Reading from Acts 20 this morning. I was struck by Paul’s farewell speech in Ephesus. He had just spent the last 3 years there, and is now saying goodbye. This is one of the churches he would later write the great letter Ephesians to; his treatise on Christ and his Bride, the Church.

In Acts 20:34, Paul mentions that by his own hands he worked among them to meet his needs, (thus keeping people from being burdened down by having to support him financially). He wasn’t a mooch or a slacker, but he also wasn’t stingy – he also saw his job as a tentmaker as an opportunity to help the weak. This urge to give away his earnings came from Paul’s christocentric orientation; thinking about “What Jesus Would Do”. He quotes his Lord, “It is better to give than to receive.”

This is the very end of Paul’s farewell address to a church that he dearly loves?…A side note about his pay earnings and his tax-deductible donations? How strange. One might think he would be busting at the seams, calling out names of beloved friends and hugging people around the neck. But maybe there is something more – something more profound.

Could it be that Paul is on a last ditch effort to help the Ephesians catch a vision of God’s economics? Might Paul be passing out a fresh, new currency in the Kingdom of God? Paul worked hard, and then gave hard. He never saw his money and things as his own, but was consistently sharing and giving. I recently discovered a collective of thousands of Christians who pool their money each month in order to cover each other’s medical bills. A sort of “spiritual family health insurance”.

Much could be said for the repercussions of the Western Church who has exported most of her distinctive, benevolent qualities to the government (welfare) or to para-church organizations (evangelism, anyone?). Suffice it to say that we are now coming to a crossroads in our part of the world where the sluggish, obese, and hibernating Bride is rousing from her winter slumber, and will have the choice to hit the snooze button, or to get up and start working off the excess that’s been weighing her down for so long. It will be her chance to reclaim the joy of interdependent living, where she is once again circulating the blood of Christ throughout the entire Body, sharing and sharing alike.

From the heart to the gut to the ends of the fingers and toes, it is essential that Christ’s body learn that they rely on each other, and that their jobs on this earth exist not just for themselves, but for their faith community as well. This interdependence is not only theologically sound, but also missiologically. If Paul expected this to be a sustainable movement, he would have to expect that followers of Christ would continue to keep their jobs, yet begin to think about how to view those jobs as a subset of their true vocation – disciples. “How does my Lord want me to use this money he has given me? How can he further the Kingdom through this insignificant offering?”

A church planting movement happens, like many chemical reactions, through catalysts. A catalyst is something that is used to cause a chain reaction that spreads throughout, but the catalyst is not used up in the process. In fact it is the chemical created through the catalyst that actually regenerates the catalyst. Sharing and sharing alike. We need catalysts in the Body of Christ today. People who are giving to the emerging church planting movement, but are not being depleted or burnt-out in the process. I am so blessed to have people like that in my life right now, and I am seeing the Kingdom expand through those efforts.

Can anyone be a full-time missionary who is supported by churches far and away? Sure, for a time Paul was! But he tried to keep away from that as much as possible, knowing that it would only lead to tainting his Gospel message. My prayer is that when I finish school, to enter the work force, but to leave some sanity in my schedule to devote to engaging people with the Kingdom of God. Not for my sake, but because

“It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

World Champion St. Louis Cardinals!!!

I honestly thought going in that the Tigers were going to sweep the Series, but watching the last few innings of game 5, I was reminded how important big hitting is, Jeff Weaver’s pitching, and most importantly, how important it is to side with my Missouri-native father-in-law who knows his team! (Congrats Allen!)

Just think, they only won 83 games in the regular season (ahem, Chicago White Sox won 90!) and yet they just blew the Tigers (95 wins) out of the water. When it all comes down to it, the underdog wins!!!

Does anyone else specifically remember the first time you were told that you had to share? Wow, what an ordeal. An immense battle of the wills and you’re not even 2 years old.

But what happened? Our parents hounded us about the importance of sharing with our peers for a few years, but before long we were on to other things; our colors, abecedary, and long division. Sharing became a thing of the past. A relic of a past life. By the time we’ve made it to our 16th birthday, we’re getting our own cars, our own cell phones and we’re desperately trying to get our own place.

Then we wake up one morning, married, but we still want it our way, so we make comprimises. We pursue our own jobs, eat our own fast food, and hide inside our own suburban castles.

When things don’t go our way in the relationship that we promised would last forever, we go our own way - maybe we get a divorce, maybe we burrow into pigeon holes. All the while we are deeply entrenched in our own careers, jet skis, weekend condos…its all ours…its all MINE.

The American Dream is the seductive voice that has been speaking to us since our parents stopped warning us: “sharing is for losers, have it your way“.

