Someday you'll have an Anniversary

 Today is my wife and my 14^th anniversary.  I can’t believe it has been 14 years.  As I was on my way to school today I was talking to the Lord about how grateful I am for my wife and our marriage.  I thought of all the things I love about my life.  Next to being loved by my Savior, I am sooo thankful for my wife.  This is why I like to talk about relationships a lot in class, in my writing, my blog, in chapel, etc.  A good marriage is so crucial to life.  You can gain the whole world (i.e. have a great job, make lots of money, live in a nice house, be involved in church, make an impact on the world, touch the people around you, go on vacations, you name it), but if you have a bad marriage those other things seem so insignificant. 

Now, I have known people who have difficult marriages, but have been able to do meaningful things with their lives.  But, that being said, they would all say that healing that relationship with their spouse would change everything for the better.

So what does this have to do with you?  I know marriage seems far off, but building the relationship and personality skills that lead to a good one start now.  Be encouraged that you don’t have to end up in the unhappy relationships that so many TV shows and movies show us. 

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Apostrophe

A little Christmas present for those of you who enjoy my weird videos.

Screwed Up Again

Just the other day I did something stupid.  I handled a situation in a way I thought would be good, but I just made the situation worse.  That screw up nagged my mind for nearly two days.  It’s so frustrating when we find ourselves in these situations isn’t it?  It’s like suddenly we realize just how “not together” we really are.

This, I think, is an important mentality to embrace as we try to figure out how to live a life differently because we love our Father.  We need to realize that we are easily swayed, easily led to poor decisions.  I’m not saying we should just throw up our hands and say, wo is me, a sinner…I might as well keep on sinning.  No, it’s about an attitude of humility. 

It’s a tough attitude to have at any age.  The challenge as a teen is that you’re at a stage in life where your independence is growing.  You are on the move toward individual adulthood (it’s not as far away as it seems!).  So, there is a tendency to fight for others to take you seriously.  You want people to know you’ve grown up and they can trust you.  It’s really hard when people still treat you like a kid. 

Those are all valid feelings, but let’s move toward not losing sight of reality, a reality that all people regardless of age need to see: we fall easily.  For me, it leads me this way: when that situation happened that I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I was angry.  Angry at the circumstances, but mostly angry at myself.  I took my anger to my Father.  I did some internal yelling (and some out loud ones in my car! J).  All in all, though, I was led back to the gracious arms of my Heavenly Dad. 

I had to go do some apologizing to someone, but I also learned not to beat myself up.  But, also, it reminded me how much I need the Holy Spirit.  As we address some issues in our lives, like the issues of sexuality, we need this humility.  It’s not easy.  We all have areas that we’re going to fail in. 

The encouragement, though, is that our Father, our Friend, walks with us.  Jesus said He doesn’t call us slaves, but friends. 

I Knew It Not

I have a quote calendar on my desk and I read one every morning.  A recent quote really struck me.  It's by an author who wrote a lot in the 50s and 60s named A.W. Tozer.

"Jacob saw a vision of God and cried in wonder, 'Surely the Lord is in this place; and I knew it not.'  Jacob had never been for one small division of a moment outside the circle of that all-pervading Presence.  Be he knew it not.  That was his trouble, and it is ours.  Men do not know that God is here.  What a difference it would make if they knew."
 

Wow. It's a cool challenge to try to remember that God is with me all the time, not in a generic sense, but in a real, personal way. Consider that throughout your whole day God is with you, listening to you, talking to you, guiding you when you eat breakfast, when you interact with your family, in your classes, at lunch, when you're walking with your friends between classes. Amazing stuff.

The Three Letter Word-Part 6

When I was younger I had this complex about doing things exactly right all the time.  I suppose I got this from several places.  For one I used to get a little extra money by cutting lawns.  However, I had several customers who would watch me while I cut it.  It was so weird!  They seemed to be making sure I did everything just right.

 

I also came from a German family.  I felt a lot of pressure to do things correctly or face disappointment.  I remember how long it would take me to rake leaves because I thought I had to pick up every single leaf.  I didn’t know if I had to do it that specifically, but I always operated on the principle of “If you overdo it, then you can’t be criticized.” 

As a young person, trying to figure out the world, it’s tough when things aren’t explained well.  We don’t know what’s expected of us.  Sometimes we don’t even know what is okay to think about!  This is all the more true in sexuality, especially as a follower of Christ.  People just don’t want to talk about it, and if they do the main idea is: It’s bad.  

On the other hand, you may have grown up in an environment where there is nothing said about, or, even where it is in your face, because of the behaviors of some family members. 

All in all, I want to suggest that if you’re a person who wants to have a life that is different because of your Savior, then we need to talk specifics.  There is much greater freedom in discussion and reflection than there is in silence.  1 John encourages us to “walk in the light, as He is in the light.”  The light is honesty. 

