Breaking the Chain

It was Beth Moore night again tonight with my friends. We are studying her Patriarchs series. In tonight's lesson she pointed out some things about Ishmael and his descendants. In Genesis 16:12 God tells Hagar that her son Ishmael will be against everyone. In Genesis 25:18 it says that his descendants where against all of their brothers. From he to they. It is a chain. It got me thinking about my chain and my debt to my father and mother. My family tree is neither physically nor spiritually illustrious. Poor farmers and railroad men from America's Midwest my father's family settled in Nebraska and my dad grew up poor, in a broken home on the wrong side of the tracks. I have just a few memories of my great grandfather. He was a gruff old man who sat in his recliner chair and watched sports on television. He was not a very spiritual man and I don't know that he ever thought about God even though he went to church every Sunday. My early memories of my grandfather were of a rough man who was loud and quick tempered. I admired his strength at the time but as I grew up I realized that he made one bad decision after another. He continually gave his strength away and remained small and bitter. Late in life he found faith in Jesus and he radically changed. He found faith because my father shared Jesus with him. It was my father who broke the chain. An endless line of poor broken men ended when my father accepted the free grace of Jesus and was adopted into a new family. A family of powerful heritage. A family of strength, and honor, and dignity. A family with Abraham as its patriarch and Jesus as its head. Sometimes I think that I still see a poor farm boy in my father's eyes. Sometimes I see a boy who wants to be on the other side of the tracks so bad it hurts. But I see a man redeemed to be much more than all those whom he has envied for so long. My father has become much more than his upbringing ever gave promise to. Because he broke the chain I am proud to stand on his shoulders. Because he broke the chain I have followed in his steps and accepted adoption into the only family worth being in. I am a child of God not because I am wise or clever or even lucky. But because my father's lost and useless family has been swept up in a story that is as old as Genesis itself. I am not a poor directionless man wandering aimlessly across America's vast Midwest. I am a blessing in the hands of Almighty God to bring hope and light to dark distant lands filled with hopeless people. This is God's own doing, what He delights to do.

These people here in Gondor are a part of this epic story. They believe that they are the sons and daughters of Ishmael. They believe that Ishmael is the child of promise. They are deceived. Islam means to 'submit'. Their heritage is that of the bondwoman Hagar who is Mount Sinai (Romans 4). They are trapped by the law that they believe will save them but it only brings death. I am here to call them to break the chain. I have been sent by God- by virtue of his great mercy- to call them to leave their father's house and join the Family of Promise. They are called to join the family of Isaac and establish the new Jerusalem. Not a city on a hill in the Middle East, but a Kingdom whose beginning is full of faith and valor and whose end is glory everlasting.

Who are you? The son or daughter of a merchant? A blacksmith? A soldier? If you are a follower of Jesus you are a child of the King. A powerful force in the world today. Live it.

One Year but Who's Counting?

Well, clearly I am not counting. It was actually October 7, 2006 when I put the first post up on this blog. My intent in beginning the blog was to talk about what God was doing in a positive and thought-provoking way. I had felt that in the SBC blogworld and maybe in the Christian blogworld in general that we were getting out a really negative message, that by focusing on all that was wrong we were missing all that God was doing. I don't know how effective I have been in influencing the blogosphere but it seems that a few faithful readers have been blessed and for that I am very thankful.

So, for the coming year I will continue to put up as many stories as God permits me to witness as His Great Story unfolds. You are always welcome to come by, comment and share in the journey. One of my favorite 'travel' songs was done by the all too secular artist Dan Fogelberg when I was still in High School. As best as I can remember it I will put it below for you to ponder. And thank you again for stopping by.

Along the Road by Dan Fogelberg

Joy at the start
Fear in the journey
Joy in the coming home
A part of the heart gets lost in the learning
Somewhere along the road

Along the road your path may wander
A pilgrim's faith may fail
Absence makes the heart grow fonder
Darkness obscures the trail

Cursing the quest, Courting disaster
Measureless nights forbode
Moments of rest, Glimpses of laughter
Are treasured along the road

Along the road your steps may stumble
Your thoughts may start to stray
But through it all a heart held humble
Levels and lights the way

Joy at the start
Fear in the journey
Joy in the coming home
A part of the heart gets lost in the learning
Somewhere along the road
Somewhere along the road

A Triumphal Procession

Things go wrong here in Middle Earth once in a while. But not all the time. If everyone was always late, if the electricity was always off, if the water was always brown then that would be predictable. Life here is not predictable and in order to maintain a proper state of unpredictability sometimes things go right. One day things went really really right. I thought I would tell you about it.
The year was 1999 and we were tired. We had started the office here in Minas Tirith, we had begun the work in northern Mordor, we had started a house church, and we had our third child. I thought that was a pretty good first term all round. But we were worn out and in need of some good time with friends and family back in the West. The trouble is that the very hardest thing we do here is travel. People often ask us how long it takes us to get here and the answer used to be about a week. We have a direct flight to a major airport out in Grey Havens now but back then we could not get very far and the layovers were always measured in days instead of hours. We had a guest come two weeks before we were to leave and they hassled him pretty good on his way out. I stuck up for him and got him through without paying any kind of bribe but I made a few customs guys pretty irritated in the process. I kept thinking that I was going to be here with my whole family and a lot of luggage in just two weeks and they were not going to make this easy.

We packed up and headed to the airport. Several friends went with us. When we got to the airport everyone was there. I had seen other people leave with a large procession of grateful nationals and honestly I never thought our leaving would be like that. But the King was good as always and many were there to see us off- except our secretary. She was supposed to be there and was not. We went to check in and there was a guy with a big broom handled mustache standing at the door. I had seen him there before but I don't ever remember speaking to him. He greeted me and then turned to the large room with all the customs officials and the passport control people and announced in a loud voice, "This is a very good man! He speaks our language, only use our language with him. He is a great diplomat!" I was in shock. I humbly said thank you to him and walked in. I went to customs and I asked to fill out the forms and begin the arduous procedure of checking in. The man looked at me puzzled and said you are a diplomat- go on. Ok. Everyone in our entourage followed us passed customs and then passed passport control which they should not be allowed to do. It was like a big party. Then we went out on the runway and said goodbye to everyone. We boarded the plane and waited. And waited. We wondered why we were waiting so long then it was announced that something needed to happen. I didn't understand. Suddenly the front doors of the plane were reopened and I was asked to go forward. I looked down and there was our secretary on the runway saying goodbye. The airport officials had held up the plane and let her out on the runway to say goodbye to us. Unbelievable. But this was stage one of a long trip. Things were sure to go wrong when we went north to one of the most difficult and corrupt airports in Middle Earth. Nothing happened. We arrived. People were not only nice, they were downright helpful. It was eerie. I kept looking over my shoulder waiting for someone to come along asking for money, or trying to be nasty. It didn't happen. We got our onward tickets and we went on the US of A. I don't usually get too place specific in this blog but I will go ahead and say that we landed in Atlanta, GA- we went on from there but that is where we went through immigration. As we walked up to the line a large black man in a uniform and a big smile was waiting for us. He took our passports and looked them over. He said, "So, you're a missionary!" I had not used that word for three years. We never use that word. Sometimes we call it the M word but that is as far as we go. I looked around to see who was listening and I said, "Is that tattooed on my forehead?" He looked at the various visas in my passport- places many of you have never heard of- and said, "It's tattooed in your passport. How long have you been away?" I told him that we had been out of the US for three and a half years. He handed our passports back and said, "Welcome home!" I almost cried.

There are days when everything goes wrong. Plans fail. I almost never go to bed having accomplished what I set out to do that morning. In our work we say flexible is not enough, you have to be fluid. But our King is a most gracious King. He gives us just what we need when we need it most. The psalmist said that though weeping endures for a night, joy comes in the morning. Here in Middle Earth it often waits until lunchtime but it does come. 2 Cor 2 says it this way: "But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads in every place the fragrance that comes from knowing him." That verse is jam packed with meaning. In June of 1999 it took on a newer and grander meaning than I had seen before. It is true everyday even though I don't feel it every day. Life does not always feel like a triumphal procession, but it is. How I feel or what the next set of Government officials do to me can not alter the fragrance of the knowledge of Christ in me. So, I will march in this triumphal procession even when it is lonely, and dark, and full of troubles. Come with me.

