Behind the Coffee

A recent investigative report on the making of Brian's Coffee. I found it quite educational.




ps. I made to about 3 1/2 minutes through. I am seriously hoping that nothing *bad* sneaks in the last half. Wouldn't go over well on a pasotrs blog.

The battlefield of the mind

When I finally decided that this process had gotten to the point where I needed to start telling people about the possibility of me leaving, I was numb with fear. Satan takes full advantage of these moments. I was bombarded with destructive thoughts. I imagined that folks would be angry, that they would reject me, that I would jeopardize their faith in Jesus, that this would trigger a rebellion leaving Solid Rock on the scrap heap of failed dreams. It was so much easier for me to imagine those scenarios rather than those marked by, what I'm gonna call painful grace.

I think it was easier for me to dwell on the negative because of the different methods utilized by Satan and the Lord. Satan is in your face. He is loud and obnoxious. He is relentless. You kinda can't miss him.

At the same time Satan is going crazy in your face, the Lord stands still in the background. Simply, quietly repeating the same thing, while making firm, but safe eye contact, "you know what you need to do, trust me".

I did not want to tell one person about what was going on on my inside, never mind 40 people. And it didn't get any easier as the things moved forward, as a matter of fact it got harder. Through it all two things remained constant:
1. Satan remained in my face
2. the Lord kept eye-contact, with a gentle, but very resolute look on His face.

And while my announcement wasn't exactly cause for rejoicing for many, none of the threats that Satan was tossing at me actually happened. Here's the thing...they usually never do.

I also want to add that worship did play a key role in me going about telling folks. I kept focusing on the song, "you are my strength" (video is posted somewhere on this blog) and it really did help.

Tomorrow I hope to talk about this "painful grace" thing. I hope.

grace & blessings,
pjim

some initial thoughts....

I'm still walking around in kind of a fog. Sunday was very awkward and difficult, but I do believe grace was having the last word, which was beautiful.

A lot of feelings to unpack. I'll try to do some unpacking here, but for whatever reason the one thing I'm thinking about now is the new family that was there to witness our...umm...stuff. (Actually, they weren't totally new; the guy had sporadically attended Solid Rock a number of years ago). I wished I was able to grab them after the service.

In talking about this family, someone remarked, "well, we know they'll never come back."

Maybe so. Who knows what they were looking for, but my immediate reaction was that I would certainly consider coming back if I was looking for a church for my family, a healthy church in particular.

One judges a church (or a person) by watching their reaction not to good news, but bad (see Job). A healthy church is one that navigates through difficult waters, not perfectly, not "sexily" (forgive me Keri), but with eyes looking to Jesus and a heart full of grace. This is what was unfolded on Sunday.

During our worship service, the new family saw:
1. A pastor who loves his people.
2. A people who love their pastor.
3. A united leadership team determined to keep pointing to Jesus.
4. Grace in action.

I believe the new couple experienced the true spirit of Solid Rock, and the true Spirit of Jesus on Sunday. I think they saw something real, something healthy. To me, I'd rather have that than smoke machines during worship and cappichinos served after the service.

Sunday was so incredibly painful for me, yet at the same time, I found it refreshing and "kingdom-ish".

No, I was not ashamed at all to have guests visiting us last Sunday. I hope to see them this Sunday.

more to come.....

grace & blessings,
pjim

Does the bible really say that????????????????

"You have not been writing many postes lately, m'love."

I woke up thinking (or dreaming) of Gollum having a conversation with himself about the lack of posts recently. I think my kids are influencing more of my life than I had originally thought. Anyways, if God can speak through a donkey, than I guess he can speak through an ex-hobbit. Whatever.....
--------------------------------------

"O Babylon, you will be destroyed.
Happy is the one who pays you back
for what you have done to us.
Happy is the one who takes your babies and smashes them against the rocks.
Psalm 137:8-9.

Imagine doing devotions on that one. Look it up, it's there, God let it in the bible. Jesus did good work scrapping that one from his working list of beatitudes. I can picture it:

Happy are the poor in spirit.
Happy are the meek.
Happy are the pure in heart.
Happy are those who take babies and smash them against rocks.

Good nogo there for sure.

Seriously, what are we supposed to do with that verse? (and similar verses)? It's about as far away from the Jesus that we know than anything we could imagine.

The other day I was dialoguing on my sim baseball message board (imaginesports.com) about faith and someone posted this verse in an effort to reveal the foolishness of believing in the authority of the Bible. Kind of like, "why believe anything that would advocate this behavior?" "Is this, or is it not, the word of the LORD"?

I took the bait and offered my response. Here was my reply to the posters concern:


grooville replied (1 day ago): very likely written by a political prisoner who was painfully remembering seeing his city destroyed. He was overwhelmed with emotion and venting to God.

Psalms are prayers from men to God. Don't confuse them with edicts from God to man highlighting behavior God desires.

The psalms are chock full of statements that aren't "correct", but the point of the book is more about revealing the heart of man (under many different circumstances) rather than a mere listing of things God approves/disapproves.

