Common Grounds Online

Timothy P. McConnell, Jesus Moves In

     We can be very good at putting on the show. The triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday demonstrates just how capable we are of putting on a show when on the inside the story is quite different. It also demonstrates the power of God to enter tough places. Sometimes the toughest place to enter is the human heart.

 Rome knew how to welcome her Generals home. If you have ever seen the movies or shows on ancient Rome, you can probably close your eyes and picture a triumphant entry of a Roman General after battle. People lining the streets to see the parade. A strong disciplined military marching in from the battlefield. Flags and guidons before the legions of soldiers. Trophies of war on display. The General himself would sit high on a mighty steed or ride in on a chariot. Roman occupied Jerusalem had no doubt seen such displays of power from their Roman invaders. They wanted one for themselves.

 When Jesus comes in, well He doesn’t quite fit the bill. Jesus comes to Jerusalem, as the prophet predicted, “humble and riding upon a donkey, not even a full-grown donkey, but a colt.” Instead of a stallion, they see a little donkey. Instead of a victorious General, they see a humble man; an obscure prophet. Instead of hands stained with the bloodshed of his enemies, they see Jesus carrying the look of a man who’s about to give his blood away. It doesn’t seem to fit.

Todd Bragg, Good Things From Bad Backs

I am thirty-five years old and I still feel like I am figuring out what to do with my life.  As I grow older the years seem to pass more and more quickly, which doesn’t make the said dilemma any easier.  It seems that I am either thinking about the past or looking forward to the future.  I have a hard time living in the present.

Tonya Riggle, For Singles: Reality Injection to Save Your Future Marriage

When you go for a job interview, you always ask to know what the company expects of you; it doesn’t work like that in marriage. Having the opportunity to teach a class for newlyweds, my husband and I have heard from a lot of struggling young couples. While the maladies differ, one trend is the same: disappointed expectations. We get surprised spouses saying, "I heard it would be hard, but I don’t think I signed up for this".

A wise woman once told me this formula: E - R = D, Expectation - Reality = Disappointment. My hope is that by upping some of the reality of marriage, we can decrease some of the disappointment that proliferates.

So, what do you think marriage is going to be like? I’m assuming you hear messages of romance and knowing, and of growing together while God’s love is expressed to you through your mate. It is certainly a recipe for great joy, but there is a slice of the pie that is sheer will. Is anyone telling you about that sliver? Note: if you are commitment phobic, either stop now or read to the end. My goal is not to make your common plight worse.

Leigh McLeroy, The Catalog Life

Houston weather is hard to predict in November. I’ve turned on the heat once (an overnight low in the high 40’s), and I’m trying to avoid running the air conditioner altogether. But it’s anyone’s guess whether the day will dawn chilly or warm. (Sorry Dr. Neil Frank and Frank B.) November just can’t make up its mind.

Weather may waver, but one thing is as predictable as clockwork in late fall: catalogs. They’re pushed through (or stuck in) the mail slot of my front door in multiples these days. (Apparently they refuse to travel alone.) And as the retail mania that accompanies the season intensifies, the “thud” of them dropping into the hallway gets louder and more pronounced.

There’s Horchow and Williams Sonoma and Sundance. Nordstrom and Crate and Barrel. Restoration Hardware and Levenger. Like pretty magazines you don’t have to pay for, the catalogs are stuffed with color and craftsmanship and beautiful photography. Oh – and they’re full of things I don’t need, but could be enticed to want if I linger long enough over their pages.

Mac Richard: WWJV

The first time I went into a voting booth, I became a cultural phenomenon. It was 1984, and I was 18 years old that year that my first presidential vote helped Ronald Reagan win the White House. I had no idea that I had just helped form the Religious Right.

 Today, 26 years later, as I again enter a polling booth, I’m grateful for the right to vote, aware of the responsibility to exercise a freedom bought and paid for by men and women I could only hope to emulate, and conflicted by the choices I have helped inadvertently create.

I don’t feel particularly powerful.

To be honest, I feel a little used. Anyone who thinks that conservative Christian voters have been courted solely by people who “share our values” is living a Fantasy Island, la-la land existence: Smiles, everyone…Smiles!

Rusty Kelley, Audience of One

Each of us has experienced the stereotype of the person I am about to describe in the office. He’s the guy that will smile at you outside of the office, but inside will cut you off at the knees if he thinks it would gain him anything. He’s the first to sing his own praise, the first to share other’s faults, the first to position themselves with your boss, and the last person you trust. If you’ve been in an office environment, or any competitive environment for that matter, you’ve almost certainly come across this person. I recently learned though from someone that had been working with a former friend of mine that this friend was exactly that person towards some other friends. This seemed completely opposite of what I’d know of this person. He was a Christian, taught in Sunday school, married a wonderful woman, and was generally liked by his friends. But inside the office, apparently a very different side of him appeared. 

