CFs – The Second Ten Minutes (part four)

The first three parts of my continuing saga can be found here (part one), here (part two), and here (part three). This is my series on the Chinese Food syndrome (CFs), a syndrome whereby one attempts reconciliation with a fellow believer and soon thereafter finds themselves with an empty, hungry feeling inside, similar to the feeling one gets forty minutes after eating Chinese Food; ergo “CFs”. This syndrome is being presented in melodramatic form, our main protagonist is Albert; he is a member of his local mega-church’s “Single & Young Married’s” group which is pastored by Scott and Allison. In our first three segments, Albert found himself the “victim” of lustful thoughts while looking at Allison. He spoke to Scott and Allison about his struggle; they were very encouraging, prayed with him for strength and deliverance from his sin. Albert left their meeting much encouraged and hopeful for change.

However, the next day, a workday, Albert again found himself the victim of lustful thoughts while at a meeting at work. He found that he could not keep his eyes off Monica’s (a coworker) rear end while she wrote notes for the meeting on the white board.

Our story continues…

The meeting ended Albert’s day. He was angry and confused. He felt that if anything the struggle with lust had heightened, that it was now more difficult than ever to keep his thoughts off of the female forms that he encountered. As he drove to the trailhead for his evening training ride, he noticed every woman walking along the road. During his two-hour ride, he saw all sorts of women in tight fitting bike shorts and closer to the beach in very brief swimsuits. It became quite difficult to keep his thoughts on his cadence, his heart rate and training intensity; this was usually not an issue, why was today different? It seemed that the prayer and struggle had only made things worse…what was going on? Albert was determined to spend a few more minutes with Pastor Scott and Allison this evening after the “Single and Young Married’s” Bible Study.

The study was wonderful; Albert had stopped at Subway after his ride and brought his sandwich along with him to the meeting. He didn’t have time to stop at home and take a shower so he changed in the back of his truck to shorts and t-shirt. This wasn’t unusual for him, sometimes he felt like he lived in the back of his truck. Pastor Scott was teaching a topical series on “Freedom from the Law”, this week he spoke about the so-called “Lord’s Prayer” and how the seeming condition of “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” did not apply to believers under the New Covenant as Jesus had made that statement under the Old Covenant. Albert realized that this gave him a lot to think about regarding Jesus’ words since most of what He said was said before the cross and the initiation of the New Covenant.

Albert waited until after Pastor Scott was free and approached him to talk about his continued struggles with lustful thoughts. Allison walked up as Albert and Scott were talking, she was as beautiful as ever and dressed in tight pants and a sleeveless top that was also tight and showed a bit of her middle. Albert again found himself struggling with his eyes and his physical reaction; how did he explain that to Pastor Scott and Allison?

They went to Scott’s office.

Scott: Albert, I understand you feel that you’ve had a setback; you simply need to keep claiming victory over this spirit. You’re involved in a struggle between the forces of evil and God’s Holy Spirit; you need to realize that these spirits are persistent, that they will try to gain victory over you and that they will tempt your eyes.

Allison: We will keep praying for you for deliverance, there are so many men struggling with pornography, even Christian men; we will pray for you, we’ll pray that God will deliver you.

Albert: I’m not struggling with porn; I’m struggling with the fully clothed women I see every day. For Pete’s sake Allison, I’m struggling with how you’re dressed right now…

Scott: Wow Albert, I didn’t realize it was that much of a struggle for you…

Albert: It is. How do you deal with it Scott?

Scott: Well, I struggled a bit with lust when I was in my early teen years. Since I asked Jesus into my heart when I was fifteen and I learned to “guard my eyes”, it’s not been an issue for me since then.

Albert: So just like that, poof, it was gone? No more struggle?

Scott: (Nervously) Well..yes. (Hesitatingly) Albert, I’m dead to sin, so are you…you need to receive that victory over your flesh and walk in freedom. Satan has no power over you; you are free from the law of sin and death.

Albert: So I can get to a place where I don’t sin anymore?

Scott: We’re always sinners, but because we are saved, then filled with the Holy Spirit, we are free.

