Courtesy of Sister K...

"The gospel came to the Greeks and they turned it into a philosophy.
The gospel came to the Romans and they turned it into a system.
The gospel came to the Europeans and they turned it into a culture.
The gospel came to the Americans and they turned it into a business."

-Stuart McAllister

New blog(spot)

Decided to transfer from Xanga because Xanga was practically featureless unless you pay for premium account. Luckily I did this before I got too many posts.

Introduction

At the 05-06 CCF retreat I ended up sharing an analogy between mathematical infinite-ness and our perception of divine intervention, titled "The Infinities", during candlelight time. People really seemed to like it but I wasn't planning on sharing one during the 06-07 retreat as I really didn't learn anything particular awesome in class that term and I actually didn't want to sound like a nerd EVERY year at retreat (Yes, Angela ended up just calling me a nerd straight up "This is SOOOO nerdy!!" :P ).

However, as I witnessed our dear sister Maxine giving her life to Christ, I realized that on this weekend God was out to smash all the impossibilities that I had attributed to CCF over the years. This reminded of another interesting tidbit I remembered from stats class on the fallacy of mathematical impossibility. Hence the 06-07 piece, "The Impossible Choice".

Seems like I'm going to end up giving one of these at every retreat (really I only have one more to attend as I have one more year here). At least now I have more incentive to pay attention in class lol.

The Impossible Choice

If I asked a group of people to pick a decimal number between 0 and 1, how many do you think would choose a half, 0.5? At least a few right? But here's the interesting part, what is the actual mathematical probability that anyone would choose 0.5?

The probability of an event happening is defined as the number of times that event can happen in a given scenario (in this case just 1, for picking 0.5 when asked) divided by the total number of events that could result from that given scenario*. So how many numbers could be possible answers when people are asked to pick a decimal number between 0 and 1? If you've read my previous analogy "The Infinities", you would know that the answer is infinity, as there are infinitely many decimal numbers to choose from between 0 and 1 (0.1, 0.12, 0.123, etc.).

Thus the probability that someone would answer 0.5 is in fact 0 (1 over infinity) from the previous definition. Therefore, mathematics tells us that there is absolutely no chance that someone would pick 0.5. However, as agreed before, surely someone would pick 0.5. It would seem then that anyone could achieve the mathematically impossible just by choosing the obvious answer.

And isn't that is exactly the type of faith that God asks of us? One that fails to be defined by the realm of possibilities, making choices that seemingly require us to achieve the impossible. Forgiveness over vengeance, service over status, selfless-ness over self-centred-ness, purity over sin, faith over doubt. But God tells us that by choosing Christ, the obvious choice, each and everyone of us shall achieve those and other impossibly great things with God, through God, and for God.

All you have to do, is pick 0.5.

*for the mathematically inclined, the correct term for an event is outcome, and the proper term for scenario is event. The original math terms seemed a little counter intuitive, so I changed them.

CCF Idol

Biggest beef this year at CCF has got to be worship. Worship coordinator, being an external position to CCF committee, has always been kind of a haphazard job. Thus I can't really lay any blame on the coord for the state of worship at CCF. Rather I will address some common misconceptions as to what worship leading is about.

Firstly, it is NOT a time for you to preach. I do appreciate a couple of inspiring words and verses, but when you begin to have entire messages during worship, that's just stupid. The worship leader's "message" at best bores the heck out of people, and more often than not actually confuses the program's message. To top that, every moment you spend spewing your "message" is a moment that you're NOT leading the congregation in worship, which simply means you're not doing you job. We have a pastor/program who will give the message! We don't need yours.

Secondly, in conjunction with "Saying NO", worship leading is NOT easier than bible study leading or small group leading, etc. Just because you can play an instrument or sing DOES NOT make you a worship leader. I am quite frankly tired of kids joining CCF worship just thinking that worship is singing and playing songs, and that just because they've had some musical training (which Chinese kid hasn't?!) they should lead worship.

