Missional Living

"If you're gonna win the world for Christ, you're gonna have to sit in the smoking section."

-Neil Cole

'You don't stop playing because you get old. You get old because you stop playing.'

-Benjamin Franklin

Remember: recreation is re-creation, not a second-class use of your time.

I got up early to pack for our annual staff retreat this week. Before heading out the door, I had a few (quiet) minutes to read and ‘be still’ (thank you, jimmie). I had pretty much decided to discontinue regular QM posts, but ran across this from Piper’s Life as A Vapor :

"When a person speaks of writes or sings or paints about breathtaking truth in a boring way, it is probably a sin."

And, imo, perhaps one of the greatest sins of our age. When students (and adults!) complain that ‘church is boring’, we act like it’s their duty (penance?) to  suck it up and endure it.

We settle for lukewarm worship music.

We become accustomed to milquetoast  ‘Christian Living’ books.

We consume a diet of art that only expresses God through some frosty lens of a deer drinking from a mountain stream next to a ricktey cabin in the woods.

[yawn.]

Where are the expressions of ‘breathtaking truth’ that leave us breathless? That leave us in silence, grasping for words to express how our hearts have been consumed? Where is the lyricless music that so enraptures us that it brings tears to our eyes without a single voice?

We need the beautiful. And the spectacular.

 "You have never talked to a mere mortal[...]it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub,

and exploit–immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.

–CS Lewis, The Weight of Glory

"We are becoming who we will be forever."

Dallas Willard, from The Divine Conspiracy

Willard is urging us to see our lives, not as 24 hour short stories, but as novels, where each event has an affect on every other event and in turn has an affect on who we are and who we are becoming. So how do we begin to see our lives this way, as a novel and not just a series of short stories?

Try picking up Iron & Wine’s "Upward Over the Mountain" and attempting to piece together the images.

‘Never rely on the glory of the morning, nor the smiles of your mother-in-law.’

-Japanese proverb

"I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the street. "

–Steven Hawking, wicked smart research pysicist (primarily in theoretical cosmolgy and quantum gravity)

Funny on a couple of levels. First, the older I get (I am 41 today), the less I think I know for certain. Second, there are  hundreds of hardcore Calvinist predestinationist/electionists out there…and this makes me smile.

"One thing that drew me to our church was the old people. We visited a few churches in the area [before joining this one], but I’d walk in and look around and be like, everyone here is just like me–young couples with young kids. They can’t help me. They don’t know any more about this than I do."

–male, 35, overheard at our men’s retreat Friday night.

Never underestimate the power and importance of community. We all need a Paul in our life. And a Timothy. And a Silas. An Ester. A Pheobe. A Rahab. A Matthew. Countless others who we lock arms with and journey with.

Give it up for the old people.

Although I’m pretty sure you’ll never find this on any church’s website, I think it’ll do nicely for a tomcottar(dot)org Statement of Faith…

"We at tomcottar(dot)org acknowledge that God’s coming to earth in the person of Jesus Christ and recounted in the Gospels turns upside down what we used to think about concepts like "truth", "righteousness", and "rights". For in Him, Truth walked around, talked to people, and even cried and bled. In Him, Righteousness was shown perfectly, and perfectly illuminated our unrighteousness. And in Him, our "rights" are no longer ours. We’re left with a faith that, while deep, is also paradoxical and difficult. As a result, we’ve committed to leaning on each other as we collectively try to follow Jesus. We’re confident about some things: Jesus’ coming to earth was good news, it’s still good news, and there’s still more good news to come. You’re welcome to join us at any time."

*adapted from The New Christians, p162

"The older I get, the more I tend to think God’s wrath is not most prominently displayed

when we seem to be ‘punished’ for going our own way.

More often it seems to be when He lets us go our own
way uninterrupted and leaves us to the consequences therein."