tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54072199813001335422024-03-14T02:06:18.136-07:00Out of the BlueLife is a song, God is the composer. But like any song, there is no value to it if it's not shared, not listened to. And like most songs, it's more revealed than written - seemingly out of the blue.Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-29843322710380154682013-02-23T23:04:00.000-08:002013-02-23T23:04:33.917-08:00Consider the GrapesSo this is going to be somewhat of an explanation of the absence of anything on this blog. But I hope it's more of a reason than an excuse.<br />
I have been restless. I am restless.<br />
You see, I've graduated college and gotten a great internship at the camp that I have loved serving so much for the last 4(ish) years. I love the people I work with. I love the actual camp. I love the mission and purpose that it stands for. I love it. But I am restless.<br />
I don't want to tip-toe through life, being so over-cautious that I never learn to run. Never learn to fly. Fearing fear itself is a tar pit that I never want to fall into, so I had somehow translated that to meaning that if I wasn't living some shiny exciting life every second of every day, I wasn't "living life to the fullest." But full of what? I don't know, stuff. You know, just like stuff......yea.<br />
I got my butt kicked recently from the memory of a message my college chaplain gave the seniors when I was a junior (you know it was good when I get convicted again from the <i>memory</i> of it). He explained that there's these times in our lives, like college, where although it's fun and exciting, we can grow to become unsatisfied with the present because we're waiting in such eager anticipation of the future. I couldn't agree more. We want to know so badly where we'll be, who we'll be with, and even what impact we'll make on the world around us. But for now, we're stuck. Right here in the present. Yay. We want the ends, but we don't want to work through the means. The means are long. The means are boring. The means are sitting in some political studies class that you don't freaking care about (too specific?), or tediously inputing camper profiles into a database (again, too specific?), or making that awkward small talk to break the ice into that meaningful conversation. We don't like the means, but we love the end. It's as if we're on an impossibly slow raft that's floating to a gorgeous shore that's too far to feel close. And we just sit there. Restless.<br />
But this is a bad metaphor. It's a pessimistic metaphor. I leave better metaphors to better men; which leads me back to my college chaplain. When talking about those chapters in our lives that make us restless, that is those times when we are thinking too fondly of what is ahead, we neglect to see the value in the now. The metaphor he used was how wine is made. Buckle up, this is good stuff.<br />
He explained that the most important part of the process of making wine is, well, the process. The looong process.<br />
Consider the grapes. They were meticulously grown and nurtured; pruned, harvested, cleaned, and hand-picked (along with other processes of wine making that I have no idea about) to be the <i>best</i> possible grapes to make that yummy classy Merlot juice. Same is true for all the other ingredients. But if you just used grapes, even if they were the best grapes possible, you'd end up with some glorified fermented Juicy Juice (and this time <i>actually </i>made with 100% juice). The best wines come from the perfect mix of ingredients, and more importantly, the loooong time just sitting in a cold, dark, dank basement. Newly made bottles of wine, just sitting there. Restless.<br />
But there's the kick - they're not just sitting there. They're getting better and better with each passing second, minute, and year. Only in that long, boring, tedious waiting do those fermented grapes become fine wine. The wine is spending all that time soaking in every ounce of flavor that it never could have had without that time. So I have to stop being restless, and start soaking it all in. There's so much to soak in. Consider the grapes. Consider the birds.<br />
Wait what? Birds? Yea I pulled a cheap fast one on you. Because Jesus had something to say about all this. I'm restless when I'm living in fear of the unknown future (that whole "fear" thing is for another post, stay tuned ha), and yet I think about it too much and freak myself out in my anxiousness. Just waiting for that shore... But Jesus said outright to not be anxious. "Consider the birds. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, but yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?" [Matthew 6:26-27] Dang. Suddenly feeling restless seems cheap, like a cop out. Why should I worry about my future, resulting in me neglecting my present, when I claim to serve the Author of time?<br />
I told you I don't want to tip-toe through life. Shane Claiborne puts it this way, <span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">“All around you, people will be tiptoeing through life, just to arrive at death safely. But dear children, do not tiptoe. Run, hop, skip, or dance, just don't tiptoe.” So, sorry I've been tiptoeing. I've been restless. But now I consider the grapes. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: #181818; font-family: georgia, serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Fill me up. Let me soak it in. Amen. </span></span>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-91421101054517093982012-12-10T15:08:00.002-08:002012-12-10T15:08:35.024-08:00<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I have been on here for awhile. My bad. Seriously. I'll explain (or make excuses) later. I'm writing messages for some kids. The hardest part is trying to simplify things that are beyond me. But I try.</span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b>
