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There is a scene that repeats itself frequently at our house. It typically follows one of my children making a decision that clearly breaks a house rule and possibly a state law. There is no innocent-until-proven-guilty. There is no representation granted. The deed is done and dad was a witness. Often I am standing IN THE ROOM as the events transpire. Nevertheless, the drama unfolds before me with the predictability of sitcom story line.

It starts with a pause. That's it, a simple pause. I begin the proceedings with a baseline question to establish the context for what will follow. It goes something like, “Honey, did would just you staple your sister's hair to the dog's collar and then throw the frisbee for the dog to fetch?” (the events of this blog are purely fictional. Any resemblance to actual deeds – past, present or future – is purely coincidental but kinda cool...) What happens next is “the pause”. Sometimes accompanied by a darting of the eyes, what is happening in this pivotal moment is part primal urge for self-preservation. Somewhere in the recesses of their yet forming minds is an escape hatch labeled, “It's not your fault.” After sufficient time elapses, the child's reasoning has pried open the escape hatch and jettisoned away from common logic to the safety of the outer orbit of excuses. The reply starts something like this, “Well, she...” You see what happened there, right? As I will certainly remind my young liege, that was an answer to a question I hadn't asked. All I wanted to know was, “did you do that?” However, the response was a fast-forward (or maybe more an end-around) through guilt and on to extenuating circumstance or possibly diminished mental capacity. I am reminded of our Genesis-father Adam in that reaction. You remember the scene following the disastrous decision to take the fruit, right? He and his wife were VERY aware that they had erred. They were suddenly filled with an emotion that was previously foreign to them – shame. When God enters the Garden again and confronts Adam (note the fact that a previously beautiful openness before the Father had been replaced by hiding from Him – always the product of sin), he asks, “Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat”? Adam - sounding eerily like my little future person - replies, “The woman whom you gave to be with me...” As if to say, “It's not MY fault! It's HERS! In fact, it's kind of YOURS since you gave her to me!” Like my child, Adam's problem is not comprehension of the facts, but an admission of guilt. The problem is, without “owning” our guilt, we will not arrive at confession and repentance. Without confession and repentance, we will never arrive at the restoration of the intimacy for which we were designed and for which we long.

In our scenario, my child and I will do a little conversational dance and finally arrive at the desired acceptance of the facts that I am after. Eventually, I will get my “yes”. From THERE I can instruct. From there I can help my child navigate the tenuous trail of offense and help them see where they veered off the path. One reminder that is often repeated in these moments is that they can't control what is done to them – they are only responsible for their actions in response. If a live lived to the praise of God's glory is the goal, then He must always be the one before our eyes. When we lose sight of that it is not typically because we are lazy but because something else has vexed our gaze. When we take our eyes of of the object of supreme worth (the glory of God) and place it on a poor, temporary substitute (our own sense of entitlement), then we find ourselves doing, saying and believing things that are “off the path” of righteousness. Like a classic male in traffic, we will never ask for directions unless we can admit that we are lost. Guilt is not meant to end in our wallowing in woe but in glorying in His grace. We'll not glory in His grace until we admit that we are in need of it.

Let us strive today to admit our guilt, receive His correction, praise Christ for receiving our punishment and glory in His grace.

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I am sure that this is not true of you, but at times I make mistakes. Now, this was true long before I could ADMIT it, but it is true nonetheless. I have found in recent years that I am a conversational Baryshnikov when it comes to avoiding being wrong. If I lay down a barrage of words and logic, I figure that surely somewhere in the muddle of my mental assault there will be a nugget of doubt that I can hide under. You can imagine how fun it has been to be married to me. I am extremely thankful that God has not left me there in my narcissistic cocoon of fanciful perfection. The metamorphosis has been somewhat painful and to a great extent, I'm still flailing – trying to slip my self-centered sarcophagus and emerge as an ill-clad butterfly that can appreciate a moth – but the struggle is better than being dead and being the only one who doesn't know it.

However, there are misdeeds in my life that no amount of auditory origami can make into a swan. Many of these interactions are of the “did you think the speed limit sign was a minimum?” variety. Now, a sober assessment of ourselves should tell us that, as an officer strides to our window, we are dead to rights. We are guilty. Their speed gun isn't malfunctioning, the speed limit WAS posted and over-sized tires can't be blamed for going 27 miles over the speed limit. But that isn't always the case, is it? Somewhere in the back of our minds, our ego flips through its recent rolodex of mental images to the guy who sped past us 5 miles back. Why didn't they stop HIM? My subconscious pulls up the water cooler tale from yesterday in which one of my co-workers made it to work in 17.3 seconds from 50 miles away (or something like that – things tend to get exaggerated when I'm trying to defend myself against over-whelming evidence). Why does HE get away with it and I don't?! Lost in all of the pre-sentence posturing is one fact – I'M GUILTY.

