The Ugly Blog

The world has all but forgotten the true meaning of Christmas, and the Church is not far behind. Of course, most believers remember that it’s about the birth of Jesus, not Santa and presents, but that is about as deep as it goes. Christmas has a dark side that we have covered over, not wanting to spoil the pretty image. Have you ever seen a Christmas card with a bloody scene of slaughtered babies?

In the scriptures, we find that Satan understood the meaning of Christmas far more than the people of God. The Gospel of Matthew presents the birth of Jesus as a violent event filled with weeping and heartbreak. When the Wise Men from the East arrive to worship the new King that was born, they check in with the ruler of the Jews, King Herod. This creates fear in the kings’ heart that there has been born a new king that may threaten his rule. Herod sends out orders to destroy all the boys in Bethlehem and the surrounding area under the age of two (Matt. 2:16). We cannot imagine the grief and the pain that came as a result of the birth of Jesus and the price these families paid because of it. This pretty Christmas setting filled with “peace on earth and goodwill to men” is shattered by violence and death.

It is too easy to pass off this slaughter as the work of an insanely jealous king who would do anything to remain in power. Yes, he was evil-he had killed his own wife and three of his sons already. But behind the hatred of Herod there stands a far greater evil with unimaginable hatred that fully knows who this child in swaddling clothing is.

In the Book of Revelation, John unveils for us the spiritual battle that is behind all of history. He uses both mythological and Old Testament language to reveal the Spiritual realities of this “war in the Heavens”. John sees a vision of a glorious woman who gives birth to a son in the presence of a terrible dragon waiting to “devour her child the moment it was born” (Rev. 12:1-4). John tells us this child is destined to rule as king over all nations (Rev. 12:5). John pulls back the veil on the real battle that is raging between God and Satan.

This battle is first spoken of in the Garden of Eden after the fall of man, and God gives the prophetic promise of the defeat of Satan by His seed, Jesus (Gen. 3:15). Ever since this prophecy of the coming Redeemer, the Evil One has been attempting to destroy the “seed of woman”. We see this graphically in Pharaohs’ killing of all the babies among the Hebrews, fearing a deliverer had been born (Ex. 1:16). Pharaoh was correct in his fears, but failed to stop God’s deliverer from liberating the people of God.

Satan’s knowledge is nothing compared with God’s, but he knows far more than most Christians do about who this child is that was born in a manger. He views Christmas as the beginning of an invasion by a King who has come to reclaim from him all that belongs to God. God became a man so He could destroy the devil and set free all those held captive by him (Heb. 2:14-15).

The birth of Jesus was an act of war. Yes, he came to “bring peace on earth” but it will cost Him His life on a cross to purchase this peace. The birth of Jesus is far more than a warm touching story we celebrate with gifts to one another. There is far more beauty in understanding His birth with all this Ugliness than attempting to “clean it up” to make it more presentable. As we celebrate Christmas this year, let’s do so with the armor of God on and the sword of His Spirit in our hands, ready for battle. We will follow our King into the battles ahead, knowing that He has already defeated our enemies. This may mess up your dreams of a pretty Christmas, but an Ugly Christmas brings the reality of true peace.

Tonight will be the release party of our first home grown album, “Ugly Worship”, written, performed, and produced by our church, the Cape Vineyard, so I wanted to share some history of how we got here. Some mistakenly have thought that this whole Power of Ugly thing is just a gimmick, marketing strategy, or attempt at being relevant. The reality is that Ugly is who we are as a community of believers-it is our DNA. We have embraced the promise that “in our weakness His strength is made perfect” (2 Cor. 12:9). We celebrate our need for grace, because we are weak, dependent sheep who must have a Shepherd. We believe that the Ugly soil of our pain, brokenness, and scars is where the grace of God grows best.

Many years ago the founder of the Vineyard drove his car to a dump and unloaded years of sheet music and songs that he had written as a professional musician. As John drove away from the dump leaving “a lifetime of work, sinking down into the mud and garbage,” his wife Carol said, “this was the beginning of Vineyard worship”. (Adapted from “The Way In Is the Way On”). Thus Vineyard worship was born out of John’s complete abandonment to the will of God, and through this Ugly death experience, Vineyard worship has grown to touch the Church worldwide. John taught us to measure the health of the Vineyard movement through the kinds of songs being written.

My journey into our style of “Ugly Worship” began in my early years of ministry through the death of a four year-old boy. You can read about it in the Power of Ugly, in the chapter Ugly Worship. This extremely painful experience made me learn how to worship in the midst of pain, without answers and the warm emotions of the nearness of the Father, but rather out of the weak places, in celebration of whatever grace you’ve received.