One thing too often missing from dialogue among Christians is the specifics of managing sexuality.  Looking back on my teen years, I wish someone would have just talked openly about specifics and accompanied it with grace and freedom instead of hard and fast rules.  Unfortunately, I’m going to not be as specific as I’d like, not because I think it’s bad, but I don’t feel a blog is the place for it.  But I do want to open the door by mentioning the issues at hand.

Below are the main areas I mentioned in a previous post.  After each are some examples of specific issues that need some management.

Your personal sexual feelings and thoughts

1. Areas to manage: thinking about sex, fantasizing, masturbation, watching movies, shows, or online videos with sexual jokes, scenes, or clothing, surfing sexually-themed stuff online, drawing sexy characters, so-called sexting, music or video games with sexual overtones (or blatant ones).

Your sexual feelings about other people

2. Areas to manage: thinking about others, what to do with attractions, obsession, the sense that ‘I can’t get him/her off of my mind,’ reading into the way someone acts towards us.

Your interaction with the opposite sex (whether acquaintances, friends, or a boy/girlfriend)

3. Areas to manage: interacting with people you’re attracted to, flirting, the things you ‘talk’ about online, images of yourself that you post on facebook, hugging or touching the opposite sex, what you wear, what it means to ‘look’ good, how far is too far physically when you’re dating.

I hope to address some of the above in more specifics in some future posts.  However, I hope there’s some freedom in just hearing some of these things mentioned.  It’s easy to think you’re a weirdo.  No, sexuality is a huge part of who God made all of us and, like other things in life, it brings up all sorts of questions for everyone. Also, the above list is not a list of all bad things.  The key is, if you love God, your life will be affected by it.  We are Christ-followers so we don’t say, like so many others: who cares?  We say God cares.  He is raising me up to be a life fully lived.  He loves me and He loves my sexuality.  Let’s not assume “it’s all bad,” nor should we assume, “it’s all good.”  Instead, as always, I encourage you to “find out what pleases the Lord.” 

The Three-letter Word-Part 5

So you want to find out what pleases the Lord.  How do you do it?  The following applies to lots of things, but I’m going to focus it on managing your sexuality.
1. Ground zero: ask God.  James wrote “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives graciously.”  How will he give that wisdom?  Probably in lots of ways, including the rest of this list. 

2. Check out Scripture.  No, the Bible does not have the answer to all things.  Its primary purpose is for God to say “Hey, here’s what I’m like.”  With that, it’s a history of how he interacts with us and, specifically, how he wants to build a Kingdom on earth and how he enacted his rescue plan with Christ dying and coming back to life.  That’s a grossly small summary, but the point is: you won’t find a section on “How to manage my sexuality.”  But there are things you can catch here and there that will help.

3. Get advice from others.  This is probably one of the hardest things on the list and, yet, it is one of the most important. 

I know you’re going to hate this, but your parents are probably a great place to start (This will work for some and not others.  I get that).  Remember that, while they look old and sexless to you, you were not born through spontaneous combustion.  Your parents, as weird as it may feel to think about it, are two people that found the other hot and found a personality that they thought was pretty awesome.  Hopefully, they still feel these things (I definitely do about my wife!).  The point is they have had (and still do have) a sexuality that they have had to manage throughout their life.  It would be worth chit chatting about.

Who else?  Think about it.  Outside of your parents, whose life do you respect?  Is it a relative, a pastor, a youth leader, a teacher, an upperclassman, a friend?  You may think to yourself, “I’m just going to be bothering them.”  Imagine someone asking you for advice.  You’d feel totally honored!  Go ahead and ask someone.  Of course, you’re dealing with a sensitive and awkward topic, so you’ll have to gauge who you feel comfortable with.  But, regardless, you can start up a conversation by asking them any advice they would give about dating (or something to that effect).  If comfort grows in that conversation or subsequent ones, then you can take it a little more specifically.

4. Observe yourself.  People, Christians included, love to give cookie-cutter ways to manage sexuality, but you’re a different cookie!  That was a terrible analogy.  Sorry.  Anyway, the point is you have to create a strategy that works for you and to do this you have to know YOU. 

So, what turns you on?  What do you find attractive when it comes to personalities, words, clothes, parts of the body, settings, scents, etc.?  You might even ask, well what does it mean to be turned on?  There will be and, for many, already are things that we have a hard time keeping our eyes off of, or our thoughts away from in relation to the opposite sex.  You are being ‘draw to’ those things.  That is the idea of ‘attraction.’  

