Don't Just Do Something, Stand There: A Future Without Me

"Anxiety is a result of envisioning the future without me." - Sarah Young, Jesus Calling

I don't know about you, but this quote hits me right between the eyes, and it speaks directly into the story of 1 Samuel 3. Eli was promised in the previous chapter a world without him. In fact, even the future he found in his family would be taken away. This anxiety must have greatly disturbed Eli, and drove him into a place of resignation and apathy. Samuel, on the other hand, represents a non-anxious world. He becomes more well-known, and God blesses Samuel. None of his words fall to the ground, which means that all of Samuel's words are infused with meaning and hope.

I find myself in the shoes of Eli sometimes. A lot, in fact. One of the processes I have been undertaking in the past several months is to ask the painful question: "What am I really afraid of?" If my worst fears come true, what will happen?

Answer: I'm alone. I'm in a world without me; or perhaps better put, a world with only me. That's a scary thought. And the fear of being in a world without me drives some of my actions. I get apathetic when I should be fired up, I resign myself to a lesser way of being because I am afraid that to risk a better way of being will lead to isolation. One of my favorite groups, The Bravery, has a song called "Believe." In that song, these lyrics haunt me:

I am hiding from some beast
But the beast was always here
Watching without eyes
Because the beast is just my fear
That I am just nothing
Now its just what I've become
What am I waiting for
Its already done...

Fear is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If I fear isolation, I will not risk vulnerability and the possibility of being abandoned, which will lead to my isolation. "The beast is just my fear that I am just nothing, now it's just what I've become..." is a perfect description of the power of fear.

But in Jesus Christ, there is a perfect love that drives out fear (1 John 4). In Jesus Christ, there is the promise that we will never be in a world without us (John 14). In Jesus Christ, there is strength for today and hope for tomorrow. So how is that love going to drive out our anxiety and fear?

Don't Just Do Something, Stand There: Laying in front of the Ark

Frankly, no image from this passage strikes me just the way Samuel laying in front of the ark does. What did you want most when you were 10 or 12? If you are anything like me, you craved comfort. Knowing your parent or guardian was right around the corner, being safe from all the sounds a house can make, and one's favorite blanket (maybe I'm channeling Linus from Peanuts fame). Somehow, I think Samuel craved the same things. And to be honest, what more comforting place could there be than the place where God is?

There is a danger in approaching this side of spirituality, the side of finding refuge in God. That danger is that our emotions can sometimes control our sense of spirituality. If we don't "feel it," then we are in a bad spiritual place or disobedient. When we do "feel it," then we are in a perfect place beyond reproach. And so we become dependent on our feelings to dictate our spiritual health. Emotions are important in spirituality, but not as a controlling force. To be honest, if I only laid down before the ark (took time to be with God and God alone) only when I felt like it, I wouldn't do it very often. And if I gauged my "quiet time" on my emotional satisfaction afterward, I would be a horrible Christian. I might be anyway, but it won't be my emotions that tell me that.

All in all, laying in front of the ark and desiring closeness with God is not about emotional highs and satisfaction, it is about a lifestyle of nearness with God. And if a 10 year old can cultivate that kind of nearness with God, I think I can too.

Don't Just Do Something, Stand There: Open Them Doors!

There is a ton of contrast in 1 Samuel 3. One of my new favorites is the light in the tabernacle. The tabernacle was designed that the room where the ark was would be completely sealed off- it would be dark. It was meant to be dark, with only a small lamp to light the room. This was the lamp of God that was going out. That lamp was a symbol- Israel's faith was about to go out and it would be replaced by total darkness. It was on the eve of the end that Samuel went to sleep in the Holy of Holies (or the Holiest Place). But while sleeping, Samuel is called by God and everything begins to change. A new day is born, and hope has been reborn. And so Samuel throws the doors open to the tabernacle, flooding it with light.


The opening of the doors has a couple meanings. The first meaning is that light has now re-entered the tabernacle. God has "come back" in a pretty big way.

But the other meaning, the one that tugs at my heart, is that now the Word of God can explode out and into the world like a rushing wind. It calls to mind this prophecy of Isaiah 2:
In the last days

the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established
as chief among the mountains;
it will be raised above the hills,
and all nations will stream to it.

