It is ironic that I am typing this message on a laptop using free wifi at a Starbucks after spending $5 on a mocha. The only thing I'm missing is a prime location. I'm not sure where I went wrong in my service. This year has been a year of conviction. In the world, I am the 1%. I am the rich man. I am a rich American. I alone make more than twice the national average for household income in the US, therefore my wife can stay home. We live comfortably. We are on track to send our kids to expensive private school. Our house will be paid off in the next 3-5 years. We have a net-worth of a little under 250k. We're doing good. I'm not sure that's the way my life was intended to be lived out. I believed the messages of "needing" Christians who work among the lost but today I am questioning. What really has been gained from that? Have I bought into a well funded and popular lie?
I've always had a passion for those who were hungry or didn't have clean water. I've often thought, I would love to GO, live with and help people learn farming techniques or build wells and clean septic systems or preserve water. I am burdened at the knowledge of people dying from starvation or that their day was devoted to "surviving," that is finding water and food. Each day, working for these things. Vacation days don't exist when you're work is finding your meals. Animals live this way.
In the spring, I competed in several races with the intent to win the races. I trained hard. I spend hours pushing myself, I ate very well. Choice foods and only ate poorly on occasion. I medaled in all three events. One event, where I placed 2nd mostly because it was a tiny race, happened to be hosted by a previous employer. I saw many old friends and co-workers, several of which commented about their surprise at my "success" and current job. One person commented, "that's not what I expected." I knew instantly what he, an atheist, meant. Everyone, thought I was going to go into full-time ministry when I resigned that position. I questioned him, hoping I was wrong.
Fast forward to today, as I was chatting with a co-worker about the Occupy Austin people, talking about how homeless they appear. We agreed,their appearance, was not helping their cause. Instead, it created a large disconnect even with those who sympathize with their message. Many people think they are ridiculous and largely ignore them as they walk by. It lead me to make the statement that I don't believe in anything strong enough to do something like that. Instantly, and I mean instantly I felt conviction.
The really ironic part is that I've long held the belief we have these near religious movements, like Occupy, or Sea Shepherds, etc., etc., solely because Christians have not stood up for these ideas as good stewards of God's creation and instead have been branded as the opposite. Creating a situation that does not lend itself to the message of Christ. Instead of the Church standing UP for OR standing IN for the needs of society and the fight for justice, we've largely let secular groups and governments do the fighting.
Occupy protesters may look ridiculous and seem fanatical but I know they BELIEVE completely in their cause. My well dressed co-worker might agree with them wholeheartedly but I don't see her passion lived out. There is little sacrifice and so her belief in the cause has little impact on me. Occupy has garnered much attention. So now, I sit hear pondering everything. Whether or not I would endure the scorn of passersby, or nature's elements in a near homeless state to Occupy Austin for Christ? Would I give up my goals for a GOOD private education for my children? A debt free life, so insuranced up that I have little to fear financially from catastrophe? Do I give up my fitness goals and my love of WholeFoods for cheaper, lesser, non-organic foods? Do I sell everything and give it to the poor? Will my children look enviously at what their lives could have been? Do I lead a life where I meet every need I encounter with every resource I have been given in the proclamation of Christ?
To be brutally honest, it is easier for me to accept dying for Christ than to Occupy the World for the Gospel of Christ.
1 Corinthians 3:15
Showing posts with label Christianity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christianity. Show all posts
Monday, December 19, 2011
Friday, April 23, 2010
Home Stretch
Well today looks like it might be the day, we make an offer on a house. We found two houses that pretty much have everything we like/want in a house.
Oddly enough they are just a few houses from each other and one is literally 3 houses away from parks, pools and an elementary school. One is a foreclosure that is in great condition as far as foreclosures go. The other is a nice house and would be move-in ready. It also is in more of a cul-de-sac type street with a large green area directly in front of the houses. It has a long driveway and a nice backyard. It also has a very nice front porch. Its only draw back is that it is more expensive than we were hoping, but we aren't sacrificing anything or taking any steps backward. It is a step or two forward.
All of this is going on while we are closely following the heart surgery for a little girl in our church. I don't know what God has in store for us, and I know that an expectation of a long life and good-health is only something that has been around for less than 100 years and mostly in developed countries, but I find myself praying or almost begging that my faith not be tested like theirs. I find myself praying or pretty much begging that my children are not the way people's faith is challenged or the reason they come to believe. It brings me to tears to acknowledge that my life, they're lives are not our own and I trust in the promise of eternity. No wonder this is non-sense to people who don't believe.
