Paul | Russellings of the Spirit

Posts Tagged ‘Paul

Jul

Breathing Lessons

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: attitudes, contagious, germs, Jesus Christ, moods, Paul, virus

WHEW!

Dodged another COVID bullet.

Joan and I just heard from a close friend – one we had recently been in physical proximity with – that she and her husband both tested positive for the virus.

Fortunately, their symptoms are mild, but she wanted us to know they caught the bug so that we could go get tested right away.

So we did. And – Praise the Lord and pass the nasal swabs! – we both tested negative.

This makes probably the fourth VERY close call for us since the beginning of the pandemic. And so far – knock wood – we have tested negative each time.

So, what do you think; why are some people infected while others are not? And what are the factors that either increase or decrease contagiousness? Joan and I are both TRIPLE vaccinated, but I know even that has not prevented people from catching the virus.

But since I have exactly ZERO training in medical science, I am going to move this question out of the realm of HEALTH, if I may, and transplant it into the realm of LIFE IN GENERAL. First, because I CAN and secondly, because I believe contagiousness is a relevant topic for us to consider… even beyond its medical definitions.

How about in the realm of MOODS, for example?

I am sure you’ve noticed how another person’s MOOD can be contagious, either positively or negatively. When you pass that cheerful woman walking on the street, her sunny disposition immediately crosses the blood barrier and moves right on into your system. Suddenly YOUR step seems a little bouncier in a way you can’t readily explain.

In the same way, handing your credit card to the guy behind the counter who would CLEARLY rather be anywhere but here rubs off, too. His sour demeanor can easily become yours in a matter of moments.

And here in the age of information, IDEAS and BELIEFS can also be pretty contagious, too, can’t they? Most of us have ready access to machines that are capable of communicating with large groups of people, spread across a wide area.

All it takes is a crazy notion with flimsy scientific support, a passionate belief, a few keystrokes… and VIOLA! We have successfully infected hundreds of people with a virus cleverly designed to produce fear and hatred of some unknown group of ENEMIES!

I hate to promote the gloomy view of contagiousness here, but lately it seems to me that the DARK and NEGATIVE viruses are spreading much faster than the HOPEFUL, LIFE-GIVING strains. I will admit that the negative stuff sometimes seems to work its way into my bloodstream more quickly. I’m pretty sure that “daily news reading” lowers my spirit’s defenses from these insidious viruses.

The challenge I am setting for myself today is this: How can I be more intentional about my contagiousness? As you can readily see that challenge has two parts. First, how do I strengthen my defenses against the SOUL-SUCKING viruses, and SECOND, how do I assure that my positive, life-affirming germs are the ones I am spreading to the people I meet?

The Apostle Paul has some sound, simple advice on this, oddly enough. He says, “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.” (Romans 8:5-6, NRSVU).

Easy peasy, right? Just set your mind on the Spirit and life and peace are there at your fingertips. The operative phrase here being, “… set your mind…”

In his letter to the church at Ephesus, Paul puts a little more detail in his instructions on the best ways to avoid the negative infections. He says, “Stand, therefore, and belt your waist with truth and put on the breastplate of righteousness and lace up your sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one.” (Ephesians 6:14-16, NRSVU).

There certainly are a LOT of germs and viruses flying around these days. And I am not just talking about COVID. And sadly, even the best N95 masks are not effective against them.

But as Paul and his mentor Jesus are certainly helping me understand, what I breathe IN has a whole lot to do with what I put OUT.

Abundant blessings;

Oct

The Voice Speaks!

By revruss1220 3 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: discernment, edging, God, Paul, purpose, voice, work, yard

“Are you edgy?”

There I was… out in my back yard the other day, tidying up some ragged borders with my battery-powered string trimmer.

That’s when I heard The Voice…

… And The Voice seemed to be asking me a weird question.

“Are you edgy?”

I paused in my work and looked around. Who had spoken? And what did they mean by that?

For the life of me I could not locate where The Voice had come from. But I knew I had definitely heard it, loud and clear. And to deepen the mystery a little and add some intrigue, I recognized that it was a woman’s voice.

As an avid student of the Bible, I have read numerous accounts of heroes and heroines of the faith who heard the disembodied Voice of God… usually inviting them to undertake a Great Quest. Noah and the ark, comes immediately to mind. There is also Moses and the Burning Bush… or Paul on the Damascus Road, just to name a few.

And every time I read one of those stories – or others – I ask myself the same question: “When will it be my turn to hear the clear, distinct voice of God steering me on to The Path I need to be following?”