The Hope of Love

In a previous post I mentioned working with Boromir. There was another guy whom I also worked with at that time whose name I will call Ted. Ted spoke some English, was educated, had been a believer for over nine years and had a wife and three children. He came and participated in our Disaster Management Course and I knew that I had found a great asset to the team. What I liked about Ted, what made him so compelling was that he would cry quite easily when talking about deep emotional things. He had a lot of those kinds of things to talk about as it turned out. The more I got to know him the more I realized that he was really messed up. He had been treated very badly by some of the Churches that he had gone to. He had been thrown out of his original Church because when he got married- to a Christian girl- his parents gave him a Muslim wedding. The pastor felt he had not objected loudly enough to this so they excommunicated him. The next church he went to tried to help him but soon grew tired of his many needs and they too threw him out. He wandered from Church to Church after that trying to find a place to belong but could not. I, being who I am, was sure that I could help him.

I started to study with him and Boromir on a regular basis. As we studied together, prayed together, and worked together many things came to light. Boromir was an alcoholic. Ted had other problems. Ted was trapped in the worst marriage you have ever heard of. He was trapped in the lies of his own making and it was tearing him apart. Sin is like that you know. The enemy is not content to let us just wander cold and miserable down the wrong path, he wants us to suffer much more than that. If we let him the enemy will tell us lies to bind us up until we are nothing more than animals with no control over any aspect of our lives. This was Ted's predicament. His wife came from an abusive family and Ted married her partly to get her out of it. But she is now a very damaged individual. Their life together is really something to see. She yells at him, baits him, and antagonizes him until he finally hits her- which is the only way that she feels she has been heard. He then feels terrible about it and goes out and seeks solace with a prostitute. She hates him all the more for that and the cycle repeats. It has been repeating like this for nine years. She leaves him- often and then comes back to him because there is no where else to go. He repents and swears his love for her often but it never last long and he is back in the worst kinds of sin and self-hatred. Enter Strider with his big Bible and truck full of wisdom based on Open Windows. (Cue Mighty Mouse theme song, "Here I come to save the daaaaaaayyyy!") Yes, yes, I already know. I am an idiot.

I plead with God to take these guys away. I didn't want to work with an alcoholic or a wife-beater no matter what their situations were. All through that fall and through that winter I would get up in the morning and tell God He had the wrong man- there was no man- for these guys. Let's just cut our losses and move on to more productive people. I already told you what happened with Boromir, how he cleaned up at first and became really productive. I began to think that Ted would never get it. He would never understand what I was talking about. We went through John Eldridge's Wild at Heart book and talked about what a real man was suppose to be. We discussed what Ted should be doing to truly love his wife. He used what we taught to justify his outrageous behavior. Then in the Spring his wife left him- again. This time it seemed for good as she took the kids up to her parents house in the North. Ted came in and suddenly there was a lightbulb over his head. He said to me, 'I get it! I understand what you have been saying all this time. I know it will be harder than ever to fight for my wife and restore our relationship but that is exactly what I have to do.' He left the next day for her city.

Now, I have to be honest. I thought two things simultaneously: One, great, he finally gets it. God bless the boy. And two, he's gone. I don't have to deal with him anymore.
A few months later I heard he had found work. He was seeing his wife regularly. He was trying to be active in a church there that was related to his first Church. He repented of all his sins in front of the whole congregation. Then a few months after that his wife left her parents house and started to live with him again. There were some struggles at first but then everything seemed to turn out great. I was happy for him. Then she left him and the kids and ran off to Arnor in the far north. He came back down to Minas Tirith with the kids in tow. He was shattered and his parents decided they would finally intervene. They set him up to marry another girl. He got an official divorce. I and other friends told him not to marry this non-christian girl that he hardly knew. It would be a disaster. The second marriage lasted four days. Then his first wife came back. He left the second wife- her reputation and life destroyed- and rejoined his divorced wife. I saw him shortly after that. I felt that I couldn't just condone all this. I had to be firm. I had to lay it on the line. I spoke harshly to him and condemned him for destroying that young girl's life. He took my words pretty hard. He left and I didn't see him for a long time. He is back up north again. Living with his wife and children and working in a new Church start. He hasn't been back to prostitutes for 2 years nor has he beaten his wife.

So, here is my point. God is a lot more patient than I am. His mercy and grace are amazing beyond our ability to comprehend. I must grow even more in this area. I need to be able to love more truly. Love hopes all things. What does that mean to you? To me it means that despite the reality of sin and stupidity love knows that better things are coming. Love knows that the walls of sin and selfishness can and will be destroyed. Love knows that the captive can be freed. We separate from our brothers and sisters so easily and it is a testimony to our lack of faith. Our Lord is at work in people's lives. He will overcome every work of the evil one. We need to confront evil in others not out of anger at them, to separate from them, or to show our offense at them. We need to confront the evil in others by inviting them into closer, deeper, truer relationship. I blew it when I cast Ted out. I should have confronted his sin and invited him in and proclaimed my love for him at the same time. My Father does this. I must do it too. But we are afraid to do this. Afraid that if someone else sees us they will think we are soft on sin, that we condone what others do. That is what Jesus was accused of. If I am not accused of this is it because my actions are so good that they are not misunderstood? Foolishness. If I am not accused of loving sinners and being misunderstood as Jesus was then it is because I am not like Jesus and I am not loving others as He does. God make me misunderstood like Jesus.

The Wrong Part of Town

I live in Minas Tirith, the capitol city of Gondor here in Middle Earth. I didn't always. My life now is very different than the life I knew when I lived in Rohan. Today I drove over 150 miles over two mountain passes and forded a river to get to a village where we are doing a water project. When I lived in Edoras in Rohan I didn't have a car and I taught English as a second language at a language Institute. Yeah, I know, it doesn't show. Anyway, I like to tell stories on this blog which make a point about my relationship with God, or Church Planting, or Discipleship. Today I will tell a story about one day in Rohan and while I think it is a good story I don't think it has much point. But you can be the judge of that.

All the experts will tell you that after about six months in a foreign country you really hit culture shock hard. In Middle Earth most Westerners get culture shock after about six minutes but you get over it, you recover, and let's face it; you don't have the language or know-how to get a ticket home right then anyway and that is a good thing. So, after six months of being in Edoras I was missing a few things about home. On really bad days we would list food that we missed, or even just the names of restaurants that we would love to go to. We might be sitting around on mats on the floor drinking green tea and someone would say, 'Chilli's!' And then I might say, 'Arby's beef and cheddar!' That kind of thing. It's pretty sad. At that time we could get almost no imported Western things at all. It was in this mood that I set out one morning to go to a section of town called Central Station. I had been there before by taxi but I wanted to figure out how to get there by bus. I went down to the bus stop and I asked a driver what bus I should take to get to Central Station. He told me that his bus was going that way so I got on. We went right at first but then slowly I thought we were going too far west. We went a long ways and everything became less and less familiar. Finally, in the middle of a strange neighborhood that looked nothing like Central Station the driver stopped the bus and told me I was to get off here. I asked him where Central Station was and he told me. See that narrow alleyway to the right? Just go down there about a mile and you will find Central Station. I was pretty mad but as I didn't know any swear words in the local language I just said thank you and started walking.

I walked a long way. It was an interesting street with lots of buildings and shops I had not seen before. I was looking up at an interesting building when I walked straight into a pole that stuck up about two feet out of the middle of the sidewalk. It probably had a purpose at one time but today it just sat idle waiting patiently to destroy my knee. It hurt a lot. I choked back a cry of pain and hobbled off to one side of the road breathing hard and hoping nobody would notice. Nobody had noticed my foolish brush with inattentiveness so I lumbered on slowly taking deep breaths. I came to a small store and decided that a candy bar would ease my pain and I went in hoping to find a good western candy bar and maybe, with a lot of luck, a chair or a bench to sit on and eat it. Upon entering the doorway I was transported. I stood with mouth wide open and eyes bugging out of my head at the scrumptious array of product before me. Shelves and shelves of Cambell's Soup, Spice packets of every kind, breakfast cereal, breakfast cereal, more and more glorious breakfast cereal, cake mixes, jars and cans and jams, and what was that on the bottom to the right? A large bottle of Pace Picante sauce which had only expired two years previously! Had I passed out? Did I die? No, I was conscious and the proof was that everything there was water damaged. Some container must have fallen off a ship somewhere and the contents salvage and sold by weight. Everything was sold by weight and it was all dirt cheap! I bought a few things and then hurried to our team meeting which was just about to take place all the way back across town. I entered the meeting slightly late and with great gusto proudly proclaimed my magnificent find. I announced that our ship had sunk three times but by golly it had finally come in! Everyone was very excited and we all ran off to the store to purchase as much as we could carry. Well, everyone was excited except our team leader who had been in the middle of a some profound point when I came in. He just said that he hoped we could one day be as excited about church planting as we were about Lucky Charms. His wife told him to grab his wallet and get moving.