Oddly enough they are just a few houses from each other and one is literally 3 houses away from parks, pools and an elementary school. One is a foreclosure that is in great condition as far as foreclosures go. The other is a nice house and would be move-in ready. It also is in more of a cul-de-sac type street with a large green area directly in front of the houses. It has a long driveway and a nice backyard. It also has a very nice front porch. Its only draw back is that it is more expensive than we were hoping, but we aren't sacrificing anything or taking any steps backward. It is a step or two forward.
All of this is going on while we are closely following the heart surgery for a little girl in our church. I don't know what God has in store for us, and I know that an expectation of a long life and good-health is only something that has been around for less than 100 years and mostly in developed countries, but I find myself praying or almost begging that my faith not be tested like theirs. I find myself praying or pretty much begging that my children are not the way people's faith is challenged or the reason they come to believe. It brings me to tears to acknowledge that my life, they're lives are not our own and I trust in the promise of eternity. No wonder this is non-sense to people who don't believe.
Monday, January 11, 2010
BANDERA 50k: It wasn't as hard as I thought!
IT WAS HARDER!!
Ok so if you go all the way back to the beginning of this blog, it started out as a training log to complement my cousin's training blog. We were comparing styles of training against each other to see how they might prepare us for a 100k race.
Well after an injury and much protesting by myself we decided, and thankfully so, to do the 50k instead of the 100k and here is a report from Saturday's Bandera 50k.
First we woke up at 4:30am to eat, get dressed and drive to the race location. 4:30am is an hour that most people never see unless they can't sleep or have a sick kid. The temperature outside was around 10 degrees according weather records for the area. 10 degrees!!! The really crazy thing is I looked it up AND some people in shorts!!
So we start the race at 7:30 a few minutes after the dawn and it gets light really fast but since we're in the valley there is no warmth from the sun. It is cold but my beard is holding steady and my warm clothes were perfect. The thing that made the real difference were the toe warmers. it is no fun to run with cold toes and the toe warmers were absolutely perfect.
Everything was great until about mile 10, supposedly the first 10 were the hardest, however since I was wiped out and hadn't trained consistently for this race the next 20 miles were the hardest for me. People hear that you're running 31 miles and they think the mileage made this race hard. The truth is, if you were to put all the hills back to back and the race was only 5 miles, then it would have been just about as difficult.
At the 12 mile mark I finally convinced my cousin to leave me behind and salvage whatever time she could. She managed to finish in 7:17. I walked/limped and almost crawled to the 15.5mi aid station. There I promptly announced, "I'm done!" continued to a chair and sat down. The volunteers graciously told me to just sit there and think about it. I announced several times I was done. They convinced me to eat a grilled cheese sandwich and I drank two glasses of coke. As I was sitting there thinking, it occurred to me that one day I might have to tell my daughter that she couldn't just quit something because it was hard. And if I wanted to teach her that lesson, I'd have to make sure I believed in what I was saying and had lived it myself. I had also been reading about the power of the Holy Spirit and how has American Christians we don't place a lot of value or believe there is a lot of power in the Holy Spirit. So I prayed, that I would have the strength and ability to finish this race and that I knew it was impossible for me to finish the exact same distance I had just finished by myself. I ran the next 11 miles.
It was nothing short of a miracle in my book, it really completely changed how I felt about marathons and the half-ironman races. I was really surprised because I had tried electrolytes, I had eaten carbs and I had taken water. I had tried to keep my physical needs met and so when I couldn't go further I just figured it was my lack of training or actually just my lack of just plain exercising. 15 1/2 miles was the best I could do. I had only put in about 30 miles of training so it makes perfect sense that I couldn't do this. So that's why, as goofy as it sounds, I really thought it was the Holy Spirit trying to show me that there is power, beyond what I'm capable of. I'm sure scientists and myself could rationalize it away, as electrolyte imbalance or calorie deficiency. But I had taken some of that in and it was more than just "getting my second wind." I did something I was sure I couldn't do. Something I would have bet money on that I couldn't finish.
I think I will always cherish this race because I found my breaking point before half of the race was over and had to rely on my belief that through the Holy Spirit it could be finished.
