Happy to be home!

At the moment I am reading Anabaptist thinkers to get a grip on the spiritual discipline of Good works that in my opinion give us inside information regarding the most prevalent action of discipleship and spiritual practice of Mennonites.

We love to work for Jesus, but my hope is that we recognize that we are working with Jesus - side by side. As we work with Jesus we can't help but be transformed into his likeness.

Thursday...

Today we discussed several topics, from final papers, spiritual guides, icons, and discernment. An orthodox priest came to talk about icons - a little strange to me as a mennonite. It would seem that Catholics and Orthodox Christians pray to the Saints like you and I would ask a friend to pray for us. Maybe the saint will have more pull with the big guy! It was interesting to learn, but at this point my Mennonite roots take over and I am left with many questions, not the least of which is - if I can go straight to the top why not?

The section on discernment was helpful - it was also nice to see that we are already practicing the discernment process at Zion. If you have any major decisions and want to call upon the community for help - let me know. Discernment is a community business.

Blessings heading home tomorrow so I won't be posting. Feel free to check in once a week - this year I will try to continue posting as I do my work on papers and such.

Hunter

Prayer

Today we discussed prayer. There are many ways to pray. We often look at prayer as asking God for the things we need, but prayer can be much more than that. One of our assignments was to meditate on John 15:9 - as the father has loved me so I love you - abide in my love. At times I struggle believing that Jesus loves me, am I lovable? Am I worthy of Christ's sacrifice on the cross? Jesus died for me. He died for you. Jesus loves us. When we think about that do we see God in a different light? I do.

For my paper this year, I will be asking the board to humor me by spending time praying about the ways that they see God moving at Zion and in their lives. This should make for an important assignment. Every since the time that I entered seminary it has been my sense of call to make God more real for people. Maybe that begins with the hope of making God more real for me. It is my feeling that many of us come to church, profess Jesus, and even perform acts of service without having a sense that God is real, loves them and wants to be a bigger part of their life. Hint Hint - me again. If we hope to experience a real God, we simply begin by being more aware - Where have you sighted God today?

ONe and a half more days. I miss my family, and Zion a great deal.

See you soon.

hunter

Day two at the retreat center

We covered a ton of ground today. Why spiritual disciplines, or practices? We looked at meditation and reflection - took the chance to reflect on the past week, paying attention to those places where God is working in me, those places where I may have missed God moving and we began to consider the plan to follow in the future. What is God working in Hunter you may be asking? Pretty personal - never has that been a problem for me has it.

1. Christ has been calling me to wrestle with what it means to serve others - the kids, Grace, Zion and even the people I meet out here.

2. Along with that I have been trying to be aware of my needs - actually more accurately my perception of needs. What do I REALLY NEED? Often I think that I need stuff that I don't really need at all - a second cookie:) My perceived needs often lead to my attempts to control situations and people to get what I want. What I really want and need is to glorify God - to serve in a healthy way - to be a blessing to others.

3. God has been helping reflect on my relationship with Grace. In what ways do I take her for granted, in what ways could I be more helpful, in what ways do I help her and cherish her. Being apart is helpful in that it often reminds us of what we miss. I can honestly say that I love her more today than when we were married and I expect that love to continue to grow as we journey towards Christ together.

4. I have been realizing how important it is to find time to be alone with Jesus, to experience Christ - in car rides, beautiful places, in friendships, in the sound of my beating heart and the rush of blood after running up a really steep hill, and within me as I work at all of these things.

it has been a great experience so far. I miss Zion, but know that you are in very good hands. The staff is able and Zion is full of competent leaders to deal with sound systems, building dreams, houses, and loving God's children. It will be good to be together again soon.

Hunter

Monday...

We began the morning wrestling with our image of God. Who is God for us? Two questions for reflection. Do you love the God you believe in? Does the God you believe in actually exist? Think about the question - I am not at a place inviting me to wonder if God exists. We assume that God exists, but does the God that we perceive really exist - is that backed by scripture? Often we create ideas of God that may not be true. "God is angry and mean" could be one way of seeing God that is not very Biblical. Sure God gets angry, but it is an anger of love. The same kind of anger that we have when we watch ones that we love hurt themselves over and over. What are your perceptions - are they true?

This afternoon we discussed Spiritual Disciplines. What are they? Whatever helps you to become aware of / more attentive to God and allow God to work in you. That could include doing laundry. My professor used to do laundry while praying for each person that the clothes belonged to as he folded theirs. Fasting, prayer, study, going to church, singing - spiritual disciplines or practices. We are on this journey - By God's grace we are saved, by Jesus' grace we are able to be in relationship with God, the relationship still demands our full attentiveness and effort.

Take note of some of the pictures of our retreat center - AMAZING!!!

Sunday with Lauren and Barret

Several months ago Lauren Kratz - the daughter of Rod and Pat, asked me to officiate her wedding to Barret Sites(sp?) They both live in LA, CA. How would we ever do Pre-marital counseling? Then it hit me - Pasadena is close to LA. So today we met, checked out Hollywood, and got to know one another. They are a wonderful young couple - too bad they don't live in Souderton.

It has been a full week - but a very good one.

Hope yours is just as good.

Hunter

Different ways to experiencing God's Joy

Saturday - I rented a car and headed out to santa monica. Driving up the cost was absolutely gorgeous. God is in the beauty of the earth. Meeting a good friend having lunch together and discussing life was great - God is in and within us!

