Dance Around the Altar

I've been thinking over the last few weeks about "the power of the altar". It seems we, especially in The Wesleyan Church, have attributed some sort of "divine power" to the hunks of wood that sit at the front of the sanctuaries of our churhes. We seem to have this subconcious drive, "if we can only get them to the altar, then we can fix them!" or "If I go to the altar I will get fixed!"

When you combined this mentality with the reality that many speakers' effectiveness is measured by the amount of people who flood the altars at the end of the message, we find a sensationalize altar. We're guilty of what I call "Dancing around the altar". We have a desire to enter into a deeper relationship with God, we're caught in some sin, or we're struggling to demonstrate certain fruit of the Spirit so we go to the altar, we pray, and we expect to magically have everything fixed.

We've forgotten that the change does not need to happen at the altar, it needs to happen in our hearts. We expect to rise from the altar and to float away on some glorious cloud. Then when we're faced with the battle of demonstrating the fruit or resisting the temptation we think we need to go back to the altar because we didn't get fixed the first time.

Speaking as one who has done this altar dance, it breaks my heart to see brothers/sisters do the same thing I did. I'd work myself into an emotional frenzie and weep at the altar. I cry out to God about the same thing for the 100th time, stand up, hug a friend and leave unchanged. "The Altar Dance". I would go through these actions like some magic ritual hoping this time it took. Thinking all I need to do is go to the altar and that'll fix everything. NO! We need to get serious about the issues we are dealing with. Faith is acting on what we believe! The heart change does not happen at the altar it begins when we stand up from the altar and start acting according to what we believe.

Wellington Mara (1916-2005)

"My magnificent Creator has seen fit to give me a long life and a large family and he has used them to show me crystal clearly the sanctity and invariability of life and for that I am forever thankful to him" (1997 Hall of Fame Induction Speech).

For those of you disinterested and uninvolved in the American Football world, you'll have no idea who Wellington Mara is, to be honest, I knew him only as a name, until his death yesterday was announced. Wellington Mara started as a ball boy and eventually became the owner of the New York Giants. For 81 years he was involved in the Giants' organization and saw 6 Superbowl Championships.

During the interviews one of the things that stuck out to many people was his uncompromising faith. He was known as a religious man and when the Giants won the SuperBowl in 1986 instead of having champagne they had Pepsi (should have been coke).
Tiki Barber, the Giants running back had the blessing to visit with Wellington the night before his death and pray with him.

This Post is dedicated to all the men in pro sports, like Wellington, who live a life committed to Christ in a world full of compromise. With the steroids scandals and the domestic disputes, it is tempting to lay down the cross to hoist the Trophy. To those who have continued to carry their cross from home, to the field, and into the locker room. I thank you for being a light in a dark world.

Remembering December

For those of you who don't know, over the past year or so I have developed a love for a little known Ontario band called Hawk Nelson. They're a punk band who encorporate girls, politics, and Christ into Rock-Awesome songs. Songs that penetrate my heart. One of their songs, From Underneath, slices deep into my heart. The part of the song that captures me every time goes, "I'm reaching out to take my Father's hand. Do you remember that cold day in December, leaving everything you knew behind?"

When we look at our relationship with Christ each of us can think back to our own personal " cold day in December". A time in our lives when God asked us to lay down our plans and venture out on the path he has for us. Like Abram we left everything familar behind to pursue what God has for us. We may have only had one "December Day" or we may have had multiple, with each "Day" calling us to a deeper or more sacrifical commitment. When I look back at my "December Day" and remember the things and pathes I left behind, there is both a peace and a thankfulness that accompanies those memories. Even though the path I have taken still isn't my ideal, I know it's a path the Lord has forged for me. The peace comes because I know I am in the Lord's will and the thankfulness comes from the knowledge I am not the man I was.

What memories do you have of your "December Day"s?

This Broken Life

Last night I was talking to a close friend of mine about life and basically where we are at with God. We were honest about our relationship with God and posed the questions were suppose to have all figured out. We weren't looking for answers; we were looking for our hearts to be heard.

For an hour we took off the clergy camoflage and told each other we weren't perfect, we don't have all the answers, and we still have doubts.
I think one of the greatest detrements to the message of Christ, is those of us who stand at our pious pulpits and pretend we have it all figured out.

When life doesn't go as planned, we have a crisis of faith, as minute as it may seem. In those moments there is a dark place of the heart where we ask, "Is God really in control?", "Does God really love me?" or "Am I praying to a religious creation?". Whether the thoughts originate in our heart, or come from an exterior source they are there and it is in these crisises our faith is challenged.

I'd like to say these questions come, but once, and being answer never reappear, however, each of us knows when the light dims for a moment our faith is shaken.

I don't know where we got this idea that our Walk with Christ is easy. The Bible doesn't tell us that, Church History doesn't tell us that, not even the Media tells us that. Maybe it's left over dreams of our ancestors, who jumped on a ship and set sail for "The New World" in search of freedom from persecution.

It's not until we allow these dreams of a utopic life to die in the origin of their sin that we will ever see daylight. When we come to Christ most of us are looking for a good cleaning and a little mending here and there, never realizing our true brokenness. It is in the reality of our broken life that we are usable. So long as we hold to our self-adequacy and the mentality that "I'm not that bad" we are useless to the cause of the cross. It is in the broken life God works.

My prayer to God is: This Broken life I have held so close protecting it from your healing touch. I release my grip from This Broken Life and ask you to do as you please.

It's a pretty simple concept, I think we need to revisit more.