Hang Drum...Not Hum Drum

I was cruising around Youtube tonight and totally by accident came across this amazing instrument called a hang drum (pronounced hung drum). Oddly enough it originates not in the Caribbean or Thailand, but in Switzerland. The sound is absolutely mesmerizing and sooo melodic. If you go on Youtube and type in hung drum you'll find tons of videos. This is the video that got me hooked. It actually made me miss the family jamming nights with the Pedersons, Adairs and Toppings et al; those were truly pieces of heaven. I hope you enjoy

Servant Of All

So there I was during worship this last Sunday when the team started to play this song about Jesus being the servant of all. I was drifting in and out of a great prayer/worship/meditate place when all of a sudden this thought really slammed into me.... Jesus servant of all. It opened a door that I haven't really looked into before, at least not for any length of time. This is probably because I spend most of my meditative time being blown away by His majesty, which encompasses His divinity and His humanity but most especially His character. His majesty lifts my eyes up to see Him seated in the heavenlies far above all the riff raff bs that tries to elevate itself in His face. It is humourous to me to see someone try to get 'all up in His face', but that is a rabbit trail for another day. When I think of Jesus as a servant I begin to see a few things more clearly.

1. Jesus doesn't mind the title. The depth of this humilty is unsearchable and yet it is part of the core of who Jesus is. Of all the titles His is given this one opens the door the widest to the character traits of mercy, justice and compassion.
2. This should begin a revolution in my prayer life as the fact sinks in that He is never put out by a request for aid. I have known this before, but not at the level of partnership. It has always been a servant and master kind of thing or at least a teacher and student relationship.
3. This shows up so much of how we structure leadership and how we approach leaders. In fact this may explain why we tend towards a religious mindset so often. Even in our best efforts our tendancy towards religion creep along beside us because we find these parts of God so foreign to our thinking.
4. This makes serving easier. I know that sounds weak and pathetic, but it is true. Knowing that in serving I am elevated with Christ makes it so much more fun. There is nothing threatening about it at all because when I go low I am with Jesus and He is above all pricipalities, powers and names that can be named so there is truly nothing to lose. Sorry if that sounds crass, but I find it very liberating.

I will leave it at that for now because I hear my wife doing the dishes and I want to have some fun too.

Yeah God!

WOW

As I was busily driving around today in the GTR Mazdarati I started to think about a discussion that Cris and I had today. There was a bit of a disagreement which I thought we had resolved and yet something was niggling at me from the back of my bean. Normally I would shelve this as some kind of mental warfare to derail what had been a good day and a seemingly good resolution to a minor crisis, but I have been allowing these things to ramble of late and see what God may be saying in it all. This time He showed me that even in my best intentions I had allowed the blinders to be slipped over my peepers and had acted in a self preserving manner. The issue that we discussed was not what was important, the fact that I put myself first and proceeded with a self justifying mindset is what was important. It blinded me to what was pivotal for my wife.

At this point it is important that I rabbit trail back a few years to a question that I posed to God. It was all about the meaning of holiness. For years I had heard and read about this word, but had little or no real understanding of what it meant in practical terms which made adhereing to 1 Peter 1:16 difficult. After a while it dawned on me that I could actually go to the source and ask God what this word meant (duh). He replied that holiness is the complete, undivided, unwavering and unending devotion to the object of your love. This blew me away on so many levels. The particular level I need to address here, though , is my wife.

What I realised is that I had not approached the whole incident from the standpoint of holiness, not to God (whose laws state I am to love others as myself not after myself), nor to my wife (whom I am to love as Christ loved the church). I had to call her back with this renewed perspective and apologise for not seeing what was important to her and actually acting like it was important. It went well.

I thank God that He is slowly softening my hard bean and dropping in some jewels in the process. I also thank Him for a wife that sees this and is patient. She's solid gold that woman.

I Had To Add This One!!! Go God!!!

I love God stories. Not stories of what people have done for God (YAWN), but stories of what God has done. Wow, what a booster for the faith. Check this story out, I found it on Youtube right next to the other one. Just for kickers, if you have a God story please share it in the comments and I will either post one or comment one of my own. Let's build each other up!

A Good Word From Graham Cooke

No words from me today. I had some good ones I thought, but I can get back to those later. This is a simple message and somehow inside I wanted to go...Yeah,yeah I know that, but I need these hammers to keep chipping away at the walls and objections inside. I hope you enjoy it too.

