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Purpose in Paper Boats

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By Nate Champneys

My five-year-old and I went down to the creek with some paper to make paper boats. In my mind I could just picture how awesome it would be to let those things go sailing down the creek. So we get down there and I fold the first one and I let it go down the creek. Kaelen was thrilled. But his excitement quickly faded into distress as the boat moved away. He waded after the boat and grabbed it.

“Kaelen, you have to let it go down the creek.” I said.

“No, I want it,” he said.

“Trust me, Kaelen. Let’s just see what happens.”

Frustrated, he slowly let it go. It went about 20 feet and got caught on a log. I waded over to it and Kaelen asked me for it. But I said, “No, dude, you have to let it go.” And I let it go and it sailed down the creek. By this point Kaelen is almost in tears and says, “But Daddy, I really want to keep the boats.”

I head back up the creek to where the stack of paper is sitting, frustrated because my beautiful plan of sailing boats down the creek with my son is not playing out the way I intended it to. But I suddenly think to myself, “Why am I so bothered by this? Who really cares if the boats go all the way down the creek or not? Isn’t the point of being here to have some quality time with my son? Instead I am driving him to tears.” Here I am, focused so hard on the end result of the boats, that I’ve forgotten that the goal of this outing was to have a date with my son. So I told Kaelen, “Okay buddy, I’m sorry. You can keep the boats.” The rest of the afternoon, I would make a boat and he would let it go ten feet or so, pick it up, and add it to his collection on the beach. (With the exception of a couple he let me send down the creek for my own enjoyment. 🙂 ) We came home with an armful of soggy paper boats, and my son was never more thrilled.

As I think about that day, I understand my mistake. I was focusing on what I viewed to be the end result: floating boats. I forgot about the process. I got focused on the “doing” and lost track of the “being,” the “doing” of sailing boats instead of the “being” of being a father to my son. This way of thinking is visible throughout my life and is something I fight daily. In another blog post I wrote about how God’s purposes are wrapped up inside the process of life. We tend to view things as “the end justifies the means” and focus on doing whatever we have to in order to accomplish a specific project. But from God’s perspective, I think that often the means ARE the end.

Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.” Sometimes we hear this verse and we think, “See, God is going to make everything I do prosper.” But that is not what this verse says, nor is it what the surrounding verses are trying to communicate. God is about His purposes. Not ours. In verse 35 Paul asks the question, “Does it mean He no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?” This question implies that we will face these things. We may face trouble. We may face hunger or destitution. We may face persecution. How is that things working together for good? Well, according to my purposes, it isn’t. But it is good because all those bad things work together to accomplish the good thing: His purpose.

God is at work in us, with purposes all throughout the process of life, with the ultimate destination being greater than our immediate happiness, but more so, our holiness. Our job is not focus on the fact that we haven’t arrived at this destination but to be with him in the process, and trust him with it, knowing that we are deeply loved and leave the results up to Him.

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Muddy Water

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By Martin Schlomer

Kim and I love to hike. When we come to a lake we enjoy sitting beside it and gazing into it. We can see the fish and all of the underwater beauty. However, there are seasons when that beauty is lost because of muddy water.

Following Jesus is a beautiful pursuit. It’s filled with challenge, depth, and increasing beauty. However, there are times when its beauty and depth are lost in the muddy water of life’s questions and complexities.

Last Sunday, a person texted this question in response to the message: “What is the by-product of a passionate follower (disciple) of Christ?” I’ve thought A LOT about this. Left to my own thoughts, I can muddy the waters with many, many, many, many good thoughts. Since I wish to avoid muddy water, I will keep my thoughts brief and focused.

The first by-product is a growing awareness that Jesus loves you A LOT! Many people know this, but the growing awareness is a bit vague. This awareness is anchored in our identity in Him. If God was to write you a letter expressing how He sees and feels about you right this moment, what would He write? While we may all believe we are sons or daughters of God, on our insides, many feel like orphans. This sabotages this growing awareness. This is why Paul prays so fervently, “And I pray that you, being [having been and continuing to be] rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ … that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17-19). As this develops, then, as the hymn states, “the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace.”

Second, out of this growing awareness emerges a growing hunger to learn and follow the ways of Jesus (Matthew 28:20). His ways are beautiful and life-giving. They are not burdensome and life depleting. I’ve never heard a person say his or her life has been diminished because of following Jesus as prescribed by Jesus.

