courage

"be courageous."

I have said it, had it said to me...we named our son Caleb, which has as one of its meanings, courageous.

Is courage a spiritual quality? Or a natural quality? Do some people have it and some don't?

Stumbled across this in some reading late(very late) last night. The word courage comes from the Latin word cor, which means "heart". A courageous act is an act coming from the heart. A courageous word is a word arising from the heart. The heart, however, is not just the place where our emotions are located. The heart is the centre of our being, the centre of all thoughts, feelings, passions, and decisions. The womb of our dreams, the place of our DNA(who we were meant to be as His kids). Being courageous is living with your heart. Putting it all on the table and givin er...

follow me for a sec...

We catch glimmers. Had a conversation regarding religion once...and it made me think about that word in its best sense. James talks about religion of value, so lets pursue that for a little bit. Religion is something that describes an area of our life and experience where in some way or another we have stumbled into a mystery and heard a summons to follow. An encounter that overwhelms us in that we have glimpsed something(Someone) so far beyond us and bigger than us that we are captured.

I think in some way we are all mystics. What do I mean? Inside all of our hearts there is a hunger for the supernatural...the taste, the touch, the feel, the awareness of that which is beyond...sort of yearning to journey towards that which we will never fully understand or see until we reach the destination.

You see, we have all seen more than we let on, even to ourselves. Through moments of beauty or pain we catch glimmers of what the "saints" or "hero's" of the faith were absolutely fixated by...but what captured and held them...we tend to go on as if nothing happened. No pause. No reflection. Little more than a pulse fluxuation.

Come on. Stop pretending you don't know. Relationship break up - cry for a day, find a new one. Sharp word spoken in anger to you - speak one back and move on...I mean, how dare they(and don't forget telling lots of people about their rudeness). Loneliness - pick your medication...food, TV, porn, work, people. Insecurity - find something that you are good at and don't venture out ever again. Summer Camp - powerful touch from God, but back to school...I mean you have to live real life. A Divine Moment where God once again stirs the dreams of your heart - find a way to stuff them back in and move on, cuz I mean, its not reasonable to think that stuff...are you following me yet?

We find ways to regain control...regain the flatline. when a truly alive, courageous heart has peaks and valleys...highs and lows...regularly...and all of them filled with the awesome, overwhelming, mystical reality of the true Lord Jesus...not our fake, serene looking deadpan Jesus...the one in most paintings.

To allow something to be as it is...something HAS happened, even though we are not sure what it is, or where we are supposed to go with it...well, that is what this journey of FAITH is all about. Don't shut it off. Don't shut it down...let it be what it is and embrace it...Because He is in the middle of all of it. Does it mean we live by emotion? No, we live by following the LIVING WORD...and feeling the tension, struggle, hardship, joy, exhilaration of the incredible journey we call FAITH!

Almost done...hold on. back to the beginning. courage. living with your heart. not your head. wait wait wait...for all you pragmaticals(new word...look up pragmatic and you will get my drift) I am not saying that you should live off of whims, but honestly, so many of us are so far from that it is no danger at all. Maybe a few of us jumping of mountaintops could swing us back into balance...chuckle.

living with your heart. What did God say to Joshua? 7 times in 3 chapters. BE STRONG AND what?

yeah. my translation? let me give you the strength to live out the dream(s) of your heart. a promised land. ignore the nay sayers, the people who will never believe and RUN.

the key? Don't shut your heart off. Your heart speaks the language of courage.

And the pain? and the joy? that is a part of the pursuit? do something with it. write. paint. speak. sculpt. design. do. Let your heart feel and breath and speak and sing...in the words of the martyr Jim Elliot, "wherever you are, be all there, live life to the hilt."

Let me leave you with a story I read about Blaise Pascal. No room to tell you who he is...look him up.

After he had died a servant found this paper sown into his jacket "since about half past ten in the evening until half past midnight. Fire. Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace." This great man, stammering it out like a little child. But he had to...its what we do when we are courageous...we find a way to get it out.

read the book of Joshua...or at least the first 5 chapters...you'll see what I mean.

yearning,

Jonathan

beauty and creativity

Trust.

Creativity.

What are the first things that come to your mind when you think about those two words?

The first thing that comes to my mind is failure. how we deal with failure and mistakes is actually the best measure of the level of trust in a community. When you trust people, you will always find a moment when you’ll be disappointed, where someone has failed or really made a wrong choice. We can use it as a basis to not trust people...and end up using it against them.

All this leads me to ask questions like, have we learned to love in such a way that people feel incredibly free to fail? Have we created places that are safe...where you can roll the dice, risk it all and make a terrible mistake? Are we creating environments that are based on confidence in God and in people? Or are we creating places that are filled with fear?

Can we learn to create places that are full of love and freedom? I am learning that the more people I love, the more I make decisions that are not based on myself. I look at people who rape, cheat, steal...and in that moment of their lives, they’ve decided that their personal satisfaction as more important than all the pain they might cause everyone else their actions touch....

The more people you love the more difficult it will be for you to make life destructive decisions. Seems to me there is a Jesus message in their somewhere. I get asked lots about how to grow your faith. And I am learning it has alot to do with how much I value me. Mother Theresa said it like this:

If faith is lacking, it is because there is too much selfishness, too much concern for personal gain. For faith to be true, it has to be generous and loving. Love and faith go together, they complete each other.

