Jon Acuff's Blog, page 158

Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas Day! I hope you have a wonderful 25th.

Unto us, a child is born. The reason for the season is rescue.

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16 Christmas Posts from Stuff Christians Like.

It's Christmas Eve! I gathered 16 of the best Christmas posts on Stuff Christians Like. Giving kids candles at church? We got that. Being single at church and hearing the craziest comments from people who want to get you married instantly? We got that. A hate mail mongoose? We even got that. Check out the list after the continue and Merry Christmas!

1. Being single during Christmas at church.

2. Giving open flames to kids on Christmas Eve.

3. #452. Leg dropping elves. (Or the real meaning of Christmas.)

4. Super spiritual Christmas cards

5. Romanticizing the manger where Jesus was born

6.  A hate mail mongoose. (Or the pastor's gift guide.)

7. How Christmastime awesome if your Christmas sweater?

8. Christmas Shoes, greatest song ever?

9. Women's ministry Christmas tea.

10. Manager Management

11. Saying "Merry Christmas."

12. Not knowing what to do with Santa.

13. Christmas Program Scorecard

14. Why you don't bring a camel to church

15. "lil Wayning" God in Christmas songs

16. Singing "New" Christmas songs.

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My unibrow is in a magazine.

Recently, Relevant Magazine made a prediction about 2011, the Jersey Shore and what I might nickname my unibrow. Click continue to see what they forecasted:

Thanks Relevant!

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The guy who wears shorts to church in winter.

Today is Christmas Eve, Eve or what I'm trying to get people to say, "The Christmas Eve Pre-Party."

Rather than go the expected route and write about Christmas, which I did yesterday, I thought it might be time to discuss a phenomenon I find perplexing – the guy who wears shorts to church in winter.

Are you familiar with this person? If not, it's really not that complicated of a scene to imagine. Take a freezing day, add a guy who wears shorts to church and you've pretty much got it. On the face of it, it's so simple, but there are still so many unanswered questions and thoughts that need to be addressed.

Here are 16 things that go through my mind when I see "Winter Shorts Man."

1. "Welcome to Stuff Christians Like. That is a living and breath post right there."

2. "Somebody who skims the post and doesn't read the second point is going to say, 'Maybe he only owns shorts and he can't afford long pants.' But I saw this guy in pants a few weeks ago, so that's a silly argument."

3. "Maybe he wants me to know he owns shorts? Kind of like the guy I saw who brought his full size Apple desktop to Starbucks. He literally set up his monitor in Starbucks. Maybe that guy is really proud of his shorts."

4. "Is it possible that pants killed his father and he's sworn off them as kind of a 'Red Dawn,' Wolverine kind of thing?"

5. "Really Jon? How would a pair of pants kill a man? You are so dumb."

6. "You are really dumb, for real. So dumb, so dumb. He's climbing in yo' windows …"

7. "Refocus, back to the shorts. You know what? There's not an opposite guy in the summer. There's a guy who wears shorts in the winter but no one who wears a snowsuit in the summer. That's weird."

8. "Does he ever cry in his car, both from leg hypothermia and that no one talked to him about his 'calf cry for help?'"

9. "Maybe he got calf implants and his just sending out some vibe for the ladies. All the single ladies. Ohh Oh Oh."

10. "Does he hate mother nature? Is this a big 'screw you,' to winter? A private battle one man is fighting against the temperature?"

11. "Is this an Al Gore thing? Like a legless jihad against the idea of global warming?"

12. "Does our pastor Pete Wilson ever get emails about stuff like this? Do people ever ask Pete to step in and 'long pants someone?'"

13. "Can you really shave your legs as a boy if you're not an Olympic level biker?"

14. "Would it be weird if I asked him about the decisions he's making in life? Probably. If someone came up to me and said, "Hey, I know you don't know me, but I'd like to talk to you about your pants," that would be odd."

15. "I can respect the guy who wears flip flops at the same time. If you wear winter boots and thick socks, you're kind of missing the point. Go all in or don't go at all."

16. This shorts guy is a little silly, but he's way better than that 60 year old at the gym who loves to walk around buck naked. What is it about turning 60 that makes you think to yourself, 'It's naked time!'"

That's usually what I'm thinking when I see the guy wearing shorts in the middle of the winter. But it's very possible I'm the only one who has seen this guy at church or in youth group.

Have you ever seen him?

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The Ordinary.

