Craig's Blog

A Son of Zebedee

Jon, my son-in-law, is my wingman.

A wingman is the man who is covering your tail, an extra set of eyes guarding your vulnerabilities. The mission is effectively accomplished because of the teamwork between a pilot and his wingman.

I’m the pilot.

Our mission is to rescue the hearts of a group of men with the beauty, power and truth of the Gospel.  The plan was for Jon to fly into Denver from LA early Wednesday morning to give the two of us a full day to connect, get caught up, go over our notes and run a few errands before we leave for Toronto at 5 AM the next morning. There was a lot to get done. Unfortunately Jon had to do the United Two Step… his flight was delayed several times, with different reasons/excuses given and then finally cancelled. In a rare moment of customer awareness and competence they finally got Jon on a flight, gave him a 1 oz. bag of nuts, a 4 oz. serving of diet Coke and landed the plane (with his luggage on it!).* 

Our day has vanished, my plan skittled leaving me frazzled. I rush north to Denver International to pick up my wingman in one of those wouldn’t-it-be-nice-if-days-like-this-never-ever-happened godless moods.

“Godless” in the sense that something in me is ranting and raving about  life not unfolding in the comfortable, pain and hassle free manner I demand.

“Demand” in the sense that all poor reactions have at their root, core beliefs about God’s goodness and what brings life. My reaction, like the “idiot” light on the car dashboard, indicates some governing world-view is being thwarted/challenged. (Note James 4)

A good time to take an inside look is when life turns unpleasant. In such times we become one of the Sons of Zebedee who approach Christ with the demand, “I want You to do for me whatever I ask of You.” (Mark 10:35).

I wanted this day, with Jon to go a “certain way” so that… this conference, with Jon would go a “certain way” and that when the mission is over I’d feel a “certain way” about the conference, myself and life in general. “Jesus I expect you to do for me whatever I ask…”

As I drove I was aware that all is not well internally. I put in The Daily Prayer CD*, which a recording of John Eldredge praying the prayer that many of us pray on a daily basis (It’ll change your prayer life). I’ll often meditate on the words as I’m driving around, pausing it at different points to linger with my own prayers and reflections. 14 seconds into the prayer there’s an acknowledgment of God being sovereign. I stop the CD and allow the idea of God being over all, in control, the sovereign God counter the sense I have that all of life is chaotic and fully out of control… that this mission is a mistake and so am I.

It was great. I traversed into a reflective spell pondering the overwhelming reality that it was God who put this entire trip together: it was God prompting Tom, our Canadian host to invite me, his suggesting that I bring a wingman, God suggesting Jon as my wingman … that God is going before us preparing the men for whatever unfolds… that He, God, would use this mission for some purpose in our lives! 

And the question surfaced was, “Given God’s sovereignty, what could happen that we couldn’t handle?”

Lose my notes!?
“It would be a relief… finally loosed from my dependence upon them I would be free to share my unanchored heart/soul.”

We miss a flight!?
“That’s simple… it’s an act of God for which we have no control, and actually might be fun.”

Jon and I are somehow separated!?
“Yeah and so? We’d make it together eventually, and if not? What a story to tell in the years ahead!

We crash and die!?
“Lori’s rich, I’m in heaven… what could I have done?”

We crash and don’t die!?
“What a story to tell in the years ahead!”

The men hate me!?
“Hey, I’m just the messenger.”

The men love me, hoist me on their shoulders and worship me as some god!?
“What a story to tell for years and years… and years”

It’s at this moment I find myself veering off the interstate and mistakenly onto a highway headed the opposite direction.

I’m thrown out of my meditative state now facing a circuitous detour and tardy arrival with even less time to get everything done! Immediately I respond will a variety of “French” expressions.

Then another question rises and quickly tempers my reaction… “If God is sovereign, is it appropriate to be profane when you make a wrong exit while musing about his control over all things?”

