Brian Castelli – With His Heart

At MFUGE in Charleston in the summer of 2007, the camp pastor was Walt Barnes, Director of BLIHP (By Living in His Presence) Ministries. (See www.thewalter.org) Pastor Walt presented a sermon on Tuesday night of the week I was there that rocked some people’s worlds.

Pastor Walt used colored markers – green, yellow, gray and black – as an object lesson. He held up a green marker and said that the green represents a Christian that is on fire for Jesus. The yellow marker represents someone who was once a green marker but has gotten comfortable. They are saved, but they have lost the fire and the passion with which they formerly pursued Jesus. The gray marker represents someone who is faking it, just going through the motions. They look saved on the outside. They go to church and do all the outward things one might expect, but inside they are disconnected from Jesus. The black marker represents those who do not follow Jesus at all. They aren’t faking it, but they aren’t getting it, either.

Pastor Walt told a number of amazing stories to enhance the imagery of the markers.

Paul McLeod is the proprietor of Graceland, Too, a personal memorial to Elvis Presley he maintains in his home. (See http://www.roadsideamerica.com/attract/MSHOLgracelandtoo.html) Mr. McLeod has dedicated his life to Elvis, staying open 24 x 7, 365 days a year, choosing Elvis over saving his marriage, and choosing to miss his mother’s funeral in case someone might want to see his Elvis memorial. McLeod once said that he would gladly die to bring Elvis back to life. This man has passion. McLeod has no problem telling anyone who will listen about Elvis. How does this compare to my willingness to tell the people around me about Jesus? Am I a green marker, ready to tell anyone and everyone about my Savior? Or am I yellow, holding back on my passion?

Think about the hottest sports rivalries in the country. I live in NC, and the Duke-UNC basketball rivalry has to be one of the most contentious. When the teams play, emotions run high. The season rises or falls based on the outcome of their games against one another. You know that the avid fans of the winning team shout and whoop and holler! They are in everybody’s face about their team and their win. They have passion. How does this compare to my willingness to tell people about Jesus’ victory? Am I a green marker, spreading the Good News to all? Or am I a yellow marker, comfortable in my church pew and Sunday School class?

Pastor Walt made many kids sit up and take notice. This is one far-too-yellow adult who took notice, too.

I read an excellent quote earlier this week:

To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.

- Winston Churchill

Think about it!

One sunny morning in San Diego, the day after I met Ron, I once again hit the pavement at dawn for a run. I was looking for Ron. I wanted to get to know him a bit and maybe earn his trust enough to convince him to accept my New Testament. I wanted to switch from hunter to fisherman.

As I ran, the scene was much the same. On Thursday morning, however, there was no sign of Ron.

I saw a black man in a dark sweatshirt and ball cap sitting on one of the park benches. He was feeding the pigeons that had gathered at his feet. He was giving them old pieces of cereal.

I sat next to Al, introduced myself, and asked him his name. Like Ron, Al acted as if I was not speaking to him at first. I’m convinced that they both are so used to being ignored that it took a bit for them to realize I was addressing them.

Al and I talked about fishing. He told me that he didn’t fish, but he’d never eat anything that came out of the bay. He asked me if I’d seen the sewage that people dump in there. I said that I hadn’t. I asked how the fancy restaurants in the area got away with charging so much money for polluted fish. He defended the restaurants, saying that they got their catch from deep sea fishing, not the bay.

Al has been in San Diego since 1991. He is originally from San Francisco. We had a great time talking until I asked him what his Thursday was going to be like. Then, like Ron, he started using evasive words in his sentences. I backed off, not wanting to “hunt”. I kept the New Testament in my pocket.

When we finished talking, I bade Al farewell and wished him a good day. I left with the idea that I could go looking for both Al and Ron on Friday…

I was going to help somebody!

I brought a tiny leather-bound New Testament with me to San Diego in July of 2007 with the idea that I’d give it to someone. As I prepared for my early-morning run on Wednesday, I thought I might find a homeless person along the shore of the Bay! I tucked $5 inside the cover, placed it in my pocket, and headed out!

Most of the homeless people I saw as I ran were asleep – wrapped in dirty blankets, lying on the benches that dotted the shoreline, with what appeared to be all their possessions in collections of bags at their feet.

3 gentlemen were sitting up, talking together at a cement table. How could I divide $5 and one book between them? I continued on.

