the gods aren't angry

Tonight I went with my friend Paul to see Rob Bell speak on the topic of "the gods aren't angry." If you aren't sure what that is, well, a lot of people paid a lot of money to see a pastor speak for almost two hours straight. That's it in a nutshell.

Was it worth it? Absolutely. The night started with dinner at a Korean Barbeque restaurant down the road. It was excellent and very unique. They gave us all kinds of things as part of our meal that Paul had never seen before, and I had only had once at a tofu house. The meat was tender and delicious, and the whole experience was a blast.

Afterwards we stood outside the Wiltern Theater for a few minutes to soak in the sounds, smells and energy of the city. I love being in the city. There is an energy that you simply don't get in the suburbs. People are everywhere, teeming about (i love the word teeming) and it just feels alive.

Inside there was a pretty well stocked bar available, something I can't remember seeing the last time I heard a pastor speak :-)

We sat down and there was a screen with instructions on how to put a text message up. This is the participative interactive element of the postmodern generation at play. There were lots of messages going by, including one that asked if Paul and Joel from HDC were in the house! Naturally, we sent a reply via text message.

At about 8:15 Rob Bell came out, and started right into his message. Rob began by discussing the sacrifice rituals of ancient cultures, talking about the system of gods that had developed and how it was up to the people to appease the gods with very little idea of if anything was working. The problem with this system is that there is an ever escalating sense of sacrifice, up to and including human sacrifice of children.

Into this context steps Abraham. He obeys God and leaves the land and customs of his father behind. Now when God tells Abraham to go up to the top of Mount Moriah and sacrifice Isaac, it all makes sense. This was not unusual in the cultural context in which Abraham lived. Although he would not have wanted to sacrifice Isaac, it was very natural for a god to demand such a sacrifice.

And then God changed everything. When Abraham reached the point of sacrifice, God declared "STOP" and changed the system. Instead of man providing sacrifices to gods, God provided a ram for Abraham to sacrifice. God is different than all the pretenders that Abraham knew of before. God was real, He wanted a relationship, and He provided for His people rather than demanding of them.

Rob then proceeded to follow the system of sacrifice up to the time of Christ, and talked about how the system was so very profitable to the saduccees. Those forces, who were aligned with the Roman empire, had a vested interest in keeping the system as it was.

Jesus stepped in and declared that he was greater than this mammoth system of sacrifice. It was time to change the game again. A bloody, violent system, enforced by blood and violence to those who would resist, was overcome by a peaceful Jesus Christ. Jesus didn't use force, he didn't attack with an army, He used love. Jesus turned the entire system of sacrifice on its head by placing the burden on God, not man.

Rob then talked about how the point of the sacrifices was never for God. God didn't need cattle, he owned the cattle on a thousand hills. The sacrifices were to provide tangible evidence of what we did. It gave man a way to appease the guilt in their soul by doing something tangible.

And that's part of the problem we have today. It's as if we can't really believe that Jesus paid it all. We still feel like we have to somehow tangibly pay for what God paid for.

Rob related a story of a woman who was receiving visions of Jesus. A priest came to her to "set her straight" on the matter. He told her that the next time she saw Jesus, to ask him what the priest had confessed during his last confession. She saw another vision and when the priest came to visit her, he asked him what the answer to her question was. She told him that Jesus' exact words were "I don't remember."

We cling to things long after God has forgotten them. We have a natural predisposition to guilt that we allow to overwhelm us, when Jesus has forgiven us and moved on if we ask him to.

Rob then related personal stories of friends of his who were wracked by guilt. Of people that he had counseled who were still trying to appease angry gods rather than accepting the free gift of Christ.

Without specifically using the phrase, Rob laid bare the joy of a life indwelled with the freedom of Christ. Christ didn't come to create a new system of rules, He came to free us from the burdens of the world, from the guilt that comes from our sin.

Freedom in Christ isn't about sinning and calling it good, it's about being free from trying to appease gods, and being free to accept the love of Christ and live for Him.

Rob shared a personal story of how busy he was, and how overwhelmed he was with everything. A friend of him took him to lunch and said "Rob, you don't have to live like this." Rob protested and told him why he did. His friend kept repeating "You don't have to live like this" over and over again. Rob relayed how he finally realized that his friend was right. His friend loved him enough to fight for him. Rob was allowing the pressures of ministry and life to overwhelm him, and trying to work his way out of it rather than letting Jesus run the show.

Rob closed with a simple statement, the gist of which is that the gods aren't angry, God is the God of Love.

God is the God of Love. Our God isn't interested in terrifying me into giving him anything. God is interested in loving me, and knowing that I love Him in return.

Paul and I had a great conversation on the way home, with topics ranging from Genesis 1-11 to the anti-Christ, and just about everything in between. Truly, the whole night was worth it just for the conversations with Paul. If this tour makes its way to your town, it's definitely worth checking out.

