united campus ministry @ ecu

http://www.savedarfur.org/

Well, sometimes my life just don't make sense at all
When the mountains look so big
And my faith just seems so small

So hold me Jesus, 'cause I'm shaking like a leaf
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace

And I wake up in the night and feel the dark
It's so hot inside my soul
I swear there must be blisters on my heart

So hold me Jesus, 'cause I'm shaking like a leaf
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace

Surrender don't come natural to me
I'd rather fight You for something I don't really want
Than to take what You give that I need
And I've beat my head against so many walls
Now I'm falling down, I'm falling on my knees

And this Salvation Army band is playing this hymn
And Your grace rings out so deep
It makes my resistance seem so thin

I'm singing hold me Jesus, 'cause I'm shaking like a leaf
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace

You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace

On Monday I had about a million errands to run. By 2:45 pm I was on the road heading to Canyon Camp (about 40 miles west of OKC) for a Bishop's retreat on evangelism. The content of the retreat wasn't so great, but it was good to be at the camp which is absolutely beautiful. Except it was cold. I did not take any sweatshirts, but I did take one long-sleeve shirt. I needed more warmth!

The retreat was over by 10:30 am on Wednesday so I headed back to Ada, but not before making a stop at Mardel's and then Chick-fil-a in Norman (yumyum)! Back in Ada, I had to scramble to get ready for "Romans and Christians" which UCM did with students from First Baptist Church. We had 21(?) students with about 8 other people helping. The evening went very well and I thought worship was awesome... totally Spirit-led with no hymnals or words on the wall and no Bibles... but we sang beautifully and also shared several scriptures... probably the most meaningful for me was when Jonathan shared the beautitudes... and of course sharing in the Lord's Supper together.

Man was I tired this morning but I was at the UCM by 8:30!!! (I know that is hard to believe!) Mostly I have to get ready for lunch (which means doing some cleaning and organizing of the kitchen, getting ice, running a couple of errands while I am out, etc).

It's kinda quiet right now. Listening to Derek Webb's Mockingbird and boiling water for the tea...

That's my day so far... how's yours?!?!

Last night I had the opportunity to hear Bishop Dan Solomon preach at First United Methodist Church here in Ada. Bishop Solomon was the Bishop in Oklahoma from 1988-1996. He ordained me (a deacon) in 1994. It was good to hear him speak again. I guess it's been ten years since I have heard him preach.

Most folks know I am a United Methodist minister, but some don't! In my position at an ecumenical ministry, I feel it is important for me to visit our supporting churches. I attend some more than others, but I try to visit all of them at least twice a year. Today I worshipped with the folks at H2Ochurch.tv, one of Ada's newest churches.

On Thursday this last week I had a meeting (required) in OKC. The 16 United Methodist-related campus ministers meet on a quarterly basis to discuss issues and make plans for the future. After the meeting, four of us went out to eat and talked for hours which meant I got back to Ada really late. It was raining (slightly) just as I drove into Ada...

On Friday, after having lunch w/a couple of friends, I went to Dallas with Rob and Tyler. Rob wanted to visit Westminster Theological Seminary. The main campus is in Philly... the Texas campus meets in an office building. They have two classrooms, a library, and 8 faculty offices. That's it. It is radically different from Asbury Theological Seminary! At Asbury, we had three dorms, several buildings including a chapel which could seat about 600, and a student center complete with a cafeteria and a gym! WTS is located in the middle of a bustling city... ATS is located in a small, quaint town in the heart of the Bluegrass. ATS is conservative/Wesleyan-Arminian. WTS is conservative/Reformed. You can't get more opposite... but both places lift up the Christ-centered life and the importance of the Scriptures in the Christian faith. Both seek to transform the world because of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

It's amazing to me just how diverse the Christian faith is... from Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic... to groups like Pentecostals and Church of Christ... Southern Baptists, Methodists, and Presbyterians... Quackers...Amish... Salvation Army... Episcopalians... it's truly mind-boggling!

St Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, died today in 1109. Spearheading the rebirth of Western theology, he was the first to try and prove the existence of God by logic alone. He also came up with a new understanding of the atonement. While everyone else thought that Jesus's death paid off the Devil to release our souls from hostage, Anselm insisted that the Devil had no right over us and it was God that he died to appease, enduring the punishment God demanded for human sin.

The controversial theologian Peter Abelard also died today in 1142. Rubbishing Anselm's idea that God demands innocent blood before he will forgive anyone, he explained the crucifixion as Christ's act of love to kindle love in our hearts. Bored of being the greatest thinker in the known world, he then gave up lecturing to write love songs for his landlord's niece Heloise. Caught in his own act of love by the landlord, he was castrated and put Heloise in a nunnery. After a spell as a reforming abbot, in which his monks tried to kill him, Abelard returned to teaching, founding a school in Paris which became the first-ever university.

What does a typical Wednesday look like in the life of a campus minister?

Wednesday, April 19

9:30 am - went to office, set up for worship, etc

10:15 am - went to First United Methodist Church to pick up grant application

10:30 am - went to St. Luke's Church to work at Matthew 25 Mission

noon - back to UCM, talked with a couple of students, checked email, made list of supplies I needed to get for office

1:30 - went home

2 pm - went to Walmart

2:30 pm - headed back to UCM, talked w/student on the phone

3:30 pm (?) - went to Perfect Blend to talk with student

5:00 pm - talked with a friend for about an hour

7:00 pm - went to get something to eat

7:45 pm - headed to UCM for worship

8:00 pm - worship

9:15 pm - mission team meeting

10:00 pm - headed home, sleep.......

Confession of Faith / Creed / Mission Statement / Rant …

A fire is trapped in my veins, it rages like flaming adrenaline, and it must be exposed to a bloodletting. I must die that Christ might come alive in me. I must be a part of a more radical, militant, and authentic expression of the Christian faith. I want to be the 2nd coming of Francis of Assisi, Dietrich Bonhoffer, and Saint Patrick. I want to grow out of the roots of the early church as well as the various traditions that have followed in their wake. I must carry the heritage of the Moravians, Quakers, Methodists, etc. I want to be a resurrected Huss, Justin, Jim Elliott, Luther, Fox, and Spurgeon. I want to carry the undying fire of the martyrs deep in my hearts convictions. I want the furnace of my soul to be ablaze with the memories of Church history and the quickening of the Holy Spirit. I want to think like Augustine, Merton, and Pascal. I want to feel like Teresa of Avila, Ignatius, and Wesley. I want to act like Francis of Assisi, Dorthy Day, and Mother Teresa.

I want to be a worshiper with my hair on fire dancing with the holy rollers in an ecstasy of laughter and tears. I want to pray like the anchorites and the mystics with deep stillness, awe, peace, wonder, solitude, silence, and reflection. I want to be an evangelist who bravely and boldly pierces the darkness with arrows of poetry, art, dialogue, and example. I want to be a discipler who helps people really catch fire with God, grow fully alive, escape the Matrix, and explode unto the scene of this fallen planet with reckless ardor for God and maniacal zeal for Jesus’ kingdom. I want to be a minister of God’s mercy, justice, and redemption; to be a catalyst for Aslan’s majestic love-parade through the citadel’s of Satan’s former territory. I want to be a combat marine, besieging hell, storming Lucifer’s Bastille, and with bloody hands tearing down the very gates of Hell. I want to be part of a fellowship that brings out the best in each other-mining our mutual potential for the diamonds of destiny found deep in the caverns of our darkness. To be a part of a group that challenges and chases each other into greatness; and a group that offers deep agape mercy and compassion to those wounded and twisted places deep in hearts and minds. I want to drink from the fountains of grace till I’m dizzy and punch-drunk on God’s goodness, and I want to lead everyone I can to the meadows of his healing and hope.

