RENOVARÉ
JULY 2013
ENCOURAGEMENT FROM RENOVARÉ FOR LIFE WITH GOD
LET TER FROM THE DIRECTOR
OUR MISSION Renovaré USA is a nonprofit Christian organization that models, resources, and advocates fullness of Life With God experienced, by grace, through the spiritual practices of Jesus and of the historical Church. Christian in commitment, ecumenical in breadth, and international in scope, Renovaré helps people in becoming like Jesus. OUR VISION We imagine a world in which people’s lives flourish as they increasingly become like Jesus. The Renovaré Covenant succinctly communicates our hope for all those who look to him for life: In utter dependence upon Jesus Christ as my ever-living Savior, Teacher, Lord, and Friend, I will seek continual renewal through spiritual exercises, spiritual gifts, and acts of service.
EXPRESSIONS: Contents 5 : Meet the Writing Team 8 : Families & Formation: by Kai Nilsen 18 : His Master Workman: by Jon Bailey 24 : Foundations: by Chris Hall 28 : Renovaré Book Club 30 : A Different Direction: by Glandion Carney 42 : Bigfoot Hunting with Millennials: by Jeff Meyers 47 : Renovaré Institute 50 : Interview with Fil Anderson 56 : Recommended Reading 57 : Summer 2013: A Poem by Emilie Griffin 58 : Formation & Friends: by Mimi Dixon 61 : Renovaré Podcast 62 : Remembering Dallas Willard
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Often when I think of Life With God, I think of a beautiful moment in my life – a moment when all was well, when life was good, and when I felt close to God. The problem with this scenario is that Life With God isn’t just about the “feel good” moments in my life. Life With God is for every circumstance, in any scenario, in the midst of the good, the bad, the hard, the joyful, the frustrating, the confusing and everything in between.
The Renovaré Board recently met together for our quarterly board meeting. I was reminded of this Life With God as we met. Mimi Dixon’s (p. 58) luggage was lost and Kai Nilsen (p. 8) and Bradley Burck (p. 50) spent the better part of 6 hours running around the Dallas-Fort Worth airport looking for her bag. George Skramstad, in the midst of sharing about a difficult transition and daily hardships, picked up his violin and played it for the rest of us with passion and grace, his voice trembling at moments when he shared about some of his concerns and fears. Richella Parham humbly and authentically gave us a glimpse into her life as she described sending a son off to > Jon & Mimi the mission field later this fall. We knelt and laid hands on Glandion Carney (p. 30), praying for his upcoming medical procedure. We laughed through stories told by Kai about his favorite birthday gift. We celebrated the birth of Jon (p. 18)and Kori Bailey’s daughter, Abigail, “oohing” and “aahing” > Richella & Rachel at her most recent pictures. I watched as Chris Hall (p. 24) and Glandion shared some moments of encouragement, sitting by the lake. We sang together the hymns that had been sung at Dallas Willard’s memorial service just a few weeks before. As we made decisions and planned for the future, we stopped often to lay hands on one another, > Chris & Glandion express joys and concerns, lifting them up in prayer. This is Life With God. In the every moment. In the relationships we are surrounded by. In the circumstances we are living in or through – whether they are a serious illness, the birth of a child, the death of a friend, the ache for someone we love who is lost, or the determined care of friends who would help us find our lost luggage. >
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MEET THE WRITING TEAM
And this Life With God is Renovaré. We passionately work to provide resources and experiences that help people understand what it means to become more fully devoted followers of Jesus – to live the lives they are to live as if Jesus were living their lives. This is our mission, our passion, our aim. And it is also the way that we live it out together. We live the With-God life in community, together. And I am so grateful that we long to live the mission together. This edition of Expressions is all about how we live Life With God in the various circumstances we find ourselves in – work, families, illness, as students, as millennials, in friendships. In these pages you’ll find amazing articles that share what this looks like to many of the people in the Renovaré community. I hope you find in these pages the rich, beautiful Life With God. Gratefully,
JEFF MEYERS
A native of Washington state, Jeff attended the University of Washington in Seattle where he received a degree in Business Administration. After interning at University Presbyterian Church, working in finance for the Boeing Company, selling wholesale coffee, and producing a radio show, Jeff attended Princeton Theological Seminary. After graduating from seminary in 2006, Jeff came to serve in college and young adult ministry at North Avenue Presbyterian Church. In addition to being a guest speaker at various conferences and churches Jeff has authored a booklet on the 10 Commandments for Relevant 10, co-written a guide to ministry internships for the Fund for Theological Education, and is currently preparing a manuscript on the Gospel of John. He lives in Atlanta with his English Mastiff, Raven.
KAI NILSEN
Rachel Quan for the entire Renovare Board, Ministry Team, and Staff P.S. I hope you’ll join me this summer in 2 things. First, help us Exceed the Match this summer with a gift that helps us continue the ministry. And second, register for our Life With God Retreat – where we’ll be changing Performance FOR God to Experiencing Life WITH God!
Kai is the Lead Pastor at Peace Lutheran Church, a large congregation in Gahanna, Ohio. As a Renovaré Board member, he is a passionate advocate for churches working together to serve their communities and demonstrate the love of Jesus Christ. Kai also serves on the Renovaré Ministry Team and is a primary speaker at the Renovaré Essentials Conferences. In 2009, Kai completed his Doctor of Ministry degree through Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, California. Kai is the co-author of For Everything a Season: 75 Blessings for Daily Life. Kai and his wife Patty have four children and live in Gahanna, Ohio.
JON BAILEY > Renovaré Board Members: Margaret Campbell, Mimi Dixon, George Skramstad, Kai Nilsen, Jon Bailey, Chris Hall, Glandion Carney, Rachel Quan, Juanita Rasmus, & Richella Parham (not pictured: Linda Christians)
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Jon Bailey is an internet entrepreneur from McKinney, Texas. His journey with Renovaré started with reading a book by John Ortberg that quoted Dallas Willard, which led him to Richard Foster. Jon and his brother, Josh, based their business on Richard’s book, Freedom of Simplicity. Jon has already helped the ministry with advice on various technical matters. >
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MEET THE WRITING TEAM
CHRIS HALL
GLANDION CARNEY
Theologian Chris Hall is chancellor of Eastern University and dean of Palmer Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. His newest book is The Mystery of God: A Theology for Knowing the Unknowable. A past speaker for Renovaré, last September he led a discussion on Spiritual Formation for the next generation.
Glandion is an associate pastor at St. Peter’s Anglican Church in Birmingham, Alabama. He came to Christ in the inner city 40 years ago and still maintains a relationship with the person who led him to Christ. He is passionate about personal evangelism and cites the work of Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline as a key to his spiritual growth. He has spent his life trying to nurture others within the church and helping them grow in their faith through transformation principles. He and his wife Marion have 4 children and 8 grandchildren.
MIMI DIXON Mimi Dixon helped write the key paper, A Call to Spiritual Formation, in 2008-09. A woman who believes deeply in the power of prayer, she serves as senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Golden, Colorado.
BRADLEY BURCK Bradley is a fundraising and marketing expert who has a heart and passion for ministries dedicated to justice, compassion, and evangelism. His professional specialty is helping nonprofits craft strategic development and marketing plans that incorporate sound development theory. His personal specialties are loving his family and friends making sure the fundamentals of Spiritual Formation take root and are practiced in his life and in the lives of those around him. Bradley is the author of two books – Conquering Nonprofit Chaos and You Can Ask. He is also the host of Renovaré’s Simplicity podcast. Bradley holds a B.S. in communication from Liberty University and a masters in strategic communication from Seton Hall University. He and his wife, Dr. Cari Burck, have two children and make their home in Wild and Wonderful West Virginia.
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EMILIE GRIFFIN
Emilie Griffin is a poet and playwright who has written a number of books on the spiritual life, especially focusing on prayer and the power of reflection. She is a member of the Renovaré Ministry Team, active with CONVERSATIONS JOURNAL, and a founding member of the Chrysostom Society, a group for writers of Christian faith. She and her husband Bill live in Alexandria, Louisiana. They are writers, editors, and speakers who have been married for 50 years.
RICHELLA PARHAM A teacher, writer, editor, church leader, and blogger, Richella’s online home is www.ImpartingGrace.com; her physical home is Durham, North Carolina, where she lives with her husband and three sons. Richella is the author of the resource: A Spiritual Formation Primer.
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FAMILIES & FORMATION By Kai Nilsen
My wife, my daughter Siri, and I have taken on a new ritual in this season of our lives. We are obsessed with the PBS series, Downton Abbey. As the aristocrats in early 20th century struggle mightily to pass on their way of being and living in the face of the prevailing winds of change and time, their lives are tossed and turned on the seas of conflict between life as it was and life as it will be. Traditions that shaped one generation suffocate the next. Reflecting on the deep schisms dividing the generations in their family, one of the main characters said something that resonated deeply with me: “Love is like learning French; if you don’t learn it young, it’s hard to get the hang of it.” I am forever indebted to parents who helped me learn love young. But, as a pastor for 24 years, I’ve also experienced the penetrating wounds of those who did not. So when I was asked to write a reflection on family formation, I immediately went back to my family of formation. My mother recalled a speech she had given at the Augsburg Youth and Family Institute (now Vibrant Faith Ministries). It captures both my history and my current ideas about family formation, so with her permission, I reprint it for you. My hope, our hope, is that it will provide guidance to struggling families, encouragement to weary families, and hope to desperate families as we, together, strive to create an environment where we can “learn love young.”
A Speech on Family Formation by Mary Ylvisaker Nilsen. “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet,” Shakespeare noted in Romeo and Juliet. What’s in a name? That which we call a milestone, by any other name would signify growth, movement, change we all know from our milestone ministries. What’s in a name? That which we call disaster or crisis or just plain trouble, by any other name would feel just as wretched. Or would it? Is there something about naming that changes things? Is there something about moving an event from one language image system to another that changes the way we think about it? Does changing the way we think about an event in fact change the event? Even a terrible event? We all know the importance of naming and celebrating the important milestones in our lives — the birthdays and baptisms, the confirmations and marriages, the moving out and the moving in. We call them milestones because they are clear markers of growth and change, of travel along the journey we call life. But when I look back on my adult life and the life of our family together,
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many of the milestones had a very different look and feel. In fact, at the time, I would more likely have called them millstones rather than milestones. But we learned the hard way that nothing is as it appears, and that the naming of an event alters the way it is experienced.