Third, out of this awareness and hunger we embrace community. I believe this is the most challenging outcome of being a passionate disciple of Jesus. The image of community we long for is seldom one we can walk into. It must be formed through the crucible of time, trial, and personal change. Peter Scazzero said it best: “Love in practice is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.”[1] This is why we must be “taught by God to love one another” (1 Thessalonians 4:9). However, it is an outcome of following Christ, nonetheless. Jesus refused to relent on this one (John 13:34-35).

At Elim, these by-products (or outcomes) are core to understanding God’s work in this community and family. They require our surrender, focus, and intentionality. However, more importantly, they require the work of the Holy Spirit.

“Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” Philippians 2:12-13

[1] Scazzero, Peter (2006-07-01). Emotionally Healthy Spirituality: Unleash a Revolution in Your Life in Christ (p. 175). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.

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Songbirds and Plastic Chairs

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By Jeff Foerster

Quickened by the rays of the morning sun. Ears dancing to interlacing melodies of songbirds. Belly being filled by breakfast. I sat enjoying the last morning at home in Oregon under ideal conditions, neither too warm, nor too cold. The sunlight upon me, but not shining in my eyes. The air was fresh and any traffic was but a minor lull, like distant breaking waves barely audible.

I had assembled some breakfast and took it to the front deck. The house was nearly empty of belongings and I was the last one to sleep over from the night before. I opened the door to sunlight and a welcomed breeze, slowly moving. The home belonged to my mother, having purchased it some 29 years ago. I had spent some of childhood there and nearly every Thanksgiving, Christmas, and other extended weekends, since. Likewise, summer included several trips back home to landscape, mow, trim, etc., and simply to visit and talk about what the Lord was doing, had done, and looking forward to what He has promised.

So here I was, taking in my last morning before the keys would be passed along. Though all was serene around me, something was wrong inside me. I wanted to savor that moment, to etch in a small memory I could later bring out and look at from time to time, like a worn photograph. Something was missing. Something felt hollow. Like the white plastic chair I sat upon, the pleasantness of the moment was but superficial and temporary. She who had made the house the home was not there. Though not 10 miles away at my sister’s house, at the moment my Mother was gone from my presence. This place was made special by her, not by its construction nor any natural accompaniments.

This makes me think of our home in Heaven. It is not a place constructed by human hands. No eye has seen and no mind has conceived of the splendor and greatness of our eternal home (1 Corinthians 2:9). Even so, I venture to say that even a place as perfect as Heaven would be only a place without the One who created it. Without our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, even the majesty of Heaven would disappoint. Yet this is not our destiny; ours is one with fullness of relationship with our Maker, the One who knows us better than we ourselves and loves us with love greater than all.

Heaven is the perfect place. It is the place of perfect relationship, first with our Heavenly Father, then with others who have gone before us. It is a place made special by the One who dwells there in all His glory. And those loved ones await us, in perfect communion with the Father. So will we join them all in fellowship and joy forever!

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Perspective and Bedtime

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By Brian Sharpe

Why is it so easy to lose something that is so important? Why is it so easy to focus on what doesn’t matter versus what does? Why is it so easy for us to get distracted from the mission God has called us to live? I know I forget way too quickly that I am here for a purpose, and that purpose is not my pleasure.

Since I became a father it has been my job at night to put my kids to bed. The more kids I’ve had, the less fun I’ve had putting them to bed. The original thought was that Tomina was with them all day, so this was a chance that I had with my kids that I could make special. I sometimes read them a story from The Jesus Storybook Bible and then pray with them. It always amazes me how much time they want to spend with me when they want to stay up longer. While this has a little to do with me, it has more to do with the fact that they don’t feel ready for bed. Almost every night I will go back into their rooms and check on them before I go to bed. When I check on Joel, he sometimes will wake up enough to give me a hug and a kiss and tell me he loves me. Then he will drift back off into sleep land.

It is at those moments that I feel my perspective being challenged. It is at those moments that I remember the way God feels about me, because I know what I am feeling about my son. It doesn’t matter what happened that day. He could have been the biggest pill, but, at that moment, I am overcome with how much I love that boy. Then my thoughts go to, God loves me so much more than this.

