The Kingdom, The Kids, & The Cowboys

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Body of Christ: Part Two

September 27, 2018 / / 0 Comments

It’s not just a metaphor. It’s very real. As the Body of Christ, the Church is the physical, tangible, concrete, flesh-and-blood presence of Jesus in this world. Paul says, “I’ve been crucified with Christ and I no longer live; Christ lives in me!” Jesus Christ lives with and in and through his Church. Jesus and the Church are the same. You can’t have Jesus without his body. You can’t know Jesus without recognizing his body. You can’t be in relationship with Jesus and have nothing to do with his body.

That’s the way Jesus sees it. That’s how he talks about it. That’s how he’s always viewed it. Jesus is the Church; the Church is Jesus.

Saul’s on the road to Damascus when Jesus appears and blinds him with his light. “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” Saul’s thinking, “I’m not persecuting you. I’m beating up these lousy Christians who are blaspheming Scripture.” No, in the eyes of Jesus, you mess with the Church, you’re messing with Jesus himself.

It was always this way.

“He who listens to you, listens to me.” (Luke 10:16)
“He who rejects you, rejects me.” (Luke 10:16)
“He who receives you, receives me.” (Matthew 10:40)

Jesus authorizes the Church as his body on earth to do all the things he did.

“Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The Kingdom of God is near!'” (Luke 10:9)

On that last night he tells his gathered followers, “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing.” (John 14:12)

And we do, right? We heal the sick and proclaim the coming of the Kingdom. And we turn the other cheek and go the extra mile, we love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. Why? Jesus says so you can be like me. So you can become sons and daughters of your Father in heaven. So you can reveal me.

When we forgive the ones who sin against us, people see Jesus. When we’d rather be wronged than to fight for our rights, people see Jesus. When we sacrifice and serve, when we consider the needs of others more important than our own, people will meet the Lord Jesus in us.

And the world will treat us just like it treated Jesus. Paul says he carries in his own body the death of Jesus so the life of Jesus may be revealed, so that Jesus’ life may be revealed in our (plural) mortal body (singular).

So, as the Body of Christ, we always side with the oppressed, never the oppressors. We always stand with the minorities, we always take care of the refugees, we always look out for the weak. We never discriminate, never judge, and never use force. We always give, always forgive, and always show love.

Jesus is the Church and the Church is Jesus. We must do the things Jesus did in the ways Jesus did them. If anybody’s going to meet Jesus in this world, they’re going to meet him through the Church, the Body of Christ.

Peace,

Allan

Body of Christ: First Part

September 26, 2018 / / 0 Comments

In the beginning, in the dark and the chaos, God spoke powerful words and created the heavens and the earth. From the top of a smoking and shaking mountain in the desert, God spoke powerful words and raised up a holy nation. Through his mighty prophets in Israel and Judah, our God spoke powerful words of forgiveness and mercy, commitment and comfort, truth and grace. But God’s words were not enough. Words are never enough. So God’s Word became flesh. God’s Word became a body.

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” ~John 1:14

The holy Son of God has a body. We know Jesus has a body — a real, physical body. Jesus ate and drank, he wept and slept, walked and talked, worked and played. He bled real blood. He suffered excruciating pain. And he died an agonizing death. He was dead. His body was killed.

And when God’s Holy Spirit raised Jesus from the grave, he raised him to life in a resurrection body — a real, physical body. Our risen Lord in his real, resurrection body was recognized by everyone who knew him. He ate and drank with his followers whether he was invited to or not. He walked and talked with them, taught them, and argued with them. It was Jesus’ real, physical, flesh-and-blood, resurrection body that proved he was really risen. It was remarkable.

Now, here’s something even more remarkable: our ascended Lord who is reigning right now and forever at the right hand of the Father in heaven continues to have a body here on this earth. Jesus still insists on being flesh-and-blood present in this world. He keeps showing up as a recognizable personality. But now he in an even stranger bodily form than his resurrected post-Easter body.

It’s the Church. It’s us. We are the Body of Christ.

Through us, together, by his Church, our Lord Jesus wraps his real, tangible, physical, concrete, flesh-and-blood presence around the whole world. Today the Body of Christ lives and breathes and moves and acts in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth, even to the panhandle of Texas! That’s us. The Church.