I know who I am and who I am not. I am a prophet alive with a deep searing and seething fire for God’s holiness and truth and I must release it to be verbally blazed out and into the hearts of saints and sinners. I am a preacher with a passionate need to be an open vessel for God to lead His people to the high and deep places. I am an administrator who wants to see the kingdom up and running with a full head of steam, actively and efficiently marching God’s army from victory to victory-but sober and mindful that God does not just build up…but also tears down. I am a poet mystic who needs to feel the reflective, mysterious, ineffable, and silent things of God in the recesses of my stormy heart. I am a cultural architect and artist trying to find the pulse of my generation and to sculpt a bridge from that place into the kingdom of God. I am a man of passion and purpose lunging after God awkwardly and haltingly as best I can. I am a man of reflection and action in balance, grace, simplicity, and unflappable elegance. Or at least these are my aspirations.

I am a liturgical, spontaneous, charismatic, and conservative Christian. I stand in the traditions of the social gospel; the contemplatives, liberals and evangelicals, and I seek to find the brightest and best in these traditions. I am the entire kingdom, now and through the ages…the blood of Quakers, Methodists, Martyrs, Monks, and others flows hot and steaming through my veins. I am a Son of God, His friend, and am becoming His lover. My job is nothing short of bringing every single person on this planet to Christ, to make every church the greatest church it can be, and to be transformed myself into a resounding echo, shadow, and a template of the very essence of Christ in His words, thoughts, feelings, and lifestyle.

I am legalisms worst nightmare, and licentiousness’s living hell. I am an embarrassment and an open sore to the cult of religious veneer with their primping, posing, and pathetic hypocrisy. I am a thorn in the side of false worship, tepid commitment, and the double minded. I am a professional assassin and arsonist-attacking consumer Christianity and easy believism with all of its orchards of withered fig trees. I deeply struggle with the 1/2 baked, the “tomorrow” people, and the perpetual and professional “weaker brother.” I admit that apathy and passivity makes me carsick…rebel or follow but I share my Father’s stomach for being nauseated by Laodiceans.

I am a pastor of healing, nurture, and renewal. A bruised reed I will not break. For people who will be “in-process,” and on a journey I offer comfort, balms of healing, patience, and covering. I dream of peoples destinies, and it keeps me up at night, travailing through tears of intercession that God would make whole the brokenness in people’s lives. Like Jesus I long to lift the chin of the shamed, naked, and abused. In my pastors heart is a furnace of love and compassion, though it mixes with the prophetic, it ever bends its knee to the whispers of God. Like the description of Aslan-Christ I want to be good, but I am not safe. I offer comfort, not being comfortable; hope, not insulation from reality; and nurture, not a winking at sin that makes my life easier while starving people of the deliverance they truly need.

I am a catalyst for change and a steward of God’s next wave of impact. I am a frontiersman for the unexplored territory and an apostle for a unified renovation of the global body of Christ. I will stand every day with those in the 10/40 window, I will pray for the persecuted church, and pray that amnesty and justice would come to those wicked places that and powers that stand against God’s will. I am unhinged, unshackled, unintimidated, and unstoppable in His power. I am immortal in his blood, and untouchable until Gods sovereignty determines the day has come to draw my shimmering soul home to heaven’s shores. And when I give my gift and it is received, everything in me centers into a fusion of my life’s purpose and I come fully alive.