3 Many peoples will come and say,

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD,
to the house of the God of Jacob.
He will teach us his ways,
so that we may walk in his paths.”
The law will go out from Zion,
the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
4 He will judge between the nations
and will settle disputes for many peoples.
They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation,
nor will they train for war anymore.

5 Come, O house of Jacob,
let us walk in the light of the LORD.

The light is meant to go out. The Word is meant to travel. God's presence is for the sake of the world. It is not contained in cathedrals or house churches, chapels or coffee shops. The light is meant for every dark place, beyond the comfortable and into the tragic, beyond the easy and into the complicated, beyond the safe and into the adventure. You are the tabernacle now. The Kingdom of God is in you now. Open them doors, and unleash a wild and crazy Kingdom of God on the world.

The LORD your God, the LORD is One: It's a process

I have a longstanding relationship with patience. It is not a healthy one. Patience is always nagging me, and I'm always telling patience to stop talking. If we were two people in a relationship, we'd need counseling. However, Deuteronomy 6:4-9 calls me to reconcile my broken relationship with patience. Following God, it seems, is a process. In waking, sleeping, traveling, staying home, having a family, on my doors and gates, faith is a process that is fairly consuming. This means, if I am truly to believe it, that I am on a pathway that leads closer and closer to God. Perhaps nobody reading this today struggles with shame, but I do. When I make mistakes, I think to myself "Why can't I be better than this!?!" Believe me, it's not helpful. I see my mistakes and disobedience as completely bad and as things that lead me farther from God. But are they? If it is true that my errors lead me away from God, then I am usually one step forward, two steps back. I'm farther from God than when I first began! But if my sin, my errors and my mistakes can be used to draw me closer to God, then everything's different. Then I can celebrate my learning, I can celebrate God calling me to a higher place- a better place. I can celebrate that God draws near to me in those times and, through the Holy Spirit, speaks clearly into my life at those times. Christians over the centuries have practiced various kinds of confession- and sometimes confession leads us to the guilty places and makes us feel that we are drifting farther and farther from God. Imagine if confession looked like this, "God, today I celebrate that in spite of my impatience, you teach me that you have a plan and that to you a day is a thousand years. Thank you for the grace to make this mistake and the encouragement to live life differently." This still takes our disobedience seriously- since we recognize that there is a cost to disobedience. And it takes forgiveness seriously- since we recognize that God is more interested in our growth than our guilt. What do you think?

The LORD our God, the LORD is One: There's an app for that

Confession: I have an app for everything. Apps, or smartphone applications, have recently become the thing that has overcome my life. Now, many of them are good. I recently paid a bill the moment I remembered it from my Huntington app. I can add stuff to my calendar even when away from my computer. I even have swap meets with other iPhone users (some of whom read this blog regularly... you know who you are) where we compare the newest and greatest apps. As for me, I mostly get the free ones, but there are so many good free ones! I have 500 Bible translations in one app, a devotional, three or four news sources (everything from ABC to BBC) a few games, and social networking apps. My current favorite app is TED- which provides great ideas and new thoughts. It's fun. The fact is, there is an app for just about everything. In the four months I have owned an iPhone, apps have affected most aspects of my life. Even as I write this, I am texting on my phone and it is providing me live updates to my social networking (not that I am a huge fan of the live updates... but that's another conversation). And the weird part is, I am usually very excited when a new app comes along that fits into my life and makes it easier. Then I come back to Deuteronomy 6:4-9. Sometimes I wonder if I don't treat God as my iPhone, finding new ways that God can fit into my life. And then God is my newest and favorite app. But as I read Deuteronomy 6, I find that God does not fit into my life, but I fit into God's life. And how cool is that! Seriously! My life is one small existence, the Bible emphasizes that my life is like the morning dew. But God's life is an epic life of creation and redemption, of reconciliation and justice, of holiness and awe-inspiring intimacy. And although God is perfectly content in the Trinity, and is perfectly capable of running the universe without us, God invites us into that life. God invites us beyond ourselves and into something eternal. And so what would my life look like in God's? Now is as good a time as any to reference Robert Webber, author of "The Divine Embrace: Recovering the Passionate Spiritual Life." He has a whole chapter on our life in God's life, and he connects the life-in-God to a disciplined life. And at first, that could be off-putting. Isn't a disciplined life just another way of saying "you have to earn your place with God?" He argues it isn't. After all, we are all fairly disciplined people. We are just disciplined to the life we are currently living. Every day we live out promises that we have made, consciously or unconsciously, of who we are going to be. Transformation, therefore, is changing to promises and disciplines that we live by. It is not simply adding tasks to our day, it is slowly, subtly and powerfully changing the kind of person that we are. How is your life lived in God's?

