The scent of the Mother’s Day bouquet hasn’t completely disappeared from our kitchen. Just a few days removed from the celebration of all things maternal, I find myself in a coffee shop pondering the plethora of (mixed) comments I’ve received on our approach to Mother’s Day at City Community Church.

This year, the celebration of motherhood intersected week two of our new message series on pain (great planning there guys…nice forethought). But instead of diverting the trajectory, we decided to throw Mother’s Day into the tension and just admit….

…there’s a lot of unspoken pain on Mother’s Day.

Infertility.

Broken relationships.

Abandonment and abuse.

Guilt.

Death and separation.

The reality is, while many are celebrating with fancy hats, pastel dresses, bouquets of flowers, and family dinners, a lot of people are quietly mourning what they didn’t have, don’t have, or may never have.

A day of celebration. A day of mourning.

So we decided to talk about it.

We utilized a beautifully uncomfortable script penned by an old friend.  Julie has struggled with infertility for nearly a decade and a half, and “Mother’s Day Letters” takes a look at the wide variety of emotions people experience on this day.

The audio is linked here (it’s worth a listen):

Mother’s Day Letters

So much celebration. So much pain. All wrapped up into one day. What do we do with the tension?

We step into it.

I stumbled onto this tweet by Glenn Packiam, a guy I really respect, that sums this up pretty nicely:

“Glorifying pain is brutality; idealizing happiness is sentimentality; weaving grief and joy together is Beauty.” -Glenn Packiam

God is present in the celebration and the mourning. In the joy and in the grief. In death and in resurrection.

Which words best describe your Mother’s Day emotions this year?

Listen to the entire Everybody Hurts…Sometimes: Mother’s Day message by clicking here: message

I was always the good kid. Easy to discipline. The rule keeper.

Don’t believe me? Ask my mom.

I hated the uncomfortable feeling of being in trouble, so I rarely strayed too far from the path. Always do what’s expected, and you can avoid a lot of tension. Decide to go Lindsey Lohan, and….well…

That was my power play, the way I avoided pain. The rules ruled.

Which makes me wonder how I would’ve handled Jesus.

Jesus was a rule breaker. He messed with normal. He created tension (still does).

In Luke 4, Jesus is teaching in His home-town synagogue. He makes a few supercharged statements that challenge the religious and cultural assumptions of His day. The response seems more like a scene from an Al Pacino movie than the Bible:

“That set everyone in the meeting place seething with anger. They threw him out, banishing him from the village, then took him to a mountain cliff at the edge of the village to throw him to his doom, but he gave them the slip and was on his way.” -Luke 4:28-30 MSG

Did you catch that? Jesus throws a fastball at their rules for understanding God, and they try throw Him off a cliff. No Donald Trump “you’re fired.” No Jeff Probst “the tribe has spoken.” Straight to cliff throwing!

Which got me thinking…

If Jesus and I had lunch today, what would He say that might cause me to contemplate shoving Him into moving traffic?

How about you?

My wife and I have fallen in love with the show Parenthood.

Most television is about escapism. Transporting out of real life into a world where sarcastic doctors always have a brilliant one-liner, Jack Bauer courageously brings the terrorist to justice, and every character is a People Magazine 50 Most Beautiful People alumni.

Parenthood seems real. Sometimes too real (although everyone is still stupidly good looking).

A struggling single mom raising two rebellious teenage kids.

The terrifying emotion of parenting a child with Asperger’s Syndrome.

Discovering your 16 year old daughter is sexually active.

The gut-wrenching emptiness of infertility.

Some nights the tension gets resolved, and other episodes leave you wondering if they’ll ever put it all back together. I’ve been known to discreetly wipe away a few tears from under my glasses (seasonal allergies, of course).

We’re going to try and embrace that same kind of tension at City Community Church.

