As people were leaving over and over I heard “thank you,” “Merry Christmas,” as well as hugs were given across racial lines. Person to person, kindness to kindness, smile to smile. Neighborhood boys from the local school were handing out candy canes to the children as well as stuffed animals. Another youth group made gift bags for other neighbors and come the following Tuesday morning we’ll be together again worshipping God, listening to one another and being a helping community.

com·mu·ni·ty

1. a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical heritage.

2. a locality inhabited by such a group.

3. a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived or perceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the larger society within which it exists (usually preceded by the ): the business community; the community of scholars.

4. a group of associated nations sharing common interests or a common heritage: the community of Western Europe.

When I consider community I wonder which we see. Is it #1, #2, #3, or #4? If I would venture my sociological insight – #4. Why? Because we come from many backgrounds, sub-cultures, interests, economic and religious, sexual orientations and fellowship together under one purpose – the love of Christ that motivates one group to serve and offer received grace to others who in turn return that grace to the other group.

I experienced this today.

Federal investigators said Ronald Weinland, minister of Church of God, Preparing for the Kingdom of God, failed to report more than $356,000 in income between 2004 and 2009.

Authorities said Weinland spent church funds for his own use without reporting that money as income and failed to register a Swiss bank account on his tax returns or report interest earned on that account.

If convicted on all five counts, authorities said Weinland faces up to five years in prison and fines up to $250,000.

I’m not sure how a minister can consider not to be above the board in all his/her doings. I know it happens and happens in all professions but what I have noticed more than once is when someone is without friends that hold them accountable they will and do stagger off. When they (we, I) do not have friends who hold them in prayer or ask the important questions because they are afraid of being asked the same questions and letting them selves be open everyone fails one another. Joe Paterno is learning this right now. We need each other to sometimes force us to do the right thing, forgive us when we don’t and offer new steps to take for reconciliation. The IRS can be God’s gift to this preacher and the justice system for Coach Paterno which ever way this turns out for him. But once we begin the staggering it is easy to find a wider path to try to stay afoot on.

Flags around the perimeter of the church reminding me of my heritage as an American, that we are all in this country together, we have a duty to the world to help with freedom, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all humankind.

That we are 13 original colonies and 50 individual states united, under God, with millions of immigrants making each of us a melting pot of experiences and life to become one country for all people.

While we may not be perfect in all our actions we correct the problems and seek not to err again. And if we err again, we trust that our people will rise to correct it. And correct ourselves in midstride is the work of every American.

I’m thankful for the Officer and friend of the Cincinnati Police Dept who stood with Cincinnati and Cheviot firemen to show we are all here to make a community a community.

I’m grateful for staff and choir who joined together to make a very celebratory and somber remembrance that tragedy comes to us all and together we can care for one another.

Another questionable positive about taking care of yourself is that I did discover that I like gooseberry pie. I’m not in love with it but I tried it out at an event not long ago and I actually like the tartness and of course the sugar. I never ever in my entire life have liked gooseberries. But now I do – strange.

Diaries: I just started writing more often than not about my day. I was inspired by a couple of things like forgetfulness and biographies. Now I don’t intend to write a biography or a book about my ministry but the thought occurred, “How do these folks remember all this stuff? Must have been a diary!” So instead of staring at my lovely wife when she asks, “What did we do two days ago?” I have an answer from a source, if only I can remember where I wrote it down.

Talk Radio: Oh my goodness – I had the radio on for 10 minutes today and heard 5 different talk show hosts – no one expects America to shine, believe in democracy, offers many solutions, has respect for those who disagree or doesn’t have some sure fire way of making a million bucks. What do you say?

Living Christlike: impossible on my own – need greatly the truth of John 15 (that is in the New Testament – book and chapter).

 And this is what some of us, not all of us do as a healthy habit.  We get an exam. I just hope your exam isn’t like this:

A fellow was hitting the ski slopes when a bizarre accident occurred. While he was fumbling his way off a chair lift, another chair hit him from behind and knocked him out cold. He woke up with a headache, in a hospital bed and immediately called his insurance company.

After explaining what happened the insurance rep said, “We’re covering nothing on this claim. You hit yourself in the head with a chair on a ski lift. You’re an idiot. And that’s a pre-existing condition.”

 What if this year we decided, you and I are going to take care of ourselves?