Roll back the clock to 1965. My husband had taken a call to a very rural parish in Sunburg, Minnesota. I had fallen into a call to parent three small children, then four, then five. And one of those children, the oldest, was, in modern lingo, an off-thecharts ADHD, strongwilled child who hated church. Or, in the lingo of the day — he was a brat. That fall, when I took him to Sunday school so that I could teach the high school kids, he kicked and screamed and made life absolutely miserable for the teacher and the class. Finally, they kicked him out. He was four. And he was delighted. Every Sunday morning our home turned into a battleground as I tried to get everyone up and out so we could go to church. He was clever and sub- > JULY 2013 : 9
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versive, using one trick after another to make life miserable for me. Once we got there, he went into high gear, creating mayhem in the pew, making his brother and sister scream, sliding away from me, dashing to the front of the church, pounding on the piano.... There was no end to his creativity in terms of creating chaos. And there was no end to the advice I received on how to handle this recalcitrant, incorrigible child. But nothing worked. I realize now, his crazy behavior matched my crazy behavior. While he was frantically trying to communicate that he hated the church because the church took his dad away, I was, with equal frenzy, trying to communicate that I loved the church and wanted to do what I could to be a helpmate for my husband. That year, before Christmas, I went into hyper-drive — entertaining the church councils from both parishes in our home, the women’s groups, the Luther leagues, the choirs.... Big parties. Big effort. And by Christmas Eve day I was in Willmar at the doctor’s office. My heart wouldn’t stop racing. When that wise man, who had delivered our third child only three months earlier, heard what I had been doing, he said, “You don’t need a doctor, you need a vacation. What on earth are you doing to yourself?” I went home to a family of neglected children, a dried-out tree, stale cookies, hastily wrapped gifts, and no energy to celebrate the birth of our Savior, much less communicate to our
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kids the sacredness of the season. That year, my mother, who always knew what I needed before I did, gave me a book by Maria Von Trapp called, Around the Year with the Trapp Family. After climbing every mountain and escaping the Nazis, the Von Trapp family ended up in Vermont and created an inn for guests. Maria was appalled at the way we did the Christmas season back then — starting Christmas right after Thanksgiving. Of course, now it’s right after Halloween. But she wrote about the importance of seasons of the year, of fasting and feasting, of times of slowing down and times of acceleration. “How can you possibly celebrate Christmas if you haven’t first experienced Advent?” she asked. “How can you possibly feel the power of resurrection on Easter if you haven’t first walked the journey of Lent?” Once I was able to get a little rest and perspective, I looked at our situation. The message we were giving our children — and I suspect a lot of church families fall into this bind — was that the church was more important than they were. Not only that, but we were also telling them that being involved with church/religion/God was a lot of work and not much fun. Why would they ever want to follow in such bleak footsteps?
mark of our family life: the season of Advent and the season of Lent. Every night when the kids were small, and then most nights as they grew older, we gathered, turned off the TV and stereo and lights, lit candles, sang songs, and prayed. In our minds, the unspoken rules were these: The intent of the ritual was to communicate a deep sense of joy that God exists and God’s Spirit is involved in our daily lives. A total lack of coercion. Children, especially, should never be forced to participate or expected to put on their church behavior. Encouragement is fine. Forcing is not. A blessing ritual is never something someone HAS to do, but something someone has the privilege of doing if one so chooses. There is no right form for a ritual. Be flexible. Delight in the unplanned. Expect surprises. I knew if these family moments weren’t fun and holy at the same time, they would feel just like church to our son and would not accomplish their goal.
Something had to change.
So there was always fighting over who got to blow out the candles; there was always kicking under the table, poking and teasing; there was always a low level of mayhem. But kids sort of like mayhem — it was only me it bothered — so I learned to set that aside.
Thus began what became a hall-
From that time on, the seasons of
Advent and Lent were sacred times, and they made Christmas and Easter all the more wonderful as we gathered around a freshly set up and decorated home, ate holiday feasts, and basked in the beauty of the day. We added to those seasons Epiphany parties — special times during the dark nights of winter — when we would invite friends over to play cards or put on plays or do other fun things, just because it was Epiphany. And we intentionally celebrated baptismal birthdays and threw a party after concerts and ball games, whether they won or lost. Life was to be celebrated, and we found whatever occasion we could to do so, always with some sense that this was what God would want us to be doing. The years went on. Life got busy. Too many dates to remember, too many events to celebrate. But we tried. During Advent, most nights, some of us gathered around the Advent candles. I remember the times when our oldest son would say, “Aren’t you going to do devotions?” and then when we got organized, he wouldn’t join us. He just needed to know it was still happening, like a touchstone to remind him of those milestone moments in his life. Then came a deeply painful Christmas in 1977, our first Christmas when we were not all together. That fall had been filled with painful crashes and dead ends — two arrests, trips to juvenile court, interviews with probation >
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officers, social workers, drug counselors. Finally this boy, this child I had poured all my love and nurturing and hopes and dreams into, this teenager who had become churlish and foulmouthed, incorrigible and bleary eyed, was declared an addict and sent to drug treatment. These are the life events which only in retrospect did we name as important milestones, the kinds of occasions that Hallmark has no cards for. I wonder how different those painful days that fall might have been if we had had any tool for cradling a call from the high school principal, or a trip to juvenile court, or the days of barely muddling through in the loving care of God. But we didn’t. We whispered our prayers privately and trudged through the days. That fall our whole family went into a tailspin of self-doubt, of blaming, of anger and pain. And yet, it was Advent, so we gathered most nights and tried to cling to hope, tried to wait patiently, tried to ready our own minds for both the coming of the Christ Child and the coming home of our son and brother, a person we no longer liked or trusted. Our tears shimmered in the light of the candles that year. Our ears heard in a new way the wails of expectancy of the Hebrew people longing to be released from slavery. Our broken hearts were slowly stitched back together by the Advent songs — “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel,” “Lift Up your Heads,”
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“On Jordan’s Banks the Baptist Cries.” Then came Christmas. Without our usual joyful emotions, we went through the motions, setting up and decorating the tree, cleaning the house, and making special foods. When we plugged in the tree for the first time, there were not the usual Ooohs and Aaahs. In fact, one of the little girls burst into tears and fled to her bedroom where she sobbed, “How can we have Christmas without Per?” Later that night, when all the food had been eaten and the table cleared, the story had been read and the carols sung, the presents opened and the wrapping paper cleared away, Roy said, “We have one more present.” Then he told how Per had called that afternoon, his voice hoarse from crying, his sentences punctuated with gasps and silences. He was devastated thinking of Christmas happening without him being there. They, of course, wouldn’t let him out to do any shopping, but he wanted badly to give us all some gift, some sign of his love. So he wrote us a poem and asked his father to read it to the family during the evening ritual. Roy cleared his throat and began: “Christmas in December without a drink in hand, Is something to remember for me and all my band. They are
coming here on Monday to make my Christmas fine, But with them or without them this Christmas will be mine. For now I’ve come in touch with God and what God came to give. Now like Jesus I am born, now I start to live.” It hadn’t all been for naught — the intentional effort to create holy space in the home, to hold up Christian events and bless them, to find any excuse we could to have a party simply because Jesus came that we could have life and have it abundantly. It hadn’t kept this son from his descent into drugs, but the memories were stepping stones for his ascent out. Later in a conversation with his counselor, he told us how surprised he was that Per accepted the idea of a higher power as easily as he did and was able to embrace the spiritual components of the 12 Step program as naturally as he did. “Most preachers’ kids by the time they get to treatment have developed such anger toward the church, toward religion in general, and toward all manner of authority, that it takes years for them to embrace the spiritual again. You must have done something right in the way you raised him,” he said. “He’s an amazing kid.” He was an amazing kid, we would all realize in time. And the family would heal in time. And the rock I had carried around in my gut for years would dissolve. In time.
Years later, in 1991, for the fourth time, we celebrated the ordination of one of our children into Lutheran ministry. A reporter for the Cedar Rapids Gazette came down and interviewed each one of our pastor children, wondering why they had gone into the ministry. Was it some parental pressure? Some dysfunctional need they had to gain their father’s approval? What was it? They all told of their different journeys — the oldest, Per, came to understand the power of God and of the community of believers through his journey into addiction and treatment and recovery. For Kai, music was the key to unlocking his spiritual life, singing around the kitchen table, singing in the Concordia Choir, listening to the powerful hymnody of the tradition plus growing up on all the new music, especially the music of his Uncle John Ylvisaker, who brought a lively beat into religious music. For Solveig, it was a journey through political activism and feminist theology and being touched by brilliant women professors and thinkers at Harvard Divinity School, thinkers who pressed the boundaries of the tradition but did not leave it. And for Erika, the youngest, well, she just always liked church. That rare preacher’s kid who walks a rather straightforward journey. But, and here is the interesting thing, without any of them knowing what the others were saying, they all >
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talked to that reporter about those old Lenten and Advent rituals as being their most spiritually formative moments, the time when they discovered awe, joy, and a sense of the sacred. In their memories, we always gathered around the kitchen table, we were always all there, we always sang and prayed and had a wonderful time. Well, none of those “always” were true, but our memory conflates and shapes as it needs to, and they wanted to remember those times as always happening. When you set up the ritual of milestones to celebrate regular events, even if you miss more than a few, when you come back to it, the moment becomes like a touchstone, reminding you of what had been, filling in the gaps, creating an always out of a sometimes. In a later conversation, when we realized that all four had said the same thing, Kai said, “Is there any way we could create a tool so I, as a pastor, could help people in our congregation create those same kinds of sacred experiences that we had as kids? That we still have?” The question, like a seed falling in rich soil, took root, and two years later, fruit of our labors — the book, For Everything a Season — was off the press and out in the world, doing Spirit-work in homes and congregations all over the country.
It was not exactly a venture without
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its problems. Our kids span the theological spectrum — the non-pastor, a church consultant, being the most evangelically religious in the bunch. So deciding on what blessing rituals to put in and what to leave out became a heated email discussion. And there were those three days when we hunkered down, five adult children and their parents in a hotel room, and edited each other’s writing. And I was the only one who, exhausted, burst into tears because of criticism. But when it was over, we poured a glass of wine and sang, “Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow.” John Westerhoff in his book, Will Our Children Have Faith?, says, “We humans are made for ritual, and in turn, our rituals make us.” It is those things we do regularly day after day, year after year that, in fact, form us, deepen us, make us who we were. If those things are not intentionally sacred, that sense of the sacred, of awe, of life as nourished by living water is lost. What we all have to remember, this is a global problem, not just a problem of our country or Western culture.
