Blog » “Don't Outsource Your Family"

                                                     Tuesday, June 4, 2013 Jeff Lampl

 “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but  rejoices with the truth."                1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (ESV) 

I plead guilty. My name is Jeff Lampl and I am an outsourcer. 

I became a Christian, got married, and raised five children and I fell into the trap of outsourcing too much of my parenting to others. 

I signed the kids up for t-ball, little league, basketball, flag football, piano, gymnastics, tumbling twos, swimming lessons, camps, boy scouts, football, soccer, wrestling, VBS . . . . and more. I confess that part of me thought the children needed all of that more than they needed me. I also confess that outsourcing is easier. It’s easier to be at work than at home with the kids. It’s easier to watch a game or coach the sport than it is be at home and play monopoly or build Legos.  

But the truth is that it is at home in family that patience is learned. How else does patience grow except where it’s tested and how can it be tested except with the context of big chunks of time spent together? Envy, boasting, rudeness, irritation, and resentment are all things that are experienced, faced, and overcome in interactive, committed relational time together in a family.  

I am grateful that in the midst of my failings Kathy has always insisted on time together as a family. She has always said in essence, “What I and the children need is not stuff and great trips or more teams, what we need is you." We need Time. We need Together. Together. Time. Among the best spellings of love in any language are these two; Together and Time.  

"Lord, show me where I have outsourced my family to others and show me how to change that. Help me to see that what my family needs is me. Together and Time. Thank you Lord, Amen.”

Blog » “Empty Heroes”

Monday, June 3, 2013   Jeff Lampl

 

 “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”           I Corinthians 13:1-3 (ESV) 
Harvard has conducted a study on human well being and happiness which has lasted now more than 72 years! When the current director of the study was asked what he had learned from pouring over the data on the 268 men in this study, he gave an amazingly succinct answer with no complexity to it, “the only thing that really matters in life are your relationships to other people” 

So there it is. And it’s not new info. The Apostle Paul wrote this 2,000 years ago. He got it from God.  

You may be brilliant, able to explain the greatest of mysteries, be a CEO millionaire, be a professional superhero athlete, be a dad who’s busy making money and climbing the corporate ladder earning accolades and hefty raises, but if you do not have loving interactive, quantity and quality together time in vibrant, caring relationship with others, especially family, you are nothing. Here’s the formula.   H – L = 0.   Hero minus Love = Zero. 

Lord, forgive me for choosing achievement, money, comfort, accolades, success, material wealth, Kudos from my boss, prestige above quantitative, interactive, together time with others who need me and whom I need, whether I feel that need or not. Lord, I need you,  I need others and others need me, not my money, but me. Lord, today I will be there for and with my spouse and children. But also, Lord, I’m paying attention, paying attention to those promptings from you which say, “stop, see that person over there, go to her, engage and listen. She needs you".     Amen

           Blog » But I am talking about Christ and the Church”

                                                  Friday, May 31, 2013 Jeff Lampl

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery -- but I am talking about Christ and the church."                             Ephesians 5:31-32 (NIV) 



This passage is HUGE!!!!!

It reflects a consistent description of God from Genesis one through Revelation 21. Marriage is a picture of God.

Sounds dramatic but it’s true. After revealing that God is both plural and singular, Genesis one tells us that the image of God is male and female together. Genesis two tells us that men and women are reunited in marriage. They become one in marriage. God is three in one. Marriage is also a trinity, God, Husband, wife. This union procreates, just as God (pro)created the cosmos.  From Hosea to Isaiah to  Jesus’ marriage parables, to Jesus’ reaffirmation of Genesis 2, to the marriage of heaven and earth (pro)creating the New Creation in Revelation 19 and 21, we see marriage as the consistent image of God and picture of God’s relationship with humanity.

Once we understand this we then understand why Christians steadfastly maintain that marriage must remain between members of opposite sexes. It may be that in a secular society such as ours that gay and lesbian life-long commitments can be blessed by the state so that all civic rights are protected, but those unions are not the same thing as marriage. It’s not so much that gay persons should not marry, rather is it that they can’t, unless of course one changes the Judeo-Christian meaning of marriage that the West (and in it’s basic form every society on earth) had held to from the beginning.

My personal conclusion about this is that God withholds nothing good from anyone (unless it is for redemptive purposes in which case the withholding is good). I think if Jesus thought physical unions outside of marriage between and a man and a woman, a woman and woman, or between a man and a man, or some other arrangement were good things, then Jesus would have said “go for it”.   

God is for you, not against you. Do not fall into the sin of Eve and Adam, the sin of believing that God was withholding something good beyond what God provides.

Blog » "Wives Need Loved. Husbands need respected" 

                                               Thursday, May 30, 2013 Jeff Lampl

 

“However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must

respect her husband.”           Ephesians 5:33 (NIV)

It is fascinating that the Bible never tells a woman to love her husband. She is told to respect him. 