And start with soul care? And we are going to get rid of any pre-existing conditions?!

 TAKE A DEEP BREATH

Most of us find ourselves trying harder and doing more and there is this emptiness underneath it all that no amount of activity, Christian or otherwise, can fill. What if it isn’t more that will satisfy but less?

 Sometimes don’t you wish that you could take another vacation today but this time be refreshed and re-born?

 What if Jesus really meant what he said, “I promise you life and that life will be abundant?”

 Does abundance mean more activity, more stuff, more work, more, more, more or something better? Maybe Less with more good, hopeful and refreshing?

My goal and hope in these three messages is to do just that – refreshment and rebirth. Not that we’ll accomplish this in some brief moments together but at least help us to think about it and make some serious efforts.

And journey towards soul care.

What is soul care?

• Authentic relationships where in trusting relationships we find solace and hope.
  • My best soul care has been in relationship with someone who will listen first and comment later, IF necessary. That style frees me up to think and even hear what I have to say. Sometimes I surprise myself! What about you?
  • Authentic is then the key descriptive.
    • A place where we can become
    • A place where together there are grounds for discussion
• In a practice of reflection that is both satisfying in style and refreshing in outcome for your desire for real life.
  • That can be many different ways depending on our personalities.
    • Woman at the well in John 4 where the discussion is back and forth and where Jesus reveals to her that he is indeed the Messiah. Vs. 26
    • Nicodemus, the Pharisee who comes in the middle of night to Jesus away from everyone and discusses who Jesus is and leaves to think some more.
    • In John 8 in a life and death situation another refreshing conversation takes place between Jesus and the woman caught in adultery. She leaves refreshed … ALIVE … and forgiven.

So soul care is the ability to have reflection that is refreshing in the outcome and by refreshing I mean life giving.

• De-cluttering our stuff in life for order and transformation.
• It is asking the right questions for the right direction.

John Wesley

Wesley used questions like:

• Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?
• Do I confidentially pass on to others what has been said to me in confidence?
• Can I be trusted?
• Am I a slave to dress, friends, work or habits?
• Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?
• Did the Bible live in me today?
• Do I give the Bible time to speak to me every day?
• Am I enjoying prayer?
• When did I last speak to someone else of my faith? [ conversation starter questions ]
• Do I pray about the money I spend?
• Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?
• Do I disobey God in anything?
• Do I insist upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
• Am I defeated in any part of my life?
• Am I jealous, impure, critical, irritable, touchy or distrustful?
• How do I spend my spare time?
• Am I proud?
• Do I thank God that I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisees who despised the publican?
• Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize, hold a resentment toward or disregard? If so, what am I doing about it?
• Do I grumble or complain constantly?
• Is Christ real to me?

What if 2011 our small groups, UMW circles, youth asked these questions at least 3-4 times a year? What if we sought authenticity, rebirth of that promised abundant life and it was done in community?

 Hebrews 12:1,2

Hebrews 12:1,2 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, ²looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

Check and examine if an attitude; an action is clinging on your soul

• Run in your life; your lot as you can determine Jesus calls
• Goal is to sit with God!

“Our soul is like an inner stream of water, which gives strength, direction, and harmony to every other element of our life. When that stream is as it should be, we are constantly refreshed and exuberant in all we do, because our soul itself is profusely rooted in the vastness of God and his kingdom, including nature; and all else within us is enlivened and directed by that stream.”
~ Dallas Willard, author of Renovation of the Heart

Sound promising?

Something you need?

             What would the results of soul care look like?

St. Francis wrote this prayer and I think it gives us an idea of a life dedicated to soul care may become…

 Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace;                    (Source in us)

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;                            (Pts to a lifestyle of character

where there is doubt, faith;                                            dependence on Christ’s Spirit

where there is despair, hope;                                         living the Great Commandment

where there is darkness, light;

and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek

to be consoled as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love;

for it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is dying that we are born to eternal life.                 (Phil 2)

Saint Francis

As I focus on this prayer, not saying that St. Francis was perfect but to be a saint you gotta seeking to be in love with God and your neighbor.

What life do you see here in this prayer?

A transformed life in relation to a Christian is someone who makes believing in God easy; where you and I are that someone whose life reflects the faith, hope and love of God.