I crack up. How quickly my response to disruptive undesired circumstances reveals my governing beliefs about his sovereignty!

– Craig McConnell

* Excuse the cynicism… it’s hard being a frequent flyer these days!@#?

Watching People

I’ll admit to a vivid imagination. It keeps me entertained, humors my friends, endears me to many and is the cause of sporadic troubles.

I enjoy “People Watching”*… you know, sitting on a park bench, in a mall or at a sidewalk café watching a parade of God’s glorious and funky creatures…  kinda like bird watching except with people. 

So, I board my flight from LAX to DC on my way to Zurich early (to get “situated” into my assigned seat stow my carry-on stuff; arrange my water bottle, head phones, iPod, journal with a 0.5 mechanical pencil in the seat sleeve; get my gum out and pray that God has sovereignly kept the seat next to me vacant).  Sitting on the aisle in the forward compartment of the plane I view everyone pass by to their seats. As I often do, I wonder/imagine what each person’s story is.  So much is seen in our countenance, our body language, eyes, and the posture of our soul.

I wonder what each traveler is leaving behind or headed to… what hints/clues to their story does their furrowed or furry brow tell? I note the wide range of smiles, styles, scowls, hairdo’s and don’ts, smirks and body shapes; their ”look”,   accessories, their gait, weight, demeanor…  it’s a virtual circus of lions and mice, glorious and broken… unfinished men posing and hiding; woman both beautiful and abused.  Each one with a story and a wound… sometimes hidden, sometimes worn on our “sleeve”.  We are a varied, odd, complex and beautiful species. 

So we’re wheels up and on our way.

Is it just me or have you noticed the phenomenal of people changing over the course of a long international flight? Somewhere over the ocean we cross some portal… some seam,  a contour, a line where something significant changes… it’s not the International Date Line, but some kind of a personality/character-time dilation-warp-speedo-change-eroonie thingamajig were people are transformed rather quickly.  The 300 or so passengers leaving DC were by far your typical looking Americans.  The gal across the aisle from me was a house wife from Winnemucca off to visit an old college friend living in Switzerland, the guy next to me … a loud businessman from Maryland intending to seal a deal in Geneva.  At some point during my sleep aided nap we crossed that line and everything was different. The economy section was now the Hofbrauhaus, Munchen. It seems the whole plane was speaking German. They’d all morphed. The gal now looks like an alpine farm girl with a handkerchief pattern dress, braided hair and a hearty Béarnaise accent. Mr. Businessman now looks like an old world silver haired clock maker in a frazzled wool vest and wire rim glasses. It’s amazing. I was surprised no one was yodeling.

I arrive in Zurich and spend the next nine days teaming with our Swiss allies in the adventure of launching the first Swiss German Boot Camp. It was fascinating, astonishing… wonderful, and life changing. A number of times I simply cried with the joy of witnessing the birth of something dangerous, wild and good in Europe.

For over two years Ruedi, Peter, Hansjakob, Andrian and Gerd had been following God, investing blood, sweat and tears**  in pursuit of the desire to awaken the hearts of Swiss and German men. Man did they! God came big time. I was so very proud of these men. They’re knuckleheads just like our team: a businessman, physical therapist, a teacher, chemist and a retired professor… and each living in a story far larger than they could have imagined a few years ago. Just like our team.

God calls each of us to be someone we’ve never been… it’s who we truly are.

 God calls each of us to do something we’ve never done… it’s usually the very thing we’ve always wanted to do but never believed we could. It’s what we were made to do. Until we do it, it’s all talk… dreams, hopes… potential… “Woulda shoulda could’ves”.

There comes a time when you gotta get up and get out on the dance floor.

And as we leave the comfort of the chair, the security of the wide well traveled path for the unique path God has for us we’re changed. It’s some kind of a personality/character- God-authored-transformational-speedo-change-eroonie thingamajig. It’s God. Following Him we’re changed… dramatically at times.