<b id="internal-source-marker_0.5689240351784974" style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">To know the Gospel is to hear the mystery of God; to pursue the mystery of God is to find love; to find love is to be free; to be free is to experience grace; to experience grace is to respond; to respond is to love back; to love back is to die to yourself; to die to yourself is to live for others; to live for others is to tell the Gospel with your life; to tell the Gospel with your life is to let the world hear it. So sit back. Listen. Just be ready to move.</span></b><br />
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></b>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I'll try to give you a good life to listen to.</span></b>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-71773327349066830292012-04-02T15:48:00.001-07:002012-04-02T15:50:01.900-07:00Food for Thought<span class="st">"People are not problems<i></i> to be fixed, but mysteries to be honored and revered."</span><br />
<span class="st"> - Eugene Peterson. </span><br />
<br />
<span class="st">Brilliant.</span>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-18216413622475037022012-03-14T21:58:00.001-07:002012-03-17T17:43:50.634-07:00That is Soooo Cliche<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-size: small;">Clichés are so yesterday. Yet it feels like everybody and their brother uses them and they never quite get to the point. We should choose our words more carefully; after all, it’s another thing that separates us from the animals. So grab life by the horns and learn to speak your mind! Hugs, not drugs! Carpe Diem!</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Now please excuse me as I wipe the barf off my keyboard because the amount of shameless clichés in that last paragraph made me a little sick. I’m willing to bet someone could give me the different etymologies behind each one, but it’s funny that just certain ones have stuck. Like, “</span><span style="font-size: small;">in the nick of time.” Does <i>anyone </i>even know what that means? When you really stop to think about it, the very existence of clichés shows how lazy we can get with how we communicate and even <i>think</i>. They even seep into when we <i>create</i> something. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-size: small;">So you get countless songs about how when you’re sad it feels like rain or how when you’re overwhelmed you’re going to break free and fly or how someone can steal your heart or…seriously, go to your music library and count them. Now, they’ll still succeed at what they’re trying to communicate, but what about creativity/originality/showing that you put in genuine thought to what you’re saying? (Check out Michael Gungor’s <a href="http://awakengeneration.wordpress.com/2011/11/16/michael-gungor-on-the-problem-with-the-christian-music-industry/" target="_blank">blog</a> on creativity in Christian music.) Would anyone ever just memorize a proposal speech they saw on a romantic movie in order to ask someone to marry them? Yikes, I hope not, but the more I think about it the more think that someone has probably done that. Weird, I almost barfed again.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> But I’m being facetious (shocker!) and I know why we use them and I probably drop a cliché or two daily. They’re a quick and easy way to communicate an otherwise expanded thought. Quick and easy. And everyone will understand what you really mean because everyone gets what you mean. No semantic arguments there. But then we <i>really</i> get lazy. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Christians have our own clichés. Some of us even call it speaking “Christianese.” Cute. Go us. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Here a few that we see way too often:</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">Ill pray for you = Good luck with that, I really got to get going.</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">Worship was great today = <i>I </i>had a good time</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">I’m good = My life is absolute chaos</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">I don’t mean to judge, but… = Buckle up, I’m about to judge someone</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">I told her I wouldn’t tell anyone but… = I told her that I wouldn’t tell anyone but I’m going to go ahead and gossip anyway.</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: -0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">·<span style="-moz-font-feature-settings: normal; -moz-font-language-override: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span><span style="font-size: small;">I don’t have the gift for that/feel led to do that = I’m too afraid to ask for that gift so I’m not going to even try to see if I could do that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: 0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">What’s the worst part about the above Christianese comments? They’re all clichés built upon phrases that actually mean[t] something. Christ said that our “yes” should actually <i>mean</i> “yes” and our “no” should mean “no.” I think it’s pretty safe to say that He wants us to <i>always</i> <i>mean</i> what we say and live accordingly.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: inherit; text-indent: 0.25in;"><span style="font-size: small;">So please, by all means, speak some Christianese every day. Just make sure you mean it. </span></div>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-36881886372018817562012-02-01T22:44:00.000-08:002012-02-01T22:44:21.419-08:00A Healthy Dose of Honesty I haven't written in awhile. I haven't felt challenged for awhile.<br />