Wimber would sometimes ask this penetrating question about the movement he led, “Is Jesus still giving us His song?” I cannot answer that question for the entire Vineyard but for our church I can say, “Yes”. Jesus has been depositing His song in the hearts of our community of weak, courageous Christ followers. I have prayed for many years for His song to rise out of the soil of this church and this album “Ugly Worship” is His beauty growing out of the fertile ground of our weaknesses.

The songwriters are reflective of who we are as a church. Chad, who is just learning the guitar, has two amazing songs on the record (which drives the veterans crazy). RJ carries on the legacy of his father Chuck who was a leader in our church and worship team for years and is now with Jesus. I have watched Charles, who I have pastored for over 30 years, walk through great brokenness earning the right to sing “Offering”. KC, our youngest writer at 17, writes out of the pain of the recent loss of her mother. Skyler, who has welcomed the Father into inner struggles and writes out of the grace he’s received in these dark places. Jesús, (who with a name like that has to be a good worshiper) and his family started our Hispanic ministry years ago and now he helps lead us in both English and Spanish. Finally, Caleb who pastors our church with my wife Kim and I, who is the reason this album has come together.

Eight years ago, I hired a 17 year old out of our student ministry as a part time worship leader. That decision cost me dearly with those among us that did not see what the Father was doing as He was making us multi-generational. Over the years, Caleb has been a “Timothy” to me and has taken whatever I have deposited in him and has multiplied it many times over by investing in others. In many ways, he could have produced this album on his own, without including others, but we embrace the African proverb, “if you want to go fast, go alone; but if you want to go, far go together”-and he chose to go far.

The main ingredients of Ugly Worship are writing out of our struggles and weakness, being broken vessels who allow glorious light to shine through us. Not professionals or performers, but followers of Jesus who can only give away what they have first received. Not theory, great sounding concepts, or pretty words, but dirty worship filled with the earth of life; songs born out of pain, doubts and the joy of discovering His strength in weakness. Honest, humble lovers of Jesus who sing His song back to Him.
I hope you get a copy of Ugly Worship and experience the heart of our church reflected in these simple songs. I believe Ugly Worship will release people from the trap of trying to be pretty, all together, strong worshippers attempting to give God the offering of our goodness to become empty-handed worshippers who have nothing to offer God but our love and surrender.

We celebrate this birth of Ugly Worship! Our prayer is that our “Offering”, of Ugly Worship will bring glory to the One who gives us His song, Jesus.

For more information about Ugly Worship, the album, click here.

One of the biggest lies churches tell is posted every week on their church signs:    “Everyone Is Welcome”.  Another way the lie is told is, “Come as you are and you will be loved”.  These are great statements made by well-meaning Christians, but little thought is given to what they are asking for.

What they really mean is that all who are like us- the same race, English speaking, belonging to the same political party, agreeing with our views on illegal immigration, and who like the same music we do (of course, hating rap). Come as you are, really? No shoes or shirt? Wearing ball caps and piercings? Smelling like urine? Wearing a shirt that says Coexist, or Pro Choice, or worst of all, “I love President Obama”!

Truth be told, if we could get away with it, we would vet people at the door of our churches, only allowing in those who agree with us, will not bring any messes, look pretty, have a job, and of course, believe in tithing. What the secret knowledge behind our slogan, “all are welcome” really means is that we want nice people who are together, look like us, and will help our church appear more successful.

If we choose to practice the welcome of the Kingdom like Jesus modeled, it will be very costly.  Loving those who are like us requires little grace, but loving those who are different from us requires taking up the cross. I am often haunted and challenged by the question, “Would you want all the same kind of people that hung out with Jesus to come to your church?” If you have not paid any attention to the crowd that was attracted to Jesus take another look. The Gospel of Luke tells us they were the outcasts of society, the losers, the nobodies, the sinful, and the poor. (Luke 15:1, 5:30) Nothing made the religious leaders more upset than the welcome Jesus made to these people. Jesus’ response was to tell them that “it is the sick that need a doctor”, and that He was the great Physician. (Luke 5:31)

Of course it is not that nice people are not sick and in need of Doctor Jesus-but they are in such denial that they would not come to him for healing.  We are all sinfully sick people in need of the Gospel cure. This requires the church to be a hospital for broken people, not a university for saints, or a love boat for eating fried chicken buffets, or a fortress that is firing its guns at the evil world.  Hospitals are a messy, bloody and sometimes dangerous place where you catch infections-yet they are a place of hope and healing.