Post #200......(Pass The Cake Please)

Who'd have thought it would have gone this far? Maybe my wife would, she knows how much I can talk when I get going. Anyway the theme remains the same; unity.

I have been thinking this morning about an email I received from some friends who were attending our missions homegroup. They were very new and seemed to be searching out what they were about. It was good to have them but now they are moving on to other things. In the email they explained that they have been very impacted by the teaching of both Kenneth Copeland and Creflo Dollar and were going to do a video series on some of their teachings. There were some hints at the last couple of homegroups that they may have been going this way so it wasn't to much of a surprise. What did surprise me were the feelings that came up in me. I am somewhat familiar with the teachings that these men have and have fellowshipped closely with other men who have been full on in the word faith movement (please forgive if I use wrong terms here, I'm not versed in all the lingo). When I was in China with jet lag I watched brother Kenneth and Benny Hinn (at 3AM on satellite tv) as well; again please forgive if they are from different streams but the men I fellowshipped with followed both of them and spoke with equal regard to both of them. There was some good stuff there that I enjoyed even more than the irony of watching it from a communist country.

For many years I have spoken my piece against the whole prosperity gospel and generalised about the word faith movement, all the while feeling quite highbrow in my opinions. Now, though, I was tunneling through much self-doubt regarding my own faith walk. I wondered if it was a lack of faith that has me tied up financially and if it has also been blocking the doors to the missions field for us as a family. There were other issues as well, but this is a blog post not a book. So I woke early one morning and set out for a walk to try out this new lesson in silent warfare that God has been teaching me.

As I trundled around the lower Mission area the thoughts came streaming in like a loud TV from next door. I couldn't change the volume, channel or the neighbour so I walked and listened. It became interesting though that although these voices were familiar they were not THE familiar voice I was waiting for...so I walked on. Slowly I became aware of the fact that I have become so attuned to listening to the neighbours TV that the signal coming into my own mind were being ignored. When God did finally speak He shared with me about my faith and stilled my worries. He began to share with me that I indeed have faith for great things, just not the same things as my brother and sister do. I love that God never made it about them being right and me being wrong but rather spoke directly to my place of need. He showed me that I have faith for the people of God to come together as one and faith to see walls of separation come down. I have marginalised this for so long because it wasn't about healing the sick and raising the dead so it was probably just a cop out.

This is the beginning of a change in understanding for me. This is the beginning of seeing for me. I tend to be a very black and white kind of person, and when it comes to the foundations of faith and truth don't expect that to change any time soon. The black and white, though, tended to extend into all things I did not understand and to people whom I didn't get. I am beginning to see more of the truth of what my favourite verse in the bible (Ephesians 3:10) is talking about:

9...and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things;
10so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.
11This was in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord...

I love this verse because it says there are many facets of God's wisdom and that these facets are being reflected through His people. He is showing it to the rulers and authorities that didn't get it when they rebelled from heaven. So now it is our chance to show it off. The catch is that none of us has the capacity to show it all off. We need others to show the parts we are not called to show. If I look to the apostles I quickly see that even those who were with Jesus for 3 years never assumed that they could do it all themselves nor that they were expected to fulfill all the offices and duties of the church. So now I look around and I see so many unique calls and duties that God has given to His children. I see those who by faith will gain riches for the kingdom and I see those who by faith forsake all riches to go to the darkest places of the world with the gospel. I see those who by faith pray and intercede for people and cities and I see those who by faith evangelise and transform people and cities. There are those who by faith establish radio and television stations to spread the word and those who by faith go to places where there is no radio and television to spread the word. There are those who stand by faith before governments to profess Christ and those who by faith suffer torture by governments for professing Christ. Above all this though I see a vision of a united body where all the parts are working and supplying to one another from the bounties of their faith. I see a body with no divisions of denominations where people of faith give to one another without measure. A body where the rich don't tell the poor to step up their faith, but rather pony up some cash. A body where the intercessor doesn't tell the evangelist to soften his own ground with prayer but rather partners to target and take down strongholds and set prisoners free. A body where the poor don't tell the rich to pack a food hamper but rather bless them to plunder the wealth of the nations for the kingdom. A place where the evangelist doesn't bash the prayer warrior for only opening his mouth in his closet but rather shares his gift and anointing to effect change in the intercessors sphere as well. A body where, as a dear brother of mine always says, we esteem each other as better than ourselves.

Then I ask myself, who wouldn't want to be a part of that????

