Hello all. As some of you may know, my friend Brandon Garcia died a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't planning on blogging about it at all, but I received an email from his mother today that inspired me. You see, Brandon died in a motorcycle crash. I am not sure of the details, but I know he was hit by a truck being driven by a man and his son, and I know many people witnessed it since it was in rush hour.

Brandon's mom has decided to contact all of the witnesses and tell them about Brandon. To, in a word, be a "witness" about Brandon's life to those to witnessed his death. In light of that, I thought I would be a witness as well.

I knew Brandon through my church in California. He was in my home group and was a philosophy student at the school where I was doing my graduate work. Brandon was an unusual mix of person. He was very bright, and finished up his philosophy degree and was thinking about graduate work, and yet he was extremely outgoing and personable. He had a huge heart for people, and yet, as an academic type loved to be alone and read.

But while these are slightly unusual, they don't scratch the surface of his heart. Brandon jumped on a plane two weeks after the tsunami hit and helped to move dead bodies and serve in any way he could. He eventually went back later to help out some more. He started a reconciliation ministry for those who need to be reconciled with others, particularly for college kids who had separated parents. He had a real heart for redemption.

As of late, Brandon was a youth pastor. This is particularly interesting because the Tuesday before he died (he died Thursday morning), he gave his last sermon to the kids in his youth group. To prepare he had written his own eulogy. The point of the sermon was to grasp how short life is, and to live for eternity.

I had the chance to witness, with many others, how Brandon did in fact live for eternity. He was a good man, a faithful friend, a devoted brother and son, and a disciple of Christ's. He will be deeply missed, but I have no doubt that the impact he had will continue on for many years down the road.

To continue on from my post yesterday, I wanted to make a note of something that is interesting, though obvious, interesting nonetheless. I find it particularly noteworthy that wealth and worry are tied together in this verse. What would it have looked like in the first century to be overcome by the worries of the world that it choked out the Word of God? How much more so will we struggle with this reality?

I would be willing to say that this portion of the parable is a picture of the church in North America. We are the ones who leave church and instead of being overcome by its truthfulness, beauty, and meaning we are overcome by where we should eat, how expensive gas is, when our mortgage is due, our rent, loan payments, credit card payments, oil changes, i-pod replacements, milk expiration, moldy cheese, job market, weekend sales, garage sales, new movies, old movies, dollar movies, dvd's, HD-dvds or blue ray dvd's, not to mention the realities of insurance, IRA's, ROTH IRAs, 401ks, car insurance, car payments, car noises, retirement, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

I heard a story once about a couple, who were easily upper-middle class - rich by the world's standards, but not awkwardly so by American standards, who, while on vacation, had a fire tear through their sub-division. Based on the maps and the pictures they realized that their house and all their belongings had burnt to the ground.

When they got back into town they realized they were wrong, their house and stuff had been saved, and they were depressed. They had felt, for the first time in a long time, what it meant to be free. They were no longer burdened by all of the junk they had accumulated, and now having to serve this junk by getting a burglar alarm, fire insurance, etc. They were now in a place where they once again had to deal with the batteries, the cable, the pool cleaner, the gas for the grill, etc.

When my wife and I moved to Scotland we put all that we belonged (well, at least 90% of it) in her old bedroom at her parents house - to be there for us when we got back 3-4 years later. Now, when I think back to that stuff, I can't remember what is even there. I miss it all so much that I forget what it even is! Sure, there are some books I wish I had with us, and some pictures, etc., but for the most part, I feel free from the burden.

I can't imagine how much more the worries of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth is an issue for us today than those in the first century. We are rich Christians in an age of hunger as the book title appropriately puts it. Yet what does it mean to hear the Words of God in an environment so clouded and busy and full? Does it mean to hear them at all?

As most of you know I have been contemplating the message found in the parable of the sower (or soils) in Matthew 13. My interpretation has been to avoid limiting this parable to people who have not hear the word, but instead open it up to be true of all people at all times. This parable is about the Word of God coming into contact with people's hearts.

That being said, I was hit with a hard reality in my latest mediation upon it. Verse 22 states, "And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful."

It is so easy to "think" away what "the worry of the world" is. As I have been stressing over logistics, my future, my dissertation, my ministry, my days, my junk, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera...I begin to wonder if I am the one constantly choking out the Word of God. Is my life ordered in such a way...or should I say, is my heart in such a condition that I can see the worries of this world for what they are? Can I be the one who gains the world and yet forfeits his soul because I spend so much time trying to do work for the kingdom that I fail to serve the king?

Prayer and meditation (along with a community of people who know you deeply), seem to be the best places where these things arise. As I sat with God today I could open deeply to how easy of a temptation it is to turn his kingdom message into my drive for success - but we must be, and I must be, aware of how easy it is to allow these worries that clog our hearts to keep the Word at bay - and eventually choke it and kill it.

