I'll be roaming a new floor at Hendrick Medical Center for the next several weeks.

The seventh floor. Oncology.

This stuff is getting pretty close to home.

This blog has caught the rough end of a lot of thinking I have done about ACU and the Graduate School of Theology. I continue to churn out deep criticisms of this system, but I must give credit where credit is due. My conversations are typically centered on the work of the spirit and the place of and respect for spiritual ministry within the GST context, which I am not sure has the place that it should, but ACU and the GST do shine when it comes to their academic and intellectual mission.

The place of the university in the world is academic and intellectual inquiry. The university, by definition, is the place in society where ideas are created, tested, and forged. Then they are continually reexamined. Any university that does not engage in this practice, or operates only by a predetermined set of ideas, fails to be a university and is only an indoctrination regime. ACU, while grounded in Christian values and framework, seems to recognize this mission about itself.

What brings this topic up is the upcoming visit by a Christian activist group called SoulForce. This group is touring the country, visiting colleges and military schools that have standing policies against homosexual behavior. Their aim is to bring as much national attention as possible to the silent suffering, hiding, and self-hatred that homosexuals must endure at these institutions. They have made ACU one of their stops.

ACU has proceeded very wisely in the face of this situation. They made the SoulForce issue public to the students and faculty long in advance and have opened the campus, within reason, to the group. While publicly reaffirming the standing core value concerning ACU's Christian view of homosexual behavior, the leadership has encouraged open dialogue on the issue and has facilitated multiple events for students to discuss this specific situation and the issues at large. In this same vein, the Graduate School of Theology is holding its own four hour event specifically for their graduate students. The Dean of the College of Biblical Studies has already made available several readings that address the homosexuality topic from a number of theological perspectives (pro and con) in preparation for this serious discussion.

Openness to inquiry. Absense of fear and rejection of dogma in the face of hard questions. Facilitation of dialogue among various perspectives. While total consensus may never be reached, the quest for better understanding of what we know and believe is sharpened by the work of the university when it lives up to its calling to continuous intellectual pursuit.

Facebook is a campus minister's best friend. Not only does it track student's social networks and points to tremendous amounts of personal information such as web pages, blogs and photos, it now tracks important social information such as the top books students are reading, the music they are listening to, movies they are watching, organizations they are joining, and their political views. Not only that, but it tracks trends in each of these categories and more, showing how much certain things are increasing or declining. Fantastic. I hope campus ministers are learning how to use tools like this.

Thank God for old friends who don't see themselves as old friends and care about you the same today as they ever did.

Galatians 3:3:

Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?

God, in his perfect wisdom, placed me into a program that forces me to visit hospital rooms every week. Thank him for that. Otherwise I would probably suffocate under the weight of the egos and hot air fluffery all around me. Passing through the doorways of Hendrick Medical Center twice each week takes me though the gateway into the land of the suffering and broken. A place where people have no ability to have egos and the burden of their failures takes the form of tubes running out of their bloody noses and straps that hold them to their beds. Bert, who last week so enthusiastically told the dreamy tales of his wondrous 47 year marriage while sitting in his chair, lay crumpled in his bed, tubes shoved in his arms and face, barely able to open his eyes and mumbling incoherent words. I tried to listen and understand while wiping away the mucus thrown onto his cheeks by bone-rattling coughs. He has nothing figured out. He is completely powerless, completely helpless, at the mercy of whatever the next person who walks in wants to do.

The picture is not much more rosy for Trinia, who sits in the corner staring with tired eyes towards her 88 year old husband who is slowly being robbed from her by dementia. All that can be done is squat beside her with a hand over hers as the tears roll down her face at the sight of seeing heroic husband of 50 years strapped to the chair, staring at the floor. He still knows who she is, though, and the bond of love is powerful as she fights for the life and the dignity of a man who has little left to muster for himself.

These are people who must accept the fact that their abilities, their knowledge, their accomplisments, their associations, and their personalities mean little to the realities that are overtaking them. Impressing others has little place in the world they now inhabit. Submission to the abilities of those that can help them is all they have.

