Undercover Pastor

I’ve got the stomach flu, and it has completely ruined my plans.  Sure, I should have been prepared when my son Johnny got it a few days ago, but I lived in denial.  I’ll spare you the unplesant details, but the part of this that’s interesting is that on Wednesday, someone in our Revelation Bible Study asked us all to pray for gratitude.  That’s an unusual prayer request.  We get plenty of heath, home, and financial requests, along with the occasional relationship issue or strugling church project, but someone said that we need to be more thankful.

Here’s the connection.  Thinking about my poor soon who couldn’t keep liquids down for a full 24 hours, I prayed that we would have the kind of thankfulness that you have when you’ve been coughing for weeks and can finally breathe freely or the kind of thankfulness that you experience afetr getting over the stomach flu and can finally eat and drink again.  We get a glimpse of it and then promptly go back to beign dissatisfied with whatever we’re prone to be dissatisfied with.

I am on the road to fresh thankfulness for being able to eat, drink, and think clearly once again!  I pray that it will last a bit longer before I get back to financial, child rearing, and church future concerns again.  Hey, may I won’t go back at all!

During my vacation this year, I had the good fortune of being able to spend a week at my grandmother’s cabin at Donner Lake.  And this year, my aunt had left a kayak for us to use.  The previous night I had tried it out and taken my sons on a short loop in the lake.  It was a lot of fun.

My Dad suggested taking a trip to the channel at the end of the lake – maybe a mile.  There’s a state park there and we could row into it.  That sounded like fun so after dinner one night, we went out.  We started out playfully, following the shoreline around to the channel, but it took longer than I expected, and night was falling.  Stubborn Determined person that I am, I decided to go all the way anyway.  So we went all the way.

By the time I started back, the sun was behind the mountains and a wind had come up.  I didn’t want to be out on the lake at night without a light – invisible to the motor boats on the lake so I had to get back.  I decided it would be faster to head straight across the width of the lake rather than follow the shore, and I began to row as fast as I could.

In the middle of the lake, the waves were significantly bigger, and for a moment, I was concerned that my foolish plan had endangered my boys.  But they were never worried because Daddy was in the boat with them.  Fortunately, we made it back to the dock in plenty of time and without any incidents.

I found myself thinking about Jesus’ disciples going for a similar boat ride with him (See Mark 8:23-27.)  A storm came up and the disciples got scared.  I think I would have also.  Jesus was sleeping, not rowing.  But I believe that the point of the story was that if Jesus is in the boat with you, you don’t have to be afraid, as my sons were unafraid to be in the boat with me.  The good news is that the one in the boat with us isn’t just a decent kayaker, he’s the one who has the power to calm the seas!

Eleanor and I were headed for a rare cup of coffee without the kids and during the five-minute drive, we encountered two different people who were angry over someone getting into the lane of traffic ahead of them.  Eleanor and I actually let a couple of people in and then found a great parking place!  Is it better to be in front or at the back?  Usually we’d say “at the front,” but I was reading my Morning and Evening devotion by Charles Spurgeon today, and he took a contrarian view.  (His writings are in the public domain now, and you can read today’s devotions for free at The Spurgeon Archive.)

July 18th’s morning reading from Morning and Evening:

“They shall go hindmost with their standards.” — Numbers 2:31

The camp of Dan brought up the rear when the armies of Israel were on the march. The Danites occupied the hindmost place, but what mattered the position, since they were as truly part of the host as were the foremost tribes; they followed the same fiery cloudy pillar, they ate of the same manna, drank of the same spiritual rock, and journeyed to the same inheritance. Come, my heart, cheer up, though last and least; it is thy privilege to be in the army, and to fare as they fare who lead the van. Some one must be hindmost in honour and esteem, some one must do menial work for Jesus, and why should not I? In a poor village, among an ignorant peasantry; or in a back street, among degraded sinners, I will work on, and “go hindmost with my standard.”