Consumerism is the Default Tradition! We just returned from a trip to China and heard speakers talk about how the hyper- economy of China and the lure of Western consumerism is producing a culture where the young people, like our young people, want every gadget and convenience they
see. The leaders are finding they need to go back and reclaim some of their old Confucian roots of the sacredness of the land and the family to try to balance this all out. For without a sense of the sacred, of commitment to the larger good, our world turns into a dog-eat-dog, consume-all-you-can world. But in our culture, the consumerism and materialism of our people has become a sad cliché, and one hardly knows how to combat it. I shudder when I see the amount of stuff our grandchildren have, but their parents tell us, and I believe them, that they are deprived compared to their peers. How overwhelmingly important it thus becomes for us, as church leaders and congregational shapers, to do whatever we can to put into the hands of our adults the tools for helping them create: • traditions that are grounded in tangible symbols but wrapped in ideas of the Spirit; • traditions that deepen a sense of God’s presence rather than relying on material presents; • traditions that safely cradle the full gambit of emotions; • traditions that sanctify the ordinary; and • traditions that intentionally undergird our most difficult times with sacred ritual. We all know that faith cannot be taught. That it comes through experi-
ence, not knowledge, that it is a gift. Receiving it is dependent on seeing it. So the question is: What can be done to open eyes to see all of life as sacred? What can we do to take even, or perhaps especially, the most difficult times and intentionally invite God’s presence into the ordinary and the extraordinary moments of our lives? How can we create a safe place for important conversations, conversations that need to be cradled in the sacred? How can we create times for expressing both joy and sorrow, faith and fear? How can we create times that are both predictable and open to surprise, both ordered and tolerant of disorder? I hope I am preaching to the choir here tonight. I hope you already know the power of ritual and the power of naming. A rose by any other name will still be a rose. But a tragedy? A tragedy will always be a difficult time, but by calling it a milestone and placing it gently into the crucible of a ritual, we dignify it and claim the presence of God in the midst of it. A wayward son or a difficult marriage or an ill parent or child or a person- >
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al medical diagnosis or any of the other troubles that beset the human condition will always be troubles, but they can also be called milestones and given dignity and purpose. After all, we have been given the promise that, “All things work together for good to those who love God.” And that’s us, my friends. That’s us. I hope that you will take home and begin living and teaching and encouraging the reality that: We need rituals as milestone markers when good things happen. But we really need rituals when bad things happen. We need rituals to reflect on events when they are over. But we really need rituals to help us make sense of events as they are unfolding. We need rituals when people are gathered in joy as one. But we really need rituals when people are fragmented in anger or sorrow. We need rituals when we have something to say. And we really need rituals when we are left mute, when we have no words left. And I have no words left. So I thank you for being here, for being such a
wonderfully attentive group, and for carrying forward the ministry of milestones. Blessings, blessings.
NEW RENOVARÉ SUNDAY SCHOOL CURRICULUM FOR CHILDREN
Kai Nilsen is a Renovaré Board member and co-author of his family’s book, For Everything a Season: 75 Blessing for Daily Life. Kai and his wife Patty have four children, two in college and two at home. Kai is Lead Pastor at Peace Lutheran Church in Gahanna, Ohio, and a frequent speaker at Renovaré events. > Kai Nilsen Mary Ylvisaker Nilsen now spends her days doing a little writing, a little spiritual direction, a little teaching, a little publishing (see www.zionpublishing.org), a little travel, and a lot of basking in the goodness of life with her husband Roy.
Roy Nilsen, a retired Evangelical Lutheran Church in America pastor, finds joy these days in the study of art and leading tours at the Des Moines Art Center, doing spiritual direction, teaching with Mary at church, traveling, and working out daily at the Y.
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By Jon Bailey
This is my vision for work — standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Jesus, working, resting, and rejoicing. His delight. Training to become a master workman — His master workman. The problem lies with the barriers we have placed in our lives which keep us from this ‘yoked’ relationship with Jesus.
RESCUING WORK Many people hate their jobs or just dislike business in general. Since the Great Recession, we’ve seen this magnified. Staggering unemployment rates, corruption, and cut-throat competition in the workplace have left a bad taste in the mouths of many Americans. We have become so consumed with the negative that what we really need is to revisit the simple definition of work.
Was Jesus a good carpenter?
I’d venture to say he wasn’t good, he was brilliant. I would have loved to sit in one of his chairs or dined at one of his tables. The craftsmanship must have been remarkable.
Work is the creation of value. Work is what God did ‘In the beginning.’ It’s actually the first thing we see God doing. He is creating value and calling it good. God hasn’t stopped working either (John 5:17). He continues to create and call it good. The workplace is holy ground. It’s sacred. We work. We provide. We create value. Work is good. We shouldn’t demonize work. We should dedicate it, or, in our case, rededicate it, to the work of formation into Christlikeness.
As we know, Jesus was extraordinary, even as a boy. He held the attention and captured the imagination of many (Luke 2:46). He grew in wisdom and stature. God’s grace was with him and I believe this translated in his work (Luke 2:39).
SACRED VS. SECULAR
Spiritual Formation in work is learning from Jesus how to become a master workman for the glory of God. In our professions, we need to ask ourselves, as Dallas Willard challenges:
Another barrier to Spiritual Formation in the workplace is our chronic need to separate the sacred and secular. We think we go to church to worship and go to work to earn. We can’t see Jesus in the common, ordinary details of our daily lives.
“How would Jesus perform this job if he were I?”
“Whatever you do in word or deed do all in the name of Jesus Christ.” —Colossians 3:17
When we think about Spiritual Formation and work, Jesus stands center stage as our Master Teacher. One of my favorite Scripture verses is Proverbs 8:30. It illustrates our union with Jesus so well: “Then I was beside him, as a master workman; and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him.” Here, Wisdom is personified as a Master Workman, working alongside God as he completes his creation. The two are fused together in organic unity, like melody and lyrics beautifully blend in the song of creation. 18 : EXPRESSIONS
The Apostle Paul said,
That pretty much covers everything. Work included.
So whether we work in a cubicle, corner office, home office, or on the jobsite, this is our training ground. In Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, Eugene Peterson writes, “I’m prepared to contend that the primary location for Spiritual Formation is the workplace.” > JULY 2013 : 19
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Wow. That’s a bold statement, and here is the truth: work is worship. You can’t separate them. When we do, we’re eliminating the premier opportunity for Spiritual Formation into Christlikeness. This is a new idea for most people and a liberating one. But to be clear, Spiritual Formation does not mean ‘churchifying’ work.
‘CHURCHIFYING’ WORK You hear people talk about getting Christianity in the workplace or taking faith to work, but the problem is the only way most people can conceive to accomplish this is by leading a Bible study before work, listening to praise and worship music, or praying before lunch.
If you want to know the answer to those questions, don’t ask me, ask Jesus.
Jesus lived in the strength and power of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom is God’s rule in action. He not only lived in the Kingdom as the Messiah in Jerusalem, but also as a young carpenter in Nazareth. So must we. It was said of Brother Lawrence: “His communion with God was interwoven with his daily labor, which furnished him for the substance for it, he did his work with great ease. And very far from distracting him from his communion, his work aided him in it.” Does that excite you? It does me. For so long I could only think of Spiritual Formation in the context of church, accountability groups, or during my morning ritual of coffee and study.
Now there’s nothing wrong with Bible studies, music, or prayer, but those activities are actually ‘churchifying’ work. Why? Because this is how people associate being with Jesus. Often they can only think of interacting with Jesus in terms of church.
But to think that my whole day is flung wide open to the disciplined grace of Jesus to shape and transform me … Now that is good news!
What I am suggesting is, if we’re going to experience Spiritual Formation at work, we need new terms.
DISCIPLINES THAT WORK
THE GOAL OF SPIRITUAL FORMATION IS TO APPRENTICE OURSELVES TO
Here are a few practical means for Spiritual Formation at work: Be the Office Waiter or Waitress, Let Go of the Last Word, and Don’t Work on Sunday.
JESUS IN OUR ACTUAL WORK RESPONSIBILITIES. This is the ‘stuff’ we’re actually doing all day. And it is how we become Jesus’s master workman. It’s not that we strive to become highly credentialed, successful, or affluent — we don’t trust that stuff. We strive for our work to become good works (Matthew 5:16). So instead of telling Jesus we’ll see him after work, we ask him to join us. We consult with Jesus when we need a new sales strategy or we feel we’re not getting through to our students. I’m not saying we need to pray before every call, lesson, or email. I’m saying invite Jesus to teach you how to become more like him in what you do. What we’re looking for is the character of Jesus himself to show up in what we’re actually doing. What would it look like for Jesus to be a salesperson, software engineer, teacher, mom, Starbucks barista, etc.? How would Jesus organize his day? How would he speak to people?
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BE THE OFFICE WAITER: When I work, I consume an exorbitant amount of coffee. I love it. Probably too much. And getting that perfect cup takes time. Someone has to put the filter in, brew it, wait for it, and deliver it. Ordinarily, I would begrudgingly get up and put on a pot, thinking of the time I was wasting away from my computer. I would probably wait to see if someone else would make it so at least I was only running in to fill up my cup. Then one day, Jesus showed me this was a small way I could take up my cross and serve. So I became the office waiter for my co-workers. As much as I wanted others to share in the responsibility so I could be served every once in a while, I used this simple opportunity to give. It only takes about five minutes and my co-workers are thankful. Like most disciplines, it feels good once I actually do it. Maybe that’s why Jesus says, ‘It’s better to give than receive’ (Acts 20:35). >
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LETTING GO OF THE LAST WORD: This is a tough one. I heard Dallas Willard mention this once in a podcast and have tried to implement it in my life. Recently, I co-founded a business with my identical twin brother and we share the responsibility of decision-making. There are so many decisions to be made when you start a business from scratch. It’s great when you agree and tough when you disagree. I usually argue for something to look or feel a certain way and my brother has a different idea. That’s when this discipline comes into play. Instead of fighting to the death to get my own way, I state my case, and zip my lips. Sometimes I get my way, sometimes I don’t. The key is letting go of getting the last word. This allows me to leave it to God and learn I don’t always have to get my way. It reminds me that it’s okay to be wrong and that there’s great value in listening to the viewpoints and opinions of others.