When I left Switzerland nine days later these men were different men. They’d been on the dance floor. They’d pursued their dream. They had a new look; countenance, an affirmed strength, a validated gifting, a tested and found true heart. Spring had come for them and they were full bloom.  This wasn’t my fanciful imagination.  Our Swiss friends became kings of a new domain, leaders in the Large Story of what God is doing in Europe. It’s was amazing. I heard angels yodeling.

– Craig McConnell

 

*Urban Dictionary definition of “People Watching”:
1.People watching is when u go around and watch people that u've never met before and, based on their actions, movements, and gestures, guess what kind of people they are and what they do.2.When people with no lives or losers who go out to watch people because they nothing better to do.

** They came to several of our Colorado Boot Camps, the Advanced Camp and flew out for a weekend given to conversation, prayer and developing our relationship. In our interactions, prayers and discussions there was a strong sense that God was orchestrating our relationship and this mission.

Der Suisse Question

(I am in Switzerland with some friends/Swiss allies teaming together in presenting a Boot Camp. I’m hoping to post several reflections on this experience.)

 

Throughout the Boot Camp men pulled me aside to tell me their varied stories. Each man genuine in his question, each in a horrible relationship or situation and every one of them, though bound in a shroud of unbelief, exercising some modicum of hope/faith by simply asking their question.

The questions were all the same, “Is God enough?”

“No, really, is God enough in THESE conditions, given THIS pain, and THIS heartless/unresponsive/emasculating person?”

And they were looking to my eyes not my words for the answer.

Somewhere in all the God-talk they'd heard along the way much had been left out. 

A man can live well. A man can know peace and joy; have a rich full life; play an enormous role in God’s story; live an adventure and pursue The Beauty in any and all circumstances and seasons. Largely untold are the profound promises of God to be our Strength, Comfort, Peace and Security, our Helper, Counselor, Friend and Lover.

Their stories brought me to tears while, I hope, my eyes flamed their hidden hopes that such a life is, indeed, possible… available, free… here, now! My words spoke of The One True God, who is here and He is neither silent nor inactive… That He is a resting place, a Fortress… that He spreads an extravagant banqueting table before us in the midst of our enemies, and to know Him is to fall on your face with groanings too deep for words… and yet are heard by Armies of Angels as praise and adoration.

Looking into His eyes I too am reassured. 

– Craig McConnell

Last Tuesday

So Lori tells me our daughter is bleeding. She’s 17 weeks pregnant 1276 miles away in The City of the Angels. My heart begins to swell. I call her and hear just beneath the surface of her always-joyful life giving voice the silver tongued devil’s fear. I mutter some words, give her my heart expressing my love, and enter the battle for my daughter and the baby in her womb.

In the moment I hang up the phone I burst into tears. My father’s heart turns violent in storming the throne of grace so aware that I have nothing but my belief in a powerful, every-present good God. I’m a madman exercising every bit of faith I have… appealing to another Father’s heart for intervention.

How little control we have over the most important things in life.

Totally dependent, with swelling hope and desire I find myself over and over… a 180,000 times praying for Life… for my grandchild, for my daughter… for my family.

The phone call comes. The doctor cannot find a heartbeat.

And so there we are… now speechless, still and overcome with pain/loss. Still clinging to God but with a loosened grip while His grip has tightened.

Death has such a sting…

When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: "Death has been swallowed up in victory."
"Where, O death, is your victory?
      Where, O death, is your sting?"The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. – 1 Corinthians 15

Life will prevail.

-Craig McConnell

Still in The Booth

I’m sitting in the sound booth through the second session of our Advanced Conference listening to John speak. At some point my mind wanders…  I’m musing* about “teaching “and God nudges me asking, 

When did you enjoy teaching most?