Albert: But what we’re talking about is a specific sin I struggle with; I have trouble not looking at women dressed in revealing clothes. For Pete’s sake Scott, don’t you think that the way Allison is dressed right now is quite revealing?

Allison: (Blushing)…Albert, why are you looking at…

Scott: …Well yes, she’s a beautiful woman, and my wife…

Albert: Exactly Scott, but she’s not my wife and in that outfit there’s not a lot left to the imagination regarding her figure. I mean it’s one thing to have to “guard my eyes” when I’m out in public riding my bike down the beach; it’s another thing to have to deal with this when I’m at church. Where’s the line between my responsibility to “guard my eyes” and your responsibility to not present me with something that I need to “guard my eyes” against?

Mountain Lake, Glacial Lakes State Park, Pope County, Minnesota

Mountain Lake is a small, only 1/2 mile long, lake situated in a pothole between glacial kames and eskers in Glacial Lakes State Park. It’s spring fed and surrounded by fairly high hills. We had paddled it before, actually the first time we paddled our canoe back on June 9, 2002, that day it was windy and we chose Mountain Lake as the hills provided some shelter from the wind.

This evening the lake was calm and glassy. In fact I used this trip as an opportunity to take some photographs of sunset, cloud and hill reflections that I’ve not yet downloaded. We put in at around 7:30pm, the days are getting shorter here to the tune of 3+ minutes per day; it was pretty much dark by the time we took out at around 9:00pm.

Basically, it was a relaxing little paddle. We caught one fish, a small crappie that I released and heard at least three or four beaver tail-slaps. There may have been some commotion atributable to deer on the south shore, but we didn’t actually see them to confirm. We were indecisive about whether to go ahead a paddle or not; mostly we needed to relax from so many days of work and play performances, I finally decided that I needed some “canoe time”. I’m glad I did.

We saw the sun set, the skies darken and change colors and we got to hear the noises of a lake at night. All of these things are proof of the creator’s existance and love for His creatures. Re-creation.

A Oreo Cookie Blizzard and sandwich for Laurie, and two nasty gut bomb chlli dogs for me finished off the evening before our drive home.

Week Three of the “Epic Church Hunt Saga”

This week I didn’t attempt a church visit. We had a matinee scheduled for Sunday afternoon, which meant that we needed to be at the theatre by 12:45. Laurie’s sister and family were volunteering so as to be able to see the performance for free; we then hung out with them in the park and BBQ’d hot dogs between performances. We returned to prepare for the 8:00pm show at 6:45pm and by the end of the show we were both so tired we wanted to cry. We don’t know how people with children do it.

Today is a very light day for me so I’m blogging from a local coffee house hoping Laurie can sleep in a bit without my presence at home. I plan to head out as soon as my battery wears down. I’m taking tomorrow off. I’m hoping to have some relaxing time today and tomorrow to canoe a bit, take some photographs and rest prior to going back to work on Wednesday and resuming our last weekend of play performances on Thursday. Sunday evening ends with a Cast & Crew party after what they call “Strike”; which must be some theatre term for “finishing a run of performances”.

I had thought about checking out our local Episcopal Church on Sunday, we partied next door on Saturday night, but I decided that I needed to stay home and get things ready for the BBQ in the park Sunday afternoon. The service was at 10:30am and I’d have been packing too much into one morning. I am committed to us participating in some sort of local church expression; the pickings are slim in Minnesota for a recovering Lutheran/Pente-Evangelical.

One thing that was really cool about the party the evening before was hearing of the director’s recent visit to Abbey Road recording studios in England. She’s involved with publicity for a recording studio here in the upper Midwest and recently flew over for a whirlwind tour. She stood where the Beatles stood…I shook her hand…

CFs – The First Ten Minutes (part three)

In part three of my serial blogging piece we examine the first (metaphoric) ten minutes of the “forty minutes to hunger” that personifies the CFs (Chinese Food syndrome). Here are links to part one and part two.

In my last post I told the story of Albert, a young man in a Singles and Young Married’s group who was struggling with lustful thoughts about Allison, the beautiful wife of the group’s pastor, Scott. Albert had struggled for a time regarding whether or not to talk to Scott and Allison about his lustful thoughts. Albert prayed through his struggles and was able to approach both Allison and Scott, he left the meeting feeling as though he had a “meeting of the minds”, that the Holy Spirit had led Albert through prayer and wisdom to freedom and deliverance from his sinful struggle. Albert went to bed that evening with a clear conscience looking forward to going to work the next day, and the evening’s meeting of the Singles and Young Married’s group.