Two weeks later the store was gone. No, we didn't buy everything. The whole lot was packed up and taken away for someone else. We have a saying in Middle Earth that if you want something then you buy it when you see it. No bargain shopping here. Tomorrow it will be gone never to be seen again. Life is like that here. Impermanence is the fabric in which we live.

Inviting Speech

I was in Rohan the other week when I took my daughters to fly out to boarding school. On my way back home my friend and I stopped in Edoras to encourage some of the local believers there. They are having a pretty rough time these days as the king in Rohan is outlawing all things religious. It is now illegal to preach in Rohan. I asked them what the Government's definition of preaching was. They said that anytime, anywhere you speak to people- even in your own home- with a Bible open in front of you and non-believers are present then you are preaching. The fines are astronomical and several have had trouble with this fun law already. But that was not what was discouraging the leaders there. What was really getting to them was the fact that many local believers were beginning to grow weary of the struggle. They were growing cold and indifferent toward God and other believers. One of the leaders asked me if he should continue to work with one of his church members who seemed to have drifted away. This person was still coming to meetings but was not bearing any fruit and seemed to be permanently immature in his faith. Should he give up on such a person and work with others who would bear more fruit?
I replied that this was a common problem everywhere in the world today and that many people had varied opinions on this. Many people quote 2 Tim. 2:2 believing that we should focus our time on giving the message to 'faithful people who will be able to teach others as well.' This is of course, true but looking to Jesus as our model I like to tell the story of the Prodigal Son. What does this story have to do with who we work with? I believe this story is critical in understanding what a 'godly' attitude towards others is regardless of who the other person is.
As you recall the story found in Luke 15 there is a man with two sons. The second son, the 'Prodigal', leaves the father to find pleasure and satisfaction in the world. The first son stays but toward the end of the story we discover that in his heart he too has left his father's house. He stayed, but began to think of himself as a servant and not a son. He was bitter, jealous, and ungrateful. When the younger son repents and returns the father receives him and invites him into a great banquet. When the older son hears of this he is enraged but the father pleads with the older son and invites him into the banquet as well. You have doubtless heard many fine sermons on this parable and indeed there is much that can be gleaned from this story. But I will focus on just this; The younger son's character was that of a man who looks for pleasure in worldly things, the older son's character was bitter and thankless, but the father's character was constantly inviting in. I see myself in all three and indeed I have been all three characters. I have and continue to seek pleasure in the world far too often. I have been the thankless older brother who is ungrateful and jealous. And, even I, am learning to become like the father. In fact, all children should grow up. We begin like the older or younger sons- usually a combination of both- but we must grow up. When we do we invite others in. It is in the heart and nature of our Great Heavenly Father that he invites us to join him. We must become like this if we are truly followers of His Son.
Jesus was constantly inviting others to join him. We remember when He invited the little children to come to Him and we smile thinking that is how He thinks of us. But remember that in the parable the father represented God, the Prodigal represented the outcasts and sinners, but the older son represented the Pharisees and the religious of Jesus' day. Yet, in the story he too was invited to the banquet. We are not told if he went in, but even he was invited. I will put it to you that in everything Jesus said and did, even when dealing harshly with His enemies He was inviting them in. He never casts anyone out who came to Him. He told them the truth. He did not sugar coat what He said with flattering speech but He was always inviting.
We must be also. I counseled the young leader not to cast out anyone but to speak the truth clearly- always inviting. Many will leave our ranks in the end. The love of many will grow cold. We must not pander to them or cheapen the Gospel for them in any way. Jesus never chased anyone down nor did He beg others to follow Him. But we can and we must speak the truth in a way that invites them into relationship with us and our Father. They too are welcome at the banqueting table. There is room. Be like the father today, grow up and invite them in.

Feet of Clay

Personal Note: My girls are safely back in boarding school and we are back to work. I will try and start doing posts at least weekly again. Well, I say that but my home computer- usually used by my wife but also by me in the evenings- has died a violent death. I don't know when I will be able to replace it but pray for us, I am looking into Macs.

He was my knight in shining armor. He showed up for my disaster management team training and I knew that he was just what I was looking for. He was ready to serve, he was intelligent, he had been a lawyer, he spoke English, he had been a Christian for many years and he was active in a local Church that recommended him to us. His name was Boromir and I loved this guy. But then I loved him less. We did the two month team training and he told stories of his evangelistic exploits. He told of his own conversion to faith in Christ and how God had miraculously saved him from his addiction to drugs. Then after the training was over, after two months of being together for 8-10 hours a day and several overnight trips he showed up to my office drunk.

Ok, he had had a tooth pulled and the dentist had suggested alcohol to kill the pain. He made a mistake, no big deal. I told him if he ever showed up to the office drunk again he would never work for our organization- he would be off the team. The next week there he was again. Then the guys- his friends began to fess up. Boromir was an alcoholic and everyone knew it but me. Typical. That was it, he was off the team, he was history, I would not work with this clown. The King had other ideas. God gave me a project to work on concerning John Eldridge's book 'Wild at Heart'. I was to take it and use it to disciple some men. But I needed translation help. So, God in His infinite wisdom asked me to use Boromir and another man to do the job. Both of these guys were seriously flawed. I argued with God every day. I have never worked with an alcoholic before. I knew nothing about this. I had lots of other guys to work with at the time and too many other projects to do. But I was in the end, obedient. It was not fun. As we worked through the concepts in the book, concepts on how to be a real man according to what God wanted in a real man, the guys did not get it. They misunderstood at every turn. The other guy used some of the concepts to justify his domestic violence and chasing prostitutes. Boromir just plowed through the material as if nothing could touch him. As if everything in his life was just fine. I prayed a lot during those days. I kept arguing with God. Then after about three months of this nonsense, just after New Year's Eve, Boromir stopped drinking. He began to make sense. He began to fight the spiritual battles before him and more than that he began to win.

He ask if I could help him get his lawyer's license back. He needed books to study for the exam and he needed money to make it all happen. I helped. We had a vision for a Christian law firm and one was registered only a year before- only we still didn't have any Christian lawyers in it. From January of 2004 on into the summer he stayed completely sober. I was wary and watching him. We studied together several times a week. I met with his parents and helped him share the Gospel with them. They were overjoyed at the difference in their son. Then he got his license and began actually practicing law. We live in one of the most corrupt countries on this planet. I know every expatriot worker thinks that but Transparency International has backed us on this consistently ranking Gondor in the top 5 - 7 for the last five years. Hey, at least we are consistent. I think that a lawyer in any country is tempted to be unethical but here in Gondor being totally above board is not even an option. Boromir told me that the judges just want money and the prosecutors just want to intimidate people with their power.

He began to help the helpless. He began to pray and seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit and he began to win. He shared Jesus with judges. He managed to reduce bribe payments by 70%- 80% to 100% for families facing unimaginable injustices. I was proud of him. Everyone was coming to me and exclaiming that Boromir had never looked healthier and happier. He found a girlfriend and began a house church in her home. One day in early October he tried one of the biggest cases he had so far. A woman who was a member of a local Church had an unbelieving husband who was a drug dealer. The police knew that she had nothing to do with his business but when they arrested him they found out she was a Christian and assumed that she had links to foreigners. Links that would get them lots of money. So, they arrested her and held her for the astronomical sum of $3500. No one here has that kind of money. Boromir went to work. Talking sense and preaching boldly about justice and God's will he brought down the amount of the bribe to less than $500. When the woman's Church went to pay it they found that the judge refused their money and let the woman go free. He sited his respect for Boromir and Boromir's God as his motivation.

Those of you with experience understand what happened next in a way I could not. Boromir celebrated. After nine months of sobriety he fell off the wagon with a huge thud. I was not totally caught off guard by this. I knew it could happen but here is what I did not expect. He never got back on the wagon again. I went to the West to be with my wife as she had our fourth child. When I returned I found a still drunk Boromir whose hands were shaking, who had drank all of his money and the money of several of his clients, whose mind was virtually destroyed and who had fallen so far that he was incapable of telling the truth about anything. He stayed drunk for a year. I saw him sporadically, usually he had some scheme to try and get money out of me. I gave him none, though I frequently gave his mom and dad food.

Last January I heard he had sobered up. I heard that he was working for some relatives and doing well. I heard that he was getting healthy again. I sent messages to him through his family asking him to come by and see me. In March I got word that he went to the hospital with what I think must have been a stroke. The next morning he was dead. I went to his parent's home and prayed with them. It has taken me from then until now to be able to write about this.