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Jesus’s invitation to Spiritual Formation is clear. He invites us to slip into the yoke with him. What’s offered is the opportunity of a lifetime. To train with the smartest person who ever lived. To learn from Jesus how to live life — well, that is truly life indeed. This includes our work — and the doing of good work together with Jesus, for the glory of God. This is work that shines. Let’s smash all the barriers in life that get in our way and turn to training with Jesus. Together, side-by-side, daily his delight, working and creating. It’s just a part of the journey of becoming God’s master workman. > Jon Bailey
DON’T WORK ON SUNDAY: No argument here, right? Any good conversation about work should include the Sabbath. As an entrepreneur, rest can be a dirty word. Work is full-throttle when you start a business and it’s all too easy for me to slip into work-mode on Sundays. There’s always the tendency to believe the lie that it’s all on me, that I am in control and running ‘the show.’ But the truth is I have to rest. Sabbath is a gift of God to human beings. It’s a restful time away from work that actually strengthens the work we do. We rest just as God rested on Day Seven of Creation. But the Sabbath goes much deeper than rest, because at the heart of authentic rest lies trust. It’s about trusting that God is with you. He sees your work and will bless it beyond human ability. It’s a releasing of outcomes to God and trusting that he is going to take care of you.
THE INVITATION IS ON RECORD “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:28-29
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FOUNDATIONS For more than 20 years, I’ve had the privilege of spending a semester with Eastern University students between the average ages of 18 and 23 to discuss issues of Spiritual Formation. I teach a class at Eastern called “Foundations of Christian Spirituality.” The course is part of a menu of offerings Eastern students can take to fulfill their theology requirement (all students at Eastern are required to take at least one theology course).
When I first started teaching “Foundations” in 1991, approximately 25 students enrolled. We now hold “Foundations” in the university auditorium, and a normal class size consists of over 200 students. This enrollment increase indicates much more about the hunger young college students have for Christ than it does about my skills as a university professor. What’s going on? First, let me tell you a little bit about “Foundations of Christian Spirituality” itself. “Foundations” is a course on Spiritual Formation, a topic familiar to all Expressions readers and supporters of the mission of Renovaré. Required course reading includes authors and titles familiar to all of you: Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines; Devotional Classics, an anthology of wonderful excerpts collected by Richard Foster and James Bryan Smith; Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline; and John 24 : EXPRESSIONS
Ortberg’s practical and insightful The Life You’ve Always Wanted, a student favorite. The first half of the course — roughly six weeks — presents a basic theology of Spiritual Formation, with Dallas’s The Spirit of the Disciplines as the key text. Readings from Devotional Classics are also peppered into each class session. Soon the mid-term is upon us. The second half of the course springboards from our general discussion of Spiritual Formation to a close look at a number of key spiritual disciplines: meditation upon Scripture, prayer, silence and solitude, simplicity, service, and confession. Richard’s Celebration of Discipline and John’s The Life You’ve Always Wanted keep us focused, as do the continued readings from Devotional Classics. Students don’t simply study the spiritual disciplines; they practice them. For instance, they are required to journal
consistently as the semester progresses. In addition, everyone who desires can participate in a media fast for the last seven weeks of the semester (with a 5% final grade increase for participation), a discipline I thought few students would find inviting. How wrong I was. The first time I offered the fast to the class — three years ago — I was expecting perhaps two or three students to participate. To my surprise 42 students completed the fast, journaling in some detail about their experiences as the weeks passed by. High student participation has continued. Indeed, the most recent issue of the student newspaper carried the headline, “It’s that time of the year again!” — highlighting an article that discusses in some detail the voluntary media fast. To quote the article: “So what exactly does the fast entail? It’s really quite simple: during a six-week period … participating students are not allowed to listen to music, watch television, use the Internet (this includes Facebook, Google, etc.), watch films, use Twitter, text, or play video games. Basically any form of media one could think of is banned. However, because the participants are college students, there are a few exceptions to the rule: five to 10 minutes allowed for email and 10 to 15 for the phone per
By Chris Hall
day (Mom and Dad still need updates), as well as using the Internet for school purposes.” The article also quotes from past fast participants. One junior commented: “For me it opened up my eyes to how cluttered your mind can become. When I stopped listening to music, for instance, I had a much clearer mind. Because I had more time with God, too, it changed how I wanted to spend my time in the future.” Another junior said: “I really learned to time manage better. I learned that all that media was really distracting me from schoolwork. It was hard, but it showed me I could stick to a goal and follow through.” The article closed with a comment: “Students have consistently walked away from the media fast refreshed, with a greater understanding of themselves, God, and the world around them. Through resisting digital media, they learned to distinguish between what is important in life, and what seems to be important in life right now.” All of this is extremely encouraging to me — and I’m sure to you as a Renovaré supporter. In fact, I think what is happening among students at Eastern can be and is being replicated on college campuses across the United States. >
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What characterizes these young, spiritually hungry college students?
3 They are technologically savvy. They get much of their information, advice, intellectual stimulation, and emotional encouragement through digitalized media such as Facebook, various websites, texting, Twitter, and so on. Most spend hours a day on the computer and in front of various screens. This tech network is the learning space they have always known and where they feel at home. 3 They are deeply relational and are in constant contact with each other and with their broader culture — again, largely through the technology that they have grown up with. 3 They struggle with distraction. Indeed, Carlos Romani has described the present generation of college students as “the most distracted generation in human history.” This might well be why the idea of a media fast is attractive, yet extremely difficult, for so many of them; they love their media, but don’t want to be enslaved by this love. Many long to learn how the rhythms of silence and solitude can intersect more intentionally with their busy lives. 3 Many are struggling with deeply habituated attitudes and behaviors that frighten and discourage them — for some it is sexual sin, for others it is the struggle with alcohol or drugs,
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for others fear, for others the pain and sorrow that attends abuse. I used to be amazed by how many Christian college students have suffered significant emotional, physical, and sexual abuse — often in the context of their home, church, or neighborhood; I am no longer surprised. How sad.
3 Yet many students also deeply hunger for Christ and the transformation Christ offers. They are extremely encouraged to learn that it’s possible to replace old life habits with new ones, that spiritual habit patterns — at first practiced intentionally — can lead to freedom, with the final happy outcome the flowering of sane, safe, strong love — love for God and love for neighbor. Renovaré and its supporters should be encouraged that thousands of college and university students have been deeply impacted by Celebration of Discipline, The Spirit of the Disciplines, and Devotional Classics. Though Renovaré’s founders are getting a bit older, lives continue to be shaped — and love engendered — through the ministry of Richard Foster, Dallas Willard, and the > Chris Hall Renovaré team.
Conversations It couldn’t be a better time to subscribe to Conversations! With a redesigned magazine and new website with regularly updated content, blogs and more, we’re making it easier for you to remain part of the conversation.
www.conversationsjournal.com
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Rhythm of the Renovaré Book Club By Bradley Burck
The idea of the Book Club was born from an idea offered by
Renovaré friend, Brenda Quinn. It was then fully “hatched” at the last Renovaré Board meeting, as Board members Rachel Quan,
If you haven’t heard about what we have planned, this is
Jon Bailey, and Kai Nilsen met around a fire and talked about the
the perfect time to catch up on this great opportunity. Over
elements that make Renovaré unique and how we can capture
the years, we have discovered that what makes Renovaré
them and allow more people to participate. The goal for the
unique is the relationships that are built as people come
online Renovaré Book Club is to capture much of what people
together and learn and practice the with-God life that Richard
experience at our conferences and retreats — a place that will
Foster, Dallas Willard, Emilie Griffin, Richella Parham, and so
allow people to interact with each other, love one another, and
many others on our team have written on so extensively.
grow in spirit and strength as we work through the ideas behind what it means to live a with-God life.
What we’ve developed for you in the Book Club is going
to be fun, exciting, intellectually and spiritually stimulating,
You are invited to join the Renovaré Book Club. How you
and full of opportunities to build relationships with others as
do it is up to you. If you simply want to participate in the
we study, think, and pray together. Here is just a small sampling
GoodReads.com conversation, you can do so for free. If you
of activities and interactions surrounding our first book, A Testa-
want to help Renovaré continue our work of teaching Spiritual
ment of Devotion by Thomas Kelly. Your hosts for A Testament of
Formation around the world, you can give a special gift of $50
Devotion will be Kai Nilsen and Richard Foster. Over the course
or more and become a member of the Renovaré Book Club.
of six weeks, they will walk you through the book, challenging you with questions and discussion on our GoodReads.
Whatever works best for you, we encourage you to do it.
com page (note: this part of the Book Club is free and open to
We want you involved. The discussions are going to be fantastic
everyone). Book Club members will have a little extra guid-
and energetic and will challenge all participants to grow in their
ance with the study guide that’s provided. They will also have
thinking and faith in Jesus Christ.
the benefit of three recorded conversations between Kai and Richard about specific chapters and points in A Testament of
Let us know of your interest and what you think about this
Devotion that will be available over the course of our study.
idea. We would love to hear from you. Everyone on our staff,
To wrap things up, members will have the special opportunity
Ministry Team, and Board is extremely excited about this pro-
to join a webinar with Kai and Richard to ask questions and
gram, and we look forward to seeing how God uses it to touch
receive additional insight into the work and the thinking of
the lives of people looking to find the Kingdom of God here
these two leaders in the work of Spiritual Formation.
and now. To join, please go to: www.renovare.org/what-we-do/resources/book-club
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A Different Direction
Facing Reality: The Grace of Acceptance An excerpt from an upcoming book by Glandion Carney and Marjean Brooks. Used by permission of InterVarsity Press.
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My good friend, William Wilson, had gone along to minister with me. A former
Trappist monk, he was now an Anglican priest like me. William noticed how sluggish and stiff my movements were becoming. At his encouragement, I decided to go to the doctor for a physical when we got home. It seemed logical that I had picked up a virus or other illness while traveling.
