no lie

but now is the time to get rid of anger, rage, malicious behavior, slander, and dirty language. don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds. put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him. - colossians 3:8-10

i'm not really sure where it all began, but for a few years now i've been hearing people say things like "not even gonna lie" or simply "no lie". at first i didn't think much of it. but i guess as i've heard it more and more and seen it grow in popularity, it has grabbed my attention. 

likewise, i'm not sure when we got to the point as a society when we started having to preface our statements or stories by saying "what i'm about to tell you isn't a lie", but to me that kinda says that anything else you say can't really be trusted. sometimes we may say some things that sound unbelievable, so it's not such a bad thing to say that it's not a lie. but then again, it's not a part of our everyday conversation to drop some strange facts that require this (unless your name is layton welborn). 

now when Jesus taught, he often would say "i tell you the truth!" some may argue a similarity and try to downplay this verbiage, but i don't feel like this is related at all to us saying "no lie." you see, when Jesus taught, he was teaching new things. he was teaching new law. he was showing people a new way. the truth, as it is used in the new testament, often refers to the word of God. 

but he also had this to say when talking about those who want to do the will of God: "those who speak for themselves want glory only for themselves, but a person who seeks to honor the one who sent him speaks truth, not lies.*" such a simple concept, isn't it? recently at a youth rally david rubio brought forth 3 things that we have to do to live Godly lives, and one was simply tell the truth. why has this become so difficult? what do we have to gain by lying as adults? deception? 

that really seems to be the only reason to live a life in which you have to inform someone when you're not lying. paul addresses this when he's instructing us on living as children of God by saying "since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes.**" 

a life of deception may have the appearance of happiness, but is ultimately empty and always searching for something to make it better. we should embrace our lives as they are and stop living behind this mask. so may you be YOU. may you live a life of truth. may your words be honest. may you live without the mask. 

*john 7:18 from the new living translation

**ephesians 4:21-23 from the new living translation 

a change in the winds

i've been with the white house congregation for almost a year and a half now. it's one of those weird points in which you look at someone and know them so well, yet you remember when you were strangers not so long ago. i have no doubt that this is where God wants me to be even though i lost some things and people in this move. any time i'm not at church on a sunday morning, whether it be a day off or that i'm on a trip, i miss my family. i wonder how God's word touched them that day, or how their faces may have been overcome with joy as they brought their gifts of praise that morning.

despite this bond, there are still a lot of ways in which we see things differently. isn't this the case with any relationship? one party thinks this, while the other thinks that. it's the beauty of our uniqueness.. if that's even a word. recently i made a change that was... well, unpopular may not be a strong enough word. but you get the idea.. and it wasn't in spite of anyone or anything. it wasn't to stir up any controversy. and though i will benefit spiritually, it wasn't even done with me in mind.

let me put it this way.. christmas vacation is my favorite christmas movie, so i'll use an example from that. some of you at this point are saying "what? you're dumb. a christmas story is the greatest christmas movie of all time.. etc, etc.." yeah yeah, we get it. he wants a bb gun and has to wear bunny pajamas. and when he gets what he wants, he furthers the stereotype that adults have been throwing out the whole time by being irresponsible with the gun and hits his eye. wee. i digress.. in christmas vacation, clark griswold is hard at work to make his house the best one on the block in order to enhance his family's holiday experience. he works through the night, he suffers several falls, but he gets the job done. and when he urges his family to come and see what he has done, they are hesitant. they're comfortable inside, it's cold outside, they're perfectly content where they are. but he keeps on them until they come out as if to say "it'll all make sense once you see this!" all of the hard work, all of the time he put into his work would make sense once they saw the result, and in turn it enhanced their holiday experience.

so for a few months i'm sitting in this situation of "it'll all make sense once you see this.." and as i sit, i know what's coming up. i'm so excited that the words of ellis "red" redding from the shawshank redemption come to mind when he said "i find i’m so excited i can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head." i can't help but contrast this with our salvation. it's like as God is inviting us to receive this free gift, we're yelling back that we're ok where we are. it's cold out there, and it's warm in here.. we're content with where we're living. maybe because in the beginning, this is the only life we know. we're used to it, we've adapted. and God is saying, "look, i have something better for you. it'll all make sense once you see this." once we accept this gift, we get that excitement growing in us.. red goes on to say "i think it’s the excitement that only a free man can feel. a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain." the only difference is, we know the conclusion. but the journey, though uncertain in so many ways, is exciting and full of adventure. embrace it. live it. feel alive.

and rest assured, it'll all make sense once you see.

a case of the mondays

i've been thinking about blogging for quite some time now. not that my thoughts are all the provocative, but i guess i just felt like putting my thoughts down for others to read in this modern format. with that being said, i'll start with the thing that has plagued me most over these last few years now that social networking and "statuses" are such a big part of our lives.

probably the most popular subject i read about as others attempt to tell us how they're feeling on any given day is "friday". you've inevitably read a status dealing with this topic, and you know exactly what that means. it means that someone is longing for that day, longing for the weekend to be here. typically i see this the most on mondays, or even the aptly labeled "hump day" that is wednesday. perhaps a weekend filled with rest, or an event that someone is looking forward to.. the possibilities are endless. so why does this plague me? i'm not disturbed that someone is looking forward to an event in their lives, but what does disturb me is how we tend to live for 3 days. it seems as though the majority of our week is something to "get through", but isn't it the little things that make life worth living? what do we miss when we look ahead so much?

i'm not a beatles fan, nor am i a fan of john lennon, but i have to give him credit for his singing "life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans*." it should bother us more that we're not living for each moment, shouldn't it? when i think about this, i get charged up as though i were listening to an invigorating speech by william wallace himself. he's essentially shouting to us who have lost our zest for life "do you want to hide and live a life worth regretting, or do you want to live for this moment and know that you did everything you could?" sadly enough, the church is not immune to this. i wish i could see christians every day who are making the most of the time they have. i often wonder if the words of Jesus have fallen on deaf ears as he exclaims "a thief is only there to steal and kill and destroy. i came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.**" the very words we claim to follow are the words that tell us to wake up and live for each moment. such simple words.. "wake up!" if only we would.

or perhaps it's that we look to the past as the "prime" of our lives, and we long for it as though we can get back to that place. there's a word for this: nostalgia. do you know someone like this? or perhaps you are this person. or have been. i have been. in living life like this, i can attest to the words of rob bell when he says "there's a certain kind of despair that sets in when we believe that things were better back then. when we're stuck back there. when we're not fully present. when we're still holding on to how things were, our arms aren't free to embrace today... if you live in the fantasy that you will get around to it tomorrow, that you'll get around to them tomorrow, you will wake up and it will not be tomorrow, it will be yesterday and you will have missed it, you will have missed them... the answer is to be so fully present here and now that you don't miss a thing in this day.***" how true and powerful are these simple words that remind us that all we have is today.

so may you live this life. may you live the life Jesus has provided for you and called you to live. may you wake up. may we all.

*i know it's not an original quote, just liked the wording
**john 10:10 from "the message" translation
***from the video today in rob bell's video series nooma

note: i encourage you to check out today as well as the movie click as these both touch on this subject in some way.