What is attractive?

Is it important for a husband to be "attracted" to his wife?  And for a wife to be attracted to her husband?   I say definitely YES!  But what's attractive?   I counsel single college students and married people alike to allow God's word, and the truth of the gospel to inform their "attraction."  Now certainly, at some level, beauty is something we respond to intuitively.  It's not something we can totally figure out like a math equation.  For sure.  But I do believe it is possible and critical to let the scriptures shape our thinking rightly in this area.

One huge truth that I think men and women really need to take hold of is the glaring fact that God made people.  Yes! (Genesis 1:27) And people -by his design are tall and short, skinny and fat, dark and light in tone.  The creation testifies loudly through and through that God loves diversity!  A lot.  He created it!  And among humans there are all different eye colors, nose shapes, leg lengths, hip widths, foot sizes, and everything else.  Cosmo, Maxim and the P90X infomercial proclaim that there are only certain body sizes and shapes that are beautiful, but apparently God disagrees!  He is the one who made you fearfully, wonderfully!  He knit you together in your mothers womb, so if you are short and pale -it's because that's how he wants you to be!   You're "big boned" are you?  God made you that way -truly your "frame" was not hidden from him.  You can feel bad about that -but only if you regard Jillian Michaels' opinion over God's and only if you crave the world's fickle approval over Jesus'.  

In heaven, we'll have glorified bodies.  That's clear enough in the scriptures.  But I can find no indication that all of our bodies will look the same!  I sincerely believe that when we get to heaven -and when we have new and perfected bodies, I'll still be skinny, my wife will still be short and Tim Tebow will still be a brick house!  Will  Edgar still be Asian?  I believe so...


Go ahead and work out!  Be healthy, move around, jog a little!  But seriously, start hating sin, and quit worrying about that butt God made you!

In 1 Peter 3:1-7, Peter informs the women that their "beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight."  He commends to them the "Holy Women of the Past" who were truly beautiful because they had Hope in God, contentment of spirit, Godly submissiveness and true fearlessness.  I pray that I can raise my daughter(s) to exemplify such character!  

At our meeting on Friday night, I asked the ladies to strive after that kind of beauty, and I challenged to guys to evaluate whether their standards of beauty have been informed more by the Bible or by pornography?  

Have your standards of beauty been shaped more by what God regards as beautiful or what contemporary porn affirms as beautiful?  

Should a guy be attracted to his wife and regard her as beautiful?  YES.  But where does he get his standard of beauty from? 
Gospel Coalition blog contributor Barry Cooper writes: 
"The pornography epidemic, raises (or rather, lowers) the bar on what we expect of a prospective spouse because of its unremitting insistence on physical performance and cosmetic beauty, over and against mental and moral qualities...[Christian men] may pray unctuously for the Lord to provide a wife of noble character (Proverbs 31:10-31), but [their] hearts are being continually conditioned to lust after the wife of maximal hotness. "Charm is deceitful," God protests, "and beauty is vain!" But we dismiss him like one of those impertinent pop-ups that gets in the way of what we really want to see.
How different would the world be if dudes were spending as much time in their Bibles as on the computer?


Christ-ones are called to be different in every way!   Reflecting on the way that the  Gospel changes everything, Tim Keller pointed out:
In the world, "Women tend to be attracted to men with good incomes, and men tend to be attracted to women with 'good looks.'  Is the Christian community behaving in exactly the same way?  Or have we been transformed by the gospel."

Is the word of God re-calibrating every area of our lives?  Including what we regard as attractive and fundamentally beautiful?   Or are Christian men and women just letting the magazine rack define things for us? 

Dating Insights?

This Friday at our Large Group meeting on Campus, I will be talking about God's designs in Marriage, sex and the modern mode of pairing off commonly known as dating....

Barrett Keene is one of our good friends and so is Bethany Nichols. They are currently dating.   Barrett is still a PhD student, and Bethany graduated last spring and is currently working with Teach For America in NYC.

