I’m back from Pennsylvania, but am way backlogged here. So until I get my feet on the ground, here are some more thoughts from Robert Farrar Capon’s Kingdom, Grace and Judgment:

I wish you can hear me laughing. This is hilarious, until you stop and realize it unfortunately and painfully true. To share God as he really is, just doesn’t fit in any of the boxes we have so expertly designed for him. So for those trapped in such boxes, it is easy to miss who he really is and easy to dismiss those who reflect his glory.

This is my last day in Pennsylvania for a while. I leave tomorrow to return to California. I’m really ready to get home and get some Sara time in. As an added bonus, my daughter and granddaughter will be picking me up from LAX because Sara is working tomorrow. That will be fun.

I am continually amazed at God’s ability to make connections. When he is so good at it, I wonder why we fuss and stew over trying to make things happen. While in Grove City, PA, I found out about a counselor at a local college who is involved in some complementary work to the work I do in BridgeBuilders. We got to spend an hour today sharing how God led us into our respective attempts to bring truth and respect to the sexual orientation debate. It was enligtening and encouraging to meet him and find that his perspective might provide some real help to the piece I’m working on with the First Amendment Center designed to help schools navigate this social conflict. Isn’t he amazing?

Also this week I met a couple who drove six hours to be part of seminar I was doing in here. Six hours? Amazing! We also had some time personally together as they are at some critical moments of decision in the process of Father’s work in them inviting them to greater freedom and life in his name. They had such gentle and warm spirits that I knew instantly Father had been well at work long before I got to meet them. It is so encouraging to see how Jesus is leading people to his side and teaching them how to live in his life.

And I heard from a friend today on an Internet list. She was responding to something I had told her in the past about how God is very good as setting his children in the family as he desires. Community is a gift God gives, not a chore for us to produce. She had been waiting a long time to make connection with someone in her locality that shared her passion for relational life in Jesus shared among believers. in the last few days God has connected her and her husband with another couple who is on a similar journey.

He knows! He is able to make every connection we need as we live deeply in him and keep our eyes and ears open for the people he puts in our path. And when he does, take some time to taste of the relationship and see where it might lead. They may be people on a similar journey that you are; or they may be people who will be if you befriend them and they see the life of Jesus in you. You just never know what God might do if you don’t make the effort to cultivate relationships with people God brings near you. I wonder how many people feel isolated and alone when God has sent people across their path, but they have missed them because they are so looking for what they want instead of what God is giving. Let’s live by what he gives, not by our own devices, nor imprisoned in our own insecurities.

At least as much as he graces us to do so. I know there are seasons may God want us just to himself for a time, so enjoy those too! But when he is ready to gift you with community, be ready to respond to the doors he opens and be able to celebrate the joy of community in Father’s family.

FRANKILIN, PA – There is nothing I love doing more than hanging out with folks for a few days sorting out the reality of what Father and Son did on the cross for us. We’re in an old castle on a hill in the woods of Western Pennsylvania that was built in the early 1900s by the man who invented kerosene. There’s just under 50 of us and we’ve had the whole week to refocus our life in God and to sort out what it means to live in his reality. It has been awesome. It always rekindles my passion to focus on these things.

This is a new group of folks for me. For forty years these people and their families have come together each summer to spend a week growing in some area of their spiritual life and fellowshipping together. They invited me to join them this week and share with them anything I felt led to share. What I love most is the questions people are asking both in sessions and at other times we’re just hanging around. The spiritual hunger is glorious, and the work Father is doing to free people into his life has been a joy to frolic in.

One of the things that has been fresh for me this week is thinking of the Parable of the Incredible Father (popularly known as The Prodigal Son.) We’ve looked at this parable with a different older brother. We not only looked at the Pharisee-son slaving on his father’s farm with anger and resentment that Jesus told about. We’ve also contemplated what this story would have been like with Jesus as the older brother. He is that, you know. He is the firstborn among many brothers and sisters who have been invited into his Father’s house.

If Jesus were the older brother in this story, how would he have felt about his younger brother? What might he have said to him when he reached rock bottom? How would he have made a way for this brother to come back home as a restored son and heir? That’s what Jesus did. Not only in his life here on earth, but continues to find us at our lowest, most broken moments, and invites us back to the Father’s house, where the table is set and the barbeque is blazing. It doesn’t take much imagination, because Jesus has already accomplished this in us who have found ourselves back home in the arms of a loving Father.

Well, gotta get back to the retreat as we finish up in the next twenty-four hours. Then it’s on to Youngstown, OH and some great friends there.

Tomorrow I head for 11 days in Western Pennsylvania. I’ll be teaching at a family camp through the week, head up to Youngstown, Ohio for a Saturday afternoon/evening with some dear friends in a home church up there and then it’s back to Pennsylvania for a seminar at an Assembly of God fellowship in Grove City. I’ll be gone about 10 days and would appreciate your prayers for the folks I’ll be with during these times. I’ll try to blog when I get near an Internet connection.

