carbonated joy

Andy has been a good friend for a long time.
He is wild about Jesus.
He is wild about his family.
In my book, that makes him wildly successful.
He told me a wildly awesome story last week.
It’s a story about something that we all do, it’s just awkward to talk about…at least out loud.
Andy was at a early morning Bible study group with a bunch of dudes. I think there was delicious breakfast food involved.
The leader of the group asked one of the men to pray. The guy said he would love to pray, but that he doesn’t publicly pray out loud. He only prays silent prayers…and THAT is what he did.
As the other men awkwardly shuffled their feet and wondered if he was done yet, he prayed silently.
Silence can be thick when we aren’t used to it in our public gatherings.
Then, after a few moments, the private pray-er let out an enthusiastic “amen” and loud handclap signifying that prayer time was over.
Nobody knew what to do with that.
Can we agree with prayer that we can’t hear?
What did he say?
Does it count if we can’t hear it?

Then my amazing friend, Andy, had a wild thought…silent farts are some of the strongest farts.
Why wouldn’t silent prayer be the same?!
This is one of the reasons that I really love Andy. He thinks of stuff like this.

I can say from years of research and exposure that silent farts truly ARE some of the strongest farts. Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about! We have all been innocent victims and purveyors of the strategically placed, silent but deadly toot.
Without any warning you find yourself in a thick SBD fog. The toxic air biscuit or ghost turd, definitely smelt but not heard. Passive aggressive gas, SBDs are the ninjas of the flatulence family. You don’t know it’s there until you are suddenly surrounded. You are suddenly consumed by its presence. The fragrance has overtaken you!

Silent farts are some of the strongest farts. Why wouldn’t silent prayer be the same?!

I’ve prayed and been privy to a lot of NON-silent prayers…
I’ve heard people preach entire 3 point sermons in a prayer. I’ve heard folks quote every Bible verse they know as they prayed. Others use big impressive sounding words, or talk in very proper King James English (like that is all that God understands). I’ve personally prayed shopping lists disguised as prayer. Over the years I’ve learned all the right religious words. I know how to pray a completely AUTHORIZED, yet completely UNAUTHENTIC prayer.
I can pray out loud!
We sometimes think our prayers need to sound lofty in order to reach heaven, and so we try to impress everybody within hearing distance with our verbal rightness.

When someone doesn’t or won’t pray out loud, we think it’s an obvious sign of immaturity, Surely it’s just a phase and once they grow up a bit they will start sharing their prayers with the rest of us.

We don’t like silent prayer.
But, wait…here’s the deal…
WHO are we praying to?
Are we praying to the guy standing next to us?
Or…
Are we talking to the ONE who sees the silent?
In our awfully loud world silence makes us nervous, but solitude is a gift from God.
Being able to just get quiet with God is actually a sign of a deep intimacy.
When I was a kid, I had a “silent dog whistle” that only my dog could hear. It sounded on a frequency that only a dog could hear. What if the prayers that we just can’t say out loud don’t go unheard? What if the prayers that are too personal and painful to proclaim are listened to on a whole different frequency that only God hears?
What if the prayers, hopes, and dreams that we can’t seem to push past our throats are heard by God? What if silent prayers find themselves surrounded by the thick presence of a God who leaves a beautiful fragrance in our lives?
What if the strongest prayers are the ones that only God can hear?
Maybe it’s time to drop some serious SBDs.

During his time on this crazy little world Jesus did some crazy otherworldly stuff.
He gave sight to the blind, and raised the dead! He cast out demons, and fixed broken people!
But…
The first and last miracles of Jesus were both…well…kind of…unnecessary.
They didn’t HAVE to happen.
They are like mismatched bookend miracles at the beginning and end of his earthly adventure. Both bookends were grounded in completely this-worldly, everyday human stuff.
And THAT is what makes them wild and beautiful.

Bookend # 1:
There is a BIG wedding celebration in Cana.
Jesus is at the wedding, along with His Mom, and His friends.
Back then, weddings were big social events. They were serious parties!
AND, Jesus was at this party. Evidently he was was the type of messiah that got invited to parties.
I like that!!
Only fun people get invited to parties!!
Jesus wasn’t a jerk. (Put that on a bumper sticker!)
AND, on this occasion, Jesus kept the party going.
It’s a young couple just starting out.
This is their BIG day.
All of their friends and family were there to help them celebrate.
There was a buffet with pizza rolls and those little cocktail weenies, and a DJ…
okay, maybe not.
But there WAS wine.
Until…
there WASN’T!!
They…BRACE YOURSELF…ran out of wine…
Turn out the lights the party is over!
Mary can’t help but notice.
AND, Mary, who seems to be a pretty stereotypical Jewish momma, decides to take action and get involved. Actually, she is trying to get her boy involved. She is kind of pushing him into the spotlight.
At first, Jesus is hesitant.
But, then he sees the newlyweds.
They are about to be embarrassed.
It’s not the end of the world.
People will talk about it, But eventually people find something else to talk about.
Life will go on.
But, something wild and beautiful happens…
God picks up the tab.
He turns water that was usually used for ceremonial hand and feet washing into divinely distilled deliciousness.
Jesus popped the cork on some new wine.
He didn’t have to keep the party going…
but he did!
He knew that once he crossed this line, there was no turning back. The wedding party became his coming out party.
Think about it…
If you are revealing yourself to be the miracle maker, wouldn’t you want your first miracle to be huge? Something earth shaking and life altering,
Not a catering job!
Once Jesus does this, it changes everything…EVERYTHING!
It changes the wedding, it changes the world.
It starts the clock on the plan to rescue EVERYONE.
But, Jesus sees the newlyweds.
The potential embarrassment, the potential shame.
And so, Jesus turns water into wine.
He didn’t have to.
He simply didn’t want a family to begin life together with a social faux pas.
How cool of God!

