Thursday, December 20, 2007

When Nothing Satisfies

When it rains or it shines on this pillow of mine
I will lift up my head to the sky
So I have chance to see
Where my hope has come from
Know there's nothing that I can't abide

When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
Hold my hand


Send forth Your Light Lord,
And send forth Your Truth
Let them guide me to your Holy Place
Then will I go to the Altar of God
To my Joy, my Delight and my Strength

When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
Hold my hand


Why are you so downcast, oh my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God
My Savior, my King
My Savior, my King

When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
When nothing satisfies you
Hold my hand

-Jennifer Knapp

Saturday, December 8, 2007

Anger

Sometimes I have wondered if I get mad too much. I get worked up by something that happens, or by something that I hear or read. I get angry in conversations with people, I get mad when I see people doing things they shouldn't be doing. Sometimes it really doesn't take too much to get me really riled up.

I just watched a NOOMA video. I am sure that some of you are familiar with these. The guy who hosts them is named Rob Bell, and some of the things he says really get me thinking. The video I just watched was called "Store" and it was about anger. Rob Bell talks about how if you walk around our society, you are bound to see rage all around. People flipping others off in traffic, people losing it in line at the grocery store, the examples really aren't too hard to think of. There are people walking around who are just ready to explode with anger. He then goes on to talk about how anger is a normal emotion, and the important thing isn't to avoid getting angry, but rather to figure out what is making us angry, and where our anger is leading.

The passage of Scripture used in the video was Mark 3:1-5. This is the story where Jesus is about to heal a man on the Sabbath, and the teachers of the law are waiting to accuse him for it. It says that Jesus looked at them in anger, because they were too stubborn to see the truth. Jesus got angry. And he used his anger for a cause. He healed the man with the crippled hand. Rob Bell says that Jesus' anger "increases the peace of the world. It leads to this good deed that makes things better." He goes on to talk about how our anger can lead to selfish ends, or we can use anger to lead to things that are good and beautiful. And then he said something that I really liked:

"When we are talking about calling and mission and vocation and purpose, what we're going to give our lives to, one of the questions we often ask is, 'What do you love?' But there's another question that we can ask. 'What makes you angry?'"

Wow! Isn't that something to think about? Obviously there are lots of things that people get angry about that really aren't important at all, but what about the things that do matter? What are the things that are bigger than you that make you mad? What are the causes that you get really worked up about that you realize something needs to be done about? What are the issues that make you so mad that it hurts? Isn't that where we should be living and working and spending ourselves? Yours might not be the same things that get me mad, but that's good, because there are far too many things that need to be changed in this world for any of us to take care of all of them. Anger has this energizing effect. It gets you going and makes you act. Things get done when anger is behind them. And often the results aren't pretty. We should be using that motivation for something good. Rob Bell talked about how the people he knew who had given their lives to a cause were usually the ones who didn't get worked up about the unimportant everyday incidents that happened. They were the ones who had figured out how to use their anger for good, because life is about something bigger than them. Some things are going on in the world that somebody needs to get angry about, and that anger is only good for anything if it leads to action. Maybe God wants to do something through that anger that is inside you and me. Maybe it is there for a reason.

So, what makes you angry?

Monday, December 3, 2007

A Game for You

We got a new Crisis Pregnancy Center newsletter today, and as usual, it contained some silly tidbits in the midst of the news. Included was the following paragraph, and there are 16 books of the Bible hidden in this paragraph. Me and my mom found them in about 20 minutes. See if you can find them all:

"I once made a remark about the hidden books of the Bible. It was a lulu, kept people looking so hard for facts, and for others it was a revelation. Some were in a jam, especially since the names of the books were not capitalized. But the truth finally struck home to numbers of our readers. To others it was a real job. We want it to be a most fascinating few moments for you. Yes, there will be some really easy ones to spot. Others may require judges to help find them. I will quickly admit it usually takes a minister to find one of them, and there will be loud lamentations when it is found. A little lady says she brews a cup of tea so she can concentrate better. See how well you can compete. Relax now, for there really are sixteen names of books of the Bible in this paragraph."