This past Sunday, May 22, 2016, I preached form John 16:12-15. Just for reference, here is how Eugene Peterson's version, The Message shares these words from Jesus: "I still have many things to tell you, but you can't handle them now. But when the Friend comes, the Spirit of the Truth, he will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is. He won't draw attention to himself, but will make sense out of what is about to happen and, indeed, out of all that I have done and said. He will honor me; he will take from me and deliver it to you. Everything the Father has is also mine. That is why I've said, 'He takes from me and delivers to you.'
I knew it would be a busy week so I carved out time for sermon prep and writing. I usually wait till later in the week but this week I did all of that on Tuesday. I reviewed the sermon Saturday, not in depth but making sure my sentences made sense in my manuscript etc. So Sunday comes....and so does the Holy Spirit. Okay it wasn't Pentecost. That was the week before. But God came to me as I was preaching. I was excited that the revelation came but it took all I could to contain myself. Why? Well after the United Methodist General Conference I was feeling down. I had read from plenty of people I trusted in ministry some of what was going on. I was having trouble balancing the words that shared how inspirational worship was and on the other hand the nastiness, entitlement, and deep divide which was clear. All I could think was Lord I know this is not what the church is supposed to look like. While I know people were sharing their zeal for the Lord, it hurt to see how broken and hurting the leadership of our Church was. Let me be clear this isn't just about th issue of human sexuality. There was so much more. Celebrations around the United Methodist Women and the ordination of women got lost in all of it. Don't misunderstand me I know the UMC is doing good in the world in many ways. But all this brokenness overshadowed it in my mind.
Here is some of what I said in my message on Sunday:
 In John as Jesus is preparing to leave he shares that the Holy Spirit will come and share from him to them all they need to know. But he cannot not share all of that right now. Jesus is calm. My guess is that the disciples were a mess. But out of Jesus' calmness he leaves his disciples with what they can handle at the moment and need for the present. Yet he is also telling them that when they need more from him, the Spirit is the “mechanism” who will provide it. As Jesus explained it, “he will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is; He won’t draw attention to himself, but will make sense out of what is about to happen and, indeed, out of all that I have done and said. He will honor me; he will take from me and deliver it to you.”
Jesus continues to speak to us today through the Holy Spirit. and not just with things he already taught 2,000 years ago and are recorded in Scripture. He speaks to us with new revelations that help us navigate a world a world that is quite different from the world the original disciples knew.
God did not stop speaking when the Bible was complete, and Jesus did not stop speaking when he ascended into heaven. 
So we should look to the Bible as God’s Word for our lives,  but our surface understanding of the Bible is not necessarily his last word on everything. The Spirit takes the things that Jesus wants us to know today, and communicates those to us through many channels. Sometimes it’s through new insight on the Scriptures we thought we already knew, but the Spirit also speaks through the power of inspiration, insight, revelation and personal experience, especially as we seek to listen prayerfully.
The second valuable thing that Jesus’ words about the role of the Spirit tell us is that not one of us understands all at once all that Christ has for us. Oswald Chambers, in the classic devotional, My Utmost for His Highest, cautioned Christians against thinking of uncertainty in this life as a bad thing. “The nature of the spiritual life,” said Chambers “is that we are certain in our uncertainty...
The spiritual life is the life of a child. We are not uncertain of God, just uncertain of what he is going to do next. If our certainty is only in our beliefs, we develop a sense of self-righteousness, become overly critical, and are limited by the view that our beliefs are complete and settled. But when we have the right relationship with God,” Chambers explained, “life is full of spontaneous, joyful uncertainty and expectancy. Jesus said, ‘…believe also in me’ (John 14:1), not, ‘Believe certain things about me.’ Leave everything to him and it will be gloriously and graciously uncertain how he will come in but you can be certain that he will come.”
I may not know why the church I serve is where it is or the whys of some things happen that happen here. I may not know why the UMC didn't just split and why things happened there the way they happened.
But what I do know is there are some things as Jesus said I cannot hear right now. Things that will through his word to the Holy Spirit I will understand in time. His time. Maybe if we stopped hating and arguing and firing bible bullets at each other long enough, we may hear the Spirit and get a glimpse of what God has for us even if we don't understand what is happening right now. We need to listen prayerfully. Period. If what we believe is in conflict with the Spirit, maybe the revelation is not from the Spirit. Again the only way to know is to listen prayerfully. And even then...it may not be time for us to hear it. I may not like waiting but I can  wait knowing the One who was, is and will be again continues to speak today...and not just the red words the Bible.