I tell a lot of stories about the people we work with. I never sugar coat what happens. God does incredible things, miraculous things in my life and the lives of those around me. But there are many things that I don't understand. I don't know how people can fail so catastrophically. I don't know why God has protected me from moral failure and yet Boromir who loved Jesus just like I do sank so low. There is a lot of talk in seminaries and in Churches about Calvinism and the idea of God being sovereign over all or Arminianism and our ability to choose. These debates make sense to the debaters as they sit in front of their computer screens or in the classroom. But out here in Middle Earth I can make no sense of it at all. God moves in my life and the lives of those around me, this is clear. I and those around me screw up all the time. This too is painfully clear. At the end of the day we face Romans 7 and look to Paul to answer our questions for us. He simply says, "Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God- through Jesus Christ our Lord." At first glance I am very disappointed in this answer. I want more. I want a winning formula that will guarantee my spiritual prosperity. Like the crowd I want to call out to Jesus and say, 'What are we to do to do the works of God?' Jesus. That is the simple and the complex answer. As I think about it I like this answer more and more. It gives hope to me and to Boromir. Jesus loves us both, Jesus died for us both, Jesus calls us both. Jesus, he's more than enough for me and for Boromir. How about you?

Redeeming Communities

Tomorrow I will take my girls to Rohan where they will get on a plane and fly off to boarding school. We have done this for a couple of years now but it seems to be getting harder. I wont be back until late next week as we hope to spend some time encouraging discouraged believers in Rohan. They are having a rough time these days so I look forward to this opportunity to see them. Until I return I offer you the following:

Revelation 11: 15 Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven saying, ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign forever and ever.’

Sounds pretty dramatic huh? The trumpet blowing and loud voices and everything. But I think that there is a subtler side to this. The kingdom of the world has become… It’s the ‘has become’ that has my attention. You see when God decided not to blast Adam and Eve into nothingness for their disobedience he made a plan. He decided to recreate man in His image. He did not decide to make another man. He took the same broken clay and reformed it through the blood of His Son. This is what we call salvation. We think we have some understanding of this but what about ‘kingdoms?’ Kingdoms, as far as we are concerned are fallen communities based on injustice and with the possible exception of our own country they will all be blotted out in favor of a new Kingdom that is coming soon. But what if we have misunderstood this? What if the Great King is going to recreate Kingdoms the same way He has recreated us? Would that change the way we live and work? In almost all Church Planting efforts for the last two-hundred years missionaries have sought to take people out of their communities of sin and brokenness and build new pure and wonderful communities. We here in Middle Earth have done our work a different way.

Kili and Fili have been followers of Jesus for a year and a half now. They remain active members of their community which is the small village called Anfalas. Anfalas was a broken difficult place from the start. Transplanted families from the mountains came down to a desert plain to try and build a life. What they found was heat and trouble. We helped them by showing them a different way of life, a life that revolved around the worship of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Kili and Fili and their wives have followed our example and are living out their faith in the village. This Spring there was an accident. Fili was down in the village well clearing out the silt when the cement ring walls slipped and his foot was crushed. He lost the two end toes of his right foot. But there is a cool side to this. The whole village took a collection and sent him to the hospital. They kept someone at his bedside 24/7 for three weeks. They paid for everything. Now several months later Fili is home but still can not work. Kili works as a day laborer and he has worked for both families all summer. He does it joyfully. He is a great inspiration to me and to the whole village. Now many of the good Muslims in this village are wondering what it is about Kili and Fili that make them so joyful, a great asset to the community, and yet they have forsaken their faith in Islam. Many others are cooperating and working together as well. The community is already transformed and yet only four out of 300 people have professed Christ! I believe that more will proclaim Jesus as Lord but not because of a logical argument or a glorious miracle- even though they have seen both- no, they are being transformed by the leaven growing and expanding in the lives of Kili and Fili. I don’t know about you but I want to see this happen in my community and in communities around the world. Can we do that? Revelation seems to say He will do that.

Forgiven to Forgive

I am back in the West this week running around in the woods doing some training. It has been great but I miss my family who has stayed in Gondor. One of the really great privileges of doing what I do is who I work with. Overseas workers are frail and human like everyone else and yet I believe that our King has created some truly remarkable people to go and do what we go and do. This week I have met some great folks. One man I have met this week is yet another study in the transforming power of our great King and with his permission I would like to tell you about him.

Thengle is a small man with a huge smile. He was born in the far east of Middle Earth in a war torn part of the world East of Dale. When he was just twelve years old his father was killed by an old family friend who turned him in so that he could save himself and increase his own fortunes. Thengle was separated from his family and forced into the army. He served as a child soldier for a short time before rejoining his mother and escaping to the refugee camps of a neighboring country. To their surprise his father’s murderer was also their in the camp. Thengle and his family made a plan to murder him in revenge. At that same time however, Thengle began listening to some interesting volunteers in the camp. These people were very different from anyone he had ever met before. They talked about Jesus and a God of love and grace. Thengle hungered for such a God in his life. He and his family became followers of Jesus. They prayed about how to kill their enemy. They believed in the verses that were taught to them that God would give them what they asked for so they asked God to kill their father’s murderer. God spoke to Thengle one day and informed him that vengeance belonged to God alone. Thengle was content. He believed that God would kill his enemy for him.

Thengle and his family moved to the West. He was educated. He grew in grace and love of the Lord Jesus and forgot about his enemy. Then God called him to go back to Middle Earth and proclaim His Kingdom. As he prepared to go Thengle was encouraged to tie up any loose ends in his life. Unresolved relationships could cause bitterness that would cripple his effectiveness. He went to see his mother one day and she told him that the man who killed his father was still alive. He had not thought about this man for years but was amazed to hear that this man was not only alive but he too lived in the West. In fact, he too was a follower of Jesus now. Thengle’s mother went to see this man and last year she sat next to him in his Church and told him that she forgave him. Thengle forgave him as well and rejoices at the goodness of our heavenly father.

Thengle trusted God to kill his enemy and God was faithful to do so. Thengle’s enemy is well and truly dead and in his place God has raised up a brother in Christ. May heaven be filled with men and women like this.

And he gave gifts....

Personal note: I have been really busy with projects and travel so I have not been very involved in blogging lately. Tomorrow I will go to the West for two weeks of training. Arwen and the kids will remain here in Gondor so we appreciate your prayers. I will be pretty much off-line until I return.

Last week I traveled up to Andros to celebrate the completion of the project there. It was an exhausting but very rewarding journey. Halbarad and his wife were already up in Andros finishing the project when I grabbed his driver, Sam, and my daughter Luthien and we headed up over the twelve thousand foot pass and into the Cair Andros valley. It took us seven hours. After arriving we went and talked with the Emergency Services Director. We ended up spending the evening talking. Finally, I went to bed but not for long as we were back up at dawn and out to the village to for the end of project celebration. I did an interview with the Governor of the area for the local TV station. After all the big wigs left we got to sit with the villagers and I let Sam make a speech in the local dialect which he knew. We then went back into town to be shown around the area looking at potential projects.

That afternoon we met with some Christian workers from another organization. They detailed the difficult situation in Andros. Most of the male leadership of the three or four local groups have renounced Christ. One of the more important leaders gave into heavy persecution and now he has a commercial on the local tv station detailing how he became a Christian and is now a Muslim again. The local mullah interviews him and makes the point that foreigners should be avoided and there is nothing to this whole following Jesus thing. That's tough ground to plow in.

We went back out to the Emergency Services guy and spent the evening with him again. His leg is injured- possibly a pinched nerve- and he went to see the Mullah for their folk medicinal mumbo jumbo. We prayed for him but the Lord spoke quite clearly and said that He would not heal him at this time. Not the same day the Mullah did his thing. Luthien got a marriage proposal. It seems that the Emergency Services guy's wife thought she would be perfect for her son. She isn't, but she was flattered. Sam then proclaimed Christ in a very bold and direct manner for about 15 minutes. Halbarad's driver then gave his testimony, then I gave mine. We talked alot and the Emergency Services guy is very interested. We will keep praying for him.

I talked to Sam afterwards and ask him about his direct Gospel presentation. I told him that the content was great but didn't we have an indirect method that we used? He said, "I know, I talk about this all the time with Frodo and Merry but honestly sometimes I just can't keep quiet any longer!" Ok. I am always happy to hear the men of Gondor proclaim the Gospel in their own language. That makes my day everyday.

It rained that night in the mountains and the road was washed out over the pass. They are constructing a five kilometer tunnel and we tried to go through that but that road was washed out as well. We waited for about five hours and when they finally let us through the tunnel had almost three feet of rushing water through it. It was a remarkable journey. After 13 hours on the road we made it home.

