Happy New Year!

Yes, I mean...today, November 29th, 2009. Today marks the first day of a new year. I didn't hear of any New Year's Eve parties. But maybe there needs to be a New Year's Eve party! For most this day passes in silence with hardly a notice. I didn't hear anyone talking about their New Year's resolution either. And likewise there were far fewer adds on television about losing all those "holiday" pounds. Yet, maybe this is why we need to have a New Year's Eve party. No, not to help us lose the pounds, but to help us think about how we will live out the first season of this new year. Most people are still recovering from calorie comatose and shopping mania so there is little energy to even think about another party. Yet today is a special day. Today is the first Sunday of Advent. For churches across the world who join in rhythm with the Christian calendar today was in fact New Year's Day. Maybe next year there can be a party. I'm not sure there is a need for fanfare or fireworks. There is just a need for awareness and intention.

Happy New Years!

It is time to begin again. It is time to reflect on what has been, be present to what is, and look forward to what we hope will be. And we have a season--called Advent--to help us do this. The culture around us (even the Christian culture) wants to skip right over the season of preparation and head right into the second season of the year--Christmas. How different the season of Christmas would be if we prepared, listened and waited well during Advent. Mothers who give birth have themselves a season of preparation, listening and waiting. Imagine if a child was conceived and birthed all in a day. I imagine most of those births would come with more shock than joy. And isn't that what often happens with Christmas? We are shocked that it is here already and stressed by the obligations and expectations that come with its arrival. We are totally unprepared and unable to be present with what awaits us. There is so much more for us than shock.

As this new year begins with the season of Advent we are invited into a life of preparation, listening and waiting. There isn't a more difficult time of the calander year to prepare for God. Life is so full of other preparations. The fullness of time gives us all the more reason to prepare for Him. How will we prepare? We are invited to carve out space to listen to what God has done, is doing and will do. In the hustle and bustle of December so many of us could use moments of silence and stillness to help us focus ourselves back on the one who holds our time. As we listen during Advent we prepare ourselves to experience those grace filled moments when God reveals His incarnated presense; the presence that comes through His Spirit at work in us for others and in others for us. Our listening is a posture of waiting. We wait to see with more clarity what God is doing in our lives and in this world. We wait with hope. For one day we will see His work come to perfection--in us and in the world. Yet without preparation, listening and waiting we'd never even notice that there is a living God who is preparing for, listening to and waiting for us.

Happy New Year everyone! May we all prepare, listen and wait this Advent Season for the living God among us.

Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving! Today I ate turkey. I know this fact is not very surprising since most American families celebrate this holiday with turkey. But for me it was (maybe) the beginning of a new trend--celebrating the holiday on its actual day. I haven't had an "American" Thanksgiving meal on Thanksgiving day since 2003.

We have chapel at Northwest Nazarene University 3 times a week--Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We had chapel yesterday for the few students that acually stayed around to attend class. Gene Schandorff, our Chaplain, set up a treat for the students and staff who showed up. We sang a few songs just like normal. But then he asked everyone to take out their cell phone. He invited us to call (or text) people we wanted to say "thank you" to. Students loved it. They loved even more that chapel was let out after 20 minutes in order that students could enjoy hot cocoa and muffins.

I met one of our students brother after chapel. The students brother is a person with down syndrome. He made eye contact with me and said hello. We chatted a little and then he put his hand up to give me a high five. Then he opened his arms wide open and invited me into a huge hug. We talked some more and he gave me another hug. Later I watched as he gave others hugs. I'm not sure what others were thinking but I felt gifted by this kid's joy and unbarring love. It made my day! And I was thankful.

There is a whole lot to be thankful for this year--a new place to live, a new way of being in ministry, and a new community. A year ago I never could have guessed that I'd be here. Thanks be to God for how He has been guiding.

Destruction of neighbor, destruction of self

Returning to the blog world...one post at a time. Here is "one".

I watched a documentary this weekend about the Dalai Lama titled, "10 questions for the Dalai Lama". Yes, I know, he isn't Christian. Yet he has some things to say that we Christians need to hear. In the documentary a journalist journeys to have an audience with the Dalai Lama. He was instructed to prepare 10 and only 10 questions. It was the 10th question and answer that promoted me to write this post. It is a questions I've been wrestling with for some time and I appreciated the Dalai Lama's answer. It wasn't a simple answer but a compelling one. It wasn't a Buddhist answer but a human one.

The journalist asks, “If you are really a non violent person you never make a stand against something evil evil, violent or vicious…. for instance the Khmer Rouge or Hitler or the events in Bosnia and Croatia……at what point do you give up non-violence and at what point do you confront something that is truly evil in the name of doing what is right?"

The Dalai Lama responds,

"Basically, the non-violent method is the best one—or the real method to solve the problem....."

"So I think as a measure for protecting oneself then…maybe...as you mentioned when someone is going to kill, going to abuse, then if the circumstances suggest there is no other way then, maybe I think…just try to hit back. But this is just protection."

"So therefore, if you look at today’s reality, everything is interdependent. Everything is interconnected. So my interest is very much linked with their interest. Their interest is actually in the long run involved with my own interest. Therefore, destruction of your neighbor, destruction of so called your enemy, is actually destruction of yourself. Our survival…our future…is very much linked with one another. So therefore, the concept of war… destroy your enemy… is old-fashioned….out of date."

I found the Dalia Lama's answer interesting in that he was both a realist and an idealist at the same time. He spoke to the human need to defend but also to the consequences entailed even when we defend ourselves against our enemy. There are times when protection of self, family and even nation are the natural and even right response. Send the troops in to stop Genocide, please! But even when we do defend--especially when our defence results in the destruction of another, their are consequences.

I'm not sure we yet understand in "the west" what it means to be so interdependent with the world. We are getting there. Surely the latest economic down turn has perked our attention to the global interconnectedness of our economy. But do we see our actions (or lack of action) towards a neighbor, towards a family member, towards a stranger as interconnected to the development (or lack there of) of the community? Do we see our actions towards others related to our own development(or lack there of) as human beings? What I do or do not do matters for me but it matters for everyone else too.

The Dalai Lama spoke of war as old-fashioned. A curious term to be used with war....old fashioned. It would be a different world if more people thought that destroying others or consuming beyond our needs (or means) was out of style.