So, last Tuesday, while waiting in line to vote at the local church where we vote, I struck up a conversation with the gentleman directly behind me.  One of the first questions that came up, as usually does in this sort of conversation, was that of occupation.  I told him that I am a pastor on staff at a local church, and that I lived nearby.  He then said that he believed that we "follow the same carpenter" with a sort of "nudge, nudge, wink, wink" in his voice.  A bit cheesy of a line, but I understood what he meant.

He then went on to tell me he was a financial advisor and that his business was to tell Christians how to manage their finances according to God's plans, etc.  This all sounded pretty fair and good.  He then began to tell me about his kids.  He had three, and two were currently attending High School.  When he told me which one, I quickly thought, "wait a minute, that school is not in our district, what is up?"  So I asked him about why his kids were not in our district (I am intentionally keeping specific names out of this blog), seeing as I knew he had to live only a block or two from my house to be voting where I voted.

Today, over lunch I went to hear Ian Mackaye speak and give a Q & A session at one of the Claremont Colleges.  Ian was formerly the frontman for the hardcore punk band Minor Threat and later in Fugazi, amongst several other musical projects.  Having grown up on punk music, and seen him perform several times, I was fascinated to go attend this Q & A and hear what he had to say.

Ian has lived in DC all of his life and runs an independent record label called Discord Records which has been going for 28 years now.  It was very interesting to hear his approach to life which is basically to shun everything that involves supporting someone elses corporate interest.  Instead, he espouses an overall DIY (do-it-yourself) approach to life.  His credo is to never play a show that is not all ages, always make shows reasonable (all shows I have attended have been 5-10 bucks), and live as simply as possible.  He doesn't believe in the political system even though his dad was once a political aid to the President and he believes strongly in local community and helping others.  His bands have often kicked people out of their shows for violence and even refunded their money.  He states that it is not worth it to create music that becomes a soundtrack for someone else's violence.

Recently, I overheard a discussion in our church office thatpiqued my interest.  The people involved were suggesting that in ourservice we will likely soon begin experimenting with texting during theservices. It should be "cutting edge" and a new level ofinteractivity. So I asked about it naturally, fascinated, and was told that weare going to begin to have people able to text their questions for the pastorto answer.

Hmmm.  It makes mewonder.  Does texting within a churchservice really promote interactivity or perhaps distraction?  Does it help or hinder the community?  It is fascinating to me how uncriticallychurches accept these kinds of things as reasonable solutions and ideas in thechurch without thinking through any potential ramifications of the use of themediums. Simply amazing, or stunning perhaps.

I recently learned about a book that some of you may already be familiar with.  It is called My Beautiful Mommy.  The website advertising this book summarizes the book this way, "Join a young girl as her Mommy goes through her plastic surgery experience, and learn how the entire family pitches in to help Mommy achieve her beautiful results."

Now here is a true sign of our times.  We now have a book to educate our children about plastic surgery once mommy has her mommy-makeover.  Because Lord knows we had better be sensitive about this sort of thing.  We wouldn't want our beauty enhancements to be mis-understood or anything.  Sheesh...

Lately, I have had a very complaining attitude about things going on in my life, at my church, etc. But today, I was reminded that I need to gain some perspective. Here is the story:

It actually begins a couple days ago. A man named Joseph called me on the phone saying that he needed some gas money. To give you some background, one of the things I do at my church is work with people who are in need, and help to meet those needs or connect them with those who can. So picking up the phone and beginning the conversation is where the often difficult task of discernment of the true need begins.

Joseph jumps into a story that in short involves long lost friendship, recent re-connection, and the discovery that his long lost friend, Christine, now has Crone’s Disease, which has not only wreaked havoc on her body, but also contributed to her husband leaving, and most of her friends abandoning her as dead.

Not long ago I was meeting with a mentor of mine, who has functioned as a spiritual director to me at various times the last few years. In my mind, our meeting was not about spiritual formation but to catch up on some other stuff going on, but all of the sudden he asked me a question, seemingly out of nowhere. He asked, "so what is God doing in your life?" An innocent and fine question to ask, but not one I had come prepared to answer. I immediately told him what I had been studying in my devotions and how it had been going.

He, being the type that he is, saw through my religiosity and complimented me upon my extraordinary accomplishments, but then asked again what God was doing, NOT what I was doing. He then politely excused himself to get some more tea while I was allowed to humbly recover for a bit. When he returned from getting tea, I began to tell him that I was not really feeling that God was doing something, but told him instead about a good friend who was in the process of moving away and how this was affecting me.

So, sometimes there are those times in life when you are under a lot of stress, things are in turmoil, your wife is in hormonal disruption, your kids are crazy, your job is changing, and you decide to go back to school and take on a second job at the same time. All of the sudden recently I have hit a wall.

This wall is one that I have hit many times before. I hit it whenever there are tons of stressful things going on. I think I can go on no longer, fight no more, and I just feel that an entire change of life is necessary. These are the times when I feel that the best thing in life to do would be to simply sell my home studio equipment, sell all my books, quit my job, quit school, and move to a land where the pace of life is slow.

And do you know why? Because everything would be better, the grass is greener there, and I would be happier. All stress would be flushed away down the toilet of life if I could only expel it here and leave it behind.

Lately I have been thinking about the role that the pastor plays. It seems that often times, we as pastors strive for the glorified, upfront position in which we are essentially the lead singer of a rock band. We seek to make a name for ourselves by fighting the battles and then coasting into our prime ministry years after making a name for ourselves by paying our dues playing in the smaller clubs and venues, before making it to the big stage.

This view of pastoral ministry has left me with quite a disgusted feeling inside. I am essentially performing to a certain level to entertain a certain crowd in order to achieve a certain level of achievement. How is this different from entertainment. A man by the name of Marshall McLuhan about thirty some years ago made a now famous statement saying “the medium is the message.” By making this statement he was essentially saying that what we communicate by what we do is making as much or more of a statement than what we are actually saying in our words. In other words, by performing to a certain level, attaining this rockstar status, we are in essence proclaiming that a pastor is a celebrity of sorts.

Welcometo my first blog here on conversantlife. How does one even begin a blog of this sort? Posting a first blog often seems to set thetone of the whole course of one's blog. To be quite honest, this makes me a bit nervous, partially because I aman extreme perfectionist, and partially because people may then see me as beinga certain way and then I may have to actually live up to those standards.

At any rate, here we go, but first my slightly apprehensive disclaimer that I hope that my blog will continually be evolving, much like my own self and thought. I hope that my participation in this site will be a learning experience, and I view it as a bit of an experiment. So here we go with some recent thoughts I have been having as I do some reading.

As pastors, and even Christians, we sometimes wonder about the motives of others. Sometimes we begin to wonder whether others simply follow Christ to escape from hell and receive a "reward." Some jokingly call this sort of mentality "fire insurance," meaning that by following, one can escape the horrible fires of hell.