Return To Silence

Went for a walk this morning and had a heavy heart from two days of taking kidney shots to my spirit. I dearly love the autumn season and my youth spent in the rain in Abbotsford made today a perfect day for a quiet stroll. The leaves are turning and the ground was wet from the rains last night and Sunday mornings are always very still as most people are either recovering from or clinging to the last moments of the weekend.

The thing I found most peaceful about it all though was walking out the revelation God gave me a week or so ago. It happened when I was riding my bike to work the other day with my mp3 player blasting worship music in my ears. I was almost half way to work when the noise in my ears became unbearable and I yanked the earbuds out. In that moment God spoke to me about fear. He reminded me of the question I yelled at Him a while ago regarding the root of my fear of being alone/quiet and especially the fear (silly as it seems) of going to bed early. You see, I always seem to need to watch a movie or play on the computer or have my nose in a book until I can't keep my eyes open anymore and then I finally go to sleep. None of these things are bad in themselves, but they keep me from getting rested and also keep my mind tucked away from God as I drift off. It has troubled me for some time and all my best resolutions have quickly fallen away. Then God spoke to me while riding down the shoulder of highway 97. He told me that the constant noise and distraction was coming from a fear of the voices that come in the silence. The picture He used to drive this home was that of my bike and the noise that it has been making for the last month or so. There was a clunk, clunk, clunk in the bottom bracket that was making me mental since I'm a bit of a perfectionist and things being out of whack make me go out of whack. This noise had actually caused me to stop riding my bike. Every time I thought of hopping on it and riding to work I heard that clunk, clunk, clunk and decided to drive instead. God said that it was the same thing with being alone/quiet and going to bed at night. The noise of the voices that come against me seem unbearable and so I just try to drown them out till I fall asleep or until there is someone else around. I have been afraid of the silence because of the noise.

The voices always come and speak lies and confusion to me. The voices always want to draw me into an argument or into an attempt to draw out enough evidence of my faith to prove them wrong. It is so maddeningly circular and unproductive that I find it easier to just drown them out. The bad thing is that I end up drowning God's voice out too. In all the arguing and babble I couldn't make it out either so it was seeming quite hopeless. Perhaps it was hopeless like Elijah felt hopeless standing on the mountain in the face of the wind and the earthquake and the fire. That must be why he went back into the cave. That is why I go back in the cave, till God comes again and reassures me with the still small voice. This time the voice of God assured me that the storm of thoughts would not destroy me or distance me from Him. He told me that if I surrender to Him in the midst of the storm it will pass. He said I do not need to put up a mighty struggle and valiant rebukes. He told me to just be quiet and He would handle it. So for the past week I have been doing this every day. When I am driving my truck at work I leave the stereo off and when the thoughts start to break on the shores of my mind and the darkness begins to cloud my eyes I simply say to God," See, those are the kind of thoughts that have been messing me up." I'm not sure how, but He then proceeds to still the storms and restore peace to me. It has been absolutely wonderful. The walk this morning was no different. As I walked I just let the tangle of thoughts roll around my head and patiently waited for His voice to clear it all up. It amazes me how clear His voice is when I keep my mouth shut long enough to hear it. It also amazes me how faithful He is to speak when I give Him a chance to say something. Maybe sometimes He just wants to let the storm look really big before He blows it away so that I will know how great He is; not for pride's sake, but for trust.

He is an incredible Dad, how can we not love Him?

Oh yeah, for evidence of just how easily He can blow away the storms I look to Thessalonians 2:8

And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth and destroy by the splendor of his coming.

WOW! He just shows up!!! How easy is that???

To My One True Fan...(How Weird Is That?)

Well, I was reminded in an email that it has been a very long time since I posted anything here so it is with tail firmly tucked that I return to my blog. Truth of it is that during the day I think of so many things I would like to post and yet by the end of the day the creative juice just doesn't seem to be there. I'll try to resurrect at least one of those ideas here and hopefully be a little more consistant in posting future ones.

Of the many things that have crossed my mind lately the main theme has been unity. All of the little stories and blog posts (that never made it here) could be funneled into this one stream. To me it is the most important aspect of our lives as believers and it will be the clincher at that age old trial to see if we really are Christians. I assume you've all heard that one right? "If they were to put you on trial for being a Christian would there be enough evidence to convict you?". If someone actually carried through with this threat (which is how I've always seen that statement) then it seems obvious to me that the burden of evidence would be based on what Jesus said about it all. He said that they would find all the evidence they need in our love for each other. This is always the toughest one though. It would be so much easier if it just relied on the nice things I've done or the number of times I pray a week. Even if it would just be on how I treat people who don't know Jesus it would probably be easier. Somehow when we enter into the fold the bar is raised till it is out of reach. It is like we walk around with a bar held up by a pole in our hand to keep it safely out of reach of ourselves and anyone else. We hold that pole up to people and when they fail to reach it we are released from our responsibility to love and respect them. I don't think we do it nearly so consciously as this, but I do see it happen all the time.

