And the three men I admire most:
The father, son, and the holy ghost,
They caught the last train for the coast
The day the music died.

                                                                                  Don McLean, American Pie

Am I the only one who's noticed?

I visit a city from time to time where there’s a great Christian Bookstore. I say “great” because holding court behind the music counter is a veritable modern-day Revolutionary. He’s a young man with vision who senses the shifting of wineskins. Though he’s ordained by an evangelical church, his heart is with the Emerging Church. When I’m in his city, I always ask, “what’s new and good?” The last two times I asked, the answer was not encouraging.

The other day I was looking for some new music to download onto my brand new iPod, and over the course of several days’ searching, what I discovered only underscored what my friend in the bookstore told me: “There’s really not much out there right now.”

Have you noticed? Or am I the only one? Christian artists currently seem to be left to producing “The Best Of . . .” or “Best Loved Favorites” in order both to provide the Body of Christ with something “new” to consider and to keep an income stream flowing for themselves.

Sorry to say it, but new arrangements of old compositions is not  “new” music.

Contemporary Christian worship music just isn’t “contemporary.” The current state of the “current” is a far cry from the days when our hearts were pierced by the sounds of the “Best of Heaven” and the “stream” was the river of God.

In the 1990’s, there was a sudden, rushing flow of inspired, brilliant, heart-burning music; a sound like we’d never heard before.

It seemed in those days that every time we experienced a new worship CD and new corporate worship, the lyrics, the sound, the flow touched us right where our hearts were. The music of the new century is – well, not new. And the difference between the two is palpable. In the ‘90’s, there was movement, there was wind and fire. There was inspiration, a realization that God was among us. In the first years of the 21st century, there is a certain “deadness,” a “staleness,” a “lifelessness” compared with the decade past.

Yet if I hear the worship leaders and the songwriters correctly, they are at a stalemate, not in their spiritual lives, but in their hearing a distinct “sound” from heaven. Blame them if you like, but I don’t believe our worship leaders are at fault in this period of silence.

I think the lack of contemporary, creative, heart-piercing music is suggestive of a larger drama playing out before the eyes of the church world-wide.

What I sense is that the hand of God has been extended – not in blessing, but rather “staying,” silencing the church and her ability to create a clear stream of worship. It is as though heaven were saying, “Stop!” “Hold it!” “Wait.”

I think that God in His mercy, grace and goodness is refusing to allow the train to just charge down the track without direction, purpose and pace.

It's as though God’s finger has touched the “pause” button on the iPod of  His church.

I talk with lots of Christian people, from all kinds of positions in the Body and from different nations, denominations, persuasions and distinctions. I’m with the pastor of an Institutional church one day and with a band of “out-of-churchers” the next. Interestingly, I hear much the same kinds of things from those on all sides of the spiritual-religio bandwidth. They all say similar things: What once worked isn’t working any longer. Sunday morning church is stale; worship is musty and bland; sermons are harder to compose, harder still to preach and   harder yet to find lodging in hearers hearts. Or “We left the church structure, but what we’ve found isn’t any better.”

When a physician examines a patient complaining that “something doesn’t feel right,” a series of tests might be ordered the results of which will be measured against a known “baseline” of “normative” indications and a diagnosis will be made, eventuating in a prescription for recovery.

When the “something doesn’t feel right” amounts to “God’s not speaking, moving, touching like He was,” the  resulting diagnosis may lead to a painful prescription – “Don’t move: Listen!”

When heaven speaks, the Body responds. When heaven is silent, we should  be still.

I believe there is coming a new “sound” from heaven – not simply a new variation on the old; not a new “style” or  beat or rhythm, but an entirely new “sound.” Some might call it an “unction” or an “anointing.” One thing is for certain – when heaven releases the awaited “sound,” the “ear” will hear it.

Until then, this may be a good opportunity for some sorting of our own “stuff,” tossing out “excess luggage” – you know – those seemingly “little” things like wrong attitudes, and wrong actions, bitterness’s, resentments, petty, childish behavior and holding on to the precious principles of spiritual life. God will move and speak and guide in the not-too-distant future. I want to be positioned for His use, ready to move at His command, listening for “The Sound” to come from heaven.