This past weekend, we were hanging out at our house and since the topic was relevant, we turned on the iphone and captured some relationship "insights" from the Betts Brothers.  Ruby chimes in with some girly perspective at the end.

Love is Triumphant

No disrespect to any parents who sent their kids to school today with Avengers, Dora, or Batman "Flashy foil" valentines day cards, but the Betts family has always been more into the homegrown, construction paper ones.    And, while I'm not sure what I even think of this over-marketed, fairy tale exalting American holiday, I do know this:

Love is Triumphant! 

And, that's really what we were going for when we made these heart's with flaming wings valentines cards for Jack to take to his 2nd grade classmates.

We didn't really write anything on them.  We thought of a few phrases, but while cutesie quotes may have their place on heart-shaped candies, balloons and teddy-bear t-shirts, we wanted to communicate something more meaningful...more real....more true!  So we stuck a glow stick on the front -because everyone wants a glow stick!  And we hoped the colors, the artistry and the FLAMING WINGS!!! would be adequately provocative.  

And, if given the chance, maybe Jack can explain that  there is One who lights hearts on fire and his name is Jesus Christ!  He takes cold, hard hearts of stone and powerfully brings new life!   Because he so loved the world -and not because we loved him first -he conquered sin, sacrificed his very life to bring us back to God.  He rose and he's alive.  He is Triumphant! 

Invention of the "Double Loco"

It's no secret that we really love Taco Bell.  It's our favorite restaurant....it's a part of our life.

5 years ago we moved to Ithaca.  We were tired and weary from an arduous winter road trip across the country.  We were actually not certain that Ithaca had a Taco Bell location -though in fact we had prayed that it did!  Driving thru the city on our first night, we decided to grab dinner at the Bell.  I still clearly remember Jack saying "Jesus loves us huh dad!?" when we saw the sign!

A few months back, we filmed our 'creation' of the "double loco."

Radical Summary

"We need HIM!"
"We come to Jesus to get Jesus!"  

A few months back, I talked about David Platt's book Radical.  It's a worthy read -but you can get the gyst of it all by watching this 30 minute message.


Platt spoke at the Urbana mission's conference in December. 

Provoking and inciteful, Platt asks: "Have we twisted Jesus into a God we are more comfortable with?  A Jesus who is o.k. with nominal devotion?  Are we molding Jesus into our image?"

1.  Jesus is worthy of all our trust. 
Speaking of some worshipers gathered overseas, Platt proclaims "Jesus is enough for them!  Is he enough for us?"  

"What happens when followers of Christ begin to say that 'he is enough for us'?

2.  Jesus is worthy of all our plans and dreams.  
"when you follow him you have an obligation, a responsibility, a plan, a dream, an ambition that supercedes every other obligation, responsibility, plan, dream, or ambition in this world...go and proclaim the kingdom of God."

Speaking mostly to students Platt reminded them that the reason you are going to be a teacher, engineer, doctor isn't so you can make it big and be rich, but so that you can proclaim the kingdom of God and declare the glory of God to the ends of the earth!!

"What happens when every single student in this room makes it their primary ambition, their primary plan and dream the proclamation of the gospel to the nations?  What plan or dream can you give your life to that is more worthy?"

3. Jesus is infinitely worthy of all our affections.  

"Does Jesus have your heart?
Is he the center of your affections?"

"We preach the gospel on college campuses because Jesus is worthy of the worship of every single college student on this continent!"

"This is why we go to the toughest places on earth."

Olympic Challenge

I posted this classic video clip back in 2010, but in light of the Olympics, I thought it would be a good one to re-post.  Francis Chan knows how to illustrate things in creative, compelling and challenging ways.  I love this guy!

The Lord has Need of This

[I originally wrote this post for our crucornell.com site.]