Worship leading is actually HARDER to do than bible study leading. In a bible study you have 7-8 minds coming together to study the Word. The leader isn't expected to know all the answers, or even to have all the proper questions lined up smoothly. Everyone works together to get the most from the Word. Worship leaders have a MUCH bigger responsibility in creating the atmosphere of worship, because you alone are playing the instruments, you alone are holding the mics and working the amps, no one else is going to come up and share it with you. Not to mention the crowd is no longer 7-8, it's 20-30; and their attention is not longer corporately on the word, it's on YOU.

See the difference? It's not as easy as most think.

Gong Jyu Byung

Work in progress

Boys will be boys?

Ever notice that the guys at CCF are all rather emo and “sensitive” (with the exception of Glenmount of course)? Ever notice that the guys at CCF never have as much unity as the girls? Have you ever seen a men's ministry flop THIS badly?

The answer is quite simple: the guys at CCF have forgotten how to be guys. It's been 3 years since we've had a male chair, and I don't ever remember a time when we had more guys on the committee than girls. No wonder guys don't know how to act; being “sensitive”, emotional, and always trying to act “broken” and vulnerable because that's “spiritual”. That really makes me wonder where God's attributes of strength, justice, and resolve has gone nowadays.

Of course, when these guys hang with girls, everything goes well, they get treated as one of the sisters even. But it becomes terribly awkward when it comes time to start a mens small group, because no one knows how to interact with one another. Everyone is pouring their heart outs, when no guy really wants to hear it from someone they've just met. And that's why men's ministry at CCF is flopping, because guys have forgotten (and for a while the girls forbid) that it's OK for small groups to sit together and eat and watch a game, to belch and laugh about it, to spend some quality time through a game of pool or DOTA.

Really CCF guys, when anyone sees a “broken”, “sensitive”, “vulnerable” guy, they don't call them a spiritual giant, they call them a pansy (guys say it outright, girls say it to their friends).

If you're being nice just so you can hook up with someone, please stop. The only girls who'd like that kind of guy are the ones who will trample you over, do you really want that? Ever notice the "nicest" guys are usually the ones who can't find a date? And if you're doing it just because you think that's how a man of God is supposed to act, please consider this: Jesus never needed to ACT broken, He was never too sensitive to say harsh rebukes, and the only person He was vulnerable to was to God alone.

Honestly if you'd just listen...

Sometimes you really do wonder if CCF leaders are deaf. On one hand, I absolutely do understand that it's proper to have a vision about what you want to do, but where does YOUR vision end and God's begin? Do the needs of the people in the fellowship even matter?

John 5:19 says "...the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does."

Why are some of CCF's ministries very fruitless? It's simply because the leaders get so wrapped up with doing what THEY want to do, rather than listening to God, and listening to the congregation, about what actually NEEDS to be done at this fellowship.

I think that the congregation's voice is a really big part of affirming a vision. They ARE who you're serving after all. Even if your vision super biblical and orthodox, I hardly think it'll be very effective if you have to drag people kicking and screaming through what you want to do. The thing that most committee members forget, is that before you can create an impact on the campus and on the city, you need to build healthy Christians first, and that requires shepherding; genuine nurture and intentional investment; not just challenge after challenge trying to get people to fit into your vision.

Ultimately, the people of this fellowship are not pawns for the leaders to play with to get to THEIR ministry goals. So before the leaders go out and set any sort of challenge in front of CCF, it would do them well to think about whether they are doing this out of genuine care for the PEOPLE, or just so they can add something to their accomplishments list.

All work and no play makes CCF a...

Honestly, try to recall the last time you had fun at CCF this year. The last time I could remember was the scavenger hunt, and that was a long while back. We even had one stretch where there was 5 bible studies in a row; bible study, application night, then someone came in to do a "talk", which was really a bible study, then bible study and app night again.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't mind bible studies, but when you don't have many good bible study leaders, and even less good bible study writers, could it be that God really never intended for us to do this many bible studies? When you schedule literally strings of not-so-great bible studies and nothing else, is it any wonder that no one is really bonding with one another? I've had talks with people about how fun it was to go bowling last week, but I've never had a convo about Peter as a rock or Paul's humility. When was the last time your relationship with another CCFer was strengthened by a bible study? Are bible studies the purpose of a fellowship? What is a fellowship's purpose? What does fellowship even mean?

