Nomad - January 2010 Update

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." That verse has been dominating my mind for a week. Someone shared during our church gathering that it is tempting to doubt the promise that God allows us to be tested according to what we can bear, and he will always provide a way out. This verse - "I can do all things through Christ..." - is the answer to that doubt.

I don't know if you followed boxing in the eighties or if you remember much about Mike Tyson, but he was possibly the most powerful speed-puncher of all time. I won't gush his whole story here, but it is an amazing story; and one aspect sticks out. Tyson figured he'd be dead by his mid-twenties. He never imagined that by then he would have smashed the record books as a unified boxing champ. One knockout - in the Olympics, at age fourteen - came 8 seconds into the match. A knockout in 8 seconds!

He ascribed all of his success to his manager and trainer (during his early years), and the man who would become his legal guardian, Cus D'Amato. Cus loved Mike, took him in, invested his life into the young man. At one point he made the comment that Mike was "keeping him alive." He was an older guy while training Mike, but felt Mike gave him a purpose - and Mike said the same thing about him. Beautiful story, right? I think so.

But there is a problem with stories like this, and the problem isn't subtle, and the problem is so definitive that - I would humbly suggest - it taints the good thing. The problem: death. If I wrap up my life, say, in my wife, or my mentor, or a prof from college, and I am one of the rare few who receives the same kind of investment from the other - free of charge, full of love - I'll experience a life-changing (maybe a life saving) relationship.

But when death comes, and the availability of that one person is lost to us, what then? You've heard Tyson's story. You know about his marriages, the rape conviction, the drugs and the partying, stating openly on ESPN that he ONLY fought to pay his bills, his tatoos - which he said he got to intimidate people (He's Mike Tyson! Why would he need tatoos!). When he speaks of this collapse - and he calls it a disaster - he always returns to Cus. His life saved Tyson's. His death was, in a way, Tyson's death. And no one ever filled that gap again. For Mike, it was "I can do all things through Cus who strengthens me..." Until the end, I think Cus would have said the same about Mike.

One really cannot generalize about a church family, but I can say here that this is kind of where Nomad is at. We are all realizing we make terrible saviors. Our weaknesses are legion, and any kind of pretense to self-based strength is merely cleaning up the outside of our cup. The month of December has been a transitional time and a learning time. God has blessed a few of us with a renewed desire for Christ-like compassion for those who are in collapse. I'm seeing incredible fruits, and yet there is a long journey before us. Sometimes the intensity of the harvest can create moments when we long for the shade of the barn, especially when we see Tyson-like collapses in the lives of those around us and we lose sight of Jesus walking ahead. Our minds wander, "Can I help this guy?" and the answer is a conditional, "In a way..."

We want the impossible. Total help. Total transformation. A renewed heart. We want back the years the locusts devoured.

And God is able to do the impossible; and he is not far off. Jesus literally walks with us; his Spirit is perfectly available; and in the midst of a sea of weaknesses his strength and presence hushes storms and clarifies our vision. When our Life Transformation Groups gather, he shows up in a palpable, almost freaky way. He sits at the table. Our discussions of the word become - believe it or not - more powerful than any podcast. It's like our hearts are opened, and the impossible change we long for happens live, right there.

Maybe you imagine a chasm of weakness between you and God - as if he has died and you are now on your own. But there is no chasm. Make no mistake, Jesus died. But he rose again. And he rose to be with you, and to lead you out. You are not alone.

Perhaps you have become so habitually disobedient to the Great Commission that any 'sense' of God's conviction instantly morphs into guilt. In your mind, well, there is no breaking the cycle. You are not alone. Maybe if you would stop relying on your own strength, and begin being simply obedient to Christ, things would change. Resurrection is tough, man. You gotta go to a graveyard, push and leverage away the tombstone, pray to God (from your heart), and then even after you are raised again there is the matter of getting out of the grave, losing the grave clothes, and getting back to the process of living. The good, good news is that Jesus provides all we need for each stage. We need nothing in ourselves. He gives us all we need.

Nomad has been gathering in a few homes and locations, and then at Westchester Park. The Park meeting has been at nine AM on Friday mornings. Comment on the blog if you want more info. Love to you all.