CWE Pre Camp Devos-#3 The Social Network

Proverbs 3:5a

“Trust IN THE LORD…”

“THE SOCIAL NETWORK”

Yeah, I saw the movie…pretty good flick, “The Social Network.”  I personally didn’t like it near as much as “The King’s Speech” (neither did the Oscar voters by the way), but nonetheless I watched it and enjoyed it.  Many of you know (since you are my “friends”) that I am in fact a “social networker.”  I do, in fact, have a Facebook page.  Now I am almost certainly not near as active as most of you on Facebook.  I don’t post many photos, and I don’t change my status a whole lot, and I sure don’t make it a habit of writing on other people’s walls.  Nonetheless, I am there.  Me and my over 1,000 Facebook friends and about a billion other Facebook members are there…amazing, simply amazing.  Social Networking has become the primary means of communication for an entire generation of the world’s population, even threatening to make a dinosaur of email.  At camp, we even “broadcast” the Ultimate Solution (don’t worry you will learn the importance of the Ultimate Solution if you don’t know it already) by updating our Facebook status as every event unfolds.  And so it was that I was extremely interested in this story of the birth of Facebook which gave legs to this revolution called “social networking,” and it truly is an amazing story. 

A young Harvard “geek,” Mark Zuckerburg, is dumped by his girlfriend and, feeling rejected, he immediately wants revenge so he creates “ facemash.”  Through this new website, students can go online and rate their preference for the face of one co-ed over another using an algorithm supplied to him by his close friend.  Meanwhile, two twins, members of the Harvard Rowing Team, are working on their own version of social connectivity and Mark Zuckerburg has been contracted to help them develop their site.  As the movie unfolds, Zuckerburg creates Facebook with the help of his friend, and is ultimately sued by the twins and his friend.  This results in broken relationships, lots of money changing hands, and all of the parties winding up very rich but very conflicted and feeling very unsatisfied. 

In the end, to me, it was an extremely sad story.  In the end, to me, it was a true story of the human condition.  In the end, to me, it was a microcosm of the difficulties, challenges and choices that each of us who proclaim to be Christians (yes, I know none of the characters in the movie were likely Christians), must deal with on a regular basis: the challenge of ego, of pride, of power, of money, of fame, of status, of rejection, and the challenge of finding your identity, your personal “facebook,” in something other than Christ.  The fact of the matter, young people, is this: all of us have to make one simple choice.  Who or what is your Lord?  

Yesterday, we talked about the requirement of Christians to trust, to have and act in faith, to rely on, to depend on…something.  And believe it or not, there are only two possible answers to that question.  You can choose to trust in God through the redeeming grace of His Son, Jesus Christ…or not.  That’s it. Period.  End of choice.  Either Jesus is Lord or something else is lord of your life.  Most of us latch on and hold tight to the claim that Jesus is our Savior…and He is.  However, equally important is the question, is Jesus your Lord?  Make no mistake about it, the lord of your life is not necessarily who or what you say it is.  The lord of your life is wherever you find your identity.  Everyone gets their identity, their sense of being distinct and valuable from someone or something.  We as human beings were created not only to believe in God, to claim Him as our Savior, but to love Him supremely, center our lives on Him above anything else, and build our identity in Him. 