And some well-meaning people say Jesus never intended to establish the Church. They say Jesus was a holy man, they even say he was the Son of God and the Savior of the World. But he never wanted to start a church. Baloney! That was the plan all along, from the very beginning of the story of Jesus. Jesus started the Church when he called together that first group, that body of twelve disciples. The Jesus movement was always a corporate, social movement; it was never just a collection of religious individuals. The Church was always meant to be the Body of Jesus.

“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.” ~1 Corinthians 12:12

The Bible is not saying that the Church has lots of different members and we’re all supposed to work together. It says Christ has different parts of his body and we’re it! We are his body, not because we all agree with each other about everything, not even because we all like one another. We are his body because we have one Lord and that one Lord is totally committed to always being physically present and flesh-and-blood active in his world.

We are the mouth and eyes and ears and hands and feet of Jesus. We are his body on earth. And if anybody’s going to meet Jesus in this world, they’re going to meet him through the Church, the Body of Christ.

Peace,

Allan

For Charlie Waters

September 25, 2018 / / 0 Comments

I received an email last week that began “Dear Allan, my name is Stephen Spacek, I am the nephew of actor Sissy Spacek and live in Austin, Texas.” That’s a weird email, yes? Completely out of left field. I half expected the next line to mention that Stephen had been abducted in Columbia or Ghana and if I would send him $100 he would be released and then send me $10,000. Something like that. But, no, Stephen is asking me to sign and circulate a change.org petition to Jerry Wayne asking the Cowboys owner to induct Charlie Waters into the Dallas Cowboys Ring of Honor.

Here’s a link to the petition:

This page is to circulate a petition for Cowboys fans to sign to induct LEGEND CHARLIE WATERS. PLEASE SHARE WITH ALL…

Posted by Dallas Cowboys Legend, Charlie Waters #41- Ring of Honor Petition Page on Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Mr. Spacek is a longtime friend of Charlie’s and found a few things I’ve written about Charlie on my blog — that dude’s doing some deep diving on Google! I’ve signed the petition this morning. Jerry doesn’t deserve the respectful request that this petition represents, but if it’s for Charlie Waters, I’m all for it.

Charlie played safety for the Cowboys from 1970-1981, missing only the 1979 season, Roger Staubach’s last year, with a knee injury. It was during Staubach’s last regular season game, with Waters doing the radio analysis with Brad Sham, when the Cowboys made up TWO 17-point deficits to beat the Redskins 35-34 on a last second pass to Tony Hill, that Charlie kept saying over and over, “Ya gotta believe!”

During his eleven-year career, Waters and the Cowboys played in nine NFC Championship Games and five Super Bowls. His 50 career interceptions rank second all-time for Dallas, his 584 return yards are second most in Cowboys history, and his nine playoff picks are still an NFL record.

His running mate, strong safety Cliff Harris, was inducted into the Ring of Honor back in 2004. Why they were not inducted together, I’ll never know. The two are inseparable. Charlie played two more years than Cliff, providing veteran leadership and leading the transition to that next generation of Cowboys DBs — “Charlie’s Angels” — Everson Walls and Michael Downs and Dennis Thurman. Putting Charlie in now would right a horrible injustice.

Putting Charlie in now might also be a great way to kick start some kind of revolt or revolution. A Ring of Honor ceremony recognizing and celebrating an accomplished team-player like Charlie and the legacy of an organization that for 35-years dominated the win column and won the hearts of fans around the globe might embarrass Jerry Wayne enough to sell the team to somebody who might have a clue about running an NFL football club. Jerry is presiding over the longest drought — by far! — of divisional playoff wins and Super Bowl appearances in Cowboys history. And I’ve seen nothing since 1996 that makes me think it’s going to end. A ceremony recognizing the rightful place of Charlie Waters in Cowboys history seems to be the very least of what Jerry could do for Cowboys fans. History is all we’ve got. Let us remember together. It might momentarily relieve the taste of bile from the backs of our collective throats.

