To Godspot Readers

Godspot is now under renovation. In it's place, an exciting new website is coming.

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Tattered Couch

Un-religious Jesus Talk -- for the space where you live.

Own Your Own Spirituality

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http://www.tatteredcouch.com/

will be launching

February 2010.

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Stay Tuned. In the meantime, feel free to browse back and make use of any past Godspot posts or video resources. See you in February!!

Kleigh

Storm

This song is about faith in something unseen. It's about a choice to step out with belief, and walk on water during a storm. In it, I hear a quiet hope that darkness will be turned to light, even in life's hardest seasons. For me, this is the best kind of honest cry to God. It speaks a heartfelt need that drives toward what Jesus offers.

Maybe Lighthouse didn't mean it that way. Maybe you think I'm making a very big leap. But that's where I take it. That's how I sing it. You decide ...

How long have I been in this storm?
So overwhelmed by the ocean's shapeless form
Water's getting harder to tread
With these waves crashing over my head

If I could just see you
Everything would be allright
If I'd see you
This darkness would turn to light

And I will walk on water
And you will catch me if I fall
And I will get lost into your eyes
And know everything will be allright
And know everything is allright

I know you didn't bring me out here to drown
So why am I ten feet under and upside down
Barely surviving has become my purpose
Because I'm so used to living underneath the surface

If I could just see you
Everything would be allright
If I'd see you
This darkness would turn to light

And I will walk on water
And you will catch me if I fall
And I will get lost into your eyes
And know everything will be allright

And I will walk on water
And you will catch me if I fall
And I will get lost into your eyes
And know everything will be allright

And know everything is allright
Everything is allright

Everything is allright

Lifehouse, All rights Rerserved.

No infringement intended.

Back to the Red Letters

It's been too long. 'Very sorry. Thanks for checking back in so faithfully. I'm back on the Godspot blog path again!

Red Letters. In keeping with my blog quest to keep you in touch with direct Jesus quotes, today, another story. This is another illustration, this time the image is a coin. Jesus uses a lost coin (possibly an inheritance or only the only money of a poor woman) to draw a picture of God's heart for people. It describes His persistent pursuit of people who are separated from Him.

It's a short little story, but try to think about knowing someone who told you a story like this. Who talks about angels? Who actually claims to know what happens in heaven when someone decides to turn their life around and 'repents' to God? Who could honestly assert these things as truth?

Reading a story like this starts to force a choice about Jesus -- either this guy was a total nutcase, a big fat liar, or exactly who he said he was. It's worth deciding.

What do you see in this little picture? Since it's so short, read it a couple times. And read it again. See if anything pops out at you about how Jesus is describing God's pursuing heart.

Today's Story:

The Lost Coin

"Or suppose a woman has ten valuable silver coins and loses one. Won't she light a lamp and look in every corner of the house and sweep every nook and cranny until she finds it? And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors to rejoice with her because she has found her lost coin. In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God's angels when even one sinner repents."

This story is found in the Bible, in Luke, chapter 15.

To Forgive

This short film spotlights forgiveness in one interaction. Here, a son confronts his imprisoned father with hard truth. The snapshot ends with the last words written by a slain VA Tech student.

I'll give you a little warning about the heavy emotional content of this clip. You may want to hold off on watching it if you're sitting in a public office cubicle. But it's worth making some space to think about. Because, in this artists point of view, we see the weighty cost of forgiving. I think this little message points to the weight of a Christ Followers freedom. It's ultimately found in understanding our conviction -- due penalty. I think the best part of truly believing Jesus is the awesome realization that a judicial verdict has been cleared.

That's what Christians understand as the forgiveness given by God, through Jesus. We are all in prison until we hear hard truth about ourselves, embrace it, and find our one means for true release, forgiveness and redemption. And, somehow, that's the place from which we draw the power to turn around forgive the people in our lives. Being forgiven brings a mighty sense of gratitude and love. It changes a life.

Here's one artist's perspective on the subject. Give it a look... and feel free to make a comment.

Kleigh

(Thanks Roy, for sending this along!)

Faith Like a Trampoline

The following post is from our new GodSpot blog contributor, Laura Parker.  Laura has a calm sensiblity about her faith and often finds herself in conversation with friends about issues of spirituality and belief. I appreciate her perspective and am glad she's a willing contributor to Godspot.  After you read her post about Trampolines and Faith, go browse her blogCereal for Dinner.

Faith Like a Trampoline

As my friends and I have been talking about faith and what you really have to believe in order to follow Jesus with your life, I was reminded ofRob Bell's book Velvet Elvis. In the first chapter, he talks about faith in terms of brick walls and trampolines. Read for yourself this excerpts from the first chapter:

"When we jump, we begin to see the need for springs. The springs helpmake sense of these deeper realities that drive how we live every day. The springs aren't God. The springs aren't Jesus. The springs are statements and beliefs about our faith that help give words to thedepth that we are experiencing in our jumping. I would call these the doctrines of the Christian faith. 

They aren't the point.