Albert woke early the next morning with a determination to spend an hour in Bible Study and prayer. He fought sleep during his quiet time, but he was able to pray through his prayer list and complete his goal of reading an entire chapter of the Old and New Testaments. He ran for fifteen minutes (down from his usual thirty), showered and drove to the freeway for his usual morning commute. The early part of his day went well, Albert was a graphic artist and he was pretty much on his own through most of the day. He worked quietly in his cubical focused only on the computer screen until a reminder for a three o’clock meeting popped up on his screen. He stopped for a soft drink in the cafeteria on his way to the meeting, he’d eaten a sandwich he’d brought at noontime and worked through lunch, he liked to work straight through his lunch and leave a little bit early each day. Albert settled into his usual seat in the conference room opened his pop and fired up his PDA to take notes. He dismissed the meeting reminder he found on its screen.

Then he noticed Monica…more specifically, he noticed Monica’s butt. He turned his eyes away and focused on his PDA, the chair of the meeting, his boss, came in and started the meeting. The talked about a couple of minor things and then his boss asked Monica to go to the white board to take notes. This was a challenge for Albert because Monica was wearing tight slacks and due to the fact that she was writing on the white board her rear end was completely available for him to watch.

Suddenly Albert felt very guilty; he’d been delivered last evening from this sin of lust, yet somehow this afternoon here he was, back to wallowing in the mire. What was wrong with him? Why did he continue to struggle? Why did he continue to want to look at Monica?

We Take Time From Our Story For a Quick Psychotic Break…

I met this guy working inpatient, he had his first psychotic break while serving as a missionary in southern Europe. His wife had subsequently divorced him and left with his kids. He rarely saw them. Every six months or so he’d show up on my unit totally disconnected and disarrayed; we’d adjust his meds and in two or three days we’d be sitting on the smoking deck talking about the wonderful, graceful love of Jesus. Being a pente-fundie at the time I struggled with his smoking and his lack of victory over mental illness, I talked to him about it at length. For some reason he always showed up when the census was low…so we had great “deck” times.

First off, virtually all people suffering from deep psychosis smoke. Encourage them in their smoking, nicotine is a (relatively) safe, calming drug that they can administer themselves. I say it’s relatively safe because many of the medications necessary to treat psychosis are tough on the body…it’s getting better, but there are still some tough side-effects from a lot of the strong anti-psychotics.

My first couple of contacts with “this guy” led me to be very skeptical of his “believerhood”, he didn’t meet my “checklist criteria” (another future blogging project). His folks dropped him off, and I sorta knew them from a local church some of my in-laws attended. He didn’t really fit their criteria either, but he’d gone there since he was a kid.

After his fifth or sixth admission to the psych unit I finally started seeing something behind all of the torment I’d written off as “sin”. I saw the man. A man struggling with a disease that racked his mind the way that cancer racked the bodies of it’s victims. I spent so much of my time looking at his “sin” and “lack of faith” that I missed the fact that through this all “this guy” held on to the trust that the One who created him, reached down through all those hallucinations and saved him through Grace.

I finally noticed that my checklist be damned; “this guy”, with all his pain, failings, struggles and sin was my brother.

How did I notice that? By sitting on the smoking deck and listening…

Thank you Father for a good calming smoke.

CFs – The Conflict (part two)

A post or few ago I started a series on something I call the Chinese Food syndrome, or CFs for short. Here is a link to part one. In this post, part two, I want to provide an example of the beginning phase of a CFs event. CFs is what I call a repetitive situation I’ve experienced in my life in which I have some sort of issue with a fellow believer, I go to them in the spirit of Matthew 18, I believe we’ve come to some sort of reconciliation, and later I discover that I’m the party who has made all of the concessions. I then have an empty feeling inside, somewhat akin to the way one feels hungry about forty minutes after eating Chinese Food, ergo, the Chinese Food syndrome, “or CFs”.