My physician did his usual examination, but then asked me to do simple
movements like walk a few steps and bend at the waist. He inspected my arms, knees, and legs and tested my reflexes. He shined a light in my eyes and then said simply, “You have Parkinson’s disease.”
Stunned, I questioned him. “How do you know? How can you say ‘You have
Parkinson’s’ when you’ve done no test or blood work to determine this diagnosis?” He looked me straight in the eyes and responded, “You are not smiling like you used to and your face looks frozen in a frown. Your movements are difficult. Your joints are in pain. All of these point to Parkinson’s. You can get a second opinion from a neurologist, but he will tell you the same thing.”
WORDS ESCAPED ME. I FELT NOTHING. I WAS EMPTY. NUMB.
There was no brilliant logic to apply. There were no prayers to pray. There was
no believing or trusting in God for the future of my life in general or my ministry. All was blank, as if erased. I walked out of his office in a fog. When I got to my car, I wept like a baby, leaning on the steering wheel for support. I called my wife and
It was 2008, and I was leading a pastors conference in the city of
told her. “The doctor says I have Parkinson’s.”
Kigali, Rwanda. Men from many countries were being encouraged as I took them through steps of meditation, reflection, and communion
with God. During my trip to Africa, I had become increasingly tired,
in silence. That’s when the process of feeling nothing moved to darkness and
more so than I had ever been in the past. The work was grueling and
hopelessness. Like Job and his friends from Scripture, we sat in the ash heap of
the hours were long, but I had done this before and it had never
despair.
Marion dropped what she was doing at work and came home to sit with me
bothered me. It felt as if my thoughts were being stolen from my mind. I would begin a sentence and then, midway, I wouldn’t know
where the thought was going.
diately came to mind to soothe my dark and foreboding spirit. The words >
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At that point, I couldn’t see any applications of grace. No Bible verses imme-
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“you have Parkinson’s disease” played over and over in my mind like a record that
him into the therapy session, I ran out of the waiting room in tears. I left and did
was stuck on a track. I felt sabotaged. Tears of hurt, grief, and fear fell unceasingly.
not go back for a year. I have never confessed this to anyone before now.
I couldn’t stop them if I tried.
THIS WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE MY JOURNEY. HOW COULD I FACE IT?
tears’ written about by the desert elders and several centuries later by St. Ignatius
I had no direction or sense of destination. I didn’t even have a compass. The
of Loyola are not about finding meaning in our pain and suffering. They do not
nothingness I had felt earlier turned into a dark shadow of gray with shades of
give answers but instead call us to a deep attentiveness to the longings of our
anger. I was on a journey with no end in sight, not one I wanted anyway. Severe
heart. They continue to flow until we drop our masks and self-deception and
difficulties had suddenly been thrust upon me, and they hovered over my head
return to the source of our lives and longing. They are a sign that we have crossed
like darkening clouds in a storm. Questions tormented me: Will I die? Where was
a threshold into a profound sense of humility.”
God in the midst of this? Where was my courage?
Many saints through the centuries have referred to tears as a gift. “The ‘gift of
I couldn’t come up with any longing in my heart, except for this new diagno-
I went to see a neurologist who was also a member of our church. After he
sis to be recalled. It was easier to deceive myself with the drug of denial than to
confirmed the diagnosis, he explained that Parkinson’s is a disorder of the brain
begin the hard work of acceptance.
that leads to shaking and difficulty with walking, movement, and coordination, and it continues to get worse. Seeing the immediate tears in my eyes, he came to my side, took me by the hand, and said, “Just pray, Glandion. God will show
A Different Direction
you the way.”
The physician recommended I seek physical therapy. He reminded me that
Even after two doctors confirmed the diagnosis, it took me 12 months to
this disease would take its toll over time and to slow the process, I needed to
accept it. During that year, I concealed my difficulties. Even though my wife
change my lifestyle. Get more rest. Exercise more. Start medication. Eat well. It
studied to learn more about the disease, I refused to do so. I hid out like a fugitive.
was all so overwhelming.
I denied everything. I foolishly thought if I didn’t acknowledge the symptoms, they would just go away.
When I got up the courage, I made an appointment with the physical
therapist. I walked into the rehab hospital not knowing what to expect. I was
blown away. Hunch-backed patients, shaking violently, were straining to remain
these words in my heart: “Glandion, you don’t trust me. You say you do, but you
balanced while they walked. Most were suffering with the visible effects of Lou
don’t. You masquerade and cover up your weaknesses. You hide because you will
Gehrig’s disease, multiple sclerosis, or Parkinson’s. So many diseases and disabili-
not accept what I have allowed.”
One Sunday morning, I was shaving in preparation for church when I heard
ties were represented — you name it, they had it. I saw myself in them and I was scared.
It was Jesus speaking to my heart at the deepest level. It wasn’t a harsh
rebuke; it was a gentle voice asking me to admit my weakness and come to
When the therapist called my name, I jerked to attention. Instead of following
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the truth. >
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That morning I stood before my congregation as associate pastor and spoke
and I ate dinner at our close friends’ home, Ricky and Marjean Brooks. After dinner,
these words: “As your priest, today I need to make a confession. I have Parkinson’s
they shared a video with us, saying it reminded them of Marion and me. In the
disease. I have been covering up my weakness and I need to share it openly. I’m
video, a man was sleeping on the couch. His wife talked excitedly about a new
trying to accept it as a grace. I hope you will pray for me.”
home improvement tool as she walked up to the camera, drawing us in. She guaranteed results and encouraged all viewers to use one like she was about to dem-
Many came up afterward to speak to me. “My weakness is drug addiction.”
“My weakness is pornography.” “My weakness is controlling others.” “My weakness
onstrate. Marion was getting interested. She needed some things done around the house and had been trying to motivate me to do them.
is alcoholism.” We wept together, held by a powerful cord of acceptance and confession.
As the woman on the video spoke, she rolled up a catalog in her hands. When
she finished with her spiel, she walked over to her reclining husband, whacked his
The spiritual director side in me wanted to sit down with each of them over
backside with the catalog, and yelled, “Get yo’ BUTT up!”
a cup of coffee to validate their experiences of integrity, honesty, and true confession. You see, my conviction is that we don’t walk alone on the path of faith. We
explore it together, learning about grace, trials, and new beginnings. We may
been a standing joke with us ever since. Afterwards I felt as if I had been prompt-
have different paths on the journey, but we all end at the same destination —
ed: “Okay, Glandion, when are you going to ‘get yo’ butt up’ and work on your life?”
Marion and I laughed hard at that unexpected ending. In fact, that line has
the discovery of God’s faithfulness in whatever we face.
But how could I express this truth to them when I had not experienced
it myself?
Like the main character Much Afraid in the classic allegory, Hinds’ Feet on High
Places, by Hannah Hurnard , I glimpsed the journey with all its peaks, valleys, and shadows. Just as Much Afraid took the hands of her companions, Sorrow and Suffering, I took the first step of acceptance. Without realizing it, I had been blocking
I admitted my weakness and began to accept it. Now I had to act on it. It
was the first step to healing and freedom. There would be many others.
grace by refusing to be humbled. Now I made the choice to embrace a different way to live and a fresh power to love through God’s empowering grace. I had no idea what lay ahead. But I was ready.
A year after I initially visited that rehab hospital, I returned for physical thera-
py. This time I knew what to expect, but I was ready to do the work. Now what I noticed in the other tormented bodies was not their dysfunction, but their eyes.
Beginning the Journey
Their eyes conveyed hope, courage, and a will to overcome. The grace of acceptance allowed me to see them in a different light. Instead of running away from
In the course of Much Afraid’s journey to the High Places, she faced tremen-
these fellow sufferers, I was motivated to join them. And, I was moved to offer
dous difficulties. After each mountain was scaled or each terror was over, she
up deep prayer for them as a sign of accepting our common experience.
would put a stone in the pouch around her waist. They became trophies of grace, remembrances of all that the Shepherd had brought her through. In the end, they
Another turning point in this journey of acceptance was the night my wife
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were turned into beautiful jewels, placed in a crown for her to wear. >
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I haven’t picked up stones along my journey. Instead, God has shown me
to death. And he calls us to go into the world in exactly the same way!
many different graces that have spurred me on my way. I have carried them until I am used to their weight in my backpack. They once seemed heavy, but now
they are weightless. They are so much a part of me that I could not live without
Grace is simply God’s unmerited favor. In other words, He gives us what we don’t
them. God’s grace has been manifested to me in beautiful yet challenging ways.
deserve (grace) and doesn’t give us what we do deserve (judgment) through
He gives these kinds of graces to all of us — if we learn to recognize, accept, and
Jesus’s death on the cross. But it’s more intimate than that: Grace is God’s blessing
embrace them to live victoriously in this world.
overflowing into our lives. To experience God’s grace is to open gift upon gift
Jesus’s acceptance and obedience brought about the saving grace of God.
of comfort, companionship, and empowerment. In his grace, God saves us,
Teresa Avila, a 16th century Spanish mystic philosopher and Catholic saint,
strengthens us, and sanctifies us. He freely offers us the gift of grace, but we
described the journey through different graces in her book, The Interior Castle:
must accept it.
Let us imagine … that there are many rooms in this castle, of which some are
We celebrate grace and thank God for the liberating power that comes to us
above, some below, others at the side; in the centre, in the very midst of them all is the
through it. But it doesn’t stop there — there are other graces God longs to show
principal chamber in which God and the soul hold their most secret intercourse. Think
us. The foreword to Max Lucado’s book, Grace, reads: “We know grace as a noun
over this comparison very carefully; God grant it may enlighten you about the differ-
but Max tells us to think of it as a verb. It is an action. It’s not enough to read
ent kinds of graces He is pleased to bestow upon the soul. No one can know all about
about grace; we must experience it.”
them, much less a person so ignorant as I am. The knowledge that such things are possible will console you greatly should our Lord ever grant you any of these favours.
When he came, John 1:14 tells us Jesus was “full of grace and truth.” And if
we, as believers, have accepted him into our lives, then verse 16 tells us “from his
As I began to look differently at my circumstances, I wanted God to show me
fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” If Jesus is full of grace and truth
all the rooms in my castle. I especially wanted to see the principal chamber where
and he is in us, then we too can experience lives full of grace and truth. What a
he and I could hold the most secret intercourse.
privilege!