It wasn’t long before that the typical sinful response of judgment rose up in me: “I would NEVER do that.” But as I began to review my own actions, I realized that perhaps while they may not have been as extreme as the story that was recently shared with me, many of those same characteristics could still be found if I examined my heart and actions in the office. When I am honest with myself, I must confess that I am often tempted to act by a different system of rules in the office. While I have been the person to say something to stop gossip in social situations, in the office I catch myself verbally agreeing with a story about a frustrating and difficult college. I’m much quicker to loose my patience at incompetence, and I am slower to do things that receive no recognition of my superiors. 

For many of us who are ambitious, we’ve learned exactly how to win. Sometimes, that goal blinds us to what we’re doing to get there. This isn’t an instant phenomenon, in fact, much of this begins in our heart as we see others who might not operate under the same moral code as us begin to succeed. We begin to lust after the success of what the job could fulfill us with, and slowly, it begins to reshape our worldview in the office. It happens to us all on some level. For some, it may just occur in your heart, as you begin to envy those who do not operate with the same principals as you and begin to call the world unfair. For others, they react in action sometimes in so small a manner that they don’t even notice it. 

When it comes down to it, I find that the common source is that I don’t truly live before the face of God with an intention on serving only Him. If I did, and my heart was pure, I wouldn’t struggle as the psalmist warns in Ps 37 not to envy when evil men succeed.  But when I put my heart to the test, I realize that what drives me is a desire to please others who reward my actions here in the immediate environment. I commonly treat them as more real and more relevant than the God that I claim to serve. I constantly find myself coming back to the Lord on my knees, asking forgiveness for my heart. And while I fail, I am a living testimony that God is faithful, and will change our hearts to become sensitive to these things when we truly seek to be changed by Him, and commit our actions to Him rather than our ambitions. 

I desire an audience of One, though I must admit I am easily distracted. But it is this very understanding of my weakness that causes me to turn to the Lord for strength, and when I do, I find myself serving at work in ways that even surprise me. And ever so often, the Lord fills my heart with such joy at this service, that I get just a small taste of how wonderful it will be in eternity when we finally see clearly, and get to have the one true audience that we may serve for all time. 

Scott Armstrong, Ruin in the City of God

Middle of August, 2006.  Serving as an apprentice to another church planter, helping him to get a new church off the ground.   I had already spent a year working with this new church and, while the group remained small, they were committed to each other and committed to seeing a new church begun in the heart of the city of Atlanta.  Everyone was committed except one person.

The lead pastor. 

Two months ago, he detonated a bomb in the middle of this fledgling church community because of a crisis of calling, who had lost his vision, who said that his heart was never in it in the first place...who suddenly resigned and left me with the keys to this very small kingdom.

Mac Richard, Vision Test

Life works best in balance. Left and right. Proteins and carbs. Male and female. Work and play. Night and day. Truth and grace. Offense and defense. Waylon and Willie. Life works best in balance.

Nowhere does this reality apply more than in the application of vision.

By vision, I don’t mean just what we see, but how we see the world and our lives in it. Remember Proverbs 29:18…

Where there is no vision, the people perish…

Proverbs 29:18

Zidane Revisited

I love the World Cup. Unlike most Americans, I am drawn to soccer's world championship where countries battle it out for national pride and four years' bragging rights. The patriotism, drama and personalities make for a spectacular theater of victory and heartache.

In 1998, I was in Paris and witnessed firsthand the artistry of the Brazilians; it took my breath away. In 2002, I'd set my alarm for 2 a.m., put on my U.S Soccer jersey and drive to an English pub to watch our national team progress to the quarterfinals. Then, I'd go back to sleep, rinse the pub's cigarette smoke from my hair and go to work.

With the American team out early this year in Germany, I needed another team to pull for. I chose France for one reason: Zinedine Zidane. Known for his sublime touch on the ball, “Zizou” was poised to make a stunning finish to an amazing career. Zidane had a rags to riches story to rival any Hollywood blockbuster.

Paul Walker, "When Bad is Good"

Click – the new Adam Sandler movie, is at the same time profound AND full of 7^th grade potty humor, which is why I liked it so much. It’s in the It’s A Wonderful Life genre. Sandler plays a young architect with 2 small kids. He’s working his way up the ladder and is overwhelmed with the demands of work and home. In the “Beyond” section of Bed Bath and Beyond, he’s given a “universal remote control” – in other words it controls his universe. With it he’s able to fast forward through difficult situations – everything from trying to get cranky kids bathed, fed and to bed to the horrible strain of trying to make partner in his firm under a boss whose a vain tyrant.

Of course Sandler uses the device to his ruination, although there is ultimately redemption in the film. But how clever! Who doesn’t want to delete, skip, or fast forward through the bad parts of your life? Who doesn’t want to press “pause” in the middle of someone’s prattle or tirade?