Immediately it was the college level theology courses I regularly taught at my church in LA. I’m grinning ear to ear enjoying the memories of waxing eloquent on Christology, Anthropology, and Harmitology… I’d hand out my 70 page syllabus chock full of enticing insights, perspectives, implications… oh, and a ton of footnotes noting alternative views with their pros and cons,  rabbit trails, sources, exegetical notes  etc. etc…. I loved it. It was thorough authoritative clarity on the cardinal doctrines of the faith… full of footnotes.

And with big warm eyes and in the voice of a loving father God says, “Yeah… you were hiding”

Pause. Silence. My smirky smile shifting to a furrowed brow,  mouth open, questioning look.

“You loved it so much because you “found” validation there. Your syllabus and footnotes was all about you answering your question about having something to say…. Your syllabus was your God”

I remember while in seminary dreaming of getting a PhD. in theology. The “Queen of Sciences” as many refer to it.

Doctor Craig McConnell would undoubtedly/unquestionably/most surely have something to say. Right?

Wow… so 30+ years have passed since bone head greek and some of my best memories of teaching are being exposed as a godless quest for life… the abandonment of God and all He provides for the in-truth mousey affirmation of man. Footnotes! Footnotes were my broken cistern… my god, my mistress in hiding. I was feeling “it”… the shame of looking to footnotes over and instead of the self revealing, sovereign immutable, triune God ….

Great… so I’m speaking to 433 men in 8 hours and I’m marveling at the times and places God “shows” up to deal with some issue of our soul. And then again I’m not surprised at all. He’s always present… longing to be our God.

– Craig McConnell

*(I’ve always viewed myself as a “pastor teacher” loving the ongoing influence my life has upon those “sitting” under my tutelage over time. It’s been one of the things I’ve missed doing most over the last several years)

Saturday Before Easter

Errands done, garage straightened up, work project finished, yard work done, emails checked.  It’s snowing, cold… breezy. I’m leaning back in my desk chair…

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday… inhale, exhale. Lord, shift my heart to Easter.

My mind goes to the resurrection. No sooner do I say “resurrection” under my breath and I’m in tears.

There is no order or sequence to these vignettes, combined they are but a glimpse of that instant moment in time when there is no more time… in the twinkling of an eye… when I will be raised/changed.

I will be on my face in tears or adoration… no, I think I’ll be on my feet with arms victoriously thrust up with my heart bursting in praise … or maybe just still… finally still and silent…  I could see myself thrown into His arms, silent, in tears, finding the words that have been groanings deep within all my life. There is so much to say here…

I will see my father, Al McConnell for the very first time… there is nothing more I can say in this moment here.

I will see my mom… free from grief/pain.  

Lori and I will gaze into one another’s eyes like never before… our daughters, their husbands, their children and their children will be on some dance floor that’s like a jeweled sea dancing, dancing, dancing some kind of previously-unknown-heavenly folk dance that has us all holding shoulders, kicking up our feet, singing in Hebrew, with colorful hats, shimmering garments…in some ever growing family circle laughing as we wobble all over.

Lori and I will wander through some crowded banquet hall of heaven with a never empty glass filled with the finest wine. Like a massive wedding reception (only with good food and a great DJ), the hall is jammed… we don’t walk, we bounce off countless groups of re-united families and friends; bumping into Nanny & Pop, Jim Schulz, Grandma & Grandpa McConnell, my dad…old friends, old knuckleheads and “nobodies” from every era, age and continent…

There a campfire in a moonscape alpine valley with the men I’ve served with over the years… A whole lot of stories you wouldn’t expect to hear are being told… but finally a lull in the conversation comes, and someone summarizes it all, “We made it… We did well”.

Okay… it’s at this point that my writing cannot keep up with my heart and mind’s kaleidoscopic impressions. I’m flooded with emotions, pictures, images, passages, quotes, faces, stories …

20 minutes pass. I cannot describe all my heart yearns for at the mention of “resurrection”.

I cannot fully express all my heart wants to say to Christ. That day will come.

He IS risen!

Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.

For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: "Death has been swallowed up in victory."

"Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?" The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. -1 Corinthians 15

-Craig McConnell

God in The Booth (part 2)

I’m sitting in the sound booth during the first session of our Men’s Advanced Conference listening to John Eldredge. At some point my mind shifts from John and whether or not the canvas bottom “Directors” chair I’m sitting in will collapse to my speaking the next evening. I’m unsettled… antsy about the direction/content/illustrations/relevance of my topic. Actually it’s deeper than “antsy”; I was feeling the pressure to make a difference in these good men’s lives. The squeeze gripping me was for God to show up in some weighty way sweeping us up and into some degree of a stunned paralysis of awe.

In my saggy seat I’m thinking I won’t deliver. I’m pretty certain I won’t come through… change that to can’t come through.

For most of us shame/self-contempt is our backdoor friend. Shame is that one we wouldn’t admit to knowing yet flirt with throughout the day. It’s really an affair of the soul we refuse to break off. Shame serves a twisted purpose… comfortably immobilizing us, explaining our unpredictable world, numbing the mythic longings of our heart and justifying our script of small-story-victim-hood. Yet sheathed by contempt’s husk/coat is something beautifully pure, good and godly… a longing, an identity authored by God. There is a kernel.

The longing for God to come is shrouded with the shame of “Who are you kidding. You! You? You’re a schmuck… You’ve got squat to say… nothing. Zip, zero, nada nichts! “

Now… that’s a slanderous perversion of the truth.

Yet, I choose to believe this shadowy mistress of mine time and time again despite her ruinous affect upon my life. She leaves me passive, disengaged, hiding behind props and techniques, tickling ears, pleasing men, internally enraged at God, others, and myself… cursing the success of others while wishing my life of impotence would quickly end. 

I’m speaking tomorrow… and surely aware of both kernel and husk.

And then God, the forever and always present God, who has been sitting next to me all this time, leans over, clears His throat and points out a defining agreement that I’ve made and lived by: 

Something more than who I am and what I have is required of me. I’m simply not enough.

Now… that’s a slanderous perversion of the truth.

Believing that, accepting that ancient script of diminishment explains why I’m so antsy about tomorrow night… so unsettled… my failure is inevitable. Internally I’m scrambling to minimize my certain losses.

This isn’t a man pawing the earth anxious to enter the arena and fight to the death for a noble cause. Nor is it a man standing tall among a group of weary sojourners in a season of fear offering words of hope, life, strength and direction.  This is Little Craig playing third base in the All Star game with a one run lead in the ninth inning, two outs and the bases loaded hoping the batter doesn’t hit it to him.

My godless agreement/affair with shame comes to the light… my hussy doesn’t look so good in broad daylight. I understand the attraction but now it feels so very wrong... the magic is gone, the price too high, the damage too broad… this isn’t the life I want to live!

 Will you break that agreement Craig?

(Note: God has a way of overlaying messages to us. Simultaneously I’m convicted of my sin of adulterous unbelief while, in the same breath hearing an invitation to another way of living. It’s like a father who is firmly disciplining his child with an authoritative, “No, you can’t get your way on this issue” while at the same moment, everything in his eyes is saying “I love you so incredibly much”.)

I do, I do, I do (the last time I said that many “I do’s” was on my wedding day). I break all agreements I have made, I take back all ground given to this lie. Christ, I ask you to… I give you permission and access to purge this hell born script from my being. May the kernel… the life, calling and the fullness of my identity come to life! Oh may my life bring Your life to others!

Again, may I offer... God is close. He is next to you wherever you may be. There is no place you are He isn’t. He’s at work… do you see Him?

(to be continued)

- Craig McConnell

God in The Booth (part 1)

One accented theme woven into my life and world view is the forever and always presence of God. God is close. He is next to you wherever you may be. There is no place you are He isn’t.

“Can anyone hide in secret places so that I cannot see him?" declares the LORD.
"Do not I fill heaven and earth?" - Jeremiah 23

You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.
…Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. - Psalm 139

No place.

