The Parable of the Cinnamon Rolls

For the longest time, I have been burning the bottom of cinnamon rolls. Then one day last week, I cooked them a little differently than usual.  I oiled the pan  first.  Then, instead of keeping the rolls spaced out (which I normally did), I put them in a group together.  I let them cook in the oven and checked on them periodically.  After a short while, I looked in on them and the tops had cooked as normal.  So now was the major test. I checked the bottom... and they were perfect!!!   What I noticed was that the more rolls were in the pan, the less heat there was on each one.  The rolls absorb the heat from one another and keep them all from being burnt.  

The cinnamon rolls represent people.  The oil represents the presence of God. (Leviticus 21:12)  The heat represents the trials of life.  By going through hard times in life together, we protect one another from being scarred and unusable.  We also allow one another to expand and become the best we can be.  God's presence is with us, but it is not the only thing we've been given to sustain us.  There are other rolls in the pan too!

For the last three years, our family has been in the oven of seminary.  By God's grace, we've been through the fire and made it out.   Today is the moment of icing - Graduation Day!!!

"It is not good for rolls to be alone"

We've learned many things about God and ourselves.  The biggest lesson has not been a theory or powerful explanation.  It has been the power and strength of community.  It has come in the form of friends and family who have gathered around us to protect us from the heat.  Phone calls, letters, study groups, cards, text messages, prayers, gifts, and visits just to say, let me come next to you while you face this.  

God puts us in each other's lives to keep the heat off one another.  The closer we become, the better we can withstand the fire.  When you are facing heat in your life, don't separate from others, get closer! I honor my wife, Ashley, who has remained in the oven with me through this season.  I love you and am so grateful for your presence in my life.  I also thank God for each of my classmates, who have become dear rolls to me.   :)  

Finally, to each person who said or did ANYthing to come alongside us during this season, may God richly bless you.  You have taught us the most important part of being God's creation - we were made to go through life together.  We are forever grateful for your relationship and Godly example.  Well, it's breakfast time now - let's go get this icing!!!

Thank you Lord for allowing us the blessing of friends and family. Thank you for our parents. Thank you for our co-workers. Thank you for our teachers and mentors. Thank you for our pastors. Thank you for each new person we met during our time in Durham. Thank you for Your presence with us here. Please help us never to forget the strength in doing life close together. Why you love us, we'll never fully know. But thank You for choosing us to go through the heat and come out better. We love You. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Cooling,
j.a.g.

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Leviticus 21:12 - nor leave the sanctuary of his God or desecrate it, because he has been dedicated by the anointing oil of his God. I am the Lord.

YGT: The Inconvenient Truth

I wish the Lord would speak to me during commercials… 


Or maybe in a text message. Then I could take a couple minutes and quickly respond to what I hear in my spirit. This last year of blogging has shown me an important truth about great thoughts - they come at the most inconvenient times. Driving to work, during an exam, at 2:00 in the morning, great thoughts have no etiquette. 


The venerable Rev. Dr. William Turner at Duke Divinity School said there’s a difference between things that TAKE time and things that MAKE time. Things that are truly important in your life MAKE time to happen. Funny how we don’t TAKE time for eating, sleeping, or social networking… we MAKE time for these things because they are important (well, the social networking one is debatable). The same could be said for any number of goals you have. As the new year rolls on, what things in your life TAKE time and what things MAKE time?  (i.e. scripture reading or TMZ.com, Butterfingers or exercise, budgeting or shopping?)


In all honesty, I worry about 2013 – will I be able to keep posting with regularity? Or will God graciously answer my prayers and speak when it’s convenient? We all know the truth to that. If it’s important (which it is), I will write. And when it’s convenient (which it never is), God will speak.


The last year has given me the opportunity to attempt to note God’s movements in my spirit. What I really learned is that hearing God isn’t optional, it’s critical. And things that are critical MAKE time. Looking forward to more great thoughts in 2013 and beyond!!!





Lord, thank You for the witness of blogging. Thank You for the last year and allowing me to note what I hear and see. Please give me a sensitive spirit, one that can sense the winds blowing. I desire to be more faithful and effective. Help me to divide things that take time from those that make time. I love You and live to serve You. In Christ’s name, Amen.