At the Vineyard we do not welcome everyone; we have a warning sign that says “No Perfect People Are Allowed“.  We station guards at the door and require evidence of your need for grace before allowing you to enter. (Ok, for those of you without a sense of humor, we don’t actually do that). It hit me freshly the other weekend at one of our “inspiring” services that we really are a broken group of Christ followers. We were taking up the offering, and I was about to offer up the anointed prayer when I looked down at one of our ushers who had shoved the wooden handle of the offering bag into his butt crack! I am not talking under his belt or shoved in with his shirt, no – it was deep into his bare butt crack.  As a pastor, this is when your life passes by in front of you, and you want to trade in your church for a new one; with every eye, including the guests who were dressed nicely and looked as if they might actually have a job, looking at the usher, oblivious, with the offering bag sticking out of his crack. How do you pray? “Father, help us to give generously today and please cleanse the bag handle from any nasty brown stuff”.  I was so conflicted between anger at this guy and embarrassment and fear of a bad offering that I barely choked out a fake prayer. You know the whole time the Father was laughing.

Our Heavenly Father does not tolerate broken people, He delights in them. To Him, diversity is beautiful and uniformity is death.  The back wall of our church is covered with huge pictures of people from all around the world. When we hung the “missional pictures”, I told our predominately white church that this is how we will look in the future, and until then we will keep the pictures of diversity on the wall. Yes, they were reminders of the nations around the world, but they also reflected the cultural diversity in our city. We are getting very close to being able to take those pictures down as our church is becoming very diverse. The Kingdom of God is filled with diversity under the banner of King Jesus. Under His Lordship, we must not allow any other loyalties to come before His Kingdom. Not our national loyalties, political affiliation, racial heritage, personal opinions, native language, dress, or musical tastes. We all come to the cross as sinners in need of forgiveness; no one comes in another way. When we say the words “Our Father” to address our God in prayer we obligate ourselves to love everyone else who calls Him Father, as our family.

If you are not being challenged in your church to love those who are very unlike you, it may be time to pray a dangerous prayer like, “Father please bring people into our church and into my life that are different and require a huge dose of your grace for me to love”.  I am grateful that we have an Ugly Church (read about it in The Power of Ugly) that exposes how judgmental, unloving, prideful and un-Christ-like I am.  We better start growing in welcoming those He loves, or Heaven will be a horribly shocking experience-if we make it!

“And they sang a new song: ‘You are worthy to take the scroll and to open the seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation.’” Rev.5:9

Let’s learn to start singing this new song now in our churches by practicing the radical welcome of the Kingdom, or we will rob people from hearing the life transforming Good News of the Kingdom message. Let’s welcome everyone who comes, no matter how Ugly they are, remembering that there is abundant grace to cover all our cracks!

My first encounter with John Wimber made me hungry for more. The second time I was going to meet him I wanted some personal time with this man of God, so I wrote his office to schedule an appointment with him at his next conference. Back then (in the 1980s) we had to rely on “snail mail”, so it took several letters to arrange a meeting with John. I flew out to California with a couple of other young Baptist pastors, and we shared a room together to cut down on expenses. This ended up being a huge mistake.

There were four of us in one room – which of course meant sharing a bed. Three of us were pastors, and there was a deacon that one of my friends brought along hoping the conference would help him to open up to the Spirit (another huge mistake, but that is another story). This deacon was up there in years, and had experienced some heart troubles which had caused him to require receiving something I had never heard of: a penal implant. Apparently he was quite self-conscious of it, since it was massive and very noticeable. As we were getting ready for bed, the deacon, without warning, pulled out the big unit. For some reason he thought that showing it to us and explaining the story would be comforting. Let me just say it was a traumatic experience! I was scarred for life by the deacon’s display of the wonders of modern medicine. We attempted to cleanse our minds before going to sleep, so we spoke of our excitement about meeting with John the next morning. Finally we turned off the lights, hoping for a good night’s rest.

Sometime in the night I awoke with the sensation of hot, nasty breath on my neck. As I was lying there on my back, it began to dawn on me, to my horror, that my bed mate had crossed the “man- line”! Coming out of the fog of a deep sleep, the ugly reality settled in that I was being straddled by this guy’s leg, and his arm was over my chest. This left his mountain-man bearded face inches from the back of my head. It was just like the scene with Steve Martin and John Candy sleeping in the bed together in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. I reacted like a ninja warrior – ramming my elbow as hard as I possibly could into his body, I screamed, “Get off of me!” After a couple hours of laying there in fear, guarding my side of the “man- line”, I finally drifted into a deep sleep. In all the trauma of the deacon’s display earlier that night, we had forgotten to set the alarm, and awoke to realize that we had all overslept. We only had 5 minutes until our breakfast appointment with John, which had been made two months earlier.