Sometimes, if I'm in a meeting, my wife will see comments on Stuff Christians Like before I do and will tell me not to read them because they're not nice.

That happened twice last week.

I guess it was technically once, since someone left the same comment on two consecutive posts to make sure I got the point. It was long, and not on the surface that mean, but despite my wife's warning to skip it, I read it and two lines stood out to me. Here is what they said:

I like the humble Jon Acuff. Not the buy-my-new-book Jon Acuff.

I found that challenging for a few reasons. The first is that, despite this all being really new to me and making mistakes, I honestly don't feel like I've been cocky about the new book. I self published a book. I haven't been bragging about a publisher or a book tour or anything like that. The second comment though, about me turning into "buy-my-new-book Jon Acuff" was more frustrating. Imagine that since the third grade, you wanted to write books. For close to 30 years, that was your dream. And in the third week your new book was available, someone essentially tells you "enough already." The book had been out for 17 days before someone told me they were tired of hearing about it. Imagine being a musician and on the third week of your album release, someone at your show tells you to stop talking about your new album. Imagine if you got your MBA after years of work, balancing your kids and your family with that dream. And in the third week, someone at your job tells you to stop talking about it already.

Those kind of situations are demoralizing, aren't they? Even if you don't have a blog, someone in your life has discouraged you or labeled or questioned you in a way that was not intended to grow you.

Someone has told you, "Enough already."

Someone has told you, "Who are you to try that?"

Someone has told you, "You're the last person I could see doing that."

Someone has told you, "That will never work."

When that happens, you feel defeated. You don't feel special. You feel common. You feel really ordinary.

We think of that sometimes as a barrier to our ability to be used by God. We look at our simple hands and our simple ideas and wonder if there is any good that can come from someone so ordinary.

I've felt that way a lot, but it's getting harder to, because there's a new thought that is becoming inescapable.

It caught me again when I heard my pastor talk about a verse in John 1. When Nathanael heard where Christ was from, his first response was, "Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?"

Can anything good come from there?

That is not the dynamic, earth shakes beginning to a ministry. That is not the warrior's entrance the world expected. There is no shock and awe to hearing a man is from Nazareth. Christ came from somewhere ordinary.

Why?

Why was he a baby born to an ordinary family in a less than ordinary place, in a worse than ordinary manger?

Because God loves doing the extraordinary with the ordinary.

He loves turning things the world has forgotten into miracles. He loves turning our ordinary expectations upside down into extraordinary experiences.

Over and over again he does this. From creating an extraordinary virgin birth in an ordinary town leading to Christmas to John the Baptist.

In Acts 4:13, we see the rulers, elders and teachers of the law debating what to do with Peter and John. Was it their extraordinary powers that wowed them? Was it the might and ability that terrified them or forced them to admit a curiosity that would not be so easily solved?

No, not at all. Here is what the Bible tells us the rulers thought:

"When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus."

They were ordinary. Like me. Like you. Like us. And it was so astonishing, to see the extraordinary so clearly displayed in people so clearly ordinary.

In 2011, people will tell you that you are ordinary. That might sting sometimes, but my hope is that by your ordinary life, you will point people toward an extraordinary savior. My prayer is that your ordinariness will be so pronounced that it will be astonishing and above all, it will reveal to friends and family members and neighbors and strangers, that you've been with Jesus.

A savior who loves doing extraordinary things with ordinary people like us.

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My person of the decade.

With 2010 almost over, it's time to say goodbye to the decade, a year late. Technically speaking, wasn't 2000 the first year of this decade and 2009, the last? I might be wrong. It's all very confusing. Regardless, I want to tell you who my person of the decade is.

And let's say first of all, you have to say Jesus. In the same way that the Bible is the book you bring to a deserted island, Jesus is who you'd have dinner with if you could have dinner with any person ever. So this other person I think is the person of the decade is in addition to Jesus.

Who is it?

Good question. He actually left a comment on this site today. His comment started with this phrase, "Acuff, speaking as someone who has known you for 25+ years …"

And that is an awesome phrase. What a gift it is to be known. For someone you ate lunch with on the first day of fourth grade to still know your spot on this planet and what you're trying to do with it. I am known by my friends in Hudson, Massachusetts and though I don't do anywhere near a good of job showing gratefulness for that, I consider that a treasure.

But I want you to know the person who wrote that, my person of the decade.

His name is Dave Bruce and his story needs to start from a text my mom sent me a few months ago.