Attraction is not bad.  It just “is.”  When you know what you’re attracted to it will help you know things you like, but also to know what you need to be careful about.  You may know a guy, for example, that you are attracted to, but you also may know that he’s not a good guy.  It’s okay that you’re attracted to him, but you have to recognize that it will be all too easy to fall for him, even though you know better.  Those are situations to be aware of, but that’s the benefit of knowing yourself: you can see those challenges in ways that other less self-aware people cannot.

There’s so much more to say, but I’ve gone on too long!  We’ll pick up the conversation another time. 

Heartbreak Hill

This is a little intermission from the "Three-Letter Word" series.  I will return to it soon.

I don't know about you, but I was really moved by Coach Januzzi's chapel today.  Wow.  I began to think, how do we respond to a message like that?  What does God want to do in your life because of what you heard? 

I'd say we could start by considering: what 'heartbreak hills' are you facing right now?  Do you have some cruddy relationship issues going on?  With a friend, a family member, a boyfriend or girlfriend?  Do you have an absense in your life that is really difficult?  Maybe you lost a relationship or there's one you wish you could have, but never seems to happen.  Are you struggling with feeling good enough, smart enough, talented enough to make someone happy with you?  Have you faced some injury or setbacks in your life recently?  Maybe you can't even name your 'hill', but you just feel like something is not right in your soul.

Whatever it is, thank God for it.  I don't mean "like it."  This kind of Thank You is one done in faith.  In essence, you're saying, "God, I don't know why this is happening to me, but thank You for what you CAN do through this to make me more of who You long for me to be."  Let us never think that every 'heartbreak hill' is from God on purpose.  But we can believe that He will USE all those hills for good.  Like Paul said to his friends in Rome "all things work together for good, to them that love God and are called according to his purpose."

Keep a heart of honesty with God about your struggles, just like Coach Januzzi did.  And with a humble heart begin to say, "God make me new and change me as You carry me through this.  I hate this situation, but help me see how I can learn, even from this."

The Three-Letter Word-Part 4

Before specifics, let’s get perspective

As Christians we are quick to hand out rules.  It’s done with a good heart because we want to protect people and honor God with our life choices.  But we can easily become like the Pharisees who respected Old Testament laws, but, because they didn’t trust people to personally work out their life with God themselves, proceeded to create more rules.  This is something Jesus and other New Testament writers often criticized.  Instead, Paul writes in Ephesians 5:10 “Find out what pleases the Lord."

This requires you, yes YOU to come to a point of decision and say “I really DO want to please the Lord,” not just because you were raised that way (though that’s good), but because it’s time, as a growing person to say: this is MY relationship with God and I want to take it seriously.  Of course, it’s not about your sheer willpower.  You need to invite the Holy Spirit to help you, strengthen you, and guide you.  Yet, it’s good to say: my parents have carried the cross long enough for me.  Now I want to take up my cross and follow the One I love. 

At this point, now, you can engage the Lord about what pleases him, particularly in your sexuality.  This is going to be an ongoing process.  It will change as you change, but keep going.  Your goal is to learn how to build your fireplace.  Your fireplace may look different from others.  There was a time in my life when I needed to stop listening to non-Christian music.  It had too much of a hold on me.  So I ditched all my AC/DC stuff.  I thought everyone ought to do the same, but eventually I realized that this was God’s call for an area of weakness for me.  It wasn’t necessarily an area of weakness for others.  Also, I do listen to a good amount of music that isn’t necessarily Christian now.  It was God’s work for a time for me to have those parameters.  So stay in the game and keep walking with God.

So, how do I figure this out?  See you next time.

The Three Letter Word-Part 3

When I was in college, my parents let me bring my friend Mike on a ski trip we took to Colorado.  One night we all went to this restaurant at the top of a mountain.  It was really cool because you had to take a gondola to get there.  The restaurant was set up like an old time lodge with wood beams and a fire place.  But this wasn’t just any fireplace; it was enormous.  It had to be 12 feet tall and 6 feet wide.  The fire was awesome and frightening at the same time.  That’s a lot like our sexual desires.

Fire, like sexuality, is awesome, but can also be consuming.  I’m so glad we have fire!  But if it’s not managed it can destroy things like the wildfires in Colorado this past summer.  When it’s in your house you need to have a fire place.  When it comes to sexuality you need to manage it well.  There are three areas that need management: 1. Your personal sexual feelings and thoughts, 2. Your sexual feelings about other people, and 3. Your interaction with the opposite sex (whether acquaintances, friends, or a boy/girlfriend).  I’ll try to hit some of these in upcoming posts. 

The Three Letter Word-Part 2

Last time I wrote about a God-given process whereby we desire to grow in independence in our teen years, and that we need to manage it.  It’s not bad.  It just needs management.  The same is true of your sexual nature. 

