September 19th, 2008 › Uncategorized › jared › no comments ›
I hate segregation. I always have. When i was a kid it bothered me how the lunch room was segregated by color. Races, genders, families, professions and social clubs all try to stay in their corners away from the others.
One thing that I see from time to time which makes me sick is that Christians segregate themselves from people around them. This is to be expected since after all, we are all suffering from the human conditions of insecurity and selfishness. Rather than get to know people different from us, we work hard to only get to know people like us. We all do it don’t we?
I saw this in a really terrible way tonight.
I work online. I know a lot about the way the internet works and the thousands of ways to communicate with internet users from all over the world. One website that has gotten a lot of press lately is twitter. Twitter is like an online party that never stops. Information moves fast. I have heard about earthquakes and plane crashes before CNN reported it because of twitter. One guy even got rescued from an Egytptian Prison because of twitter!
Twitter is a good place to network with others and build relationships with all sorts of people.
Tonight i joined gospelr. Gospelr is a psuedo-twitter site. (notice it even keeps the “er”) Playing off of twitter fame gospelr does the same thing, but promotes itself as a twitter for Christians. That is only a minor paraphrase from the website.
Why, I asked. I didn’t get a really good answer. I’ve said elsewhere that the creator of gospelr is a genius - I totally admire his design and coding skills, his ingenuity and his creativity. But with talents like that why on earth keep it closed up for Christians?
What’s the problem?
You see here is the thing. For years, centuries perhaps, Christians have operated under the assumption that this world is all “going to hell in a hand basket” and we need to “duck and cover” so we can survive it.
We huddle together in our churches, in our youth groups, in our “Saturday skates” and Jesus cookouts. We have our own TV shows, our own movies, we even have our own candy!
When will it end? Jesus didn’t call us to go and form a club! He called us to GO! We have to mix in with people and live where they live and hurt where they hurt and rejoice when they rejoice. No wonder the church in this country is dying. We buried ourselves alive and now we are finally running out of air.
The only community in the bible where Christians gather is at church. We are told to meet together regularly for worship and prayer. We are not told to make sure we stay safe from dirty worldly influences.
Let me pause for a second and say I am not in any way transferring this attitude on the developer of gospelr. But a service that is “for Christians” could easily allow and even influence both Christians and non-Christians to think that’s what the Christian life is all about.
What is the gospel?
The gospel is not for Christians alone. The gospel tells us (in the words of Tolkien) that everything sad will come untrue. That all the pain and sadness has not only an explanation but an end! This is great stinking news! But our actions when we hide in our ghettos and communes say we are better than you. Is this the gospel? God forbid we ever communicate that either by our lives or by our words.
If you are a Christian reading this I beg you to find places you can get to know people. Don’t ask if they are a Christian. Ask them their name. Ask them their dreams and their hopes. Show them that you respect them as a person and you want to help them any way you can.
If you are not a Christian and you are reading this. If Christians have ever treated you like you are a project, I am sorry. If you have ever felt like Christians don’t really care about you. I am sorry. Please just know that Jesus never felt that way. Jesus didn’t teach his followers to hide from you and ignore you and judge you. He taught them to care about you. We just messed it up. Give us another chance and we will happily mix with you and join you where ever you are.
September 2nd, 2008 › Uncategorized › jared › no comments ›
I have spent the last couple hours reading letters written by a dead guy. I have to be honest, these books “the letters of (fill in popular dead person’s name here)” have never really appealed to me much but in The Letters of Francis Schaeffer I have had a very different experience.
Two thoughts have stood out to me as I read. First and probably most significantly, why aren’t I more like that. And I could say I mean his super spirituality and his awesome godliness, but that’s not what I mean. Folks of his generation wrote very personal letters to people they rarely saw. Look at him, he was in Switzerland for years, writing to people who he had once had a relationship with. He wrote 17 page letters and expressed his hopes and dreams for those people.
Why don’t I do that??
I blog (sometimes) but that’s total narcissism, my blog is about me! The busy-ness of my life (and the television) which keeps me from sitting down and writing letters to people I love, is again - narcissism. Are you seeing a pattern here?
Seriously is there a person of our generation who when we die they would be able to put together a book full of letters we wrote to friends? I doubt it.
So, how about write to me?
Seriously. Don’t comment, send me an email. We can interact off the public realm and see where it goes. (jaredmlee.net (at) gmail - you know what comes next)
The second thing that really struck me was his committiment to the cause of Christ. Francis faced some serious opposition because he didn’t really like the idea of swearing allegiance to a group of people or to an institution. Rather he wanted to pursue Christ, love, and holiness.
It makes me wonder whether our denominational allegiances are distracting us from what we are really called to? Sure I understand that there are certain distinctions that are important. I am pretty reformed and see the importance of the reformed distinctions. But as the good Dr Schaeffer wrote. Isn’t allegiance to Christ all we are really called to?
As I post this to the internet I think to myself, “self, you are looking for a job, be very careful.” Is my allegiance selfish or do I say what I believe to be true regardless of the ramifications? Schaeffer gave up his income when he resigned from an orginazation which he bellieved had lost the gospel and had instead emphasized the rules and rule of men.
I hope I would be willing to do the same.