The LORD our God, the LORD is One: My Greatest Treasure

This will be another confession post. On Sunday morning, I preached on the shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-9) and I described God as our greatest treasure, worthy of our heart, soul and strength. And as the sermon sat (and continues to sit) in my belly, I am stuck on that word treasure. I will confess that it occupied much of my run yesterday afternoon- I sang songs from childhood about treasuring God. And yet, something about that phrase "treasure" rings hollow. It's not that I don't believe that God is our greatest treasure- I do. I just examine my life and wonder what it would mean to treasure God. You see, when I think of the word "treasure," I imagine a child opening that one gift they really, really wanted on Christmas morning. I was totally that kid. I'd go nuts, jumping up and down excited for the one toy I really wanted. Here's what is also true- my "treasured" gifts were given to Goodwill or sold in a garage sale long ago. My jumping up and down was always a precursor to the inevitable disappointment when all the gifts were given and opened, and there were no more treasures for me. Perhaps I need to re-think treasure. When I think of treasure today, I really think of people. I think of my wife, whom I treasure. I think of my family and friends, whom I treasure. I don't jump up and down, per say, when I think of them. I think of our history, of the difficulties we have overcome, of our great moments together. And what I think of most is that they are never too far away- either a phone call or a walk home. And if that is truly treasure, then God is my greatest treasure. When I am really excited, I share my joy with God. I occasionally dance- but not in public. When I am grateful, God shares in that moment with me too. When I am frustrated, you better believe that God hears about it. When I am disappointed and burned out, God is the refuge I collapse into. Now certainly, I do not do these things perfectly all the time. But when I can go to God with anything, I know that God is my greatest treasure, beyond any material or spiritual blessing God could give me.

The Lord our God, the Lord is One: Love and Times of Recession

It is no secret that times are tough for a lot of people. My situation is unlike that of many people. Whereas 2008 marked severe disruption in people's careers and livelihoods, 2009 marked the beginning of my career. Thus, I have been insulated from the harsh reality that a lot of people have now experienced (and are continuing to experience). I can pay my bills, put some money away in savings, and I view significant drops in my retirement account with a certain amount of *shrug*. After all, I probably won't draw on that until after 2050. We will probably be ruled by the apes by then, and I won't need to worry about it. But I know that my experience is a limited one. For many, as exemplified by Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party, these times are ruled by bitterness and cynicism rather than hope and trust. I will admit my own cynicism contributes as well. The bitterness and cynicism has been amplified by the fact that people are busier. Being laid off or unemployed is hard work. Navigating a support system, finding new and meaningful work, handling the stress and pressure is a full-time endeavor. For those who are still working, and trying to do twice the work as before, life is becoming busier and busier. Doing what we love, frankly, is becoming a luxury. And when we give up the things we love to support the people we love, we add just a little more bitterness and resentment to the pot. Movements begin to give people a united cause- blame. Children absorb this bitterness and resentment, leading to bullying (a different form of blame) and a rise in child/teen suicides. It should shock and disgust us that children are even aware of suicide- but now it's just a headline, like all the other suffering. And we get more bitter, and we blame more. And in the middle of all of this, the clarion call echos from Scripture- love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul and strength. What if our heart is broken, our soul is crushed and our strength is running out? Does God possibly want this busted offering? This would be a good place for me to turn on my "pump up" music and encourage us to follow the words of Nike and "just do it." But the reality of life is that you're told every day to "just do it." The God of the Bible doesn't seem to me to shrug off difficult circumstances and say "buck up and do it." Instead, the God of the Bible comes to us in our brokenness and our bitterness, our resentment and our resignation, and seeks to be our refuge. Sometimes, loving God with heart, soul and strength is found in service; other times, however, loving God with heart, soul and strength means collapsing into God. In all things, as it says on the door of a chapel in Stauton Harold (England), it means "to have done the best things in the worst times."