Imagine you looked outside one morning and saw two 18 year old guys opening the door of your car and getting in.  One of em’ looks a little nervous for sure, but the other one carries himself like he owns the thing!  Maybe your first thought is; “why didn’t I lock the door!?”  But as you run outside filled with panic and  rage to yell out “Hey!  What the heck do you think you are doing?”   the nervous guy looks you square in the eye and says “The Lord has need of this.”  Then he gets inside with the other guy and they drive off, waving, with a sincere look on their face that says: 

“Don’t worry man.  This is going to be awesome!”

   [29] When he drew near to Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount that is called Olivet, he sent two of the disciples, [30] saying, “Go into the village in front of you, where on entering you will find a colt tied, on which no one has ever yet sat. Untie it and bring it here.  [31] If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ you shall say this: ‘The Lord has need of it.’ (Luke 19:29-31)

What would be going thru your mind!?  And what was going thru the disciples mind as they walked  toward Bethany to untie  some guys prize donkey.  I say “prize” not because I think it was  a county fair  blue ribbon winner but because in a first century agrarian community a donkey would have been  one valuable tool!  It was your tractor, your truck and your personal transportation.  I imagine the disciples proceeding with faith along with their usual bewilderment, no doubt hoping to get that donkey and get out of town without anybody asking questions.  “Just tell them  the Lord has need of this?  He had said.  Would that work?

   

I think of this passage every year at the end of September when  our ministry is getting ready to go to  the Upstate Fall getaway.  I also think about it on the second Friday night of the semester when we host a raging bonfire just off campus to welcome new students.   Sometimes I think about it on Friday afternoons when we need to move sound equipment across campus to our meeting room.  Basically, this passage comes to my mind whenever we need to transport people or equipment somewhere because I have never been to a college campus in the United States with so few cars!   In my feelings of stress and desperation I fantasize about walking calmly over to an unlocked construction van and driving off.  Of course I’d bring it back in a few days.  And if anyone asked me what I was doing, I’d tell them the truth.  “The Lord has need of this.”

 

” [32] So those who were sent went away and found it just as he had told them. [33] And as they were untying the colt, its owners said to them, “Why are you untying the colt?” [34] And they said, “The Lord has need of it.” [35] And they brought it to Jesus, and throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it.  (Luke 19:32-35)

Looking for a natural explanation, some might speculate that  Jesus already knew the Donkey owner  or that some sort of arrangements had been  made before.    It is conceivable that the guy knew who Jesus was, -but since He said  “why are you untying my colt?  we can’t conclude that he understood all that was happening.   It seems pretty clear that they were caught off  guard.  So we could surmise that it all worked out because  the colt was owned by an old elementary school buddy of Lazarus’, but what we actually see here is the Word of God going forth with power.  I imagine that fear was replaced with excitement and paranoia with peace in this situation because of Christ’s authority.  “they told them what Jesus had said.” 

And what might have looked like a couple of high school punks gaffing a dude’s valuable asset  was actually the Lord calling a man –inviting a family perhaps to play an active  role in the advancement of His Kingdom.  It was a simple donation.  But upon that donkey Jesus entered Jerusalem; fulfilling prophesy and marching towards the cross where he made a way for us to be reconciled with God.   

Our ministry exists see students reconciled with God.  And I’m writing this to you –students and parents to ask for a simple donation.  As we labor together to advance God’s kingdom and  proclaim the good news of Christ’s reconciling work

WE NEED MORE VEHICLES!

Faster than walking and smoother than riding a donkey, the wheel is a glorious invention!  And in our ministry we don’t have enough of them!  Not even close! 

Over the years students like Ben Hutton, Joe Teirab, Sarah Furnish and Larry Lin have served our whole ministry and even those outside our ministry by bringing cars to school.  Without  guys like Barret, Tyler, and Eddy and girls like Charlene, Nicole, and Tricia the army of God at Cornell would be even less mobile than it is now! 

And I am writing this post specifically to ask students and parents to please pray and consider seriously the benefits of bringing a car to school.

If you have a car, or if you can possibly scrape together the means to buy one on craigslist I am saying to you now,

The Lord has need of it!

I know there are many different factors and concerns related to this issue.  In my next post, I will take the time to sketch out a little cost/benefit analysis.