Confident Deferral

FEB 6 – FEB 12 2011 — CONFIDENT DEFERRAL — ISSUE 192

Things that don't make good shovels: tablespoons, iPods, ice scrapers, empty dvd cases, old cds, TMNT action figures with arm-sling action, your left shoe, pillow cases, or bare hands.

Things that do make good shovels: shovels.

And that, ladies and gents, is where I went wrong; not having a shovel. One minute you're thinking, "I live in a townhouse, what do I need a shovel for?" Then the next you're wading through 46" of snow, digging your tires out with an ice scraper that suddenly seems as useful as a baby spoon being used to feed a blue whale, and all at once you think, "Oh, yeah. For days like this." I do hope your adventures in our winter wonderland have been better, or that you at least own a shovel, and while we're warming up inside, let's talk about Christ. In continuing through the book of John, I came across this statement by Him right after He's been taken captive by the High Priests.

JOHN 18:19-21

If you were standing on trial, your life on the line, authorities are throwing insults and accusations at you, and you know they're looking for any reason at all to put you six feet under, and you're suddenly given a chance to defend yourself, to justify, clarify, or expound on anything you've said or done, how do you respond? Do you quake in silence? Do you restate everything you've said before? Do you change what you've said, toning it down or restating it in a much more politically correct way with the hopes of diffusing their anger and giving yourself better odds of surviving? Or do you let others speak for you?

Of all the solutions, I don't know that with my life on the line I could stand back and let the masses speak for me, especially if I know not all of them like me. Plus, people have a tendency to misquote, misunderstand, misinterpret, or paraphrase while dropping out sometimes important details, and that's not the kind of testimony I'd want at that moment when it's for all the marbles. But Jesus, He never was one to take the normal approach. He decides in that volatile time to put His life in the hands of those He's been sharing it with for the last three years. He was so confident in His actions, His teachings, and how well He'd followed God's will and plan for Himself, that there was no hesitation in stepping aside and letting His life speak for Him. No new defense, no second guessing, no "clarifying."

How about you? If your life was depending on how you're living at this moment, on the people you interact with at school, at work, at church, or when you're with your family, what would they say? Would you be so confident, you could let their testimonies stand alone?

Let's be men and women like Christ. Let's be so closely tied to God's will and so much like Jesus that we too have no need to defend ourselves, instead being able to rely on those around us to relay our message loud and clear.

Brett "If I starch my socks, could I carve them into a shovel?" Hibbler

RtD wk5: Epitaphs

JAN 30 - FEB 5 2011 —  RtD wk5: EPITAPHS — ISSUE 191

Being in Sturgis all weekend, we obviously didn't hear about the upcoming weather. Since I've been home, however, it's all I keep hearing about. "Storm of the century! Storm of the millennial! Snowpocalypse continues!" So what does this Snowmageddon potentially bring us? 12-16 inches and some freezing rain. Wow. How scary. Excuse me as I quake in utter fear. As a child in northern Michigan, I used to be able to dig tunnels from the front yard to the back every winter without piling snow up, that's just how deep it was. 16"? Come on people. Wake me when you get some real winter weather.

Since people are losing their minds and awaiting certain death though, that topic fits perfectly with what I had planned to do this week for the 'C, which coincidentally, is very similar to what Ryan had us do for a spiritual challenge at the Winter Retreat. For those who weren't there, this is a great exercise to try if you've never done it.

Take a moment to reflect on the person you aspire to become. As Christians, we're always looking to improve ourselves, changing and growing to become more like Christ. But what is your ultimate goal? What do you want the final outcome to be? If you could read your own epitaph at the grave site, what would you want it to say? Take a moment to write one down.

Now take some time to reflect on who you are right now. Think about the life you're living, the wake you're leaving behind as you forge ahead each and every day. If you died tomorrow, what would your current epitaph say? Would it in any way resemble the one you're striving toward?

If the answer is no, then you know what you have to do. If the answer is yes, then perseverance is in order, or perhaps a new goal, a loftier standard, and a mightier legacy can be aimed for.

Some of the most life changing questions we can ask as we go to bed each and every night revolve around personal reflection. Will you regret how you lived today? Do you want to look back and regret not starting sooner, not changing something more radically, not fighting for what you know is true? Don't reflect on today and realize you're just wasting time away and letting the precious gift of life be squandered on meaningless actives and worries. Stand up and start living. Let your epitaph be one of legend.