The Danites occupied a very useful place. Stragglers have to be picked up upon the march, and lost property has to be gathered from the field. Fiery spirits may dash forward over untrodden paths to learn fresh truth, and win more souls to Jesus; but some of a more conservative spirit may be well engaged in reminding the church of her ancient faith, and restoring her fainting sons. Every position has its duties, and the slowly moving children of God will find their peculiar state one in which they may be eminently a blessing to the whole host.

The rear guard is a place of danger.There are foes behind us as well as before us. Attacks may come from any quarter. We read that Amalek fell upon Israel, and slew some of the hindmost of them. The experienced Christian will find much work for his weapons in aiding those poor doubting, desponding, wavering, souls, who are hindmost in faith, knowledge, and joy. These must not be left unaided, and therefore be it the business of well-taught saints to bear their standards among the hindmost. My soul, do thou tenderly watch to help the hindmost this day.

There are some big churches who seem to be marching in to conquer the Promised Land with great resources,  filled with capable people who seem to have it all together.  But many of us smaller churches find ourselves in the tribe of Dan’s position – bringing up the rear and gathering those who have wandered away or who have been left behind in the march. We have an awful lot of people in our congregation who have been hurt by churches. Welcoming them is a really important calling, and one that smaller churches may be uniquely qualified to handle.

It may not be glamorous, but Jesus had different ideas about position and status than we do. In Matthew 19:30, he tells us that “many who are last will be first and many who are first will be last.”  I believe that helping those who have been left behind by those ahead is something Jesus celebrates.

I believe I’ve blogged about this before, but lately in Northern California, we’ve had high heat and smoke everywhere from the many fires burning in our state.  This, along with high energy costs, leads to a new urgency to…  wait for it… keep the door closed!

I don’t want to cool the neighborhood!  (Of course I took engineering thermodynamics so I know that we’re actually creating more heat in the neighborhood, but that’s beside the point.)

Are you familiar with any of these classics?

In or out!
Don’t just stand there in the doorway!
You’re letting all the cool air out?

If you know others, feel free to comment.

But even as I face the inevitability of becoming my own father, I’m thinking about what it means to become like my Heavenly Father…  Is that as inevitable?  I thought my dad was nuts with his obsession with turning off light switches, demanding that the refrigerator stay closed, and all the energy around keeping the back door closed.  But I now see the wisdom of it – or the necessity of it.

Some of what God tells us to do has seemed unnecessary to me in the past – some of it’s still confusing.  But many other things have gone from being annoying to wise and helpful.  Much as I have become like my earthly father in many ways, I now hope to become more and more like my Heavenly Father as God helps me to grow in wisdom.  That’s probably the best thing that could happen to my wife and kids too!  But I’ll still be making sure the the door stays closed. 

Lately, my son Joshua has had some trouble with drawing on the floor, walls, furniture, and windows with crayons.  We’ve always had an understanding that crayons are only to be used on paper, and he can answer the question, “Where do we used crayons?”  “On paper, Dad.”  But temptation strikes, and our little artist feels the need to decorate everything around him.

The last time this happened, I had a talk with Josh.  Since he knows that it’s wrong, why does he keep doing it?  “Dad, could you put the crayons up high where I can’t reach them?” he asked.

I wish most adults were so wise!  When you’re experiencing temptation and falling for it again and again, the best thing you can do is to either get it away from you or get yourself away from it!  Joshua has uncommon wisdom for a three-year-old.  Hopefully more of us will learn from Joshua and deal with the things that cause us to stumble by “putting the crayons up high”!

When I was a kid, my dad had to make a rule that you could never take the last ice cube from the little ice bin on our freezer drawer without opening and refilling a fresh tray of ice.  So my sister and I always left exactly one cube.  Then Dad changed the rule to “you must leave a few ice cubes.”  So we would leave three.  Poor Dad.

Anyway, in the business world it was the same deal with the water cooler.  If you didn’t want to install a new bottle of water, don’t be the one to empty the cooler!

Well someone finally solved that problem.  This new water cooler sucks water out of the air, runs it through ultraviolet light to purify it, chills it, and then serves it up!  Five gallons per day.  Who wouldda thunk it?

This is even better than Tammy Faye’s air-conditioned doghouse!

Disclaimer: I have no financial interest in the company and do not recommend that you purchase this item