As we go through life, we have these moments where our perspective is challenged and even changed. God uses our experiences to remind us of His love for us. He also reminds us that He is here. It is when I remember that God is with us and that He has called us that I remember I am here for a reason. My reason is to be His witness to everyone I know. It is a perspective thing. We cannot forget what we are called to do. We cannot forget how much God loves us, and remembering that should compel us to share Christ with those around us.

Think about what matters to you, what you focus on most. Does it have eternal value? Is it helping you accomplish the missions God has you on while you’re here on this earth? We are not guaranteed tomorrow. That statement is not to guilt or shame anyone, but to put life into perspective. Life is short. God loves us and has called us to Himself. Because of this, we need to live on mission, sharing His love with those we come into contact with. It is a perspective thing, and perspective is a funny thing.

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Life Can Be Messy

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By Jim DeAngelo

We were at Long Beach this last week and had a great time. I will always enjoy this memory of taking Sandra on the beach in my Jeep and driving in the sand. I asked Sandra if she wanted to try it — usually she said no, but this time she said YES. She had a great time laughing while doing donuts and spins. Yet we were not the only thing on the beach. During the last few weeks, 100 million jellyfish had died and washed ashore, and the smell was quite overpowering. Well, Sandra went spinning into these jellyfish, slipping and sliding. The Jeep’s undercarriage was coated from the splashes of these rotting creatures. It was quite overpowering.

Well, we dealt with it with smiles. We called the incident “Sandra’s follies.” It was quite an effort to clean up the mess, and there is still a good amount of residue — including the smell! — left. But it will clear sometime in the future (I trust this to be true).

When the events of life are hard and the future looks bleak, we have the choice to trust God and our relationship as His sons and daughters, knowing that it will work out. Because of who we are through Christ, we can put our trust in Him and know that He is truly in charge. We can take comfort and acknowledge that, through the relationship with our Heavenly Father, we look forward to the situation coming to a close. We can take joy in this. If we don’t choose to trust God, however, we can choose to be overcome by the events and the impacts.

So what does the Jeep, smell, and hard events have in common? Life has messy parts, it smells, and it’s hard to clean and get through it. Yet, like our relationship with our Father in heaven, it does work out, and the smell and difficultly goes away. We can take our rest, joy, and comfort from this along the way.

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I Want to Waste My Time

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By Jeff Foerster

My work is focused, my attention is directed, and my clicks are precise. Each image and each caption is carefully read and logged in my short-term memory for comparative purposes. I can easily track my progress toward my endgame, as all are ranked in order of speed. So there I am, dedicated to the task of researching and compiling data crucial to, uh, something or other. There is just enough peripheral information to keep me interested and moving forward, onward toward that approaching goal of uncovering the one — the fastest aircraft in the world! I wade through differing builders and differing sponsoring countries. When a Russian variety makes the list I feel a small sense of competition building, until that plane is superseded by an American aircraft. Then, as this is revealed before my eyes, nationalism is renewed and patriotism stirs within me. I, as an American, am back on top — a victor once more. And all I had to do was click on a slideshow built for the selling of advertisements. Then, something unforeseen took place.

Just below the image of plane number 12, a banner appeared. In a rectangular box plain text spread from left to right across the screen. Unencumbered by decoration, the displayed message was clear: I WANT TO WASTE MY TIME. This is not good advertising. There was no flashy imaging or scrolling text to garner my attention. It didn’t make promises of fulfillment or happiness, however temporal. It didn’t intrigue my curiosity with intellectual ponderings. Nothing of the sort. In fact, the message comes close to being insulting.

Yet I was stunned by this most simple, monochromatic missive. The words before me became almost audible. You see, I had spoken to someone the night before this odd occurrence and revealed to them that I thought God was opening my eyes to how I spend the time He has given me. Lips slightly parted and brows raised, I sat there, staring, then reading and rereading the text to make sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me. I felt exposed, like just becoming aware I had been watched for an indeterminable amount of time. I may have laughed or just shaken my head, though I don’t recall. This had to be one of the bluntest, timeliest messages I have ever received in all my years.

I am not about to delve into concepts of synchronicity or weigh in on the idea that “there are no coincidences.” I will not meander down rabbit trails or set the stage for doctrinal dissertation. What I will do is remind myself and declare to you that each day is precious because it is a gift that our God and Father gives us to unwrap as the day itself unfolds. Each day provides opportunity to take a stand and praise our Maker. How I choose to spend the time given to me declares my priorities, my values, and my loves.

What are you going to do with the time given to you? Who, or what, will it declare that you love?

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