Here is an excerpt of what she wrote:

"Pat told me David Bruce is donating one of his kidneys to Matt. Thought you'd want to know. Love you. Mom."

There are days, maybe even whole weeks where I feel I am living a generous life. There are moments where I feel gracious and humble and giving.

And then there are moments where your mom tells you that your friend Dave is donating a kidney to your friend Matt.

I don't want to over dramatize this, but there is little drama is telling the truth. Matt would have eventually died without Dave's kidney. Dave saved a life this fall. And I never heard about it except from my mom. I sometimes write tweets when I've been generous enough to let someone else in front of me in traffic at the mall. Dave gave away a kidney and didn't say a word. And this wasn't his first superhuman act. During a great family tragedy, he was the glue that bound everyone together at a time when most kids his age are playing frisbee on a college campus.

I know you don't know Dave Bruce, but there's a Dave somewhere in your life too. Someone who gave more than was expected, worked harder than anyone thought possible, cared more than you thought one person could.

Today I just want to say "Thanks Dave." Today, I want to give you some space to say, "Thank you" to your person of the decade. That's it.

How would you fill in this blank,

"Thank you ___________, you are my person of the decade."

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Peeking to see who is raising their hands during a prayer.

A few weeks ago, my wife and I went to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert. This was an event that I am still processing both mentally and emotionally. During one of the songs, a lady came out and started throwing down on what could best be described as "rock flute." It was very similar to Ron Burgundy in Anchorman and his jazz flute. It was a completely bizarre instrument to throw into the mix. It felt very arbitrary, like maybe this girl happened to have a rock flute in her purse and just thought, "What the heck? This moment needs some rock flute! Let's do this!"

The only thing I compare that incident to is the time Mr. Marshall, an 80 year old member of my dad's church, brought his own tambourine to service. He apparently found our service lacking in tambo' and although he probably considered that a bit of a "hippie instrument," he decided to bring one unannounced on a random Sunday. Then, during the middle of worship he made his move, walking up to the front of the church, standing next to the worship leader and proceeded to bang away on his tambourine.

Fast song, slow song, it didn't matter. I think at one point he was jangling up the song, "In our house Lord be glorified," which is fairly slow and depressing. Why did he do that? Because sometimes we church members are tempted to help the staff out. To add a little to the service. To tell the pastor, "don't worry, I got this one."

The situation I find myself doing this the most is when a pastor asks people to raise their hands if they've committed their life to Christ that morning. We're all supposed to have our heads down and eyes closed, but I always peek. And according to the end of "Velvet Elvis," so does Rob Bell. Why do we do this?

1. As a service.

I'll double count the numbers for you pastor, to make sure your math is right. Sometimes we do "church math," and report our attendance with a 33% exaggeration. I can't trust your math, so I'll do my own.

2. It's like God's Google Analytics.

Every other part of my day is tracked. I can see my unique visitors, how my Twitter Klout score is doing, how many clicks I've had on my Facebook page. I'm trained at this point to keep tally or score, so when I count hands I feel like I'm helping out with God's Google Analytics.

3. To judge people.

My friend Bethany told me that her pastor recently asked the congregation to pray with him about their church growing. Then he asked everyone to keep their eyes closed and raise their hand if they had prayed for the church to grow. That's an excellent judging opportunity. Who is not raising their hand in that moment? That is an "auto hand up," situation. That's like not giving to a love offering. (As I've said, if you don't put a dollar in a love offering, that's the equivalent of putting in a fistful of hate.) I could totally see someone being tempted to peek during this type of prayer to essentially say, "Let's see which of these punks isn't praying that the church grows."

All three of those reasons are kind of whack, but I don't have to worry because our church doesn't do a lot of "heads down, hands up," moments. (Which when you say it that way kind of reminds me of the song "Da Dip." Remember that one? "I put my hand up on your hip, when I dip, you dip, we dip." So classy.)

But be honest today, have you ever done this?

Do you ever peek in heads down moments?

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Make it a Stuff Christians Like Christmas!

There's still time to add a copy of the Stuff Christians Like book to someone's stocking. It's got over 75 new essays that aren't on the site, it's illustrated so it doubles as a surprisingly fun coloring book, it's got what I [image error]think is the best Serious Wednesday idea I've ever written (Mustard Ice Cream) and it's only $10. You can also get it on Kindle, iPad etc. (My new book, "Gazelles, Baby Steps and 37 Other Things Dave Ramsey Taught Me About Debt" is also aerodynamically tested for stockings.)