In Acts 2, where they talk of the fellowship of the believers, no where was it mentioned that they studied the word of God week in week out. What does get mentioned twice is that they broke bread together regularly, and shared things with one another, praising God all the while. I've never thought of fellowship as Sunday school class #2, that's what church is for. The point of fellowship was never that we'd learn more of Christ by studying.

The point of fellowship was the build up a community of believers practicing the teachings of God. And let's face it, we already know plenty of teachings, let's spend a little more time practicing how to be community for God. Have a potluck, go bowling together, get out, have fun, give us chances to practice the love of God to each other, and not just command things to memory like a textbook.

Don't fix what ISN'T broken, but please fix what IS

I'm always amazed at every committee's commitment to be on an extreme on every scale. Some feel they aren't doing their job right if they don't change something. others keep things EXACTLY the same, regardless of changes in circumstances.

I love using the single gender small groups failure as an example of what goes wrong when people don't think long term about their decisions. Not that I'm against single gender groups; I'm just against having them exclusively. Actually, not even that, I'm just against things being changed without prior thought to practical logistics, current congregational need, and long term impact.

2 years ago the commitee decided, in the midst of years of successful co-ed groups, that we should switch exclusively to single gender small groups. That switch failed horribly for the men's side that year. The next year, I don't know how this is supposed to help, but they introduced more bible studies in SGs (bible studies were pretty much jammed into anything and everything). Men's attendance was STILL dismal, women's attendance was good, but leadership investment was forgotten about. So finally we come to this year, we have almost no female leaders, due to graduation and lack of development, and a bunch of male leaders that have little to no clue as to what they're doing, because no one has ever been in a small group before. Hardly the brightest picture is it?

See what happened there? We essentially lost 2, maybe 3 years in the small groups ministry because:

1) someone (someone, not so much God) wanted to change something
2) the change was made without adequate thinking and preparation about the consequences, and taking in the concerns of the congregation
3) successive leaders had slow/non-existent reactions to a ministry that was clearly not doing well
4) some leaders just wanted to stick with whatever happened before.
5) lack of communication between years to reflect on successes and failures, and how they apply to their current situation.

Now you ask anyone at CCF and no one has any idea of how small groups actually worked great before the single gender fiasco; how plugging newcomers into small groups was easy, and people genuinely enjoyed being there rather than having to be reminded to go every week.

Leaders, when you make choices, think about HOW (I already know you have a million Sunday school answers as to why) you're going to do what you plan to do, and more importantly, what will you do if it DOESN'T go well. I know we need to live by faith, but it is simply irresponsible to not think about consequences and potentially leave a mess for the next committee to clean up. And evaluate your ministry on a constant basis, and COMMUNICATE to future leaders what went well and what didn't, not so much that they can just follow you, but that they can make informed choices in order to properly meet the needs of their situation.

Who knows, maybe some of them will actually listen for once...

Saying "NO"

Same idea of accountability for those who are serving, if someone really can't sing, or someone really can't lead a bible study, why shouldn't they be directed to other ministries? Are the leaders so undiscerning that they can't even tell when someone can't hold a normal conversation, never mind lead a bible discussion?!

I know we're supposed to be nice and build up each other. But come on, we're not in the third grade here, building up each other isn't about making everyone feel warm and cuddly about the things they “think” they can do. Building up each other in Christ means to help each other identify their God-given talents and nurturing those abilities. Sometimes (more often than not) it means bursting someone's bubble so that they will open their eyes to all the other talents God has given them.

Saying “no” saves everyone headaches in the long run too. If you knew someone is a compulsive perfectionist and can't work with people, why in the world would you let them volunteer to coordinate a coffeehouse? You wouldn't want to be in that person's group in class, why would CCF be any different? Or if you find that there are a billion just-ok singers volunteering for worship, is it so hard to imagine that perhaps some of them God really called to be bible study leaders?

All it takes, is a simple “no, but I think you would be a good _______, you should talk to ______” (ok, not as simple as just “no”, but still only one sentence).

Someone explain this to me....

If a leader is clearly not performing to his/her abilities, or clearly doing their tasks below par, why shouldn't that observation be voiced? I’ve seen time and time again where certain ministries have slip to the point where the membership is grumbling, and yet the committee somehow feels the need to put up this facade that all things are well!

