thoughts on having the blues…

I used to read Spurgeon’s Lectures to My Students. I have not for a while, but I saw this online this morning:

“The lesson of wisdom is, be not dismayed by soul-trouble. Count it no strange thing, but a part of ordinary ministerial experience. Should the power of depression be more than ordinary, think not that all is over with your usefulness. Cast not away your confidence, for it hath great recompense of reward. Even if the enemy’s foot be on your neck, expect to rise and overthrow him. Cast the burden of the present, along with the sin of the past and the fear of the future, upon the Lord, who forsaketh not his saints. Live by the day, by the hour. Put no trust in frames and feelings. Care more for a grain of faith than a ton of excitement. Trust in God alone, and lean not on the reeds of human help. Be not surprised when friends fail you: it is a failing world. Never count upon immutability in man: inconstancy you may reckon upon without fear of disappointment. The disciples of Jesus forsook him; be not amazed if your adherents wander away to other teachers: as they were not your all when with you, all is not gone from you with their departure. Serve God with all your might while the candle is burning, and then when it goes out for a season, you will have the less to regret. Be content to be nothing, for that is what you are. When your own emptiness is painfully forced upon your consciousness, chide yourself that you ever dreamed of being full, except in the Lord. Set small store by present rewards; be grateful for earnests by the way, but look for the recompensing joy hereafter. Continue, with double earnestness to serve your Lord when no visible result is before you. Any simpleton can follow the narrow path in the light: faith’s rare wisdom enables us to march on in the dark with infallible accuracy, since she places her hand in that of her Great Guide. Between this and heaven there may be rougher weather yet, but it is all provided for by our covenant Head. In nothing let us be turned aside from the path which the divine call has urged us to pursue.”

HT: DashHouse

an Irish prayer

“May green be the grass you walk on,
May blue be the skies above you,
May pure be the joys that surround you,
May true be the hearts that love you.

May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of his hand.”



music Monday (a day late…)

in case you missed it on Sunday night, here it is again…

U2 on YouTube – Live from the Rose Bowl

prayer for the week

…came across this prayer & it made me think of my good friend Chad, who has a huge heart to make a difference in the lives of the children of this world.

Ever-watching Father:
we pray for the suffering children whom we do not see.

We know that your eyes see their tears,
that your heart knows their sorrow,
that your hands can reach them now.

We remember that Jesus was once a child,
that poverty stole his bread,
that tyrants sought his life,
that his mother tasted tears.

We ask you to send friends for the lonely,
food for the hungry,
medicine for the sick,
saviors for the enslaved,
rescue for the perishing.

Give us the wisdom to do our part,
share our possessions,
leave our comforts,
lend them our voice,
send them our food,
love them with more than prayers.

We call on you in the name of your child Jesus.
Amen.

HT: KingdomPeople

praying with Brueggemann

At the dawn

Our first glimpse of reality this day, everyday, is your fidelity.
We are dazzled by the ways you remain constant among us,
in season, out of season,
for better, for worse,
in sickness and in health.
You are there in watchfulness as we fall asleep;
You are there in alertness when we awaken, and we are glad.
Before the day ends, we will have occasion
to flag your absence in indifference,
but not now, not at the dawn.
Before the day ends, we will look away from you and
relish our own fidelity and our virtue in mercy,
Now, at the dawn, our eyes are fixed on you in gladness.
We as only that your faithfulness
permeate every troubled place we are able to name,
that your mercy
move against the hurts to make new,
that your steadfastness
hold firmly what is too fragile on its own.
And we begin the day in joy, in hope, and in deep gladness. Amen.

-Walter Brueggemann

about last night… & a quote

Last night at Kairos, God did something. Not sure of all the things the spirit did in people’s hearts, but I know god did something in my heart.

There was openness and honesty and acceptance and grace. It was a beautiful thing.
We shared secrets last night with one another. Secrets that some would never even whisper in the dark, but they wrote them down and opened up their hearts.
I was honored to be let in on some deep, hard, messy, broken things in people’s lives.