Click here to order SCL on DaveRamsey.com

Click here to order on Amazon

Click here to order on Barnes & Noble

Click here to find a Christian bookstore

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The Santa Problem.

Last week, I said three ridiculous things on an interview with a Christian radio station.

Here is what I said:

1. "Alvin and the Chipmunks are Demon Rodents."

The radio show was asking callers if Christians should be listening to non Christian Christmas songs. When one caller said she loved the chipmunks, that is the first thing that came to my head. Clearly I was joking, chipmunks are adorable. (As I mentioned in another post, squirrels in your attic on the other hand are from the devil.)

2. "'Where's the line to see Jesus?' is the 'Christmas Shoes' 2.0."

There's a new Christmas song where a little kid is at the mall and kind of jukes a lady by asking her where's the line to see Jesus since he can clearly see the line for Santa but none for Christ. A caller said she loved the Christmas Shoes song so I pitched her that other one as "Christmas Shoes Part Deux." I stand by that assessment. (Both songs will get played a lot because there are a ton of folks who love them.)

3. "Christmas is the only time you'll hear Wham, Mariah Carey and Christina Aguilera on Christian radio."

It's true, for 11 months of the year, we're not having Xtina on Christian radio, but in December we say to her, "Get over here you rascal and sing 'Oh Holy Night.'"

Looking back on those three things, I was really able to pack a lot of silly into a seven-minute interview. And, we even managed to discuss the problem with Santa. (If you are 6 and inexplicably reading this blog, this is a spoiler alert. Stop reading if you don't want to know the truth about the North Pole.)

One caller said something I have heard often from Christians when it comes to the man in red. She said, "We're not telling our kids about Santa, because when they find out he's not real, they won't believe that God is real when we tell them about him."

Have you ever heard that? I'm not sure if it's a Baptist thing or a Bible Belt thing but this show was out of New York and Canada so maybe that theory is national at this point. Regardless of its popularity though, I think there are two flaws with it.

The first is that in no other aspect of imagination do we put the same constraint. For instance, for a solid year, I'm pretty sure my kids thought the Wiggles and the Doodlebops were real. They watched their shows, they sang their songs, they loved those brightly colored/oddly terrifying characters. And not once did my wife and I say, "When they find out Captain FeatherSword isn't real, they probably won't believe in an all powerful God later on in life." Sure, the Wiggles are different than Santa and we imbue a lot of "belief" language around him, but we only talk about him for six weeks a year. We wiggled for a solid year and discussed the Wiggles far more than we do Santa in an average Christmas season.

Kids are imaginative, that's what they do. If I play along with their American Girl Dolls or take my oldest daughter to a Narnia film and she really believes it, I'm not afraid that I've effectively prevented her from believing in God. We'd never say, "I'm not taking my son to see Lord of the Rings, because if he ever finds out Gandalf is not real, he won't believe in God." We might rail against Harry Potter, but even that is not because we're afraid if they find out Harry Potter is not real our kids won't believe in God.

The bigger issue though with the Santa problem is that I'm not sure it really ever comes to fruition. For instance, I've had dozens of people tell me that they have a hard time seeing God as a loving father because their own father was not loving. They feel stuck and trapped with a broken filter of their own father that they apply to God. I completely believe that happens and have heard it a lot. Do you know what I've never heard? I've never had a friend tell me:

"I want to believe in God, I do, but I can't get beyond my Santa Claus issues. I have 'Kris Kringle complex.' When I found out Santa wasn't real as a 7 year old, I swore off God that day with a kind of a Charlton Heston final scene of Planet of the Apes anger."

No one says that. And we're also not seeing the damage of a generation who grew up believing Santa was real only to learn he's not. By that I mean there aren't any books for adults designed to help you get over your Santa problems. Zondervan hasn't published "Get the man in red out of your head." Thomas Nelson has not published "Empty stocking, full heart." Lifeway is not doing a ladies conference called "Deeper Still Than Santa." There's not an industry to support the thousands and thousands of 30 year olds struggling with Santa Claus, because there are not thousands and thousands out there who do.

