Author: youthguysteve

Am I alone?

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And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near
Hebrews 10:24-25

Bring a Church worker can be a very lonely vocation. We spend countless hours with other people, We are on call for people and their problems 24/7 and finding someone in ministry you can be honest with and dump on can be a truly difficult thing.  Its not that people at Church don’t care, because they do, but it is your place to be with them not them with you. So my goal has always been to have people outside of my church and community to speak with and grow with.

But I don’t think this is just a problem for Church workers.  I think this is a problem for all people in many walks of life.  You see I think it is one of the devils great tricks. He wants us to be alone.  When we feel truly alone, when we have no one we are talking with about this faith thing then we are so easily tricked into feeling like God isn’t there. Or we believe no one cares including God.

Lately I have been a part of a couple of groups of people who have helped me feel less alone.  People who I really feel care about me, and I can dump on.  I try to do the same for them.  My point here is don’t be alone.  God calls us to live this faith out in community.  He calls us to live it out with others.

I think American Christianity has lost something in our goal of individualism. Many people tell me today their faith is between them and God. Although I agree that it obviously has a personal part, faith is truly lived out in community.  The community helps keep you on the straight path when it comes to theology, faith life, and practice.  It keeps us from going too far down a path of evil.  Its goal is to hold everyone accountable, and more importantly remind them of the God who forgives us for Christ’s sake.

So we come back to, are you alone?  Well with Jesus of course we are not but since we don’t get to see touch and see him in visible form it is probably best to experience this Jesus in community as the body of Christ.  You see; we see Jesus, when we see each other.  We see Jesus when we gather together around the Word of God and sharing our faith in that context. This faith we are given as a gift and we experience all of it in this amazing community.  We also experience it in this community when we experience the forgiveness of sins with body and blood of Christ. We can receive it in private confession surrounded in God’s word.

So today I pray all of us experience this community of the believers in Christ.  We never have to be alone.  Where even if our vocation or job makes us feel alone we have a place where we never are alone again in Christ Jesus through his body the Church.

in Christ,

Steve

Love by definition!

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Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 ESV.

What is love? I have been asked this a lot over the years by students and friends.  I always take them back to 1 Corinthians 13. I know it is a verse that is read at every wedding and often gets quoted during Valentines day but what does love really mean?  As a good Lutheran it is a great question to ask. Let me start by telling you what it doesn’t mean first.

Love is not an emotion.  Love is not a feeling about another person.  Love isn’t about making me happy or making the other person happy.  It isn’t an emotional high. What Paul talked about here has nothing to do with how I feel about someone.  If we think love has to do with feelings then we missed the whole point of the text. But more importantly what love truly is. (this by the way is the hardest for my students to understand)

Over the years I think many of us have gotten the idea that the love in a relationship between two people has to do with how we feel.  When people use this text as a marriage text I pray the pastor explains to them what the text means.  The Love used here is always used as a verb.  It is never an adjective or noun.  It describes how we care for each other. You see Love is about how we respond to those around us.  It tells us how love is acted out.  Love is about action. The really crazy part is this text has very little to do with us at all beyond a way for us to imitate Christ.  If we were to focus solely on how we are to love each other we would miss out on the most important part of love text.

The most important part of this love text isn’t how do I love my spouse or how to do I love my girlfriend or boyfriend but how does Jesus love me? His love in this text points us to something that is so important to marriage, love endures.  Love doesn’t give up. That care from God lasts even when we don’t deserve it.  Love is patient…Absolutely Christ is patient with a crazy awful sinner like me. God showed His love for me by forgiving my sin through the cross.

Today as you think about Love remember that Love isn’t about how you feel about other people but about how God showed his care for you.  As you think about those around you today share the crazy love Jesus showed to us sinners.

in Christ,

Steve

Do you hear me?

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Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.  And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Colossians 3:12-17

It happens all the time… I am sitting in the room with a bunch of teenagers and everyone of them is on their phone, iPod, or other device.  One of them might be talking to the group but in general students today are constantly on a device either with twitter, txt messaging, snap chat or some other electronic from of communication.

The problem isn’t just teenagers. We younger adults and increasingly older adults are getting into the habit.  In fact if I am honest, I am just as bad if not worse than most of the teenagers I work with.  My kids have looked at me with those oh so beautiful eyes and said “Dad will you stop playing on your phone and play with me.” My heart breaks a little every time they say it.

Maybe you can relate, maybe you aren’t there yet, but we all need to struggle with the damage we are doing to our relationships when we don’t communicate in person.  We are so busy trying to communicate with every person on the planet instead of the person sitting across the room.

For all of us in youth ministry but more importantly for all of use as fellow Christians.  We need to be better at this communication thing.  The problem with electronic communication is it is so easy to miss read people and or not hear and see the pain and struggle they may be going through.  It is so much easier to speak ill of people when it is in electronic form instead of speaking to them in person.  These forms of communication are causing many of us to be very mean and hurtful. It is damaging our Christian community and everyday lives.

So what can we do…

We could take our computers, smart phones, iPods, etc. and chuck them out the window into the snow.  I know your heart just skipped a beat. It really isn’t very realistic anyway.  These forms of communication do have a great benefit.  The problem is that if we only use this form we never really know people. When we miss that face to face talking with someone we cannot possibly know them or understand them.  (ask the kid from Notre Dame.)

So who is it in your life you are ignoring or hurting?  Who are you only speaking to on twitter, facebook or txt? How can you show them love and compassion by actually being with them. How can you bring reconciliation to a situation by being in the situation.  I know it is a challenge for all of us myself included but it is a challenge we must all take seriously if we are to forgive and bear each other burdens. To help bring hope to our relationships and lives together.

Still trying to figure out this Christian life, while living in Christ’s grace.