Soul Care begins in knowing that we are loved which frees us up to follow the Christ.

Most of us are familiar with Maslow hierarchy of needs.

Needs at the bottom of the pyramid are basic physical requirements including the need for food, water, sleep and warmth. Once these lower-level needs have been met, people can move on to the next level of needs, which are for safety and security.

There are five different levels in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs:

Physiological Needs
These include the most basic needs that are vital to survival, such as the need for water, air, food and sleep. Maslow believed that these needs are the most basic and instinctive needs in the hierarchy because all needs become secondary until these physiological needs are met.

Security Needs
These include needs for safety and security. Security needs are important for survival, but they are not as demanding as the physiological needs. Examples of security needs include a desire for steady employment, health insurance, safe neighborhoods and shelter from the environment.

Social Needs
These include needs for belonging, love and affection. Maslow considered these needs to be less basic than physiological and security needs. Relationships such as friendships, romantic attachments and families help fulfill this need for companionship and acceptance, as does involvement in social, community or religious groups.

Esteem Needs
After the first three needs have been satisfied, esteem needs becomes increasingly important. These include the need for things that reflect on self-esteem, personal worth, social recognition and accomplishment.

Self-actualizing Needs
This is the highest level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Self-actualizing people are self-aware, concerned with personal growth, less concerned with the opinions of others and interested fulfilling their potential.

While all true there is a core truth that can come to anyone anytime – the truth of God’s abundant love. This is the core of St. Francis’ prayer, “Thy Peace” and our dying to self and being alive to Christ. As Maslow shows we become because we rest in security and this is what Psalm 139 is all about.

Follow along with me in Psalm 139

¹ O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
² You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
   you discern my thoughts from far away.
³ You search out my path and my lying down,
   and are acquainted with all my ways.
⁴ Even before a word is on my tongue,
   O Lord, you know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in, behind and before,
   and lay your hand upon me.

⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
   it is so high that I cannot attain it.

¹³ For it was you who formed my inward parts;
   you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
   Wonderful are your works;
that I know very well.
¹⁵   My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
   intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written
   all the days that were formed for me,
   when none of them as yet existed.
¹⁷ How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
   How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
   I come to the end—I am still with you.

²³ Search me, O God, and know my heart;
   test me and know my thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any wicked way in me,
   and lead me in the way everlasting.

When we consider soul care, it isn’t about us only as believers, as Christians, it is all about living within the love of God.

We take care of ourselves because God loves us and knows us.

We know this is true for Jews and Christians, truth matters infinitely and ultimately because it’s a question of the trustworthiness of God himself. He is true, he acts truly, he speaks truly. Our human “truth seeking,” our soul care is therefore underwritten by the truthfulness of the creator of the universe. Truth transcends us. As we follow it, it leads us on, back, and up to one who is true.[1]

That is what 23 and 24 are about.

²³ Search me, O God, and know my heart;
   test me and know my thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any wicked way in me,
   and lead me in the way everlasting.

The goal of the Father is leading each of is from our backgrounds, our experiences, our problems, our successes, our failures, our hopes to the way everlasting.

That “way everlasting” is that way that leads from pain and death.

The way everlasting is that way of life that leads to joy instead of misery.

If that is your prayer I have good news!

God will answer! And is answering.

Soul care is that testing and knowing your heart and mind. It is understanding why I do what I do and why I struggle so. And having the God permission to do an exam of myself. To take the time for soul care.

What if this year you set yourself to understanding yourself and freeing yourself to be who God already knows you can be?

Soul care then is realizing that God has an infinitely higher view of you than you do of yourself.

It is a motivator of soul care.

This isn’t to be confused with expectations.

            Expectations are placed on us by others or even ourselves.

• An expectation to make an “A” on a test.
• An expectation to provide money for a cause.
• An expectation to be on time.

No God’s view of you is precious.

⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
   it is so high that I cannot attain it.

How do you see God?

I see God as being pure and holy, good and marvelous, joyful and who in love as never had an evil thought nor intent about me or you.

            Have you thought evil of yourself? God has never thought evil towards you and never will.

            Have you ever thought unholy, impure thoughts of yourself? God has never done so, nor ever will.

 God never has.

 And the first step of soul care is grasping this wonder of God’s care for your soul.

It is to rest in the character of God.

