Holy Week
Holy Week is the week between Palm Sunday and Easter, containing three of the biggest milestones for Christians: the triumphal entry (Palm Sunday), the day Jesus died (Good Friday), and the day Jesus rose from the dead (Easter). But somehow, nearly 2,000 years ago, in a span of just four days, the people of Jerusalem went from celebrating Jesus to demanding His death. What happened?
The people of Jerusalem had a unique opportunity that most of us have wished for at some point in our lives: to see Jesus in action, to sit and talk with Him. But that's also where the problem lay. They witnessed Jesus performing miracles and heard the depth of His wisdom that surpassed human understanding. They saw God in the flesh, and that made them come face to face with the reality that they are NOT God. Imagine if Jesus were to visit our town. At first, we'd all be thrilled, I mean it's Jesus! But how long before doctors would start to resent the lack of patients? My guess is that it wouldn't be long before the clinics shut down and they had to look for new jobs. The more Jesus would do, the less important we would become to the rest of the world. Sporting events wouldn't be quite as much fun when you realize that Jesus did indeed hear what you just said to the referees. When you are constantly around perfection, you are reminded of how imperfect you are... constantly.
Jesus sounds great when He's in the next town and you hear about the wonderful things He's doing. But it's harder to feel the same way when He starts challenging your own life. As Bonhoeffer said, "In the gospels, the very first step a man must take is an act that radically affects his whole existence." Easy Christianity dies when we spend too much time with Jesus. When presented with the option of picking up our own cross or putting Jesus on the cross, the people of Jerusalem made the same decision that most of us would have made. Next Sunday, as we celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus, let's take a moment to reflect: have we allowed Him to radically affect our whole existence? Or would we have crucified Jesus too?
The Return Department
Setting – A clerk mans the desk of the Return Department
Customer: Hi, is it too early to return these New Year’s resolutions?
Clerk: Were they unrealistic or just soul-crushingly awful?
Customer: Does it matter?
Clerk: Of course not! Next in line…
Customer 2: Is it possible to return this negative self-talk?
Clerk: Did you get it from here?
Customer 2: No, I’m pretty sure I picked it up on social media.
Clerk - as she feels around the bags: Let’s see… “I should not eat carbs” and… “I don’t deserve dessert.”
Customer 2: How’d you know?
Clerk: A lot of people are returning these. They’re very unpopular. Next…
Customer 3: Can I return this love-hate relationship with cookies?
Clerk: Do you want to return them both, or just the hate?
Customer 3: I can return just the hate?
Clerk: Yeah!
Customer 3: I love that! I hate the hate.
Clerk: Hate the hate!
If you are a TV watcher, like me, you will recognize these interactions as the scripts from the newest series of Weight Watchers commercials. I love them, all! My first job after college, was working the desk at the Wilbro Customer Service counter in Dothan, Alabama, where I heard every reason imaginable for wanting to return a recent purchase. Wilbro policy was simple. If the customer wants a refund or exchange, just give it to them. No hassles at all. We were as cheerful and as helpful as the clerk in these commercials.
Still, customers always seemed to feel the need to offer a good reason for the return that would not reflect poorly on their own choices. In all the time I worked there, not one customer ever said to me, “I made a mistake buying this” or “I was impulsive and have now decided I don’t need it” or “I really can’t afford this.” Many customers walked up to counter, loins fully girded, as if they were expecting a confrontation. You could tell some of them had been rehearsing their story in the car all the way to the store and practicing for the inevitable escalation of the conflict should we give them any trouble about it. Maybe they had been to other stores where the policy wasn’t so forgiving. Maybe they just carried a little sense of shame to the counter with their return item. Whatever the reason, it was not necessary, and I always took great pleasure in their stunned looks as we cheerfully took the items they didn’t want and peacefully handed over their refunds – the very same looks of relief and surprise we see from the customers in these commercials.
Of course, it all reminds me of church. Oh, come on, you knew it was coming eventually! These commercials tap into a basic need in people to acknowledge and recover from their mistakes and poor choices AND the need for a place where the “associates” understand this happens to everyone AND where there is a process and a policy that can make things right again. We have all of that at church, or at least we should. For all the good we do in our community meeting financial and physical needs, I think our Return Department is the greatest service we can possibly offer anyone.
Isaiah understood this, very well. He tells us in Isaiah 61:3 that the Lord appointed him to seek out those who mourn and trade them beauty for their ashes, oil of joy for their mourning, and a garment of praise for their spirit of heaviness.
What better mission for us to be on during this season of Lent – a time of year we set aside to acknowledge and even to mourn over our sin? I would expect this should be the busiest time of year for our Return Department, which I should also tell you, is equipped to handle much more than just our sin. Our associates understand there many other returns you need to make. Our grief, our betrayals, our depression and anxiety, our finances, our illnesses, our concern for our children, our jobs, and many other things can produce artifacts in our lives we need to return.