In His Grace,

Greg

Night Lights and Long Flights . . . .

It's late. The night is "far spent." I'm tired; bone-weary. The cup of coffee that has been keeping me company must have been sitting in front of me for hours - I just took a sip and the black liquid is as    cold as rain.

In just about 24 hours I will board another airplane, find another seat, buckle another seat belt, and watch the concrete runway transform itself into blue sky. It's a familiar course we will set: Across      the Cascade mountains, and then the Rockies, followed by the Great Plains and then southward,     across Georgia, coming to rest at Atlanta. I know the terminal there like I know my own back yard.      I'll exit the plane and move to another gate where I'll watch the clock move towards my next     departure time, the interminable waiting more exhausting than driving nails into wood for eight hours. Then another flight will be ready and we'll make our way north, from Georgia's pines to Maine's woods, and then our craft will plunge out over Newfoundland, piercing the airspace over the cold Atlantic, passing by Greenland's white ice mass and Iceland's green valleys. And then, some eighteen hours    after I began my journey, we'll land again, this time in London, England.

My friends there are more family than they are mere acquaintances. We've been through fire and      wind and rain together. I've agonized in prayer with them, waiting to see God's salvation and   deliverance come. They've prayed for me - for my family - during times of crisis and pain. And     together we've watched the hand of God intervene, drive out the enemy, bring healing and strength   and provision and blessing.

This is why I do what I do; why I endure the long, cramped flights and the cold, remote concourses.   It's why I don't mind arriving somewhere, far away, exhausted before I've begun to pour out. It's      why I endure the painful separations from family. Because this is what the church is intended to be.     Brothers, literally, and sisters, walking together, believing together, hoping together, holding one   another when one is weak and one is strong.

I've seen enough of surface, fair-weather Christianity to last a life-time. I'm hungry for relationship,     for sharing good times and bad times, victory and defeat, laughter and sadness, dancing and     mourning with someone who likewise is willing - who desires the same kind of association.

And so, in less than 24 hours, I'll gladly move into the confines of another jet aircraft, strap myself to    a miniature seat and settle in for a journey not to another church, but to family.

What is it you would be willing to do to get to somebody who is real, who is your true friend, brother, sister, companion? May I suggest you just go ahead and do it? I can promise you, the pain of getting there is worth the joy of arriving.

In His grace,

Greg

Note: There is much peace and far less conflict in Northern Ireland today than there was in the late 1990's. We give thanks to God and to the people of Northern Ireland and Great Britain for coming to a place where peace has a chance and much of the aggression, killing and the wounding of the National Heart is giving way to healing. The following is in the context of those days, during the late 1990's when a small band of us - some would call us "Conquistadors of the Impossible" were jousting with the enemy of God - the devil - in Northern Ireland in the meetings that were known as "Fireland".                

Dreamers Of The Day

 "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night
in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find
that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous
men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it
possible."
                    - T.E Lawrence, "The Seven Pillars of Wisdom"

Grace and love like mighty rivers

Poured incessant from above

and Heaven's peace and perfect justice

Kissed a guilty world in love

There's another one we sang over and over in Northern Ireland. I'll share the lyrics in a moment, but first, do you recall these, have you ever heard the names?: South Armagh. Lisburn Barracks. Omagh where my friends were killed days after we left the city. Do you remember or have you heard of Ballyclaire or Londonderry; Coleraine or Antrim, Ballymena, Belfast, Upper Falls Road, Lower Falls Road, Crossmaglen or Enniskillen? Does the name Bessbrookmill mean anything in particular to you? Do you remember Portadown, or Newtownards? Or Bangor - the Valley of the Angels - where St. Comgal planted the longest running 24-hour a day house of prayer and worship since the Tabernacle of David in Jerusalem. Bangor; where three thousand holy men sang and prayed responsively in continual praise and thanksgiving to God for over two hundred and fifty years. Some say that the influence of this community became the very basis of modern Western Civilization. Do you know the story of Coleraine, where a schoolboy went home from school sick and was healed on his way. Revival came from that healing and swept the land. That was a hundred years ago.