Somehow I was “chosen” to run downstairs to meet John before the others could come down. So without brushing my teeth or showering-and with my hair looking like Don King-I ran downstairs to meet him. When I got to the hotel restaurant he was standing in line just hanging out with other pastors. John had no idea what we looked like, so he was just faithfully waiting for his appointment to introduce themselves. This was my first face to face meeting with John Wimber, and I looked like a homeless guy! I nervously introduced myself, making apologies for my appearance and the tardiness of my friends, but he just smiled.

When we were seated, the rest of my crew made it down, looking far more manicured than I. I had been waiting with expectation for this meeting for weeks, like a child before Christmas morning. I had prepared so many questions to ask John-I wanted to sit at his feet and receive his wisdom. As we began eating our breakfast, John asked us to tell him a little about ourselves and our churches. That was the open door that my bed-mate pastor was looking for! He began to tell John how he was leading his great church and all the wonderful things he was doing (he had about 80 people). John just kept eating his eggs and bacon, allowing this young guy to pontificate his great wisdom, telling John how to do it. You would have thought John had made the appointment to listen to this guy! Between his nasty breath on my neck, and now his hot air filling all our time with John, I was boiling mad. I wanted to come over the table and tear out his tongue. Not only had he robbed me of my sleep, now he was dominating the conversation with the founder of the Vineyard.

John never interrupted him, he just kept eating his bacon and eggs until this guy finally ran out of advice for him. As he stood up, John said, “it was great having breakfast with you guys, and I hope you enjoy the conference”. I was speechless. It was over and none of my questions were answered!

Looking back at this experience, I have come to realize that John taught me more by just showing up and listening than he would’ve by answering all my questions.

Here are some Fathering principles from “Breakfast with John”:

1. Fathers value listening to even the weakest, most immature sons. I am sure that pastor left that day totally affirmed and feeling like he was greatly valued (even though we hated him). He had never had a spiritual father give him this kind of undivided attention before. The rest of us were like the older brother in Luke 15 who found no joy in his brother’s return to the father.

2. Fathers will not force their wisdom on us. It is up to us to learn to listen, ask questions, and seek out answers. One of the hardest things to learn as leaders is to not give answers to those who are not asking questions. Fathers must learn to be “swift to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger” (James 1:19)

3. Fathers know they can teach without teaching. John said a lot to us without saying anything to us. He knew we wanted to ask him many questions, but he felt no pressure to fix us or be our source for wisdom. He knew that our Heavenly Father was really good at training His children. It is never a spiritual father’s responsibility to replace the role of the Holy Spirit as our teacher. John always pointed us to seek “what the Father is doing”. (John 5:19) Many spiritual leaders draw people to follow them, but John, as a father, taught us to follow the Spirit.

4. Fathers know that just hanging out, spending time with their sons, is mentoring. Just the peaceful presence of a father who is not in a hurry, but enjoying his bacon and eggs, giving time to listen to his sons, is valuable. As someone has said, “you spell love, t-i-m-e”. Fathers have a ministry of presence by just being there. Years later John (as a father) would challenge some of the “super-spiritual” prophets who were among us to learn to just hang out with the rest of us. Some found that to be far too difficult of an assignment, choosing to remain aloof at their own peril. With John there were no superstars, and he never acted like one, he was always just one of us. Humility is an essential for fathering. John taught us that all ministry flowed out of relationships.

5. Fathers know their primary role is to be faithful to the Heavenly Father. All the Father required of John that morning was to be there. John would often tell us that much of ministry is “showing up and being on time”. Even if you do not get to brush your teeth, comb your hair, or have any of your questions answered-just be faithful to show up for breakfast and the rest will work itself out.

It may have been an Ugly Breakfast, but it turned out to be a valuable experience of fathering. This Thanksgiving, let’s be fathers to those who have come to the table to eat with us.

