Holy Saturday

The Saturday between the crucifixion and resurrection has always fascinated me. Yes, the book-end days are where we spend our Easters, but there is something about that Saturday. 

God was dead, now what?

I have to think that not all the followers scattered in fear. Not all of them hid out. Not all of them packed it up and went back home. Some of them waited. Some of them tried to piece together conversations and ideas from Jesus, looking for a slice of hope. A hope that said...maybe, hopefully something we can't see yet is about to happen. 

Imagine going to work, having a meal, taking a walk, or just trying to be normal that Saturday. Waiting. Hoping. Then losing hope. Remembering something HE said. Then having hope again. And waiting more. 

Faith was born on that Saturday. 

We are still watching a drain. We wait for a drip and then count the seconds until the next drip. It's maddening to wait and yet thrilling when it drops. Each time they roll Stacey over to check her incision and bandage is pure anxiety overload, then they tell us it's dry and we relax until the next shift change. We try and piece information together from doctors and nurses for some glimmer of hope. We try and block out the negative noise that gets overwhelmingly loud at times and remember to encourage each other. To hold hands and shut up. We reach for the next small victory. We hope and wait. 

In the next few days we will challenge the incision and drain. We will begin to find out how much healing has happened. 

But I can't help but feel like I'm walking into that Saturday between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. The space where faith is born. The place that is scary and unknown. The place where demons haunt you and anxiety runs rampant. Did it heal? What if? Why didn't you do this or that? The place where all is quite except those voices you wish you could shut off...

But I want with everything I am to believe that Sunday will come. That new is just around the corner. That dark always gives way to light. That Stacey's dura has sealed and we can go home. We can begin anew. I tell my shower walls and car windshield every morning that "I believe". 

And I do believe. I really do. We will get better and not bitter. But she and HE still have some work to do. She's got a few more days of laying on her back. A few more days of waiting and watching a drain. A few more shift changes. There is still some fight left. 

But I saw her smile that infectious smile today. The one that got me 13 years ago. The smile that's been absent for three long weeks. It was just another step towards the new... 

Here we come Sunday. 

I believe. 

#teamhealandseal

Waiting...

I guess I've never really thought much about miracles. I've been content with stories of dinner for five thousand, resurrections from the dead, and making wine out of some water. They were stories in the book and displayed on a flannel graph. Miracles happened then and they were cool. 

Today I need the miracle though. I need a graft about the size of a half dollar to seal. I need it to be strong and do what it's supposed to do. I need the stitches to hold. The needle holes to close. I need the body to do what the body does. 

I need God to hold that graft and those stitches in HIS hands. I need this miracle in the now.  

She is so tired. Her eyes are red with tears, worn out from crying. She's been poked and poked and then poked again. She hasn't washed her hair in three weeks. Hasn't held her baby girls in even longer. She needs the miracle today. She needs HIM to do what only HE can do. 

I've begged. I've kneeled. I've cried. I've ejected. I've come back. I don't know what to do anymore. I know I can't make God do what I want. No more "God if you will just do A then I will do B." No more karma.

I just want to believe God can and will fix her.  

I can't believe any harder. I can't hope more than I already am. I can't give up and give in any better. We are raw and vulnerable. We have, I really do believe, fallen into HIS arms. 

But we still have to wait and see. God, we do believe, just help our unbelief. 

Your kingdom come. Your will be done...on earth as it is in heaven.  

HE will fix her. 

#teamhealandseal

On a boat with Jesus...

There is a story in the bible where Jesus calms a storm. It's a really neat story about the power and awesomeness of God. My favorite part of the story though is that Jesus was sleeping while all hell was breaking loose in and around the boat. The disciples, the 12 people Jesus hand picked, freaked out. Go read it...

When we go to church on a Sunday, when we sit with our small group, or when we have fancy coffee with our friends we tend talk all about how we always know Jesus is in control. We talk really good about "giving things to God" and praying and all that. Truth be told in those settings, I bet we kinda laugh at the disciples for freaking out on that boat. 

I'm guilty. I'm guilty of rolling my eyes sometimes at the weak faithed and broken people I come across. Oh them of little faith. I'm guilty of laughing at Peter for sinking in the water. Dude, it's Jesus, he's got you. I'm guilty of being over confident because after all...I'm a chaplain by trade, work at a company called Alpha Omega, worked for a church, have lots of bibles, 94.9 is a preset station in both cars, I knew about and read Jen Hatmaker well before any of you, and WE HAVE A CROSS WALL IN OUR HOUSE! I'm pretty freaking awesome. 