And then Soul care is you in relation with God and others with the goal to discover God’s thoughts for you and what that means.

Oh the wonder of Psalm 139 as it tells us that God has hemmed you in behind and before (5) and that is a welcomed truth! It feels like Maslow’s response that we need safety and security to be able to press on and God has provided it.

 Sometimes we may feel that having someone know us this well is like hemming us in! But in a negative way – how can I ever be me?

 But as we experience what our hearts have longed – to have someone know everything about us and love us anyway- that love becomes a safe harbor within which I am able to know and be known.

 Soul care this year is because God cares for YOU.

 Let’s Do It Well Again!

As I watch them I don’t think I would like to be one of them. No, I like my coffee! So far in all my searches for good bird feed I’ve not come across that flavor. Have you?

Christmas is that reminder that Jesus did come in a manner of speaking as a bird. He left his riches of Heaven as being Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father and took the form of a human-being. With our limits as opposed to his unlimitedness; our frailties as opposed to being perfect and told the world the God loves us. He hovered for position, ate what he could, became a part of the world we live in and have our abode. It was a choice of God’s – to come into the world and speak our language(s).

I hope you have a joyous Christmas season especially as we live into 2011. Know I am in prayer for you as I hope you are for me. May God help us to be people who make it easy for others to know God’s love.

Twenty-seven years ago a man in Kansas City made a choice to give away the cash. It was a choice that changed his life and the lives of thousands more. The Associated Press reported that for the next 27 years, a man known only as Secret Santa roamed the streets every December quietly giving people money. He started with $5 and $10 bills. As his fortune grew, so did the gifts. In recent years, Secret Santa handed out $100 bills, sometimes two or three at a time, to people in thrift stores, diners and parking lots. He anonymously gave out about $1.3 million. It was a long-held holiday mystery: Who is the Secret Santa? Last Christmas, weakened from chemotherapy and armed with a desire to pass on his belief in random kindness, Secret Santa decided it was time to reveal his identity.

 Larry Stewart, a 58-year-old businessman from the Kansas City suburb of Lee’s Summit, Mo., made his millions in cable television and long-distance telephone service. While Stewart also gave money to other community causes in Kansas City and his home town of Bruce, Miss., he offered the simple gifts of cash because it’s something people didn’t have to “beg for, get in line for, or apply for.”

His epiphany happened just before Christmas in 1979. His circumstances were dire. For the second year in a row he had been fired just days before Christmas. He admits that he was wallowing in self-pity when he learned that giving returned an inexplicable joy. That simple discovery changed him, the entire city of Kansas City, and beyond. Let’s pick up the story as Stewart was nursing his wounds at a drive-in restaurant after getting fired once again. He describes that December day in his own words.

“It was cold and this car hop didn’t have on a very big jacket, and I thought to myself, `I think I got it bad. She’s out there in this cold making nickels and dimes,”‘ he said. He gave her $20 and told her to keep the change. “And suddenly I saw her lips begin to tremble and tears begin to flow down her cheeks. She said, `Sir, you have no idea what this means to me.”‘

Larry Stewart was deeply touched. He decided to go to the bank that day and took out $200, then drove around looking for people who could use a lift. That was his “Christmas present to himself.”  He hit the streets each December every year after that Christmas. Last January Larry Stewart died from complications caused by esophageal cancer. He was only fifty-eight years old.

Even after his passing his mission lives on. Stewart spoke often to community groups about his devotion to kindness and to inspire others to donate their time and money. “That’s what we’re here for,” Stewart says, “to help other people out.”

Larry Stewart learned the reality of money and possessions that was eloquently expressed by author Thomas Fuller. “Riches enlarge rather than satisfy appetites.” 

 As a follower of Christ, Dave Burchett wrote, I think Stewart has it half right when he notes that we are here to help other people out. The religious scholars asked Jesus what a purpose driven life should look like. “Teacher, which command in God’s Law is the most important?” 
Jesus said, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. But there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from them.”   (Matthew 22, The Message)

 During this Christmas season I am challenging you to join me in trying Larry Stewart’s experiment. Go buy yourself a gadget or outfit or bauble. Note the reading on your personal joy meter. Then go give money to a desperate Mom trying to make ends meet. Or give some cash to an elderly couple who can’t pay the heating bill. Deliver a Christmas gift to children who would not receive gifts any other way. Then see which action has given you real joy. Was it acquiring more stuff or meeting real needs in the lives of others? Larry Stewart learned that lesson. And the world is a better place because of the revelation he experienced on a cold December day twenty-seven years ago.