Here is the thing I would like to point out. Halbarad is learning and growing in his role as an apostle to the Cair Andros valley. In a very short time he has learned the valley, the people, the language, how to run projects, and how to share his faith effectively. He is not a pastor. He is not a teacher. He is not an evangelist. He is not a prophet. He does not operate in any of these giftings at all. He is an apostle- and a very good one. He delights in breaking barriers and bringing hope to those in utter darkness. I am proud to work with him. I am honored to be a part of sending him and enabling him there. This too is an apostolic role. It is not for everyone, and it is not for so-called super Christians. It is for those whom the King calls and gifts to do it. I pray that you will be about your calling today. For the sake of the lost, and for the glory of God.

TCK's are totally cool

TCK means Third Culture Kid. It is the new descriptor for MK or missionary kid. TCK refers to all children who grow up outside of their cultural home. I was a TCK myself growing up. My father was in the Air force and we lived overseas most of my teen years. It is interesting that now that I have been trained as a cross-cultural worker I know understand much of what happened to me as a teen. I never saw the connections at the time but my grades alone tell an interesting story. My sixth grade year we moved East and my grade dropped from A's and B's to C's and D's. Then my seventh and eighth grades report cards showed almost all A's and a couple of B's. My ninth grade year we moved to the West. My grades were almost all D's. Then tenth and eleventh grades saw report cards with almost all A's and a couple of B's again. We moved back to the US my 12th grade year. You guessed it- all C's and a D or two. Clearly I was affected by the moves, by the lifestyle, by the stress. I tell you this because I want to describe my own kids to you. I want you to understand them as I see them. Before I do that I need to tell you one more story about myself. It was not all difficulty and maladjustment for me overseas as a teen.

We arrived in Okinawa, Japan when i was 12 years old. Our plane landed at night and we were whisked off to a hotel off base in Koza City. It was a dream. We were tired and jet lagged and I remember very little of the trip. The next morning we awoke in a strange hotel and went out to see where we were. Those first moments are etched on my brain. I walked out on to the street in a light rain in January. There was strange dissonant music loudly playing, there were people everywhere, the smell of the 'benjo' ditches was sharp. Strange things were hanging in all the shop windows and everyone was speaking a language I could not comprehend. It was electrifying. I was mesmerized. This was fantastic. It was a call. I would never be the same again. I would never look at downtown USA and think, 'this is all there is' again. The world was much bigger than I imagined, than I could possibly conceive and I was very grateful to see even the small piece.

My first born was a girl I here name Luthien. She was born in Texas but she is not from there. She landed in Middle Earth when she was just five. She has been home schooled, cooperative schooled, and now boarding schooled. My second daughter was born in her Grandmother's town in England. Goldberry was just three when we moved to Rohan and four when we went to Gondor. Many people say that kids learn the language and culture quickly. Not always. The second day we were in Rohan we were walking down the street and a group of kids were playing in a field nearby. Our girls said to us, 'We don't want to talk like those kids'. We were surprised. But they refused to learn. They played everyday in the street with 20 different boys and girls and learned very little of the language. Sure, they could say a few things but for the most part they could not converse. One day I sat down with Luthien and told her that we were going to be here for awhile and if she was going to be happy she needed to learn the language. She said, "Nope, I am going to teach them all English!" She didn't succeed but it was interesting watching her try. All the years of her growing up have been very difficult. She was very difficult to teach. She was an extreme introvert with no attention span at all. But slowly, with a lot of work on her mother's part especially, she has changed. We baptized her a few years ago in our home Church in the West. We were not totally convinced she was ready. What was she really thinking? This was always hard to tell with Luthien. Two years ago we ran out of schooling options for her. Home school was not working anymore, Internet school was a disaster for our family- it requires a lot of discipline! So, we sent her off to boarding school three timezones away. We didn't know if she would make it but she blossomed. I am irritated to say that now that I have sent her away my introverted, non conversant daughter is now an extremely interesting person to be with. She reads the Word everyday and makes her decisions based on it. We are really enjoying having the girls home for the summer. This week I took Luthien to the village to see one of our projects. It was a difficult road up over the pass and a long long day the next day as we evaluated the project, met lots of people and government officials and looked over new project possibilities. While we stayed up late one night witnessing to a local official Luthien was proposed to by the wife of our host. She had a young son that she was sure was just right. Luthien didn't think that she would be a very good daughter-in-law in Gondor culture. I am sure she is right. But she did help cook the meal that night and the whole discussion was in the language of Gondor which she supposedly doesn't know very well!

Goldberry is the opposite of Luthien. She is vivacious, fun, and outgoing. We knew she would do well at boarding school but there was something we did not take into account. While Goldberry is much more interactive and aware than Luthien she is also much more emotional. She really struggled this last semester being away from Mom and Dad. She failed algebra and that hurt her emotionally too. One day she told me that she was not good at anything, she was not talented, was not intelligent, was not special. I lost my temper. I told her in no uncertain terms that grades, clever tricks, or physical ability meant nothing in the Kingdom. Love was everything and no one could love others like Goldberry. She is sensitive to others, she includes others, she is a good friend. No, she does not juggle or play soccer well. But she is great in the Kingdom and I am grateful for such a daughter. She wants more than anything- at the moment- to be a cross-cultural worker like Dad and Mom. She wants to tell the world about Jesus.

The boys come next. Elladan was born in England in 1999. He is wiry, strong, and thinks he is a gymnast. The fact that all the furniture in our house is broken is a testamony to this. He is not crazy about school and Arwen is going to home school him this next year to see if she can motivate him better. He stays locked away in our yard too much of the time. The neighborhood boys just throw rocks at the foreigner whenever they see him out. He has a bad attitude about the people of Middle Earth even though it is the only home he knows and would not want to live anywhere else. He loves camping and I try and take him out to the villages when I can. Elrohir was born just two years ago and is a small tank in motion. He is a chunk of a kid with the sweetest attitude you could ever hope to see in a child. He loves to sit and play quietly with Woody and Buzz of Toy Story fame and play for hours. Probably due to the dual language issues he does not speak at all yet. The only thing he can say with any consistency is, "To infinity and beyond!" of course, quoting Buzz.

I guess the purpose of this post is obvious. There are great advantages to raising kids here and there are great challenges. The kids will never be the same as a result of what we have done to them by bringing them here. I think that our Father is going to take them and make them exceptional humans as a result of being here. They don't know their grandparents or extended families at all. They don't like the US and don't feel 'at home' there. The truth is they, like me, will never 'feel' at home anywhere. This might be the best lesson of all. We are taught theologically that this world is not our home. Most people around the world do not understand this. TCK's know it all too well. They understand that they do not belong anywhere in this world and for most of them it drives them to seek somewhere else. A Kingdom not made with hands and ruled by our mighty King. When we get there many of us may have to deal with culture shock. If you do, just look up a TCK, they will proudly welcome you home.

Feasting in the Kingdom

Holy Communion. The Lord's Supper. The Eucharist. The Breaking of Bread. What do these words communicate to you? I usually call it the Lord's Supper myself but all of these are legitimate names. In today's post I would like to tell you what I teach when I teach on the Lord's Supper. It is my hope that you will be moved to reflect on this important tradition that the Lord Jesus himself has given us.

I went down to Anfalas to witness a baptism. We did a lot of teaching on baptism but I knew it was important to follow this up with the Lord's Supper. Both of these important traditions in the Church witness the same thing. They both portray Jesus' sacrifice for us on the cross. (By the way, I am using the word 'tradition' to describe these events rather than the theologically acceptable term 'ordinance' because it conveys an emotional force to me that 'ordinance' does not.) So, after we saw Kili and his wife baptized we went to their home. We sat on the floor around a cloth and I pulled out the box of juice and loaf of flat bread that is a major staple in all of Middle Earth. I showed them Matthew 26 and we talked about the Lord's Supper. Verse 26 is a small parable for me concerning the entire event. It says:

While they were eating, Jesus took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to the disciples, and said, 'Take eat: This is my body."

First, I should point out that this happened while they were eating. The New Testament knows nothing of a small cracker and an itty bitty cup passed out during some kind of theatrical show. They were in someones house eating a meal together. It was not a formal solemn thing. It was a significant life changing event that happened in the midst of normal life. I think most of our experiences with God should be like that.

Next, I explained to Kili and his wife the significance of the supper in the context of Matthew 26:26. What follows is taken from the table of contents of a book by Henri Nouwen. I can't remember the title of the book and he took these subjects in another direction entirely but the chapter titles stuck with me as I went through this verse so I will give him credit.

Jesus took the bread. He himself as the bread of life was chosen by the Father. Jesus was not someone who happened to be in the right place at the right time. He was God's specific instrument uniquely designed for the purpose God chose him for. So are we. We are called by the Father himself to be who he has called us to be. Isaiah 43, speaking of God's people says that he has 'called us by name', and 'you are mine.' You and I are not idly wandering through this world trying to do the 'best we can'. No friends, the King meant something when he meant you. You are called with a purpose. He has taken you just as surely as Jesus picked up that bread.