I am also melancholy, broken, depressed, lonely, frightened, faithless, seduced, rebellious, and exhausted. I deeply need those around me to minister healing, hope, and renewal to my soldier’s soul. I openly, nakedly, transparently, and honestly confess I need people. I need the flow of their hearts, spiritual gifts, wisdom, experience, and lives to mingle with my own. I need to sweat, work, be embarrassed, worship, bleed, suffer, sit, rest, drink a beer, stand, and laugh in the company of the saints. I need to be taken cared of, prayed over, challenged, rebuked, edified, encouraged, cried over, kicked in the ass, kissed on the lips, hugged, and slapped in the face. I have a tendency to be a hermit, an island, and a fortress of isolationism. I need God and my brothers and sisters in Christ to scale the battlements, cut through my barbed wire, and beat down the doors of my life. I want to believe I can make it without you…but I must confess, I can’t.

I also confess that apart from God I can do NOTHING. Everything I am, have accomplished, or ever will is a testimony solely to Gods goodness, grace, longsuffering, and tender compassion. I am and have nothing, my pockets are empty…yet the glory of God overshadows and blinds me to my sin, wretchedness, and shame. He alone is worthy, and I am but clay in the His hand. Like Paul, I consider all of my credentials as shit compared to the honor of knowing God.

This is my creed, my mission, the gospel according to me. I cannot and will not bend from these visions, convictions, and callings. This is who I am.

(by David Sherwood at Mosaic)

The Pentecostal revival burst out in a mixed-race chapel at 312 Azusa Street, Los Angeles, today in 1906. Inspired by the Welsh evangelical revival, Pastor William Seymour started prayer meetings for revival in Azusa Street. The meetings erupted with Pentecostal phenomena. Thousands came and took the gift of tongues home to share with friends and family. There are now in excess of 51 million Pentecostals worldwide. (from ship-of-fools.com)

Now the green blade rises from the buried grain,
Wheat that in the dark earth many years has lain;
Love lives again, that with the dead has been:
Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green.

In the grave they laid Him, Love Whom we had slain,
Thinking that He’d never wake to life again,
Laid in the earth like grain that sleeps unseen:
Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green.

Up He sprang at Easter, like the risen grain,
He that for three days in the grave had lain;
Up from the dead my risen Lord is seen:
Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green.

When our hearts are saddened, grieving or in pain,
By Your touch You call us back to life again;
Fields of our hearts that dead and bare have been:
Love is come again, like wheat that springs up green.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, we pray to set your passion, cross and death between your judgment and our souls, now and in the hour of our death. Give mercy and grace to the living; pardon and rest to the dead; to your Holy Church peace and concord; and to us sinners everlasting life and glory; for with the Father and the Holy Spirit, you live and reign, one God, now and forever.

(from the Good Friday liturgy, Book of Common Prayer)

The most moving part of last night's Maundy Thursday worship experience was when they 'stripped the altar' at the end of the service. The whole congregation recited Psalm 22, the church was bare, and we left in darkness and silence... in preparation for Good Friday.

This is a shout out to Brett S., Christina H., and Andy W. who have helped with lunch preparations and cleanup for the past few months at UCM. Thanks!!!

Tonight was our annual "Stations of the Cross" worship experience at the campus ministry. It is always a moving experience as we walk through the events leading up to the cross and the resurrection.

A small group of us have been reading through the Bible together. We try to meet for one hour 4 days a week. With patience and perserverance, we have made it to the end of 2 Chronicles. At times it has been tough with all kinds of names we don't know how to pronounce! I am looking forward to reading through the Psalms and Proverbs! It will be a nice break from all the history we have been reading.

Refrain

All glory, laud and honor,
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To Whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.

Thou art the King of Israel,
Thou David’s royal Son,
Who in the Lord’s Name comest,
The King and Blessèd One.

Refrain

The company of angels
Are praising Thee on High,
And mortal men and all things
Created make reply.

Refrain

The people of the Hebrews
With palms before Thee went;
Our prayer and praise and anthems
Before Thee we present.

Refrain

To Thee, before Thy passion,
They sang their hymns of praise;
To Thee, now high exalted,
Our melody we raise.

Refrain

Thou didst accept their praises;
Accept the prayers we bring,
Who in all good delightest,
Thou good and gracious King.

Refrain