They help us understand the point, but they are a means and not an end. We take them seriously, and at the same time we keep them in proper perspective. . . 

It hit me while I was watching that for him (a man giving a lecture on the six-day literal creation) faith isn't a trampoline; it's a wall of bricks. Each of the core doctrines for him is like an individual brick that stacks on top of the others. If you pull one out, the whole wall starts to crumble. It appears quite strong and rigid, but if you begin to rethink or discuss even one brick, the whole thing is in danger . . .

One of the thing that happens in brickworld: you spend a lot of time talking about how right you are. Which of course leads to how wrongeverybody else is. Which then leads to defending the wall. It struck me reading the letter that you rarely defend a trampoline. You invite people to jump on it with you.

I am far more interested in jumping that I am in arguing about whosetrampoline is better. You rarely defend the things you love. You enjoythem and tell others about them and invite others to enjoy them with you. 

Jesus invites everybody to jump.

And saying yes to the invitation doesn't mean we have to have it all figure out. This is an important thing to remember: I can jump and still have questions and doubts. I often meet people who are waiting to follow God until they have all their questions answered. They will be waiting for a long time, because if we knew everything, we'd be . . . God. So in the invitation to jump is an invitation to follow Jesus with all of our doubts and questions right there with us. "

rob bell, velvet elvis, pgs. 22-28 

I am learning that faith is less about having the rigid brick wall all figured out and more about just choosing to get on the trampoline and jump, experiencing and living the Way of Jesus in the world. I am learning that the details of what you believe are much less important than simply enjoying a relationship with this God. In essence, I'm learning that jumping is leagues better than brick-laying.

If you haven't read Velvet Elvis yet, it's definitely worth your time. It is an authentic, outside-the-box look at Christian spirituality that rings true on so many levels.

~Laura Parker

25 Attributes

Today... a list. It's pretty simple. The following 25 attributes are ascribed to God in the Bible. (I'm including the addresses, so you can look them up and find the whole direct quote for yourself, if you want. 'Up to you. )

One at a time, each description gives another shade of the God of the Bible. Altogether, they begin to form a bigger picture. What do you see

God Is...
1. All Knowing Hebrews 4:12-13

2. All Powerful Revelation 19:6

3. Eternal Psalm 90:1-2

4. Ever Present Psalm 139:7-12

5. Faithful Psalm 46:1-2

6. Father John 20:17

7. Good Psalm 52:1

8. Full of Grace Ephesians 2:8-9

9. Holy Levitius 19:2

10. Immense 1 Kings 8:27

11. Infinite Psalm 102:24-26

12. Jealous Exodus 20:5

13. Just Isaiah 45:21

14. Full of Kindness Psalm 36:7

15. Long-Suffering 2 Peter 3:9

16. Self-Existent Exodus 3:14

17. Merciful 2 Chronicles 30:9

18. Patient Psalm 145:8

19. Wrathful Romans 1:18

20. Sovereign Psalms 100:3, 103:19

21. Spirit John 4:24

22. Truth John 14:6

23. Unchangeable Malachi 3:6; James 1:17

24. Unity Deuteronomy 6:4

25. Loving John 3:14-18

List from, "Find it in the Bible: Lists, Lists, and more Lists" by Bob Philips

Howard Publ. Co., 2004

In His Own Words

More "I AM" words from Jesus.

The following statements were made conversationally.  They aren't set in the same kind of 'stories' found in the last "I AM" post.  However, they are still quotes from Jesus, describing himself. Each one has a context that's worth reading more fully.  (If you're interested, I encourage you to find a group for discussion, or  someone who knows the setting of each conversation. It's pretty compelling stuff).  

The list below is no different than when I choose to describe myself.  When I say, "I am... " I will finish that sentence with things like --  a writer, a Goodwill shopper, a Jesus Follower, a gardener, a hiker, a mom, or a wife. Collectively each word I choose gives you a better sense of who I am, even if you haven't met me personally.   In the same way, taken as smaller bytes the Jesus words below fill in a better sketch of the man who was claiming to be God.  We get a sense of him, even though we didn't get to meet him 'personally.'

What do you see about Jesus in these words?

I am. Mark 14:16-21; Matthew 27:43; Luke 22:70; John 10:36

I am with you always.   Matthew 28:20

I am willing.  Matthew 8:3

I am gentle.  Matthew 11:29

I am in the Father.  John 14:11

I am a King.  John 18:37

I am He who lives.  Revelation 1:17

I am the Alpha and the Omega.  Revelation 1:8

I am from above.   John 8:23

I AM

In His own words, Jesus described himself in a series of "I am..." stories.  Each one painted a picture and gives explanation for who He claimed to be.  The religious leaders of his day were enraged by these descriptions because they all point to one thing -- equality with God.  Jesus spoke it in many ways so as to be understood from many points of view.  He said "I AM" in a way that was clearly understood to mean, "I am God."   

Seven 'I AMs" of Jesus

The place in the Bible where the entire stories can be found are listed as well.  