So, score one… I finally heard The Voice. But also, bummer… the words I heard made absolutely no sense to me at all. Why couldn’t I have heard something like, “Set my people free!” (Exodus 3:10), or “Go preach the Word all over the Fertile Crescent area and start, like, a zillion churches,” (Acts 9ish).

All I got was this stupid question: “Are you edgy?”

But let’s stop and think about that for a moment instead of complaining. Maybe this is EXACTLY the message I need to hear from God right now. Maybe God has watched me as I have sort of oozed into retirement, goofed around with a hodge-podge of volunteer activities, taken naps in the middle of the day, and been thoroughly unimpressed.

Maybe my own, personal, Russell Brown-specific Burning Bush moment is meant to be a CHALLENGE! Maybe it is meant to wake me up somehow! Maybe God is saying, “Hey! Lawn Jockey! I didn’t call you to collect your pension and pretty up your yard all day while gaping at the beautiful mountains and the aspen trees! I called you to get out there ON THE EDGE! As long as you’ve got breath and health, I expect you to actively USE the gifts and graces I gave you to help build my KINGDOM!

“So get out there, bub! Go make a difference!

“Um, excuse me?”

I heard the voice again. Only this time I was facing in the right direction. It seems the source of the voice was my neighbor across the back fence. She had been momentarily obscured by the nine-foot-tall hedge between our yards, but now I could see her standing there, quizzical look and all.

Suddenly I understood.

She looked at me and said, “I heard the noise from your yard and was curious what it was.”

OK. I get it now. My neighbor heard the noise from my weed-whacker and called out to me to ask if I had been EDGING.

“Oh! Yes. Yes, I am edging. Sorry… did the sound bother you?” I asked.

“Oh no, you’re fine. Sorry to interrupt,” she replied, and then turned and went back into her house.

So… not the Voice of God after all. Just a neighbor wondering what all the commotion was. Not to worry.

And with that, I returned to my chores, confident that God had definitely NOT used the voice of my neighbor to spur my soul and ask me challenging questions about the direction and purpose of my life.

As if that would ever happen…

Abundant blessings;

Oct

DONE!

By revruss1220 1 Comment

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: complete, done, finished, Jesus Christ, Paul

The voice of my sweet wife: “Are you finished in there yet, honey?”

ME: “Almost!”

Sweet wife: “OK. Just let me know. We need to leave in five minutes!”

ME (as we walk into whatever-occasion-it-was, 10 minutes after the festivities began): “Sorry we’re late. I had to finish.”

I have a thing about finishing. Call it a personality quirk. Call it an endearing quality. Or you can choose to call it what my sweet wife Joan calls it: downright annoying.

I’ll admit; if I start a task, I like to finish it. “Half done is undone,” as my dad used to say. I love to see a long “To Do” list in front of me accruing check mark after check mark beside each item.

This completion drive of mine is probably why I keep shoveling food into my face long after I am comfortably full. I’m all, “Hey… if there is still food on the plate, it isn’t FINISHED, is it!”

That quality is probably one reason I like to blog so much. It is a project that I can start… and then finish.

On the surface, this sounds like a wonderfully positive quality, doesn’t it? I mean, who doesn’t like a “finisher”?

Recently, however, I have discovered the “shadow side” (as my Jungian friends call it) of this characteristic…

… and that is, the inability to walk away.

Sometimes I have trouble going to sleep at night, even when I am physically bone tired. It is probably because I lie in bed making mental lists of all of the tasks l didn’t finish that day.

Not to get too psychological about it, but I am reasonably sure the little “remember to clean your plate” voice inside my head has a lot to do with why I have struggled so much with retirement so far. Anyone who has been a pastor will tell you the same thing: the job is never done. There are always more sermons to be preached. There are always more hands to be held. There is always more spiritual growing to do. There are always more hearts to be softened. There are always more souls to be energized.

And yes… there are ALWAYS more meetings to attend. There is never a clean “breaking point” at which to just turn and walk away… although I know a lot of people who have done exactly that.

There is something to be said for sticking with a job and seeing it faithfully through to completion. But there is also something to be said – maybe even something more important –for being able to be at peace with laying a task down, turning your back, and walking serenely away.

As he hung on the cross in agony, Jesus was able to muster one last timeless phrase. He said, “It is finished.” (John 19:30, NRSV) Some scholars contend that in addition to his mortal life, Jesus was also referring to the earthly mission he came to fulfill. The door to forgiveness and eternal life was now open. Nothing further was called for.