It has been sometime since I have posted anything here. I had some good intentions in starting to write again but what popped in my head one day was gone by end of business so to speak. So here I am again with a renewed sense that I need to put some thoughts down more intentionally and regularly.
Over the last two years I have been a part of classes on leadership which have renewed by soul and commitment to my faith and living it out as God has called me to. For some time I stepped out of the traffic stream of ministry by neglecting what had gotten me thus far along the way. In these two years I have quickly discovered that I need to engage God again., intentionally and daily.
I am currently in a peer mentoring group of clergy who have come together in a process and initiative to help pastors and churches discover who God has called them to be and who God is calling them to serve. We have been reading some wonderful material which has reignited the embers of faith and leadership within me and given me renewed focus and direction.
We first read "Too Busy Not To Pray." Too often when we say I will pray for you we say it but never do it. Some argue that God already knows so when we say that, God heard our prayer already. But the question isn't whether God heard us but do we hear God? It brought me back to a spiritual discipline of prayer I used for so long and then life and the business of church got the priority. In my days at seminary and beyond up until about 5 years ago, I would pray the Daily Office of the Order of Saint Luke. Each day I would set time and a physical space aside and pray the prayers and listen. It lead me to some wonderful discoveries of myself and where the Spirit was guiding me to. However I got out of the practice or habit of doing that. I have begun to pray that way again and am developing a prayer space which is dedicated to that task and nothing else.
The second read we had together was "Renovate or Die." An ominous title for sure but eye opening nonetheless. While reading it and thinking of the church in general, I began to see that this was more than just about the church. It was about my life. I had been redecorating and slowly becoming one of those whitewashed tombs Jesus spoke of. Altogether on the outside but dead on the inside. I thank God for second chances. Renovation doesn't mean swinging a sledge hammer but a dedication to a blueprint and it may take time to have a finished product like home renovation. Too often in the church and in our lives we simply redecorate and look good instead of renovating and being faithful. Slowly my will then supplants God's will for my life. Again I am thankful for a second chance to serve God in new ways through a renewed focus and vision and hope as I seek out God's will once more.
The latest book we are reading is "Simple Church." The author discusses how we complicate the discipleship process and most of us and our churches have no idea what happens or what should happen when people make a decision to be a part of church. It's kind of like throwing a party and inviting everyone but not making plans for refreshments, food menu activities etc. We want people to come in the door and then we say, "Now what do we do with them?" We need to offer a simple process to help people move from attendee to disciple. As I read the words I dug through my flash drive to find two files. One was a booklet I created ten years ago to help the church I was serving then to develop an easy step process to help people dive deep into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and become all that God had for them. It never got off the ground. Why? I got more focused on the business of church rather than the mission of the church: to make disciples of Jesus Christ so as to transform the world. The second file I searched for was one called, "Our Covenant Together." I created that at about the same time as the step process for discipleship. My goal was to present it the leadership of the church to covenant with each other and God. Among the pieces was how we talk and treat each other, a commitment to the mission of the church rather than the business and some other pieces. After reading and praying over it we would all sign it together. What happened there? Again business of the church. As I type that phrase now it makes me mad at myself that I got off track of my ministry like that.
All of this to say what? Do you know how sheep get lost? They nibble a little grass here then walk over there and nibble a little more. Before too long they find themselves at a cliff and then...Well for you and I at that cliff the Good Shepherd pulls us back and celebrates finding you. I was lost and am found...again. I don't want to keep redecorating my life and become like a whitewashed tomb. I want to renovate my life with God's help and Jesus words so I can be back on the road and not standing on the sidelines.
What would your life look like if you renovated your life? What do you need to say NO to in order to say YES to God and to have a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ? What decorations need to be thrown away? What would happen if you prayed intentionally at a time and in a space dedicated to that purpose only? What would happen if you simplified your life in such a way that the path of discipleship made more sense and led you to new ways of living life as a disciple of Jesus Christ so as to transform the world?