Passion

I've been thinking about my experience at the Adaptive Leadership Academy in Denver. There is so much information to process and so many experiences to consider that I'll probably (hopefully) be thinking about that experience for a long time to come.

The word that came to mind this morning is PASSION. It is a word that is used in many different contexts and with many definitions. Interestingly during the keynote address from Rick Barger at the Academy, he mentioned that his son who is a "power consultant" in Corporate America has stated that the word PASSION is no longer the term to use when talking about someone's drive and desire for something, that the word has become meaningless, but as Rick mentioned, and I agree, there is no better word to use, especially in the church.

When I think of PASSION I think of excellence, people who can do nothing other than what they are doing, people who are willing to commit all of themselves to a project or vocation.

We all have passion for something. Unfortunately, for most people, passion is misplaced. It is directed to the things that don't really matter in life: bigger houses, newer cars, better seats at sporting events, more acquaintances (and ones who can increase our status), the newest technological toys, another television for another room in the house, I think you get the idea.

But then I meet people, like the people at Abiding Hope Lutheran Church and I see PASSION as it is meant to be: People who have a passion to make a difference in the lives of the less-fortunate (they donated over $250,000 to Haitian efforts in 2006 with plans to donate over $1 million to such efforts by 2010); People who worship God passionately and without worrying "what does my neighbor think of my worship practices"; People who open their homes to students for three weeks and share their lives with them; Adult men who cry openly because they see that God's plan for this world has been manipulated by us humans to serve our needs.

The church openly uses the word PASSION each year around Easter and this was made no more public than in Mel Gibson's movie, yet I think many of us Christians either miss or forget what the PASSION of Christ is really all about. Many get caught in the graphic nature of the crucifixion, many simply see a process that was necessary for the forgiveness of human sin, but I believe the PASSION refers to where Christ's heart is, where all of his efforts point: that each human being matters so much to him, not as nameless faces in a crowd, but in a personal relationship, that Jesus was willing to endure the pain and suffering in order that we might, as John 10:10 states, "have life and have it abundantly."

But there is something that many seem to overlook in the PASSION. Oh, we think about it on Easter Sunday, but we often fail to see that it is how we should live each day. The tomb is empty. Christ's PASSION doesn't end at the grave, but it rises with him and through the Holy Spirit it should live in us today. The love for others that focuses our efforts not on how to make ourselves better, but how to lift up the less fortunate.

This morning in my devotional time I was reading an excerpt from Martin Luther's commentary on "The Magnificat" in which Luther writes, "God's eyes look upon the lowly. The eyes of the world, on the contrary, look only above the lowly and are lifted up with pride. Even now and to the end of the world, all God's works are such that out of that which is nothing, worthless, despised, wretched, and dead, he makes that which is something, precious, honorable, blessed and living.

When we begin to live our lives realizing that the tomb is empty, our passions shift to the people that matter to God.