Karl Barth said that the decisive Christian action is prayer. Jonathan Edwards said that you can quickly tell if you are deceiving yourself about your relationship with God if you take a look at your life and see that you don't pray. Prayer is the fruit of the Word uninhibited.

I am once again reminded of the reality of prayer, and coming to God as we are - reorienting our world around God and the kingdom.

Thanks for stopping by. Blessings. kyle

At the center of Mark's gospel Jesus asks a question of his disciples: Who do you say that I am? This, I fear, can often become one question of many that Jesus may ask, or one statement among many that we read quickly and then read on. Because of our familiarity with it, we may treat it as one of many parts of the Jesus story, instead of giving it the focus it deserves.

This question is THE question. I noted in part 1 of my blogs about questions, that our life is an answer to a question, whether we know the question or not. Building upon that idea, our life is an answer to a question, a very real question, that is an answer to the question that Jesus asked: Who do you say that I am?

We cannot merely unleash the barrage of catechismal-rhetoric that we have filled our minds with over the years, and we can't take time to think what our pastors and theologians might say in response to Jesus' inquiry. We are already speaking. Our life is constantly forming a question, every day it creates anew the question our lives are answering, which turns into a month and a year and a decade, until we have an overarching question that we give our lives to answer - and it is that question, and only that question that can truly answer for us.

Peter answered Jesus' question with insight beyond himself - which became clear when immediately afterwards he rejected any possible understanding of it by rebuking Jesus. I wonder how often we are the ones who are proclaiming who Jesus is, and by everything we give ourselves to proclaim the opposite?

So, I was just thinking about the nature of meditating on the Word of God, when I couldn't help but notice a place of stumbling for many people. In my encounters with other people like myself who have been Christians a long time, I find that there is often the temptation to meditate on the text, and yet miss the Word.

How is this possible?

In the Gospel of John we are told from the very beginning that Jesus is the Word of God, and then in John 5:39 Jesus states, "You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me."

It is a great temptation to try and know the Bible and fail to realize that in hearing God's words to us, we need to turn to The Word, namely, Christ.

It is because of this that I run into people who know the Bible inside and out and yet fail to grow in Christ, who fail to be sanctified by The Word. It is why the Pharisees and teachers of the Scriptures could be so educated and yet so wicked. Meditating on the Word is to be brought into judgment by the Word - by stepping into its sphere and having eyes that can see and ears that can hear - allowing the Word to pierce our hearts and life like a double-edged sword (see Hebrews 4:12).

The Bible is the place where we can come and be met by The Word of God - but we have to allow this Word to be The Word, and not something we mold to meet our own desires.

Meditating on the Word should be equivalent to kneeling at the throne of God. We have nothing to add but our very selves.

So, I was thinking about a blog I wrote much earlier, and I wanted to go back to it. I am of the belief that we are all answering a question with our lives. This question is usually subconscious, something we have never probably verbalized in any way, and something we probably couldn't accurately define.

That's just what life is - an answer to a question.

It is important to note that the question we are answering cannot be what we wish we were answering. Sadly, many of us spend our lives thinking we are answering a question we only wish we were, rather than the question that really governs our lives - like how DOS really governs Windows in some way - it is under the surface, subconscious, unseen.

The reality we have to face is that we cannot answer this question on our own. We deceive ourselves too readily, and without knowing so. The only way you can answer is by looking at your life, and seeing how you spend your time, what are your priorities, what you give your heart to, etc.

I wonder what question you are answering - and if it has anything to do with what you say you believe?

So I was thinking the other day randomly (side note: it is not random that I was thinking, I am not trying to use "randomly" as an adverb for "thinking" as much as for the content of the thinking), and my mind grabbed onto passover (see I told you it was random).

And in doing so, it has become clear that sometimes the most meaningful and profound things are the most obvious and simple.

I was thinking about the original passover, and I was thinking about being there. Sadly, most of my creative juices were spent sifting around my consciousness until it landed on passover, so I basically ended up settling on being a character in the Prince of Egypt.

In any case, I was in my little hut made from fired bricks and the sun was going down. I took the blood of the lamb, as I was told to do, and rubbed it on the door frame to my house (see Exodus 12).

This is when the profoundly simple message came to me, that is probably in every children's rendition of this story - what to do now? Sit and wait. That is the whole point, there is nothing I can do, it is up to God and the blood of the lamb.

What struck me as being profound was the simple reality of the incredible faith it took to follow and believe. There was certainly not a doubt that God was going to do it - he certainly had proven himself. The questioning would probably have landed on oneself. Did I put enough blood there? What if God gets confused? Does God know my address?

The simple message of faith is that we have to trust, at the core of it all, in the blood of the lamb and the grace of God. Profound and deep, but at the same time, incredibly simple. Has God ever given us a reason to think that he wouldn't fulfill all his promises?

Hello all. Sorry I haven't been around for a while, but I think I am going to interact on this blog a little more. I wanted to solicit some of your options on the issue of blogging. I must note that I am really tired, so please forgive any run on sentences, misspellings, or just plain incoherent sentences.