As I have (hopefully) matured in my practice of confession, I believe my approach to even these situations has changed. On a recent trip back from the in-laws in Texas, my family and I were just north of their lovely south central Texas home when the familiar hues of blue and red blazed in my rearview mirror. The rapid deceleration and the chatter from the roadside rattle strip alerted my familial cargo that all was not well in Denmark. I think my kids giggled. I'm pretty sure my wife did not. As a rugged Texas Patrolman ambled vanside, I humbly reached across to the glove box for my insurance and into my wallet for ID. I had acquiesced to the fact that I was indeed speeding... technically. But then, as if to press the issue farther, God had this little gem for me from the mouth of my badge-toting brethren: “Is there an emergency?”

My response went something like this in my mind:

“EMERGENCY?! Dude, I was going 5 miles over the limit! Legend has it that you don't even COUNT that! No, there's no emergency. It's just called 'flow of traffic'... I'm driving a minivan for crying out loud.”

My actual response was:

“No sir. Just headed home.”

Try as I might to rationalize or minimize my behavior, one blaring truth remained – I was busted. The speed limit was 65. I was going 70. It might not have been “much”, but it didn't have to be. There is a law and I broke it. He was merely an enforcer of a law of which I was not ignorant. It was not his fault, it was mine. In the time between his first trip to my window and his second, that truth crystalized and subdued my excuses. In the short span of time during which I can only guess that my friend the policeman was calling my mother and my first grade teacher for character references, I even had a spiritual moment. My stance towards the speed limit looks an awful lot like my stance towards God's law at times. I can treat God's laws in degrees and come to the conclusion that I am not really breaking them – or at least not as much as other people. If I am ignorant, I can lapse into thinking of sin as I often do speeding; it's only wrong if you get caught. Oh, that I might see sin for what it is! And may I know my dead-to-rights guilt. Not for the sake of feeling bad but for the sake of understanding that I stand convicted. The cold testimony of a black and white road sign stood as my accuser. Without its testimony I might try to wriggle free of my sentence. BUT, without its testimony, I would also be ignorant of the beauty of what happened next.

When the officer returned to my window we had a pleasant conversation. Where were we headed, where had we been, …what did I do for a living... I must admit that in a split second about 20 other occupations flashed through my mind. But, when you're already busted for speeding by the world's authorities, why add lying to the list before the heavenly One? So, I tell him I pastor a church. He got a kick out of that. (And mentioned something about the people he pulls over the most are pastors and pilots...) He is apparently a deacon at his church in Texas. Lovely. Our interchange did not change his mind. He had already made his decision regarding my punishment... He would be issuing me a warning with the caveat of “take your time.” He had displayed a micro-vision of a mega-grace. I had no alibi. I was exposed and at his mercy. And he extended grace. That assessment may seem a bit grandiose for a traffic stop, but do you know what affect it had on my driving? In response to the mercy I had received, I was the picture of a law-abiding driver for the rest of my trip and beyond.

If that is my response to not having to pay hundreds of dollars in fines, what OUGHT to be my response to having an innocent substitute stand in for my execution!? In Christ, God has exponentially dwarfed the grace of my peace officer! So, when I see that my life is plagued with idolatrous neglect of pleasing Him, what is missing? Often, what is missing is my understanding of my guilt. Like a flow-of-traffic disciple, I tend to look around at the other offenders and not the offended and think that maybe I'm not really guilty – or at least not AS guilty. Maybe I expect that God allows us to go “five over” in regards to his commands. When I minimize my guilt, I minimize His grace. His grace changes everything. Knowing my guilt and his grace frees me to obey Him – not to stay out of trouble, but because he has forgiven my great trouble. Like the speed limit that day in Texas, the law is no longer a burden because it is no longer a restraint on my will but an avenue through which I can express my great gratitude.

I believe that is what Christ is getting at when he tells some religious leaders that “...her (the woman who wept and anointed Jesus' feet with oil at the Pharisee's house) sins, which are many, are forgiven – for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.” (Luke 7:47) In truth, the Pharisee loved little not because he had little guilt, but because he THOUGHT he had little guilt. The issue at hand in that situation is much like the issue at hand in my situation: I love little because I am ignorant of how very much I have been forgiven. Let us not be afraid to confess our guilt – that we might fully see the vastness of his grace. His grace changes everything.