Last Saturday night I felt like a disciple on the boat though. I freaked out. My wife was in pain beyond belief and I couldn't make it stop. I got scared. I got pissed because Jesus was in the back of the boat sleeping and he obviously didn't care about my wife and family. Didn't matter how many Max Lucado books I had read or Crowder songs I had listened too...there in that moment...my faith-meter bottomed out like a disciple on a boat in a storm. 

I won't lie, I didn't run to wake him up. I didn't really know what to do. I curled up in the corner scared, almost believing he didn't care what happened to us. 

Right now its storming outside as I type...Stacey has had 3 surgeries in last 15 days. She's asleep right now, very comfortable. We are hoping and praying that this incision will heal and seal in the next few days. That's really all we can do. We have run to the back of the boat to shake Jesus and ask, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?"

Again, it's all we can do at this point. Hope and wait. 

I am a proud boat disciple who's scared and honest. Fear and doubt are real. We need to be a little more honest about that in our churches and circles. I'm sorry if I've ever made you feel like you can't be scared and be a disciple. You can be, I promise. I'll show you 12 really good examples. 

This storm may or may not be over for us. I have no idea what happens next, just that I'm on a boat with Jesus. 

And I'm still kinda scared...

#teamhealandseal

That time we had surgery. Twice.

It's 6am the morning after Stacey's 2nd surgery, this one to repair a leak in her incision. I am curled up in a chair not really meant for sleeping, so why not blog?

We found out in January this surgery was going to take place. At the time it was elective and so we decided to wait until June. We wanted to get through school, kindergarten graduation, and other fun stuff, then tackle Chiari. 

Chiari...google it. Basically her brain was compressed against her skull and spinal cord causing some severe headaches, etc. I won't go into detail, but she had a procedure last week to correct the compression. Surgery went well the first time. Then it started leaking spinal fluid when we got home and we went back in for repair surgery. She's doing better now and recovery is underway...again. 

She's honestly amazing. She's going through hell and making me laugh. She's holding my hand way more than I hold hers. She's had two surgeries, lots of pain meds, eaten a ton of not good hospital food, and she still looks beautiful in her little hospital gown. I don't know how she does it. 

Me? Idk. I try my best to hold her hand and shut up. After all, silence is better than bullshit and she has the 3 inch incision down the back of her head, not me. I try to be big and strong and all that. Then she falls asleep and I cry a little. Okay, a lot. I tell God I'm mad at him. Like really mad. I keep trying to tell him we get it...whatever "it" is...and he can go elsewhere now. I even have a list of people for him if he just asks me.  

(Yes, my theology is a load of crap in this season of suffering. I'm okay with it and I'm pretty sure he is as well.)

I just get frustrated and feel more helpless everyday. I've learned a ton about myself in the last six months. Two things stand out...1) waiting sucks and I'm not good at it and 2) I'm not good at not being in control. 

We basically hit pause on life until June 11th. Everything was about getting there. At first it wasn't so bad, but it progressively wore us down. Things became items on a check-list and the more we checked, the closer it meant surgery was. I think over the last week we attempted to stop checking off items in order to not have to do follow through with all of this. Waiting sucks. It messes people up I think. 

And it's not that I really love control (who doesn't though?), it is more that I'm comfortable in control. See problem, fix problem. Hear story, empathize with story. I'm good at it. My gift is presence. Reading a room and reacting as pastor is natural to me. It's almost robotic at times, emotions are left out and you do what you do. This is different, this is the other side. The side with a full plate of emotions and no control. 

For six months both at home and in other places I've simply been out of control. Literally I've had no control. I can't trade places with Stacey. I can't make the hurt go away. I can't take the second surgery since she took the first. I can't keep her going here and be home with my girls. Hell, I can't even get my dogs fed. There is just a lot of can'ts. I can't, I can't, I can't. I just stand and grasp and never touch anything. I feel utterly useless and suspended in a weird place. It is torture. 

I'd love to tell you about the moment God made me feel better because he made me remember that he's in control, but it hasn't really happened yet. I have no amazing story of bright lights or inspired moments in scripture. Just a couple of tired and broken souls trying to put one foot in front of the other. 

I know he is in control. Promise. I make a living on faith and hope. I know all the right answers and I still have faith and hope...I was just blessed with some healthy doubts to go with those. I know we are going to be okay. Just today, right here, it's hard. The journey just sucks today and I want to quit and go home. We are tired. We want our life back. 