Right now, where you sit reading this… perched on the corner of the very desk/table your computer sits is the God of Whom it is said that neither earth nor even the highest of heavens can contain.

Whoa! What does that stir up in you?

(to be continued)

– Craig McConnell

A Moment in Time

It was evening. I was eight, my younger brothers and sisters had just been put to bed, mom and dad wanted to talk with me alone in the family room of our home.

Time stopped, winter began, and the earth’s rotation was altered, never again were there “blue moons”, innocent summer days lying on the grass imagining shapes, characters and creatures in the billowy clouds above. The neighbor’s dog became mean, my younger “brothers” and “sisters” weren’t really brothers and sisters… my family became opaque, a faded hue, less real. My bedroom became smaller and darker; now there were nightly burglars/murderers and malovent strangers perusing my windows terrorizing me waiting for the opportunity to do me harm. Learning of a father who died I died as my mom had.

My father was drafted and killed in the Korean Conflict. My mom was 21, I was three months, 14 days old. The concussion, the trauma of God allowing her lover, a fine and godly man die left her lifeless… about 6 rows from the front, on the left, in a pew alone, crying most every Sunday. 

She remarried. A retired naval officer became my dad; he adopted me and changed my name from Craig McConnell to Craig Barnard. I was too young to remember any of this and the secret was neatly kept until the evening I was called into the family room and heard “Craig…your dad isn’t your father. Your father was killed in a war when you were born. I married your dad when you were little…and he loves you very much”. And for this little guy all the adventures of boyhood in our Southern California baby boomer neighborhood were indelibly changed.

It’s inevitable; we’re all wounded in some way. And the scar remains and with it some message that becomes the script by which we live.

As a young boy the first draft of my script(the message) was, “I’m different. Everyone else has a father… their real father...what’s wrong with me.”

What was the first draft of your script?

As life unfolds the message goes through numerous edits while staying true to the theme. For me the second significant edit came in adolescence. Living disoriented with the pain and loneliness of not having my “real” father coupled with a variety of in-securities centered on the abiding question, “What’s wrong with me”, and a culturally affirmed rebelliousness it was pretty easy to provoke my dad (the 20 plus year naval veteran who didn't take any crap). And so, in the intersection of the hall and his bedroom, he grabbed me, shook me and for the first of several times told me, “You are nothing but a seagull. All you’re good for is sitting, squawking and shitting”.

I believed him.

No significant re-edits were needed following this.

I have absolutely nothing to offer… I sit, squawk and shit. Period.

That script has held up well…

Jump ahead several decades… which feels like a couple of lifetimes… we (Lori, my daughters and me) live at the beach. On our part of the Southern California coast there is a section of bluffs rising up overlooking the beach and ocean. Regularly I would park near by, walk over near the edge of the bluff and yap with God. I don’t fully understand it, but it was easy to be still, reflective and expectant there… my favorite time was early in the morning and especially when it was socked in with fog. The pounding surf, the salty moist air… the cool sand… ahh a cup of Joe, my journal and/or bible… it most always was a transcendent time.

One morning I am there. In the presence of the Lord… enjoying a meandering conversation. It’s overcast; cool… nobody is around, nice size surf… I can hear the harbor fog horn in the distance, the beach is empty, I’m leaning back into an old rail fence, and I’m sporting what I dearly hope we will wear in heaven: flips, old jeans, sweat shirt… a cool hat…. Heck I’ am in heaven!

Disrupting my communion is black lab puppy that comes bounding up to me. He nuzzles me in twisting gyrations, tail wagging with big dark eyes inviting me…“Hey, wanna play?” He cold-noses me and is full of life… begging, insisting, demanding that I enter in and romp with him. He’s a lab pup…”come on… live a little!” 