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There are a lot of things that I enjoy about being a pastor. I am sure you can guess some of them. Having the chance to study and communicate the Gospel week in and week out is an incredible blessing. There's also the relationships that you are able to forge and getting to be in conversations with the individuals in the body who are all over the map in their journeys with our Father. It seems that every week is filled with particular blessings of being a shepherd in His flock.

But, there are some other fun things about being a pastor that I would venture you wouldn't think about. One particularly entertaining aspect of the role is the visual perspective you get to have on a Sunday morning. I have always been an observer of people. I seriously think I could spend an entire day just sitting on a bench in the mall watching people and penning their back stories in my mind. At times have bandied about the thought of writing a series of books consisting of completely fabricated stories of people seen in the mall... (My working title is, “Lives They Probably Never Lived”)

You likely think, as you sit in your variously equipped seat on a Sunday morning, that you are somewhat secluded – toiling away your own private swirl of thoughts and activities, while the dude at the mic spins his masterful web of insight, leading his micro-church to ever deepening pools of spiritual insight. At least that is what we put on our resumes and blog bios... However, the worship hour also provides a fascinating opportunity for sociological observation. As a public speaker, it's always good to be able to read your audience to pick up some cues as to whether your artful presentation is penetrating hearts or gathering on the floor at their feet.

There are certainly the not-so-subtle clues that you pick up along the way. For instance, there are seats in the room that afford themselves more acutely to slumber. If you watch carefully, you can see the “wall sitters”. There is a keenly-crafted equation that goes something like row angle + proximity to an outside wall / lack of sleep = the inability to keep ones eyes over half mast. If you also add to the equation an ambient room temperature north of 70 degrees, the inability quotient sky-rockets! Losing track of time? You can count on the “Thump and Gather” crew. If the hour gets too late, you'll begin to hear the dull slap of Bibles being closed and the chatter of keys and crayons being reassembled as the crowd prepares for landing. That's to say nothing of the apparent plethora of Bible apps that is SURELY what occupies the attention of so many towards their hand-held devices. On a side note, if you're the guy who whips out his flip phone and tries to play the “Bible on my phone” card... just... don't. Listen, I haven't always been a pastor. Some find it hard to believe that I am NOW. I think I've been in each of the roles above and many more. Some of the greatest sermons I've ever heard came to me by osmosis.  And, in truth, the examples above probably transpire a lot less frequently than I might have imagined. The degree to which people are engaged – at least from my experience – is much higher during a Sunday morning message that it is at their Thursday morning staff meeting. It's not really these clues that provide the most valuable input as to the tenor of the crowd.

The signs I look for to determine if my people are following where I think I'm leading or if I've left them behind are a little harder to detect. There is a look on people's faces that gives me a clue. I have had the tell-tale countenance myself many times. It happens to me at the grocery store. The next time you are at your local proprietor of foodstuffs, you'll see it. It will typically be a male (sorry guys). He's been sent on a seemingly simple mission that has gone terribly wrong. He's there with a wisp of paper in one hand (with hand-writing that is OBVIOUSLY not his own) and in the other hand is a phone with a number already keyed in. His thumb is hovering over the call button restrained only by an internal ache of geographical pride that has matured through years of driving in unfamiliar territory. He navigates the choppy water of the grocery aisles pushing the basket with his waistband. His eyes dart back and forth, from shelf to the overhead sign that is supposed to provide a beacon of hope. (You know what's NEVER on those signs? OLIVES! There should be some international summit of grocers to determine a standardized positioning of olives. It's in a can. It's a kind-of fruit. It's a kind-of vegetable... Let's put it with the salad stuff along with the other “kind-of” food – unrefrigerated pickles!! HAHAHAHA!!! But I digress.) As you happen upon our little produce pilot, you may have the opportunity to make eye contact and you'll see what I mean. There is a look on his face that says both “What the....” and “help me!” at the same time.

THAT'S the look that, when it happens upon a parishioner, tells me much the same information as our sullen shopper. He's arrived at the store and he knows that the goods are on the shelf – he's just lost the ability to find them. It is a great charge and challenge to catch those glimpses and steer people to the harbor. Let me encourage you to do something the next time a sermon takes a direction and you feel like you missed a turn. Find your pastor later on and simply ask, “Help me understand this...” As I mentioned, those conversations are one of the particular joys of shepherding. It will bring him great joy to help you find the “Spiritual olives”.