Some people have a hard time with the idea that a pastor would be speaking in a concert hall and charging admission. I think this is a cultural thing. The people that were there were for the most part young, I would guess between the ages of 20 and 30. Nobody seemed upset to have to pay, they were happy to get the chance to see Rob Bell in person and hear a powerful message delivered.

On the whole, I am really glad I went. I hope that this sort of thing comes to town again.

Joel

Noelle

My friend David is a filmmaker. He wrote a film that, while not overtly a "christian movie" (a good thing in my book) is a tale about God's forgiveness. He believed so firmly that God was in this that he sold his house and put the money into making this movie.

Noelle has received standing ovations virtually everywhere it has been shown. It is a powerful story and one worth taking the time to see in the theater. It opens December 7th. Click Here to Visit the Website

Not to be missed.

Joel

Fall

Fall is my absolute favorite time of year. Today is the first day in the high desert where it feels like it's actually fall. The leaves are blowing off the trees around the church, the weather is turning cold (it is currently 50 degrees at my house, the warmest it's been all day) and the decor of choice is pumpkins, indian corn and gourds.

I love the food and drink that comes with fall as well. Apples, apple cider, hot cocoa, squash, turkey, cranberry anything etc. There is a certain "feel" to fall that just fits me. It's this time every year where I miss living in New York, where the leaves are simply spectacular, and the weather is colder.

Rejoice with me, fall is here!

Joel

$6 BILLION in sales!

I am a mac fan. I like them for two reasons. One is that I've used them for over twenty years. Two is that they just work. They are related. One of the things I've noticed is that mac users expect perfection. As Apple goes, so goes the future of the mac platform. That's why today's news is such good news. Apple sales for their fourth quarter were over $6 Billion dollars, and their profit on those sales was $904 MILLION. That's astounding!

One of the great things about Apple is that they are an innovator who pushes technology forward. The iPhone is a great example. I have a Sony Ericsson P900. It's a great phone, and it does a lot of the same stuff the iPhone does. The iPhone just does it all better, and makes it easier to use.

I don't have one because AT&T is too expensive, but I will benefit from the iPhone by other companies copying it and being forced to make their phones better to compete with the iPhone.

Competition is good, and a healthy Apple is good for the industry. Apple is also a case study in the difference between a visionary leader and a non-visionary leader. Under Gil Amelio Apple nearly died. Under Steve Jobs the stock has gone up from $13 per share to $180 or so today, and that's after splitting at least once!

There is a leadership lesson in all of this. To be the top dog, a leader needs to have vision. A leader needs to look past what exists now and thing outside that box and dream of what can be. And then that leader needs to inspire the people to move there.

Why are churches so content to have leaders that copy others and think in the same boxes we've thought in for the last 50 years?

Joel

Hands

I think part of being made in the image of God is being made with a desire to create. Oftentimes we may not recognize this, or may make our lives too busy for it, but I think we have an inherent desire to create things.

Recently our TV died, and as part of its replacement we needed a new entertainment center. I built the last one we had about fifteen years ago, and it is a relic of a distant era. It is designed to hold CD's and videotapes, neither of which we use anymore. The CD's are in boxes to go in the attic (archival storage only) and the videotapes have been replaced by DVD's that we keep in our library.

After looking at a few stands, I decided to build a new entertainment center. I spend about $170 on wood, and got to work. It is incredibly rewarding. My hands are stained, my back hurts, my shoulders hurt, and I can't wait to get home to keep working on this thing. Somehow there is a connection to the creator that we experience when we create.

Joel

Life

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. - James 4:13-14 (ESV)

On August 9 my grandmother died. On September 18 I learned that my other grandmother had gone in the hospital for the second time that I can remember in my lifetime. On September 26 the mother of my Uncle Rich died. She fell down the stairs a few days ago, and suffered serious head trauma. Although she was old, this was still a sudden event and very traumatic and shocking for the family.

Today I visited an 11 year old girl in the hospital who had an incorrect prescription that was 10x the dosage she should have had. She appears to be improving, but it was still very traumatic for the family and today certainly did not work out like they had originally planned.

A friend of mine was in church with his family and had a seizure, only to discover that he had a brain tumor. Prior to that day he had no inkling that anything was wrong at all. Now this fact dominates their life as they deal with the repurcussions of the tumor and surgery.

I'm beginning to think that James might be on to something here. Our lives are short, and unfortunately for us, we don't know how much time we have. I don't think James is advocating a total lack of planning on our parts, but he is telling us the nature of life. Our lives are a mist, they are fleeting, and we cannot choose when they will end or what life will bring.

Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there were none of them. - Psalms 139:16

It is interesting that James refers to our life as but a mist. A mist is fleeting, but it can have an impact. When I'm standing in line at a theme park, I'm grateful for the mist created by the misters installed for my comfort. When I drive my car I am grateful for the mist of gasoline that explodes forcing the piston up and giving my car power. A mist can have an impact, but only if it is put to proper use. A mist of gasoline in the open air is a health hazard. In an engine it is power.

What kind of mist are you?