Making time,
j.a.g.

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Psalm 62:5

My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him.

YGT: The Blackness that Whiteness Created

I don't usually write about my assignments in school, but this semester, I'm taking Theology of the Black Church with Dr. J. Kameron Carter. The class has brought up very powerful insights into the ways Christianity promotes whiteness*. The term "whiteness" has to do with white social power along with it's place as the unquestioned standard for all other people. It's important to say that whiteness doesn't simply refer to white people. It refers to a power structure, an invisible hierarchy that imagines itself as the ideal. All white people wouldn't be in this structure (though white people should immediately attempt to remove themselves either). Conversely, all black people wouldn't be excluded from this structure either (continue reading).


One of the comments that came out of class a couple weeks ago is "the blackness that whiteness creates". This is the idea that whiteness has created a desire and need to define what blackness is. (Don't get lost here -  this is important) I hadn't made that connection before, but I was intrigued to think about the ways in which those who are black define themselves by/against those who are white. Sometimes people can do this in ways that actually ignore their realities. For example, black people can become more focused on "not being white" than in finding out what "being black" really means.


Trying to think about this theologically...

According to James Cone's Black Theology and Black Power, Jesus’ Jewishness is essential in understanding God’s connection with the oppressed. The context of Jesus’ suffering is central - he was a Jew, a minority within the Roman state.  Jesus’ Jewishness was a social marker of oppression because of the Caesar of Rome. Said plainly, there is no struggle without an oppressor.  In Jesus’ culture, Jewishness was defined by and against ”Romanness”. 

This “Roman-ness” mirrors “whiteness” in intriguing ways; In John 19, when Pilate is sentencing Jesus and the Jewish crowd says “we have no king but Caesar”, the Jews are performing the theological problem of whiteness. In a sense, this minority group is saying, “we will not acknowledge that there is an alternate understanding of king, because that doesn't fit into the social world that has been created for us.” This is the Jewishness that Roman-ness creates. It creates a blackness that is in the best interest of whiteness rather than the best interest of the oppressed. Similarly, whiteness (like misogynistic theologies) denies that there is another understanding of God outside of the one that it has proliferated.  The kind of blackness that can only name a king that has been given to it is a dangerous blackness.  Blackness unvetted is nearly as toxic as whiteness unacknowledged.




Lord, we pray that we love our neighbor as ourselves.  Please help us through the hard work of study and examination.  Not just the examination of books, but the examination of our hearts.  Forgive us for times we are implicated in social oppression.  Thank You for freedom and the life of Jesus Christ.  In His perfect name, Amen.

Created,

j.a.g.








*There are countless books/resources that examine whiteness, including works by Richard Delgado, Mike Hill, and others. The word can also find early mention in W.E.B. Dubois' "The Souls of White Folks" chapter in his book Darkwater, where he notes the world's people discovering "personal whiteness".

YGT: Marriage, In all Seriousness

I’m currently taking a class on marriage and family at Duke Divinity School.  One of our first readings for the course was Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics.  The things he says about marriage are truly powerful.  Read below (caution - helps to read slowly):  

The essence of marriage is more comprehensive than what we must understand by the term love in the sense of the special love of husband and wife.  It consists essentially in the life-partnership established and subsisting between these two… Marriage therefore is the proof of love.  In marriage as a life-partnership it is a matter of repeating in all seriousness the Yes of love.  But “in all seriousness” means in a life which is the whole life of man, in toil and care, in joy and pain, in sickness and health, in youth and age, in wrestling with the many questions, small and great, inner and outer, individual and social… “In all seriousness” means experiencing all this in the succession of unforeseeably many days of twenty-four hours and unforeseeably many years of fifty two weeks, with the intimacy of an everyday and everynight companionship which discloses everything on both sides, in which each very soon gets to know the other with terrifying exactitude, and in which the greatest thing can become astonishingly small and the smallest astonishingly great.  “In all seriousness” means to have become a collective, a We, a pair, and to live as such, not merely outwardly, but inwardly… This seriousness of love is what we mean by marriage as a life-partnership.  And when love stands the test of this seriousness, it means that marriage is a partnership which is fulfilled not merely according to the claims of duty, but gladly, joyfully and willingly, in repetition of the Yes of love...

