Maybe I need to adjust the lens

I am no photographer. I enjoy taking pictures, absolutely. But I don't have the skills of knowing how to compose a shot or check the light levels. Sometimes I consider taking a class or reading a book but the notion usually passes, and I go back the simple pictures and selfies I normally take.

I recently went on a 4,000-mile roadtrip across the country. I started at Lake Erie, drove south to Kentucky, across the plains to Denver, and through the mountains and desert of Colorado, Utah and Nevada. It was a fantastic trip and much of the entertainment was simply enjoying the incredible landscapes of this immense country.

I took a lot of pictures. Digital photography is great because you can take a lot of terrible pictures and know immediately whether you need to try something else or just give up. I played around with different ideas and got to know my camera better just from trial and error. One thing I was struck by was how much my life felt like I was viewing it through a camera lens lately.

When I am in a very busy season or focused on one project, it is much like taking a close-up picture of an object like a flower or a fancy door handle or something like that. You spend a lot of time trying to get it framed just right and focused so the details stand out. But it can be very easy for me to stay in a "close-up" mode and miss what is happening around me.

It took an epic road trip across 10 states for me to "zoom out" a bit and get some perspective on life. There are so many people living lives that are so unlike mine in places that are so different from my everyday experience and I just plain forgot because I was so wrapped up in my own life. I needed to adjust the lens at which I was viewing life.

So the question is...do I need to do this more often? Focus and details are great and have their place, for sure, but I feel convicted to build some more time into my schedule to "zoom out." There is so much to see, and even though I realize how small a part of the picture I am, I still feel like I am more in focus because of it.

Can we become dependent on serving?

Recently I haven't been very consistent in going to church on Sunday. Part of the reason is my busy schedule with lots of weekend soccer tournaments, but for some reason, church hasn't been very enjoyable. I've had a hard time pinpointing why I don't enjoy attending a Sunday service.

Image from Flickr-Brian Jeffery Beggerly

For a while, I surmised this was because I don't really know that many people at my church and making connections in Ohio has been a slow process since I moved here. The relationships that connect people to the whole of the church are important for a sense of belonging. The more I think about it, the more this excuse seems irrelevant. I have been going to the same church for 2 years now and know enough people to feel I belong to the community. Then, I thought, maybe I am just not connecting with the messages and my faith isn't growing. Again, it didn't take much reflection to see that my faith has taken some giant steps forward recently and the messages I hear are relevant and convicting.

Image from RightNowMedia.org

So, what is it? Why do I hesitate to spend an hour of my Sunday at church? I am reading Matt Chandler's "To Live is Christ and to Die is Gain." Chandler talks about church as being the "lamest hobby ever," and the danger in compartmentalizing our faith to a certain location or time or setting. I think I've fallen into this trap but I am actually doing the opposite of what Chandler is talking about.

I have compartmentalized my faith walk into my quiet times during the week and my job in ministry and as a result, Sunday has become a day for my hobbies, including attending church. Perhaps I am so dependent on 'serving' through years of church leadership that now I have a difficult time 'just' singing and listening to a sermon. I guess it feels too passive and I feel I'm treating Sunday services as lectures to gather information. I never thought I would disassociate church and my faith, but that is exactly what I have been doing lately. Jesus wants us to live out our faith daily, including when we are at church. What a crazy notion! In my effort to live out my faith in other areas of my life, I forgot to take the time to praise and worship God with the church community to which I belong and make it about Him and not about the Sunday routine or the camaraderie of fellow believers. The great thing is, the more I get it wrong, the sweeter it is when I really rest and receive God's grace and forgiveness.