In order to avoid gossip I’m going to create an event, fiction will not be stranger than truth.

Meet Albert..

Albert struggled with lust. A fairly new believer and a young, vital, single man he found that his eyes often strayed to the wonderful curves that God created and placed on the bodies of his sisters in the “Single and Young Married’s” group at his local neighborhood mega-church. He loved the group because they were athletic, outdoor oriented and really had a lot of fun taking bike rides, hiking and skiing together. It was a wonderful blessing for Albert to be able to spend time with fellow believers and at the same time be engaged in the outdoor activities he so loved.

The “Single’s and Young Married’s” Pastors, were Scott, a newly graduated seminarian from somewhere in Missouri, and his wife Allison. Scott and Allison were beautiful together; they had met in Bible College and married right after graduation. They had decided to wait to have children until after Scott had graduated seminary, and established himself as an associate pastor of a growing fellowship. Allison was behind Scott all of the way, she believed that he had what it took to be a “mighty man of God someday” and lead a large church; in her eyes Scott was a rising star and he had, in the words of their denomination: “the juice”. Allison had majored in music ministry, she felt it was the best way to support Scott, he could preach and she could play keys and lead worship along with him. They both knew that their position within this church was a chance to show their “stuff”, that they could, with a bit of work, move up and become shakers and movers.

Albert had “noticed” Allison. In fact he had really noticed Allison, Albert had noticed everything about Allison, Albert had trouble not noticing Allison because: (1) Allison was incredibly beautiful and (2) Allison dressed in a way that assured that she would be noticed, especially by men. Albert really struggled with this, Jesus had become real to Albert some months ago and Albert believed that he was to follow, to obey, and to be conformed to the mind of Christ. He had seen the truth of both his sin nature and God’s grace; he struggled with his sin nature and desired to place that nature under the Lordship of Jesus, his Lord.

In the light of this, Albert decided to take his concerns to Scott and Allison. He reasoned that if he was struggling with lustful eyes, so were others in the Singles and Young Married’s group. In the spirit of Matthew 18 he knew he needed to speak directly to Allison, but he knew that would be inappropriate, so he asked to speak to both of them, he reasoned that as they were married, they were one.

Albert was very nervous about the meeting he had scheduled with them, but he prayed and believed that because they were all Christians things would work out well. He believed that they would all be led by the Holy Spirit to a deeper love.

The meeting went very well, Scott and Allison understood his struggles, they counseled him to continue to resist lust, to claim victory over his sin and they prayed with him for strength and deliverance. Albert left feeling strengthened and understood, that his pastor really cared for him, blessed that they had spent time with him, prayed with him, and promised to continue in prayer for him. Albert really believed that he would have victory over lust, that he would be delivered from his sinful struggle.

How We’ve Changed…

My wife and I had a great conversation this afternoon. Laurie initiated the conversation, I had just gotten home from work and decided that my next task de jour was to hitch up the mower and shorten some grass. We sat in the family room outside of our laundry room and talked.

Laurie had been reading a devotional book that a friend had given us a couple of years ago for our anniversary. She had looked up some topic or another, I can’t remember which, the book was arranged by topic; in other words you can look up “ambition” and the devotional will show you a bunch of scripture on “ambition” and have 10 or 15 different little essays about “ambition”.

Our conversation went something like this (granting me a large level of poetic license for my wife’s exact choice of words):

Laurie: “Some of the verses they use contradict other verses they use.”

Kent: “Yep.”

Laurie: “I mean they’ll quote Proverbs, which says ‘X’ and then they’ll quote Psalms which says ‘Y’.”

Kent: “So what do you think about that?”

Laurie: “I don’t know, I mean, we’ve always been told that it’s like ‘the Word’, that it’s like perfect.”

Kent: “Jesus is the Word.”

Laurie: “Yes, He is.”

Kent: “I don’t think that we can really approach scripture the way we have in the past, do you?”

Laurie: “No, we can’t grab a verse or two and get some sort of meaning from such a small piece of scripture, I’m not sure what we need to change, but…you know, we’ve changed…”

Kent: “How so?”

Laurie: “Things that would have bugged me a couple of years ago don’t bother me anymore.”