1 TIMOTHY 3:16b - NIV

Brett "16" of snow is nothing; I eat bowls of cereal deeper than 16 inches" Hibbler

RtD wk4: Soul Guard

JAN 23 – JAN 29 2011 — RtD wk4: SOUL GUARD — ISSUE 190

A few days ago, I discovered  my car had been encased in a block of ice. (Either that or someone replaced my car windows with that bizarre frosted bathroom glass as an early April Fool's Joke). As I chiseled and chiseled and chiseled and chiseled and then rested, and then continued to chisel, I kept hoping there'd be some other car underneath. Perhaps an Aston Martin? Maybe an Integra? But, alas, it was just my car at the bottom. Maybe next time. But speaking of water in its various forms...

Pretend for a moment that you're swimming, then suddenly fatigue sets in. Logically you turn to head back to shore and suddenly realize how far you've drifted, not even realizing you'd let yourself get that far away. Then, inexplicably, a cramp sets in. The outcome seems dim, but right at that moment, a lifeguard spots you and comes to your aid. Would you secretly hope he would almost die so could save him in return? Would you turn him back, mid-rescue, because you didn't think you could repay him? Or would you be able to accept that he had done his job, one you're obviously grateful for and would want to show appreciation of? I mean, he's saving you, something you want desperately, so why would you tell him, "No, don't save me," unless you really didn't want to live?

At the ACR conference this past November, Chris Reed delivered a whale of a message (appropriate description given all this talk of water, right?)  regarding God's "job" as our savior. One way he described it was like this: "God refusing to save people is like a lifeguard looking at a drowning person and not doing anything about it. It's not going to happen. Saving people is what He does."

It's true. This idea that we can somehow slip too far into sin and disparity that God cannot save us, or will not save us, is basically just you putting a limit on God's power. It displays either a limited faith, or a complete disregard for what He's told us time and time again. God tells us, "I will never leave you or forsake you." (Deut. 31, Josh.1, & Hebr. 11) Christ Himself said, "Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matt 28) Paul lays it out even more in-depth:

ROMANS 8:35-42 - NIV

God never leaves us. Our Savior, Jesus, never leaves us. Nothing on this earth can separate us from them. If there is a separation, a time when we're alone in the waters of life, it is when WE have left. It's when we've swum too far from shore and become susceptible to sin cramps. The good news is, we have something better than a lifeguard on duty at all times, we have a Soul guard - an Almighty God who watches over our physical and spiritual selves all at once.

God saves, it just what He does. We can't save Him. We can't return the favor.  We have to accept that God is beyond us and this is "what He do", so enjoy it. Embrace it. Stop feeling inadequate or like you've overdrawn from your "savings" account. (Zing!) There's no tab, no bill, just grace.

So if you're feeling lost, the only question is: What's keeping you from calling out to God for help?

Brett "The next time my car's encased in ice, I'm going to carve it into an Aston Martin myself" Hibbler

RtD wk3: Pride Or Pity?

JAN 16 – JAN 22 2011 — RtD wk3: PRIDE OR PITY — ISSUE 189

Sunday I laughed in the collective faces of old age, stretching, and "rust." Why you ask? Well let me tell you since you're so interested. Saturday I went ice skating for the first time in a few years, and probably only the 9th or 10th time ever, I barely stretched before hand, and I haven't been physically active since the corn-maze in October. Despite all these things, I feel pretty good today with only a vague sense of pain in the lower part of my back. So take that health experts, sniveling younger people with your old jokes, and my 6th grade Gym teacher! If I were a country karaoke singer, I'd fire up the jukebox and sing "How do you like me now?"  And as you all try to get that song out of your head, on to the 'C.

Jesus, as we all know, had a propensity for provoking very strong reactions out of people. One thing I always find fascinating with those who know Him, (both those who knew from meeting Him and those who know Him through study of the Word) is how reactions to His grace are so varied. Though everyone will tell you of His limitless grace and compassion and will offer it freely to others as the first step towards repenting of sin, for some reason many of us don't think it applies to us, or get frustrated by the challenges He puts out there in conjunction with His grace, or just flat out abuse it.

Judas, for instance, reacted with the ultimate pity after He realized what He'd done in betraying Christ.

MATTHEW 27:4-5 - NIV

If anyone had a shot at understanding how abounding Jesus' grace was, it would have been one of the 12 who spent three years with Him. Yet Judas, seeing what was done, decided that grace couldn't cover His sin, and either punished himself, or wanted to end his own emotional turmoil depending on how you view his suicide.

The invalid at the pool accepted Christ's grace and mercy which resulted in him being healed from 38 years of affliction with open arms, yet was unchanged by it and continued in his old ways.

JOHN 5:13-15 - NIV

When he realized God's grace requires repentance, for us to live a life worthy of a higher calling, he ratted Christ out, the one who'd given Him relief from years and years of pain.

Then there's Peter, who passionately denied Christ very shortly after boldly proclaiming that he'd stay with Jesus till the death.

