Daddy Knows Best

Being a dad has been on my mind a lot the past few days. When my son Jace had to go to the hospital because of an illness, my love for him grew tremendously. I want what is best for my son’s life. Parenting out of love and grace is a goal I have for my fatherhood. Take a moment and watch the video above. If you are familiar with Rob Bell, then you know about his short teaching videos called “Nooma.” The link above is from the Nooma “Kickball.” It’s an oldy, but a goody. Here’s what I’ve learned from the Nooma and from being a father: God is a good Father and can be trusted. He knows what is best for my life. Therefore, I can and should be obedient to Him. Why? Because His true character is about love…not law. Even when I ask for something and God, as my Father, says “no” or “wait” I can rest assured that He is acting out of love and has a plan for my life. What a great reminder for me as I father my children. God is good, can be trusted, knows what is best for our lives and His true character is love. What a great reason to be obedient to all that He tells us in life. I mean, think about it…Jesus sums up the New Testament by telling us that we are commanded to love God, love people and go expand the Kingdom of God. That kind of teaching can be trusted. I can be obedient to a God who calls me to love…and not to do something crazy like strap a bomb to myself and blow up a mass of humanity. That’s a good Daddy…and obedience to Him makes sense. Leave me a comment with your thoughts on “Kickball.”

 

Football and Love?

So I just watched a video from HBO sports about a football coach in the Baltimore area who coaches in a very unique way. He is a former NFL football player and this is how he coaches — with love. It was strange to hear things like, “It’s our job as coaches to love you and it’s your job to love each other as players.” It was amazing to hear coaches and players repeat this phrase in unison. The coach’s reasoning: “I want to develop men…true masculinity…wins and losses don’t matter, what matters is what kind of husband and father you will be.”

What’s even more crazy? This team hasn’t lost in 3 years! That is amazing! To have high school players using words like, “love” and seeing that they are loved by their coaches and win is definitely interesting. It has really made me think about my coaching style…I tend to use yelling to motivate people. What if I simply loved players?

So, what can we learn about obedience here? If you’re like me at all, it’s very hard to obey demanding, mean, cranky people who constantly measure you and your performance and don’t show a lot of grace or love. If you have ever had a coach, teacher…someone in authority…who was constantly gaging your performance and making you feel bad about yourself, it’s very hard to want to be around that kind of person…let alone obey them. This past week has been amazing to me. To remember that God is not constantly measuring my performance and loves me is huge…and relieves a ton of pressure. Thank goodness that God is a good Father…who simply loves us and wants us to love each other. The coach in Baltimore loves his players and wants what is best for them in life — to be good men, amazing fathers and husbands. Does that coach deserve to be obeyed? You bet. Why? Because he wants what is best for his players’ lives. That’s a good coach…that’s a good father. Sound familiar?

 

May Cause Drowsiness

So my family has been sick the past few day and now the creeping junk…better knows as the “cold” (full of snot, a sore throat, congestion, coughing and just feeling like garbage) has claimed me as a victim. I would love to show you what I am coughing up and blowing out of my body right now. Anyway, I woke up at 2:11 am feeling pretty bad. I couldn’t breath or sleep. So, I went downstairs and took some medicine. Here’s the funny thing about cold medicine: while it can definitely help you, it can also mess you up.

There are specific directions on any kind of medicine. Directions, such as “take 2 tablets every 4 hours” and “do not take more than 10 tablets in a 24 hour period” or “may cause drowsiness…operate motor vehicles and heavy equipment with extreme caution.” Thank goodness these directions are on cold medicine. What if I would have ignored these directions and decided to go out and take a drive at 2 am despite taking medicine that warns me of the danger of mixing drowsiness and driving? That could have led me to harm…and others. I guess in some ways, driving while drowsy is comparable to some of our high school kids driving Wow…now I am sounding old. Sorry.

Anyway, the directions on the medicine keeps me safe. The directions lead me away from potential harm. The person who wrote the directions has my health and safety in mind. Does that sound familiar? God provides commands to keep us safe…to give up freedom…to improve His creation. Just like the directions on cold medicine, we don’t have to obey God’s commands. But, when we realize that God’s commands lead us toward something better, we are so much more likely to obey. Think about the 10 commandments. Yes, they are a part of God’s Old Testament Law, but these commands really do lead us towards freedom and something better. Think about it…don’t take things that aren’t yours, don’t kill each other, don’t sleep with someone else’s spouse, be truthful etc etc. Clearly, following these kinds of commands make the world a better place. I think that God has our best interest in mind when He gives us direction and command. So, the next time you’re sick and take medicine, follow the directions and think about God’s direction for your life. Obedience may just make your life a whole lot healthier.