He blessed it. Jesus as the bread of life was uniquely blessed. To be blessed by God means that God has put his hand on his life in a special way. Jesus is empowered, gifted, cared for, loved, guided, protected, and placed as a cornerstone in the ultimate building not made with hands. So are we. He blesses us. He empowers us. Jesus prays for us and guides us into his unique plans that we may be a part of the building he is making; the Kingdom that is coming.

He broke it. Jesus was broken many times in his life and none more fully and finally than on the cross at Calvary. We also are broken. Many times throughout our lives we are broken down in the difficult circumstances of life. How many of your hopes and dreams have been shattered? Loved ones lost? All your efforts and labors come to fruitless ends? It happens to all of us. It must. The message of the cross is to be born by those who lead the life of the cross. We must die. This is the message of baptism. We die to our old life and we rise to walk in the new life. But the old life has a way of lingering on. More death is always necessary this side of eternity. I am a huge fan of brokenness. We need it if we are to carry the authority to proclaim the resurrection. Brokenness builds in humility, perspective, and most of all character. It is what Almighty God is using to recreate us back into his image. The journey begins with the death of Jesus but it always ends in our own death. I don't enjoy brokenness but I know without doubt that it is my friend.

He gave it. Once we are broken we can be given away. Jesus was broken on the cross and through his breaking the world was changed. The Kingdom o f God came new and we are set free as a result. This is the Good News. The bread of life was given to us. We in turn are given to others. In the Great Commission of Matthew 28 we are sent out on a mission to participate in the redemption of mankind. I told Kili that I was sending him out on mission with God. He looked at me with wide eyes. He understood well what that would mean for him as a former Muslim in a Muslim land. I can confirm that since then Kili has been more than faithful in going and he has suffered for it.

I went on to talk about the shed blood and forgiveness of sins. Through Jesus blood we are a new community and communities have traditions that give them cohesiveness. They have common experiences that build bonds of love and friendship. This is what the Lord's Supper is for. We remember Jesus together. In recognizing him among us in this way we worship him and in worshiping him we are transformed to become more and more like him. I will say that the Church in Anfalas does not do the Lord's Supper very often. The reason is simple. They imitate everything we did in front of them and we never did the Lord's Supper as a team down in Anfalas. We are working to fix that mistake. We are trying to recover what Jesus meant when gave us this tradition that would enable us to think of him 'as oft as you drink of it'. Do you really think that means once a quarter? It sounds a lot like he means every time we eat together. Let us break bread together often and in remembering Jesus together let us remember not only who he was, but who he is and who he is calling us to be. Let us not be sidetracked by issues such as who gets to pass out the bread and juice or who you will eat with in your own home. These issues are not mentioned in the scriptures. Let us focus on what is mentioned; that Jesus wants us to remember his sacrifice. We do not remember it out of some vain sense of sentimentality but out of a true love for him we live like him and love like him. His Kingdom is accessed through the cross. Let us embrace our brokeness and love a world that is dying without Jesus.

In Hot Pursuit

Legolos is our BSM. This stands for Business Service Manager and it means that he oversees the finances for our team. His primary job is not Church Planting but because we are all followers of Jesus this is exactly what he is involved in. I have told the story some time ago about a young lady who worked in Legolos’s home and became a believer but was later tragically killed. Since that time many interesting things have happened in the story that the King is telling in that family. I thought I would update you all on what is going on.

The proud grandfather came to my door at 9:30 in the evening. He came with a 25 year old girl and a young boy. They wanted to come and plead with me to get his granddaughter back. I was unsympathetic. She had begun to consider Christ’s claims a few months ago but was shamed into leaving the study at Legolos’s house and went back to the village. They continued to treat her terribly and after a few weeks she had left them and come back to the city. They thought she was staying with Legolos’s family but they were wrong. I knew she was staying with relatives. The real trouble was that she had broken bread- become engaged- with a young Muslim man in the village and now for her to leave completely shamed the grandfather and indeed, the whole family. But I knew, even if they did not understand that this was not a situation where faith in Christ leads to family division. This was all about the sins of the Grandfather. He had allowed each of his daughters to prostitute themselves. He had allowed this abuse to come into his home and affect the grandchildren. He had made the situation intolerable for this young girl. The truth was that she had not brought shame upon his name in the village, it was already shamed. I challenged him, gently, about this. ‘Why did she leave?’ They said she was taken away by Lotho. ‘But why did she call him?’ They said he was usurping the Grandfather’s authority. What he did was not right. ‘But why would he do that?’ I asked. Again and again I put it back to them. Finally, we prayed and they left. I doubt that they heard me but the King is working in them. They don’t have honor, they don’t have respect, they don’t have money, they don’t have food. One by one the King has eliminated these things from their life. I think they are being pursued by God. It is a painful thing to watch. You see when the King reaches out in love He will get your attention any way He can. For proud, stubborn people that can often mean a series of devestating events. But be assured, the King is still about seeking and saving the lost.

In the meantime who is this Lotho you might ask? Why did he come to her rescue? Well, it seems that God is pursuing him as well. Elsie is my wife’s best friend and has been ever since we met in Rohan eleven years ago. She made a half hearted commitment to Jesus a long time ago and we have prayed for that commitment to deepen for years. In her early immature days she decided to marry a young Muslim boy. He was immature. He had no job, no character, no future, and no respect from me. He cheated on her the week after their marriage. He is not ‘evil’ per se, just useless. Please understand that I am describing him with human eyes. This is not what the King sees. Even I knew that this man could be more in the Kings hands. But it seemed very unlikely that he would ever give the King a chance. Rude and uneducated he didn’t like to talk to me much less was he interested in any truth I had to share.

A couple of years ago Elsie began working for Legalos. Lotho would come around to pick her up and drop her off. Occasionally, I saw him and one night in particular had a meaningful conversation with him. He was not a religious person but what he had seen of Islam was not appealing to him. This was the first time I had any idea that the King was working on him. Then Legalos came back from Stateside Assignment in January and Lotho’s whole family fell apart. This girl was abused by the family and Lotho and Elsie stepped in to help. He saw that his aunt and his cousin were radically changed by the power of Christ. His wife became bolder and deeper in her faith as the crises in the family escalated. An uncle died, a marriage fell apart, money was owed by the extended family in huge amounts. As this extended family unit fell apart several of the ladies began meeting and praying with Legolos’s family. They began meeting three times a week. Lotho began to meet with them. He began studying the Word. He not only listened as others prayed he began praying and asking for prayer. He is not a Jesus follower yet but you would not recognize him from even six months ago. God is pursuing this young man. His family is still a mess but he is looking to Jesus to be his rock more and more each day. Next week two more of the women will be baptized. Pray that Lotho’s faith is deepened and that the Spirit will move in his heart. Pray for faith to overcome the fear and hope to overcome the despair. Above all pray for love to transform a wasted meaningless existence into real abundant life. God is pursuing this family. I pray that they let Him catch them.

Taking Jesus with Us

Disclaimer- I have been exceptionally ill last night and today but I have been thinking about these things so I thought I would write them down. If I read this tomorrow and realize I was delirious then I will remove it.

I think that we can do ministry without Jesus. Don't get me wrong here, I don't think we should, I just think we often do. Now, why would we do that? I may have a partial answer here. The other day we had some guests from the West and I was, as usual, telling my stories. I told them about Kili and Fili and their wives down in Anfalas accepting Christ and starting a Church. One of the guests broke in and ask, 'Wait, if Anfalas is three and a half hours away then who will pastor and lead the new Church?' 'Exactly,' I answered. Who will? If not me, the seminary trained experienced pastor then who could possibly keep this group in line? Who could protect it? Who could guide it? After some discussion I told them, 'Jesus is building his Church. It isn't my job. His Spirit will gift the people and raise up the leaders they will need with the giftings they need when they need them.' It was a bold statement. As I have been thinking about this I have been challenged by others who have had great struggles in raising up mature leaders. Many have poured years of their lives into men and women who are shallow and immature. Many still struggle with weak faith and total dependence on the foreigners. One year since the baptisms Kili and Fili are as fiery a gospel witness as you could hope to find. These men and their wives are dynamic, growing, faithful, and utterly transformed. I thank God for them and well I might. It was Him. It was Jesus all along who has been in control and has transformed these families.