The God of the Spirits of all Humankind- the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts

When I was a young(er) Christian, I was introduced to the idea of spiritual gifts. I was so excited- God, through the Spirit, gave me a gift that uniquely fit me. Given my battles with accepting uniqueness (see yesterday's post), it was neat to know that I could grab my spiritual gift and charge into the life God had for me. And so I took "the test." For those who don't know, there are multiple tests out there to see what one's spiritual gifting might be. And I took mine and found my top 3 spiritual gifts. And guess what? Nothing happened. I think that there are many people who learned a lot about themselves and about God through spiritual gift tests. But there is a reason I have never pushed for them in our church- I don't necessarily think they reflect the Biblical reality of the Holy Spirit. When I read back over Joshua's story in Numbers 27, God lifts Joshua up because the Spirit is in him. Everything else- the leadership, the authority, the blessing of Moses, comes later. God does not lift Joshua up because he is a leader, God makes Joshua a leader because God chose him to be a leader. I think that we find our spiritual gifting not through standardized tests, but through participation in God's mission. It is when we take our steps of faith and commit ourselves to God's purposes for the world that we find our gifting. And our gifting is not permanent. Indeed, there is nowhere that indicates that God gives gifts once for all. In fact, they seem to be given in the moment. Some gifts may hold on, but others happen because the Spirit is doing something that we are unable to do. This tells me something. One, it tells me that God created a Church because of the mission, not created a mission for the Church. God raises up leaders, raises up disciples, raises up a community because God has a plan for this earth that is greater than the track we are currently following. God did not call a group and then give us busy work. And so when we are actively engaged in the mission, God equips us as we walk. One of my favorite Cornel West quotes describes faith as taking a step onto nothing, hoping to land on something. That "nothing" is the mission, the mystery of how we are going to do greater things than Jesus Christ. The second thing this passage tells me is that I ought to be pushing myself to take risks. After all, if I am fully capable with my natural skills to do everything I am currently doing, then what do I need God for? So why do you need spiritual gifting today? What is God calling you to do that is beyond your current skills? In that, you may just find your spiritual gift.

The God of the Spirits of all Humankind- Embracing Uniqueness

One of the best conversations I ever had went something like this... Me: "Is that something loose coming off your truck?" Dude: "No, it's tied down, why?" Me: "We are in (unnamed town near my hometown of Holland, known as hillbilly country). I don't want to pull over the car and hear dueling banjos." Dude (while laughing): "There are days I am surprised you are going to be a pastor. And I love it." I look back on that conversation with some pride. In the dude's mind, a pastor represented certain traits and tendencies. Controlling, judgmental attitudes and a refusal to walk alongside people are among the traits that were expected among clergy. And there are plenty of examples to reinforce that attitude. And I have had to work through all of those things. I can be pretty judgmental, and the anger that comes from that is not among my more attractive features. However, God has given me victory over some of those things in my life and I have been able to drop some of my former judgments and love people. But what got me was not a pride of "I'm better than others," but a celebration of my uniqueness. I like to think that I have embraced uniqueness as a pastor. I'm never in a suit unless at an official function. But I'm also not cool. I'm not an athlete, I'm not really handy around anything, I'm not a good artist or musician, there's a lot of things that I am not. I try not to focus on those things, but the sin of envy creeps in and I wish I could be one of those things. And then I feel guilty for feeling that way, and then I envy people who seemingly don't feel that way. I imagine by this point you can understand the vicious cycle this can present in me. But then I reflect on the God of the spirits of all humankind, and I can embrace my uniqueness more. I am not defined by the things I am not- I am defined by the God who created me, loves me, sustains me and fills me. I am gifted to live out my purpose in God. And while I have thought about what my purpose is, I think it comes down to this: I am created for good conversations with people. I am uniquely created to do this. I am interested in so many things that I can engage in conversation about just about anything. I feel alive when I'm sitting with someone and hearing their heart or their story. I am motivated when great conversations turn into action beyond my imagination. I am willing to look ridiculous if it means that I can build a bridge with another person (just ask anyone who witnessed me play soccer in Kenya- and who witnessed my limping the next day). On my worst days, I wish I could be you. On my best days, I am having good, if not great, conversations where I can share the God of the spirits of all humankind. What's your purpose? Have you embraced your uniqueness in the body of Christ?