“Father God, the job you sent me to do is DONE. I’m ready to come home.” And even though we can look around today, more than twenty centuries later, and see millions of people who refuse his gift, Jesus knew that he had finished the work he came to do.

Perhaps there is a difference between the concepts of FINISHED and COMPLETED. Is it possible to say that my assigned role is finished, and yet still say that the overall task is not yet completed? As in, “Joe the electrician FINISHED all the wiring, but the house is not yet COMPLETED”?

Maybe.

Perhaps the lesson I am meant to learn here is that outcomes do not ultimately depend on me (or you).

We are each given our tasks. We carry them out faithfully and to the best of our ability…

… and then we walk away, trusting that, as Paul wrote to the Philippians one day, “… the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” (Philippians 1:6, NRSV).

Gosh, I sure hope so!

Abundant blessings;

(OK. Now I’m finished).

Aug

A New World? Or a New Heart?

By revruss1220 4 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: Byrds, Dylan, God, gospel, heart, Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, Mary, new world, Paul, Peter, protest, resurrection, Seeger, social order, songs, transformation

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind…

If I had a hammer…

To everything, turn, turn, turn…

Abraham, Martin, and John…

We’ve got to get out of this place…

WAR! [UH! GRUNT!] What is it good for? (Absolutely NOTHIN’!)

In terms of musical themes, the decade of the 60s will be best remembered as the decade of the social protest song.

Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, The Byrds, Peter, Paul, and Mary, and other well-known (and lesser known) musicians of that era attempted to bend spears into plowshares in the white-hot smelter of music.

Personally, I remember feeling just a little bit subversive as I sat by the campfire in the summer of 1967 singing, “How many years must some people exist, before they’re allowed to be free?” Those lyrics made me think about the poverty and unrest in our country’s inner cities.

Even though we imagined we were creating something utterly new and revolutionary back then, the idea of expressing a political point of view through music goes back centuries. In 1801, for example, Richard Allen, a former slave and a Methodist minister, published a hymnal titled, A Collection of Spiritual Songs and Hymns. Those familiar with Methodist history will recognize Allen’s name as the founder of the AME (African Methodist Episcopal) Church.

According to the book, Routledge History of Social Protest in Popular Music, most of the songs in Allen’s Collection dealt with his frustration about the level of racial discrimination he experienced from white Methodists.

The two essential elements of a song – melody and meaning – are a potent combination. A series of musical notes, skillfully combined, has the power to reach deep into our subterranean human chambers. When paired with words that convey a timely, haunting, moving, or unsettling message, a great song can’t help but create an almost transcendent spiritual moment for the listener.

But even if we concede that songs have the ability to produce a soul-stirring, spiritual experience, is that the same thing as hearing The Gospel?

We remember that the word gospel comes from the Old English godspel, roughly translated as “good news.” We also recall that when Christians today talk about the Good News (capital “G”, capital “N”), we are most likely talking about the good news that Jesus – in his resurrection from the dead following a painful and humiliating death – forever broke the power of sin and death over humanity and freed all of us from those ancient curses.

Good News indeed! Hallelujah!

But that message is probably a qualitatively different message than the one you hear when you hear Pete Seeger sing, Michael Row the Boat Ashore.

Based on interviews I have heard, I know that the goal of the gifted individuals who write social protest songs is CHANGE. They seek to stir the hearts and move the arms and legs of their audience. They want to convey a message so irresistible that you and I won’t be able to help ourselves… we will drop what we are doing and get to work, actively building a New Social Order based on justice for all, equality, and compassion.

Their aim is a New World.

The aim of the Gospel, by contrast, is a New Heart, and then through it, a New World.

Today, we look around and see AT LEAST as much need for a new world as those protestors saw in the 1960s. Racism, poverty, runaway greed, random violence, environmental crises, political distrust, addiction, and sexual depravity seem to be at all-time highs.

But the question we need to wrestle with today is: Which comes first…

… the new heart?

… or the new world?

Abundant blessings;

Jul

Puzzle People

By revruss1220 1 Comment

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: belief, blessings, concentration, divine, faith, frustration, Gideon, gifts, God, intervention, Jesus Christ, jigsaw, limitations, Moses, opportunity, patience, Paul, Peter, pieces, puzzle, release, skills, talents, unleash

As you can see from the photo immediately to the right, Joan and I have almost completed this 500-piece jigsaw puzzle. All that remains are fitting the last pieces of the pale blue sky together.

This puzzle was very much a quarantine-inspired undertaking.

“Good job!” You might be tempted to say. “Way to go!”