It’s the myth of sharing - that we grow out of needing each other like we grow out of diapers.

The Gospel calls you…and me…to interdependency. We don’t have to take a vow of poverty, and we sure as hell don’t take the pot of gold all for ourselves.

This morning was a very early morning.  I took Trina in for the dreaded wisdom-teeth-removal operation.  She was strong, and got through it without TOO much pain.  She’s still working through some major adjustment issues (we bought her a dry-erase board, for example), but we’re praying she’ll be back to full health before her trip next week.  Praise be to God for his faithfulness…

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I’ve been reading more from Shane Claiborne’s The Irresistible Revolution, a book I’ve been wanting to read ever since my Bostonian friend was raving like a lunatic about it last Spring.  Claiborne is a Christ-ian; a radical follower of Christ.  Although he would twinge at the word “radical”, since he sees what he is doing as the ordinary - this is what people who actually follow Jesus’ teachings are supposed to do.  Just listen to a few of his words:

“We hang out with kids and help them out with homework in our living room, and jump in open fire hydrants on hot summer days.  We share food with those who need it, and eat the beans and rice our neighbor Ms. Sunshine makes for us…We reclaim abandoned lots and make gardens amid the concrete wreckage around us…We hang out on the streets.  We get fined for distributing food.  We go to jail for sleeping under the stars…We wrestle to free ourselves from macrocharity and distant acts of charity that serve to legitimize apathetic lifestyles of good intentions but rob us of the gift of community.”

Christians have become a society of individuals with “good intentions”.  We write checks to charities, who hand out government cheese.  We donate clothes to Goodwill, or serve at a soup kitchenand feel like we’ve contributed to the homeless “problem” in our city.  We head out on short-term missions trips, and return telling others how “blessed” we are. 

What a sham.

I’m convinced that until we begin to truly KNOW the poor we’ve been serving across a desk or a checkbook, we wont be able to ask the bigger, more systemic questions like “Why is he poor and I am not?”  That question cut you to the heart.

Claiborne says, “We give people fish.  We teach them to fish.  We tear down the walls that have been built up around the fish pond.  And we figure out who polluted it.”

I don’t think Jesus was all about personal piety and “feeling good”.  His mission went way beyond that.  Know this!  There will be more written on this book coming from this site!

“When is salt not salty?”

That question has been floating through my mind the last several days. Of course, it comes from Jesus’ perplexing question found in Matthew 5:13, “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.”
My only question is, HOW can salt loose its saltiness? There’s absolutely no way! It’s chemically impossible for salt to become unsalty unless its bonds are broken…but then it isn’t salt anymore, it is sodium and chloride. This has got to be one of the dumbest statements Jesus ever makes!

This past weekend I went to the World Missions Workshop in Lubbock, TX. What an amazing time to meet new people; so many of whom are interested in God’s Mission! Specifically, I was able to bump into Marvin Crowson, Harding University’s point man for organic church, (a good Q&A with him here). He introduced me to a team who are looking at moving to Chicago in a year and a half to begin living missionally (they will all have day jobs) but they will live their Christian vocation out as missionaries to the city - planting simple churches in apartments, coffee shops, parks, and yes, even Sears Tower. You can imagine my excitement, meeting a whole team that is assembling (a mix from Harding and Lubbock Christian University) who have such a similar vision.
Beyond meeting cool cats, I found myself bouncing from conversation to conversation, discussing dreams different folks had regarding what the church could look like outside the traditional walls. More and more people are beginning to see this way of living as a legitimate option for church; and that makes me truly excited. Missionaries who have seen organic church as a means for spreading the gospel all over the world are “clicking” as they realize that if it can work around the world, and it works in the New Testament, maybe it can work in North America too.

So when is salt not salty? What about this salt shaker seen here? Is the salt in it salty? How do you know? How can you prove it? Truly, no one really knows if salt is salty unless they taste it. So why does Jesus talk to us about salt loosing its saltiness? Because it is our nature to hang out in the salt shaker! We’d rather sit pretty with all the other salt, bickering over who is the “purest” salt crystal of the bunch, while the world dies of hunger. The world is hungry for something that tastes good - something that awakens their appetite for God. When we fight and complain over meaningless arguments (find one here), we totally lose sight of where Jesus wants his Church - out of the salt shaker and into the world!  If we stay inside the church - we are GOOD FOR NOTHING.
Maybe that’s why I liked going to WMW so much - it reminded me that for too much of my life I have stayed inside the salt shaker, moaning about how all the rest of the salt doesn’t look tasty enough.  Maybe I should get out of this “bubble” and start meeting people I can “get salty” with.