I know I’m a hypocrite for saying this, as I’m one of the loudest background grumblers at CCF, but why should things slip so far that we as the members have to do something? There are six to seven leaders, shouldn't they keep each other in check? I find it hilarious how the leaders even pretend that all is well to each other! As if that makes everyone feel better and things will just move happily on forwards (to oblivion probably).

Why shouldn't leaders have to explain, to each other and probably the membership as well, why “we only had 15 minutes to practice this particular worship set” or “this single gender small group thing isn't working for the guys and but we're sticking with it anyways” or "he/she wrote all the bible studies themselves even though I'm a DL too"?! Did the leaders really think that we weren't going to notice that those ministries are going down the toilet? Or maybe they thought that “hey I'm leading for a year so whatever doesn't work I'll just leave it for next year to do better”.

Either way I think the committee needs more transparency in their decision making, and members must take advantage of this transparency to see why things go as they do at CCF.

My turf, your turf

This point goes hand in hand with "Ain't No Superheros Here". It used to be that we had more generic committee titles like outreach coordinator, worship coordinator, vice chair, etc. Now in our committee we have specific titles like men’s ministry coordinator, small group coordinator, prayer meeting coordinator, etc. We didn’t even have a vice chair at all this year believe it or not!

This kind of specific titling only boosts the leaders' preconceptions of their roles. It gives all the leaders an excuse to say “hey, I don’t need to help with prayer because so and so is the prayer coordinator” or “he/she is the small group coordinator, let he/she handle it”. The effect is pretty much the same as the previous point, leaders lose touch/stop caring about each other’s ministries, to the point where they don’t even act if it becomes apparent that the other leaders are doing a poor job

I really think that these clearly defined roles are detrimental to the running of a committee. Clearly those who DO end up with a generic title, like administrator or chair, end up doing most of the work week in week out, with the other leaders chipping in whenever the program suits their titles. Leaders need to come together, and get what’s needed done, regardless of what your title might be.

Ain't no superheros here

The predominant attitude for those entering the committee is that there is something they wish to fix, eg. I want to have single gender small groups, I don’t think our bible studies are deep enough, I want us to do more things on social justice, I want to reach the campus more, etc. Everyone seems to carry some sort of agenda into CCF committee, and it has led to all sorts of problems as leaders realize that, yes, there are issues you have to deal with other than the one you wanted to fix.

You find that the REAL leaders have a hard time getting support for the more mundane things, like running CCF week to week, as the other leaders continue to drop the ball on things that they think aren’t really their “turf”. This kind of thinking not only results in ineffective programs, it also places unnecessary work loads on those who ARE willing to step up to any task, and it distances the committee members from each other.

Their concerns for their particular ministry might be valid, but I hardly think God called them to be a hero to come save CCF's whatever by themselves. No one stepping through the doors of CCF during the last 3 years could be considered a spiritual giant, and just because you’re on committee doesn’t suddenly make your spiritual life stronger, so stop trying to act like a spiritual superhero.

Introduction

This is just a spot for me to vent my frustrations about CCF, past and present (so yes, it is written in the "Kenneth" tone, as I've been said to have). It's amazing, I don't even go anymore (since starting 2nd year masters), and I still get disappointed, and sometime downright embarrassed, at some of the things the leaders and congregation do.

God Knowledge != God Power

I was reading a book titled "When God doesn't make sense", it got to a chapter about Job, his seemingly unwarranted suffering, and how we hopelessly try to rationalize such things to ourselves.

That got me thinking about my friend, her way of spreading the gospel has always perplexed me.

She seeks knowledge. She struggles so much to rationalize, to find answers, to place the happenings of our faith and our God logically, and to appeal to non Christians with that logic and order ... only to be baffled with more questions in return ... and so the cycle goes on ...

Didn't God say "as the heavens are higher than the earth so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts" Isaiah 55:8-9? That's what troubles me about young Christian’s (like us) popular views that God makes sense; He doesn't. So you end up trying to explain something to yourself and your peers that was never intended to be understood by you in the first place.