You would, however, immediately withdraw your lavish words of praise when I confess to you it has taken us nearly 90 days to get to this point.

We began the project with great enthusiasm, dumping the box out onto our dining room table, grouping all of the similarly colored pieces together, bringing over snacks and drinks, taking turns studying, fussing, fiddling, and painstakingly fitting pieces together.

After a couple of sessions each, the wind of motivation suddenly left our sails. The puzzle just sat there for days… fragmented… silently judging us.

About a month ago, as we both sat staring dejectedly at the scattered pile of pieces, Joan and I looked at one another and said, “I guess we’re just not puzzle people.”

Puzzle people (and God bless you if you are one) must possess great powers of concentration. They must be infinitely patient. They must be able to visualize patterns and connections in their mind’s eye. They must have a finely-honed appreciation for solitude… or else possess the ability to work well with others.

Puzzle people are able to play the long game and do not set their sights on immediate gratification.

As I sat down and began listing out all of these traits, I found myself muttering, “How awesome would it be to be a Puzzle Person. Too bad I’m not wired that way at all.”

But then I stopped and looked again. I noticed that in spite of these serious impairments in my God-given proclivities, I was less than 30 pieces away from finishing this puzzle. The bliss of hearing that soft “CLICK” as I drop the final piece into place is just hours away.

“Is that amazing or what?” I whispered. “How did that happen?”

And then I remembered that sometimes God sneaks up behind us and surprises us with a totally unexpected result in a situation we thought we had completely figured out.

(Hang on here… I am not claiming divine intervention was at work in our puzzle progress. I am beginning to piece together a spiritual analogy of sorts. Hang in with me for a minute…)

Throughout the pages of scripture, we find countless examples of God deputizing people who believed they were hopelessly ill-equipped to do necessary deed. There are scenes of denial and protest and, “Sorry God, you’ve got the wrong guy/gal. Go pick someone else.” Following by that hopelessly inadequate person suddenly stepping up and delivering the goods.

There is Moses, for example.

And Gideon.

And Deborah.

And Ruth.

And Esther.

And David (later, KING David).

And Ezekiel.

And Peter.

And Saul (later, Paul)

And on and on, ad infinitum.

I don’t believe these stories are meant to teach us that sometimes God swoops in and supernaturally imbues hapless schlubs with magical new powers. Although I am sure that does happen sometimes.

What if the point of these stories is more to show us how God intervenes and opens our eyes to abilities we already have, yet which we have somehow submerged under layers of doubt and despair?

What if it is the case that each of those “unlikely biblical heroes” (and each of us, too) already had those remarkable faculties FROM DAY ONE and just needed a godly “nudge” to believe in and USE them?

Imagine that!

Gee… maybe I AM a puzzle person after all!

Jun

I Can’t Know

By revruss1220 3 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: ally, assist, brutality, cause, comfort, compassion, empathy, feel, Galatians 6:2, George Floyd, God, Jesus Christ, minister, murder, options, Paul, privilege, racism, redemption, sympathy, violence

Grieving people By my not-totally-rigorous estimate, I have officiated at close to 100 funerals during my career as a pastor. This total was boosted significantly by one memorable week in 2014 when there were three.

Every one of these formal church services was preceded by many hours sitting with and consoling grieving family members. In some of those situations, I was also privileged to spend time with the person as they slowly died.

I was taught this in seminary, but also learned by direct experience that there are things you say and things you DON’T say to people when someone close to them dies. And right at the very top of that “DON’T” list is the phrase, “I know exactly what you are going through.”

Because you don’t.

Because you can’t.

Even if your father died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 79 after undergoing numerous surgeries and chemo therapies and you are talking to the son of a person whose father just died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 79 after undergoing numerous surgeries and chemo therapies, you still don’t KNOW what they are going through.

One journey of pain is utterly unlike any other journey of pain. Every journey of pain is unique and unrepeatable.

And yet, even though you stand entirely outside that person’s experience, there is still a “compassionate ally” role for you to fulfill in that journey.

First, you need to discover the role. Then you need to fulfill it.

In the wake of the horrific lynching (let’s call it what it was) of the black man named George Floyd by a group of white Minneapolis, MN police officers, a lot of pain has been brought to the surface. In most cases what we are seeing is a pain that had been bottled up for centuries that is finally exploding.

This crime provided a moment that has led to some long-overdue, national soul-searching.

