Stretching a shriveled hand

Matthew 12 recounts the story of Jesus' encounter with a man who had a shriveled hand. The Pharisees saw the man as a theological object lesson. Knowing how people are, I suspect that this man had been the object of many cruel comments and jokes. I can imagine kids taunting him or asking him to hand them something to highlight his limitations.

I suspect that the man was not really looking forward to these religious types having a discussion about him while standing near him. It must have been incredibly de-humanizing to have healthy people debate the theological theory of proper Sabbath activities using his handicap as the focal point.

It struck me recently that Jesus' request for the man to stretch out his hand would have been incredibly cruel and mean spirited if uttered by anyone else. Jesus asked him to do what he was incapable of doing. But since it was Jesus doing the asking, the man was able to do what was impossible to do; he stretched out his hand. If he hadn't attempted the stretch, I don't think the healing would have occurred.

Sometimes Jesus will ask us to do what we are incapable of doing. But since it is Jesus doing the asking, we have to stretch and allow Him to enable us to do what we are incapable of doing.

Time Changes Everything

If you stay with something long enough, it will eventually become cool. As a boy, just about all I listened to was Hank Williams and Johnny Cash. I was thought of as being incredibly dorky because I didn't listen to the Monkees. Most of my friends thought johnny cash was money you put in a pay toilet.

Roll the tape forward about 40 years. Both Hank Williams and Johnny Cash are revered as rebels and groundbreakers in the music industry. Now all of my Johnny and Hank albums are considered collector's items. Now being able to recite the words to "I'm so lonesome I could cry" and "Folsom Prison blues" is a sign that I am "with it" instead of being hopelessly lame.

I even get to sing "Ring of Fire" at the 50's dinner tonight, and people think I'm awesome.

Maybe, some day, my knowledge of "Leave it to Beaver" will help me bring world peace.

My Wish

I would give my right arm to be ambidextrous.

The Man at the Pool

During prayer time last Sunday morning I was reminded of the story in John 5 about the man who lay at the pool of Bethesda. The man had been an invalid for 38 years and was lying among many people with needs waiting for a miraculous healing. He was waiting for his answer in the only way he knew; which was to get into the pool first when the water was stirred. Since others were always able to beat him to the water, he continued to suffer. He could only see one way of receiving his answer. He had to find a more efficient method of getting in the water. He had faith that if he could get to the water first, he would get his healing, but his faith was limited by the method. He couldn't see any other way to get what he needed.

When Jesus appeared, the man found that an unlimited number of "methods" could be used to bring about his healing. Jesus asked him, Do you want to get well? The man gave his response based on his understanding of how things worked, saying that he didn't have anyone to help him to the water. To him, an answer to his prayer would have been for Jesus to give him a helper to wait with him until the next time the water was stirred. Jesus just bypassed all of his thinking and answered the need rather than the request.

We display our own undersized idea of God many times by praying for specific outcomes based on our understanding of the situation. It is fine to ask God for what you believe you need, but don't be surprised if the answer looks different than the request. The invalid asked for a helper. Jesus told him to get up and walk. Remember that God knows what you need. Trust Him to give you what you need.

Drag Racing is no drag!

Saturday I went to the drag races, (sore kidney and all) at Thunder Valley Raceway near Noble, Oklahoma. Why would I do such a thing? Because my son-in-law's dad is a drag racer in the Top Sportsman category. I always thought that drag racing was simply a matter of getting the most power out of the loudest car possible and going from 0 to 900 or so mph in 4 or 5 seconds.

As I observed and visited with my son-in-law, Mark, (who fathered the smartest and best looking child in the universe, so I like him a lot) I learned that there is actually strategy involved in drag racing. It was really quite intricate and involved. What appeals to me is that with my short attention span, strategy that plays out in four and one half seconds is strategy that I can keep up with.

It is always a good day for me when I can learn something I didn't know before, especially if it involves something I really didn't know anything about before. So Saturday was a good day.

Lithotripsy is not a blast

I'll spare you any graphic or gross descriptions, but suffice it to say that lithotripsy is no walk in the park. I know it is better than conventional surgery and I guess it is making me better, but I'll be glad when I don't dread going to the bathroom again.

Kids- Take it from me. Just say NO to kidney stones.

Throw me a bone, here!

By the time you read this, I will be under the influence of anesthetizing drugs. I've been doing battle with kidney stones for the past week or so, and now I have called in the big guns. By the end of this little excursion, I will have added another adventure to my life list- lithotripsy. Basically, the way I understand it, they drug me and put me in a pool where sharks with laser beams on their heads blast away at the stones until they are vaporized. Very Austin Powerseque, don't you think? Oh, behave.

The down side to all of this is that I had a tee time to play golf with some good friends today and I had to cancel. But I should be able to go the the drag races this weekend, assuming I escape the clutches of Dr. Evil today.

Sister Hill is the Coolest Person Ever!