Sometimes we church leaders can foster escapism, too (even sincerely motivated). A pinch of Scripture here. A few well-known cliches there. Wrap it up with a bow and come back to see us next Sunday. Don’t ask too many uncomfortable questions that can’t be resolved in 44 minutes of playback from my DVR.

I’m guilty.

So how do we stir up a soup that includes both this God we worship, and the very real tensions of everyday life? How do we acknowledge pain without permanently setting up camp there? How do we handle the undeniable reality that Everybody Hurts…Sometimes?

Honestly, I don’t always know. But we’re going to humbly step into the conversation starting Sunday at CityCom.

Divorce. Death. Family strife. Cancer. Financial ruin. Is there a ‘hurt’ you’re actively encountering?

Easter Sunday. The Oscars of the church world. The Super Bowl of pastoral leadership. The Royal Wedding of religious gatherings.

It’s here.

One of two weekends a year that the market for church attendance outpaces the demand for Justin Beiber t-shirts.

Mailboxes, radio stations, and social media sites are full of invitations. Creative teams are mobilizing, dreaming, and building bigger and better experiences to cut through all the noise. Extra services, catchy videos, new music, edgy sermon titles, live animals (oops, wrong holiday) endeavor to capture the attention of our 140 character world.

Our church is no different (see, I even subtly added a link there).

But amidst the deserving cynicism of our American “consume your favorite version of God” culture, I still believe in the simple beauty of why we gather together on Easter Sunday (or any Sunday for that matter).

Jesus is alive.

No, seriously. Did you catch that? Don’t let the number of times you’ve heard that phrase numb you to the reality of it. The Creator made a way to repair my brokenness when there was no do-it-yourself manual available.

And while gathering in an auditorium to sing a few songs and hear a sermon isn’t what defines this eternal gift, it is vitally important to remember. To commemorate. To celebrate the beautiful reality that God made a way for us. All of us.

We simply want to share that with you.

So forgive us if our passion begins to look like a Facebook spam campaign. Sometimes we get carried away. I’ll be the first to admit, an hour in church this Sunday isn’t what God wants from you. But you never know what that hour could set in motion for the other 167 hours of your week.

Find a good, Bible believing church near you. Encounter the reality of Jesus once again. Then ponder what the message of Easter might mean for the other 364 days of your year. In the everyday. Where it counts.

Happy Easter everybody. Jesus is alive.

A few weeks ago I had breakfast with my friend Danny Carroll, the pastor of Indy Alliance Church in the Fountain Square district of downtown Indy (and the wearer of great hats).

I love hanging out with Danny. He has uncanny insight, and he uses it to ask great questions. The kind that make you think. That make you go places you didn’t know you needed to go. That perhaps you didn’t want to go. Danny challenges me.

It’s a gift. But the beauty may be more in the way he uses it.

Never once during our many conversations have I ever feared his anger, rejection, or condescension (even when I may have deserved it). In fact, his personality is contagious. I always feel like Danny leaves me a little better than I was. And leaves me wanting more.

Similar encounters have been less inspiring. Sometimes a challenge goes all Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann (we have an equal opportunity metaphor policy here), leaving me hollow, guilty, and condemned. More like a drive by flogging. And no one wants to have coffee with that, even if it’s buying.

That got me thinking (what doesn’t?).  Where’s the transformation? When does David Banner turn into the Incredible Hulk? What’s the difference between challenging someone and condemning them?

Isn’t it ironic that the people who appeared to be like Jesus the least, were the ones who wanted to hang out with Him most? Everything about Jesus was a challenge. To their culture. Their perspectives. Their self-absorbed nature. His words must have been brutally uncomfortable at times. Challenging.

Yet Scripture is very clear, Jesus didn’t come to condemn, but to offer hope. Not to heap guilt, but to put the world right again (John 3:17).

So what’s the difference?

Challenge is essential for growth. For change. For transformation. But when does a healthy challenge turn into ugly condemnation? Are the two even related? When have you felt challenged? Condemned? What do you think is the difference?

Love to hear your thoughts.