Steve Wilson

Chrismas: They lied to me!

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The brothers immediately sent Paul to Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue.  Now these Jews were more noble that those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.  Acts 17:10-11

Over the last month I have spent at least 5 days with different classes at our Lutheran Day School, Adult bible class and Sr. High youth going through the Christmas story told to us by the gospel writers.  I have been amazed and saddened by some of the reaction.  The first class I went to was the 5-6 grade class.  I had a quiz they were to take and then we went over the questions in a fun power point I created.  Many of the students we amazed at how many questions they go wrong.  The average score on the test was 8 out of 28. To be fair many of the questions were tricky and meant to make you think.  (Adult class had the most trouble admitting they were wrong!) I even got called out on one of the questions because the text was unclear.

I knew it would be fun, but I guess I didn’t expect some of the reaction I got from doing it with all the groups.  Some of the adults were angry and thought the test was unfair or they didn’t think I was right with my answers.  I think the most amazing response came from one of the 5th graders.  She said in a somewhat funny but somewhat sad voice.  “I have been lied to all these years.”  That phrase got me to thinking about how we teach students, or families, and adults about scriptures.

I don’t think many people have the intention of lying to students or their children when they tell a story from the Bible.  I think most of us have good intentions.  However, I do think it is most important for all of us to actually be in the text.  we believe this is where God speaks to us.  When we talk about God speaking to us we say in happens in and through the Word of God. We stray from this all to often.  We will go to a note in our bible or, rember how it was portrayed in a movie all too often.  The Pastor I currently serve with is fond of saying after someone talks in Bible study “That is great what your note says or what that book or this book says but what does the text say, lets start there.” Sometimes we read a text and just assume we know what it is saying or we repeat something that maybe isn’t really in the text but it is how we think it should have gone.  As Christians we can read all the books and commentaries we want but if they aren’t based on the actual text then they can be less than helpful.  These books and such are not bad things but sometimes we can miss what the text actually says.  We have to be careful and discern what the text actually says and share that with our people, families and friends.

Have we lied to kids about Christmas? Well no it happened, and many of the details we think we know from Sunday school class, a nativity display or the children’s Christmas program are false or at least misleading. So why don’t we correct it then? The answer is I don’t know.  The girls comment in class a few weeks ago really made me think about biblical accuracy.  In my Church I am know for taking the wise men form the nativity because they don’t come until Jesus is older (Matthew 2).  They were not there at his Birth.  I don’t however stand up and destroy the manger that looks like a stable, or protest the Christmas pageant with the innkeeper (Luke 2).  So what is my point.  I guess it is that we as Christian Men and Women need to be in our Bibles more.  Be more aware of what the text acutally says not what we think it should say or pull things from out of context to fit our purposes.  We all should be checking more in our scriptures about what the bible actually says not what we think is says.  As for me. I know I will be reading much more in the coming year.  I plan to get into it the text more and when I hear someone tell me something about the Bible I am going to be asking more and more, “Where is that in the bible?”

Gods richest blessings to all of you as you celebrate “The Word becoming flesh and dwelling among us” John 1:14

Steve

Worship is Never Convenient!

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Therefore, brothers since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus,the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. (Hebrews 10:19-25)

Many times in ministry people will complain to me, as their child gets older, especially High school aged and beyond, “They never go to worship and want nothing to do with it.”  Often this comment comes with the “Why aren’t you getting my kid to come to Church” look.  On one occasion I was brave and told the parent what I really thought. Maybe it was a bit harsh but I think it was truth all the same.  I told the mom I was talking to “You taught you child about worship.  They are just following your example.  A lot of families have said we go to worship when it is convenient or when we feel like it. ” She proceeded to get a little angry and defensive about her worship practice.  She came up with the classic excuses “I work, my kids had sports this weekend and sometimes I want a day to sleep in. They really didn’t want to go and I didn’t want a fight so we took a week off….”   I responded with “What did that teach them? It taught them we only go to worship when it is convenient for your schedule.” We shouldn’t be surprised that our kids are listening and watching everything we do.  It may seem like they are never listening but in all reality they are watching our every move.  If every time it is difficult to go to Church we miss worship, our kids see this and pick up on it.  They will make the same choices we make when it comes to worship and ultimately life.

For high school, jr. High, and college students worship is never convenient.  For most parents, adults, and young adults worship is never convenient.  Our lives are super busy we run from one thing to the other. We all have many activities that take up most nights of the week especially Saturday night as we get older.  Most teens stay up very late on the weekends and just don’t want to get up for Church. Many young adults do the same thing.  It is not convenient to be awake before noon on a Sunday. In fact to be honest as a Church worker I would love one Sunday to just skip and sleep in until noon as well.  The question for us as parents is “Have I made my worship attendance all about being convenient? Have I told my kids worship is only for when I want to go.”

This is a tough moment for all of us as parents.  I have seen it done many times over and over where parents let sports, social activities, homework and everything else get in the way of worship.  The amazing thing about worship is that in worship we receive the two greatest gifts of our faith lives. We receive Christ’s Word for our lives and Christ’s body and blood for the forgiveness of sins in the bread and wine.  These two things alone are our greatest defense against all the world has to throw at us.  Satan would want nothing more than to get us by ourselves away from our gathering together in order to take us out.

I don’t want to end this with just God to Church.  I want to end with Forgiveness is available for all of us because it is.  Grace is available through our amazing God even when we as parents teach our children the wrong thing.  It is important for all of us to think and pray about how we can do it better.  We can come up with all sorts of excuses but in the end we are called to gather together so that we may be lifted up. Come join a community of believers in Christ. Hear the good news of Christ and may it life up you and your family in your faith journey going forward.  Worship is never convenient but it is the greatest benefit for our faith.