A man is commanded to love his wife as Christ loves the Church. That’s a huge thing. In essence a man is told to give up everything, including his life, for his wife. It is interesting that many men find it easier to give up their lives in crises to protect their wives, than to say, “I’m sorry” to them. Men are built for risk and for heroic measures. Many men find entering danger easier than connecting emotionally.  

The flip side of this is that men respond to being respected in ways that they will never respond to be loved as woman might define love. 

The upshot of this is that every man must discover from his wife what love means to her and then love her in that way. Every woman must consistently look for all the ways (take nothing for granted) that she can affirm her respect for him, and then she must tell him.  

What if she isn’t loveable? What if he doesn’t deserve respect? The Bible doesn’t take that into account. We’re commanded to do it. It seems to me that there is something to affirm, love and respect in our spouses even in the worst of times, and it is especially in those times that we need that affirmation and need to give it. 

I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THAT EVERYONE (especially wives!) READ THIS BOOK! You will be so glad that you did!!!! Love and Respect by Dr. Emmerson Eggerich

Blog » Wives Submit?

 Wednesday, May 29, 2013 Jeff Lampl 

   "Wives, submit to your husands as to the Lord.  For the husband is the head of the wife as
Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior.  Now as the church submits to christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.
   Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her....."
   Ephesians 5:22-26 (NIV)

"Sorry, I'm not going back to that outdated worn-out woman submits to man bit."

"You don't know my husband, he has not earned my respect much less my submission."

"But I thought marriage was a partnership, not a dictatorship"

"You have no idea what would happen to our household if I let my husband lead.  We'd be out of house and home by now."

No question about it, the first sentence of vs. 22 is tough to swallow at first glance.  But read the context.  Verse 21 (yesterday's blog) sets the stage and verse 25 explains it.

In a first century world where women were not valued and were demeaned to the point of being essentially the property of men, the apostle Paul turns everything on its head.  He does so by telling men, "put yourselves at the service of your wives.  Men lead in submission.  Your most important job in the world, after worshiping God, is to honor, cherish, love, respect, elevate, protect your wives. . . . just as Christ loved the Church.  How did Christ love the Church?  He died for her.

Husbands love your wives this way today and then again tomorrow, especially when you don't feel like it.  You don't feel appreciated?  What's that got to do with it?  You don't think she's doing her part?  Although no outcomes are guaranteed, it is at least more probable that men leading in and modeling this kind of submission will beget something similar in his wife.  Lead her by means of your sacrificial love of her.

Wives, what do you think about submitting to this kind of man?

So, if your marriag ie one where neither of you are following Paul's teaching, the question arises, "who goes first"?  I think you know the answer.  You do.

Blog » Oh No! You Mean Marriage is not all about Me?

Tuesday, May 28, 2013   Jeff Lampl

"Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ”
Ephesians 5:21  

It’s a huge shock.

A man spends twenty or thirty years living a life that’s all about him, his needs, his hopes, his dreams and then he makes a commitment to this woman who has spent twenty or thirty years living a life that is all about her, her needs, her hopes, her dreams. And then these two people get married and are together in one house every day for the rest of their lives! And God says make it work! What a plan!

This is either a disaster waiting to happen or a brilliant plan by God to grow us human beings up!
Actually it’s both.

So the apostle Paul introduces the greatest teaching on Marriage on planet earth (Ephesians 5:21-33) with the words “submit to one another.” Do you know any couple who does this consistently?  

Which is why Paul adds, “out of reverence for Christ”. It is only as husband and wife each, like spokes on a wheel, humble themselves before Christ, and as they grow closer to Christ, as they also grow closer to each other, they are then empowered to humble themselves before each other.  

So, before asking how it’s going in your marriage, the better question is how are you doing in your submission to Christ?

Blog » Names Will Never Hurt Me?
Friday, May 24, 2013  
Jeff Lampl

 

“ Let the Word of Christ—the Message—have the run of the house. Give it plenty of room
in your lives. Instruct and direct one another using good common sense. And sing, sing your hearts out to God!     Let every detail in your lives—words, actions, whatever—be done in the name of the Master, Jesus, thanking God the Father every step of the way”
Colossians 3:16-17 (MSG)
 

What kind of music do  you listen to?    Does it in any way, shape of form train your ears, mind, heart and soul in the direction of viewing other people as objects of your desire?  

What happens is this.   The moment your mind categorizes a person or group your mind also gives that category a name.  Now persons are demoted to members of a category.   From there it’s a short step to adding a denigrating name to that category.   My daughter recently read a book in which she learned that in WWII Jews were referred to by Nazis as rats.  

What names does the music you listen to give to women and men?   Take a moment to list them.   Are women referred to by the “w” word or the “b” word?   Are people commodified into objects for personal need meeting?  List the names given to that?  

It’s not exactly news that human beings treat other human being according to how we name them?  (Hutus called Tutsis “cockroaches” which helped them to legitimize the slaughter of almost a million of them in only a month or two)  

What names do you give to members of the opposite sex?   How do those names help create or legitimize how you treat those persons?    Is it ever true that you treat some categories of people in different ways according to your labeling system?  

Do you feel led to delete any songs from your ipod playlist?