She's awake now. Hopefully we can go home soon if she's feeling up to it. She wants me to take the TV remote and watch whatever I want. 

Finally I get some control...

Telling better stories...

Honestly it sounded like an email forward and I wasn't paying full attention, but it went something like this: there was a woman with cancer. She was praying to God one night and asking all kinds of questions. She asked God why He had not created a doctor to cure cancer yet. God's response to this woman and her question was that he had created a doctor with the cure to cancer, but...because of pro-choice...the baby, who would have grown to cure the terrible disease, had been aborted. She was left to suffer. 

I have no idea if this is a true story. I have no idea where it came from or why it was being discussed over lunch. I'm not interested in the debate actually. 

It just left me with this terrible emptiness after hearing it. I believe the stories we tell matter. The stories we tell define things. This story (to me) didn't speak to the debate at hand, but told a story of a God who quits. A God who is waiting around the corner for us to screw up so he can point out our consequences. It was, or is, told to shame us. To guilt us. To fill us with that terrible emptiness. 

We need to tell better stories. Stories of the God of second and third and forth chances. The God who never stops running. The God who doesn't quit because we suck. Stories we find on page after page of scripture. 

Like the God of Adam and Eve. He could have ended it there after all. 

Noah spends few months on a boat, watches the world destroyed by God and rain, plants a vineyard, and then gets drunk in a tent. Give me the God who still gives us the rainbow after all of that. 

Moses said "no" a few times. He tried hard to talk God out of sending him. God never told the people of Israel, "well I was gonna save you but there was this guy who told me no..." Moses went because God didn't give up. 

David got another chance. So did Jonah. So did that woman at the well. And the one caught in the act. And Peter. And Paul. And me. And you as well. 

I know. I know. Insert stuff about obedience and sin here. All of that matters. I know. I promise. 

But can we start using more stories of a God who NEVER stops chasing His love for us because of the stupidity of us? Let's go looking for the redemption and grace of others because our own story found it first. 

"When we see and accept the unacceptable in our own lives, we recognize the unacceptable in other people's lives and yet accept them anyway. Then we are truly able to help others, to lead them to grace, to help them discover transformation." Jay Bakker in Faith/Doubt

God isn't going quit all of us because you had an abortion, or you cheated, or you lied, or you stole, or you cussed. 

God doesn't quit on his own story.  He'll see you from a long way off and start running towards you...

That is a story worth telling. 

After 11 years...

January 26, 2003 I drove to Aledo for my first day as a growned-up minister. Plus or minus 4,015 days later a few things have stuck with me...

God created you. So that means all of you. Happy, sad, and mad He created it all and saw that it was good. 

Certainty isn't all it's cracked up to be. 

Doubt is normal. 

I don't know is an answer. 

Karma isn't real. But I still find myself thinking it is. I just want God to like me and give me good things. 

Say thank you at the end of everyday. You grew, I promise. 

Hope is good. Have a little. 

People will always be broken, no matter how hard you try to put them back together. Keep trying. 

People will always be beautiful. They'll always surprise you if you keep at them.

Grace is deep and big. Live that way with yourself and with others. 

Being open is a must. Once you decide you have it all organized and figured out is the day you become completely irrelevant. 

Be diverse. Read things you don't agree with. Watch Fox News. Watch CNN. Eat food you've never tried. 

Have friends who are different than you. Race. Age. Sex. Political views. Religious views. Just be diverse. 

If you're going to have an opinion on something, make sure you actually have a connection to it. 

Better put: don't tell me what you think about a certain group of people if you don't actually know any of those people personally. 

Think before you speak. 

Sometimes don't think too much before you speak. 

Have friends with bald heads. I'd be lost with out my two bald-headed friends. Thank you Kevin and Craig for always being bald. And of course being there for me. 

Make friendships that last and remember they aren't just a number on Facebook. Make sure they make you better and let them teach you. (Thank you Shelley Lynn for sticking around and teaching me about life.)

Read. Then read more. 

Find out what idol you chase and tell someone about it. Then ask them to help you stop chasing something you'll never catch. 

Laugh at yourself. Trust me, you're an idiot a lot. Me too. 

Read your Bible and even forget what you think you might know about it. And please...read the Old Testament. 

Stop, sit, and drink some tea in the front yard. Trust me that work, the gym, the kid's practice, the yard, the house, and the nation will be okay. You aren't that vital. 