Many times I have had big discussions with Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pipen. They would love for me to just give them a blank check to go out and solve all of the problems that the people around them have. I continually remind them that we must serve people but we are not to be God to people. They must look to Him. We can not, must not solve all of their problems. I believe that God is using the brokenness of this world to bring people to Himself. When we solve the problems ourselves- apart from His guidance and direction- then we short-circuit the process. We end up making disciples of us instead of disciples of Him. I have instructed the team not to refer to anyone as 'their' disciple. We are to make disciples but not of us, of Him. When we do that, when we take Jesus out and set Him loose in the lives of people we love then we can expect to see the radically transformed lives that we have been waiting to see.

I know a group who a few years ago went to a town up north. Through a dynamic prison ministry which reached out to the prisoner's families they saw fifteen house groups start. It was a great time and we all praised God for it. Today none of those house groups exist anymore. A few of the families go to the mother church but the house groups did not continue. Why? Well, they would not say this but I will. The mother Church never let go of control. All decisions were made down here in Minas Tirith. They were only allowed to have the Lord's Supper when an ordained someone from Minas Tirith was up there to give it to them. The groups were completely dependant on the leaders of the mother Church and eventually they died. They died because no matter how good you are you can not change a heart. You can not change a life. You can not raise the dead. But the dead must be raised. It is our calling. So, I must take the only one who can raise the dead with me and let Him get to work. He is eager to do such work in the lives of men and women. The question is are you going to let him? Can we trust Him to be in control and not us?

Giving Freely

Disclaimer: This post has nothing to do with the previous post.

The second week I was here in Middle Earth I left the house to go in search of groceries. Half way to the shops I realized that I had changed my pants and left my money in the dirty clothes pile. So, being penniless I turned back to the house to retrieve the funds I would need to go shopping. Just then I ran into a man who was shabbily dressed and appeared to be trying to communicate with me. I spoke only English at that point and I couldn’t figure out what he wanted. Suddenly, I realized that this man was a beggar- a gypsy- and he wanted me to give him something. I told him- in English- that I had nothing. He looked puzzled. I pulled out the lining of my pocket and demonstrated that I was completely broke. He looked really concerned. He spoke much to me and very fast. I could understand none of it. Then he held his hands up in the position of prayer and instructed me to do the same. He turned me- presumably to face Mecca- and he prayed for us. Then he smiled at me and left. Now, for those of you with less overseas beggar experience this was pretty unusual. There were very few foreigners in Rohan at that time. In the city where I was there were only two other foreign families and I am sure that this man had never met a foreigner before. I think he really felt sorry for me and wanted to bless me with a prayer. I was bemused. I had come there to help these people and he was praying for me!

When we moved to Gondor the situation was very different. In the wake of the brutal civil war beggars lined the streets. They came door to door with stories of despair. We didn’t know what to do. After much prayer and Bible study our team came to some conclusions for the way we deal with beggars and those in need. I am well aware that there are godly men and women on other teams in other countries who disagree with me. That is fine. For us here, in this situation this is what we do and why.

In Matthew 5:42 Jesus gives us the foolish and ill-conceived words, “Give to everyone who begs from you.” Of course, he surely did not realize that there would one day be professional beggars who make a decent living by begging. He probably was unaware that many people beg for bread and then go out and buy alcohol. He couldn’t have known that there would one day be gangs of beggar boys and girls who would be forced to beg by some thugs who would take all they earned. You are likely unaware that sarcasm is one of my defining characteristics. Yes my friends, ‘Give to all who asks’ is an outrageous blank check and I think that Jesus knew it full well. Can we really do this? We are trying. It takes intentional preparation to be able to do this. In our country there is a coin that is just about the value of five cents and it can buy a loaf of flat bread. I try and give this to all who ask. That means keeping these coins in my pocket and being ready to give them. They are perfect for us in our context because anyone who is genuinely hungry can eat with this little coin. Anyone who wants alcohol or something else needs to collect quite a few more of these to get what he wants. But in the end this is not my business. Jesus has commanded me to give and I will give. You will notice he didn’t say what to give. I have had men approach me and demand that I give them beer. I didn’t. I gave them bread and if they turned and sold that bread for beer then that is between them and God. Between me and God the relationship is clear. He commands me to give and I give.

So, we always give. We do not always give what was asked of us. We always try and respect those whom we are serving. I usually try and give a quick blessing to the individual whom I am serving. We do not worry about being taken advantage of. The things we give are just things- easily replaced by a big God. Many times someone will say to me, ‘Yeah, but that guy is lying.’ I always reply, ‘Yes, but the truth is just as bad.’ But in the end this command was not given to us for the sake of the poor. It was given to us for our own sake. We are not to view the resources at our disposal as ours. We are not to be dependant on our riches. We are to be obedient to Jesus and expect that he will care for us and for the poor. At the end of the day who is going to bed praising God for something you did for them? There ought to be someone. Today make sure there is someone who is thanking God for you. Freely you have received, freely give.

Care Packages

The good folks over at Missionaryblogs.com have asked that we put out a post giving advice on sending care packages to M's around the world. This is problematic for many because such a post would look like we were begging for stuff but since this blog is fairly anonymous I feel safe to tell it like it is.

First, a little advice on packaging. Here in Middle Earth the postal service is not very dependable. The post passes through several countries who are all notorious for pilfering the packages and it is very often that our packages have been opened and much of the contents end up as presents for the children of the postal workers. Insuring a package is completely useless for us- and I suspect in many countries so don't bother. What you can do is go crazy with the tape. A thoroughly wrapped package is a nuisance to get into and they will move on to a softer target. Also, if you individually wrap each of the contents then that also adds a good measure of security. Finally, if you write a packing list on the inside flap with a big ol' magic marker they are less likely to pilfer.

Now, that is how to ship it- but what should you ship? I like Oreos. You know you can get a lot of cookies in this world but Oreos are unique to the USA. But other than that if you send package food stuff then often local postal workers don't know what to do with it and leave it alone. My personal favorite is Taco Bell Taco Dinners. I can't get anything like that here and it is so foreign that it always makes it through in the post. Mac and cheese stuff for folks with kids is always good. Condiment things like salad dressings are not usually available and much appreciated.

Now some things you might think would be a good idea but really it isn't is a cake mix. If you think about it a cake mix is heavy and cost you a lot to ship but it is 90% flour and hey, we can get flour. Some specialty mixes like a gooey brownie mix or something like that can be very nice however. Chocolate is not a very good idea as it never travels well. The only exception to this is Reeses Peanut Butter Cups. They don't travel well but you can't get them anywhere but the US so we eat them melted when we can get them. Oh, and personally I don't like mayonnaise. I am just saying.

Something else you should consider when sending a package is valuables. Don't do it. We had a family leave behind a young boy's favorite stuffed bear and they mailed it out to him. We never saw it again. Sad. If you don't want to loose it don't send it in the mail. Also, kids love toys and it is great to get them but again, the postal workers have kids too and the toys do not often make it. My mom sent us a package our first Christmas overseas full of Barbie Dolls for the girls and it never made it. It cost her a fortune and she decided never to mail us anything again. Please try again Mom?

Something that always seems to make it but you wouldn't think it might is CD's and computer games. We love Christian music and the latest movies. They are light so they are cheap to ship and you can buy us the discount stuff cause we haven't seen anything in the last two years anyway.

Well, I hope that this was helpful for those of you out there thinking of sending a package to someone. It means a lot to us to get a package. Even something small communicates much love and grace to us at the end of a long day. Thank you to all those who support M's this way. If you have any questions about what I have said leave a comment, I will be glad to follow up with you.

It's Just Not Fair

Thanks to all the faithful folks who have been missing my blog this week. It has been a rough week to be sure. Our dog got very ill - distemper- and should have died. God had tremendous grace on her though and she is well now and eating everything in sight. My girls' travel plans have been tumultuous. We are trying to bring them back from boarding school but we could not get ticket confirmation until Friday- one week before they are supposed to fly. The stress was very great and our faith tested but He is faithful and Goldberry and Luthien are due to arrive next Friday at Midnight!
There is lots more going on as well but here is this week's story.