Brokenness is a hard place to go. It is a place that shatters the mirror we spend our days posing in front of and vaporizes the walls of protection we spend so long building. But on the other side of that mirror, just beyond the foundations of that wall, is the spirit of God, waiting, with an outstretched arm.

A Valentine's Day Story
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The door to Bert's hospital room was wide open, so I stepped in, knocking on the door frame as I usually do. Bert, a 70 year old man recovering from knee replacement surgery, was reclining in the chair and welcomed me in. As most people are on this floor, he was glad to see me and let me sit down. We did the usual chit-chat about his condition, how long he had been here, and the usual questions about background and family. Patients usually like to talk about their families, but Bert took me on a special ride today.

"I met a wonderful girl in 1952. She was 12 years old. We were in grade school together. She and I became good friends, and when she was 18 I married her."

Bert's wife died of cancer a little over a year ago. The tears form in the corner of his eyes as the words breathlessly escape his lips - "I lost her." The two of them had celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary only weeks before - in the hospital, with her weakened by the cancer ravaging her body. She eventually slipped into a coma. Two nights later, he awoke by her side at about 2:00am and knew that something was different. He knew that she had fallen asleep permenantly, and laid by her side and held her hand as she left him. Forty-seven years of radical commitment and unquestioned loyalty culminating in a quiet moment at her side in the middle of the night.

Bert tried to apologize for laying this on me. But his story conitnued. He talked of the commitments that they had made together - the vows that were sacred to them both. The decisions they had come to about what their life together would look like - a simple life - his days as a professional mechanic and her full time job as a mother - but his words brought out the wonders he found in such a life simply by being able to come home to her every day. He was honest about the difficulties, but covered that with the strong language of undying commitment. "We said to death do us part - and we meant that."

It was time for me to leave, so Bert and I prayed together. We prayed of the blessings of life that God grants us to carry us through every day. We prayed of the gift of marriage that he had experienced for so many decades, and was now learning to live without. I thanked God for the testimony that he has given Bert of what unfailing commitment and love looks like - a picture that is slowly fading in the world.

I left Bert sitting in that room, still feeling some of the pains of his loss. But I left a man in that room who can face God knowing that he made a commitment before him and gave himself to a promise that he took seriously and cherished with his whole heart until God reclaimed it.

I left a man in that room today, who, through tears and apology, reminded me that the embodiment of God's love for us can still exist on earth today.

Click here to be blessed by a powerful testimony.

Yesterday I was at lunch with a number of good friends. As a response to a comment in a conversation, one of my friends remarked "These are my people."

Although it was said in jest, it was true. These were her people. And they were my people too. These are the people with whom I am closest. These are the people with whom I share almost every day. I know them deeply, and they understand me as well. They know the things that make me excited, what annoys me, what my goals are, and what my fears are. They are the people with whom I can actually waste time. Our time together doesn't have to have a plan or agenda. I share different things in common with each one of them, but together we form a "family" whose ties create a tight bond. This is sappy, I know. Just stick with me. This is important to me because I know we all came together through our common faith. This is the kind of thing that, for me, make scripture and the Christlife come to life. This kind of community is the thing that God had in mind from the beginning and what the fellowship of the first believers was like. It is not defined by institutional forms or programmatic planning. The community exists as much on a Tuesday night bike ride as it does during worship on Sunday.

But there is something that bothers me. I sat in my GST mentor group this morning and helped welcome in a new member who is in his first semester of the MDiv. (Remember those days? Way back, six months ago?) He, like so many others, is a young guy who wants a job as a preacher. And, like so many others, he is scraping together little preaching gigs week by week at some of the many small-town rural churches in the area. He is taking it upon himself to offer his spiritual leadership and teaching to these little communities so he can get some experience and improve his skills. God bless him. But he is empty, and it is obvious. He has no connection. He has lived in Abilene for years now (he did undergrad here), but cannot claim to have any people with whom he is close or can call spiritual family. He said that he preached on 1 Thessalonians this past Sunday for a little church. That's awesome.... but wait.... what are the important themes of 1 Thessalonians? As far as I can tell, it is to encourage the church there in the bond that they have with one another and their powerful communal faith in the face of intense persecution. It is to emphasize their duty to one another as the fulfillment of the daily Christlife. I hope this doesn't sound judgemental, but how can these ideas be taught to a church by someone who has no experience in living that in his own life?