Go to church. Yeah, because you're supposed to. And because you need spaces like that. 

And have that one. That one person when it all goes good you can laugh with. And that same one person when it all goes to hell that you can hunker down and fight the storm with. Thank you Stacey for always laughing till it hurts with me...literally. And yes, we will hunker down again for the storm and come out laughing on the other side. Promise. 

Remeber, love wins. 

Basically after 11 years...love God and love others. The rest will take care of itself. 

I don't think I pray right...

I used to sit at Ranger games and pray. Not because I was a super spiritual child, but because I was trying to win God's favor so he would help my team win. I promised him I would be nice, clean my room, eat my vegetables, obey, or basically never do anything bad again. 

All I wanted in return was a win. 

The older I got, the more this mentality became a part of my life with God. I understood God to be weighing my choices and then determining my blessings. If something didn't go my way, then obviously God was not pleased with the choices that I had made recently. And if things went the way I needed, I hardly ever gave God much credit. Those things were mostly on me and my own awesomeness. 

Honestly, I'm just older now. Not wiser. I still have no idea what I'm doing in regards to prayer. I don't know what to ask for, when to ask for it, or even if I should ask at all. Sometimes I wonder if I'm not folding my hands right or if I forgot to close my eyes. I don't know if he listens or when he listens or even what language he speaks. God and I usually differ on how and when to answer prayers. He and I are totally at odds on who should face trials and who should get blessings. 

But I started doing a "bible study" every other Wednesday for a group of people in a nursing home. There are usually around 15-20 of them. Some of them can't speak. Some of them can't stay awake. A few cuss at me. Most of them have no idea what I'm saying or even what day it is. But still, we meet twice a month and "study". (Dementia Devotionals 401 should be a required class in seminary)

One week we read Matthew 6. Not because we wanted to exegete the Sermon on the Mount. Because I didn't plan anything that day, scrambled through my bible, didn't really care because they don't get it anyways, and landed there with Jesus talking about prayer. 

I just started reading and they started praying. I tried it again the next week. And the next. It keeps happening. More join in every week. And so for a few minutes, these mostly forgotten people, do whatever they can to say the Lord's Prayer. Even the most precious, confused, and spirited woman in the bunch...has moments of complete clarity and will almost lead us all with old school power and conviction. Then it's back to bingo, puréed diets, and hospice for us all. 

It is one of those tiny spaces between heaven and earth. Places we miss because we aren't looking or paying attention. 

God and I really aren't all that great at the moment. I'm a little (or a lot) upset with the way he's doing things. Once again he forgot to ask me my opinion on how it should go. I can't see what he's doing or why he's doing it this way. 

And I just feel like I haven't been praying right again...

But there is a group of sweet, old, and crazy people who are teaching me that praying isn't about knowing the system. It's not about karma or being good enough. It's not about being happy with life all the time. Or fully understanding what the hell is going on around you. It's not about asking for the winning run in return for a perfectly clean room. 

It's about gathering up all that you have and just showing up. As is. 

Tomorrow they'll be there at 10a. Some got there on their own. Others had to have help. Tomorrow I'm going to gather up all I have and show up as well. Broken for sure,  but looking for that tiny space between heaven and earth. 

Hope

"Let me tell you something my friend, hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane." 

                                               -Red -

I hope all day. I hope I'm busy. I hope I'm not too busy. I hope we have money. I hope the mailbox is kind to us. I hope I have enough gas to make it to cheaper gas. I hope dinner is ready. I hope for this. I hope for that. And then hope that I hoped enough. 

Hope can drive me insane. 

I don't know what I would do without hope though. Hope in people to get better. Hope in life that it'll turn around. Hope that God actually knows what he is doing. Hope in this story we are writing. 

Today I hoped the best for my little Laedin Grace as she started kindergarten. The last 5 years flew by and I can only imagine how fast the next 13 will go. 

Walking into school with her back pack on, nap mat in hand, lunch packed, hair done...she was excited and I was the nervous one. I hoped she wouldn't cry. Hoped she would look the principal in the eyes and shake his hand. Hoped she would make friends. Hoped she would eat fast enough at lunch. Hope, hope, hope. 

She did good. She put up with my endless pictures and hugs. I said goodbye 100 times, but she was already coloring. I started hoping she wouldn't forget who I was. 

I passed a lot of other parents and kids filled with the new hope a school year brings. I sat in my car, took a few deep breaths, and started driving. Hope keeps me going. She's writing an incredible story that has endless possibilities and that makes me smile. 

"Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies."

                                -Andy Dufresne-

Ill never stop hoping the best for her (or her sister). She's going to drive me insane with hope. I know because everyone is constantly telling me to "wait until she becomes a teenager"...but that's okay because I really do believe hope is a good thing. And she will always have her mom and dad's hope...

I hear she has to go back tomorrow and I'm already hoping it goes well!!!

The waiting room...

I went to church a lot, but I think I missed the class on doubt. 

I remember the classes on sex, drugs, and appropriate music. Baptism, worship, and tithing...check, check, and check. Been to VBS and retreats and summer camps. I know all about salvation in my particular community. I've read books from Max Lucado to Peter Rollins. Can say with ease all 66 books of the bible. Know a little about 4 part harmony and can sing "Booster Booster" very well. 

Still, I must have missed the class on doubt. 

The one where they help make sense of the doubt that creeps in when it doesn't all fit inside the box of pretty Jesus they feed you. 

The doubt that comes with an unplanned pregnancy, or with the night in jail, or with the house that won't sell even though you've "prayed about it", the doubt you'll make the next paycheck, the child that won't call and the doubt that they might not be okay, or the doubt that just comes from sitting in a waiting room and yeah...waiting. 

Don't get me wrong, I believe God is in each of the above somehow. He is God after all. But the answers we get sometimes don't ease the doubts. 

"It's God's will" or "it's all part of His plan"

I just missed the class that made those answers make sense in the midst of what seems like utter godlessness. 

Its hard for me to be the Peter that hops out of the boat in faith and walks on water. Most of the time I'm just the Peter that starts to sink with doubt. 

I doubt. I stand in the chaos of my life, and the lives I'm closest too, and ask God where he is...because sometimes I just don't see him. 

But recently nothing has brought me closer to God than wrestling with my own doubt. Releasing the need to have a fancy 3 part Jesus answer for everything and just learning to let go. That sometimes faith isn't about making sense of it all, but more about being present in it all. To be real and honest in every moment, even if that means you have doubts. Struggling with doubt doesn't make us less Christian, if anything it makes us more real. Or I guess that's how I see it. 

I'm grateful for a Jesus who understands my doubt and for a few people who will sit with me in the shit doubt inevitably brings.

Grace

"At this point I think it is too late to try and convert mamma to Catholicism. We'll just take our chances that God understands she was a faithful church goer of some kind. So, if you don't mind praying with her that would be good."

Actual quote from a patient's daughter. Most of the time I hear it from the other side...convert mamma from Catholicism. So this was a shock to the system. 

I wasn't sure God would even hear my prayers according to her. 

But I went and sat with mamma. We talked about her life in the Church of Christ. How she loved to sing "the good songs". She loves the creation story the most and asked me to read it next time I'm there. She seems like a very nice woman. Even a faithful church goer. 

Im not sure when I stopped caring about who goes to heaven and who ends up in hell. Both places matter, but I'm satisfied to let other people debate who is in and who is out. I just don't have time to keep up with a scorecard. 

Jay Bakker says "I want to hold on to my views lightly, to keep an open mind, and not feel like I've arrived at the end of theology. I want to put people first and live my life. I'm not out to save anyone from hell or win people to Jesus. I'm just trying to follow Jesus myself, and help people find grace and peace and acceptance in their lives."

I agree. 

Sent from my iPhone

Till death do us part...

A week ago I did a wedding. It was a beautifully normal wedding. Bride in white, sun shining, crying moms, and plenty of good eats. Vows, prayers, and limos. It was a wedding. 

A week later I watched a wife say goodbye to her husband of 54yrs. I imagined their wedding looked a lot like the wedding I had just done. Filled with smiles, laughs, and forever. They made their promises and rode off into the sunset.

Here they are...at the beginning. An entire life of adventures together right in front of them. Newness. Unknownness. Unbridled excitement.  Unable to stop smiling as they dance their first dance. Swept up in the emotions of forever. They have a million moments left...hand in hand they start the journey. 

And here they are...at the end. An entire life of adventures together behind them. They know each other totally. They've forgotten what life is without the other. They are swept up in the emotions of the end. They are dancing their last dance. Only a few moments remain...hand in hand one slips away. 

I stand in the middle. Trying bridge life and death with the people I live with. Praying for forever in one moment and the mercy of death the next. Makes waking up everyday all the more real. 

It's painfully beautiful at times...