We started in a building constructed in the field where John Wesley preached in Hillsborough. There are cows in the field now. It's green grass; rolling meadows. The wind whispers over those hills. It's just another "place" but once Wesley's voice thundered out the grace of God. And we met night after night there and we sang:

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best thought by day or by night
Waking or sleeping Thy presence my light
Be thou my wisdom and Thou my true word
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord
Thou my great Father, I , Thy true son
Thou in me dwelling and I with Thee one

Riches I heed not nor man's empty praise
Thou mine inheritance now and always
Thou and thou only first in my heart
High King of heaven my treasure Thou art
High King of heaven my victory won
May I reach heaven's joys, O bright heaven's Sun
Heart of my own heart whatever befall
Still be my vision O Ruler of all

I wrote in my journal in those days: "And now the pain; the broken lives and destroyed families. The distrust and the    ache that rises up when cemeteries are passed by. Religion is a killer. Jesus is the Healer. Northern Ireland, America, England, the Republic of Ireland, Wales, Germany, Croatia, Latvia, the World needs a Harbor and not a Holy Hierarchy. The earth cries for a Refuge and not the cloak and the cancer of Religion. There is a generation that calls forth the Dreamers of the Day. A people, young, unspoiled, untouched by the edicts of spiritual politicism and untainted by the deadly stupor of a lifeless Institutionalism languishes, cries for the Fathers, looks to you and to me to find not merely Dreamers, but Doers of His Word in this hour.

. . . . the dreamers of the day are dangerous
men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it
possible.

I think we must do it. I think someone must do it. I think the time of aimless dreaming, of pointless scheming is past. I think we must act on our dreams with open eyes; make it possible for the generation - for this generation.

Greg

What Does One Say When There is Nothing to Say?

We've become such a noisy people, and with all our noise, we hear so little.

We talk and laugh and sing and shout and increase the volume of our radios and television sets and mp3 players in order to hear over the other "chatter" of life that pulsates and pounds at our ears and our minds and our hearts.       

We’ve nearly lost our appreciation for gentle silence.

And yet, so often, it is in the silence that God speaks. When we’re calmed and quieted, when we’re hushed and serene, somehow, that “still, small voice” can be discerned: The Voice that is so easily drowned by the sheer Volume of Life.

I have grown quiet in the past several weeks. In the stillness and silence I’ve groped for “something to say”,  something to produce, something to offer in this little column, but for all my investigations into this subject or that theme, I have heard nothing......but silence.

I stood a few days ago on the banks of a cold, flowing river in Alaska. It was early morning; the day had not yet   been imprinted with Noise and I stood silently, watching, gazing, observing. Looking above, the high snows of a mountain’s summit shimmered in pure and blazing white; untouched by the footprint of man or the detritus of creation’s Creation. At my feet, like a magnet a current pulled at waters flowing from the lake above me to the ocean below me.

I listened to the quiet, and in hearing the indiscernible, perceived a hush of wind, whispering through the thick pine forest just across the river.

And I thought of the unchangeableness of the sound of the wind in the trees. A hundred years ago, the sound was the same; a thousand years ago, from the time the first forest grew upward on the ridgeline above, the sound had not changed. What I heard, standing there on an April’s morning in 2005 was heard by passing bears, moose, swans and geese for a millennia. I was not alive, was not conceived and the Sound had remained the same. Kings and Rulers and Potentates rose and faded and disappeared and the Sound remained the same.

In all of the time of history’s passing, the sound never changed.

And standing there, with nothing but His creation around me I “heard” the Voice, still, small, persistent;                      ".....Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.”

And standing along that riverbank, in the early morning light and silence, I thought I heard another voice; an anthem, a choir, a song:

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

What does one say when there is nothing to say - When  there is nothing to declare, nothing to announce, nothing to proclaim?

What does one do when God’s silence preaches a sermon louder and more powerful than any human voice ever pronounced?

Along a riverbank, in the midst of the silence, booming out of the cavity of nothingness, exploding from the hush of emptiness, His Voice speaks when He is not speaking. . . .

“Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever You had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.”   

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with  whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”

There is no problem, no difficulty, no circumstance beyond His knowing about or out of reach of His hand to repair, to heal, to resolve.