The "knowledgeable" Christians way of spreading the gospel involves forming attractive and convincing arguments. Sometimes that like hammering a nail with your fist, trying to do something that for most of us simply cannot be done. Even the most acclaimed theologians can't come up with satisfying answers for everyone, never mind us. When our silly arguments don't work, we pray that God will make the other person understand what you're saying. The next time you share God with that person you proceed the same way, say the same things.

Some have moved beyond that; they ask God for a hammer. "May I have more knowledge to answer their questions ... May I have more answers for this person ... May you give me the answers to life so I can tell them ..." (that last one was sarcastic).

The loving Christian asks God for something completely different, something to change themselves rather than God. That's like asking god for a box of screws and a powered screwdriver, a totally different approach. "God, may more of my life reflect you to them, may my love overflow to them, may you show yourself to them". There is an overwhelming humility that we can’t possibly explain God fully to people or ourselves.

Are you changing what you do to be a better apostle for God, or are you asking God to change the way He works so that you don’t have change yourself? Knowledge and passion are both important, but are you more of a trivia-geek or a passionate Christian?

The Culture Driven Life

If you really sit down and think about it, one of the biggest challenges our faiths' face today isn’t the secular world; because we have piles of material teaching us how to deal with that. A topic that almost goes completely unchallenged is how we deal with popular Christian culture, our own culture.

Increasingly, believers' faiths are based on culture. Popular worship leaders, popular books, popular ways to make your Christian life “better”. All the while no one is really questioning what is being portrayed, or not portrayed, as our faith and our God by this culture. One rarely stops to ponder how this culture determines what is “Christian” and what is not.

The Christian music industry is a good example of this. Just like it does in secular music, the culture drives the market. Here we see some evidence that our culture doesn’t accurately represent Christianity as a diverse whole. Why does Evanescence, a band that even themselves proclaimed that they aren’t Christian, been originally so freely accept as Christian artists? Why does Kirk Franklin, an established Christian R&B and rap artist, get his albums scrutinized each time a new one comes out? Why do only certain genres of music, such as rock or contemporary gospel, get heavy marketing in the Christian music industry while other genres like R&B, punk, and dance get left behind?

Popularity of the genre can’t be the reason for this. Is gospel more popular than R&B in general? The reason can’t be that all Christian have the same likes or dislikes either. Most Christians I know listen to both Christian and secular music, sometimes in vastly different genres between the two. The reason certainly can not be that some genres “sound” more Christian than others, because as any Christian will tell you: “It’s all about the lyrics.”

The answer lies in culture. Kirk Franklin’s more secular R&B sound didn’t fit into the culture as well as Evanescence’s rock sound, even though it was obvious as soon as one looks at the lyrics which was more directly Christian. The fact is this: our culture filters out much of the material available to it not by determining whether it is inspired by God, but by judging whether the piece “fits” into our definitive mode of Christian living; a mode defined entirely by culture. Books telling us how to pray, CDs teaching us how to worship, seminars demonstrating how to be a Godly family, the list of products that seek to define our lifestyles goes on and on. Uniformity, conformity, and in a sense, complacency, is a huge driving force behind Christian culture; thinly disguising themselves as an easy method to unity.

I am, by no means, belittling or doubting the value of some of the material that is out there. There are books that have been invaluable to me and many songs that have led me closer to God. One must, however, confront the fact that the Christian merchandising industry is a business (a good note to remember, most Christian record companies are owned, in whole or in part, by the big record labels), and businesses are out to make money. That is why uniformity, a “cookie cutter” Christian, plays such an important role to these businesses. Wouldn’t business be easy if all their customers have the same tastes and wants?! And that is exactly what is happening in popular Christian culture, a convergence of preferences and attitudes about our faith. One has to wonder if the push for this in the products by the marketeers is perhaps to make our demographic simpler to cater to, easier to sell to.

Thus the scenario becomes this: the uniform flock of us sheep, each continuing to pursue a “unifying” ideal Christian life, led not directly by God, but by a culture that filters and screens who we see as God. What a terrifying thought! Perhaps it is especially concerning to those that never really question the materials they feed themselves with; those who believe the hype, those who follow the trends – I bought/believe in this because “this book is on the top 10 list”, “this CD is by that cool new worship leader that everyone is talking about”, “other Christians are doing it”. Here’s a final point to consider. How does one gain unsuspected influence on a group of people? The cops do it this way: they go undercover. Is it so inconceivable that perhaps Satan is behind some of these “Christian” merchandise/hype/trends, quietly leading us astray?

