Reframing for Thanksgiving

"...I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. 12 I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. 13 I can do all things through him who strengthens me." Philippians 4:11b-13 ESV

Contentment is a decision, not a condition.  It's not something a person is, so much as something that a person decides to be.  We need to decide in every ungrateful moment of discontent, to become content.  Maybe after a long habit of doing so, we can start to become grateful and content as our default condition.  I'm not there yet.  So I'm grateful to our forbears for this one day a year we call Thanksgiving - a uniquely American frame of mind.  Europe or the Islamic world would never have come up with such a public holiday.  neither one of them has a worldview that can acknowledge God as the giver of all good gifts.  Neither do I.  Which is why I need Thanksgiving Day.

I used to be happier.  I used to have more friends, deeper friends, I used to have clearer purpose, more confidence, a sunnier disposition, more peace, less heavy, less grumpy, less sorry for myself and easier to be with, closer to my family and generally less of a jerk.  That's life.  But I am closer to Jesus, love music more; I am older and quite a bit wiser.  I still have people who put up with me.  There are a handful of people who still call me 'pastor' and for that I could not be more grateful.  I have my health.  My family are still around me and doing OK. So I'll decide today to get over myself and practice contentment with this generally ungrateful and dark egocentric heart.  God knows. 

Randy Stonehill recording "Billy Frank"

Here is a treat for you.  A great song about a great man from a great guitarist, singer songwriter:

http://www.youtube.com/v/MDvREqeRqXQ?autohide=1&version=3&attribution_tag=1d3KCCHECQbEWsn39YoVNw&autohide=1&showinfo=1&feature=share&autoplay=1

Beautiful insignificance

"I need regular reminders of my call to faithfulness, not to success. How easily I forget what's important. I still have some major unlearning to do about identity, results, and ministry. I am not defined by what I do, but by who I am. Or, more importantly, to whom I belong."

This little quote from J.R. Briggs tidily expresses where I am in my ministry these days.  It encompasses a kind of identity shift away from the metrics of corporate success and into something that roots down towards the person and work of Christ in my own heart, and thereby into ministry.  I came across the quote in Paul Pastor's beautifully written article here: http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/2013/october-online-only/among-successful-failures.html

I love fine art - painting - and try to visit the great galleries whenever I travel. So often it is not the really famous paintings that move me. (The Mona Lisa comes to mind.)  It's the little corner of a painting that suddenly captures a moment, a truth, a beauty. I am encouraged to set aside the allure of significance and profile that I see some of my pastor-friends reaching for.  I'm happy to do some little thing really really well.  Something that very few people would ever notice, but that God will enjoy.  It'll probably be regarded as a misguided ministry failure or more realistically not be noticed at all. But it'll be worship, and what is better than that?