Ever watch "Fiddler On The Roof"? There is a great monolog from the beginning of the film:
Main character: A fiddler on the roof. Sounds crazy, no? But here, in our little village you might say every one of us is a fiddler on the roof trying to scratch out a pleasant, simple tune without breaking his neck. It isn't easy. You may ask "WHY do we stay up there if it's so dangerous?" Well, we stay because [it] is our home. And how do we keep our balance? That I can tell you in one word: tradition! Traditions, traditions. Without our traditions our lives would be as shaky as, as... as a fiddler on the roof!
TRADITIONS, TRADITIONS
It's easy for me to relate to that scene. My motto used to be live for the experiences. I want transformative experiences, and I want it now. Rite of passages, the climatic second act, joie de vivre, carpe diem, and so on...
But as I get older I want to be drawn to something constant that I'm willing to go back to time and again. I want rituals with depth, traditions with a meaning behind them that runs richer the longer I go on.
The closest thing to traditions in my life right now is my faith, church, and Sunday school. (Note to self: work on community, ie relationships.)
Last week in smallgroup I learned about asking what do I want? What is it that I desire?
Instead of asking that I should be asking what is His desire for me? I need to learn from the silence and stillness, to hear His small voices.
All I want is not to break my neck.
Years ago, when a friend visited me during Christmas, we would go to the Stanford church to attend the Christmas mass there. It was quite a spectacle, what with all the candlelights, prayers, and chorus music. It was very "holy". At the same time, I didn't know what the big deal was in that quiet hall, where everyone looked very pious and serious.
Shouldn't Christmas be...merry?
A few days ago, my older brother asked me where church meets this Sunday so he could take his kids there. I felt a sense of joy as I detected a sense of envy coming from him. Wow...my brother waming up to my faith...to Christ the Savior!
By the way you may be tagged so be forewarn.
I'll start this with the parable of the mustard seed that Jesus taught specifically about faith. Jesus ever the masterful teacher uses a pretty nice imagery of something like a tiny seed growing into a large tree.
Most of us are familiar with that parable. I've even paraphrased it...as in "i'll plant the seed and watch it grow...and grow...and grow...yeehaw!" I've even used it in filmschool, where we were taught in screenwriting to introduce a plot twist or a new nefarious character subtly. Again planting seed...pretty common metaphor.
Of course in biblical stories a one-two-liners could in fact span over a period of time. In this case a seed takes time to grow. Who knows how long it took for the mustard seed to grow into this tree where even birds can perch on it.
A Question To Be Answered
Q: Is Unstoppable that seed?
A: Unfortunately as the way it was communicated Unstoppable is not that seed. More like asking for a grown tree in terms of the timeline. (For such details read the the Unstoppable brochure. Running the numbers means something like $64000/week of tithing for the next 3 years. (($10mil/52)/3))
Following some highlights of the weekend, I'll blog a bit about the second quarter. (Here's the writeup of the first quarter.)
The highlights of the weekend...
- after driving up and down the 152 East for more than eight years while living in LA, I finally visited Casa de Fruta. It's a conglomerate for Casa de anything. My favorite is sampling the food, although Sands would say it's gross.
- played bocce with Sandy, Jimmy, Lauren. We were ever the gentleman, letting the girls win of course. Altough you wouldn't know that from this version.
- saw fireworks in Cupertino. We brought with us (again with Jimmy and Lauren) blanket and lawn chair. We ended up sitting on the driveway of Citibank, a bright halogen light blasting our face. If I squinted hard enough I could make out the fireworks, which lasted about fifteen minutes.
As a service to these "footballers", what do you say of us performing a "washing of the feet" for these players in the upcoming World Cup in Beijing—Fifa World Cup Feet Washing Service. As Sandy would point out to my niece Lauren, "uncle goofy."
Okay...moving on: as wonderful as New York was, it is good to be back here. I can't imagine ME finding much spirituality with all the rampant materialism in New York. Wide indeed is the gate—a very enticing gate—of New York City.
Not to say that spirituality doesn't exist there. While we were there, Sandy was able to "by chance" hook up with some of her old church friends (5th Home?) from Cali who had decided to move to New York. It's too bad I didn't meet up with them and talk to them, in retrospect, to see how living in NY has work on their perspectives of things.
Some churches in midtown New York are wonderful old type churches that are surrounded by modern business type buildings. It felt out of place, like an afterthought. Of course that was not the case as these newer buildings were build around these churches.
I miss our church here, even if it is mobile.
Finally after a little over a month I got my 2005 Federal tax refund in the mail yesterday. In our modern electronic filing day-and-age, to get a refund back after more than 30 days is...well...the whole process just seems so antiquated. I could have use TurboTax to e-file but Sandy will do her's tonight and will probably file it that way. We share the software and only one e-filer at a time.
Oddly enough today I had to go to my nearest BofA to make a deposit. I don't remember the last time I actually had to do that. Incredible!
Busyness is self glorification masquerading as service rendered to God. (Pastor Dave)
For those considering where they would fit into what ministry that is appropriate for them any advice would be good. That is how do you know which ministry to serve? One where you enjoy or one where you feel you can be effective? Here are the list of my ministries and my thoughts of them. Okay some of these are more volunteer than ministries but...
