The War on Christmas and St. Nicolas of Myra

I'm trying to make sure I get a post up here every about every two weeks. I remember the words of the wise Dr. Siburt at the beginning of my class this semester, he said "Ministers don't last very long when they spend more time on their blogs than with their people." Now I have two to keep up with, one that only ACU students can see, sorry non-ACU students! Nevertheless here's another Christmas observation.

Every year around this time of year, I begin to hear all of the cries about what has been dubbed as the "War on Christmas." I've always been puzzled by this idea. I've heard the stories about nativity scenes not being allowed on government property, and not being able to say Merry Christmas. I don't particularly care for nativity scenes, but if they should be anywhere it's in front of churches. I'm all for separation of church and state, and looking at history confirms that for me. To my knowledge it's not illegal to say Merry Christmas, and Happy Holidays is fine with me. In some ways, it is more Christian in its inclusion and respect of others and their beliefs. Also, when the first Pilgrims came here they banned Christmas, it wasn't till later we got it back (Pesky Puritans).

I do want to point out something that is unsettling to I've noticed this holiday season. And it's in this commercial.

When we were younger Santa was the one who gave good things to the kids who were good, and bad things to the kids who were bad. He was always watching so you had that pressure on you the whole year (who am I kidding, no kid really thought about that until late November). Plus he stuck down your chimney at night, which was a little weird. But in essence, Santa is comparison to God. And the statement I see in this commercial is "We don't need you Santa, we're advanced consumers who can take care of and bless ourselves, how bout the dog?"

This unsettles me. I see it all the time in this society that is becoming increasingly consumeristic. We don't need help, we can solve our problems with money or our own ingenuity. In essence, there is becoming less room for God. I thought about this when I was teaching my 4th grade boys about the rich young ruler and how it is hard for the rich to get into heaven. They don't need God when they can take care of things themselves.

I'll end with the story of the original St. Nicolas. He was born in Turkey and committed his life to the church at an early age and was the Bishop of Myra. He sold all of his family's wealth and gave it to the poor. When good Old St. Nicholas heard about three girls that were to be sold into slavery by their father he went and threw three bags of gold from the church's treasury into their house. Supposedly, they land in stockings by the fire, which is how we get stockings by the fire on Christmas. And that's the St. Nick I want. That's the St. Nick that everyone should want. And that's the God I want. The God who pays people's ransoms from slavery no matter the cost. The God who empties out His storehouses for His people. And is so committed to paying their ransom that He sends His Son and is willing to put Him on a cross to buy our freedom. Because we need His gifts, most of all the gift of Jesus. That's what we remember on Christmas.

An Advent Post

In light of the holiday season, I thought I would make a holiday post or two. I found this interesting and funny video depicting the Christmas Story. Now don't get me wrong, dressing kids up as the characters of the biblical story is weird to me, but this one had cool accents and a creative touch.

In recent years, I've begun to observe the season of Advent. I like Advent for two reasons. First, Advent is the season of a world pregnant with hope, and that hope we call Christ will soon arrive. Second of all, Advent focuses not on gift giving, but God's giving of His greatest gift, Jesus.

Something I have been doing in the past few years is not asking for hardly any presents, but instead asking that people give money to charities I like, this year it will be to a couple of different places like my beloved Impact. It's a part of an effort to restore the meaning back into Christmas by a group called the Advent Conspiracy. They seek to focus more on the celebrating the coming of Christ into the world with family and friends, and finding the joy in giving rather than receiving. Maybe you'd like to join in on the conspiracy. Here's their promo video for the year.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

My First Oath

A couple weeks ago, I made my way to the Mickey Leland Federal Building here in Houston to get my first passport. As some of you may know my girlfriend Michael is in Honduras for the next two years as a part of the Helpers in Missions program. There she is working with a homeless ministry called Breaking Chains, and Shine Honduras which seeks to provide education for underprivileged kids. I am going to be able to go visit her around Christmas, thanks to a wonderful couple who bought me a ticket.