Darren Woodson is in the Ring of Honor. Charlie Waters meant every bit as much to those teams of the ’70s as Woodson did to Jimmy Johnson’s dynasty teams of the early ’90s. Charles Haley is in the Ring of Honor which, to me, is highly questionable. There are 21 Cowboys in the Ring of Honor, seven of whom won Super Bowls as teammates of Waters’. And I know you can’t put every Cowboy from the ’70s in the Ring, but I’ll never understand why Cliff Harris is in and Charlie is out.

So, please, click the link above and sign the petition. If you’re so inclined, you might also share it on Facebook or Instagram or email.

Either way, let’s all remember Charlie Waters together today: a hard-nosed, team-first, community-minded, play-making winner who represents what we all use to love about this terrible team.

Peace,

Allan

Dak Prescott in Bad Company

September 24, 2018 / / 0 Comments

What do Dak Prescott and Quincy Carter have in common? Well, going back to the end of last season, Dak has thrown for under 200 yards passing in each of the past five Cowboys games. The last time a Cowboys quarterback threw for fewer than 200 yards in five straight games was in 2003. That quarterback was Quincy Carter.

Oh, my.

Not only has Dak not broken the 200 yard mark in five consecutive games, he hasn’t done it in nine of the past eleven games.

Oh, no.

It’s not unfair to wonder if this Dallas offense is the worst in the league. Through three games the Cowboys are averaging 13.6 points and only 277 total yards of offense. Dak is averaging 145 yards passing per game, they’re converting less than 24-percent of their third downs, they’ve scored a total of just four touchdowns in those three games, and they’ve given up eleven sacks.

The Giants game was a fluke, not the opener in Carolina or last night’s sluggish loss in Seattle.

The offensive line is missing a piece or two and is nowhere near the “best line in the NFL” from a couple of seasons ago. Jason Witten is gone and Rico can’t even get on the field. You’re not going to win many games if Cole Beasley is your number one receiver. And if the running game’s not going, the passing game will never get out of the driveway. Scott Linehan has proven to be less than creative as an offensive coordinator and Jason Garrett’s never been known for making in-game adjustments. But the glaring thing, to me, is Dak Prescott. He’s not as good as we thought he was two seasons ago.

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A highlight of the annual ACU Summit for me is taking the Central students out for Sharkey’s burritos. Greg Dowell and I were blessed to share lunch last Monday with Chelsea, Josh, Kathryn, and Brooke. We talked together about their favorite teachers, their hot dates, and their parking stickers. We marveled at Chelsea’s double-major class load, Brooke’s landlording responsibilities, Kathryn’s enterprising creativity, and Josh’s unfortunate lime incident. And we shamelessly compared the Abilene Sharkey’s unfavorably to the Amarillo Sharkey’s. I’m so grateful that all it takes is a cheap lunch to get these kids to hang out with us for an hour.

We drove to OKC this past weekend to see Carley for the first time since she started classes at OC five weeks ago. She was performing in the school’s Freshmen Fanfare, something OC does, I think, to appease the freshmen who have to wait until they’re sophomores to pledge a club. As expected, Carley was super-animated, over-the-top with her Spring Sing face and her tasteful choreography. We didn’t see much of Valerie — she was training and working double weekend shifts at her new job, Ted’s Cafe Escondido! (Our whole family is so proud! Ted’s! A colossal achievement!) But we got to chill with the Bear, check in with her roommate, and meet some of her new friends. We also learned that Randy Roper’s kid can sing. Who knew?

Peace,

Allan

The Mess

September 7, 2018 / / 0 Comments

“The story is not so much about how to simply clean up the mess, but how creative you can get with the mess you have. This is what God seems to be up to — creating good, mysterious things out of messes.” ~Curt Thompson, Anatomy of the Soul

If You Had a Twitter…

September 6, 2018 / / 0 Comments

My daughter, Carley, emails me every now and then with “If you had a Twitter…” in the subject line and a really funny meme or otherwise internet hilarity attached. I cannot resist sharing with you what she sent me today. If you have a Twitter, maybe you’ve already seen this. If not…

GUNS ‘N’ ROSES HAVE SURE MELLOWED OUT IN THEIR OLD AGE

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