In an eerie parallel of the scenes surrounding the death of a loved one, some folks are responding to the pain by releasing their own pent-up pain. Some are responding by trying to deny, dismiss, or rationalize the expressions of pain they’re witnessing. Still others are struggling to find a way to respond… knowing that this particular pain is not part of their lived experience, yet also aware that they dare not turn their backs on it.

Number me as a member of that last group.

I want to come alongside those who are now in pain. I want to minister to them. I want to do something more redemptive and more effective than clucking my tongue and saying, “Ain’t it a shame.” I want to figure out a way to somehow engage in the struggle without making the mistake of saying, “I know exactly how you feel.”

Because I don’t.

Because I can’t.

Because I’m white.

In his letter to the church folk in Galatia, Paul told them they were called to, “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way, you will fulfill the law of Christ.” (Galatians 6:2, NRSV).

And as much a fan as I am of most of his work, I have to confess I am having a hard time getting with Paul on this one. The burden of systemic racism and oppression is not one I will ever be equipped to carry.

And yet somehow, despite my shortcomings, I know there has to be a “compassionate ally” role for me to play in this struggle.

Continuing to shine a light on it might be one option. Refusing to allow our national angst to be swallowed up by the next news cycle might help keep the dialogue going and the solutions flowing.

Educating myself about the depth and nature and duration of the pain might be another.

Standing up visibly with those who are hurting the most might be another ally role I can play.

Supporting the cause financially is certainly another.

What else?

I’d love to know what you think…

Mar

Before and After

By revruss1220 2 Comments

Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: blessing, COVID-19, death, disease, divorce, fear, God, healing, Holy Spirit, hope, Israel, Noah, optimism, Paul, prayer, Psalm 130:7, redemption, restoration

Mustang restoration It was over 20 years ago, but it was a period that still holds the title of “Absolute Worst Time of My Life.”

It was the time when my marriage of 23 years crashed and burned… one hundred percent due to my own immaturity and misanthropy.

It was the time when my struggling advertising and public relations business foundered and then finally ground to a halt.

It was the time when I seemed to be competing with myself to see if the next bad choice could somehow be worse than the last one.

It was the time when I succeeded in not only alienating my then wife, but also both of my sons.

It was a time when I was unable to see any hope or a way out and did not see how it was possible to sink any lower in terms of energy, self-esteem, or faith.

It was the time when I let go any shred of pretense of self-sufficiency, dropped to my knees in anguish, and cried out to God in utter despair.

It was also the time – I now see in retrospect – that my rebirth and redemption began in earnest.

The Bible tells us again and again that God has the desire and the power to redeem… anyone and any situation. Psalm 130:7 says, “O Israel, hope in the Lord! For with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem.”

114 other verses spread across the Old and New Testaments repeat the same theme.

And yes, I believe this truth because I grant God’s Word supreme authority in my life. As we trace through the narrative of God’s activity in the world, we come across the theme of redemption over and over and over again… from the redemption of Noah and his family from the flood, to the redemption of Israel from slavery in Egypt, to the redemption of the zealot Saul following the death of Jesus, and many others.

Heck, you might even start to believe that communicating the theme of REDEMPTION was one of the main reasons the Bible was written in the first place!

But I also believe in God’s power to redeem because I have experienced it! God redeemed my miserable husk of a life and used it for (I hope) something higher and better than chasing the next sensual gratification.

From my first-hand experience, I have learned that redemption doesn’t mean, “The bad chapter never happened.” Instead, it is God’s assurance that when we lean completely on God, abandoning our own claims to wisdom and nimble adaptability, God gazes on us with loving eyes and says, “I will take this wreckage and create something beautiful and life-giving from it.”

Sort of like the guy who pulled the old, burned-out Mustang off the scrap heap and restored it to better-than-mint condition.

I do not know where the current situation with the novel Coronavirus and COVID-19 is going to lead us. Our country seems to be taking dramatic steps to keep us from gathering in large crowds and spreading the disease at exponential rates. I mean, you know things are bad when major league sports franchises close down indefinitely.

Hopefully, these measures will keep us from overtaxing our healthcare systems, leading to tough decisions about who receives care, and who doesn’t.

As hopeful as I am though, I still fear things might get a lot worse before they show signs of getting better.

But wherever we end up three months… six months… or a year from now, I know one thing with absolute certainty. I know that God will continue to be in the redemption business.

I also know that God will – when we put our full trust in him – take the wreckage that is left behind and make something beautiful out of it.

Always has.

Always will.

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Posts Tagged ‘Paul

Breathing Lessons

The Voice Speaks!

DONE!

Puzzle People

I Can’t Know

Before and After

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