“Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you in turmoil within me?” Psalm 42:11a

As October passes and November quickly approaches, the weather cools and leaves change colors. There aren’t as many leaves here in the city as other parts of the country, but you still feel the effects of the changing seasons. Things here are no different. We get a hundred new pumpkin flavored items to distribute, some of which are Pumpkin tea, pumpkin coffee, pumpkin spice cake(!!!), pumpkin pancake mix, pumpkin pie, pumpkin tarts, and of course, pumpkins. The change of seasons also means a change of wardrobe. The shorts are packed away and jeans become the work clothes. Jackets, hoodies, sweatshirts, and knit caps all make their way out of the trunk and into the rotation of daily clothes.

With the changing seasons also comes the reminder of the changing rhythms of life. I find myself in one of these cycles lately that is a bit of a time of discouragement. No doubt you have experienced these times as well. You find yourself offending people more frequently, and needing to go to them to make things right. You find yourself being misunderstood, and your motives and actions being misjudged. When you find out about the 4^th person you’ve offended in the last 3 days, it can be a bit overwhelming. But why is it so difficult to face the reality that you’ve needlessly offended people from all over the spectrum of life? Perhaps it is because it’s the attention grabbing shock that jolts you back to reality and out of the narcissistic dream world that is so much more fun to live in.

My brother likes to point out my special ability to make people upset with me. In his words, “You’ve managed to make everyone who’s ever known you really mad at you at some point.” I confess; this is true. If you live in close proximity to me for enough time, it’s going to happen. If you’ve been around me and you can honestly say that I’ve never made you very upset with me, just give it some time. It will come. I’m not really sure why that is, but I’ve found myself to be a lightning rod for as long as I can remember. I think there are many factors, but one primary factor is a fundamental view on human relationships, which is that I believe you can only be as close to someone as you are willing to be open and honest with them. When I was in school I was advised to be careful about how straightforward and open I am with people. I’ve tried to keep this in mind as I interact with others. The new term for this would be “contextualization.” The Apostle Paul did this. Jesus did this. Everybody who knows anything does this. When the Apostle Paul gave his testimony three different times in the book of Acts he told it in different ways depending on who he was speaking to. It was always the truth that he spoke, but he knew his audience and let that knowledge shape the message he delivered. Jesus did this in the Sermon on the Mount. He kept his audience in mind as he spoke by using illustrations that they would understand. He gave examples of the birds, lilies, salt, light, trees, fruit, storms, and natural disasters. Having a deep understanding of your audience is vital to clear communication, and this kind of communication is important to keep from needlessly offending people.

I love the ending of the verse that I quoted at the top of this post:

Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my salvation and my God.

While 1 Peter teaches us not to get ourselves into trouble by our own wrong-doing, Our ultimate peace comes from remembering God and our position before Him. We really have very little control over the responses of others to things that we do and say, so it’s important to remember to hope in God rather than man. If our identity is found in our approval from others, we can easily become trapped and controlled by the tides of their emotions. Thinking about all of the things that people could say is enough to fill a person with crippling fear.

"Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God."

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This last Saturday we had 126 people in our outreach service, and our Sunday church service was up in the neighborhood of 50 and I knew of regular attenders who weren’t able to make it. We’re anticipating a big group at tomorrow’s service given the nice weather forecast and the normal ebb and flow from week to week.

I intend to preach from 1 Peter 4, but I’m not certain yet if I’m going to continue with 4:12-19 or if I should go back and do a second message on the local church. Last Tuesday’s message had a more noticeable response than normal with between five and ten people approaching us afterwards and inquiring about ways to get involved. There were a number of additional things that I wanted to clarify about Spiritual Gifts and the Ecclesiology in general, but this is a series on First Peter, not 9Marks.

I’ve also enjoyed hearing the congregational singing improve from week to week. We use an approach to music that was somewhat unique to my experience prior to arriving here. For a variety of reasons we don’t have a traditional “song leader” who stands up in front and waves his arm, and for other reasons we use a projector and screen for the words to the hymns. For these reasons, music comes with a different set of challenges than in a hymnal/song leader setting, but we are employing a “hymn of the month” approach to help the people learn the different songs that we want them to know. It also gives us a chance to learn to play the song well. We are all instrumentalists out of necessity rather than by nature. There’s nothing quite like hearing people enthusiastically singing great hymns that rejoice in the work of Christ on their behalf.