August 25th, 2008 › Uncategorized › jared › 3 comments ›
It’s been a long summer, and there is reason to believe maybe next year will be longer than the last…
Sorry about the blatant plaigarism of the Counting Crows there, but it expresses well what i intend to say.
This summer has been full of personal work projects as well as some school work (yeah I forgot that Greek and Hebrew are things I need to stay on top of). So with everything else going on I have been bad at updating this blog. I hope to do a bit better as the school year rolls around and I am forced to think more about myself, my education, and my spiritual life than I have this summer. For the most part this summer has been about earning money and spending time with my family.
Its been great though. I forgot what it was like to hang out with my kids over the last two years, and we have done some fun outings this summer. The St Louis Zoo has dinosaurs which truly amazed my 3 year old who reminds me alot of his dad at that age. I wanted to be an archeologist at his age, since he is already much smarter than myself, he accurately wants to be a paleontologist - He learned that one on his own by the way.
I just went down and got my classes all set for the fall semester. you can get a glimpse of what I will be learning (and contribute if you want) by visiting my amazon wishlist. No pressure, but I always think it is fun to see what folks will be reading, so feel free to have a look.
So here I am, kicking off a new school year with a new post on this blog. It will be a goal to update it weekly this time around with either reflective, or fun or just annoying posts. So if you are new here, feel free to subscribe. (look up there at the top right)
Most of my blogging takes place over at my professional blog - TheBloggersDesktop where I talk about internet marketing and similar things. This simply isn’t the place for that, but if that is your cup of tea feel free to watch that one as well.
I wanted to take a moment and post a sermon I gave last night. It was a bit short, we were having communion, as well as hearing from some visiting folks who have been ministering in South Africa. It was really fun to sing songs in Swahili! It is always a neat experience to be reminded that there are some faithful folks in places other than America (More faithful sometimes- GASP!)
Enjoy the sermon if you want, and please feel free to engage me on it in the comments. I would love to know what you think!
April 17th, 2008 › life › jared › 3 comments ›
I remember when a person could say - “i’m hacked off” and it meant something.
I remember when only the cool kids could afford parachute pants.
I remember when mc hammer had money.
I remember when the new kids on the block were a band.
I remember max headroom.
I remember the pet shop boys.
I remember when Michael Jackson was stinkin’ awesome!
wow - I’m an old fart
April 1st, 2008 › in the news, redemption › jared › 1 comment ›
It was sad really. Last night, my lovely wife and I were watching 20/20, or dateline, or one of those other mindless shows. One of the stories was about people who had chosen to have themselves cryogenically frozen. The hope is that one day, whatever killed them, will be treatable. At that point they will be revived and healed.
There was a range of people being interviewed. We learned from one couple, that their desire was to be together forever, and this was the way they hoped to accomplish that. We discovered that these people had set up trust funds which if left for a hundred years could make them multi millionaires when they wake up. Which is probably a good thing considering inflation ad the cost of medical care.
We saw large stainless steel coffins which maintained a constant -325 degrees and housed the remains of four individuals.
Despite all this, the most disturbing image we saw was when a family was interviewed. The whole family was going to be frozen (at a rate of 75,000 per person) there were the parents and three children ranging from possibly 8 to 12. One girl was asked, “why do you want to be frozen?” her answer? “its better than having no hope at all.”
No hope? What do you mean? The only hope in death that this young girl has is that one day she will be able to be thawed out and restored to life in a tragically diseased flesh in a suffering and hurting world??? That is her only hope.
We live in a society where people’s greatest hope is to be frozen so that one day they can live. Their greatest hope is to live. Wow! It happens that I have a greater hope. That I will live in the world the way it was always supposed to be, and then I will never die.
That’s my only hope.
March 27th, 2008 › in the news, theology › jared › no comments ›
This summer in Europe Physicists will be searching for God! Actually, they will be searching for the final answer which will make sense of everything else. Newsweek has an interesting interview with the lead Scientist.
Reading this is kind of sad. Someone so intent on disbelief, that human beings only meaning in life is what they make for themselves. Science attempts to explain alot of things, but it can never explain pain, suffering and death.
Not really - Read the article, and I would love to hear your thoughts - Will Physicists Find God?– Newsweek.com
February 25th, 2008 › blogging, fun, thoughts › jared › no comments ›
The story you are about to read is a fictional tale created as an entry in the list-o-rama contest from snap.com. Is shows off the diversity of potential uses for snapshots. I hope you are entertained. You can read more about the contest and join at this page. Read more…
February 15th, 2008 › family › jared › 1 comment ›
You might think that I am linking to this post on my wife’s blog to show you how cool I am. Wrong. I am showing you how cool she is! I can was humbled when I read this. She is so great… take a look, but remember its easy to be that guy for this girl.
February 15th, 2008 › Uncategorized › jared › no comments ›
Wow! What next? a new old wife? A new business is starting up by delivering a cloned dog to its old? owner next year. Thoughts?
Dog Cloning Becomes Business
February 6th, 2008 › injustice, redemption, theology › jared › no comments ›
Not really of course. But my friend Hemant not being a Christian quotes people who have a twisted view of what the Bible says about homosexuality. Its sad really. Ted is a sinner, like all of us. His particular brand of of sexual sin happens to be homosexuality, and he is under the discipline of the church and seeking healing for this sin in his life. Read more…