We are certainly to be in this world and not of it and, as such, building a Christian culture really is an important unifying force. However, let us not be blind and ignorant of the businesses that create and perpetuate this culture, and let us not be unquestioning of the ideas and concepts they pass on to us as the truth of God.

“If you tell them something often enough; they will begin to believe it.”

Just because it’s popular doesn’t mean it’s Truth.

Who hurts Whom

We cause most of our own suffering.

Think about all the things we complain about, war, disease, natural disasters, personal misfortunes....

Almost all traceable to man. Pollution, personal greed...even technology. Most people have milivolts upon milivolts of electrical energy flowing THROUGH them...radios, cell phones, TV, wifi....from the moment they were conceived. Is it any wonder cancer is so rampant?

There are those who complain that God isn’t being fair; why doesn’t he just stop suffering, he IS God isn’t He? There’s a simple illustration for why it isn't that simple.

Think of a person being robbed in a back-alley, the robber shoots the victim, the victim dies. Now God can of course stop this situation from taking place, but think about what he has to do in order to achieve that. He has to literally remove by force, the robber’s desire to hurt the victim, or at least the robber’s greed for the victim’s belongings. Fact of the matter is, God created us to be companions to Him, not puppets. The robber had the freedom, granted by God to all creation, to make the choice to hurt the victim. It wasn’t God’s choice for the victim to suffer; it was the robber’s choice. God allowed it to happen not because He can’t stop it, but because he created us to be able to choose.

Sometimes we are so quick to blame God for our pain that we completely forget that it was obviously us who caused the problem. Who builds a house in tornado valley and gets surprised when their house is destroyed by a tornado? Who builds a sandcastle on a beach and becomes angry when their castle falls from high tide?

In the same way, what right do we have to blame God for things that are clearly our own fault? If you entered a relationship that you had uneasy feelings about, why do you blame God when you break up? If you didn’t study, why do you blame God for lousy marks?

I know there are situations when questioning, and perhaps genuine doubt, is justified, but my point is clear; take a look at what you just did before you start pointing fingers, especially at God of all beings.

The Infinities

In the world of mathematics there are actually 2 types of infinities: countable and uncountable. Countable infinites are rather self explanatory; a sequence such as 1,2,3,4,5.....and so on is considered a countable infinity. Each object in the sequence is distinct from one another and separated by a finite distance with a unique progession e.g you know that 3 comes after 2.

Uncountable infinities are a little more complicated. An example would be all the decimals numbers possible between 0 and 1. You'd probably start listing numbers like 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, etc, but between 0.2 and 0.3 there's always 0.22 and 0.23, and between those 2 there's always 0.222 and 0.223. Thus in this way it is impossible to "count" the decimal numbers between 0 and 1 because there's an infinite number of infinities between 0 and 1.

A lot of times we think of God as infinite, but what sort of infinity are we thinking of?

Most of the time we tend to think of him as the first "countable" kind. We pray for a certain end result; we expect that one of several plausible/imaginable results will happen; we start praying as if we know that at least one of our solutions would be the proper one. We start thinking about scenarios where we think God can work, and we get all in a knot when we have no idea what's happening because we can't imagine how the current happenings could possibly be part of God's plan, or how this particular progression of events could possibly lead to one of the results that we wanted.

What we ought to be doing, is to start thinking of God as uncountably infinite, to understand that no matter how hard we plan or scheme, God is going to be more. We need to recgonize that although we have no idea what's going on, or even how this is going to benefit us or others at all, that God is more. He is more than we can know, He is more than we can imagine, He is more than what we can dream of even if someone were to explain it to us beforehand.

So the next time you want to scream at God and say "What the heck is going on? This isn't what I, or anyone else, needs." Remind yourself, there is more to what I, or anyone else, can figure out about what's happening. God is unexplainably, unimaginably, uncountably infinite.