to lose it. Of my wife’s five closest friends at work, she was one of two who had it. In one month, she will be the only one left.
I love my wife, but sometimes that is not enough. Why am I bringing that up now in the middle of my story? Well, it all has to do with what all these wonderful, caring, and loving people have lost, their marriage. Sometimes it was their fault. Others times, it was their spouses. To be truthful, they and their spouses were all at fault.

Eighteen years ago, I thought we would never have that problem. My parents were married until death. Both sets of my grandparents were married until death. Now it seems that everyone I know has lost or at least cannot remember why it was so important to find it in the first place.

I pray that my wife and I can remember and grow that special thing that we have. At least, I hope we still have it.

Bloggers start your engines

The name of this blog has changed since it beginnings. I settled on "Paul, Barnabas, and Timothy."

There is a story behind the latest name. It goes back to a sermon I heard many years ago at Promise Keepers. Dr. Howard Hendricks preached that we need one of each in our lives. He talked about how Paul is the teacher, leader, and spiritual head of the group. Barnabas is the one who needs to be mentored. Timothy is the one who needs to be trained up.

For years, I have thought of myself as Timothy, and only Timothy. There is the rub. I am currently enrolled in divinity school. I have been a children's minister for two years, and a deacon for three. When do I become someone more than Timothy?

As I am taught more and more, I have found that life is more than living the life you have because of your name. In the Bible, Abram became Abraham and Jacob became Israel. Even Peter became Petros.

We no longer are named after our lot in life. I have always thought of myself as a young christian who had a lot in common with the biblical Timothy.

I have a good friend who's name is Stephen Paul. In college, he would sign his name St. Paul. I assumed the role of young Timothy.

What I now take from Dr. Hendricks' sermon is much more than which one of the three are you? It is which one of the three are you working with to become the better christian? Also, which one are you during different periods and different events in your life. To be the best christian, you need to be each type of these men continually, and work with each type of these men. We are to be trained while training, mentored while mentoring, and lead while leading.