Ok so if you go all the way back to the beginning of this blog, it started out as a training log to complement my cousin's training blog. We were comparing styles of training against each other to see how they might prepare us for a 100k race.
Well after an injury and much protesting by myself we decided, and thankfully so, to do the 50k instead of the 100k and here is a report from Saturday's Bandera 50k.
First we woke up at 4:30am to eat, get dressed and drive to the race location. 4:30am is an hour that most people never see unless they can't sleep or have a sick kid. The temperature outside was around 10 degrees according weather records for the area. 10 degrees!!! The really crazy thing is I looked it up AND some people in shorts!!
So we start the race at 7:30 a few minutes after the dawn and it gets light really fast but since we're in the valley there is no warmth from the sun. It is cold but my beard is holding steady and my warm clothes were perfect. The thing that made the real difference were the toe warmers. it is no fun to run with cold toes and the toe warmers were absolutely perfect.
Everything was great until about mile 10, supposedly the first 10 were the hardest, however since I was wiped out and hadn't trained consistently for this race the next 20 miles were the hardest for me. People hear that you're running 31 miles and they think the mileage made this race hard. The truth is, if you were to put all the hills back to back and the race was only 5 miles, then it would have been just about as difficult.
At the 12 mile mark I finally convinced my cousin to leave me behind and salvage whatever time she could. She managed to finish in 7:17. I walked/limped and almost crawled to the 15.5mi aid station. There I promptly announced, "I'm done!" continued to a chair and sat down. The volunteers graciously told me to just sit there and think about it. I announced several times I was done. They convinced me to eat a grilled cheese sandwich and I drank two glasses of coke. As I was sitting there thinking, it occurred to me that one day I might have to tell my daughter that she couldn't just quit something because it was hard. And if I wanted to teach her that lesson, I'd have to make sure I believed in what I was saying and had lived it myself. I had also been reading about the power of the Holy Spirit and how has American Christians we don't place a lot of value or believe there is a lot of power in the Holy Spirit. So I prayed, that I would have the strength and ability to finish this race and that I knew it was impossible for me to finish the exact same distance I had just finished by myself. I ran the next 11 miles.
It was nothing short of a miracle in my book, it really completely changed how I felt about marathons and the half-ironman races. I was really surprised because I had tried electrolytes, I had eaten carbs and I had taken water. I had tried to keep my physical needs met and so when I couldn't go further I just figured it was my lack of training or actually just my lack of just plain exercising. 15 1/2 miles was the best I could do. I had only put in about 30 miles of training so it makes perfect sense that I couldn't do this. So that's why, as goofy as it sounds, I really thought it was the Holy Spirit trying to show me that there is power, beyond what I'm capable of. I'm sure scientists and myself could rationalize it away, as electrolyte imbalance or calorie deficiency. But I had taken some of that in and it was more than just "getting my second wind." I did something I was sure I couldn't do. Something I would have bet money on that I couldn't finish.
I think I will always cherish this race because I found my breaking point before half of the race was over and had to rely on my belief that through the Holy Spirit it could be finished.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Atlanta, Georgia by morning
Ok so I just spent the last day driving to Atlanta Georgia, and after 16 hours away from home we made it to a hotel to sleep and then continue driving the remaining 2 hours.
I hate driving, I usually only drive as far as Amarillo. Then I either don't go or fly there. I used to love driving but after a while it just ends up becoming a mind-numbing experience. So you end up become one of two different types of people. The guys who "try to make good time" and get there as fast as possible or the Clark Griswold types who enjoy the locals, the sencery and their families. I'm more of the Griswold type, because I don't want to have the mind-numbing lets just push on through to the next stop. I usually stop twice on the way to D/FW, once for Kolaches in West and then in Hillsboro or Waxahacie(sp.)
What makes this trip interesting is my parents gave me a TomTom for Christmas. I thought I would never use it, but I love it. The information it gives you is great and fits right into my number crunch personality. That coupled with the fact that everyone traveling with me was pretty much sleeping 60% of the time. I became the other person... I made them take pictures from the car, I kept asking them if they thought they could hold it for another 30 minutes. Thankfully we're traveling with another group and they forced me to slow down and enjoy at least meals rather than just the snacks we had.
So today we'll finish our trip and start enjoying some great teaching and great worship at the Passion conference. I'm kind of sad that I'm not going to see my wife and baby but sometimes what's best isn't what you want. Hopefully the trip back will be faster!
