I've had a wierd combination of places I have been over the weekend, discussions with people, doing ministry to a kid, and a goofy dream that have come together in a sort of coherent way.
The dream was that I was driving down the interstate, and I looked ahead of me and saw people walking cows across the road - that seemed strange, so I slowed down and was stopping when I noticed that the people and cows were on the other side of a big river that went under the interstate, except that there was no bridge. The bridge was completely out - in fact, it seemed like the bridge was just gone - like it had never been there. I pulled over to the left - there were cars on the other side still coming this way - I guess they had a bridge.
To my right a big truck slowed down to avoid falling into the river. It went off the edge of the highway, but it turned around somehow and avoided the plunge. Then the dream did one of those fast-forward kinds of things that dreams do. Then I was standing on the side of the road, watching all the cars stopping and trying to figure out how they would go on. About 100 cars or so at one time were trying to push the cement median wall out of the way so they could go onto the other side to keep going. All the cars were pushing in a continuous motion, kind of like a bunch of guys using their shoulders to move somethingtogether. The cars all busted down the wall and they started driving this way and that, scrambling to get out of the stopped up jam of traffic.
Some people had got out of their cars to wait for the traffic to clear, and when the cars started their frenzied motion, cars started wrecking into each other. I watched helplessly as cars smashed over people - adults and kids. Whole families were mowed over as one car crashed into another and pushed into another. A little child holding a teddy bear was smashed between the bumper of one car into the next.
It was total chaos and mayhem - the kind that made my stomach turn.
This dream came alive in application as I talked to a friend about college ministry. So many churches are doing nothing to try to re-evangelize (Have I done a post on "re-evangelism? - I'll check, but if not, I'll put that on the to-do list) college students. They are growing up in a world that is crazy and stupid - like all the cars trying to bust their way out, just so they could move. One of the greatest griefs I have is for all the students that I have worked so much with - kids who grew up in church and in supposedly Christian families, who have gone spiritually south when they graduated from High School. I can see them crashing into each other, ruining their lives, scarring themselves with destructive stuff, and I'm watching on the sidelines.
It seems like too many churches are sitting there also, watching it all, saying, "What do we do?"
I also ministered to a kid that was having some family issues - I won't go into it on this public blog, but it was another one of those things like watching the cars crash into the kids.
I guess the real issue is that I don't want people to raise their kids like humanists, but call themselves Christians. If being lukewarm would cause God to spew us out of his mouth, then surely we need to throw up at the thought of chasing after the world. I want to throw up at the thought of watching people hurl themselves at the world, while they crash their lifestyles and their ambitions into the hearts and lives of kids. I want to throw up at all the years of my life I wasted, calling myself a Christian but thinking like a secular humanist.
I think one of the blessings and the curses of doing camp ministry is that kids can be removed from the world and its garbage - they can focus on God and hear his voice here. It's awesome that God can speak to them here, but why does it have to just be here? Shouldn't God be speaking to them in their Christian homes? When they leave here, they just go back into the cultural muck. I am on the side of the road watching it happen. I wish Godly families would exalt the ways of God and not the world. Alas.
Yes, I am meloncholy today, but that is ok, and right, and good, because we need to mourn over the things that break the heart of God.
jc
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
James 4:7-10 ESV
The dream was that I was driving down the interstate, and I looked ahead of me and saw people walking cows across the road - that seemed strange, so I slowed down and was stopping when I noticed that the people and cows were on the other side of a big river that went under the interstate, except that there was no bridge. The bridge was completely out - in fact, it seemed like the bridge was just gone - like it had never been there. I pulled over to the left - there were cars on the other side still coming this way - I guess they had a bridge.
To my right a big truck slowed down to avoid falling into the river. It went off the edge of the highway, but it turned around somehow and avoided the plunge. Then the dream did one of those fast-forward kinds of things that dreams do. Then I was standing on the side of the road, watching all the cars stopping and trying to figure out how they would go on. About 100 cars or so at one time were trying to push the cement median wall out of the way so they could go onto the other side to keep going. All the cars were pushing in a continuous motion, kind of like a bunch of guys using their shoulders to move somethingtogether. The cars all busted down the wall and they started driving this way and that, scrambling to get out of the stopped up jam of traffic.
Some people had got out of their cars to wait for the traffic to clear, and when the cars started their frenzied motion, cars started wrecking into each other. I watched helplessly as cars smashed over people - adults and kids. Whole families were mowed over as one car crashed into another and pushed into another. A little child holding a teddy bear was smashed between the bumper of one car into the next.
It was total chaos and mayhem - the kind that made my stomach turn.
This dream came alive in application as I talked to a friend about college ministry. So many churches are doing nothing to try to re-evangelize (Have I done a post on "re-evangelism? - I'll check, but if not, I'll put that on the to-do list) college students. They are growing up in a world that is crazy and stupid - like all the cars trying to bust their way out, just so they could move. One of the greatest griefs I have is for all the students that I have worked so much with - kids who grew up in church and in supposedly Christian families, who have gone spiritually south when they graduated from High School. I can see them crashing into each other, ruining their lives, scarring themselves with destructive stuff, and I'm watching on the sidelines.
It seems like too many churches are sitting there also, watching it all, saying, "What do we do?"
I also ministered to a kid that was having some family issues - I won't go into it on this public blog, but it was another one of those things like watching the cars crash into the kids.
I guess the real issue is that I don't want people to raise their kids like humanists, but call themselves Christians. If being lukewarm would cause God to spew us out of his mouth, then surely we need to throw up at the thought of chasing after the world. I want to throw up at the thought of watching people hurl themselves at the world, while they crash their lifestyles and their ambitions into the hearts and lives of kids. I want to throw up at all the years of my life I wasted, calling myself a Christian but thinking like a secular humanist.
I think one of the blessings and the curses of doing camp ministry is that kids can be removed from the world and its garbage - they can focus on God and hear his voice here. It's awesome that God can speak to them here, but why does it have to just be here? Shouldn't God be speaking to them in their Christian homes? When they leave here, they just go back into the cultural muck. I am on the side of the road watching it happen. I wish Godly families would exalt the ways of God and not the world. Alas.
Yes, I am meloncholy today, but that is ok, and right, and good, because we need to mourn over the things that break the heart of God.
jc
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
James 4:7-10 ESV
No comments:
Post a Comment