One of the interesting thoughts I have been wrestling with lately as I have been thinking about freedom is "control". How much control should anyone have? What I am realizing is that every organization, group, community, team, etc. has tight control somewhere. All of us have had experiences with organizations that want to control the end product. Maybe what we should be pushing for instead is having a high control over the quality of people we trust. When I trust a person’s character, I can let them have an immense amount of freedom—knowing that even they will not always make the best decisions, because wisdom is something you grow in. I see God calling us to become tight in our control of character, not behavior.

Unfortunately, so many of us are so afraid of making mistakes that we don’t; that’s why so many people that I have talked to say they are not creative. The creative process always dies in the atmosphere of fear. Because creativity and failure are twins.

Chuck Swindoll said, "In vain I have searched the Bible, looking for examples of early believers whose lives were marked by rigidity, predictability, inhibition, dullness, and caution. Fortunately, grim, frowning, joyless saints in Scriptures are conspicuous by their absence. Instead, the examples I find are of adventurous, risk-taking, enthusiastic, and authentic believers whose joy was contagious even in times of full trial. Their vision was broad even when death drew near. Rules were few and changes were welcome. The contrast between then and now is staggering."

In the leadership push of the last ten years, we have been taught to focus on excellence. The last couple of days has taught me something. Ready? When your focus is excellence, and your focus is execution—in terms of it having to be executed precisely so it’s efficient—excellence and efficiency actually become enemies of the creative process. Maybe instead of talking about finding ways to be creative in effectively administering the mandate of the gospel...we need to be finding ways to express that which is beautiful about the Gospel. Calling people who are weary, worn, overwhelmed and overcome by the darkness of sin to the majesty of a wondrous Savior who is able to bring His light into the darkest night. And when His light appears in the darkness, the darkness cannot stop it...redemption happens.

As the people of God, we are all artists. Our lives are the painting of God crying out to a world with His love, with the powerful message of redemption! Is it clean, sterile and disinfected process? no. Efficient? no, but really, art is never efficient...but it does move our souls. We are His masterpiece. What is more moving than a redeemed life living with joy and wild abandon in following the dream of His Kingdom?

I don't want to live with fear...trying to find rules and regulations to control "end products". We are stretching to base our entire life mission on the reality of Jesus actually transforms people. So much so that I feel no pressure to try to make people act or be a certain way. I’m banking everything on the fact that Jesus is the redeemer of broken lives.

Maybe that's what faith is. Banking it all...on Him.

"Faith is a living, bold trust in God's grace, so certain of God's favour that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it. Such confidence and knowledge of God's grace makes you happy, joyful and bold in your relationship to God and all creatures. The Holy Spirit makes this happen through faith. Because of it, you freely, willingly and joyfully do good to everyone, serve everyone, suffer all kinds of things, love and praise the God who has shown you such grace."
Martin Luther

the unveiling

check out my photo blog - my unveiling of my first assignment with waves coffee company has been printed!

woo woo. :)

tracey's photo blog

check, check it OUT.

i just found my passport

hey...
during our time together on friday night, i was struck by something that i thought i'd try to blogicate.
we talked about a myriad of things...and struggled with the idea of what Christ meant when he told us to seek or set our hearts on his character and kingdom. what struck me as we talked is that, no matter how much i've read and studied the gospels, i think i've always held subconsciously to the idea that this 'kingdom' that jesus always talked about was surreal, cognitive, ethereal, heavenly, to-be-realized-in-eternity. and while i've read lots of the same books as many of you and heard some good people talk about bringing his kingdom to earth today...a thought struck me.
you ever think about how 'the kingdom' is really God's only plan for making things right? you ever think that while Christ came and salvaged all of creation from eternity's scrap yard...he still talked incessently about this 'kingdom'...this notion of a world made right in the wake of his followers?
what i realized clearer than ever before [and perhaps it's quite redundant] is that 'the kingdom' jesus talked about was made for you and me and everyone else. christ's teaching of a new way of living and a transformed way of experiencing wholeness is for me. it's not for the spiritually elite who are able to decipher the secret code...and it's not for those who've worked their way to the top.
and that made me think about when jesus was teaching and said that, '...the kingdom of god is in you.' you ever realize that christ came to restore a long forgotten kingdom...long forsaken and over-grown...long ruled by tyrants and dictators...long held captive in the broken hearts of people like you and me? and then did you ever trip over the fact that THIS kingdom is God's MASTERPLAN to make all things right again? isn't that crazy?
ya...it is crazy. but there's nowhere else my heart feels at home.
sw

hats off day

on hastings street, here in north burnaby, they have every year a day they call "hats off" put on by the business association in "the heights", the business district along hastings.

they have a parade, they block off the entire street for about20 blocks, vendors and business come out on the street, lots of things to do and see.

it's a great community event!

so scott & hayley, erin, and me and the kids made our way down there..it was cool.. there was also an antique car contest, so a bunch of rods were out..oh my dad would have loved it!

so here's a few of the pics:

hats day off - june 2, 2007