 The very first of the Ten Commandments tells us that we are to have “no other Gods before Him.”  To do otherwise is to sin.  Therefore, the primary definition of sin is not just doing bad things, but making good things (family, relationships, career, power, money) into ultimate things.  It is seeking to establish a sense of self by making something else more central to your significance, purpose, and identity than God, in other words making something else your Lord.  Most of us are willing to give Jesus a part of our identity, but hold back on giving him our complete self.  Why?  Because we are asking Jesus to be our Savior but refusing to make Him our Lord.  We have our own ambitions, we have our own priorities, we have our own passions, and we have our own dreams.  We have things that are ultimately more important to us than God.  We can’t allow Jesus to preclude those things because you see, young people, Christianity is the only religion that requires us to completely give up who we want to be and become a new creation, a new self, based on who God wants us to be.  Don’t kid yourself.  That is not an easy decision to make; however, let me speak to you from 62 years of experience.  Everything else you depend on to provide joy and peace and meaning in your life, and I mean everything else, will ultimately fail you.  I don’t care what it is.  Family, Friends, Money, Social Status, Career, Physical Beauty, Power, Fame…none of them are sufficient to provide you the peace and joy that only come when Jesus is Lord.  All of those other things crowd Jesus out for one reason and one reason only.  You trust them more than you trust Christ.  You believe in yourself more than you believe in Him, you care about things more than you care about becoming a new self in Him.  You think that your desires, your thoughts, your rights, your ways will ultimately lead to more happiness than the unknown, uncontrollable, surprising, scary ways of a God who loves you ultimately more than you could ever begin to love yourself.

This summer you can survive by trusting in yourself.  No doubt.  You can have a blast by trusting in yourself.  Absolutely.  You can make friends with kids and staff by trusting in yourself and go home at the end of your time feeling pretty good, or…you can make Jesus your Lord not just your Savior and you can begin an adventure, an experience that is so unlike anything you could ever create for yourself, you won’t know what hit you.  When Jesus is your Lord, life is not always easy, but it is always joyful.  When Jesus is your Lord, life is not always comfortable, but it is always meaningful.  When Jesus is your Lord, life is not always simple, but it is always characterized by peace, security, and a renewed sense of self because you are a new creation, the creation of the Lord of your life, Jesus Christ.  It is not easy, but it is essential.  Think about it, will you?  And, oh, by the way, check me out on Facebook.  Who knows, you might even want to be my friend.  I am, after all, a “social networker.”

CWE Pre Camp Devo #2--THE SWIMMER

Proverbs 3:5a

“Trust…”

“THE SWIMMER”

She is cute…very, very cute.  She has long legs, a long waist, an impish smile, and big beautiful eyes.  She is also very, very, stubborn.  If she wants do something, rest assured she is pretty much going to do it.  If she doesn’t want to do something, well you can rest assured that, in all likelihood, there is not a chance you are going to get her to do it.  She is 3 years old. 

“She” is my granddaughter, Anna Scott Torn, number 8 of 9 grandchildren to whom Susan and I are fortunate to lay claim to.  It is during this time of year that Susan and I get to see quite a lot of our grandkids, all of whom live within 10 minutes of our winter home in Houston, Texas.  It would be nice for me to say that the reason we get to see a lot of our grandkids during this time of year is because they just can’t wait to see “Belba” and “Pops,” the two greatest grandparents in the history of the universe (o.k., maybe I am a little biasedJ), but in actuality, when you get right down to it, what they really like is… our swimming pool.  It’s a great backyard pool for kids, not too deep, a waterfall with rocks for kids to jump off of, a hot tub, and even a beach entry that starts at a depth of zero and gradually increases to a couple of feet before stepping off into a little deeper water.  On any given afternoon you just might find up to all 9 of them having a ball in our pool.  Well up until recently maybe not all 9…more like 8 of the 9.  Anna Scott, it seems, just wasn’t real fond of the water.  Oh she would splash around in the beach entry, usually with both her “floaties” and a life-jacket on.  Sometimes she would even venture in the hot tub so long as Belba or Pops or one of her parents was holding her tight.  But, swim in the “big pool?”  Don’t even think about it.  Not a chance. 