Wow.  Like Christ and the church (Ephesians 5:23 below), there’s something about marriage that is mystical, sacrificial, and moving.  Marriage is a great teacher.  It shows us how God must love us and how we must become a "We" if we are to embody Christ's nature.

Committed,

j.a.g.

Lord, thank You for giving us the blessing of partnership.  As You declared, "it is not good for man to be alone".  We turn to marriage for a glimpse of Your nature. Even as we struggle with new definitions of marriage today, help us never to elevate earthly marriage above singleness.  Instead, let us each be married to You.  We long for Your presence.  In Christ's name, Amen.

*I honor my wife, Ashley, for being my life-partner and confidant.  She is by far the greatest thought I've ever had.  Through it all, “in all seriousness”, I love you.

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Ephesians 5:23

For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body.

Genesis 2:18

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.”

On Being Marked by the Beast

Aslan the lion from the "Chronicles" series

Yesterday, our Baptist class at Duke Divinity School met Archbishop Malkhaz Songulashvili.  He is a Baptist Archbishop in the country of Georgia (yeah, the country).  Our time with him was a blessing.  He spoke to us about their ecclesiology (the hierarchy of their church) and why it is similar to Catholic/Orthodox churches.  He also spoke about the seriousness of serving God.  He referenced the Chronicles of Narnia, where Aslan the lion, who is loving, is also spoken of as a frightening beast.  In the Chronicles series, Aslan often represents God.  Archbishop Malkahz was telling us that like Aslan, God is a beast.  We can love God, but we should also fear God.  Most significantly, because we are serving the beast, we have to take it seriously.  

This terrifying idea reminded me of a scripture - The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom… –Proverbs 1:7a.  After searching, I found there are numerous passages that encourage a holy fear of God.  Some are included below.

Archbishop Malkhaz (right) welcomes Bishop
Rusudan Gotsiridze (left), the first woman
ordained as a bishop in Georgia.

Before leaving, I asked Archbishop Malkhaz if there was any advice he would give to those preparing to serve the beast.  He said to have integrity and to listen.  He said that speaking is always tempting for preachers (agree anyone?), but it should be secondary to being active listeners.  He told us that in Georgia, bishops must go off and be in silence for 40 days before they are ordained.  This is because ordination is a form of social promotion and people have to know what their true motivations are.  The candidate must know themselves and their calling.  They do this by listening.  (Wow, how much could we hear about what God desires for us if we were listening in this way?!?)

I thank God for the Archbishop's presence in our midst.  Being marked by God is not trivial, it is humbling and petrifying. The beast awaits and expects our obedience and reverence. This was definitely a rattling I needed. 

Lord, You reign and rule over all.   I love You and yet I fear You.  Please grant me the wisdom and temperament to serve You and Your people well.  Let me enter into your service with integrity and open ears.  Lord, thank you for the blessing of leaders in your church here on earth.  Bless Archbishop Malkhaz and the work his congregation performs in the name of love and peace.  In the name of Jesus Christ, the head of the church, Amen.

Fearfully made,

j.a.g.

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Psalm 2:11
Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.

Psalm 34:9
O fear the LORD, ye his saints: for there is no want to them that fear him.

Proverbs 31:30

Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.

Acts 9:31
Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.

Revelation 15:4
Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thou only art holy: for all nations shall come and worship before thee; for thy judgments are made manifest.

On Thanksgiving Day in May

This morning, my heart is overjoyed. Yesterday was the last day of final exams at Duke Divinity School this year! I’m so grateful to God for providing and keeping us throughout this year. I didn’t know what to write, but I knew I wanted to express my thanks to God, so I decided to seek out a Psalm that adequately expressed what I was feeling (thanks Pastor Renee and Dr. Portier-Young). This is taken from Psalm 65 (NRSV; brackets added by me):


1 Praise is due to you,
O God, in Zion;
and to you shall vows be performed,
2 O you who answer prayer!
To you all [men and women] shall come.