I have finished Robert Farrar Capon’s Kingdom, Grace and Judgment and there’s a few more quotes I think you’ll enjoy:

Wow! Can you imagine living alongside folks that really believed that? It would be an absolute joy. I hope you know some of those. If not, I hope you are one of those so that others near you will have a safe place to fall in moments where their weaknesses are evident. If not, ask Jesus to help you see this reality from the core of your being. He’s the one who helps us live in this freedom.

I forget sometimes how much I hate change.

I think I enjoy it, and for most of the spiritual changes in my life I love what God has transformed in me. But from the safety that process has brought, I often forget the pain that produced it. I’ve gotten a great reminder of that this past five days. We have moved 30 miles to the east and are now setting up a different home and different office. Nothing has been easy. Phone connections, plumbing, Internet—all have been a gigantic chore that has ripped more time from my hands than I had to give them. It has been a horribly frustrating process. We want to enjoy our new location, but we’re too warn out finding our way here.

Even though I know we will settle into this place one day and enjoy it even more than our last home, for the moment, we can’t find anything we need when we need it, because everything has a different place her. Everything takes longer to do because we’re always searching for a tool or a piece of something that got separated during the move.

As I sat down today to catch up on some of my email backlog, it was filled with some very desperate pleas for people who feel greatly disoriented as God is bringing change into their lives. Most people don’t like it and I can’t blame them. Change is painful and theological change can be the most painful of all. When we realize the Jesus we’ve heard about all our lives may not be a complete picture of the Jesus of the Bible, it can be horribly disorienting. When we discover that church isn’t what we thought it was, or Christian growth is motivated by his grace and affections not by our fears, the result can be frustration, disorientation even anger.

At times like that it is easy to give into the notion that we’ve gotten sidetracked somehow, or that God has left us on our own, when in fact those frustrations prove the process is ongoing. As they say, old habits die hard. The good news is: they do die. In time, everything will find its place in our new home and it will work better for us than our previous one did. Right now all we have to do is stay in the process until it is completed.

That’s why Jesus told his disciples to “Remain in me.” Don’t go anywhere. Don’t give into your fears that I have abandoned you, or that you are hopelessly lost. Just hang in there right where I put you and everything I need to do in you and everything I need to show you will be done.
Change is painful, but one day when you’re feasting on the fruits of it you, too, will forget the pain in the fruit of those changes.

It has given me a fresh compassion for those in mid-process of coming out of religion to embrace life with the living God.

I have finished Robert Farrar Capon’s Kingdom, Grace and Judgment and there’s a few more quotes I think you’ll enjoy. Here’s one:

As one who has both been cut off at the knees for the sake of the institution and as one who did it to others in more religious days, I agree wholeheartedly. The dying to self and institutions we are so afraid of, is the door into his incredible life.

And on a personal note, don’t expect to hear from me for the next few days. It is finally time to pack up all our junk and take it down the road about 25 miles. We won’t even have Internet service until Monday. So, be well. I’ll talk to you on the back side of this move, if I survive it! And all our numbers will change. The new office address will be: 7228 University Drive, Moorpark, CA 93021. Phone number: (805) 529-1728. Stay well!

In case you think all of my email is filled with great questions and wonderful affirmations, it isn’t so. Take this one I got last week:

Are you surprised he signed his letter as ‘Senior Pastor’ so-an-so? I’m not even sure what article he is referring to, since he didn’t say. I’d assume he means Why I Don’t Go to Church Anymore. But my heart goes out to people like him. I used to be one of them only considered those who were involved in a recognized local assembly to be committed Christians.

Now I know better. Institutional commitment alone is meaningless. Jesus never told his disciples to organize such things, nor people to attend them. The writers of the New Testament talked of the church locally as believers in a given region. They met in homes, related to each other with joy and service, and for over 300 years never began the kind of institutions and traditions that have come to mark Christianity for the last 18 centuries. They loved each other, were devoted to each other even beyond their faults and weaknesses, and shared his life together by the strength of their relationships throughout the week.

I honestly think those who see their church involvement as a congregational meeting have more to explain about New Testament precedents than those who live in the reality of open and honest relationships with lots of other Christians in their area—and not just those who attend one institution. Over the last five years Sara and I have built relationships with a variety of people in this area. Some of them attend a Sunday morning gathering; many of them do not. But what they do have in common is a passionate desire to live deeply with Jesus and to walk alongside other believers in meaningful relationships. What more could we ever want from the church?

I do agree that those who claim the name of Christ are part of the local body of believers. I guess I just mean that differently than my pastor friend does. Some us just grew tired of all the institutional baggage that seemed to hinder rather than help those relationships. We’re not attacking others who see it differently by calling their beliefs foolish or accusing them of great harm. I don’t see the need for them to do so with us.

I love the questions people are asking as they wake up to the reality of living in the life of Jesus. This one came today from Mississippi and in the limited space email offers, I tried to give her a bit of an answer:

Not stupid at all… Religion finds no end to the ways of manipulating people to do good or even to convert. As God wakes us up to his reality we can admit that most of what evangelism has meant is exploiting and manipulating our neighbors and friends, rather than demonstrating to them the reality of who God is by the way we live our lives. I’m blessed God is doing that work in you.