What does one say, when there is nothing to say?

In His Grace,

Greg

on a mission in the midst of the noise

"Meaningless! Meaningless!"
says the Teacher.
"Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless."

What does man gain from all his labor
at which he toils under the sun?
Generations come and generations go,
but the earth remains forever.
Ecclesiastes 1:1-4
 

It’s noisy outside today. The press of humanity makes it so.
Loud cars
Loud music
Loud voices
Loud people

I yearn for a quieter dawning.

Wind Whistling,
   Whispering,
          on its way through valley and forest: Its melody rising to meet the harmony that man grasps hard to reach but never achieves.

I relish the remembered sound of cold snow crunching underfoot; of ice creaking as it claims dominance
over fast-flowing streams.

Or the lone call of the crow, lifting its wings to depart a nighttime roost in the early morning, taking flight on the wings of the wind, searching out sustenance to energize another day’s requirements.

Sounds in my mind, drowned by the Noise of Progress; Evolution; Development; Life.

Moving forward, sometimes it seems we only regress and so become more desperate to find our
essential qualities in the abundance of senselessness.

It’s noisy outside today.
I want to hear the whisper,
The soft murmur of life gently singing in the stream of eternity,
But the clamor obscures life’s sweet melody.

Where is the insulation? Where is the protection from the confusing din?

What does man gain from all his labor at which he toils under the sun? All things are wearisome, more
than one can say.

And then, a still, small Voice.

So it was, when he heard it, that he went out and stood. And a voice came to him, and said, "What are you
doing here? Go, return to the Wilderness; (the Wild-er-ness) and when you arrive, anoint..... 1 Kings 19:11-13

Life is seldom what we’d like it to be. Our minds paint wonderful portraits of the way we would position all the components of our masterpieces, were we God.

But we are not God. We are merely mortal; fragile; temporal; impermanent beings with perpetual souls.

And so we are cast into life’s flow without our permission,
Or asking,
Or liking.

Performers on a stage, we live out our destinies in full view of eternity, asked merely to answer the call of our duty.

To return from our complaints into the Wilderness of life
And to anoint: To pour out oil; to bless; to bring the lubricant of God’s grace into lives devoid of Goodness And Mercy And Truth.

Someone we will meet today, in the midst of the noise, is in need of that anointing, that lubrication.
A broken heart,
A broken family,
A broken dream,
A broken marriage,
A broken image,
A broken life waits for anointing to bring healing.

And we are called today to carry God’s grace, in the midst of the annoying sounds of life, on a mission in the midst of the noise.

In His Grace,

Greg

I've been recently captivated by the awareness that the current generation of youth is largely "fatherless."

So many young men and women seem to be drifting through life, searching, probing, wandering; looking
for something elusive and unknown, unidentified - searching for a father. The following is a call for the
fathers to rise up, to realize their purpose on the earth and to father those whose sometimes raucous and grating cries beg for a man "to stand in the gap" for them.... This, then is for The Men.

  Every Man Needs a Cause    

It’s the way we were made, wired, formed.
We didn’t choose to be this way.
It’s not because dad or mom bought us toy soldiers or toy rifles

Or because we watched The Sands of Iwo Jima
Or Platoon
Or Saving Private Ryan
Or Band of Brothers

Or because we read Sgt. Rock comic books
Or read Guadalcanal Diary
Or We Were Soldiers Once, and Young

Or because of images or profiles or the demands or the expectations of a pressing society around us.

It’s the way we are; the way we were put together.
It’s in the assembly and not because of the neighborhood we grew up in.

We are “cause” oriented. We want to be rescuers, heroes, achievers, doers.

But we have so few role models;
So few to look to.
The examples we’ve seen are largely defective, damaged, destructive.

Our dads didn’t turn out to be the heroes we thought they were, or if they were heroes, They never told us.
They lived busily and died quietly.

We feel alone, unaided, unaccompanied

And we need a Cause, A rationale for
Why we are,
Where we are,
Who we are

We want to stand up and cry “Give me liberty or give me death!”
We want to shout “I regret that I have but one life to give for my country!”
We want to gather with Roosevelt’s Rough Riders at the foot of San Juan Hill
We want to join with brothers, shoulder to shoulder on the summit of Mt. Surabachi, atop Iwo Jima, raising
Old Glory. We want to jump into the skies of France on a June night in 1944 with the Screaming Eagles,
crying “Curahee!”