Bookend # 2:
This story starts with Jesus in a garden.
In the original story the human race lost it all in a garden.
AND NOW, the plan to get it all back is starting in a garden.
Jesus is in the garden with his friends when an angry little mob shows up. They are led by His betrayer. They are there to arrest an innocent man.
That’s when a not-so-innocent man steps in and takes action…
Peter has a sword.
Who gave Peter a sword?
NEVER give Peter a sword!
Peter has walked with Jesus for three years, yet he is still clueless, and NOW he is armed with a sharp object!
There is a guy at the front of the pack named Malchus. He is a slave. He belongs to the high priest. He is there in the garden because he has to be.
He is just doing his job.
For some crazy reason, Peter lunges at him and chops off his ear!! I’m guessing Peter had bad aim. I think he was actually trying to cut Malchus’ head off with a modified zombie slice. But, like so much of his life, Peter screws up. He missed and got the ear…whoops.
The earlobe went flying and landed in the dirt. I suspect it looked like a little bloody Vienna sausage flopping around on the ground .
Losing a chunk of ear was probably quite painful for Malchus, but it didn’t kill him. With a few Tylenol he could be back at work the next day. He might never be able to wear sunglasses again, but at least he suddenly looked like a MMA fighter. This had to be good for his street cred!
But, something wild and beautiful happens…
God picks up the ear.
He didn’t have to. Jesus is pretty busy at this point of the narrative. He knows what is about to happen. In the next few hours, Jesus is about to be betrayed, beaten, and executed.
He is about to lose a lot more than an earlobe.
His time is running out.
But, Jesus sees Malchus.
The look of pain, the look of embarrassment, the look of shame.
And so, Jesus stops the clock long enough to reach down in the dirt and grab the earlobe off the ground. Then, he reaches over and simply reattaches it to Malchuses head!!
And they STILL arrest him!! You would think that if a man is magically reattaching ears that he would get a “get out of jail free” card!!! BUT, NO!!!!
In reattaching the Vienna sausage ear, Jesus also gave Malchus a much better story!! “Jesus healed me” is ALWAYS a better story than “Peter cut me”.
Do you catch where Malchus is standing when Jesus heals him? On the opposite side, even if he’s not standing IN opposition, he IS standing WITH opposition. He is standing with the accusers and attackers. Most people wouldn’t give an “enemy” a chance. Jesus doesn’t have an issue with it. He fixes Malchus where he is at.

Two unnecessary miracles…
They were both just examples of extravagant kindness.
They were both proof that God is crazy about people.
Water is transformed into wine…
An ear is reattached to a face…
The mismatched bookends of Jesus’ earthly miracle roadshow.
The miracle motivation for both bookend seems to be to save some people from shame and embarrassment…
WOW!
Jesus was about to save them from sin and death, but first…he saves them from being embarrassed.
We find ourselves in need of fresh miracles.
It’s nothing big, it’s just the small, everyday stuff.
We don’t even want to mention it, the Creator is busy running the universe.
We’ve ran out of wine, we are tired, and stale, and it seems like the party is over.
Life has taken a swipe at us, we’ve been cut. It’s just a flesh wound, but it stings.
We can just keep going and suck it up, right?
But, something wild and beautiful is happening.
Jesus sees YOU.
And because, God is kind and crazy about you, He offers new wine, He recreates you, He fixes the broken places.
No miracle is too minor.
Look for the unnecessary miracles in your life.
I promise they are there!!

1949…

The people came…
The people came to the two circus tents in the parking lot.
And they kept coming.
It had been planned to last for three weeks…
but the people kept coming…
so three weeks became eight weeks.
The people came and sat under the “canvas cathedral” on creaking benches and folding chairs, every flavor of humanity, desperate to hear stories of hope…

The smell of sawdust sat heavy on this Fall Southern California night.
An expectant hush spread through the tent as the music faded and the tall, lanky preacher stepped up to the wooden pulpit. He was dressed in a dark suit, and he sported a thick pompadour that framed his strong face.
The people came…
and he looked straight into their souls with lightning intense icy blue eyes.
He waved a leather bound book over his head, he had recently wrestled with this book and its claims. He had come to believe it’s promises.
This night, the people came to believe too.
He spoke in a rich Carolina baritone and the simplicity of his message invited the supernatural…
Ripples of anointing flowed through the crowd like raw electricity…
The sky cracked…
The clouds parted…
And the people came…
As the choir sang, “Just as I am…O Lamb of God, I come, I come.”
The people came.
Los Angeles was used to aftershocks.
But, this shaking would echo throughout  eternity.