 Pray about what you can give this Christmas. Remember that Larry Stewart started small. I pray that you will receive the kind of joy that drove the Kansas City “Secret Santa” for twenty-seven years. The chance to witness the surprised joy of a person receiving an unexpected and much needed gift. Kind of like salvation, isn’t it? That is the gift that Jesus brought to Bethlehem two millenia ago. And that is another gift we should be eager to share this season.

 Jesus to John’s disciples: ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: ⁵the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. ⁶And blessed is anyone who takes no offence at me.’

The Person who seems to have done a lot in the world was Jesus and He seemed to know what to pray about (the Disciple’s Prayer) and he modeled it many times as he went off alone to pray. Were those times irrelevant? It is easy to say no but remember the story of the Jesus coming off the mountain and the disciples saying to Jesus, ‘where have you been ….. look at all that we have to do!’ Everyday there is another person, another dollar, another test, another job interview, another bill to pay and there will be the next day and the next and the next and th….. Why not take a break and spend an hour in prayer? Use the Disciples Prayer as a model. Pray back to God some of the Psalms or Gospels or Letters of the New Testament.

I don’t want to be irrelevant. But Jesus seemed to have a handle on how to be relevant.

Baseball while a team sport is also an individual’s effort. You face the pitcher alone, you field your position with a team but alone, you have to perform.  Sometimes the rest of the team carries you because you can’t hit, you make an error, you don’t have your “game” today other times you help carry someone else.

But “two out and nobody on” adds a whole new dimension to the game. You are the last out, the last effort, the last chance. You are the object blocking 9 other guys from going to the dugout and 8 other guys from grabbing their gloves one more time and trotting back out to defend their score. You are the movement of fluid motion that will either miss or hit a ball traveling at 90 miles an hour and you have 1 second do to it.

90 feet away is a base that beckons for your arrival, sweeting the charts with a single or a walk, offering a percentage point up on the batting average because once again you moved from nobody to somebody on. Joe Buck says your name, the camera flashes your profile, the crowd cheers and the inning that once was almost over has hope to continue as “two out and nobody on” becomes that’s a hit.

Nobody is Somebody.

700 Sundays title came from the revelation that the Sundays Billy had with his dad were just that – 700, Billy’s dad died when Billy was 15 and in those short years Billy got to know some of his dad’s life – love of jazz, business owner, friend of people down and out and respected for his caring and hard work to help others in their careers. Reading this story I began to reflect on my days with my dad too. He is still alive and we live several miles apart but I wonder if I’m as grateful for his days with me?

My dad is a guy who when I grew up offered to help me learn and better myself. He always believed in me and my abilities. We would play catch forever in the back yard and he would gradually throw the baseball harder and harder so I would learn to catch the ball and not be afraid of getting hit. I only remember getting hit in the nose twice by balls thrown to me – one by my dad that ripped through the webbing in my glove and the second as my high school team was warming up and the shortstop, Steve, throw a rifle shot the jumped when it should have dropped and tipped the top of my glove. Neither time did my nose break, that was the only game I missed in high school once I started and all because of a miss.

My dad was one too that inspired me to risk for the right cause. Risk taking and adventure, the game of life, the excitment of something new was always happening at my house when I was growing up. We were the house kids came too, the place where wiffel ball games would last all day and into the late hours of night, where pool was played with a corner cue stick that was only 3 foot long, where pizza came out of the oven and Pepsi was everywhere. We had pong (remember?) and those guns that would shoot out a laser beam and make a sound that meant you were dead, hay rides and watermelon seed spitting contests with not just a dozen kids at the house but 3 dozen.

My dad showed his emotions on his sleeve too. When he is/was mad – you knew it but he is so quick to say he loves me and patch it up. Many times I didn’t  get my way, but you know even if you didn’t it is okay, just to know we talked about it.

I hope I still have some Sundays coming. You never know as we all get older who will be promoted sooner and later. But in the mean time I think I’ll pick up the phone more often and just talk, neither of us is too good at that, talking on the phone, but we can try and maybe we’ll enjoy some more Sundays.