Telling Secrets

I am on a number of simultaneous adventures: I am husband to my wife, father to my children, son to my parents, son-in-law to my parents-in-law, writer with writer's block and confidence issues, new goer and hellraiser at the Master's Church, sometime volunteer for Xylem, prevention specialist for Kaiser, Ronin organizer of the State of our Values event, president of my HOA, board member at-large for the Colorado Society for Public Health Educators, and ... I think that's basically it.

I discovered about a week and a half ago that I didn't really believe that I could "do all things through Christ who strengthens me." I said with knowing wink to Russ (pastor of the Master's Church) that my problem in life is that my horizons are too big. He didn't think it was very amusing and told me that was a ridiculous thing to believe. If we can do all things through Christ, and Christ promises to never leave us alone, then there should be no such thing as a vision that is too big, horizons that are too wide. He is fond of saying that we are the children of God, the ones who all of creation, groaning under the curse, has been waiting to be revealed. If that's true then we need to GET GOING! Like Neo in the Matrix, we are waiting for something when we already have what we need to work God's redemption of the people and Nature of this world. What are we waiting for?

Every time I watch the Matrix, I ask myself that question and I can't answer it. Now I know that, like Neo, I don't really believe it. When I said this outloud, Russ smiled and said that knowing your unbelief is the first and biggest step.

The next day, I got a call to action from Sojourners to organize a State of the Union watch. I felt so strongly that I should do this that I couldn't sleep that night. So I got up and did all the initial planning. I wanted to start acting from a position of belief and this was something that was highly dependent on God to pull off. I could get the ball rolling and do everything I could, but the actual success of the event, whether or not anyone comes, is entirely out of my control.

It's been a good experience so far. I still don't know who's coming to this thing. I've been interviewed by the L.A. Times, the News, and the Post who is coming to the event with a photographer. My connection at Fox News is working on getting someone to come too. They all want to know who's coming because I've billed it as a general, "bi-partisan" event and I can't tell them. The reporter at the News kept pushing me for names and churches and I finally had to say, "Look, I have between 20 and 30 people confirmed and I don't know any of them or what church they're from. I can only tell you who I've invited."

They are all really interested in whether or not I can actually get the conservative churches there. The reporter from the News said, "So you're trying to get conservatives and liberals, but is this really a liberal event? I mean, you're serving organic, fairly traded coffee, which pretty much gives you away." An interesting observation. I am in fact having a difficult time getting conservative churches to commit, but the liberal element is eating it up. The executive director of Denver Urban Ministries has heard about this event from 4 different people.

So what does that mean? Do conservatives drink slave-worked, chemical laden coffee? Maybe...it is cheaper, which often trumps social responsibility in consumers (e.g. the appeal of Walmart, Gap, Old Navy, etc.). Does that mean that conservatives are only interested in strictly conservative events, such as pro-life and anti-gay marriage rallies? Maybe. What I don't understand is why care for the poor, homeless, orphans, and environment is relegated to the realm of the Religious Left and looked upon with distrust and often disdain. These are the things the Bible tells us to care about. They should transcend our political views because they are what God cares about. God doesn't say that we need to prevent homosexual marriages or even drug abuse through legislation. You can't force non-Christians to have Christian morals.

I don't know. Can't we all just get along?