This wouldn't be an issue to me if it weren't so common. I spend most of my days right now in the halls of an institution that is designed to help train spiritual leaders for greater service to the kingdom. Why is it so filled with people whose only obligation to the kingdom is a "job" that they do on Sunday morning? Why am I sitting in rooms with many guys whose only ambition to kingdom work is to somehow find some kind of job when they are done so that they will not starve? Why, when I ask the graduating MDiv student with whom I am eating lunch what his goals are, all he can give me is a flippant answer about joining a cult and skipping through flowers? Then when I press, all he can say is "get some kind of job"?

I thank God that, even though this situation is common, is it not the majority. There are many incredibly directed, spirit-driven students here that are involve with, and preparing for, great missions in service to their Savior. People who recognize the purposes God has given to them and what the daily life in community with his people is about. People for whom it is not a job but a calling. These are the people to whom God has given spiritual eyes and who see the world around them as mission and work to make every moment a chance to glorify and lead for God. These are also the people who recognize how much they need - how desperate they are - for the lifeblood of God's spirit, his word, and his community.

Recent words:

Hope, caution, love, confusion, trust, uncertainty, unknown, forgiveness, honesty, together, hearts, mystery, wrestle, waiting, risk, path, future, guard, commit, call, join, vulnerable, discernment, uncertainty, fear, rebuilding, amazing, beautiful, life, protect, laughter, hiccup.

Courage: I like it because I need it to do something.

Very wise words.

The first chapter of Luke tells of two important people who had similar experiences. These characters were Zechariah and Mary, and what happened to both of them was extraordinary. Both were visited by an angel who told them they would be part of an impossible birth - a son to Zechariah, and a son to Mary.

But there was a difference. Zechariah was a priest. He was an official servant of God. He had every qualification and was "upright in the sight of God." His job description essentially was to be the interdmediary between God and the people - God's instrument. When the angel appeared and told him he would have a son, he immediately (even though this was an angel standing before him) questioned the possibility of having a son. Right there the angel struck him mute because of his unbelief.

A few months later the angel visited Mary and gave her the same message. Mary was incredulous as well, since she was a virgin. But the angel gently explained to her what would happen. At this, Mary made what is one of the greatest faith statements in the Bible: "I am the Lord's servant. May it be to me as you have said."

What was the difference between these two circumstances? What caused one to bring temporary divine punishment upon one and explanation with acceptance upon the other? Perhaps it fits the pattern that Jesus was to demonstrate with his life and ministry. Christ constantly calls out the hypocrisy and unbelief of those who fill the "elite" religious positions. The self-importance they heap on themselves while supposedly being the "teachers" of the faith cut against the grain of the call to radical humility and service. Therefore, who dares deem themselves worthy of "filling" such a position? Could it be that Zechariah had lost sight of the profound implications of being a priest in the presence of God, and, despite seeing himself as one who caters to an all-powerful God, dared to question the validity of his decree? Perhaps it wasn't because he questioned, but because he set himself up as one who wouldn't question, and paid the price for it.

Mary, on the other hand, was perhaps keenly aware that she was nothing more than a simple woman bound to humble life before God. She was at the mercy of not only God, but her soon-to-be husband and a society that did not value her. She carried no position, no social weight, and no wealth. People did not come to her for wisdom, answers, or leadership. So when Gabriel came to her, of course she was confused, but just as Jesus would later do, God, through the angel, put his hand on her in compassion as an innocent soul who did not yet understand what was happening. Her response reveals her in-kind trust: "May it be to me as you have said..."