And so it was, on a recent Sunday afternoon, after succumbing to the fatigue that comes from an old man tossing grandkids as high as I could toss them in the water over, and over, I came face to face with Anna Scott, sitting calmly on the side of the pool, life jacket on, with absolutely no thought whatsoever of actually getting in the water.  “Time for a change,” I thought to myself, but what I actually said was “Cottie” (that’s what we call her), “let Pops hold you.”  At first, she wasn’t really sure what to make of that but, after a moment of contemplation, perhaps wondering if she should really “trust” me, she somewhat reluctantly put her arms out and let me pick her up off the side of the pool.  She was fine with that…so long as I didn’t let her actually touch the water, but then slowly, ever so slowly, we began to move away from the side of the pool and get lower, and lower, into the water until after just a couple of minutes, we were smack dab in the middle of the pool and Cottie was immersed as far as her life jacket would let her go.  Now what I would like to tell you is that Cottie had absolutely no problem with this little maneuver, that she knew she was in the arms of her grandfather who loved her dearly and that because of that, any direction he chose to take her would be just fine.  Yeah, sure I’d like to tell you that, but in actuality every time we moved an inch further away from the side of the pool and every time we moved an inch deeper into the water she protested.  Now by protested I don’t mean she reasoned with me and I don’t mean she simply asked me to return to the side of the pool.  What I mean is that she squawked…loud and consistently…for several minutes.  I mean the tears flowed.  She was, after all, moving into the unknown, she was moving into an experience with which she was unfamiliar and she was, to be frank, scared.  She cried, she kicked, she screamed and it was breaking my heart, but we didn’t stop.  We stayed right there in the middle of the pool until, after about 10 minutes, she finally realized she wasn’t going to sink, she wasn’t going to be left alone and she was, in fact, going to be just fine.  Then a strange thing happened.  She started to smile.  Then she started to laugh.  Then she started to splash.  She was experiencing something she had never before experienced, something she had watched 7 of her 8 cousins (Charles Henry is only 10 months) experience time and time again while she sat on the side and watched…she was swimming and she was loving it.

 The most difficult part of the Christian journey is very much akin to the experience of Anna Scott that Sunday afternoon….TRUSTING.  To trust means to rely on, to depend on, and to give up control.  When you get right down to it, none of us particularly like doing that.  It is against our selfish nature, but in order to experience the fullness of God through His grace, that is exactly what we are asked to do in the very first word of this amazing scripture from Proverbs.  Now, a lot of us give lip service to this concept of trust…we say we trust, we act like we trust, we even condemn others for not trusting.  But deep down inside our souls can we actually say we really trust God?  Do we trust Him enough to give up control over our own destiny?  Do we trust Him enough not to stagger and quit when things are not going exactly like we want them to go?  Do we trust Him enough to endure and experience difficulty knowing that in His loving arms, He will not let us sink?  This summer your trust is going to be put to the test.  First, you are going to be asked to trust us and our leadership.  You are going to be asked to trust our knowledge, our experience, our methods, our motives, our passion, and our commitment to working with children.  Some of the ways we do things may seem strange to you.  Quite frankly, some of it you may not even agree with.  Nonetheless, we are going to ask you to trust us.  We are going to ask you to rely on, to depend on…us.  Much more importantly, some of you will experience difficult days…even difficult weeks…even difficult sessions.  Your patience will be challenged, your physical endurance will be challenged, and your emotional well-being will be drained.  In those circumstances, just like in all of the trying times of life, God is going to ask you to trust.  The key is…will you do it, or will you just give it lip service?  Are you fine so long as you are just sitting on the side of the pool or are you willing (even if it is kicking and screaming) to be carried into the unknown by a loving and trustworthy heavenly father?  This summer you will learn a lot about yourself.  More importantly you will learn a lot about the dependability of God…that is, if you are willing to simply TRUST.

 The sun was setting on that spring Sunday afternoon.  All of the other grandkids had climbed out of the pool and were busy eating, playing, or resting.   But there, in the center of the pool, were “Cottie” and Pops.  Cottie no longer needed Pops to hold her.  He would back up and she would swim toward him until she reached one end of the pool, then they would turn around and do the same thing to the other end of the pool.  Every time Pops would start to climb out of the pool, Cottie would look at me with those big dark eyes and in a very quiet voice say, “Pops, will you swim with me,” and back we would go, again and again and again. She was experiencing something she had never before experienced and she was absolutely loving it.  Why?  All because she truly decided to trust. Think about it!