MARK 14:72 - NIV

Peter was broken by his actions. He realized the fullness of his error, but unlike the other two, he did not let that guilt, that shame, the lofty weight of following Christ and all that means, keep him from once more residing in God's bosom. When Jesus extended the hand of grace in John 21, Peter accepted it, along with the challenges that came with it, and went on to be a mighty man for God. He didn't let his pride keep him from salvation. He didn't let pity leave him useless for the kingdom. He didn't let selfishness leave him unchanged and nothing more than a one-sided Christian who freely takes but never gives.

Are you stubborn like Naaman the leper? Are you blind to your own sin like David after he'd committed both adultery and murder? Are you consumed by guilt and rendered unable to do anything like Judas? Are you abusing that grace like the invalid and continuing to live a life of sin? Or will you be willing to accept God's restoration, the fulfillment of Jesus' sacrifice which covers our sins, every last one of them, and follow in Peter's footsteps as God transforms you into the Christian He so deeply desires?

What is keeping you from walking hand-in-hand with God?

EPHESIANS 3:16-19 - NIV

Brett "Feeling spry enough to run with the bulls in Pamplona" Hibbler

RtD wk2: Frankenstein

JAN 9 – JAN 15 2011 — RtD wk2: FRANKENSTEIN — ISSUE 188

For anyone who was at the super-amazing, mind-blowing, reality-reshaping prayer night (can you tell it was a good time?) you can skip down a paragraph; you've already heard the following jokes. For the rest, well you can read on and hope they're good, or just skip down too. You've been warned.

There are two things I learned about driving in a mild snow storm in 15˚ weather on Friday. Number one, freshly baked pizza is a far worse companion in that weather than a car-full of talkative people. Your windows fog up nearly instantaneously, and it's with a condensation that's too thick for your ten year-old defroster to compete with. Number two, if you're going to be driving to an all-night prayer night in a mild snow storm in 15˚ weather, volunteer to bring the food. I felt an overwhelming calm as I trudged along, knowing that even if I was buried in a snow drift for a month, I had enough food in my car to last me and probably even have some chips left over to give my rescuers when they finally dug me out. This is a really good thing because as foggy as my windows were, a ditch was a very real possibility that night.

I know it's winter, but I'd like to discuss a creature that usually only pops up in October, Frankenstein. Yes, I know Frankenstein is the doctor, not the creature we always call Frankenstein, but Frankenstein's Monster just sounds... lackluster. So when I say Frankenstein, I mean the creature. Cool?

I believe we're all familiar Frankenstein, he's that random gathering of parts and organs sewn together with the world's worst stitching job (that guy could harness lightening to give life and create a retractable roof, but he couldn't sew any better than that?), which, thanks to a perfectly timed lightening bolt, is brought to life.

GENESIS 2:7 - NIV

Reality is much different than Frankenstein's. As science has discovered, adding electricity to parts does nothing more than contort and manipulate them. But that's probably because life takes more than just "parts and electricity", it needs God's breath.

Spiritually speaking, there's no denying the ugly effects of sin. It tears us apart, our lives apart, even our souls apart. It turns us into nothing more than a random scattering of useless bones, organs, and formally useful appendages. And as we continue in life we feel like some sort of Frankenstein, a monster, a collection of ugly parts which, when sewn together, make nothing more than a lifeless representation of a Christian.

We may try to fix everything, to cover it up, to hide our blemishes and skin grafts, to find electricity to give us life once more. But man's methods can never do what only God can. Nothing we come up with can remove the terrifying affects of sin and restore us to a state of true living. But God can combine those scattered fragments, regenerate them, fuse them back together, and make something old anew. He can take man's failure, and make it His triumph. He is the life giver the first time, and so why not the second, third, fifth, and 200th as well? Does His breath have limits? Did He not use dirt the first time, something (seemingly) harder than just combining already sculpted parts? Did He not send His Son to conquer death once and for all?

We are never too separated, too far gone, too beat up, too broken, or too dead for God to sew us back together and infuse life in our bones.

ROMANS 5:17 - NIV

Take the abundant provisions of grace, that electricity, and reign in life once more! Stop being a walking representation of man's attempt at creation, and become the beautiful achievement God intended.

Brett "I can forgive the bad sewing job, but Frankenstein's neck-bolts were just plain tacky" Hibbler

Raise The Dead

JAN 2 – JAN 8 2011 — RAISE THE DEAD — ISSUE 187

Not sure what was a better start to the new year, seeing a crazy Discovery Channel special called "Rise of the Jellyfish" which convincingly instilled fear in me regarding those crazy, boneless, bloodless monsters of the deep (I'll never swim again. Ever.); or the 30 seconds of an old Martial Arts film I caught on Telemundo. That's right, a poorly over-dubbed film from Japan was even more bizarrely hysterical seeing them all speak Spanish. I love this country.