The God of the Spirits of all Humankind- A Life of Significance

I want my life to be significant. That desire is hardwired into what it means to be a human. Marshall Rosenberg pioneered Nonviolent Communication in the 1960's, which focuses on communication as expression of needs. He listed the need to give life to another human being as one of the most significant human needs. In other words, we all experience the fundamental need to make a significant impact. When I was in Kenya almost a year ago, I talked to people raised in a completely different culture as ours who wanted to have lives of significance. They were young men and women who desired education and training in order to come back to their village and make it a better place. They would not have become rich, at least by our standards. And while they may have been tempted by material possessions, their hearts were on fire for their community. The same fire burns in the hearts of all people. And God nurtures that need with the Holy Spirit. By the Spirit, people are gifted and encouraged to go out and continue the work of Jesus Christ- a life of significance. The problem is that the word "significance" is married in our culture to economic thinking. We use words like "invest" to talk about mentoring. This, by itself, is not bad however, significance can easily be seen in the realm of scale and scope. In other words, significance is celebrity. Significance is being on the New York Times bestseller list. Significance is being heard by thousands of followers online and selling out conference centers. Significance is awards and accolades, the suitable reward for hard work. I think we can only move forward if we take an understanding of significance that is closer to the life of Jesus. One author explains this significance in the "For all, for one" rule. Think for yourself about what should be true for all people, and then help one person with that. All children should have a safe place to be a kid (Mark 9:42), a Kids Hope mentor helps one kid have that space. All people should be growing in their faith and living lives more like Jesus (Matthew 28:20)- Jan starts groups with three people at a time. There should be no poor among us (Deuteronomy 15:4), our Saturday morning Men's Bible Study helps one family at a time. To me, these are stories of significance. They may not be turned into a blockbuster movie, but they embody the truth of God's Word in our world.

I am the God who Brought You- Into the Thick Darkness

Frankly, I am not a dark person. There's a reason most movie monsters come out in the dark, and why haunted houses are always dark, and why we spent so much time on creating lights. Dark is not fun. And then we come to the end of the 10 Words (or commandments) story in Exodus, and God shows up in the middle of thick darkness, and even invites Moses into it. Personally, I would ask for a little "let there be light" so that I could see in the thick darkness. Or maybe I would quote 1 John 1:5 and say that in God there is no darkness at all. On my worst days, I might want to even go and get a flashlight. Either way, at the end of my excuses, Bible quoting and fear, I am still on the outside and not where God is. To be frank, I think we have the whole "God thing" way too figured out. Following God is so tame and nice that it involves no risk and mystery. The only mystery are the Bible verses that make us panic before we silently decide never to read them again- I'm looking at you, Lamentations. There we go, mystery solved. We can move on. I feel somewhat empty by this understanding of following God. It's boring. After all, we never tell stories of boring things. You will never hear me tell a story of the time I drank that glass of water and it tasted just like water. You'd be bored by that story. But when following God, we seem perfectly content to be bored and boring. Instead, I wonder what would happen if we followed the God who invited us into mystery, into being called beyond what our spiritual gifts inventory would tell us to do, beyond the social groups we are "planted" in and into the lives of the marginalized around us. What is the mystery you might be called into today?

I am the God who brought you: Wrestling the "Thou Shalt Nots"

"God said it. I believe it. That settles it." Thus is a bumper sticker available for purchase. Before you click the link, please wait. Because there are some deeply troubling aspects to this theology. For one, it presupposes that God does not want us to think. It wants us to pick up the Word, and do exactly what it says, and we'll be fine. Now, obedience to God is incredibly important. However, that way of viewing the Bible also leads to a moralist God. This God does not want to be known, engaged, or united with. This God wants "nice people." The 10 Words are an important part of the Old Testament, and for many good reasons. On Sunday, I said that they begin to paint a picture of the world God is creating. We, in obeying these words, show the world a snapshot of the Kingdom- in fact, a snapshot of Jesus Christ. But why stop at just picking them up and doing them? After all, there is a neat conversation that could be had if we only read a little more closely. The 10 Words are mostly negative commands. But what are we supposed to do instead? If we are not misusing the name of the Lord, how do we appropriately use the name of the Lord? The 10 Words are the beginning to a conversation- Who is God? Who are we to be? The 10 Words are mostly limits, lines that ought not be crossed. I have not killed anyone, but what would it mean to value all life? On Sunday, the bulletin included a worksheet for continued thought, and one of the questions asked you to take one of the "commandments" and state it positively and in your own words. In the comments, I would invite you to share what you learned and how you what you discovered about God in the "Thou Shalt Not's."