So I show up to present my application and birth certificate at Mickey's building (I really like the name Mickey, but could not tell you a single fact about Mickey Leland). Everything is going well, there's no line, I turn my phone, then forget my birth certificate in my car. I go retrieve it, then begin the process again. After getting every piece of identification photocopied, the lady behind the counter asked me to put my left hand on the application, and to raise my right hand. I'm sure she got a kick out of the look of confusion on my face as she told me to repeat after her. 

So I, John Carson, swore that I completed the application to the best of my knowledge and that the picture was a good likeness of me. There was a brief moment where I thought "They're going to figure out I've been in Texas longer than I should have without a Texas Drivers License and revoked this thing." Luckily this didn't happen and I now have my passport. 

All of this got me thinking about oaths in the Bible, specifically God's oath with Abraham. In Genesis 24, Abraham is speaking about how God swore on oath that He would give Abraham's offspring land and make them into a great nation. All through the Bible this oath is referenced, and seems to carry a lot of meaning. One of the things that came along with an oath was a seal, which acted as a symbol of that promise. For a weird example of this, read Genesis 38.

When I think about seals it makes me think about one of my favorite songs "Come Thou Fount." We sang it at Impact Sunday and it was amazing. The song ends with these words "Here's my heart, Lord, Take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above." When I sing these words it's like I'm making my oath with God and saying I'm His. Also, here's my heart as a symbol of that oath. For me, when I hear the whole congregation singing this song, it's like hearing a bride say to her husband, "I'm yours."

Grace & Peace,
John

3 Days with a Labyrinth

Lately, I find myself having a lot more time without my girlfriend here in Houston, which gives me time to think about interesting things to do with my time. While most people where off to Halloween parties on Saturday night; I was off to draw a labyrinth in Impact's back parking lot, which can be seen below. Now I'm sure the few people that saw me doing this thought I was insane, and drawing something akin to a crop circle or something of the occult.

Many of you may be wondering what exactly a labyrinth is. It is an old term used for mazes and places the Greeks and other cultures used in their mythology. Labyrinth slowly became the term used for any sort of maze or meditation circle. Eventually, it was hijacked by the Christians as a replacement for a pilgrimage. It began to appear on cathedral floors around 1000 AD for people to use as a tool for prayer. There has been a revival of sorts for labyrinths lately, they've been popping up at churches and chapels all over the country.

Chartres Cathedral, France



I was building my labyrinth for an experiment for my Spiritual Formations class, and because I thought it would be something cool my kids could try. A labyrinth walk is a time where the person walking it can think about all the things they need to give up in order to abide with God more fully. Once in the center of the labyrinth the person prays and mediates what is on their heart, and meets with Christ in the center. Now while the person sits, they wait until a word is put on their heart. All the way out of the labyrinth, they meditate on that word and how they can put that into practice into their lives.

I like labyrinths. They make me slow down and contemplate what I need to give up to be with Christ, and forces me to make sure my heart is right and I'm ready before I step the middle of the circle and meet God. They also wind and twist all the way to the center, which I think is a nice metaphor for life. I don't have to think about all the twists and turns that God has me on, I just have to keep stepping towards Him.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that a few of the middle school kids really enjoyed doing it in our class Sunday morning. Our youth team also walked the labyrinth on Monday as per my prayer project for class. It was new to many of them and they felt soothed after the chance to have an intentional time of prayer and meditation. Last night, I took my High School students on a labyrinth walk as a chance to remind us that we have chased desires that will not fulfill us, and that we need to give up these desires and be fulfilled by Christ.

Afterwards many of them spoke of how it gave them the chance to think deeper about their lives and their relationship with God. Some even cried afterwards, which really surprised me. Many people would say that you can't do quiet, contemplative things with inner-city kids. I would agree a lot of the time. Lots of our kids are ADHD, immature, neglected and needing so much attention, that lots of times it's hard to get them quiet during any activity. But it was different with the labyrinth. They stopped. They thought. They walked. They followed the path. And they met with Christ and prayed.

