Meekness = Weakness?

Several years ago I had been thinking about God's definition of meekness, gentleness and humility as compared to the world's definition...weakness, weakness, and weakness. So, as I was thinking of examples that might be able to help me communicate what God's Word teaches on the subject my mind went back to a time when I was walking my new puppy named Bo…here’s how God showed me what humility feels like…

We had just gotten a puppy a few weeks prior to preparing for the gentleness message. After the Yankee game was over I took Bo outside in our yard to do his business, and like a good puppy he was right on time! I had some time to kill and wanted to walk off the bowl of ice cream I had just devoured, so I decided to take Bo for a walk around the block of my neighborhood.

I got about 10 minutes away from my house when Bo began to “circle the wagons” and prepare to unload…if you know what I mean. That was great and everything except for the fact that since he had just done the same thing ten minutes earlier in my yard, I didn’t think I needed to bring the “magic bag” to make it all disappear when he was done.

Kumbaya Camp? No Way!

The first time I took my youth group to Adventure Camp in West Virginia was an amazing experience. In fact, it was a miracle that we were even allowed to go in the first place especially after the parents meeting I had in order to explain and convince them that it was going to be all right to take their kids rafting, rappelling, and Mountain Biking for a week in the New River Gorge of WV.

I think it was probably the “Assumption of Risk” form that they had to sign that made them a little edgy. The form said “All of the activities at Adventure Camp have an element of risk involved. You are assuming the risk for your child…If they get hurt or die you are releasing the camp, and won’t sue!”

Yeah that was an interesting meeting, but the bottom line was that I knew that if we could get our kids out of their comfort zone and challenge them with some things they would probably never get do, we would start to see some qualities like, faith, teamwork, unity and trust begin to emerge.

Well, they bought it, and we loaded up the van and headed south to Wild, Wonderful West Virginia for a week of fun and challenge through extremely risky adventures like rafting, rappelling and mountain biking.

Everything was going great; we were ready to tackle our first challenge of the week, whitewater rafting the class 3-5 rapids of the lower New River. We got our life jackets, oars and helmets on and proceeded to the waiting area where the guides were assembled to go over the rules and expectations for the day. We were really excited and full of anticipation; there were smiles galore, as we thought about how awesome this day was going to be.

Excitement abounded, that is until the head guide stepped to the front and for the next 30 minutes explained to us how risky this adventure really is. He didn’t pull any punches. He had kind of a monotone low speaking voice that would get louder and louder until he would come to his crescendo, which was also the main point he wanted to deliver to us. It went something like this…

“Ladies and gentleman it is my job to inform you of the inherent risks, and dare I say DANGERS of what we are about to partake of today. Rafting may look like a fun sport to the novice, and fun it is, but I would be remiss if I didn’t point out the crucial elements that you need to abide by if you want to come back from this trip ALIVE!”

Man Up

I've been thinking a lot about persecution these days, especially persecution that comes from sharing the gospel with people. 

Well actually I've been thinking more about the lack of persecution that many people face because they just fly under the radar and keep the "mystery of the gospel" exactly that...a mystery.

The more I think about the gospel the more I realize that because of Christ the mystery has been revealed and as Paul put it, "Christ in us the hope of glory" is the mystery. Hmm, once a mystery is revealed it's no longer a mystery is it? 

So, with that in mind I'm just doing some prayerful reflection on the correlation between sharing the gospel and being persecuted for it and not sharing the gospel and missing out on my purpose at least and participating in some grand "keep it hidden and just fit in" scheme at most.

When I think about all that Jesus went through for me to be able to have a relationship restoration with God words like "Excruciating pain", and "Unbearable grief" come to mind and it's interesting that when Paul gives a little Recap of what he incurred for the gospel He uses the equivalent of our word "stresses" to describe them, not anywhere close to what Jesus's suffering involved. That really got my attention and made me think about my perspective on things especially when I realize what my Savior went through for me.