Alma Hill is awesome. She and her husband Mel were missionaries in West Africa for like a bazillion years and is one of those people who you respect for what they have done and one of those people who you would never ask to do something out of the ordinary. Even though I am a very informal person, she is a person I cannot call anything other than Sister Hill. Last week I was at the Light for the Lost banquet at the Inner City Church. The workers from Inner City were wearing t-shirts like the one in the picture. There are two meanings to the shirt. The expressed meaning is spelled out on the back of the shirt where it says "I will make you fishers of men". The other meaning is even more compelling in that Jesus loves us even before we come to him. The shirt is intended to provoke conversation and it does.

In visiting with Greg Tiffany, who is the Oklahoma director for campus ministry, I jokingly told him that I would contribute $100 to campus ministry if he could get Sister Hill to wear one of those "Jesus Loves Hookers" t-shirts to Lakeside on Sunday morning. I never dreamed that Greg would have the nerve to ask such a thing of Sis. Hill, and it never occurred to me that she might actually do it, but he had the nerve and she wore the shirt.

That is so cool. She was willing to forego her own tastes and preferences to help college students in their walk with God. She is an example for us all.

Blog Envy

I haven't posted in a while. I got out of the whole rythym of blogging. I gotta get back in the groove. While reading the blogs that I subscribe to, I noticed a common theme of the people who blog daily. They seem to be busier than I am doing better things than I am doing, so I can't blame my lack of posting on being busy. I think the mainmost reason that I don't post often enough is that I don't have a cool enough computer and cell phone.

These busy, awesome bloggers are always posting from airports and bus stations from their laptops or iphones. That elevates their coolness quotient into the stratosphere. Here I am, strapped down to my desktop. My cell phone only makes phone calls. I am hopelessly uncool.

I know that occasionally I post from places like Zacatecaluca, El Salvador, but it is not on my own laptop. It is from a borrowed desktop in a small, inner city school with a very slow connection.

Someday, I will own a laptop. It will be the coolest laptop ever with the fastest wireless internet and will work in jungles and on mountaintops. Then I can post multiple times a day and just happen to drop in lines like "Just sitting in the little four seater bush plane waiting to parachute into Crocodile Swamp in Kreplaukostan, and this thought popped into my head and I wanted to share it with you."

But until then, I will try to get back into the groove with boring posts from my boring office on my boring desktop.

Budgeting is Moving- Too Boring!

I am moving this discussion about budgeting to my other blog, On My Mind. The posts will be too long and boring to belong on this blog. If you need help getting to sleep, go to http://rwhitlow-onmymind.blogspot.com/

Another Exciting Budgeting Post

We have used several budgeting methods over the years. All of them are better than not having a budget, some some methods require a lot of work for the small benefit received. The past several years when we were going through some transition in both attendance and giving, we went very basic in our budgeting. We established a payroll budget based on the paid positions we planned to maintain, and then we established what the average general and administrative budget was. In other words, we determined what it cost to keep the church open and staffed and figured out that amount on a weekly basis. The various ministries were instructed to operate with the income that they produced with no help from the "general fund." That way when we tallied the weekly offering, we were able to determine if we met the basic operational needs that week. Whatever was received over the basic operating budget amount was available to be used for departmental ministries, or for capital improvements. It was simple, and it gave us latitude to make the decisions necessary to take care of priorities. On weeks that the offering didn't cover the basic budget, we didn't do anything extra, and if we could delay or reduce an expense, we did. On weeks that the offering exceeded the basic budget, we could do a repair or purchase a ministry item.

The disadvantage of this method is that it is so short-term focused that it is difficult to think long-term. And now that we are in a period of growth it is important to think long-term. It is over that long haul that ministry excellence is enhanced. And it is counter productive to ask that ministries be self-sufficient on a long-term basis. What happens is that there are a great number of fund-raisers sponsored by the various ministries and these can eventually wear out the congregation.

Next time I'll talk about another philosophy of budgeting.

Holy Ghost Budgeting?!

I am currently working on the church budget for 2009. I have been involved in the church budget since the late '80s and it is never fun. It is weird that I don't consider myself a "numbers" guy since "numbers" is the main part of my job here at the church. I am a "words" guy. I love words and stories. However, I understand the importance of accurate numbers in the whole accounting/budgeting thing. Accountability and integrity are the non-negotiables of finances.

There are some who feel that budgeting "limits the Holy Spirit" in church life and resent any mechanism that would inhibit the ability to follow His leading. They are the ones who operate under the banner of "if we have the money we will do it". There are others who see the budget as paramount and value the process of planning over spontenaity. They are the ones who say, "if it is in the budget, we will do it. It it's not, we won't." I fall somewhere between those two points.

Budgets are a lot of work. If we are going to do all of the work, but then enter 2009 and disregard the budget in light of new directions in ministry, that is frustrating. It is also frustrating to be bound by a budget that will not allow a church to follow new opportunities that may be presented during the course of the year. So what is the solution? How do we plan ahead and remain flexible? Can we and should we budget without limiting the Holy Spirit? Is God limited by our plans? I'll talk about this for the next few days.