Or maybe I haven't been challeng<i>ed </i>anything for awhile. Or maybe I haven't been <i>listening</i> to God's challenges. <br />
I haven't been completely myself lately. In fact, I've been looking around for me everywhere. I've felt...empty. <br />
<br />
Paul, in an effort to encourage his brothers and sisters that made up the church in Ephesus, challenged them to be "filled with the fullness of God" at all times, but especially when they felt that needle inching closer to "E".<br />
I can relate to that.<br />
You see, I've been praying to God, asking, no <i>begging</i> Him to fill me up. I've felt (relatively speaking) unfulfilled, unsatisfied, and de-energized since being back to school. It's not necessarily the school's fault, nor the classes, the people (especially the friends!), the lack of Chic-Fil-A's; it's me.<br />
I've flicked some kind of mental (spiritual?) switch, both in my mind and my heart, that this last semester is this burden I must bear before I get back to living the way <i>I want. </i>Doing the things <i>I want.</i> Only daring to invest love in the people <i>I want</i> to invest in. Because hey, I'm almost out of here! Why would I invest time, energy, and love into people that I won't have to see anymore after a couple months of monotonous school work? Right? Yea, right. Nice, Jon.<br />
I'm sure that's what the God of love wants. <br />
<br />
Someone close to my heart showed me a message that Francis Chan had given at his church. <i>Man, that guy. </i>Talk about someone that God uses to encourage, but maybe more importantly for my case, convict the rest of us. He talked about how in times where we feel empty, instead of having an expectation that God will somehow change the <i>situation</i> because <i>I </i>am in some shape or form suffering from it, I should ask, no <i>beg</i>, no <i>want nothing more</i> than for God to change <i>me</i>. Who am <i>I</i> to question the God of <i>everything ever</i>'s intentions for placing me where I am in life? I serve an intentional God. I serve a perfect God. Therefore, <b><i>His intentions are perfect</i></b>.<br />
I want to feel challenged again. Because I want to discover, or merely see a glimpse, of how deep, how wide, and how INFINITE God's love is for me; how infinite His love, and how limitless His plans. <br />
But it's easier said than done, isn't it?<br />
Because this whole "feeling conviction and attaining a sense of purpose on a daily basis no matter the circumstances" is a work in progress. I'm not going to end this with some clever full-circle insight. I'll instead leave a link to Mr. Chan's sermon that has helped crack open my hardened heart.<br />
<a href="http://www.preachitteachit.org/about-us/the-team/francis-chan/sermons/sermon-detail/resource/sermon/Castles-and-Crowns-Come-Down-Harnessing-Gods-Power/">Francis Chan</a>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-82194567894045216412012-01-03T12:49:00.000-08:002012-01-03T16:52:15.893-08:00No Way But Up The only thing crazier for me to think about than how high, how difficult, and how perilous hiking Mount Everest is would be how crazy the men and women who have done it must have been. People don't say that some one <i>climbed</i> Everest, they say they <i>conquered</i> Everest. Over 220 people have <i>died</i> trying to reach the summit, and that's not exactly as peaceful as passing away in your sleep; it's a little closer to freezing to death and/or not being able to inhale the thin veil of oxygen in your deflated lungs. Fun times.<br />
So what's the point? Despite the unenviable death described above, almost 3,150 people have at least attempted the climb...what a bunch of morons. Have there been that many morons with an interest in rock climbing throughout history, or am I missing something? I think George Leigh Mallory, who climbed Everest in 1924 (<i>before</i> they had oxygen tanks and things) would say I'm missing something. He had this to say:<br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"> "The first question which you will ask and which I must try to answer is this, 'What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?' and my answer must at once be, 'It is no use'. There is not the slightest prospect of any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behavior of the human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any coal or iron. We shall not find a single foot of earth that can be planted with crops to raise food. It's no use. So, if you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to enjoy life." <span style="color: black;">Mr. Mallory was on to something. And Mr. Mallory died in his failed attempt to climb Everest in 1924. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="color: black;"> A mountain can take your breath away with its beauty and grandeur, while all the while it can <i>literally</i> take your breath away. But I like to think that there is not <i>one</i> person to have reached its summit and regretted it, even if things were lost along the way. And stranger still, there are those who attempted it and failed but still regret nothing. </span></span><span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="color: black;">If you're like me, love can seem like a similar endeavor.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="color: black;"> I have yet to reach love's summit. It hasn't worked out with the people that I've tried climbing it with in the past. I've gotten lost on the way up, I've run out of air, or I acted like it wasn't a dangerous climb at all only to get swept up the wind. But I don't regret those climbs. <i>Not one bit</i>. Because the view was still beautiful, and I'm actually closer with those people for trying. Because maybe we're not supposed to worry about reaching the summit. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="color: black;"> Maybe God cares more about the climb. Maybe God wants us to have those moments where we hold each others' hand through the coldest wind or where a mere gaze from our partner is more sustaining than water. Maybe God wants us to share an adventure; and no one has ever had an adventure where there was nowhere to go. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="color: black;"> Love seems dangerous. But that's the beauty of it; that I <i>still</i> want to climb, and that there's someone who would want to climb with me. Because I'm sure the view from the top is gorgeous, but it's the journey up that I hope takes my breath away -- one way or another.</span></span>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-85918418778776777182011-12-11T19:52:00.000-08:002011-12-11T19:52:43.198-08:00Moving So I just got home for the holidays, leaving one family to enjoy time with another. But what's strange is the family I left I had only known for a few way-too-short months. I love these people. It's a tremendously powerful thing to be as <i>humbled</i>, as <i>loved</i>, as <i>moved</i> as I have been by these brothers and sisters; my friends.<br />
Jesus said that we could move mountains with the faith of a mustard seed, which is only a little bigger than a strawberry seed. In these past months, I have come to know and love people that have the faith to dedicate their <i>lives</i> to a higher calling; one that is in no way certain and in every way adventurous. Imagine the faith of a person that is truly willing and ready to <i>give</i> their life to<i> find</i> it. Such a faith is probably a lot bigger than a mustard seed.<br />
Jesus also said to His disciples, in reference to His ministry and miracles on earth, that someday His followers would do things "greater than these." What?! Greater than the amazing stuff He did during his time here? I never got why He said such a thing. Then I met the people that would become the family I've been talking about. There is not <i>one</i> doubt in my mind that even <i>one</i> of my newest family members won't do something amazing with their lives. Because you see, each of them has found the beauty of giving their lives to something bigger; and perhaps it's because they have that faith of something bigger than a mustard seed. I don't know if any of them plan on moving a mountain, but with their faith, they can move hearts -- and I like to think it's the same business God's been in for years.<br />
So consider me moved. I love you and miss you all.Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-34390518791388960552011-12-04T22:17:00.000-08:002011-12-04T22:17:37.414-08:00Lovestruck It's funny how such an essential thing as love is the probably the hardest to understand. We need it more than we need water, but yet you can <i>never</i> perfectly define it; and we certainly don't understand it as much as we claim to. It's a lot like lightning, actually.<br />
Did you know that modern science <i>still</i> doesn't understand how/why lighting even exists? We of course know <i>what</i> it is, and we know its effects (and side effects) on weather, humidity, climate, electronics, and other things, but we don't know how it happens or why. We just don't. We have theories, we have folklore (THOR!); we even have measurements and data showing <i>what</i> happens. We can even replicate it in a lab. Yet, we cannot, with the combined knowledge of the histories of science, global climates, and freaking NASA know how or why lightning exists. Yet in the time it's taken you to read until here, lightning has struck around 300 times around the world. And that's just lighting <i>strikes</i>; not even the majority of lighting that lasts for minutes on end bouncing around in the clouds. Striking the earth more than 5 times a second, it's probably the most common force of nature we experience in our lives. It's a lot like love, actually.<br />
We spend most of our lives trying to figure out the how's and why's of love only to come up short. How could I possibly love <i>that</i> person? Why doesn't she love me? There seems to be no formula, no definite definition, no rhyme or reason to any of it. It happens a lot more than 5 times a second all around us, but let's face it: most of the time we don't know how to handle it. So what if we focused on the <i>what</i>? Because if we at least have some idea of <i>what</i> it is, maybe the why's and how's would just fall into place.<br />