                When Paul wrote to the Thessalonians he expressed his hope that “your whole body, soul, and spirit will be kept blameless until the coming of Jesus Christ.”  He’s not wagging his finger here.  Instead, he’s acknowledging God’s process of developing us throughout life (sanctification) isn’t just a spirit thing.  God’s glorious work in you involves your spirit, your soul (who you are), and your body.  It is not an accident that you have sexual drives.  God made you a sexual being.  It’s not even that you have a sexual part of you.  It is interwoven into your whole person.  You can’t separate your masculinity or femininity and still be you.  But, like all things good, it needs management. 

                Now some people don’t care and operate under the “if it feels good do it” concept.  These people can’t be helped.  If you want to jump off a cliff because it’s a great thrill, go ahead and enjoy the ride, but don’t expect the rest of us to clean up your mess.

                For the rest of us, we want to love God and others and it’s sometimes hard to figure out how our sexuality fits into this.  First, I want to dispel a myth: your sexual desires are not at war with you or your faith any more than your hunger for ice cream is at war with you.  They just need management.  Start out by giving thanks.  Thank God that he made other people really good-looking!  Thank him that he’s made an insatiable desire in you to eventually marry someone and know them on the most intimate levels emotionally, physically, and spiritually.  Even thank him for the desire to touch and be touched. 

                So, we need to start on this playing field, embracing what your creative and loving God has given you.  Paul said to Timothy, “Everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.”  In fact, in his critique against cults, he complains that “they forbid people to marry.”  Look through cults in history and you will often find those groups manipulating or forbidding one-on-one committed, married sexuality.  And finally, here’s the big kahuna: our Father explains Christ’s love for us by comparing it to a bride and a groom.  A bride and a groom at their wedding are excited to spend life together…and to get to the wedding night!  This has nothing to do with Christ having a sexual desire for us.  But God is saying, that intensity of desire that a groom has for his bride is a great picture of just how incredibly Jesus longs to be close to you.  Check out Ephesians 5. 

                This head and heart stuff is a crucial beginning.  Now what about the day to day?

The Three Letter Word - Part 1

“Welcome to the jungle, baby.  You gonna die!”  Anybody know that line from Guns ‘n Roses?  I was into them hard core when I was in 8^th grade.  I think that was the time in my life when I started to really be annoyed with my parents.  I didn’t like them telling me what to do and the whole bit.  So, one way I tried to bother them was to go into my room and crank up Guns ‘n Roses.   Not just any song by them, but especially the ones where Axl Rose dropped the F- bomb. 

                Now, parents don’t raise us to stay at home (at least they shouldn’t!).  They raise us to ultimately leave home.  They do a lot of that ‘annoying’ stuff because they want us to grow up and eventually be a respectable person.  God has also designed kids to gradually desire more independence as we move toward adulthood. 

                So, my feelings in 8^th grade were a good part of God beginning to move me toward gradual independence.  However, I was managing those feelings in a pretty stupid way.  There’s an interesting parallel here to…sex.

I heard from God

When I was a freshman I had Mrs. Muth as my English teacher.  One day we walked into class in 100B (yep, the same room I teach in now!), and she announced that we were going to have a large pop quiz.  As you can guess, we were startled!  She passed out the quiz and we all began diligently working.  I set my determination to get the solid grade I was used to getting.  The quiz was lengthy and had numerous essay and short answer questions.  In the midst of my furious writing, I noticed something disturbing: people around me were beginning to get up and turn in the quiz!

I was floored!  How could they have finished already?  I wasn’t even halfway done!  I dug in my heels and continued to write until I got to the last question.  In the directions it said, “Good job.  You’ve been listening to my advice to read all the directions before starting a quiz or test.  Leave this quiz blank and turn it in.”  Duuuuhhh.

Oddly enough, don’t we feel this way when it comes to God too?  We feel like we’re working hard to make this relationship work, but it’s so confusing.  Yet, all the people that talk about it in class, chapel, youth group, or church seem to have it figured out.  They talk so confidently about hearing God, having Bible verses jump out at them, or seeing what God is doing in their life.  It’s like being in my quiz story.  Everyone around you seems to know something that you don’t.

Well, here’s the good news: unlike my story, they don’t know either.  Often they use terms and rhetoric to talk like they understand it all, but relating to God is weird.  I think we all just need to get honest about it.  Once we acknowledge that, we can truly begin to settle into this thing called a relationship with God. 

I can talk confidently about my relationship with my wife because we have a long history of working through life together.  Just like this, you too can find a steady connection with the Lord as you learn to relate to Him in a way that is specific to you and your personality, but it takes time and honesty.  I guess I just want us to give up the illusion that it’s really easy to figure out.  It’s not.  So, let’s start from reality and embrace the mystery.