Fourteen years ago today John Wimber finished his course and was welcomed into the everlasting arms of the Savior he had faithfully served. I remember the feelings I had when I first heard of John’s death, I had lost my father 10 years earlier and now I was experiencing many of the same feelings. John was a spiritual father to me and an entire movement of churches called the Vineyard. I will never forget my first encounter with John-it was 1983 in Houston TX. I was 25 at the time and had been pastoring a Baptist church for 3 years. I came right out of seminary into full time ministry without any spiritual mentor. In just three years as a pastor I had already experienced tremendous pain and failure. I had no model, no coach, and no mentor (all of which are words that describe a spiritual father).

I had flown out to Dallas to attend the Southern Baptist Convention with a few pastor friends. On the second day some of us “snuck out” of the conference and drove to Houston to check out this guy we had been hearing about named Wimber. From the moment I walked into the conference I knew I was home, even though I stood out like a neon light with my 3 piece suit in a church filled with jeans and tennis shoes. As I listened to John speak I kept seeing my father’s face in John’s. He spoke in a way that was so disarming, with stories filled with humor, honesty and mercy. In his own words he told us that he was “just a saxophone playing fat man that was trying to get to Heaven”.

At the end of John’s message he invited pastors to come to the front to be prayed for, and I ran down to the front. He began to pray for us that the Father would release us from hurts in the ministry and I began to sob with all the rest of the pastors. The room was filled with the deepest groans and the loudest weeping I had ever heard. He was praying for us to experience the Father’s heart. After some time of just letting us be healed in the Father’s love, John began to pray for us to be empowered so we could minister to others. He sent us into the crowd to lay hands on people and pray for them, something I had never done before. The only problem was that I could not stop crying and was unable to move. I managed to turn around and face the crowd and there was this lady standing in front of me and she said “You are supposed to pray for me”. I had no idea how I was going to get out a prayer for her with snot running out of my nose. This was my moment to be a super charged man of faith, and all I could do was to put my hand out and cry. It was so weak, embarrassing and Ugly! But in the middle of my slobbering prayer the power of God shot through me knocking the lady to the ground like she had been punched by Joe Frazier. It was at that moment I began to discover what I now call the Power of Ugly. In total weakness, and with nothing in me to offer but tears, “the Lord made His strength perfect in my weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). It was not in the power of my words or some faith formula, it was just being willing to be what John called a “fool for Christ”.

This began my journey of being spiritually fathered by John. One of my highlights with John was years later at a Vineyard leaders conference. It was dinner time and I noticed that there were two seats at John’s table. My wife Kim, being the shy one, said “no Jamie that is for important leaders not us.” But John had taught us that “we all get to play”. He never accepted titles people tried to put on him and was always just one of us. So I boldly walked over to the table and asked if we could sit with them and John said sure. We had some of the best steak for dinner and I quickly finished mine as I “sat at the feet of John listening to him tell stories”. I noticed that John had not touched his steak because at this time he was battling cancer and was unable to eat solid food. I could not get that steak off my mind! Now, you may judge what I did next as rude, brazen, and over the top boldness; but I viewed John as my father, so I did what I would have done to my Dad, I asked John if he was going to eat his steak! He looked down at his plate and the large steak on it and then back at me with that fatherly smile and said go right ahead and enjoy it. As John was watching me devour his steak he said “I love to see a growing boy eat”. It was one of my proudest moments, eating John Wimber’s steak. Was I secretly thinking that somehow there would be some of his anointing on the meat? Absolutely! The reality was that what I received from eating his steak was just a few more inches on my waist line and a precious memory of a father I will never forget.

Standing beside John’s open casket looking at him in his jeans holding his well-worn Bible this story of eating his steak came back to me and I heard the Heavenly Father say that when a big tree goes down in the forest it opens the sky up to many little trees to grow up, so when a father who goes down it opens the way for many of his sons to grow up into fathers like him. I received that as my marching orders for the rest of my life to become a spiritual father to as many as the Lord allows me to invest in.

Let me leave you with a few principles on Spiritual Fathering from “Eating John’s Steak”:
1. Fathers must have a generous heart willing to give all they have away for their children.
2. Fathers must have a delight in watching their “growing boys eat”. Fathers feed their children the good stuff.
3. Fathers do not hide their weaknesses but minister from them.
4. Fathers make room at the table for new sons, not just sitting with the other fathers.
5. Fathers know investing in their children allows their lives to live on beyond them.
6. Fathers are so approachable that children feel a boldness to ask them for their steaks.
7. Fathers teach their children that “the real meat is in the street”! Take what you have been fed and give it away to those who do not know the Father’s love.

John thanks again for the steak and all the Spiritual meals you served us over the years at a great sacrifice of your life and for being a father to the fatherless.