How many times have you been in a service and/or gathering and in a moment of glory wished that all the body could experience God like you were? How many epiphanies have you had in the scriptures and felt sure that it applied to everyone? How many special times have you had with Jesus and felt sure that it should be this way for all.....or at least that one person in particular. Truth is that this reveals in us the desire to cookie cut, the desire that will fight against dropping the walls. Truth is it all appears so noble in the moment too. Truth is God is too big to fit in one expression or epiphany. Truth is that if someone is standing on the same foundation (not a denominational pronouncement of foundational values, but the firm foundation of Christ) than we have before us an opportunity to pull the curtain back a little bit more. We have in that moment a chance to see more of the face of our Lord, a chance to see a side of Him that may not fit our experience or understanding. We need not worry about the difference too much either, because if it is grievous or erroneous it will be borne out in time. If, on the other hand, it is not grievous and erroneous we will have shrunk ourselves to fit into the box we are building. That place is small and always growing strangely smaller.

This post has taken a very long time to write due to the many distractions of a Saturday morning, but I just want to leave it with one question: How many times have you found it so much easier to minister to the lost than to the body?

PS Sorry it took so long between posts Wendy.

Who's A Bigot Anyway?

I may have to apologise for the title of this post, but the question is an honest one.

We talked this morning about a friend who lives and works in East End Vancouver and quite enjoys the life she has there. The problem was in explaining this choice to the friends of her new beau, they were from a different strata of society and could only see the need to get away from that part of town. The kneejerk response was to call these folks out as some shallow end of the pool socialites who don't want to get their hands dirty. That of course is a carefully contrived label, and one that doesn't fit. It doesn't fit because there are too many edges that stick past the real on both sides. I used to live in that kind of circle and I recognise the parts that the label covers and the parts that it sticks past. Those parts of the label are the ones that talk about hypocrisy and shallowness as described by the more street level saints. It has taken a few more years than I would like to get that stuff out of my eyes and now I see that what used to seem like hypocrisy and shallowness are simply different walks of life. The label would fit better if these people weren't like Zacheus, Matthew and Luke, the doctors and lawyers of their day. They weren't rough smelly fishermen, pimps or even roving minstrels; they were the respected ones (or at least richer ones) of their day. Nicodemus wasn't a bluecollar guy either, he was part of the theocratic power structure of Israel. Each one of these men had their lives changed just as much as the prostitute and the demon possessed, and I'm pretty sure that that change looked different for them than it did for the outcasts. It would probably be easier, though, if we could get them to all look the same because then we could wrap our little brains around it all in one neat little package.

Perhaps, on the other hand, it would all be easier if we adopted the principle that Paul did which allowed him to go from the market stall to the halls of power without a noticeable shift in his demeanor or conversation. He seemed to truly treat each person equally. He saw each person as someone in need of a saviour just as much as the next guy. He told us to not look down on others because we were in the same shoes (and would be again if not for constant shepherding). He didn't delineate between classes or stratas. Everyone got a fair shake, everyone heard the gospel.

I also have always found it interesting that when Paul stood before people of power he never told them that they needed to change their policies or take a closer look at social justice, he simply lifted up Jesus Christ. Wow, I wonder what it would look like if I did that all the time?

Yay God!!!!

The Lord is so good. We have prayed and interceded for these S. Korean brothers and sisters for weeks now and God has shown His mercy to all concerned.
Early on as we pressed in and the reports of hostages being killed started to come in the Lord spoke of how extravagant His love is for the Taliban fighters who did the killing. As He sacrificed the life of His own Son for us He showed that He is willing to spend our lives to see others free as well. The testimony of these brothers who gave their lives has gone not only to the Taliban, but to the rest of the world who are asking what provoked them to go to such a dangerous place. The answer rings back: The love of Jesus compelled them to go! This testimony is not lost.
Now we hear the glad news that the rest of the hostages are to be released upon S. Korea's agreement to withdraw troops from Afghanistan (which they were already going to do) rather than the original demand for a prisoner swap. They come home at last! We weep for the loss and we weep with joy for the gain. Welcome home sweet brothers and sisters!!!