20 Grand Days Out - Guam

This summer we took an amazing vacation. We were gone for 20 days, hence the title. We traveled to Hawaii, Guam and Yap. This is part II of the tale of our journey.

After a wonderful time on Hawaii we flew to Guam for a five night stay. Guam is very interesting. It's part of the US, but not many people know that. It is a tourist destination for Japanese, one that is marketed as a place to go for a less expensive vacation. Guam is a long way from the US (7.5 hour or so flight from Hawaii) but pretty close to Japan. To make matters worse, it's across the international dateline, so it seems further than it really is. The flight times all look like they will be 30 hours or something ridiculous like that.

Guam is primarily thought of as a military base, because it is. But there is a lot to do there, and we had a great time. Our friends Fred & Helen Nisihira met us at the airport, which was really sweet. It's nice to arrive to a friendly face after a long plane flight. We checked in to the Marriot and agreed to meet them the next morning.

The Marriot. Wow. The hotel was very nice, and the view was stunning. The one big problem was that the kids did not have a bed. We thought we would have a pullout couch, but there was only a small chair in our room. We were able to make it work by asking for some bedding, and the kids were good sports about sleeping on the floor.

The view from our balcony overlooking Tumon Bay, Guam. Click on the pictures for a larger view.

Fred and Helen took us on an Island tour, which was really helpful to get a sense of what Guam is like. There are a lot of military bases, they take up about 30% of the Island, but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy a visit to Guam. We drove around a good bit of the Island and had lunch at a really neat place called "Jeff's Pirate Cove" which is located near the cave of Sergeant Yokoi, the Japanese soldier who hid until 1972, still believing we were at war with Japan. After a break and a swim in the hotel pool, we went to a birthday party with our friends.

One of the things that really struck me about Guam was how alive everything was. There was stuff growing everywhere. Virtually every structure had mold growing on the walls, on the roof, out of the concrete, everywhere. I really noticed it at the birthday party, when I looked at the jungle right next to the house. There is plenty of oxygen with all that greenery. I guess living in the desert where life has to work hard to survive really made Guam stand out to me. It seems to me that God had places like Guam in mind when he created life. The fact that we try to live in a desert is our own fault...

We went to church with the Nishihira's on Sunday, and then had lunch at a Benihana type place called "Join Us" that was quite good and owned by a friend of Fred's dad. We had another delightful day with our friends, and then had their family over for a barbeque at their house. I was really struck by how much better it was being on Guam with friends than being by ourselves on Hawaii. Hawaii is a great place, but being with people is really what life is about. Guam offered us Island beauty coupled with good friends to share the experiences with.

After the weekend, our friends lent us a car to drive while they were at work. This was a huge blessing as it let us see the island rather than just staying at the hotel, and it allowed us to eat somewhere other than the Marriot for breakfast. While it was a tasty breakfast, spending $60 every day for our family to eat breakfast was a bit much. The first day we went to Shirley's for breakfast, which was ok but nothing that we would fly to Guam for. At least it was a lot cheaper!

We visited a lot of neat sites. One site was latte stone park. The latte stone is kind of a symbol of guam. It is part of the ancient chammoro construction techniques, and the architecture of the island pays homage to the latte stone. The park was small, but it had a nice display of latte stones and a cave the Japanese had built (with chammoro labor) as part of their defense of Guam in WWII. At one point someone declared this cave a fallout shelter, which is laughable as it was very small. The sign is still there, but someone has scratched the number "1" in the sign under the word "capacity" which is probably more accurate than whatever number was originally there...

After the latte stone park, we went to the War in the Pacific National Historical Park. This park is very spread out, preserving beaches and other sites that were significant battlegrounds as the US retook Japan in 1944. I only have one memory of Guam from when I was there in 1979/1980, and this park (specifically the hill overlooking Asan Beach) was it. One of the neatest things we did was climbed the hill behind the town of Piti and looked at the Japanese gun installations. These guns were never operational, the US invaded before they could be completed.

We had an elegant lunch on our balcony that we catered by going through the drive through at McDonalds. I hated to fly halfway around the world to eat McDonalds, but I guess you have to make concessions to the kids every once in a while. At least the view was great. After an afternoon in the pool, we had dinner at a really cool Japanese Restaurant called Watabe, and that was excellent. It was a little bit of a cross cultural experience, as they offered us things to eat like raw eggs that our American palates aren't exactly used to.

Our last day on Guam we spent visiting the war in the pacific park again, a really cool beach on the northern part of the island, and two lover's point. Two Lover's Point is probably the most well known tourist destination, and it was awful. The popularity of this site has created a kitsch location that is overcommercialized and ruined. It was quite a shock after tooling around the island enjoying it's natural beauty. We gave the kids one last western meal at Friday's for dinner, and then prepared for the main focus of our trip: going to Yap.

We saw everything we wanted to see on Guam except Yokoi's cave. I think that is the perfect amount of time to be somewhere, when you wish you could stay one more day. But the highlight of Guam was definitely visiting with Fred and Helen, and their family. I would not go back to Guam to see the sights again, but I would go to be with them again.