At the start of this school year, we had many hopes and expectations. But we needed Your help to sustain us. We prayed many prayers for You to answer and…

5 By awesome deeds you answer[ed] us with deliverance,
O God of our salvation;
you are the hope of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest seas.
6 By your strength you established the mountains;
you are girded with might.


…You were there. But it wasn’t always easy. Sometimes things felt unbearable…

7 You silence[d] the roaring of the seas,
the roaring of their waves,
the tumult of the peoples.


…but You kept us. There were times we didn’t know how we would make it financially or academically. There was desperate “roaring of the waves” in our families and “tumult of the peoples” during finals, yet…

9 You visit[ed] the earth and water[ed] it,
you greatly enrich[ed] it;
the river of God is full of water;
you provide[ed] the people with grain,
for so you have prepared it.
10 You water[ed] its furrows abundantly,
settling its ridges,
softening it with showers,
and blessing its growth.


…your provisions and faithfulness exceeded our expectations. You continued to surprise us and meet us, “softening” our hearts and “blessing our growth”. God, for this You deserve all the glory and praise because...

11a You crown[ed] the year with your goodness*




Praise be to God! In addition to Cinco de Mayo, I’m making today another Thanksgiving Day (sorry but there won’t be any cranberry sauce, lol). If you have something to thank God for today, let us “shout and sing together for joy” (Psalm 65:13). Happy Thanksgiving!




God, thank You for Your goodness, faithfulness, and love. I lift my hands, my voice, and my heart to You this day in thanksgiving. Your mercy endureth forever and to all generations! Let the fruit of my lips praise You for all You do on my behalf. Forgive me for times when my praise is muffled by life. You are not good because of what You do, but You are good because You are God. Please help me not to get this confused. You are amazing! In Christ’s name, Amen.



Reflecting,
jag









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* The NRSV translation uses "bounty" here. The translation here is from the NKJV which uses the word "goodness" instead. "Goodness" is a closer translation of the actual root word used in Hebrew (towb, pronounced tōve, meaning good), but the ideas are the same. A bounty is simply an abundance of goodness so the difference doesn't significantly alter the meaning. - Look at that first year already paying off! Lol.


Psalm 65:1-13 (in it's entirety)

1 Praise is due to you,
O God, in Zion;
and to you shall vows be performed,
2 O you who answer prayer!
To you all flesh shall come.
3 When deeds of iniquity overwhelm us,
you forgive our transgressions.
4 Happy are those whom you choose and bring near
to live in your courts.
We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house,
your holy temple.

5 By awesome deeds you answer us with deliverance,
O God of our salvation;
you are the hope of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest seas.
6 By your strength you established the mountains;
you are girded with might.
7 You silence the roaring of the seas,
the roaring of their waves,
the tumult of the peoples.
8 Those who live at earth’s farthest bounds are awed by your signs;
you make the gateways of the morning and the evening shout for joy.

9 You visit the earth and water it,
you greatly enrich it;
the river of God is full of water;
you provide the people with grain,
for so you have prepared it.
10 You water its furrows abundantly,
settling its ridges,
softening it with showers,
and blessing its growth.
11 You crown the year with your bounty;
your wagon tracks overflow with richness.
12 The pastures of the wilderness overflow,
the hills gird themselves with joy,
13 the meadows clothe themselves with flocks,
the valleys deck themselves with grain,
they shout and sing together for joy.

On the Slingshot

Wait for the LORD;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the LORD.
- Psalm 27:14

This week marked the end of my first semester at Duke Divinity School and it has been a true journey. I have learned a lot about God, the church, and myself. One of the lessons that is being revealed to me is the importance of waiting. Here, I feel I'm being stretched and prepared for something greater. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm getting ready. Waiting on this 'something' though can sometimes be tough...

If you're like me, in life it can be tempting to be impatient with where we are. We look at life and say, "I wish I could afford ________", or "I wish I was doing ________", or "I wish I was already _________" (substitute your own situation in the blanks) But this semester has reminded me of the need to just be still, keep working, and wait.

Life is kind of like a slingshot. You are put inside it and then you are pulled. You get pulled and pulled and pulled until the "puller" is ready to release you. After you are released, you fly according to how far you've been pulled.