But then, we have to be careful where we look. Because what some people will tell you is love is certainly not. And what some will tell you is just kindness, or mercy, or laughter is just unaware of how much love they are capable of giving. Paul defined what it is beautifully in 1 Corinthians 13 (how many of you just thought of a wedding), and I'm not going to quote the whole thing here because I want you to find it and read it. Really <i>read</i> it though. Because his explanation of the <i>what</i> of love, when fully considered, could perhaps be the most beautiful thing you could ever hear. Because when you flip that little switch to <i>live</i> exactly <i>what</i> love is, the why's and how's are not only revealed, but they become synonymous with the what of love. Go, live, love, and find out for yourself.<br />
I love lightning, and I don't care if I can't explain to you why.Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-63070132966483753872011-11-08T13:48:00.000-08:002011-11-08T13:48:58.384-08:00Boxes<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">We’ve managed to put our lives into boxes. We live in boxes – we put fences in our yard, roll our windows up in our cars, and wish for a corner office with a view of the people that we don’t want to interact with. We box ourselves in with our “safe group” of friends, and we start to box in the way we think and feel about the world and the way it works. Heaven forbid we ever have to get out of our boxes, or worse, have someone come in and try to rip it open a bit. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">So let’s rip open some boxes.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">We live in boxes because it feels secure, safe, comfortable, familiar. And maybe it is. But is that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">really</i> how you want to live? Who has ever loved that didn’t take a risk? And who has ever found what they’re passionate for without leaving comfort and failing a few (or ton of) times? Spoiler alert: the answer to these seemingly rhetorical questions is “nobody”. Comfort is perhaps the most misunderstood concept for my generation, and maybe even this culture. Because comfort is not sitting on a couch all day doing nothing. There’s a reason you feel crummy after spending all day lounging around (been there, done that). Now I think comfort can still be found on that same couch, but maybe after a long day’s work or a well-deserved break from it all. And hopefully you’re sharing that couch with someone you love or even someone you’re just meeting. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">You see, I don’t want to overcorrect and somehow say that being comfortable is evil or something. Sometimes in the thick of it all, the best thing to do is seek solitude and quiet – to crawl into a box (maybe even sometimes literally). It’s necessary and natural in a world that is pulling us in a million different directions to the point that a few of us start to tear at the seams because that’s not good for anything either.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">But the fact remains that too many of us have crawled into some kind of comfort box a long time ago, and we haven’t come out. We haven’t changed the way we think, we’ve closed ourselves off, and we doubt the workings of a world that we’re not really a part of anymore.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">To box ourselves in is to box in our potential. To box in our potential is doubt ourselves and therefore what God can do with our lives. And to doubt what God can do in our lives is to doubt that God can empower us to do “anything through He that strengthens us” [Philippians 4:13], and to doubt <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">that</i> is to put God in a box. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .5in;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 10.0pt;">But there’s nothing convenient about putting God in a box; He doesn’t ever fit, and if He did we can’t seem to get Him to stay there. So perhaps if our lives are indeed as boxed in as they seem, we should start unpacking from the top. We should start to unpack God from the boxes we’ve shoved Him into and allow Him to reveal Himself as the INFINITE being that He is. Because Paul said it pretty well when he stated in Ephesians 3 that we cannot <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">know</i> the love of Christ that is beyond knowledge – in other words, we’ll try, but we can’t even imagine how big, how good, or how perfect our God is. That’s something you can’t box up. And if that God is in your life, your life isn’t exactly something to keep to yourself, either.</span></div>Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-26190328566687932652011-11-06T21:53:00.000-08:002011-11-06T21:53:53.704-08:00Blue Like Jeans (see what I did there?)They call Nashville the "buckle of the Bible Belt" har har, a nickname that is well-deserved as evidenced by an excessive amount of churches throughout the city limits and even into its suburbs. So, it would seem that in a place like this, finding the "best church for me" would seem like an easy task. It's funny that we do that though, isn't it? That church should conform to us, like trying on jeans or something. We say that "the church is the people," but come on; I've heard that my whole life in countless churches where they say its "the people" when they really care about the music style, the charisma of the pastor/speaker, and countless other semantic factors that in reality, give no evidence that the church is truly found in the people. Christians don't choose a church based on the people, at least it can seem like that where I come from. You find the one in the pile that best fits you for those countless aforementioned reasons and get a membership and tithe your 10%. Easy peasy.<br />