We want to save a damsel,
Slay a dragon,
Defeat an evil

We want to be Defenders, Liberators, Victors
We want a Cause; our Cause;

A Cause worth living for,
Investing in,
Dying for.

We’re made that way. We don’t just decide one day to find The Cause
We live our entire lives looking for “it.”

And some of us stumble,
Lose our sight,
Lose our way,
Squander our time,
Our energy,
Our lives

Some of us surrender to the grind, relinquish the call, submit to the day to day, lose our passion, get in line
and become just another number in a numberless company moving in silent procession between the cradle
and the grave, wondering all along, where “it” is –

The Promised Purpose,
The Anticipated Action
The Fruit of Boyhood Dreams

And some of us die, having never lived.

But still The Cause is there
And The Cause beckons
The Cause awaits

And for those few, those blessed few who find it, the Cause becomes

The reason,
The rationale,
The purpose,
The point of life

And so, stirring within us,
Awakening from it slumber,
Rising from its stupor

Is the memory of the Dream
And the recognition of the Hope
The Desire
The Need
The Cause

And The Cause beckons.
It Calls.
It Whispers and Shouts and Cries
To those who will hear
To those who can hear
To those who, though dying, are yet alive

“Whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel's will
save it.”
“For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to
the truth.”
“For this purpose I have come forth."

"In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who
works all things according to the counsel of His will,”

And to those who are dying, yet live

He calls
He beckons

His Spirit Awakens
Pursues
Woos

He bids us come,
Follow Him,
Learn of Him,
Imitate Him

“And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”

For the Cause
For the Call
For the Purpose
For the Reason we were Fashioned
Made
Assembled
Born

“stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.”

And answer the Call
For the Cause

Rise up, O man of Destiny and of Purpose and of Promise!
“Rise up from the ambush, and seize upon the city: for the Lord your God will deliver it into your hand.”

On July 1, 1898, Colonel Theodore Roosevelt saw that his attack was stalled. The Americans appear to
be stymied - unwilling to move forward and unable to retreat. Suddenly, Colonel Roosevelt emerges on
horseback from the surrounding woods and rallies the men to charge: He cries, “If you don’t wish to go
forward, let my men pass, please!”

And the men rallied, they sprang into line and they charged....

If you don’t wish to go forward, let My men pass, please!

It’s time
It’s the hour
It’s the moment

It’s the place
And we are the men.....

For the Cause

In His Grace,
Greg
 

Abandoned to be Found

What images do these words conjure for you?   

Abandoned

Deserted

                      Discarded

                              Forsaken

                                      Alone

Whatever impressions emerged or pictures were drawn in your mind as you thought of these words, it is likely that you have also experienced the feelings, the emotions, yes, the hurt and pain of abandonment or rejection.

Perhaps it was a parent – a mother or a father who abandoned you. Maybe it was a spouse or a child or a brother or sister who rejected you. Those you believed were your friends forsook you and you found yourself suddenly and silently alone in your aloneness, shivering in the icy chill of your isolation.

Rejection and abandonment can come in a thousand costumes and speak with myriad voices. The effect, the result produced is always the same:

Rejection brings injury to the soul and anguish to the mind. Abandonment makes the heart grow weak, but more; desertion destroys self-worth. We learn early in life to discard what we do not need; what we do not want; what is not essential or profitable or useful or even acceptable.

Garbage is disposed of; trash is discarded. We keep only that to which we attach value.

An abandoned soul feels valueless, worthless, insignificant, useless.

A forsaken heart is more than empty and crushed and bruised and injured; it is a playground for devils, a gymnasium for demons, a potential abode for the citizens of hell.

From the soil of rejection flourish the sour fruits of bitterness, resentment and, dark, brewing rage. Implacable, stone-hearted and pitiless wrath proceed from hearts that have known the frigid winds of torment spawned by the uncaring, the unfeeling and the unaware.

From such renunciation Americans have become familiar with the name “Columbine” and are now becoming aware of “Red Lake High” in northern Minnesota.