I’m annoyed…what’s he doing here? Where’s his master? (There is nobody around). Actually I get a little snarly with this intrusion into my transcendent oneness with the Creator of the Heavens and Sea. I mean, every single access to the beach in LA County has a sign posted that reads, “NO DOGS ALLOWED ON BEACH!!!” I try and scare him by arching my back like a big… really big old alley cat hissing, “Get outta here dog, SCRAM!!!. After a gentle nudge with my foot  ... he gets the message. He’s gone, freeing me to return to intimacy with the God of grace and creation.

Little did I know I nudged the God of grace and creation gently with my foot… because it seemed like a mere moment later I’m looking down on the sandy beach at the lab. He is on the hard sand at waters edge dashing through the surf jumping frolicking, prancing… doing what labs do. I find myself smiling and enjoying him from my bluff above.

Whatever God intended a lab to be and do he was being and doing. Having a ball. He’s in and out of the water, digging a hole, running wild and chasing birds.

God was so present in that moment… and I found myself…. Praying, “I wish I was a lab.”

(One of the great things about Labs is that they cannot read the signs… the signs that say, “No Dogs on The Beach"... You can’t do that… you’re a seagull”. This lab had no script. He was simply being and doing what God created labs to do. Free, alive, simply living as God intended me to.

Yearning, longing, hope and desire from the deepest regions of my soul… aged for decades they surfaced in a groan, a smile and my prayer.

It was God… inviting me again into life, into freedom. In that moment, and ever since, I’ve got a clear picture of the life I want to live. Ignore the script handed me and live the script God has written on my heart. To simply be Craig McConnell… running on the beach… alive, free.

And your new script is…?

- Craig McConnell

Notes:

* There was something about my brothers and sisters being “half” brothers and sisters that sinisterly took root in my soul at that young age and it all too often expressed itself in a unloving distance/coolness… a “Big Brother” meanness in my relationship with them most of my life. Oh how I wish, knowing what I now know, I could relive… re-relate with those in earlier years I missed.

I became a Christian at 21 and reconciled with my dad. As the years have gone by I have so much compassion for him and his best attempts to father me while profoundly wounded himself. He was a good man... and I miss him.

 

Little Much

So this guy interrupts Christ perturbed that his brother is unlawfully withholding his portion of the family inheritance… I’d be pissed too.

Someone in the crowd said to Him, "Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me." But He [Jesus] said to him, "Man, who appointed Me a judge or arbitrator over you?" Then He said to them, "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions." - Luke 12:13-15

Do you see it? This guy comes with a legitimate complaint about his brother expecting the Peace Maker to do his thing. But Jesus refuses to go after the offensive law-breaking-inheritance-withholding brother.

Instead of confronting the obvious sinner, Jesus goes after the heart of the apparent “Victim”, the perturbed brother, warning him of the issues in his life… greed, the idolatry of material security…

One of  the justifications I make in failing/refusing to offer my strength, love…  or gifting is because of the offenses of others. You don’t love me, I don’t love you… neener neener neener!

The often legitimate faults/failures/sins/defects/abrasive-relational-style of another is my justification to not be the man, the lover God intended me to be. The man I truly am.

And so… while railing against others He often allows me to rant and then with sympathetic warmth interrupts me saying something along the lines of, “You know what really disturbs me about the whole situation?”

Still miffed* and expecting His affirmation of the injustice done, i ask, “What?”.

Without hesitation He responds, “You”. “Your hiding/sin… your little boy approach to life.”

And then the invitation to learn and know in a much deeper way, His great love, forgiveness, delight in me and call to live a holy, loving life.

(How many times i have learned this lesson… over and over, each time on a little deeper level? AGHHHHHH………)

“…he who has been forgiven little loves little." [And he who has been forgiven much loves much… ]

Read Luke 7:36-50.

And why don’t you love?

 

– Craig McConnell

Notes:

* “Miffed” = A self protective editing choice… personal synonyms would be: enraged, vengence seeking, calling-down-lightening angry…