Kent: “Like what?

Laurie: “Well, like hanging out with these people in the play, I’m having to dance with this guy who I think is Gay…a couple of years ago I’d have made a big deal about how I couldn’t do that…now, well, I don’t approve of his lifestyle, but it’s really not a big deal to be in a play with him. It’s not like I’m endorsing his lifestyle.”

Kent: “No, you’re not. Would your attitude a couple of years ago help him to know that he’s loved by Jesus?”

Laurie: “No, it would have gotten in the way. But you know, things just don’t seem to be as big a deal as they used to…like what people say and do…I don’t know…”

Kent: “You don’t feel like you should be trying to change them?”

Laurie: “Yeah…”

Kent: “Like it’s yours to love them and God’s to draw them to Him?”

We got to the place a couple of years ago where we asked the question: “Why would people want to be Christians based on what they see in us? We’re kind of miserable.”

The joy is coming back…

Forty Minutes Later…or “CFs”…(part one)

There’s this old joke about eating Chinese food and being hungry again
forty minutes later.

I’ve an individual in my life that gives me the same feeling, she is the kind of person that in order for me to get along with her I need to stay away from her, she’s a very controlling individual. Most of us have similar acquaintances. This is the kind of person that tells you what to think, believe, pray, say and feel, if she and I talk we have conflict. I’ve attempted to discuss issues and reconcile, and things seem to go well, it seems that we have a meeting of the minds and hearts; forty minutes later I have an empty feeling in my gut as I realize I’m the only one who made any sort of concession, extended any sort of intimacy or transparency, I’m the only one who yielded, who softened. Forty minutes later we’re back to where we started.

This is getting to be a pretty universal church experience for me as well. When I look back at most of my church experiences I can see that the churches I’ve attended have also been very controlling, I’ve been told what to think, believe, pray, say and feel. When I’ve attempted to discuss issues and reconcile, things seem to go well and then about forty minutes later I have that same empty feeling in my gut realizing that I’m the only one who made any sort of concession, I’m the only one who extended any sort of intimacy or transparency. I’m the only one who yielded or softened.

This is a repetitive pattern in my life. Whenever there’s a repetitive pattern in my life I start questioning whether it’s me or whether it’s what I’m confronting. In a sense it’s always me, I’m the one that ultimately can remove myself from the situation or individual that’s causing the conflict. I’m going to call this the CFs for “Chinese Food syndrome” (I made the “s” for “syndrome” lower case both in honor of e.e., whom I quote below, and also because it’s stylish), the root cause seems to be a conflict between who I am and who a particular subculture or person expects me to be.

To be nobody but yourself, in a world which is doing it’s best, night and day, to make you like everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting…
–e.e. cummings, In Struggle

This has always been one of my favorite quotes because I’ve always felt it described my greatest struggle, I want to please people. I want people to be happy with me, I’m often crushed if people are upset with me, especially people that I respect, admire and/or are authorities in my life. The “and/or” is crucial. I don’t always respect and admire the authorities in my life. This is because they are often not respectable nor admirable.

I’m going to write on CFs in a few segments, considering first the original conflicts and circumstances that lead up to the need for reconciliation, second each of the four “ten minute” segments after the initial contact. In other words, you have a conflict with someone, you attempt to reconcile, and after forty minutes you have this empty feeling in your stomach that things were really just a one-way street, and you did all the driving. Somehow right now breaking this syndrome up in stages makes sense, being that it’s a “repetitive pattern” i (honoring cummings in the lower case) need to break it down into chewable (and hopefully satisfying) pieces.

Please bear with me kind reader, and pray. This is a work in progress (as are you and I).

Think to write, write to think…
–Kent Runge

The “Dammit” Demon…

I’ve a good friend who says that he’s starting to think that there’s a “dammit” demon. This is a demon that follows him around causing bad things to happen. When the bad thing happens this friend then says “dammit”, and he knows that the demon has struck.

This is the same friend who says that we’re like ants walking on God’s palm and occasionally God smushes us with His finger and then we try to stand back up all crippled and smushed looking.

I guess Job felt like that, and this friend’s gone through some Job-esque experiences that I’m sure have colored his point of view.