Well, the great "Puller" is God. God pulls, stretching us to the point where we are ready to be released, then we fly. The key is the more we are stretched, the further we will fly. Being stretched in the slingshot is difficult and it takes time, but it is much better than being pulled slightly and only going a short distance. By waiting and allowing God to pull and stretch us, we are preparing to fly into the destiny that awaits.

So wherever you are today, be strong in the slingshot you are in this season and wait on the Lord. Don't compare yourself to others (thanks Pastor Kim!) or lose confidence - God has not forgotten about you (Philippians 1:6 below) In this time, you are being prepared for greatness. Remember, the further you're stretched, the further you'll go.




Lord, thank You for the gift of patience. It is indeed a fruit of the Spirit. Help us all to learn to wait on You and have faith that in these times, You are stretching us for a reason. We know You have not forgotten about us and will perform the work You set out for us to do. Thank You for loving us enough to spend time with us and perfect us as Your servants. Help us to be faithful during our times of waiting. We love You and need You in this hour... Amen




Waiting,
j.a.g.







--------------------------------------------------
Philippians 1:6 For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

On How MLK Paid for Graduate School

Please forgive me. I have not blogged in over 3 months. Ashley, Jocelyn, and I have been extremely busy this summer, as we moved from Bloomington, Indiana to Durham, North Carolina. We moved in order for me to attend Duke Divinity School. Check out Ashley’s blog for more details on the developments in the last few months. We’ve since arrived safely and are adjusting to a new life in a new state. Please pray for us. That said though, I can now post monthly life updates again. Below is the most recent "God moment".

----------------------

Yesterday afternoon, I received a call from the Director of Admissions at the Duke Divinity School. He called to inform me that some scholarship money became available and I would be getting the Martin Luther King Scholarship for my first year in the program. Wow, I thought to myself. Thank You God! The news completely blew me away. It also confirmed some valuable lessons about faith.


God doesn’t show His hand. I received my award information from Duke in the spring (March/April). I had to accept my admission into the school even earlier than that. It would have been easier to make the decision, financially, if I saw it back then. But that would not have been faith. It’s funny because even if I knew I was a candidate for the award, I would’ve felt better. It would have helped to think, “there’s the possibility that this scholarship could come through”. But none of that would have been faith. If you can figure it out beforehand, it’s likely not faith. God is mysterious - His ways are “past finding out” (Romans 11:33 below).

Let’s put it this way, if God played poker, He’d likely bluff a lot. Not lie, but act as if His hand was worse than it was. Then, when it was time to show, He’d always outdo you and everyone at the table – He’d always win.


Faith requires action. If we would have never taken the chance and enrolled in school, we would have never received the award. In other words, I had to make a move for my faith to be rewarded. In other other words, FAITH TRAVELS (hmmm...). It acts, it decides, it steps out without having all the facts.

At first, this sounds elementary. Of course faith requires action. Even the Bible teaches “faith without works is dead” (James 2:26 below). But it’s much more than this. You can’t even experience faith unless you test it. You can’t trust something has happened by faith until you act on it and wait for God to move. If you’re unwilling to act without having all the answers and trusting God, you are not exercising faith. Maybe a humble hypothesizing, but not faith. Faith is not knowing the solution, but living as if you do.



That’s it. That’s how MLK paid for graduate school. He lived a life worthy of creating a scholarship and that scholarship is helping to pay for my graduate education (btw, it’s not a major scholarship, but it’s definitely helpful). However, none of this would have been possible had it not been for a God whose interest is better than a Stafford Loan and who is more forgiving than any bursar. He’s shown His hand again and it is so much better than I thought. I believe that as I travel in faith, it will only get better.





Lord, thank You for your provisions. Thank You for showing us that You still reward acts of faith. And teaching us that those are the only acts You reward. I love You and am grateful for the opportunity to chronicle this journey. Please give us all the strength to live lives of faith. Encourage us to take steps out into the unknown and live as if You are waiting to catch us if (and sometimes when) we fall. We need You everyday.




Thanking God,
j.a.g.







---------------------------------------------------
Romans 11:33
O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!

James 2:20-26²⁰You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless^d]">?
²¹Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar?
²²You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.
²³And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,"and he was called God's friend.
²⁴You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.
²⁵In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?
²⁶As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.