If you've read this far, I'm sorry for the obnoxious cynicism of the above paragraph. Dramatic effect. I know there are, and should be, many factors that help us decide (/be led) what church is best for us. Yet I find that sometimes dramatic sarcasm can shed some light on at least a little truth. For me, that truth is that for a long time I had lost my faith in the Church; NEVER Christ, but the Church. Because you see, I feel that I've gone to churches my whole life where the people are more absorbed in the politics of it all (whether its worship wars, grilling the pastor, or debating who should be in office or who had the audacity to mow their lawn last Sunday) than the MISSION that Jesus Christ Himself asked us to carry out. Some of these disagreements are the results of passions and convictions that each side understands to be in some shape or form prophetic, and in history, such disagreements have caused division on a macro as well as micro scale. I'm not saying denominations (which essentially are Christians saying to other Christians "agree to disagree") are wrong; we're human so they're probably necessary. But we can't cling to such cultural semantic differences and call it faith. Jesus never claimed that He was starting a new world religion (although I'm quite certain he was aware) -- He said that He was the WAY. A "way" indicates that we need to follow Him, laying our burdens down, dying unto ourselves to receive life from the Creator of it. And then <i>live</i> that life He gave for Him. He didn't say He was the rut, and He didn't say He was the moving-sidewalk-at-the-airport-thingy; He didn't say it would be easy, and He definitely didn't say it would be COMFORTABLE: He said that He was THE way. Just ask any of the martyrs.<br />
So then, why have we gotten to a point where we try on church like we try on jeans to find the most <i>comfortable</i> pair? Because if this is our outlook on Church, then what is the point of the Church? Please don't get me wrong; we need to find a Church family, and in this broken world, in this broken nation, there <i>are</i> broken churches. In fact, I dare say all of them are. But that's what makes them BEAUTIFUL. That the Church is broken, that its people are broken; yet God still wins. So don't look at Church like you look for jeans. But if you insist, find the church with the most obvious patch jobs and stains -- because I guarantee it's the most real, the most honest, and I dare say the most Christ-like. Because the Church <i>is </i>the people, the people are the Church, and when we follow His WAY, that is to walk in rhythm and step with His steps, we will truly rock this world and move mountains.Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407219981300133542.post-3918870301202620982011-10-30T13:53:00.001-07:002011-10-30T13:53:49.686-07:00First time for everythingAlright, [knuckles cracking] here we go. Blog one, day one. So I decided to start up a blog for several reasons. <br />
1. I usually think out loud anyway. Those of you that know me (not even know me well) already know this to be true.<br />
2. There's too much life in life not to share it. We are created as communal beings; to share our experiences, dreams, ambitions, fears, and hopes together -- something I don't think we're very good at, even with Facebook and Twitter and such (although I don't really consider those ways to legitimately share yourself, but that's for another time ha)<br />
3. I like to think I have some pretty solid thoughts once in a while, although to quote<i> Easy A</i>, "not all of them are diamonds."<br />
4. I geek out at things I find cool and love showing them to people, so this seems to be a pretty cool avenue for that. <br />
I don't really have a fifth reason off the top of my head, so a little bit more about me that I didn't put in the actual "about me" section: I love music. I make music and I listen to it, even if it's not actually playing nearby. I could go into describing the tried and true cliche reasons why music is important and great, but I don't think I have to. It's good stuff. In fact, I'm learning about it more than ever right now. I normally attend Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa, but this semester I'm at the Contemporary Music Center in Nashville for a semester and it's awesome, to say the very least (like before, more about that later).<br />
I love people in general. I've never actually taken this personality test, but I'm told by some friends that know me well that I'm a "WOO", which basically means that I like you. I'm normally skeptical of those personality tests (you don't KNOW me *ghetto snaps*), but it hit me on the head when it said that a WOO takes 45 minutes on a college campus to get somewhere where it would otherwise take 5 minutes for anyone else because we stop and talk to everyone we see. Yea, about right. <br />
But most of all, I want to live a life that pursues God so fiercely, so truthfully, that it wrecks me to challenge His will. I don't think such an undertaking can be done alone. That's where you come in. Like I've said, I might not even know you, but I don't care about that. He knows you. And if you've read this far, He's already crossed our paths. Whoa. That's my God.Jon Bakkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04547723032385403092noreply@blogger.com0