Jesus, Full of Grace and Truth
The way of grace is the phrase I have used to describe my journey. It is op-
tional whether we embark on this road. It can be the chosen path or a rejected course. God offers it freely and openly. He will not force it upon us.
On this journey into grace, I was led to see Jesus as one who both gave and
modeled grace in his earthly life. It started with his acceptance to come to this
world. Philippians 2:6-8 speaks of his willingness to be humbled and to empty
of Israel journeying to the Promised Land. There are dangers and giants in this for-
himself of the rights of heaven in order to take his assignment on earth. Jesus
eign country, but there are also mysteries to be revealed and provisions along the
went from heavenly riches to earthly rags; from exaltation to humiliation; from
way that only God can give. The invitation is to cross over into the land of grace.
authority to obedience; from ultimate significance to ultimate rejection; from
Will you go? >
God issues an invitation to venture to a new land. It is much like the children
comfort to hardship; from safety to danger; from glory to sacrifice; and from life
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The Grace of Acceptance
• Instead of hiding, I tried to live openly and honestly about my
condition.
This book is simply a recounting of the graces God has worked in my life.
• Even though I still had tears, I welcomed laughter.
For me, it became a three-step process of acceptance, submission, and relinquish-
• Instead of being afraid to open up to others, I relished in deep,
ment (continued in the next two chapters). It is not a new concept, but one that
honest relationships.
Each chapter will highlight a different grace. We start with the grace of acceptance, for it was the first step of many in letting go of the control I thought I had.
must be experienced before moving on. God’s coming alongside me to extend
It was revolutionary.
embrace what He gives. I come to terms with the fact that I don’t have all the
Grace enlarges the capacity of our heart. It allows us to be guided into
answers. I accept his gift of grace even when it comes alongside illness, weakness,
truth. It gives us courage to accept, a reason to celebrate, and opens our eyes to
or death. I move from a place of depression, self-pity, and denial into the grace of
glimpse wonders from God. The foundation for experiencing this unique call is
acceptance.
the knowledge that we are saved by grace, live by grace, and are filled with grace
grace, not just once, but every day, humbles me as he pours out grace upon grace. Acceptance is simply this: I receive God’s invitation or offer, and willingly
if we are in relationship with God through Jesus.
This is what I might have become had I not experienced this grace:
• An alcoholic, abusing a substance in order to find peace.
At a conference one year, I talked with Christian philosopher and author
Dallas Willard (who is also my friend) about my struggle to understand grace. He leaned his tall frame toward me, gazed at me with his deep blue eyes, and said,
• A bad husband, seeking mental and emotional health from others
“Grace, you know, doesn’t have to do with forgiveness of sins alone. Grace is for
while neglecting my wife.
all of life.”
• A disbelieving priest, all the while acting out the role of a life lived
in faith.
Another friend, Richard Foster, Christian author and founder of Renovaré, told
me: “What happens after grace? Is there anything after grace? The answer is no; there is just grace.” The greatest thing I want to experience and pass on to others
Acceptance changed everything.
is the reality and totality of God’s grace — how to apply it to any situation, and to be nurtured and empowered by it. It is greater than we could ever imagine.
• Instead of thinking about death, I began to embrace life.
• Instead of ignoring people who were handicapped, I prayed for them.
Reflection
• When I needed help, I asked for it, even from strangers.
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What about you? What is the circumstance or difficulty that is hard for you to
embrace? It may look completely different than mine, but no one gets through >
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life without a cross to bear, a thorn to embrace, or a difficulty to overcome.
I heard a unique story while traveling in Africa with a Bedouin tribe. It goes
back hundreds of years. Two Bedouin men were traveling in the desert and came across a man who had died at an oasis. One man asked, “How could he have died — he’s right at the oasis? There is shade to cover his body and plenty of water to drink.” The other man replied, “He died out of fear. What he thought was a mirage was, in fact, reality.”
Let us not miss the waters of grace, or faint beside them. They are not a
mirage, but true waters of refreshment and life. As the prophet Jeremiah stated, “Blessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream. It shall not fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit” (Jeremiah 17:7-8 NRSV).
Application
Take five minutes to sit quietly and reflect. To begin, meditate on John 1:14
and 16. “And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.”
Meditate on the phrases “Jesus, full of grace and truth”
and “grace upon grace.” Say them over and over in your mind. Think of them throughout the day when life becomes demanding. Let the words become waters of refreshment overflowing into your life. > Glandion Carney
Pray a simple prayer:
“Jesus, I thank you for your grace. May you impart your gifts to me. Help me to recognize them and to apply your grace in every situation. Grant me the grace of acceptance for what I’m struggling with today. Amen.” 40 : EXPRESSIONS
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BIGFOOT HUNTING WITH MILLENNIALS By Jeff Meyers
mil • len • ni • al - l/ /m -’l-nee
e
Adjective - People born approximately between the years of 1980 and 2000. “We are searching for Bigfoot.” That’s how one Millennial described her generation’s spiritual search: looking for something rumored to exist in the world, snapping a blurry photograph of it, only to be let down days later when someone else claims to have found it. For the Millennial, the thrill of almost catching Bigfoot on camera is only surpassed by the anxiety that someone will soon come along and take a better picture. How do Millennials respond to this anxiety? They go hunting for Bigfoot again. “Millennials” have caused a stampede of management gurus and social scientists claiming to understand what makes this generation tick. Offer flexible hours with opportunities for public service. Make sure they can express themselves. Give them constant positive reinforcement. Urban Dictionary, a site whose very tagline is “define your world,” describes Millenials saying, “They have the attention span of a gerbil and require constant stimulation.” And stimulation is what they get. Never in the history of the world have so many messages been targeted at so few people. Advertising firms of the God-Shaped Hole try to appeal to any weakness or need this generation might have. From body image issues to Millenials’ smallest desires, marketers ask: What does your deodorant, cereal, car, jeans, tattoo say about you? Marketers meet these desires with multifarious myths of fulfillment that entice Millennials to “Open Happiness” with a can of soda, to discover themselves with a
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computer purchase unleashing “Your Potential. Our Passion,” and to relax about the future, remembering “You’re in Good Hands” with the right insurance company. But, whereas in the past these messages went in one direction from advertiser to consumer, now Millennials are talking back. Invited by the ease and availability of new forms of communication, Millennials post and receive texts, tweets, blogs, photographs, and updates about everything from their deepest thoughts to last night’s dinner. They live in a world of, what the late author David Foster Wallace calls, “Total Noise” — the tornado of swirling messages that disorients and distracts anyone caught in it. It is no surprise that Attention Deficit Disorder became a common childhood diagnosis for Millennials. Why stay tuned to one channel when there are so many to watch? Millennials are caught in a situation like the man seen riding on a galloping horse. As it sprints down the road, a bystander asks, “Where are you going?” The rider responds, “I don’t know — you’ll have to ask the horse.” I have 1,500 Facebook friends — so what? I have volunteered at 18 different nonprofits this year — for what purpose? I discovered the newest and coolest band, but now everyone else is listening to them too — what now? With all of this effort, where are we going? Soren Kierkegaard once defined the specific feature of despair to be “precisely this: it is unaware of being despair.” The continual search for Bigfoot lulls Millennials into a spiritual slumber where they become oblivious to their own despair. In case we missed the significance of the recent glut of zombie movies and television shows, here it is: there are sleepwalkers among us. Millennials need a way to cut through the multitude of messages that buzz around them and set out on the spiritual search. They need to wake up. This is not a search for one option among a number of other options, but rather the ultimate search for meaning and purpose — not the search for Bigfoot, but the search for the Pearl of Great Price. As Walker Percy wrote, this search “is what anyone would undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life.” Many of us in the Church who could invite Millennials into the search often contribute to the very problem of this “everydayness.” We develop new strategies to draw Millennials in and then offer entertainment rather than enlightenment. Fearful of boring congregants, churches offer just another Bigfoot. We fret over whether our music is cool, our YouTube videos are viral-worthy, and our message is “relevant.” But >
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we should ask: If the church experience is reduced to entertainment, why wouldn’t Millennials choose instead to go to the movies, or to the ballpark, or to the bar? The problem with the Church’s message is that it is frequently packaged to be so relevant that it ends up being irrelevant. God wants me to have fun, but why do I need God to know that? Millennials are not hearing a unique and transformative message, and so they don’t so much hate religion as they just shrug their shoulders at it. The band, appropriately named Fun., has a song called “Some Nights” that spent seven months on the Billboard Hot 100. The lead singer croons, “Lord, I’m still not sure what I stand for. What do I stand for? What do I stand for?” He concludes, “Most nights I don’t know anymore.” Can we in the Church offer a better answer to this question other than “I don’t know anymore”? Just when this question tempts the Church to try and respond with a new and novel answer, it must offer the oldest answer it has ever had — namely, Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh. Here lies the heart of the Church’s message. And rather than offer a message that sits as a message beside other messages, Jesus Christ stands as the Lord over all messages. In this way, Jesus becomes the supreme guide through the noise of our culture. Rather than continuing to search for Bigfoot, we follow Jesus, who promises to direct our very act of searching.
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with them; they’ve been navigating diversity their entire lives. Given the cultural noise they swim in, the most prophetic call they can answer is the one to silence and contemplation. Here they will encounter the clear message that has been the Church’s foundation from the very beginning. The same message that has worked for millennia works for Millennials too.
Jeff Meyers is Senior Associate for Discipleship Ministries and Teaching Pastor at North Avenue Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, GA. He grew up in the Pacific Northwest and graduated with degrees from the University of Washington and Princeton Seminary. He lives in midtown Atlanta with his English Mastiff and is engaged to be married in December. He’s not telling how close he came to being a Millennial.