People in our community need to know our Return Department is open 24/7 and the boss is always on duty. (If you haven’t already guessed, its Jesus.) His mission and passion is to take whatever we bring off our hands and give us something better in exchange. I heard in a great song once He is available “anywhere we choose to bow.” No need for elaborate stories or fancy excuses. We can leave it all with Him with no judgement. And if you prefer to visit a brick-and-mortar location, our pastor has arranged for the altar of our sanctuary to be open every day during Lent. If you would like for someone to pray with you, we can arrange that, as well.
If that were something we wanted to advertise to our church and our community, our commercial might go something like this:
Setting - Jesus manning the desk of the Return Department;
Prodigal walking up to the desk: I would like to return this reckless living.
Jesus: Not really working out for you, huh?
Prodigal: No, not really. There were a lot of attractive things out there I thought would make me happy, but they didn’t.
Jesus: Yeah, I’m seeing a lot of that this Millennium. Of course, I’ll take back the reckless living. What would you like in exchange for it.
Prodigal: I really just want to go back to my father’s house and work as one of his servants.
Jesus: Well, I think we can do better than that but let me make a quick call.
Jesus hanging up the phone: Yes, go ahead and find your way home, Son. Your father is waiting for you on the road. He has ordered his servants to bring you his best robe, a ring for your finger, and new shoes for your feet. Later today, he will kill the fatted calf and throw a great party in your honor and declare to everyone, “My son was dead, but is alive again. He was lost and is found!”
Prodigal: OMG! Thank you, so much!
Jesus: You are very welcome! Next in line…
Our boss is always able “to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.”
Joy for your mourning.
New lives for old.
Beauty for ashes.
You are not going to find a better deal anywhere!
Grace and peace, my friends.
Kiss
I like to think of myself as a smart person. However, I’m also aware that 65% of people think they are smarter than the average person, which is a statistical impossibility, so there’s this whole other side of me that thinks I’m just an idiot. As I said, I “like” to think I’m a smart person, because it hurts less than thinking I’m an imposter.
There’s a term that I recently learned called the “Dunning-Kruger Effect”, which basically describes why some people think they know everything when they really have no idea what’s going on. If you’ve ever been around a pre-teen, you know exactly what I’m talking about. After a 30 second YouTube video they suddenly know everything there is to know about driving, quantum physics, or investing. There’s a fun little graph that goes alongside the Dunning-Kruger effect. My favorite part isn’t the peak of Mount Stupid (even though I laugh every time I see it) but rather the Valley of Despair. As weird as that may sound, it just resonates with me because I’ve been there so many times. It’s that moment where you just want to throw your hands up and quit because it gets too hard.
As you learn more, you suddenly realize that there is so much more that you don’t know. As our circle of knowledge increases, so does the edge of that circle that touches what we don’t know. And at a certain point, our circle becomes so large that we forget that some core principles were hard fought for and learned.
Karl Barth is probably the most influential theologian of the 20th century. I had the “privilege” of reading seven of his Church of Dogmatics for one of my college courses. Literally thousands of pages explaining God, the Word of God, creation, and reconciliation. His footnotes alone take up thousands of pages. But he was able to sum up everything about his theology in one simple sentence that was turned into a children’s song. “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”
When it comes to reading Barth, I still feel like I’m swelling in the valley of despair. But he did something incredible when he was able to boil it all down to one sentence. In a way, he reminds of when Jesus was asked to sum up all the law and the prophets and he replied with “Love the lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength” and “Love your neighbor as yourself”. Jesus took hundreds of commands, thousands of years of his people’s history, and communicated it’s essence in two easy to understand sentences.
I look at these examples and think “Anyone could have come up with that”, but that’s exactly what makes them so genius. Anyone can understand what they mean. They have taken some of the most complex things and made them easily accessible for everyone. I don’t know if it’s more art or skill to be able to do this, but I know that I want to be able to do that with everything. While on a youth white water rafting trip, our guide asked our kids “What is the Gospel”. After several of them tried extremely hard to give super complicated and accurate answers, one of the youngest girls on the trip spoke up and said “Isn’t it like John 3:16? For God so loved the world that he gave his son?”
There were few moments that made me prouder as a youth pastor than that one. She got it. She was able to take all of the stuff that we tend to overcomplicate it, process it, and come up with the simple answer. When someone asks you why you believe in Jesus, you don’t have to give them a complicated answer. In fact, if you do, you’ll probably end up scaring them away or intimidating them. Instead, keep it simple. Maybe you share a story about when God did something incredible in your life, but keep it to only 3 or 4 sentences. Before God acted my life was like this. God did this. Now my life has changed and is like this. If they want more information, they will certainly ask. Maybe you don’t feel like you have a compelling story, so you just share one or two sentences about why you believe. If you get into a whole apologetics argument they’ll tune you out.
It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking we know everything, but the truth is that the more we learn, the more we will realize how much we don’t know. And so we strive for deeper understanding and somewhere along the line we forget that not everyone has the same background we have. We have to be able to take the knowledge we have gained and be communicate it to others in a way that they can understand, even if they’re in the valley of despair. It’s often the simplest answers that have the greatest impact.