Another example from a psalm about despair (instead of anger)

PS 13:1 How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?
Did God really forget him? or is he feeling alone?

The point isn't being right. For me at least, these psalms show me that I can be honest before God with my true feelings and not have to put on a righteous "god-face' with the hopes of pleasing him. (Delete)



The conversation continues.....Klement is the person who originally posted Psalm 137

-Klement replied (1 day ago):

There are "inaccurate verses", "untenable verses", "verses that don't deserve to be taken literally", and "incorrect verses", as you and grooville say in the two posts above.

But this is "the word of God," and therefore should not contain all this assorted silliness, a ton of which I won't bother listing here. At one time I, like you, would read it and make excuses for it, and would try to explain it away. Once the amount of strangeness became overwhelming, I permanently set it aside.

-grooville replied (1 day ago): Klement--

I believe there is a difference between making excuses and understanding something in the context in which it was said.

I do not consider a person being frank with God about the condition of their heart "silliness". I consider it refreshing.

Using your method of biblical interpetation, one could argue that the bible denies the existence of God because it contains the sentence: "there is no God."

You could argue that Jesus was a demon because it contains the sentence: "He is a demon." (words directed to Jesus)

You could argue that Jesus was never crucified because the bible says "this will never happen to you" (Matt 16:22) in reference to Jesus' announcement regarding his death.

CIE=context is everything

The book of Job contains numerous speeches from men like Bildad, Eliphaz and Zophar. These men say a lot of things about God. In Job 42:7 God says that their descriptions/definitions of God were inaccurate=wrong. The words of Bildad & friends are in "God's word"--they are "the word of God", but to pull them out of their context and use them in an effort to invalidate or question the authority of the bible (because they are wrong and "God's word" cannot be wrong) is pretty bad hermeneutic.

In the end, I really have no problem with Psalm 137:8-9 being in the bible. I personally find it freeing that we can be that open before God with our feelings, as bad as they might be...and His response is grace & healing.

Nope, no problems here....

grace & blessings,

pjim

bad news/unshakeable faith

I got word yesterday that Mackenzie Lee's dad has been diagnosed with cancer. Mac is a student from Cedar Crest who drives the white van with the flames on the sides. Her family is all up in Maine. Her parents were here at Solid Rock just last week...dad smiling and happy to be visiting his daughter. From what Mac has told me and from the few times I've met them, they are strong in their faith.......

Mac used the word "aggressive" is describing the cancer....just 8 days ago he seemed fine. I guess you never know what's around the corner. Can't be easy sitting in college classes when you're dad has cancer 4 states away....

The whole thing brings Jesus' words about house construction front and center.

MT 7:24 "Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. 26 But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. 27 The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash."

What you build in good times, you lean on in hard times. If what you built is strong, it will support you when the storm comes. If what you built is weak, well.....

My marriage, my kids, my friends, my Jesus. Now is the time to work on these. Yeah, times might be tough, but budget problems are nothing. If cancer is like the storm describes by Jesus above, than financial problems are like fog--they make moving forward a hassle, but if you're careful, you can make it.

What is neat, and is something I'm glad to share is that Mac's moms email was filled with faith. She knows she is not alone. She shared how God was preparing her for this news as she did her devotions the days before the doctors appointment. She was led to mediate on James 1:2ff for three days in a row.

It's apparent that her house is built upon the rock. The Lee's have passed this faith down to her daughter, and this faith will sustain them throughout this storm.

Let's keep Mac's parents (Dick & April) in prayer. Let's huddle around Mac and walk with her on her journey.

grace & blessings

pjim

"Jesus is a Friend of Mine" by Sonseed

I'm not sure how to take this video. Is this a goof? Or...gulp...are they serious? There are just too many things that made me goof as I watched this. Please do not show it to anyone outside the walls of the church.

"In between" times

After I do this, if I don't go downstairs and respond to like 6 emails (which I should do), I'm gonna either read the book of Jonah or read an article on the book of Jonah. Jonah is such an interesting book, and I'm not even thinking about the stupid fish, which takes the focus away from the important matters in the book. I remember having a conversation which a group of Free Methodist pastors and asking the question: "can a good Free Methodist not believe in a literal interpretation of the book of Jonah?" But I digress.....

Jonah will be the last prophet we consider in the prophets sermon series. The end of a sermon series is always a depressing time for me. You get into the subject matter, build up momentum and then "poof", it's over, and you're like "what am I gonna do now?" For two months I was focused and on-task. I felt the "yes!" of God. I knew what He was calling me to do and I was doing it. Now I'm getting back to square one and awaiting my new assignment.

It's an "in-between time" for me.

I do trust that God has good things around the corner, and that the next crop of sermons will be just as meaningful, but these times are still hard because you just don't know what God has up His sleeve.

And it's hard not to know.

grace & blessings

pjim

ps. I'm pretty sure the next series will come out of the gospels.