I think there is something fascinating about ancient practices. Many times I think a lot of people would find them boring. On the surface, they really can be boring, but they are deep with rich spiritual meaning. Lectio Divina or Divine Reading, the Book of Common Prayer, and now Labyrinths are all things I would have never guessed my kids would love. My kids strive for God, they do experience Him in these ancient practices. I think I will be incorporating them into our worship times and classes more. Maybe you faithful reader can seek out some of these practices and experience God in a deeper way.

Grace & Peace,
John

M&M's bad day

I sit in my chair tonight, fairly sad. I got home a little while ago from a very rough route ride home. It was a full route tonight, and everyone seemed to be wild tonight. One in particular was one of my middle schoolers I jokingly call M&M and she calls me JJ. The night began with me seeing her get yelled at by her mother and grandmother. She was then loud and obviously unhappy to see me tonight, which could be since I wouldn't let her come last week because she acted so badly the week before that.

All of the time at church, M&M would not stop talking or listen to any of the adults. After class tonight when M&M was finished in middle school, she began to yell at me about different things and give me attitude. All the way home nothing changed, she still would yell and be just outright defiant towards me. I had already decided that she would not be coming back next week and knew I'd have to talk to her grandmother. Once we arrived at her house, she knew what was coming, and begged me not to tell. But I had to.

I knew what would happen, I knew she would probably be beaten tonight; She knew that too. That fact gave me little comfort. I know about some of the abuse that M&M has experienced. I know some of the evil things that have happened to her. Because I know these things, it doesn't surprise me when she acts out, or when she hates men.

I wish there was a nice happy ending to this post, but there's not. I will be sad tonight. I will pray tonight. And I will hope for a better day for both M&M and JJ tomorrow.

Grace. Peace.
John

A Night to Celebrate!

This past Sunday Impact hosted its annual Night of Celebration. At the Night of Celebration there is usually an awesome speaker like Mitch Wilburn or Brian Mashburn to come and talk about all the good things that we work to accomplish here at Impact. But this year was different, instead of a speaker, we decided to let all our ministries speak for themselves. Each ministry had its own little booth set up in the auditorium and around 2 minutes to descride how they change lives in our community. 

In our youth section we had 3 sections to work with so we chose to make them all fit together by showing what the average kid experiences as they grow up in Impact's Youth programs. Our average kid was named Zachary and was played by Impact children at each age level. We showed how Zachary learns how to read and that Jesus loves him in Elementary School. How he learns life skills like shaving and the importance of serving others in this world in Middle School. Everyone got to see how Zachary has grown and matured into a High School student who teaches and loves kids who came from the exact same situation he has, and how he is able to go on trips to serve all over the country. 

And at the end of it all, we showed our Zachary graduating from High School surrounded by all the people who loved him every step of the way, and that he is stepping into the world to succeed as a Christian adult.

There is no way for me to describe how well this night went and how much God was glorified in it!

The highlight of my evening (shown above) was when I met one of my supporters here in Houston who has never met me. Clara Beaman is an amazing woman with great faith, and is such an encouragement to me. Without knowing a thing about me other than what Suzannah Gabriel and Steven Wells said, she supports me. She encouraged me when we talked like we had known each other all my life, and she knew me all because of this blog and Facebook. So I know she'll read this and I want to say Thank You! Thank you for believing in the call I have heard to come and love the kids of Impact. Thank you for being an encouragement that renews my soul. Thank you for giving from your heart and stepping out on faith to support what God is doing here.

And the same goes to all those who support me and Impact as a whole.

Grace and Peace and Blessings to you all.

John Carson

Traders?

I like these two videos and I thought I would share. They reality is most of the time this doesn't happen because of fear.

Food for thought. 

Grace and Peace,

John