At the end of this issue is an explanation and invitation regarding the Single's campaign this month. If you have an extra moment, please check it out and contact me if you're interested in joining us in anyway you can. Thanks.

John 11:1-43 (please read for a better insight than my recap)

In John 11 we read about Lazarus dying and how much Christ cared for him. In verses 21 and 32 Martha and Mary challenge Jesus, saying if He'd been there Lazarus would not have died, a thought spectators concurred with (v37). Martha is still optimistic in Jesus, believing even with her brother dead, God may still raise Him if Jesus asks. When Jesus wants the stone to be removed, fear of the stench makes others hesitate to comply. He reminds them that if they believe, they will see God's glory. When they pull back that stone, Jesus prays and commands Lazarus to come out; he does, thus rising from the dead. Jesus brought back to life a person who, to the world, was no more.

Like Lazarus' sisters, at times some question God, wondering why He wasn't there when they, or someone they cared about, fell. They know that He is more than capable of preventing it, and out of their hurt they seek for answers, letting their emotions override the truth we all know; that God never leaves us, we leave Him. (Deuteronomy 31, Josh 1)

Deep down, like Martha, they know it's not too late, that repentance and a renewed walk are still an option. But this renewal comes at a price, obstacles have to be removed and lives have to be laid bare once more. That stone has to be rolled back and the stench from the sin has to be let out. Some don't want to deal with the smell, and chose to walk away. Others can't get over what they may hear and discover. Even some believers are guilty of this, having not learned how to embody the grace God so badly wants to instill in us on others, and hinder attempts at helping those who have fallen because of doubt and a failure to forgive. But others believe and obey, they "take a chance" on God, and roll back that stone. And if the person inside is willing to listen, to obey the command, "Come out," Jesus then does the rest.

He restors to life a person the world had counted out. Someone everyone had given up on, who had been living in a tomb of sin and who could not remove that stone between them and God on their own, was given another chance. Jesus' final command is that the "grave clothes" be removed, shedding the last evidence of death and forever freeing the newly restored of the bondage their past can hold.

God on more than one occasion displays His power for us in one of the most awe-inspiring ways; raising the dead back to life. If He can do this, to bring a dead body back and give them another opportunity at life, how can we doubt He can't or won't do the same for a sinner? For us? His abilities are beyond our wildest imagination, and so if something we long for Him to do is within our realm of understanding, how can we still doubt?

Trust God. Roll back your stones. Believe in Him who there is no limitations. Come out of your tombs and live.

Brett "If Jelly fish were the source of the jelly on my bread, I'd be willing to forgive some of their creepiness" Hibbler

PREFACE, EXPLANATION, & INVITATION
As many of you are aware, the title of this week's 'C relates to the Singles Campaign this month, where our focus will be on those who are no longer a part of the Body. Join with us for prayer, fasting, reaching out, and other supplication as we extend God's unyielding grace to those we dearly miss with the hopes they'll pick their crosses back up and join the fight once more.

As a Christian, there are some realities we cannot escape. The first is that once we've been to the foot of the cross where our deeds were exposed and our lives laid bare before us for what they really are, we will forever be different people. We live with a new purpose and focus in life, and cherish the gift God gave us through His Son, forgiveness of our sins and eternal life. The second is that once you know the truth, it is impossible to completely walk away. Leaving is complicated. Your thoughts will forever remind you, in concordance with the Spirit, of His will, and it takes a lot of initial willpower to block out that truth, those gentle whispers of what is right, and to continue to stray from that narrow path.

Why would anyone leave? I'm sure we've all met someone, perhaps even ourselves, who were once passionate believers. The reasons for leaving are many and the explanations long, but take a moment to consider what it would be like if you left. How would you respond?

Would you just hope that over time you'll grow numb to that voice and any guilt you may feel regarding your current life, attempting to regain some form of "normalcy"? Or maybe you'd never shake the truth and long to return to it, to come back to God's embrace, but could you accept that you can do so with no ramifications and that it is impossible to be beyond saving? Would you fear that those you abandoned won't share that same display of grace and love? Or perhaps you'd just believe you couldn't make it to the end, that the burden of the cross is too large and that you couldn't overcome your sin and struggles, or that by continuing to sin your faith would forever be a sham, so why try. Or what if you realized you made a mistake in leaving, that you caved to an emotional or rash decision, or a deception of Satan; could you admit it? Or would your self view and what you call dignity not let you return?

These are just some of the things going through the minds of those who have fallen, and though I'd love to show through scriptures the answers to all these issues, I instead wanted to focus today on one thing: the power of God. All praise be to Him.