Now clearly this will be the moment I hear from the 17 people on the planet who have in fact confessed to a Christian counselor that Santa Claus shotblocked God for them, but I still think we've blown the problem with Santa out of proportion. I think most folks will say that the Santa vs. God thing isn't an issue, but instead that they don't want to "lie" to their kids. I understand that point and know that some kids have said "you lied to me mom and dad," but we also have to be careful that we don't miss out on the word "pretend." I'd never say to my kids, "I don't want to create a house of lies. I need to be honest with you and confess that My Little Pony is simply a lump of hard plastic not a real pony, when I did that magic trick and took your nose, I really didn't take it, and I always know the end of your knock knock jokes but have been living a lie by acting like I didn't all these years. To be perfectly honest with you, 'Knock, knock, who's there, a tornado of spanking' is not that funny. I fake laughed. I hate to say that, but I refuse to lie to you kids."

I think every parent needs to be deliberate and smart about how they handle Santa and Christmas in general, but lets not throw him under the God bus. Don't talk about him for a million other reasons, but I'm not sure the God reason is the best one.

What do you think?

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My pants don't fit. (Or 4 ways to pick sponsors for your blog.)

Last weekend, my wife and I had a discussion about my pants.

Some don't fit right now. When I wear them, it looks like the button might burst off and shoot through an innocent bystander like a bullet. I've probably put on 12 pounds in the last 6 months and I need to do something about that.

That is a weird way to start a post about blog advertising, but there are two things I recently realized. The first is that I haven't done a great job clearly explaining why I've selected the Stuff Christians Like sponsors I selected and lots of folks have had questions. And the second is that over 300 people took me up on my offer to help with their blogs. One of the issues we'll discuss is blogs and advertising.

There are a lot of great ideas out there on this topic. My opinion is simple, writing SCL is my job now. I didn't have advertising for two years or so because it wasn't my job. I worked full time for AutoTrader.com. Now, it is my job. So if I want to pay my mortgage, feed my kids, etc., I need to find honest, smart ways to work with sponsors.

So how do you do that? How do you find sponsors for your blog? I have four ideas:

1. Find sponsors that fit your life.

As previously stated, I need to lose some weight. I need to eat smarter and better. Queso is apparently not a vegetable. I've started working with a trainer and going to the gym a lot more, but changing my eating habits has been hard. So when the chance to work with E-Mealz came up, I jumped at it. Not because I had to or was forced to, but because I wanted to. I want to eat better, they help you eat better. Done and done. Internet Safety was the same way. I've talked on this site a number of times about the toxic nature of porn. Internet Safety makes a software called "Safe Eyes," that filters the Internet. That one was a no brainer. If Internet Safety made accounting software, they wouldn't be on SCL. If E-Mealz made candles scented like the Red Sea, they wouldn't be on SCL.

2. Find sponsors that fit your family.

It wouldn't make sense to work with sponsors who can help pay for my family needs, but are radically different than what my family believes in and cares about. I love the faith and hearts of the E-Mealz team. I believe Internet Safety is doing important work that I have personally seen help dozens of guys. And in a less dramatic, but equally important way, I like that we've partnered with a game company. I've mentioned before my family's love of Skip-Bo. My 5 year old is guru of UNO. Playing games is one of our "media off" moments that is important to my family. So partnering with the folks who make the game "!" made a lot of sense. I have no problem at all recommending that as a Christmas gift you can get at Family Christian Stores. (Particularly when I realized the company had a out.)

3. If possible, meet your long term sponsors.

I've had breakfast, lunch and dinner with the E-Mealz team. My wife and kids were with me two of the times. I hung out with one of the guys from Internet Safety too. Whenever possible, I try to personally know the people who are going to sponsor SCL. I didn't spend close to three years building this site to mess it up with a sponsor who doesn't fit. Now clearly, if you're going to run a small banner ad for a book or something, you won't get a chance to meet the sponsor. But if you're talking about a long term sponsor relationship, try to connect in 3D at some point.

4. Say no. A lot.

Last week we said no to 15 different potential sponsors. We will say no to hundreds in 2011. Why? Because money isn't worth wrecking the SCL community. So if your product or company is out of line with what's going on with SCL, it won't ever be featured on this blog. Be hyper careful about who you work with when it comes to sponsors. Say no. A lot.

Those are four of the ways I look for sponsors. And regardless of if you've got a massive blog or a small blog that's just looking for that first sponsor, I think these ideas are true.

Most of this is new to me, and I am bound to make mistakes. I apologize for not explaining my sponsors in a clear manner until today. I'll hopefully get smarter and even better at this stuff in the future. Thanks for being patient and gracious with me while I figure this all out.

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