Kili went to Ithilian to see his father last month. He has been a believer for one year now and we wondered how he would present himself back home. Would he keep quiet? Would he be faithful? It would be a difficult test to be sure. He reached the capital of Ithilian and found that his younger sister was in the hospital and was very ill. He prayed for her in Jesus name. The doctors and nurses rebuked him but he proclaimed Christ to them. He then went to Gimli and Galadrial's house and met them for Sunday morning meeting. He wanted to go up to his father's village the next day and coincidentally (hah!) Gimli was going there to check on a project so they went together. Kili stayed for about a month. Early on in the month a neighbor died and a large funeral took place in the village. Kili stood up before them all and told them that they were all blinded to the truth. The Truth was Jesus and he proclaimed Christ loudly. Later that week four men approached Kili. He said that he could tell immediately that they were believers. He asked them if they met together to study and worship regularly and they said they did. He ask them how they came to faith and they said that Bill had come last year and told them about Jesus and had given them a New Testament. We cut in on his story. Bill? Bill Ferney? Bill Ferney the guitar player? Yes, that was him. But he isn't a believer! Frodo and Merry have known Bill for years and have shared much with him but he has always resisted the Gospel. Now we find out that he has been used of the King to bring four men into the Kingdom in a place that is completely dark- no Church and no witness except for the occasional visits by Gimli. My first reaction? It just isn't fair. We work hard, we share our faith, we serve, we pray and we strategize and in the end the King uses a coward like Bill who does not have the courage to stand up for Jesus in his own home to bring glory to Himself. It's almost as if God deserves all the glory, honor, and praise for the work that is going on in all the world today. I can live with that. To God alone be the glory. SDG. Oh, and I guess I am saying that if Bill can be used so can you and so can I. Let's be about the work of the Kingdom. It's coming!

Forgiveness that Transforms

I got the call one week before the big training event was to begin. I had planned for months for this event and I was very surprised to get a call from a fellow worker from another agency asking for my help. He wanted me to include Thorin in my two month disaster management training program. I asked him why and he replied that Thorin had recently confessed in his local church that he had got a girl pregnant. His eldership in the church was removed and he was under church discipline. Ok, I thought, what does this have to do with me? My friend said that everyone knows that Thorin is a capable worker and some don't care about his sin. He has had several job offers from other agencies saying if he was not going to be a leader in his church then they could make him one in their organization. My friend said, 'Look Strider, just put him in your two month training program and I will pay the stipend. Thorin needs time and healing. If you don't take him I think he may go off and do something rash; either joining another organization or quitting everything altogether.' I am a big believer in redemption so I told him that I would add him to the fellowship. That made ten the total number in the training.

Thorin needed the time we spent together and I consider the effort I spent on his behalf to be one of the most important things I have done here in Gondor. As we studied together, worked together, traveled together over the next two months I learned alot about him. He was a middle aged man around 50 years old. He had come to faith in Jesus nine years ago. He had been divorced before he became a believer. His ex-wife lived in up in Arnor with a second husband but he still saw his teenage daughter on occasion. After his conversion from Islam he became a passionate evangelist. He and three other men started a Church here in Minas Tirith. He had been an elder in this church for four years. How did he fall?

When he told me his story I was shocked. He said that he had been single ever since his divorce and that since he had become a believer he had never even considered remarriage. He worked hard at his church and did not think about women. One day a woman from his same tribe up in Ithilien came and joined the Church. She caught his attention. They discussed marriage and she was agreeable. He approached her family and got their permission. They agreed. He was very excited. This would be the first marriage between two believers in their church. He met with the other elders and announced his plan. He asked them for help in planning the wedding and expressed his desire to make this event an opportunity for bold witness. They looked at him like he was crazy. What was he talking about? He could not get married because he had been divorced. They instructed him to call it off and tell the family. The family, who were not believers, were furious. He and the girl were heart-broken. A month later he took her anyway secretly without getting married and six months after that she was pregnant. It was a huge shame for them and for the church. He stood up in church and publically apologized.

I was pretty angry when I heard all of this. I really felt that the elders were as much to blame for this mess as he was. Did not Paul say it was better to marry than to burn with desire? But, there are a lot of verses and words from Jesus' own lips that indicate that remarriage is in fact, a sin. I didn't want to go off half-cocked (for a change) so I said nothing to Thorin and the guys for a while and I prayed about a response. It was tough for me to wrestle with the scriptures on this. I had been very legalistic as a young christian but I had swung way in the other direction during college days. This means that as I approach the Word I have presuppositions like everyone else but I am not always sure what they are. Is it the letter of the law- or isn't that what kills? I have seen remarriage be a key redeeming factor for many people, including my own father but does experience trump the Bible? I think not.

I prayed and studied and I worked with the team. One day as I was praying it seemed that God gave me the answer. So, I waited for the right time to give it to the guys. The last week of training we went down to a village and spent the week doing a pilot project on Disaster Preparedness. We set up the tent and field office. We began canvassing the village and working with the people. One night a small argument arose among the guys concerning this issue. We met the next morning and I took out my Bible and we began. This is what I gave them.

Jesus teaching on divorce is found in Matthew 5:31-32; 19:3-9; Mark 10:2-12; Luke 16:18. Most all of these are the same so I will just quote Matthew 5 here:

It was also said, 'Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.' But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

It is interesting to note that in the Mark passage he does not give the unchastity clause but the point is the same throughout Jesus teaching. Divorce is a sin against God's original design for man/woman relations. But of course, no one knows that like divorced people. It is a painful, horrible experience. But what then? Well, as I kept studying there were two other passages that interested me. In 1 Corinthians 7: 10-11 Paul says that a woman who is divorced should not seek to be remarried but remain single. Interestingly however, he goes on to say that if an unbelieving spouse leaves and refuses reconciliation then they are 'free' or as my version in verse 15 says, 'not bound.' So, to the original question and the situation with Thorin what is the Church to do with such individuals who have been divorced? Romans 7 became my answer. In Romans 7:1-4 NRSV it says:

Do you not know, brethren- for I am speaking to those who know the law- that the law is binding on a person only during that person's lifetime? Thus a married woman is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives; but if her husband dies, she is discharged from the law concerning the husband. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man, she is not an adulteress. In the same way, my friends, you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit fo God.

We can see that this passage is not actually a passage about divorce per se, it is actually about sin and our relationship to God. But look at what it says! It describes us as being married to sin, death, and hell and that we were bound in this marriage. Death is the only release from this contract so someone had to die. Christ died for us! This is the bedrock of our faith, the reason for our hope, the truth of our salvation. Christ died to free us from our eternal contract with death. So, follow me here for a minute. We have determined clearly that divorce is a sin. Sin leads to death. Jesus died that death for us to set us free. Therefore, in my limited human logic I conclude that Jesus' death sets us free from even the sin of divorce and if we are free then what? Romans 8:1-2 is clear:

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of Christ has set you free from the law of sin and death.

In all my teaching experience this is the hardest concept for people to believe. No condemnation. None, zilch, zippo, nada, it's not there, it's out the door, we are free. If you show up at a meeting of believers and they say here comes that murderer, you can say, 'No, I am not. You can not condemn me, I am free.' If they say, 'Here comes a liar and theif.' You can say, 'no, not anymore. I am forgiven, clean, free.' If they say, 'Here comes a divorced person.' You say,'No, I am not. I am forgiven, free, clean.' Don't beleive me? Look at the much stronger words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:17:

So, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old is passed away (except divorce and homosexuality of course. Wrong!! that is not in there!); see, everything has become new.

New, free, a new creature. The old creature was a liar, was a murderer, was divorced but not the new creature. So, if this is true why do we see the new creature behaving as if he/she were bound? I mean, 75% of second marriages fail- even among followers of Jesus. Why? I think I know why. Would you walk up to me and ask me for $100,000? Of course you wouldn't. You do not believe I have that much money to give- and you would be right! We do not ask for that which we do not believe exist. The Church has taught that while divorce may not keep you out of heaven, there is no forgiveness here on earth. How many of you have said, 'Oh yes, you are forgiven but there are consequenses.' Brother, you can have that kind of forgiveness! Thanks for nothing. Either I am forgiven and the slate is clean or I am not. The answer from the Church has been 'not' and divorced people know this. We need to recover Jesus true message of forgiveness. Forgiveness that transforms us from death to life. Forgiveness that truly cast our sins as far as the East is from the West. Forgiveness that burries our sins- all of our sins- in the bottom of the ocean to be remembered no more. If we do this then the divorced among us can be set free to ask for transforming forgiveness that will set them free from the sin in their lives that killed their first marriage. Then they will be free to marry again and love and honor and cherish as a new creature in Christ. And brethren, when they say to you, 'You are divorced, you can not serve, you can not marry, you can not lead, you can not....' you tell them, 'I am set free by the blood of Jesus who died in my place. I am a new creature whom you have no right to condemn. I am free to live the life Jesus has called me to.'
And then friend, please, live free and set others free.

After teaching the guys this there was much discussion. The next day as they continued to argue about this Thorin rebuked them, "No condemnation means no condemnation! You can not bind me." He meant these words and he went on to marry the girl and raise the daughter in the Church. He has gone to Mordor itself and planted a church in a city where no Gospel witness has ever been known. He continues to serve faithfully and whenever he stops by to see me he hugs me hard with a big smile and thanks me again for teaching him the truth of the freedom he has in Christ. You can not set others free unless you are free yourself. Be free my friends and live a life of freedom. This will transform your life and our world.