> Jeff Meyers
This journey comes not by trying out the latest ministry fad, but in the practices that have been present in the Church from the very beginning. The spiritual practices of prayer, contemplation, confession, the reading of Scripture, Eucharist, fellowship, and serving the poor direct our search deeper into the heart of God. This is no search for Bigfoot because this journey leads us out of anxiety and into what St. Paul calls “the peace that passes all understanding.” Millennials’ experiences have so much to offer the Church. Their searching has produced virtues that enable them to see the Church’s future with impressive clarity. They desire to set aside denominational trivialities and focus on the essentials. They demonstrate a drive to live out their faith in action and not just in pious words. They would rather start making a difference now than wait for someone else to lead the way. Millenials yearn for relationships and community in contrast to the individualism of the day. These relationships occur in a world filled with diversity, and that’s okay
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: TESTIMONY
When my wife and I were first getting to know each other, I found that spending time with her old friends and extended family was always a rich source of knowledge about the person I loved. This new knowledge made possible greater levels of intimacy between us as well. In a similar way, the Renovaré Institute has offered me the opportunity to meet many long-time friends of Jesus from around the world. Intentionally journeying with a diverse collection of our Lord’s “extended family” has allowed me to learn so much more about who Jesus is and how to become more like Him. This experience of community, together with an outstanding faculty of seasoned disciples and a proven curriculum has changed my life.
www.Renovare.org
A key strength of the Institute is the seamless way in which the various aspects of the course combine to offer a rich but realistic, soaring yet sustainable vision for daily life with God. Perhaps the best endorsement for the Institute is the fact that my family, friends, and colleagues are noticing positive changes in me and want to experience this same kind of journey themselves.
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– John Robinson (Melbourne, Australia)
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www.Renovare.org
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INTERVIEW
MEET RENOVARÉ RETREAT SPEAKER FIL ANDERSON:
Remembering Brennan Manning & Soul Care By Bradley Burck
BB:
FA:
Let’s get right into this. The foreword of your book is written by Brennan Manning. Brennan passed away recently. It’s very easy to tell from the foreword and then talking about Brennan in this book that there is a very deep relationship that is special. So, tell me how you met him and how that relationship began. I met him nearly 30 years ago. Like thousands of other folks, I went up and got him to sign a book. We spent a few minutes visiting. That was about the end of it. A few years later, I found myself in a pretty dark place. It was a stormy season. I had already had a very significant kind of crash-and-burn experience when I was in college. Now, I’d been in ministry with Young Life for about 15 years, and I was desperate for help. Having read several of his books and listened to him speak, I decided to call Brennan. I don’t even know how I got his number, but I tracked him down and called him. I said don’t bother trying to remember having met before. It’s not going to work for you. I just explained to him that I was in some trouble and needed help. I don’t know what I expected. I just asked, “Could I grab some time with you? Are you going to be in the area?” He said, “No, not really, but would you be willing to travel.” I said, “Sure, whatever it takes.” A few days later I met him in the Denver airport. We went together to Vail where he was speaking at a conference. We spent the next four days pretty much all day each day together. That was the beginning of a really wonderful friendship.
BB:
In the book you talk about how he called you out on stuff, like he read your mind or your heart.
FA:
You’ve heard the expression “It takes a crook to catch one.” Brennan was very forthright about the fact that he was a bundle of paradoxes. Well, I am
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too. I think he was able to read into me and understand. He just forced me to come to terms with the truth; most especially the truth about God, my view of God and, of course, my view of myself. Both were terribly twisted at the time.
BB:
You spoke at his funeral. What’s one thing you shared in the eulogy you gave?
FA:
I think Brennan was certainly well-known for his writing, preaching, and teaching. The thing that was most significant to me about our friendship was not his writing or his speaking, but his listening, starting with those four days we spent together. Here’s a guy who’s famous for what he has to say, yet what I remember most about him was how he sat and listened. It wasn’t the solutions he offered. It wasn’t the answers he gave. It wasn’t the advice that he kind of laid on me. It was the way he touched my life with his kindness, with his compassion. The person who listens well, loves well. That’s what stands out most in my mind. I wanted to honor him for that. I think Jesus must have been the most focused and intent on really hearing person who’s ever lived. Brennan reflected that nature and character beautifully.
BB:
That personality type, that discipline of listening, is something that we’ve gotten so far away from.
FA:
That’s an interesting thing about the eulogy I was given the opportunity to offer at Brennan’s funeral mass. The family insisted that I have this opportunity. It’s not the norm in his religious tradition. I was actually only given three minutes, kind of a bummer at first. But, as I began to sift. . . I had a lot I would have said. But, I had three minutes. It turned out to be quite a remarkable gift. You’ve got three minutes. Obviously, I don’t talk that fast. I don’t think fast. So, what I did wind up saying, as precisely as I could, were those things that were most important to say.
BB:
I was watching a documentary the other day. The guy who spoke before Lincoln at Gettysburg took two hours. Lincoln gets up and in two minutes gives the Gettysburg Address.
FA:
We were talking about listening. I think one of the qualities that was unique and particularly significant was Brennan listened not only to what I said, but he listened to what I didn’t say. He had this wisdom, >
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this ability to discern and to kind of cut in between the words and get to those things I wasn’t talking about. That was remarkable.
BB:
As our friend, Emily Freeman, would say, he looked past your mask.
FA:
Yes, he did.
BB:
Tell me. The work that you do. . . You probably have taken a lot from Brennan and put it into practice. For the benefit of our audience, tell us what it is that you do.
FA:
I hope my mom and dad are listening because they’re not sure either. That might include some other members of my family too. I was with Young Life, which is a ministry to high school and middle school students, college as well, for 25 years. I left the Young Life staff 15 years ago. Really, over the last 15 years I’ve kind of pieced together these different parts of the whole of what I do. Some of it, obviously, is writing. I’ve spent a good bit of my time one-on-one with folks, a lot of listening to what they’re saying. We call it spiritual direction, which is kind of a peculiar term because one of the first things I tell folks is that although I have that title, the Holy Spirit is really the one who directs. I’m not capable of doing that, even for myself. What I try to offer is a prayful, listening presence, an occasional question as you pointed out, using a lot of things that I did learn from Brennan. Then, the rest of my life is made up of offering retreats, speaking at conferences, consulting, trying to help various ministries, particularly soul care. Our culture is so obsessed with caring for the body. There’s a lot of attention given to caring for the mind, but what about the soul? I guess you could say the whole of my work is soul care.
BB:
I like it. Fil’s gym for the soul. Tell me how you got started?
FA:
I had a crazy early start. I actually began ministry in my home church my freshman year of college. One day I’m in the youth group and the next day I’m leading the youth group. I really am a deep-feeling, passionate person. I really care. I really do. But, there’s a driven-ness that’s been very dangerous. One of the biggest disappointments after I wrote Running on Empty was that people kept getting this idea that the point of the book was that we just need to not be so busy. That really was not the point I was trying to make. Actually, I think Jesus was very busy.
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BB:
He was managing lots of relationships. He was managing lots of speaking. He was doing all kinds of stuff.
FA:
He was very busy, but he was not driven. There was this, peculiar to our culture, rhythm to his day. He would be going at it hard, and then all of a sudden he would say, “Time to go.” His guys would be saying, “What do you mean? We’re not finished.” “No, we are finished.” I think the thing that began to stand out, when I began to notice it, was this listening that he did, not only to people around him, but also to his Abba. He said, “I don’t have any will of my own. I don’t have any personal agenda. I don’t have a set of goals. My agenda is to do my Father’s will. So, I go where I’m sent and I say what I’m given to say.” It just blows my mind to see how he would screech to a halt, duck out, and spend his time alone. I don’t think all of that time was necessarily on his knees praying. I think there was probably a lot of playing and napping and who knows. I didn’t get that for a long, long time. There were some demons that were driving the agenda for me. I think a lot of good things were happening. That’s part of the problem. Good things were happening at the expense of my soul. It took quite a toll. I wound up, as I mentioned earlier, during the third year of my college career (which lasted quite a bit longer than the norm) I wound up in just a. . . Well the cheese slipped off my cracker. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, mentally exhausted. I wound up in a psych unit. People hold their breath sometimes when I say that. They say, “Oh, my gosh, that must have been horrible!” There were things about it that were, but at the same time, I have to tell you, there were things about it that were wonderful. Not the least, for the first time in my life I had the experience of feeling no pressure to look like a person who had it all together. Obviously, I didn’t. I began to discover it’s okay to not have it all together. That lesson was quickly forgotten.
BB:
I know you spent time with some monks at an abbey. I love that. Tell me about that experience. The way you write about it, even the way you write about driving up to the abbey, there is a change in the book. All of the sudden there are these descriptions and it’s beautiful.
FA:
Thanks for the kind words. I used to want to look like a person who had it all together. I’ve become a person very willing to admit that right now I need all the help I can get. I really do. I desperately want to live this life with God that Jesus demonstrated and assured us is possible. We read stories of all of these great saints. I don’t want to get into the notion >
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got to do, get done. We had two kids at the time I was on the Young Life staff. They were both quite young. We were going to camp for a month. I knew I was going to be crazy busy when I got there. We decided to take our time traveling to camp. We had a week for just family. I had no other focus than being with them. Then we got to camp and they weren’t in the picture at all the first few days. One day I’m in a meeting. Out of the corner of my eye, I become aware of somebody pacing up and down the hallway. I look and I see that it’s our son Will. He’s just about three or four years old. I start wondering, “ What’s going on there?” It occurred to me he might be wondering,” Does Daddy know that I’m here? Does he still like me?” I’d hardly spoken to him for the last few days. I couldn’t bear the thought of that. The next time he passed that I could catch his eye, I motioned for him with my index finger to come to me. The first thing he did was look over both shoulders to see if there was somebody else there. When he realized I’m motioning to him, he started tearing down the hallway, “Him wants me! Him wants me!” Going back to Brennan’s profound voice, which really was the voice of God coming through him, the message over and over to me from him was, “God wants me. He really wants me.” I remember when Brennan and I were in Vail, we’d talk, I’d talk, for hours. He’d see me getting tired and he would say, “I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you go back to your room and just sit with these words for a while. Jesus loves you just the way you are, not as you should be. Fil, you’re never going to be the person you should be.” That started a revolution in my life that’s ongoing. It’s the truest thing about me. He loves me. That’s just who I am. His.
that I can’t experience some of that myself. I’m game. Wherever I can find help, I’m game. I began to know Brennan and read some of the other classic writings of Thomas Merten, Henry Nouwen, and many others. Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline was just an enormously transformative experience for me. I started to hear about these abbeys and these monks. These guys take prayer really seriously. I found an abbey down in Charleston, South Carolina. I went to visit. First, I was struck by how odd their life was, right down to their dress.
BB:
Pull somebody out of the 21st century and drop them in the 15th century.