Most rejected and broken-hearted people never pick up a gun or seek to lash out at others. There is no need and no desire. The slow, grinding suicide begun by the deadly injection of aloneness and friendlessness is as deadly as any bullet that ever roared in tortured anguish.

We cannot control if and when or by whom we will feel the lethal claws of abandonment.

What we can do, what we wield control over is our response to rejection. Options exist for the heart that was crushed. Brokenness may come, but annihilation is not inevitable. No soul that was crushed was ever beyond repair.

And there is Someone who knows.....feels..... empathizes.....understands..... cares and Who also possesses the power to heal even the most trodden and crushed heart. It was foretold of Him;

“I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice....He will not cry out, nor raise His voice, Nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed He will not break, and smoking flax He will not quench.”

Who is this shining Knight; this Rescuer of offended hearts? Who is this Champion of the soul Who comes to right those who were wronged and to heal those who’s destruction seemed certain?

He came forth of misinterpreted illegitimacy and was raised in humble anonymity; He came forth from obscurity and moved about in lonely exile. He left His home country and renounced his nobility, He was  self-effacing and pointedly unassuming. He sought nothing for Himself and was content by Himself.

He was “despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.”

It is He Who “will bring forth justice for truth,” and God will hold His hand; “He will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the prison, those who sit in darkness from the prison house.”

And to the One Who promised, “I will hold Your hand” hear the anguished cry from the central cross on that Crucifixion Day of all Days when Innocence was fixed to the Tree of Final Death: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

“Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him....” because He saw your face and knew your brokenness and He anticipated through forsaking Him, your wholeness.

This Man above men, “made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” So that He might see you, find you, know you, touch you, heal you, a bruised reed, tender, delicate, nearly too far gone to be repaired, but repairable in the Hands of a Master Physician.

And when we – you and I – accept and receive healing and restoration and the comfort of friendship with Him, we then carry within ourselves the knowledge, the ability and the sympathy to carry Him to another abandoned, rejected, forgotten heart, “that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

So, we reach to the “least of these.” We find ourselves among “orphans and widows.” We observe pure religion and undefiled before God because we become what He has always been; a Father to the fatherless; a Lover of the unlovely; a Friend to the friendless. A visitor of prisoners and a provider of a cloak, a meal, a home...a heart that knows, that feels, that sees, that understands.

Our Abandonment was essential for another’s Recovery

We were deserted so that we might learn to Salvage

                     Discarded so we could Recapture

                              Forsaken that we might Comprehend

                                         Alone that we might point to the true Companion

What images are conjured in your heart? What scenes play before your mindscreen? Someone has been abandoned, deserted, discarded, forsaken. And who will notice? Who will go? Who will touch them in their brokenness and in their loneliness and Who will bring them to the Forsaken One Who alone has the antidote for this poison of the soul?

In the Shelter of His Grace,

Greg 

Ten Years After . . . .

The date was March the twelfth, 1995. It was a Sunday morning, like so many Sunday mornings before, but unlike any from that day forward. This was the day that God "showed up" in the midst of our church service. Oh, we had thought, we had been certain that God had been with us every time we worshipped. After all, "where two or three" of us "gathered in His Name, there He was in the midst of us." Only today would prove to be a different kind of "in the midst of us."

A young preacher, still wet behind the ears had come to minister that morning. As he was preaching, God "showed up." I wound up falling to the floor. I knew what this was, our church history called it being "slain in the Spirit." When it happened to me that day I would have called it "embarrassing." Laying out for all my congregation to see, I tried to raise myself to the pew only to discover I couldn't get up! It was like a scene from the old TV commercial where the aged lady cries out "I've fallen, and I can't get up!" After the initial embarrassment had passed, I jokingly prayed, "Well, if I'm going to be stuck on the floor, You might as well do something in me." For the next two or three hours (I can't recollect the time span), God seemed to reach into my spirit and begin to pull "things" out. It seemed that He would examine them briefly, shake His head sadly and toss the "things" over His shoulder. After this had gone on for a time, I said, "Lord, if You don't stop throwing things away, there'll be nothing left!" It seemed at that moment that time stopped. I felt as though He laughed in pity and said, "That's the whole point! You've asked me over and over to fill you, but you were so full of yourself, there was no room for Me to fill you with anything; I'm just making room for Me." In the days to come, we would learn to call our experience "renewal."