Practice What You Preach
Well, what I'm about to blog about could be more addressed to myself. Whenever I talk to my kids back home I'm always giving them advice on life. Whether it's about living,love or just your typical day to day things. I know as a father I need to be strong and positive about a lot of things that I do or think of. Do I really listen to the words that come out of my mouth when I feed them advice? I'm gonna say, sometimes not. Did I pick the right songs for Sunday worship? Did I say the right words when I'm speaking to the congregation?
Or do I take good care of my vessel that God has given me? I am human so that makes me not perfect. I stress at times because I want to make sure that what I do or say to my friends, family and the folk that come into our church to praise the lord is right. Boy, I really don't know where I am going with this so bear with me. See? I'm doing it again so I will give my heart control of the keyboard and just go with it.
Last Christmas was tough on me. But, I am always up to a challenge and boy did I get one. I have learned a lot about my job and my duties that I have to do to fulfill my obligations. I've learned so much about Christmas. I thought I knew it all but I didn't. My pastor and my colleagues have taught me a lot. Thanks guys and thank you God for bringing these folks into my life. As we get closer to Easter, I now know that this is THE BIG ONE! I'm nervous but with the help and understanding from my church family, I feel more prepared. I'm so ready to rock this! Well, in a contemporary way lol.
I guess what I'm trying to say here is, looking back on all the things I have accomplished with this church and my life has been blessed.. When I speak to the Congregation it's like, Jamel disappears and in comes the Spirit. As with the music, being a father and a husband.
Listening to my colleagues and pastor and getting great advice is awesome. But, watching them practicing what they preach is heavenly. So, back to the top of this blog. Giving my kids advice about life and wondering, am I actually listening to the words that come out of my mouth? Absolutely! Better yet, I have been practicing what I preach. If you believe and you put your trust in the lord, you can accomplish anything! Give yourself the credit you deserve. Especially, when you are giving advice to those who need it. The Holy Spirit will guide you. Thanks for reading folks!
It's About Showing Kids God's Love
One of the things that encourages me the most about God’s character is His love for us; and there is no other time in the life of an individual more important than a child’s in which love is needed to help them nurture and grow. As a teacher for about 9 years prior to coming on staff at our church, I found that the students that came from the strongest family backgrounds had a greater chance to find success in school and home life. Not to say that a family would not have its struggles or deal with all the “junk” life throws our way. But the parents that were the most involved in a child’s social-emotional health and well-being were the ones that saw their child continue to make progress in other areas. That’s why its so important for families to begin modeling that love and nurturing way before they step into the front doors of a school at 5-6 years old.
Developmentally speaking, children are way more concerned about the issue of being safe and loved before they are concerned about any other issue. It’s during this stage between infancy and early childhood that the brain needs to be constantly reminded that the body’s well-being is taken care of. It’s the first question our tiny brains are asking when we come into this life: “Am I loved?” We are solely concerned about being taken care of. Think about the main reasons why a baby cries; it either wants food, sleep, or attention (love). And parents are the first example in a child’s life that will model love.
Of course, as they get older modeling love can be harder. The tantrums start, the talking-back starts, the irritability over less important things start… oh wait, am I still talking about children or God’s children? See where I’m heading with this? Unconditional love that the Father shows us is a model for how we should care for our children. It’s not easy, and it doesn’t mean we don’t correct when needed. But that’s how important love is.
God’s unconditional love is selfless; it remains constant regardless of circumstances. In the Bible, love is not a feeling or emotion; it is something we see in action. Love has arms and legs that serve. Love is the disciplined will and resolve to seek the welfare of others. Selfless love motivated Jesus Christ to abandon heaven’s glory. Love allowed Him to wash His disciples feet and willingly take a lowly position. Love kept Him on the cross, paying for the sins of His beloved. God calls us to show agape love to one another, a love that selflessly gives without expecting anything in return.
So how do we do this with our kids, or the kids in our care at church?
Model selfless love (1 Corinthians 13:4-7). Children need undiluted affection that consistently mirrors the qualities described in the “love chapter.” God’s Spirit empowers us to love others in this way.
Choose love (1 Peter 4:8). Avoid letting your emotions dictate your response. Filter your actions through the lens of love that “covers a multitude of sins.”
Pay attention to how your children receive love. Ask the Lord to help you identify their “love language.” Then find creative ways to express love in ways it will truly be appreciated.
After discipline, affirm your love (1 John 4:16-18). When your children make a mistake and receive appropriate consequences, use the post-discipline moments to teach unconditional love. Affirm and embrace the offender until his or her body language indicates that your love has been received.
Discipleship begins with our children, and showing God’s love to them is the most important thing we can do for their spiritual development. Let’s pray for our families, our children, and our youth each and every day; and if you’re really brave, ask God how you can show His love to them in church, community, and beyond.