I am the God who Brought You: Is Salvation Real?

The question above may seem strange, coming from a pastor, but allow me to explain the sentiment behind the question: "Is salvation real?" I see a lot of resignation in Christianity. I see resignation in our personal lives, and I see resignation in how Christians interact with the world. The resignation seems to be that true transformation is not possible, and therefore salvation is a strictly future reality. Nothing could be farther from the truth. When God delivered the Israelites to Sinai and gave them the Ten Words, God was creating something new, this much I said on Sunday. And this new thing was meant to make a difference. It was supposed to model a completely new way of living, and God was going to lead them along. The world was supposed to be different because of them. As we know, the people broke faith and did not do what they were called to do. God then sent Jesus into the world, who did do it, made a tremendous difference, and passed His mission and His Spirit on to the Church to continue His work. And yet... there is tremendous resignation that things are going to stay the way they are forever, until the end of all things has come and past, and so our primary job is to wait. That, and get other people to wait with us. Here is an example. In the book of Acts, when the Holy Spirit came, people were healed, the poor were taken care of, boundaries of language were removed and people experienced God. Today, I most often hear the movement of the Spirit associated with a great emotional experience related to a super-charged worship service. So, it salvation real? Are we meant to experience transformation in this life? Is that transformation meant to change the world? Check out this video from TED. This guy organized a day of peace that even the Taliban honored (there was a 70% reduction in violence on this day). Then let's have a conversation about the possibility of transformation and how salvation is real and experienced. http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jeremy_gilley_one_day_of_peace.html

I AM who I AM: Where God starts

The Exodus event, for middle-class white American Christians, is a neat Bible story that acts as a metaphor for Christians to be delivered from sin and delivered to Heaven. However, there is a lot of Christianity that leans heavily on the Exodus story as an organizing story that shapes who God truly is- a liberator, a rescuer in the here and now. Recently, there has been a lot of controversy around the topic of Liberation Theology. Mostly, Liberation Theology has been linked to Marxism and been treated as heresy at best or blasphemy at worst. And while certainly there are Liberation Theologians who have gone outside the realm of orthodoxy (i.e. one liberation theologian I have read could not accept the deity of Jesus), there is a lot we can learn from Liberation Theologians (if we are careful listeners, there are a lot of people we can learn from, but that's another subject for another day). The reality is that God begins among the poor and downtrodden in society. Exodus begins with an oppressed, suffering people who are liberated into a new way of being. Exodus 3 makes it clear that God is starting at the bottom of the social pole. And God performs a very physical and spiritual liberation for the people. This motif continues when God instructs the people to be EXTREMELY careful how they treat the poor. Deuteronomy 15:4 says that in Israel, "There shall be no poor among you." In other words, if the people of God are doing what they ought to do, there will be no need to rescue the poor from the hands of the people of God. And yet, the people of God oppressed the poor (Isaiah 58) and became the Egypt they were liberated from. And so God stepped in and liberated the poor from Israel in exile. And then Jesus came with words taken right from Isaiah: 18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19) Today, it is well known that the poorest countries observe a vibrant (even growing) Church, while the richest countries observe a Church bloated on million-dollar buildings and tax breaks. The Church has lost a lot of its influence, unless you turn to the poorer areas, where revival is happening and people are experiencing what Jesus said when He said: "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of Heaven" (Luke 6:20). What do we do with this knowledge? I am not sure. I am still wrestling with the Kingdom and how God works in the world. That's what I have you here for, to comment and to grow with me. All I know is that if my/our ministries ignore the poor, we are practicing fake Christianity (James 2:5).