Today marks ten years since that day. I wish I could tell you that the journey has been enjoyable, that it has been great fun, filled with peace and joy and good memories. I wish I could tell you that when God reaches into a man's life, only good things follow. The reality for me is that these ten years have been filled with pain, sorrow, the ugly kind of pain at looking into a mirror and seeing oneself as he really is. The past ten years have been years of death. Ten years of thinking the process had ended only to discover that there was another level of pride, of self, of rebellion to uncover and to kill. I'd like to tell you that after ten years I've arrived; that the dying is finished. I'd like to tell you that life is now a bowl of cherries.

What I will tell you is that life is better; much better than it's been in all my life. I have more peace, more joy, more intimate friendship with Jesus than I've ever experienced at any point in my life. I have a family that loves me and who I love. I have a life that I never knew was possible to experience. I hear the Voice of my Master, my Friend, my King often in the night hours. He speaks to me in the early morning hours. He talks with me through the day. He shows me secret things - He reveals truth to me. I find myself singing to Him often, without thought, without rehearsal and without embarrassment. Ten years ago I thought I had accomplished something for the Kingdom of God. Tonight, as I write these words, I'm just starting to live.

I hope you live, too, when the dying is done.

In His Grace,

Greg

On War and Reality and Brothers

War isn't like the movies portray it. War isn't neat and orderly and clear-cut: War is messy.

Those going to war need to understand that the brave will turn into cowards while some, thought to be cowards will stand up and be counted. Brilliant plans will become ridiculous babble and simple ideas will win the day. Strength will be discovered where it is least expected and weakness, hidden by careful manipulation will be exposed like a flimsy tarp, blown into the wind by the merciless wash of a helicopter's rotor. And when the day of battle ends and the guns have grown still, tired, silent men will look into one another's eyes and know - they will be brothers from this day on.

Look around your town today; does it appear that America is at war? Probably not. The War on Terror is being not fought on conventional battlefields by conventional means. This war is largely unseen, yet more deadly in its potential for destruction than a marching army; the nearly invisible war on terror is a reality although most of us have never seen an enemy combatant or heard the angry sound  battle. And while we don't see the battles, we witness the devastation left in their wake. New York City, The Pentagon, Pennsylvania, Afghanistan, Iraq, Spain, Indonesia. These names awaken terrible memories of death and destruction, of sorrow and grief beyond words.

But there is another war, deadlier in its execution, more insidious than any terror network that wages war daily everywhere in the world. It is the war for the souls of mankind. We may never see our enemy with our natural eyes, because he is invisible; yet we feel the effect of this war, calculated in broken families, destroyed lives, wrecked dreams, crushed and discouraged hearts.

The basic building block of any army is the individual soldier; but soldiers seldom fight for grand causes or for lofty ideals. From history's first war until now, soldiers have always fought for each other. What is needed in this deadly war of the spirit are brothers who fight for each other; sisters who war alongside sisters. What heaven is seeking is an army, an army of brothers, soldiers of the cross who will rise to the challenge of heaven, who, "out of weakness will be made strong, become valiant in battle, turn to flight the armies of the aliens . . . ."  And when the battle has ended and the guns have grown still, tired, silent men will look into one another's eyes and know - they will be brothers from this day on.

Greg

Curing Neurological Disorders

"We are a nation that is unenlightened because of religion. I do believe that. I think that religion stops people from thinking. I think it justifies crazies. I think flying planes into a building was a faith-based initiative. I think religion is a neurological disorder. If you look at it logically, it's something that was drilled into your head when you were a small child. It certainly was drilled into mine at that age. And you really can't be responsible when you are a kid for what adults put into your head." Bill Mahre, February 15, 2005

I sat up and listened this week as Bill Mahre put himself in the media spotlight with his remark that “religion is a neurological disorder.”

My initial knee-jerk reaction was to get angry with Mahre and condemn his statement until a commentator brought me back to reality with this; “we must distinguish between “religion” and “faith.”