1.  I am the bread of life.   (John 6:35)

2. I am the light of the world.  (John 8:12)

3.  I am the door.  (John 10:9)

4.  I am the good shepherd.  (John 10:11)

5.  I am the resurrection and the life.   (John 11:25)

6.  I am the way, the truth, and the life.  (John 14:6)

7.  I am the vine.  (John 15:1,5)

"How do I find it?"

Finding stuff in the Bible can be tricky.  It's one book made up of 66 individual books that span over history.  So, when you're looking at a reference or address like "John 14:6" here's what you do.

• Table of Contents. Look in the front of a Bible for the Table of Contents.  Find the book:  "John"
• Book. Go to that page.  (After a while, some people decide to memorize the list of books so it's faster and more convenient to flip to a passage.)
• Chapter. The numbers after John are the chapter and verses.  So, John 14:6 is chapter 14 verse 6.  Flip through John to find  a big "14."  
• Verse.  Scan down the littler numbers in 14 to find "6".  
• There you have it!

Red Letter Stories

In the course of many faith conversations, I've observed a pattern.  People typically spend a lot more time talking about what they think Jesus said than actually reading what he actually did say.  Second-hand hearsay is pretty common.  I recognize the following prefaces to statements about Jesus:

"I remember that a Nun once told our class ... "  

"I read it somewhere that ... "  

"My Mom used to tell me ... "

The Source. It makes sense.  We look to our past, or people we respect, or books, or the internet for answers. Fact is, the best source is a primary source.  In mountain living terms, that means stream water is always coldest and most pure when it's closest to the snowmelt source.  In terms of investigating a faith system, it's always best to go directly to the source of the faith. I'm convinced that the best place to get a solid understanding about Christianity is to directly check out the person Jesus.  Before making any choices, it's important to read his actual words -- hear his stories.  

Red Letters. With that in mind, I'm going to start posting excerpts from the Bible which are direct quotes of Jesus. The red letters are words that Jesus was known to have spoken. For the record, they aren't mystical spells or codes because they're red.  It just makes it easier to see that it's a quote. According to Christ Followers, those quotes are primary source information.   It's the stuff we have to reckon with, if we want to really live and understand this faith.

Today's Story. To start, I'm posting a relatively well-known story about a son who rebelliously wanders away from his home and squanders his inheritance.  There are a lot of things in this story that cause some big questions. Family dynamics were apparently just as messy 2000 years ago.  It's a story worth picking apart, wrestling over, and talking about. (That's why I think the Bible is  best experienced in groups and dialogue.)  

I love what this story reveals about Jesus.  He's telling this story in response to the criticism of 'religious' people.   Judgmental people of religion followed him around, but were ticked that Jesus kept hanging out with "sinners" like prostitutes and tax collectors.  Jesus was drawn to be with the people who truly needed him --  to lost and honestly broken people -- not to proud I-have-all-the-answers-and do-all-the-right-things type people. He welcomed wandering people into his life. This story kind of puts his overly religious followers in their place.  It paints a picture of what God cares about. 

Questions. Pay the most attention to the Father's response to the Prodigal Son. 

• Does the Father character care more about the behavior or the heart of the lost son? 
  
• What happens when something lost is found?   

Those answers carry  the point of Jesus' story.   

This story is captured in the book of Luke, in the Bible.  The red letters are words that Jesus was known to have spoken.  Many people during that time would have recognized this story as his.  We know it as 'The Prodigal."

___________________________________________________________________

Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach.

This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such despicable people--even eating with them!

 ... To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: "A man had two sons.

The younger son told his father, `I want my share of your estate now, instead of waiting until you die.' So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.  A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and took a trip to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money on wild living.  About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him to feed his pigs.

  

The boy became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.

"When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, `At home even the hired men have food enough to spare, and here I am, dying of hunger!

  

I will go home to my father and say, "Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired man." '

  

"So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long distance away, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.  His son said to him, `Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.

  

"But his father said to the servants, `Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger, and sandals for his feet.

And kill the calf we have been fattening in the pen. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.' So the party began.

  

"Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, and he asked one of the servants what was going on.

 

`Your brother is back,' he was told, `and your father has killed the calf we were fattening and has prepared a great feast. We are celebrating because of his safe return.' "The older brother was angry and wouldn't go in. His father came out and begged him, but he replied, `All these years I've worked hard for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends.

  

Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the finest calf we have.'  "His father said to him, `Look, dear son, you and I are very close, and everything I have is yours. We had to celebrate this happy day. For your brother was dead and has come back to life! He was lost, but now he is found!' "

From The Bible, New Living Translation

The book of Luke, chapter 15, verses 1,2, 11-32

A Beauty's Prison

Ashley grew up surrounded by football and beauty pageants. A consuming need for perfection sent her into a dark spiral of body image secrets. Challenged by a verse in the Bible that claimed her body was a temple, she began to let it all go.

After a long process of walking away from her obsession and walking toward God instead ... she can say she is healthy now.

www.iamsecond.com

Sunday

"Sometimes we have to stop and ask, 'Why do we do what we do?'
 ... God doesn't want empty ritual. God wants our hearts."

~Rob Bell
Nooma 004