Anyway, I wanted to talk about the idea of blogging. I am trying to think through what blogging should be - at least in my case. I'm sure there are a lot of different ways to approach blogging, but I don't just want to start blogging without any idea of what I am doing.

First, as a Christian, I want to approach blogging, I need to approach blogging, in light of that fact. So there seems to be some questions I need to ask. First, it seems that as a Christian who is communicating freely, I am, should be in some sense, acting as a witness. But as a witness, I am acting in accord and presumably under judgment of the God who is self-communicating. So it seems, as a Christian, that I should have some element of witness about the self-communicating God as he engages me through his word, through his people, and through his spirit working in my life.

Second, it seems that for blogging to work well there needs to be a community of people engaging one another as people who are under this same self-communicating God, who are seeking to help one another as fellow witnesses of the Word.

Third...actually, I have no third. I am too tired for a third. But I would love to hear some of your thoughts. Why do you blog? What is blogging for? I look forward to the conversation.

There are few vices as pervasive and ignored as the vice of vanity. Vanity could very well be the vice that has been turned into the great virtue in nearly every area of our lives. For many, this is hard, because having vanity when you are in troubling circumstances is difficult .. at least in the way we classically understand the term.

But the vanity I am talking about is when we begin to love our ability to fit in according to certain factors, most of which are virtually arbitrary. These are the things that we fill C.V..s, resumes, and water-cooler conversations with. They are what we long for when we don..t have great C.V...s, resumes, or even a water-cooler to talk about .. they are wave runners, cars, and clothes.

Vanity, as I see it, is any way to achieve that is based on our own autonomy, our pride, that we come to identify and truly love about ourselves. It is what we portray when we meet people for the first time .. which can be humility, zest, or humor. It could be what we portray visually, whether it be our clothes, our hair, or our muscles .. or legs, breasts and neck I could probably add. Vanity is the slow and festering rot that eats away at the core of ourselves and leaves us full of our achievements and yet empty of any real achievement. Vanity is the lie that we can create a self, of ourselves; a self that is built upon all that we hold valuable, but in the end is a self seeking comfort, care and love .. like a child beat up by bullies at school.

What is odd is that we live in a world where we judge each other based on our ability to accomplish, acquire, and succeed, and we have bought into the same model of value in the church. A pastors resume usually proceeds him .. particularly with other pastors. A church..s size and financial status usually precedes it .. this time with other churches. We have ignored Paul when he says that the body is a whole, and that we are to lift up the parts that are naturally less acknowledged, and yet we continue to ignore anything they do.

I find myself in a strange world .. a world of degrees, books, and speaking engagements .. and yet I can only look upon it with Paul and see that it is all rubbish next to the cross of Christ. The cross that Paul stumbled over seemed to leave him (post-stumble) with a new orientation to value. Suddenly the ability to speak well was a fault that sought self-gratification and emotional manipulation over the truth of the cross. The ability to have power was now found in the ability to rest in God in one..s weakness. The ability to achieve was now found when one could truthfully say, ..Without Christ I can do nothing... What Paul found, and what we often neglect to notice, is that when we say we believe, that should mean that it affects the way we approach the world. Yet all too often, the ..We believe.. precedes all that we truly believe in .. namely, our ability to achieve all that we can according to our own self-will.

To add to my last post, and respond to Vince, we really should talk about what it looks like to make a decision - do we trust emotions, cognition, or both. First, it seems appropriate to look at both.

Emotions, like I said before, seem to be signals of what is true about yourself. It is kind of like a red filter - light goes through it and it projects red light. The redness of the light post-filter says more about the filter than it does the light. Likewise, your being angry about the price of gas says more about you than the price of gas. So in making decisions, it is good to pay attention to your emotions, because they will tell you a lot about what you believe, what you want to be true, how you wish things were, etc., but they won't tell you much about the actual decision - but will tell you about how you really think about the decision.

The cognitive aspect of making a decision will probably take into account the emotional, but will also try (we hope) to take into consideration the evidence, value, etc., that we believe our decision to have. For instance, working more hours to make more money, might feel bad, but because you want to rid yourself of debt, you want to provide for your family, etc., you might choose to do it, and note that your feelings say something about what you wish were true - probably that you were independently wealthy.

The hard thing we must recognize is that we don't normally know what the right thing to do is. Is working hard always right? Certainly not. There are other factors which we must prioritise. I am reminded of the Garden of Gesthemane. Jesus felt that things should go different, and he asked that God would take away the path before him - but in the end, replied with "Not my will, but yours be done." Our first goal in decision making is to make this claim - that we will not naturally, through our emotions or even our decision making skill, come to the right priorities, they are supernaturally oriented and not naturally oriented.

So that answer, in length, is neither. We should neither trust our emotion or our cognition, we should trust God, and trust that God will redeem them both.