I hate driving, I usually only drive as far as Amarillo. Then I either don't go or fly there. I used to love driving but after a while it just ends up becoming a mind-numbing experience. So you end up become one of two different types of people. The guys who "try to make good time" and get there as fast as possible or the Clark Griswold types who enjoy the locals, the sencery and their families. I'm more of the Griswold type, because I don't want to have the mind-numbing lets just push on through to the next stop. I usually stop twice on the way to D/FW, once for Kolaches in West and then in Hillsboro or Waxahacie(sp.)
What makes this trip interesting is my parents gave me a TomTom for Christmas. I thought I would never use it, but I love it. The information it gives you is great and fits right into my number crunch personality. That coupled with the fact that everyone traveling with me was pretty much sleeping 60% of the time. I became the other person... I made them take pictures from the car, I kept asking them if they thought they could hold it for another 30 minutes. Thankfully we're traveling with another group and they forced me to slow down and enjoy at least meals rather than just the snacks we had.
So today we'll finish our trip and start enjoying some great teaching and great worship at the Passion conference. I'm kind of sad that I'm not going to see my wife and baby but sometimes what's best isn't what you want. Hopefully the trip back will be faster!
Monday, December 28, 2009
Christmas!
Well now we're far enough away from Christmas to start thinking of New Year's eve so before I forget I figured I would tell everyone about our Christmas day.
Christmas Excitement
I worked on Christmas Eve and when I went to lunch I saw an good deal on something I wanted to buy the wife, but the stores never had one because they were sold out due to a Thanksgiving sale they were struggling to maintain stock on. I thought I had found one and after a little negotiating (I never buy big items without at LEAST a 10% discount) I got the item at 15% off!! :-) There was however a catch, the store I bought it from was not the store where the item was located. Nevertheless, I was soooo excited, that I left work early at 2:30 to go pick up the item and return my wife's gift I had bought her, some boots. After returning the boots I headed to the store to pick up her new gift, and I was beaming with excitement!! I went up to the customer service desk to pick up my item only to be met with a disappointed clerk that said, there was a mistake and they didn't have the item in stock. Apparently, he explained, their computers only update twice per day and someone had purchased the item between the last and next update. :-(
Now Regret
So at this point my head is spinning on what to do. I now have NOTHING for Christmas... WHY did I take the boots back? Why did I do this on impulse? I thought in my head disaster! So I started thinking ok IF maybe there was a mistake to I started asking people, they checked the back of the store, nothing. There was a nicer gift in the same style as the one I purchased for her but it was more than twice what I paid for the one I THOUGHT I was getting! Hope was fading for a Happy Christmas for the wifey.
Not Really a Miracle
After trying to strike a deal with several people to purchase the more expensive gift and getting about 10% off. The manager got involved and this is where magical things started happening. At this point I am very close to being defeated. I know achieving the deal I want was probably not going to happen and I can't go back to the store and re-purchase the boots I just returned. So I asked the manager for a deal on the gift, but I told her if not can I just get an empty box for the display so that I don't just have a receipt on Christmas Day. Then when you get more in on Jan 5th I'll return the box and pick up my wife's gift. I know, I know, it sounded like a sad attempt to get a deal but it really wasn't and she seemed to be ignoring me anyway as she furiously typed in the computer. A few moments later she said, "Ok the best deal I can do is $, would you like to buy this?" I struggled to maintain composure because she gave me 30% off!!! I couldn't believe it. It was brand new, no open box, no returned item. Brand new!! As calm as I could, I politely said, "Yes!", and they processed my purchased and I ran out of there fearing they would change their minds. I love negotiating but sometimes you just get lucky.
The Real Fun
So Christmas Day I gave it to her with excitement and I think she loved it. However, I was surprised by what made the day for me. It was our baby scratching at the boxes with her little fingers, every once in a while catching the end of the wrapping paper and pulling a half-dollar size off. It was really great. She has no clue what was happening, or "the meaning of Christmas." But what she continues to show me, is if I love her as much as I do, and I enjoy watching her learn, play and explore and try new things. I cannot fathom God's love for me, for us. I have no explanation for why I don't trust His love as much as I want her to trust my love, especially knowing, I'll fail her, but He'll never fail anyone. The depth of His love is really something I'll never understand.
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