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Every now and then piles of nostalgia that surround my workspace or crowd my attic need to be culled through and either consolidated or cast off. As I get older, it seems like the frequency with which I need to sort the breadcrumbs of my past increases. It sounds quite monotonous, but I find the personal archeological quest to my recent past to be extremely informative.

Some of the things I find on those excavations are kept – relics that bring a particular joy in remembering the events that surrounded their procurement. Other items are unceremoniously tossed with little tinge of regret. What makes the difference?

Of the things that find a new home in the scaled-down Crypt of Sampson Lore there are many pictures. Pictures (being worth a thousand words and all...) have the capacity to capture many memories that cannot be adequately penned. There is emotion and nostalgia trapped on paper in vivid color. Pictures of family, friends and special occasions just tell too much of a story to my soul to get rid of them. The four-by-six inch footprint in a box represents a twenty or thirty year imprint on my life. I remember coming across one picture in particular in which I am standing next to my first car outside of my paternal grandparents' house. So many things flood in from that one captured frame of my life: how much I loathed and loved that first car; the incredible love of my grandparents; the now painfully too-obvious delusions I had about myself as a teenager... Pictures possess a power little else in the box will. After a bit of sorting (so long, old kind-of-girlfriend who never really knew you were my kind-of-girlfriend...), pictures: check.

Also invited to my remember-this party are cards, letters and awards. There are many, many notes in my box written by my now-wife while we were dating. I'm not sure why I hold onto them – when I see them in the box I rarely read them. There are a few that are very significant, but many are simply the trail of relationship-building between two people deciding to learn to love each other. THAT is why I keep them. Just seeing my name written on the envelope of so many letters in my wife's distinctive handwriting ushers in a host of thanks for who she is, where we have been, and where we are now in our relationship. Sometimes I have to smirk at the former version of myself and say, “man, I could SO help you out...” So, into the box goes a hundred or more envelopes filled with the trail maps and signposts of the most significant relationship of my life. I don't need them to remember her. I don't long for the relationship the way it was when they were written. I choose to keep them not because of what they say but because of who wrote them. Past letters remind me of God's present gift. Letters: check.

Other various items fill out the capsule: many, many, many (read: three) awards and accolades for my prodigious athletic prowess as a youth (of particular pride is a Little League Baseball trophy recognizing me as “participant.” I'm pretty sure that was code for “MVP.” At least that's what my dad told me...); a poster-sized photo of one Crosswalk editor on stage with me our freshman year of college mimicking New Kids on the Block (I have no fond memories of that day – I simply need blackmail information); a styrofoam cylinder of old marbles for no particular reason; a high school letter jacket I hardly wore because I received it at the end of my SENIOR year (note the aforementioned prodigious athletic talent) and a hand-made item from the man who taught my grade school Children's Church. It was from an Easter Sunday. Jim was a very gifted artist and he regularly made things to give to one child at the end of each Sunday. I ALWAYS wanted one, but it came with the prerequisite of being “good” during Children's Church... so my coveted prize usually eluded my grasp. But that particular day I must have either been tired or all the other kids stayed in church with their parents – because this bad boy took home the prize!! It is a plastic wall-hanging in bright colors with a blue background and a vivid yellow half-circle sun on which is painted, “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. Isaiah 60:1” Evidence that I was once well-mannered in a group setting and someone noticed: check.

What didn't make the cut? The greatest difference I find between things that become great memories and things that become great compost is this – memories were the stuff of real life that actually happened, compost is the stuff of diversion and busyness. I thew away an impressive collection of To Do lists that never “did.” I kept a few scribbled ideas just for the sheer entertainment value of my unfettered mind. I have a knee-high pile of unfinished journals that were written by some guy who sounded like he was trying to impress some future version of me. The items that endure are real. They were real events. They were real impressions of a real God – not some recycled ideas of someone I read and thought was smart. They were real struggles and real joys. And I scripted precious few of them. In fact, one thing that struck me was the fact that, of all the things on To Do lists that didn't get done – none of them were missed. But I'm pretty sure some memory-worthy things were missed while I was writing down the things I was going to do.

I'm no advocate of shunning planning or of not ordering your time. I have had my fill of unproductive days. But rummaging through the shrapnel of the day-to-day to determine what will last has given me more perspective on the importance of not missing today for the sake of tomorrow. I think I would do well to start my day looking at a well-aged reminder to “Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD is risen upon you” than looking at my planner.

May we live today thankful for the things we will want to remember.

[In an exercise to remind herself to be thankful for today's events that will become valued memories, my amazingly gifted wife writes a daily (she's much more dependable than I) blog you might like: 365picsofgratitude.blogspot.com.]