And Driving your friend's electric sports car - hitting the go peddle and being pulled back in your seat in complete silence. Well I can't really explain that feeling - for me it erupted in child like giggles. Cool. Did God create the car? Not directly, but God did create adrenaline rushes and giggles - God was in the drive. I posted a picture of the car.

thanks again Alex

What we pursue and blindness.

We had the chance to spend some time meditating on scripture - I chose Matt 20 because Greg is preaching on this sunday. I related deeply to the two blind men in verse 29. To what am I blind?

A quote for the day. We are all seeking after God and trying to avoid pain in our lives. Are we blind to the ways that we pursue both things? Do we pursue what only God can give through wealth, perfection, drugs, and what do we do to avoid pain? Deny, lie, avoid, hurt others? My hope and prayer for me and for you is that we would Cry out to Jesus to lift our blindness and open our hearts to Christ's will for us.

Lord Jesus - we are blinded by our own attempts to provide salvation and to avoid that which may be painful. Open our eyes that we might see you, follow you, find you, and love you. Jesus by your grace empower us to see.

amen

The final project musings...

As I think of what my final paper/project may involve - my thoughts keep coming back to the same thought. I have always been interested in empowering people to see the reality of God. Is God real for people? It is my calling to help others and myself become more aware of God in their lives. Awareness is the key to that sense of real, at least that is what I am thinking. The project may very well focus on awareness and developing God awareness in our lives. Guess there will be more on that later. time to go for a walk and see if I can allow myself to see God to experience Christ in Pasadena. One place this happens is in the prayer room - picture on the right.

John Calvin

Communion does not lead to faith, but in faith it can deeply empower our faith and give us strength.

The Lord’s Supper is to “nourish, refresh, strengthen, gladden”

What is communion to you? Is it the recognition that we need Jesus, and the receiving of Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit as we partake together? Boy I hope so. I need all the Jesus I can get.

Calvin says that we receive Christ in communion and we are enabled to participate with what he is doing and has done. Powerful!

The Anabaptists

As we wrestle with the Anabaptists, I realize quickly that our Spirituality is most evident in our doing of good works. Feeding the hungry, going to church, praying, building, and giving. That is a legitimate way to pursue Christ and Christ's presence, but have we become so good at doing, that we don't even think about Christ as we do what we do?

When we feed, do we seek Christ in those with whom we feed? While building houses with MDS do we see ourselves working alongside Christ building the kingdom?

Spiritual disciplines are designed to meet Christ, to grow in our faith in Him and in discipleship. Our doing is a spiritual discipline when we look at it as a way to grow in Christ by participating in his work. Next time you are "doing" for God, I invite you to think about why you are doing it, who you are touching, and how you are growing with Jesus!

More Luther...

Surprisingly it has been nice learning a bit more about Martin Luther. Despite the fact that he was deeply in favor of killing those radical anabaptists, the did have some good thoughts.

He did care about doing good, "works" but his thinking was that good works were not even possible without the grace of God. We often criticize Luther for relying so much on grace that his followers did not have to pursue discipleship. Not true. We should never pass judgment without really getting to know people.

Tuesday morning

Discussing Luther and Jan Hus - two of the Reformers. They were deeply concerned with the direction of the Catholic church. One issue being the amount of influence and power being given to the pope - only Jesus is the head of the church. Those words got Hus a date with the burning fire pit.

Indulgences were a problem as well. What is an indulgence you ask? Basically for the right amount of donation to the church you could buy a few get out of sin free cards to free one of purgatory obligations for their sins. Luther could not find the pursuit of indulgences in the Bible. It seems that the right donation could buy one just about any kind of forgiveness, or ceremony that you might want. A child born out of wedlock could have that overlooked for the right price. Do we ever think about our tithe as buying our way to heaven or certain entitlements? Just a question that came to my mind. Luther was sure to remind that only Christ and faith in him could make that payment. Thank the Lord for that, especially in this economy:)

On to the afternoon.

The first days lectures.

Well today’s lecture had a few interesting ideas as we looked into the developments that lead to the reformation. One that struck me was the way that the printing press changed the world in much the same way that the Internet has for our world. For the first time the scripture was made available to everyone. Imagine how we take the Bible for granted – I have at least four different versions myself. And suddenly anyone with their own thoughts or theology could begin to spread it without any controls. Amazing.

Another interesting factoid if you will – people like Martin Luther valued all things ancient over anything new. If the printing press reminds us of our own world, this old is greater than new idea is completely different. If Luther could find ancient writings, they were valued over new thinking, as they were closer to Christ in time frame. In our society – everything is branded as new and improved. What does this say about us older people – I just turned 36 and my daughter would say I am very old. In this computer high tech age, have we valued the new to the our detriment? Have we completely devalued our senior demographic without ever intending too? So much wisdom and untapped potential. But how do we tap into this wealth of knowledge and experience? That might give you something to think about.

Have a great day. Hopefully my pictures will change soon.

Hunter

Working on the internet!

Well I don't have internet in my room. But I will try to post from the classroom. Not during class of course.

This morning we are looking into the history that encouraged the Reformation.

More later.

Getting Ready

Well I leave again for Pasadena on Sunday and I have a wedding, rehearsal, and a ten page paper to write.  Winding down and ready to go.