Scripture makes clear that it is the Spirit who convicts the world (John 16) and that it is our task to love them freely (John 13:34-35) and not manipulate them by persuasive words (I Cor 2) nor shameful tactics (2 Cor 4). Rather by living in his reality and openly talking about it as others ask us about our lives we ‘set forth the truth plainly (and in doing so) commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God. (2 Cor 4:1-4)

As we live in his reality, we’ll have no end of opportunities to give an account for the hope that lies within us. And then we can truly express our love and concern for people and not just manipulate them to respond the way we think they should.

It makes sharing this kingdom a task of exquisite joy, not a heavy obligation.

You would probably have had to grow up in the 60’s and 70’s to get this one, but back then it was big-time preaching to take the names of God from the Old Testament that used the word Jehovah as a prefix. For instance, Jehovah-Jireh, (the God Who Provides) Jehovah-Rapha, (The God Who Heals You ) and Jehovah-Tsidkenu (God Our Righteousness.) Since then translators have used the more accurate Yaweh and have left out the Hebrew suffixes so that sermon doesn’t preach as well today. It actually was an interesting study in the redemptive attributes of God throughout the Old Testament.

But a college student from California has uncovered another one. This one isn’t in the Bible, but she swears its true nonetheless. During my recent trip to New Mexico, her father told me about her engagement with Jehovah Tsnikki. You’ll have to read that out loud to make sense of it—Jehovah Tsnikki, The God Who Sneaks Up On You.

How many times have you followed the Lord’s leading into a situation just certain as to how it would turn and be absolutely shocked when you realized that God had an entirely different outcome in mind? Certainly there is evidence of this reality throughout the Bible. God told Paul he would be going to Rome. At the time, I’m sure Paul had no idea it would be as a prisoner. But then again, the price was right. God sent Peter to Cornelius’ house before he had any idea God was going to allow those pesky Gentiles to get saved! And who can forget Joseph’s dream that he would rule over his brothers, only to find himself kidnapped, sold into slavery and finally unjustly imprisoned? God has some interesting ways to transform our lives with his glory.

I’ve had occasion to see Jehovah-Tsnikki as well, though I never knew there was a name for it. Often I have gotten involved in something thinking I knew exactly what God had in mind, only to find out I was being set up for something entirely different than I could have conceived. Most times it was more painful than I’d ever imagined, but if I had known that in advance, I may not have followed him into it. At other times, I’ve found him sneaking up on me right in the midst of some mess I’ve made, making himself know and accomplishing his purpose anyway.

Jehovah Tsnkiik! What great name for an incredible Father who dazzles us over and over again with the sheer wonder of his character and an unfolding purpose that isn’t even thwarted by our own ignorance or misguided efforts. Would you expect anything less from someone whose ways are far higher than our ways?

I’m sorry it has been so quiet around here. I got back Monday from a weekend in New Mexico and fell right into a host of details that need to be sorted out not only for the people I encourage and the websites I run, but also to make final arrangements for our move next week about 30 miles to the east in Moorpark. So don’t be surprised if this blog is kind of quiet for the next few days.

Last night Brad and I recorded a new edition of The God Journey which has just been posted on our sister website. “Living in the Relationship” is designed to encourage people outside the box to go on and thrive in their personal relationship with God through Jesus. Brad and Wayne also tackle the difficult question, “What do you do when you feel like God is asking you to do something you’re not ready for?” and comment on some recent letters from listeners.

I had a marvelous time in New Mexico, meeting a wide variety of people in a broad diversity of places in this journey. We talked and talked and talked about how it is that we can live in the power and simplicity of the life of Jesus and how we that can be freely shared with other brothers and sisters without the complications and baggage of institutions and programs that offer an illusion fo community without letting us experience its life and depth. I spent a couple of days in Albuquerque and then the weekend up in Capitan. I am continually blessed by the hunger I find in God’s people and the willingness of so many to risk the disapproval of friends and family to pursue the hunger that is on their hearts.

We ate everything from barbeque to Mexican to Cajun, sat under the trees and shared the rich heritage our Father has provided for us in his son. We were even interrupted Saturday night as we talked outside under a 1500 square foot tarp some of them had put up that morning in case it rained. As we were winding up for the evening a powerful thunderstorm cell crossed overhead flooding us with water and blowing down the tarp we were under. It was quite a finish to a marvelous day. We left Sunday evening to head back to Albuquerque so I could catch my 6:00 a.m. flight home. We were treated to a magnificent sunset as we drove west from Capitan back to Albuquerque.

One of our themes from the weekend came from Ezekiel 34. As God prophesies against the bad shepherds for feeding off of his sheep instead of feeding them, he said he would replace those shepherd himself. One of the things I noted in that passage was that he never blamed the sheep for being scattered. He blamed the shepherds who had misused them. Then he promised to gather the sheep to himself. He would be their shepherd and lead them into pastures where we would never need to be afraid again. What an amazing reality! Jesus is the only Senior Pastor you will ever need. Imagine the freedom and joy we could experience if we could grasp that one simple truth.