FA:
It was crazy. It felt like I was on another planet. Yeah, just like going to another culture or another country. You’ve got to get beyond that and you’ve got to realize that these are people just like me. Eventually, I began to realize that these guys, like I described before, are living a life with God. That’s what they’re doing here. I haven’t been called to be a monk, but there’s a lot that I can take home with me from their life. For instance, I began to notice that seven times a day a bell rings. It doesn’t matter what they’re doing when the bell rings, they skedaddle to their place of prayer and they pray together. I was trained to begin the day with prayer. You’re done. You can check the box. You’re good for the rest of the day. What I had discovered is that I’m not good for the rest of the day. I began to explore what it would look like for me to bring some of that wisdom into my world. I’m still on that journey.
BB:
Here’s the best picture I’ve ever had of Christ, of God and his love for us. I have a four-year old. When he wakes up in the morning, the first thing he wants to do is just be with me. I had a friend a couple of years ago talk to me about prayer. He said, “Think about when your child comes and sits on your lap and is just there, and you’re in that conversation. That child asks you for something.” You don’t deny them what they want, and it’s not that you use prayer to ask God for that. It was a beautiful picture of the God who loves us unconditionally and wants us to be who he made us to be. All of those things, like a father holding his child, are what God feels about us.
FA:
You just put me in touch with something. I think there are a lot of people like I was years ago, and I can still fall into this rut today. We’ve got so much to do. So, then we wind up that we’ve got this relationship with God. That’s obviously the most important thing we’ve got to do, but it becomes a thing to do. It’s just one among many things on the list. This is really important. I’ve got to get this done. To have that notion that life with God is something I’ve
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BB:
The real Fil. The real Bradley. Well, Fil, I appreciate you taking the time on this great Saturday morning in Greensboro. I appreciate you. I do. Fil’s going to be at the Renovaré Life with God Retreat in the fall. I want to encourage everybody to come on out to that. It’s going to be a retreat. It’s not going to be a talking-head type conference. It’s going to be a spiritual time with Fil and Emily Freeman and Nathan Foster as our leaders. The relationships are going to be great. The time and space for reflection is going to be fantastic. I can’t wait, and I can’t wait > Renovaré’s Simplicity to see you again, Fil. Thanks!
Podcast host Bradley Burck with guest Fil Anderson
You can listen to this interview on iTunes or on the Renovaré Blog: http://blog.renovare.org/simplicity JULY 2013 : 55
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RECOMMENDED READING
Get Trevor Hudson’s new book at: www.Renovare.org 56 : EXPRESSIONS
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FORMATION & FRIENDSHIP with Jesus at a camp for younger children. The feedback we receive shapes us for life.
By Mimi Dixon
I used to think that I was the expert on myself — that no one knew me like I know me. But now I know that Jesus enables some of his friends to see me more clearly than I see myself. How would you describe yourself? How does that line up with the words that the people closest to you use to describe you? How do you reconcile the difference between the two? The answer to these questions has a lot to do with our ability to be the persons we were born to be. Some years ago, an experiment was conducted, without the teacher’s knowledge, on a classroom of first grade students (this was long before experiments of this sort were forbidden). The teacher was told that the purpose of the exercise was to identify her most gifted students. With the teacher’s permission, the researcher observed the classroom for several days. Before he left, the “educational expert” presented the teacher with a list of students who showed the greatest academic potential. (The researcher deliberately bypassed the students whom he recognized to be most promising.) When she received the list of names, the teacher was surprised. These were
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the students who, in her estimation, demonstrated the least potential. But, as an “expert” had spoken, she accepted his assessment. Over the next weeks, the teacher directed extra attention and encouragement to the students on the list and less to the students who were not named. Six months later, the researcher returned for a follow-up. Observing the class, the researcher found that the students he identified six months earlier as possessing great potential showed remarkable improvement, while the students who had not been on the list demonstrated a significant decrease in performance. When he published his findings, the researcher presented the experiment as proof of “The Pygmalion Effect:” the way we treat other people effectively shapes their potential. It is easy to recognize the Pygmalion Effect in our own lives, isn’t it? We have been shaped by the way other people view us. Your coach takes a special interest in you and spends extra time helping you develop your potential as an athlete. A teacher commends your ability to write poetry and encourages you to pursue writing. A youth pastor invites you to share your relationship
This understanding stands at the core of our having been created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26). God is a community of persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father is not complete apart from the Son and Spirit; the Son is not complete apart from the Father and Spirit; the Spirit is not complete apart from the Father and Son. Believing that their unique fellowship was too rich to keep to themselves, the Father, Son, and Spirit formed humanity in their image to share in the perichoretic life. What this means is that I cannot be myself or even know myself apart from God and other Christians in the family of faith. A helpful picture of the way this works is the Johari Window. Created in 1955 by Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham, the window demonstrates how it is not possible to know ourselves apart from the input of others. Utilizing a square diagram comprised of four sections, the window represents:
1. The part of ourselves that we see and others see 2. The part of us that others see but we are not aware of 3. The part of us that is hidden to us and to others 4. The part of ourselves that we see but keep hidden from others. According to Luft and Ingham, selfawareness grows as we are open both to receiving the observations of others and revealing more of our hidden selves. Now imagine how this works when guided by the Holy Spirit in the context of authentic Christian community! God places us among friends who, when they look at us, see us with the eyes of Jesus. They see our true selves. This is the person they address when they speak to us. They call us out, inviting us to be present. When we behave badly, our friends are confused and ask: “Why did you say that? That is not who you are!” Indeed, the Spirit equips our friends to see us more clearly than we see ourselves. If we are open to receive what they have to offer, we’ll grow in >
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WHAT IS A PODCAST? our ability to be the people we were born to be. This takes courage. It takes courage because most of us see ourselves from backstage. We see all the junky “stuff.” And we are quite certain that if anyone knew us the way that we know ourselves, we wouldn’t have a friend in the world! But the opposite is actually the case. The Holy Spirit equips our friends to see us accurately — the way we were created to be. They look past the duct tape and baling wire to view us the way we were before life happened to us. Enabled by the Holy Spirit, our friends introduce us to ourselves! This is why spiritual friendship is absolutely indispensable in Spiritual Formation. We cannot become our true selves without it. Without spiritual friends who see me clearly, I’ll never know what I am capable of becoming. Without friends who see me clearly, I’ll spend my life trying to be someone different, someone more presentable and worthy. Without spiritual friends who see me clearly and share what they see, I’ll never find my place in the Body of Christ; I won’t recognize my place or fulfill my function. I have a suspicion that our persistent lack of personal self-awareness is deliberate. I’m thinking that God created
us this way on purpose! We feel a lack, there is a hole in our souls, we look in the mirror and don’t see clearly; we are blind. Desperate, we seek healing, and God draws us into the fellowship of his friends who act on God’s behalf to facilitate our spiritual restoration. In truth, we can no more do without spiritual friends than any member of the Godhead can do without the others. We are whole only together, where we join the Trinity in > Mimi Dixon the dance of life.
pod • cast /’päd,kast/ Noun - A multimedia digital file made available on the Internet for downloading to a portable media player, computer, etc.
Renovaré has launched two new audio podcasts that you should listen to and share with your friends and others you know who are interested in the topic of Spiritual Formation. Denver Conversations takes place in the Renovaré office each month. We bring in a special speaker to talk about topics that relate to Spiritual Formation. Now you can be part of these conversations too!
The new Simplicity podcast challenges listeners to find new ways to live simply and to create space and opportunity to draw closer to God. Each episode is hosted by Bradley Burck and features Renovaré Ministry Team members and special guests who are actively writing, thinking, and speaking about Spiritual Formation and the ideas of simplicity and spirituality. There are many ways to listen: You can listen on your computer, tablet or phone by simply visiting: www.Renovare.org. You can also go to iTunes or any other podcasting service and simply search for Renovaré.
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RENOVARÉ
By Richella Parham
Wednesday, May 8, 2013, was not a normal day. Dallas A. Willard, the most brilliant yet most humble man I’ve ever known, died that day. You’ve probably heard of Dallas. If you’ve spent any time around me, you’ve heard about him. You’ve heard his words quoted. Perhaps you know him as the author of The Divine Conspiracy, The Spirit of the Disciplines, Hearing God, or Renovation of the Heart. If you’ve been around me for long, I’ve probably given you a copy of one of his books. One thing’s for sure: if you know anything about Dallas, you know that he didn’t just live his life for God. He lived his life with God.
And he’s still living it.
Dallas has no more need of his human body. It was the battery–pack that powered his spirit. He liked to say that we are all “unceasing spiritual beings
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in God’s great universe.” And though his body has ceased to function, Dallas surely lives. Lots of people have said, “He’s with Jesus now.” And that’s true; he’s with the Lord face-to-face now. But Dallas has been with Jesus for a long time now. He understood that Jesus made available to all of us the opportunity to live in the Kingdom of God – right here, right now, right on this earth. Dallas understood like few others that “those who live in reliance upon the word and person of Jesus, and know by experience the reality of his kingdom, are always better off ‘dead,’ from the personal point of view. Paul’s language is, ‘to die is gain’ (Philippians 1:21). And again: ‘To depart and be with Christ is very much better’ than to remain here (v. 23). We remain
willing, of course, to stay at our position here to serve others at God’s appointment. But we live in the knowledge that, as Paul elsewhere said, ‘Jesus the Anointed has abolished death and has, through the gospel, made life and immortality obvious’ (2 Timothy 1:10)” (The Divine Conspiracy, p. 394). As I was thinking today about Dallas’s life and work, I was embarrassed for a moment that I blog about such little things as homemaking and cooking and decorating. I found myself wishing that I devoted all my space at my blog, Imparting Grace, to weightier matters.
in the Kingdom of God, consecrated to God, and for the glory of God. I seek to live my life as Jesus would live it if He were I. Not the life of someone else, but my life. A life deeply enriched by knowing Dallas Willard – and the God he serves. The One who reminds me: “Whatever you do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him” (Colossians 3:17).
But then I heard Dallas’s gentle voice, reminding me that Jesus offers me the opportunity to live in the Kingdom of God. I alone have the opportunity to bring my own little kingdom (or queendom, if you like) – the range of my effective will – under the authority of God’s Kingdom. And that changes things. So I devote myself to writing and speaking and deeply spiritual matters – but I also make a home for my family. I cook. I decorate. I do a thousand things that often seem to be inconsequential, but they all go together to make my life – a life lived
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RENOVARÉ
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