How would you feel if someday God said to the Adversary:

Have you considered my servant, insert your name ?

How Great thou Creation Calls…

Sunday was week two of my “back to church” experience. Last week’s visit was fairly positive, this church is alternating “traditional” and “contemporary” services from week to week. Generally I prefer “contemporary” music so I thought I’d much prefer this service compared to last week’s. It didn’t turn out that way, I liked last week’s service better. This is a quote from my PPC notes taken during the service.

It seems like I’m in a wannabe eva-mega-church.

I also wrote “Hmmmmm…” a lot, which usually means I’m skeptically thoughtful. Hmmmm. Maybe I messed myself up this morning by watching that D. James Kennedy guy this morning on TV before I went, you know, that Presbyterian pastor down in Florida that can go from scripture to politics in three sentences?

Anyway, back to the subject.

Church. It was a “contemporary” service instead of a “traditional” service and I didn’t like it. ‘Sup with that? Right now I feel like all I can write are “Hmmmm”’s and “dang”’s, I’m frustrated and in a quandry. This is the deal, I really like contemporary praise and worship music better than hymns on an organ. But this is what happened: We sang a couple of worship songs together, songs like Matt Redman’s Heart of Worship, which is a pretty good song, but it’s not about Jesus it’s about one guy’s experience. I guess that the story is that Matt found himself all wound up in the business of worship music and this song was a bit of the telling of his story of returning to the “Heart of Worship”. Great story, great story telling in a song, I like singing it; but it doesn’t seem like worship.

Last week we sang,

Oh Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the world thy hands have made,
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.

One time I got all ticked off at Elisabeth Elliot for saying that modern “praise choruses” didn’t really “cut it” for worship. For some reason I’m starting to see what she meant. This is a big struggle. One of the things I absolutely adored about my days in the Vineyard movement was the music. I still listen to and love much of the music from Vineyard artists. I just started Brian Doerksen’s Creation Calls in iTunes. I remember hearing it first at a praise conference we went to in Anaheim in Fall of ‘94, right before we started our YWAM (Youth With A Mission) DTS (Discipleship Training School) in January of ‘95.

How could I say there is no God,
When all around creation calls,
A singing bird, a mighty tree,
The vast expanse of open sea,
I love to stand at ocean shores,
And feel the thundering breakers roar…

So, that’s your quandry Kent, you’re trying to keep a foot on the dock of tradition and your other foot in the boat of contemporaneousness. Pick one of ‘em and git along with your life…otherwise you’re going to fall in the lake (or thundering breakers)!

Hmmmmm. First off, it’s pretty easy to sucker me in with a song that calls to mind creation, I’m a nature addict…

Well…shying away from another diversion from the subject…the “contemporary” music on Sunday had some problems. First: some of the songs are too hard to sing. Second: the tempos were often too fast. Third: mostly nobody knew them. One of the things that I think really stinks about the religion of modernism is that the “newest” thing, is the best thing. “New and Improved” is the first commandment of the modern age, and it’s become the mantra of the modern church. I don’t mean for this to head off into some of my postmodern leanings, but the point I do want to make is that in building a hymnody we need to, well, build. My wife consistently makes the point that there are a bunch of great songs that have been passed by, and that newer songs are getting tougher and tougher to sing.

The hymnody of the church is an open canon, when a song like How Great Thou Art appeared to English speakers in 1951 it became apparent over time that it should be included in the hymnody of the church; a mere 53 years ago there wasn’t the marketing pressure that there is now, there weren’t people who were making their living off of the “Christian Music Industry”. Marketing is not a positive influence in the further development of the church’s hymnody, popularity is important for some reasons; i.e., sing-ability, remember-ability, but popularity can also deter.

I encourage our leaders to think about the songs that are sung during their worship services, to coordinate with the worship leaders, to teach and correct. I realize that music is one of the biggest land mines in the church today, but without leadership in this area we’ll keep wallowing in ever bigger circles. Michael Spencer once remarked on Boar’s Head Tavern that we needed liturgists; I agree, maybe they can head off lyrics like:

Your love is extravagant, your friendship, intimate…

Try it, sing it out loud, nobody can sing “extravagant”…