I shared this quote last night by Frederick Buechner, who is one of my favorite authors:

“I have come to believe that by and large the human family all has the same secrets, which are both very telling and very important to tell. They are telling in the sense that they tell what is perhaps the central paradox of our condition—that what we hunger for perhaps more than anything else is to be known in our full humanness, and yet that is often just what we also fear more than anything else. It is important to tell at least from time to time the secret of who we truly and fully are—even if we tell it only to ourselves—because otherwise we run the risk of losing track of who we truly and fully are and little by little come to accept instead the highly edited version which we put forth in hope that the world will find it more acceptable than the real thing. It is important to tell our secrets too because it makes it easier that way to see where we have been in our lives and where we are going. It also makes it easier for other people to tell us a secret or two of their own, and exchanges like that have a lot to do with what being a family is all about and what being human is all about.”
— Frederick Buechner (Telling Secrets)

Sunday prayer(s) for the week

I am no longer my own, but yours.
Put me in any place of service,
rank me with any type of people;
Put me to work,
put me to suffering.
Let me be useful for you
or laid aside for you,
exalted for you
or brought low by thee.
Let me be full,
let me be empty.
Let me have all things,
let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things
to your pleasure and for your use.
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
you are mine and I am yours.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.

- John Wesley, adapted
(HT: Kingdom people)

Savior of the world, teach us to follow your example and love as you have loved.
Reveal yourself through your word and allow your spirit that dwells within us to
guide and comfort us. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

Saturday links

Tim Keller blogging. Lets hope so !!

Crazy story of how many millionaire athletes go broke

Maddening, ongoing story of Polanski…

Another take on it…

The most difficult aspects of pastoral ministry

follow-up to Rob Bell’s definition of ‘evangelical

the Informant – ‘unbelievable’

Caleb & I went to see the Informant:

A movie, like life, is always about ‘expectations’. Caleb was studying at a coffee shop & he texted me last minute & said – ‘dad, lets go see a movie’ – so we did. I saw the trailer, and I admit that I am a huge Matt Damon fan (from the Bourne movies, to the Oceans 11 movies…) — he has great acting chops.

So my expectations with this movie were really high. Maybe because of that, I was left wanting more….
It was not a bad movie, just not a great movie I felt like.
There were a number of funny scenes mostly involving Damon talking to himself (portraying Mark Whitacre), but not enough to be a great movie.

Here is the blurb from Warner Brothers:
“What was Mark Whitacre thinking? A rising star at agri-industry giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Whitacre (Matt Damon) suddenly turns whistleblower. Even as he exposes his company’s multi-national price-fixing conspiracy to the FBI, Whitacre envisions himself being hailed as a hero of the common man and handed a promotion. But before all that can happen, the FBI needs evidence, so Whitacre eagerly agrees to wear a wire and carry a hidden tape recorder in his briefcase, imagining himself as a kind of de facto secret agent.
Unfortunately for the FBI, their lead witness hasn’t been quite so forthcoming about helping himself to the corporate coffers. Whitacre’s ever-changing account frustrates the agents (Scott Bakula and Joel McHale) and threatens the case against ADM as it becomes almost impossible to decipher what is real and what is the product of Whitacre’s active imagination.

Academy Award® winner Matt Damon (“Good Will Hunting,” the “Bourne” movies) stars in “The Informant!,” based on the true story of the highest-ranking corporate whistleblower in U.S. history. The film also stars Scott Bakula, Joel McHale and Melanie Lynskey.

“The Informant!” is directed by Academy Award® winner Steven Soderbergh (“Traffic”) from a screenplay by Scott Z. Burns, based on the book The Informant (A True Story), written by Kurt Eichenwald. The film is produced by Gregory Jacobs, Jennifer Fox, Michael Jaffe, Howard Braunstein and Kurt Eichenwald. George Clooney, Jeff Skoll and Michael London served as executive producers, with Michael Polaire co-producing.

The behind-the-scenes creative team includes production designer Doug Meerdink, editor Stephen Mirrione and costume designer Shoshana Rubin. The music is by multiple Oscar® winner and nominee Marvin Hamlisch (“The Sting,” “The Way We Were”).

Warner Bros. Pictures presents, in association with Participant Media and Groundswell Productions, a Section Eight-Jaffe/Braunstein Enterprise, “The Informant!” –© Warner Bros”

loneliness (quote of the day)

here is why we are doing, what we do…

“The greatest disease in the West today is not TB or leprosy; it is being unwanted, unloved, and uncared for. We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread but there are many more dying for a little love. The poverty in the West is a different kind of poverty — it is not only a poverty of loneliness but also of spirituality. There’s a hunger for love, as there is a hunger for God.” –Mother Teresa