I see a lot of social media lately saying that we need to put God back in public schools.
Excuse me, but I don’t think He ever left.
God is bigger than legislation.
As long as there are kids and teachers who have the Holy Spirit living on the inside of them going to school everyday, God is there.
Faith is movement, not mandate. It is unleashed one person at a time.
God doesn’t need a permission slip to go to school. He shows up every single day.
The omnipresent One is…well…omnipresent.
When people show Him the door, He opens new doors.
Don’t pray that God would be allowed to return to public school, He never left.
Pray for the ones who carry Christ into public schools and universities every single day.
The students, the teachers, the staff.
Pray that they would have courage, and compassion, and creativity.
Pray that they would know that they are not alone.
God is with them…
Right there in school…
Every single day.

(Warning: this story contains adult content)

Growing up our family went out to eat twice a year.
Yup, two times.
It was a big deal.
On Christmas Eve we would go out to eat at a seafood place called Captain D’s before going to look at Christmas lights. Nothing says Feliz Navidad like fried flounder, hush puppies and cracklings. I loved the pound of greasy batter droppings that came with every meal. We would stuff ourselves with shrimp and coleslaw, and then stuff ourselves into the Dodge Dart to go look at pretty lights on the rich side of town. It was awesome! We had tartar sauce in our hair and looks of wide eyed wonder on our fish grease covered faces. I have some amazing memories that smell like overcooked halibut.

That was dining adventure number one!

Then, once a year, our sweet little Britney Spaniel, Bridget, would breed with a randomly picked boy Britney Spaniel. ( I warned you that there would be adult content). When we sold her litter of puppies, we would celebrate by going to McDonalds. Despite the fact that Bridget had done most of the work, she never got to go to Mickey Ds. We also never questioned her morals, we just celebrated the fact that she shacked up with a different hairy stud each year. (MORE adult content)
This explains why, to this day, I have a great affection for both hunting dogs and Big Macs.
To me, the Big Mac was the ultimate culinary achievement. I grew up thinking there was truly something special about the special sauce AND I believed that sesame seed buns were magical. It was a once a year treat.

But…
Don’t cry for me because I didn’t get a happy meal until I was 23.
I obviously never went hungry.
Growing up, we were eating homegrown steaks, burgers, and vegetables. We had our own beef, chickens, and garden.
I didn’t realize how awesome that was until I started paying for my own groceries. (EVEN MORE adult content!)

Two times a year we stepped out on the town and it was a big deal!
Some of the best memories are homegrown.
Story turns the simplest things into the most treasured traditions.
(I wasn’t content with that until I was an adult.)

We wake up on days like this and think this has to be a nightmare…
Dear God, yesterday couldn’t have happened…really?!
ANOTHER school shooting?!
We live in a world of lost boys and broken girls hurting each other, hurting themselves.
It’s a jungle out there, it used to be a garden.
Something HAS to change.
We have to lay down the rocks that we are prone to throw at each other.
We need to pick up our kids.
We need to tell them stories of hope.
We need to remember that love is ALWAYS stronger than hate, but it has to be unleashed.
kindness is a superpower that we all have at our disposal. It’s time to step up and put on the cape.
It’s a jungle out there, let’s turn it back into a garden.

There is a word that has to be one of the coolest words EVER. It’s a incredibly fun word. It’s fun to say or shout or even whisper this word.
The word is WOO!
WOO is a wonderful word!
It means to try to gain the love of someone.
To WOO is to work to get the attention of someone you care about.
Valentine’s Day is a big WOO day.
People work hard to WOO today!
They WOO with chocolate and flowers.
They WOO with Valentine’s cards shaped like hearts.
But…hold on, wait a minute, wait a minute…put a little love in it…
WHAT IF the original Valentine’s wasn’t shaped like a heart, but instead shaped like a…
STAR?
What if in the beginning God created things like stars, and waterfalls, and cocker spaniels as Valentine’s?
WOW!
What if stars were God’s very impressive way of WOOing us, showing off, and getting our attention?
What if God WOOs us by creating a WOW?
I think God’s plan was for His people to be WOOed by the WOW. He created a garden that was full of WOW, but, in a shocking plot twist, Adam and Eve got distracted by the WHOA!!
We do that…
We lose sight of the WOW because of the WHOA.
As in…
WHOA! I shouldn’t believe this lie.
WHOA! I shouldn’t be here.
WHOA! I shouldn’t be doing this.
All the while God is WOOing.
The good news is that the God of the WOO knows how to wait.
He created a whole new Valentine’s. It wasn’t shaped like a heart, it was shaped like a cross.
In the ultimate act of WOO!
God died to show his love for us…WOW!
The Bible is one big love story. God is WOOing His people.
He wants them to experience the WOW!
But, we keep getting tripped up by the WHOA.
In Jeremiah 31:3 God tells His people: “I have drawn you with loving kindness”.
Let the Creator and Rescuer of your heart WOO you.
Choose to live in the WOW and not the WHOA!
Happy Valentine’s Day!