5 minutes further, I spotted Ron. He was standing at the shoreline facing the water. He was wearing a dark blue San Diego ball cap, a red jacket, and dirty blue jeans. he was smoking a cigarette. A tan suitcase with a few broken seams was on the ground at his feet.

I stopped and asked Ron – I didn’t know his name yet – for directions to the ferry. It was a ruse. I had just run past the ferry landing. I knew where it was. I just needed an opening.

At first, Ron acted as if I wasn’t talking to him. When the awareness of my attention hit him, he turned to look my way. He gave me vague directions. I thanked him and engaged him in some idle chit-chat. I asked for his name. (Ron) Did he like to fish? (No.) How long had he been in Sand Diego? (A while.) I then asked Ron what a typical day looked like for him. He started rambling on about coming to San Diego on business and how there were somethings that he would say and some things that he wouldn’t say and he wasn’t sure what he was going to say today… After several minutes of his rambling with a few inserted questions from me, I told him that it was time for me to move on. I pulled out the Bible and offered to give it to him. I crossed a line with that offer.

Ron started another ramble session. What was I giving him that for? He didn’t need my money. He had his own money. He didn’t know why I would make such an offer. I interrupted him to apologize. I said that I was sorry to have offended him. I told him about my devotion to Jesus Christ, and I asked him if he knew Jesus. (No coherent response.) I apologized again, said “goodbye” and turned to walk away. Ron drew me back. He wanted to keep talking, so we did.

After a few more minutes of rambling conversation, I said, “Ron, look. I am sorry for having offended you earlier, but I have another offer. How about if I give this Bible to you and you give it to someone you know who needs it. Okay?” I held out the Bible. He refused to take it.

Ron rambled on. How do I know there aren’t any strings attached to this? I don’t know what you want back from this. And on and on he went. I told him that I was simply being obedient to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. There were no strings, no commitments, nothing. I was offering a free gift. As I got nowhere with him, I said “goodbye” once again and departed, with Ron talking to me – or someone – as I moved along the Bay.

I learned a valuable lesson from my encounter with Ron. Drive-by help doesn’t always work. I don’t know if Ron would ever have accepted anything from me, but it’s certainly clear that I would have a much better chance if I had spent more time pouring life into him.

I was talking to my friend, Domou, today. He said that as we make positive change, we find new reasons to change. I find this line of reasoning fascinating. As he talked, I thought about what happened at my house when we put a new floor in the living room. It looked great, but the walls looked dingy by comparison. So we painted. Then the drapes looked shabby by comparison, so we changed them.

I think a similar thing happens to us when we make positive change. When we improve in a single area, we often expose other areas where we need work. As we tackle these newly-exposed areas, more opens. Over time, if we’re diligent, we continuously improve.

Fascinating! And true!

In a previous post, I asserted:

The toughest thing about making a marriage last is that you need to work on yourself, not your spouse.

There are reasons why this is hard and reasons why this is the only thing that works. In this post, I’ll focus on why this is hard.

First of all, we just about always think we’re right. I never do something that I think is wrong. If I know it’s wrong, I won’t do it.

Second, no one wants to look bad. We go to great lengths to wear nice clothes, keep ourselves in shape, drive nice cars, to avoid handling questions we can’t answer, and so on. When we mess up, it’s a natural tendency to cover up.

Third, many of us think we can fix our spouses. We think we can see exactly what the problem is. If only he or she would listen! (Frankly, sometimes it is the other person. But attempting to fix the other person rarely works. I will explore this is greater detail in my next post.) It’s really hard to shift the focus back to working on ourselves when we can easily rip through a short list of the things our spouse has done wrong. It seems so unfair! The down side here is that all too often he or she could rip through a similar list about us!

Fourth, we can almost always find friends to back us up. Because many of them are also struggling in this area, they tend to close ranks with us. It’s a rare and precious thing to have a friend that doesn’t buy into our B.S., that challenges us to think critically about our situations. If you have a friend like this, thank God.

Fifth, the world is against us. The odds are against us even being willing to try to work on ourselves because the world in which we live seems to want to pull us apart. We are bombarded by messages about getting what we need, realizing our dreams, and eliminating from our lives anyone getting in the way.

For these reasons, and more, working on yourself is a very difficult endeavor. It takes great maturity, humility, and strength.

But it’s worth it.