 

Obedience in Alaska

Obedience is something that I really haven’t understood for most of my life. What if God were to call me to something that I didn’t really want to do? Like, what if God told me to move and rescue endangered and other fury, woodland animals in Alaska? That would really stink…it would be so cold and weird! But, as we talked about yesterday, obedience is really a matter of how I view God. For most of my life, I have viewed God as law – full of demands, expectations and measurements. So, if I disobeyed God, I felt I was disappointing to God and would distance myself from Him. But, what if I really trusted God’s character? What if I really viewed Him as love? (Read 1 John 4:7-11) If I did, then I would probably obey Him more. I would trust that He knows what’s best for my life and strive to be obedient in all areas of my life. There have been times where I have been obedient to God and trusted that He knew what was best for my life. My senior year of college, I felt God was telling me to get into ministry, but I was studying to be a teacher. Would I be obedient to God? Would I trust that He really is love? That He was a good dad? Well, I did…I decided to get into ministry. This decision called for sacrifice. I was all set to graduate and begin a career as a teacher…but now I would have to go to graduate school and pursue a ministry career. Was it a good decision for me to do that? Absolutely! I’ve met so many amazing people here at FCC. I met my wife here at FCC and have experienced so many things with all of you! My point? We should all be challenged to live a life of obedience to God every day! Why? Because God’s character is good! He’s a good dad. He knows what’s best for my life (Read Proverbs 3:5-6). So, because of God’s character…because God is love…because God is a good dad…because God can be trusted…my expression of appreciation and love for Him should be obedience. Even if He tells me to move to Alaska to whale hunt and preserve trees ☺

We’re not a church unless we obey. May God work in our lives as we strive to be obedient to Him!

 

The Big Day

Yeah, that’s a picture of me and my beautiful bride on our wedding day — April 16, 2005. In the picture you’ll see some of our best friends and closest family members. I remember my flood of emotions on this day: “Wow, she’s gorgeous! I can’t believe I’m getting married! I wonder if she knows I snore at night and have bad breath in the mornings?” Anyway, weddings are big events, aren’t they? Just last week, I attended Brian Clark’s (our intern from last summer) wedding and was once again reminded of all the planning that goes into making that day special. You have to invite all of your family and friends, you have to pick out the right church, the bride and groom have to pick out the perfect invitations, flowers, colors, food and on and on. It is supposed to be a day where you go all out…I mean, it’s only supposed to happen once. For one day, you and that special someone have the spotlight on you as people join you in celebration of a commitment to a life-long marriage. It should be a big event…after all, it’s supposed to be a once-in-a-lifetime event (unfortunately, divorce can make it happen multiple times throughout someone’s life.)

Weddings — ideally, a once-in-a-lifetime event. Jesus was involved in a once-and-for-all event. When Jesus took on human flesh and came to earth, he had a mission — to provide rescue and forgiveness of sins through the sacrifice of His life. Jesus was obedient to the Father and went to the cross providing a once-and-for-all sacrifice for sin. Three days later, the tomb was empty and Jesus had defeated Satan’s biggest weapon — death. What can we learn here? Jesus’ sacrifice was so amazing…so powerful…so perfect and complete that it took care of everything. Jesus’ sacrifice provides forgiveness for the world once-and-for-all. Unlike things in the Old Testament, Jesus’ sacrifice doesn’t have to be repeated. It lasts forever and ushers in a new hope: that one day Jesus will come back and rescue those who trust in Him and fix all of creation. Because Jesus’ sacrifice was a once-and-for-all event, we can be assured that He can be trusted and therefore we can feel good about obeying Him. I hope that we all can remember the power in what Jesus did on His Big Day.

 

The Toilet

Without a doubt I have experienced some amazing things with all of you! Last year at Know Sweat (our summer mission trip to Milligan, TN) was probably one of the highlights of my life! Why? Because we were a team on a mission together. We simply loved God by loving His creation – taking care of people in need.

If we say that God’s character is good, then everything that God creates is good (read Genesis 1 & 2 and you will see that everything God creates is always described as “good”). Therefore, we’ll be obedient to Him by loving His creation – and that includes people…His greatest creation (read Mark 12:28-34).

I have never seen you guys more obedient than when I saw you serve people during Know Sweat last summer. Think about some of the things you did that expressed your obedience to God – painting garbage dumpsters (really, who does that?), blacktopping a parking lot, painting playground equipment, cleaning out abandoned, government housing units, building soccer goals for kids and even scrubbing some nasty toilets! Your obedience to God was demonstrated through those acts of love, sacrifice and service. Your obedience proved that you were completely Christ-like and loved God and His creation. Why? Because that is the way Jesus obeyed the Father. Jesus – the best expression of God’s character – washed feet, loved the unlovable, touched the untouchable and even loved God and His creation enough to die for us. Why? Because that’s the heart of God. That’s the command of God – to love Him and love His creation…all people…even those who never feel love from others. That’s obedience in action.

So, when I think of obedience, I think of Rebekah S. scrubbing a disgusting toilet in the projects last July in Milligan, TN. Why? Because that what Jesus would do…and that what He expects of us (read Matthew 25:31-46).