One limitation I have, for example, is that I was born with a brain malfunction. I took medicine from the time I was a child until college, because I would often faint. I could be sitting in a classroom and just kneel over. I even had to take a year off from college because of this. It was a scary time. It’s complicated, but a simplistic explanation is that my brain has an unusual reaction to adrenaline.

Now anybody who speaks knows adrenaline is the pastor’s best friend. It gives you passion, alertness, and energy. The very thing I need to accomplish what God has called me to do acts like a poison for me. I guess it’s a thorn in the flesh. When I speak, I’m often unable to clearly see the congregation during the first several minutes of the normal adrenaline rush. People look blurry, I feel panic, and it is extremely painful to speak.

People ask me, “Do you ever get full of pride speaking to all those people?” Honestly, that’s the last thing on my mind. I’m praying, “God, get me through this. Use this weak vessel, and in my weakness, you be strong.”

Excerpt from Leadership Handbook of Management and Administration (Grand Rapids, MI: BakerBooks, 2007), 36.

Guess who that is?

Rick Warren

Spider-Man’s Uncle Ben said: “With great power comes great responsibility.”

We should say instead: “With great spiritual influence comes great thorns in the flesh.”

What does God use to keep you from becoming conceited?

“Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor. 12:7b-10)

Three pastoral acts are so basic, so critical that they determine the shape of everything else. The acts are praying, reading Scripture, and giving spiritual direction. Besides being basic, these three acts are quiet. They do not call attention to themselves and so are often not attended to. In the clamorous world of pastoral work nobody yells at us to engage in these acts……

The three areas constitute acts of attention: prayer is an act in which I bring myself to attention before God; reading Scripture is an act of attending to God in his speech and action across two millennia in Israel and Christ; spiritual direction is an act of giving attention to what God is doing in the person who happens to be before me at any given moment.

Always it is God to whom we are paying, or trying to pay, attention. (3-4)

He also warns us:

Pastoral work disconnected from the angle actions — the acts of attention to God in relation to myself, the biblical communities of Israel and church, the other person — is no longer given its shape by God. (5)

Fellow pastors, if you find it useful, feel free to download this poster (300dpi, letter size) and put it up on the wall of your office (or home). Read the book too.

“I believe that many who find that ‘nothing happens’ when they sit down, or kneel down, to a book of devotion, would find that the heart sings unbidden while they are working their way through a tough bit of theology with a pipe in their teeth and a pencil in their hand.”

C. S. Lewis (from his introduction of The Incarnation of the Word of God: being the Treatise of St. Athanasius, 1944)

“To be a peacemaker means not to judge or condemn or speak badly of people, not to rejoice in any form of ill that may strike them. Peacemaking is holding people gently in prayer, wishing them to be well and free….. It is welcoming those with whom we may have difficulty or whom we may not especially like, those who are culturally, psychologically, or intellectually different from us. It is to approach people not from a pedestal, a position of power and certitude, in order to solve problems, but from a place of listening, understanding, humility and love……”

Jean Vanier, Finding Peace (Toronto, ON: House of Anansi Press, 2003), 68-9.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” (Matthew 5:9)

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all–surpassing power is from God and not from us.” (2 Cor 4:7)

…… skipped a few cartoons here ……

View the rest of the cartoons here.

When our church culture becomes increasingly consumeristic, it is inevitable that everything that involves money (e.g. hiring a new staff, charging for a summer camp, fundraising for the third world…) feels like asking people to buy an iPhone app. The reason why people exhibit extreme stinginess and frugality is because of the low perceived value they attach to these things or judge what they can get out of it (i.e. always asking the question “Am I getting the worth of what I’m paying for?”)

Such consumerism will only lead to a cancerous death.

Rather, we should strive to cultivate in our churches extreme generosity — not only towards internal needs, but also and especially external needs in missions and aid. As Archbishop of Caterbury William Temple said: “The Church is the only society that exists for the benefit of those who are not its members.”

We can be and ought to be generous, because our Father in heaven is abundantly generous in the first place (Matt. 7:11).

“We are all the best person we know and, in general, tend to think we’re pretty unbiased as well. Illusory superiority can help us keep a healthy, optimistic attitude, but it can also prevent us from doing something great.

Recently Derek Sivers, founder and former president of CDBaby, posted about the benefits of assuming you’re below average. The suggestion is this: if you don’t assume you’re all that great you’ll be much more open to learning new things, asking more questions, and approaching situations with the sort of humility that leads to considering a good idea you may have otherwise thought to be stupid.”

Get Smarter by Realizing You’re Not That Great – Lifehacker

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.” (Phil. 2:3)

“Love is exhausting. It’s work to really love. Have you ever felt like, ‘I don’t have any more love to give’? Most people don’t understand that their physical condition has a strong impact on their relationships and their ability to love.”

“What happens to your relationships when you’re run down? Little issues become big problems when you’re tired. You’re more cranky, defensive, and critical when you’re physically low.”

Daily Hope (Aug 1, 2010): Keep loving others by maintaining physical health by Rick Warren

“Fools have no interest in understanding;
    they only want to air their own opinions.”

– Proverbs 18:2, NLT

雖然以往在波士頓的 St. Paul’s Cathedral 和三藩市的 Grace Cathedral 都見過明陣 (Labyrinth)，但這次算是第一次行和親身體驗個中的感受。

有關明陣的介紹，這裡不會詳盡說明。請看這裡的簡介。

道風山基督教叢林：明陣

1. 本人發覺行得越近中心時，路徑會變得越短和越有壓逼感。若有其他人一起共用明陣時，會很容易行得很近，亦可能會有身體上的接觸。我也不其然地感到非常不自在，很想離開。感到最舒服的，反而是行在最外圍的路徑的時候。我體會到，若中心點代表三位一體上帝的親密團契，聖徒越親近上帝時也必然會越親近其他人。而這個經歷更使我領會到原來我是有點怕 intimacy 的。
2. 行了三份一，我站在樹旁停下來。乘涼之際，觀察一下別人的進程。不知為何，停下來便不想再起步。站在樹蔭下比繼續前往中心點的渴求更大。這有點像我讀神學的心路歷程，不少次跪下來想放棄也不想再上路。但這次的分別，是我不再只是抽象地在腦裡打轉，與那孤單無力感糾纏，而是很具體地用雙眼看見別人的同行 (co-pilgrimage)。有些人跟我一樣停了下來默想、有些人繼續行、有些行得快點、有些行得慢點。觀察了片刻，心裡頓然感到安慰，知道人人都像我一樣，是個 pilgrim。有停滯不前的，也有積極前進的。我頑固的心，被這個場面軟化了。心裡跟自己說一句：「不如繼續上路吧」，雙腳便開始行了。這經歷告訴我，原來一個有血有肉、能夠看得見、在信徒 proximity 內的群體，是何等的重要呢！Spiritual pilgrimage 重要，physical pilgrimage 也一樣重要。
3. 我一直對明陣這玩兒都有保留的地方，可能因為我曾在兩個極其 liberal 的聖公會處見到，再加上它的來源不明，不知會否有些 pagan 的影子。不過，我都抱著一個開放的態度去認識、學習和嘗試，要親身經歷了才敢下結論。我得出來的結論是，明陣的確是一個非常好的靈修默想工具。它所涉及的層面，包括時間 (temporal)、空間 (spatial)、以及全人的身心靈。未行之前也不能估計到行完之後有那麼深刻的感受。若有機會，我也想在我後花園弄個小明陣玩呢！