A Little Help!!!!!

This year, I have the honor and pleasure of participating in MDA's DeWitt Lock Up 2008 to help "Jerry's Kids®". To reach my goal I need your help! I'd like to include you on my list of contributors who are helping me reach my goal. Your donation would help MDA continue the important fight against muscular dystrophy. Check out my web page by clicking on the link below. There you'll find all kinds of information about MDA, and be able to make your tax-deductible donation on-line using your credit card.

MDA serves people in our community with neuromuscular disease by providing clinics, support groups, assistance with the purchase and repair of wheelchairs, braces and communication devices, and summer camp for kids. MDA also funds research grants to help find treatments and cures for some 43 neuromuscular diseases that affect people of all ages, right here in our community. I sincerely hope that you'll take the opportunity to support MDA. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to call or e-mail me.

On behalf of the families MDA serves, thank you!

Click here to visit my Participant Page.

If the link above does not bring you to my Participant Page, cut and paste the address below into the address bar of your internet browser.

https://www.mdaevent.org/ParticipantInfo.aspx?j=22f0abc0-ec1b-4a8e-b2f3-2c54b1be01fe

Body and Soul

Romans 5:1-11
"Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us."

I just got back from a workout at the Rec Center - a little biking, a little running, a lot of sweating. Since the summer of 2006 I have been training for and participating in triathlons: Sprint and olympic distances. What that means is swimming either a half mile or mile; biking either 12.4 miles or 24.8 miles; and finishing with a run of either 3.1 miles or 6.2 miles. One right after the other. My youngest son, Keegan, inspired me with his efforts in that realm. I was also inspired by my older son, Jesse, who was running a half-marathon and my wife, Sue who had run an 11 mile race. I have done races with each of the boys and the three of us raced in the Des Moines Hy-Vee Triathlon (olympic distance) in June of 2007.

To be honest my competitive nature kicked in and that is why I wanted to race. Well... they raced and I survived.

But it has given me hope. Hope born out of suffering and enduring and a change in my character. I am still competitive but against myself more than anything. I have lost weight and know that my physical health has improved. But more importantly I have used the time that I workout as a time for meditation and prayer. It clears my thoughts and opens my soul for the possibilities that the Holy Spirit offers.

Consider a way to exercise both your body and soul. Let it be an experience of God that gives you hope.

Just a thought,

P.C.

With or About?

“Theology has to do with culture because theology has to do with living religiously, which always takes place within the culture. Theology, by its very name, makes the great assertion that we can express a logos (word or reason) about a theos (God). Theology means talk about God, because it is first possible to “talk with” God, or to encounter revelation about God. Despite the airy claims of some theologians, then, there is no theology apart from life in the world, from life in culture.” Tom Beaudoin, Virtual Faith

I would suggest that we (The Church) have too often moved away from “talking with” God because we have for too long set ourselves apart from life or culture. We have in general stopped talking with God (and listening for God) as worship and ministry have moved more toward talking about God. Many I think crave an experience of rather than more knowledge about God.

Two subtle words perhaps, with and about, however, they were integral to Jesus’ ministry. Jesus lived in the midst of the culture and lived the concept “with God.” Tension arose when the Pharisees, Sadducees, and disciples attempted to talk about God without being with God, the disconnect most obvious as the people they encountered immersed in the culture were neglected, even denigrated.

Perhaps the experience of God we crave is to be found not in one great hour sheltered behind the opacity of stained glass windows but in moving beyond the walls of our supposed cathedrals to be with all of God’s creation.

Just a thought,
P.C

On Hearing

"The immediate person thinks and imagines that when he prays, the important thing, the thing he must concentrate upon, is that God should hear what he is praying for. And yet in the true, eternal sense it is just the reverse: the true relation in prayer is not when God hears what is prayed for, but when the person praying continuesto pray until he is the one who hears, who hears what God wills. The immediate person, therefore, uses many words and, therefore makes demands in his prayer; the true man of prayer only attends."
Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855)
Danish theologian

Authentic Holiness

Paul Evdokimov, a Russian Orthodox theologian who lived from 1901-1970, wrote, "It is not enough to say prayers, one must become, be prayer, prayer incarnate. It is not enough to have moments of praise. All of life, each act, every gesture, even the smile of the human face, must become a hymn of adoration, an offering, a prayer. One should offer not what one has, but what one is."

I do agree with that theology. That way of being is, I think, authentic holiness. However, it is certainly difficult to share with others. The reluctance for me comes from a fear that people will think me too pious or put me even higher on that false pedestal some have created for pastors.

There is also a layer of apologetics that is needed to counter the modern day Pharisees who have usurped what holiness in prayer is all about. For many who have been "burned" by the church Pharisees there is a sense that holiness is a shroud placed upon them in order to control or condemn rather than holiness being a baring of one's soul, a removal of the death pall.

Just a thought,
P.C.

Hope from Isaiah

Do you not know?

Have you not heard?

The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:28-31 New International Version