A few months ago I read a fascinating book, “How Now Shall We Live?” by Chuck Colson and Nancy Pearcy. The book looks at the Christian worldview and compares it to the secular and pantheistic worldviews that run counter to it. A couple of points caught my notice:

1. “In every action we take, we are doing one of two things: we are either helping to create hell on earth or helping to bring down a foretaste of heaven. We are either contributing to the broken condition of the world or participating with God in transforming the world to reflect his righteousness. We are either advancing the rule of Satan or establishing the reign of God.”
2. Any worldview we try to live by ought to answer three questions:
   • Where did we come from and who are we? (creation)
   • What has gone wrong with the world? (fall)
   • What can we do to fix it? (redemption)

Both of these points come from Chapter 2, Christianity is a Worldview.

The first is rather daunting. Everything we do. Do you go through your day considering the kingdom-building or -destroying implications of your choices? Beginning to think this way has been challenging to say the least.

The second is interesting in that the people I interact with usually create or take on their worldview without much thought. It “feels” right or “fits”. I think if more people would consider the origins of their worldview and the way it maps onto reality we’d have fewer problems in our world today.

I’m really not any good at understanding my own feelings. This seems odd to me. I would expect that I would be completely in touch with my feelings because, well, they are inside of me! Unfortunately, this is not the case.

When I’m feeling a particularly acute emotion such as anger it’s pretty easy to figure it out. Other emotions are far more difficult. Examples:

• A friend admitted that he’d been unfaithful to his wife. Pain was all around. He’s repentant. They are trying to work things out between them. I thought I was fine. Disappointed, but fine. When I went to work the next day, however, I had this cloud over my head. As the day went on, I realized that I was really, really upset inside. I had missed it.
• A loved one returned from a long trip. I’d welcomed her home in the evening. The next morning, I went for a run while she ran an errand. When I came around the corner, I was hoping that her car would be in the drive. It was, and I felt my heart leap a bit. I had no idea I felt quite this way. See, we’ve been married for more than 28 years. I knew that I loved her, but I didn’t realize quite how much having her around still makes my heart jump.

I am going to be more watchful of my feelings from now on. What will I discover next?

Your legacy is now!

A few months ago I attended a Christian Men’s Leadership Conference in my area. One of the speakers closed with a few comments about legacy.

My legacy is *now*. I’m always thinking about what I’m going to do, the legacy I’m going to leave. The speaker said that this is wrong thinking. The legacy I leave is where I am right now because I don’t know if I’m going to survive to see tomorrow. He used the example of Tim Russert, the TV reporter who slumped over in his chair at work last week. He had no warning. Poof, he was gone. Not everybody gets a notice like my uncle did. He had cancer and received a “you have 4 weeks to live” prognosis. My grandfather, in excellent physical condition, died of an aneurysm. He was gone in minutes.

This could happen to me. None of us know how much time we have left. Steven Curtis Chapman does a song called, “The Next 5 Minutes.” The premise of the song is that we can predict with high certainty that we’ll live for 5 more minutes, so let’s use those 5 minutes to bring glory to God.

On a related note, I recently read something from Chuck Colson in which he said that every choice we make either builds God’s kingdom or tears it down. Put these two concepts together and it’s pretty clear that we are to spend the next 5 minutes building – God’s kingdom and our legacy.
Let’s get busy, people!

I was thinking about the men’s leadership conference that I attended a few months ago.

An important take-away is that leaders aren’t the ones who sit back and complain when there is a problem. It’s the emerging leader who makes himself available to solve the problem. This doesn’t mean that we sweep things under the rug or somehow sugar-coat what’s real. No, it’s more of an attitude. It’s being able to say, “Yeah, this is bad. What can I do to help?”

As I look back on any kind of success that I’ve had in business and in life, I would say that is the attitude that buoyed me, that sustained me through the difficult times and led to tremendous growth. Recently, my son-in-law’s boss changed jobs. In the swirl of uncertainty, I heard a few people advise him to bail out, to find another position – fast! My counsel to him was the opposite. I told him to stand firm through the crisis, to demonstrate his ability to keep on delivering. I suggested that he might want to make it look like his boss was irrelevant – not in a mean way, but as a way of demonstrating his own personal capability and maturity. I suggested that he might want to be seen as someone unruffled by external events. This would be the characteristic of an emerging leader.

New leaders emerge as those willing and available to help solve the problems. Are you an emerging leader?