If you've studied world history, you know that it was the socialist Karl Marx who said, “religion is the opiate of the masses.”

John Lennon’s famous song, “Imagine” talks about “nothing to kill or die for and no religion too.

Christians have long had problems with the likes of Marx, Lennon and now Mahre – but perhaps we need to take a closer look at what's really being said by non-religionists and ask if there might be grains of truth in their bushels of attack.

I’m not defending Bill Mahre’s position on God or his politics. I certainly am not a follower of Karl Marx or a proponent of Lennon’s philosophies, but there is something in their statements that underscores a truth that is emerging from the “fog of war” that exists between  spiritual, religious and secular segments of society. Notice the differentiation between “spiritual” and “religious,” the distinction the commentator quoted above noted.

I don’t believe most non or anti-religion people really have as much a war with God as they do with religion.

Years ago, I heard Dr. C.M. Ward – a conservative Pentecostal Christian leader say “The tendency of religion is to muddy.” I didn’t fully appreciate his words then. Much later I really looked hard at what Jesus said about religion: “...you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition.” (Mt. 15:6).

I remember someone, back in college days telling us “religion is man’s attempt to get up to God; Christianity is God reaching down to man.” That’s why we’ve often said to non-Christians “we’re not talking about religion, we’re talking about relationship with Jesus. "Christianity is not a religion," they would intone," it is a relationship with a Person, Jesus Christ." But really, we, the collective "us" of Christianity have twisted our faith into a religion as surely as ancient Israel created for themselves a king just like the other nations around them had.

The word “religion” has an interesting etymology: It comes from the Latin religio, which means both “supernatural constraint” and “religious practice,” perhaps from religare to restrain. The root of the word also gives us the word “rely” which means to be dependent.

Think about that for a moment: Religion restrains and causes dependency.

Restraint is defined as “a device that restricts movement.” Jesus said He had come that we might have life and life more abundant; yet millions of people who have come to the church to find God and to find a relationship with heaven have also walked away in varying degrees of disappointment frustration and confusion.

Some, as Bill Mahre had religion “drilled into your head when you were a small child. It certainly was drilled into mine at that age.”

Sad, isn’t it? The thing that was sent to give life, to bring liberty and to set us free was corrupted and twisted into something that is “drilled into” heads of small children: “restraint” and “dependency.”

I guess religion was drilled into my head when I was young. Like many people of my generation I attended Sunday School and Church and all the attendant meetings, programs and services. But when I was 21 years old, I met a Person named Jesus. I discovered that God liked me, that He wasn’t angry with me, and that He intended to be my best Friend in this world and my Companion one day when I step out of time into eternity. I found a relationship and the relationship displaced religion.

The more I think about Bill Mahre’s comments, whatever else he means or intends by them, I’m beginning to agree with him, “I think religion is a neurological disorder.” I would recommend to Mr. Mahre and to everybody who has a problem with religion – meet a Man named Jesus; He specializes in healing neurological disorders.

In His Grace,

Greg

What We Want.....

We're not cute; I know. We don't use "cutting edge" graphics; I know. We haven't employed  "trick" designs and we haven't used the current "buzz words" of emerging church language to communicate our message to you. We don't use titles such as "apostle" or "prophet" to describe ourselves because, to us, we're just people with names given us by our mothers and fathers and we're much more comfortable on a first-name basis.  I know, we don't seem "cool." Maybe we're not "cool." And if we're not, I don't care that we're not.  Being "cool" isn't our objective; it doesn't even appear on our radar. 

We want to be accepted by God. 

We want to accurately represent Him to the world around us. 

We desperately want to walk in close relationship with Jesus. 

We want to effect our world with His presence, Spirit, anointing, touch, healing.

I know, we're not "cool." And that's really ok with us, as long as the moment appears when we hear Him say to us; directly to us, "well done, thou good and faithful servant."

So if you're looking for "cool," do a Google search. If you're looking for the reality of a group of people given entirely to the single purpose of pleasing Him, we invite you to join with us on our quest to see the church that Jesus promised He would build.

That's the Emerging Church that this site talks about so incessantly and so passionately. It's the church we invite you to join.