Are You Thirsty?

Think back to a time where you have been really thirsty. I mean REALLY thirsty. Your mouth was completely parched. Tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth. You were to the point that you couldn’t talk clearly. You’d take anything you could to drink. Maybe not Bear Grylls kind of thirsty, but you might have been close to it.

When you’re that thirsty, how do you quench it? Usually when I am this thirsty I actually have a taste for something other than water. I drink water most of the time. But for some reason when I am really parched thirsty, I get this desire for something else. In the past it has been milk. Mind you I don’t generally ever drink milk unless it’s in cereal or my coffee. Yet, for some reason, there have been times when I’ve come into the house, extremely thirsty, and grab the milk container and guzzle down a cup. It’s been a while now that I’ve done that. Now I might down some chocolate milk…but who doesn’t like chocolate milk right?

Have you ever been so thirsty you’d drink just about anything?

What about your spiritual life? Have you been spiritually thirsty? Maybe even felt abandoned by God? Maybe you’ve experienced abandonment by others in the world, and feel as though God too has abandoned you. Maybe you’re missing something inside and you’re not even sure if it is God, if there is a God, or what. You only know you have this emptiness you want filled.

The story of the woman at the well may be familiar to many of us in the faith, but I believe it speaks to some of these feelings of thirst and spiritual dryness. It speaks to a thirst for something, for water, for God, for friendship, for community, for acceptance maybe.

This story is about an interaction Jesus had with a woman. Not just any woman, a Samaritan woman. And if you don’t know what that means, the short end of it is, these were people the Jews absolutely disliked. They were considered halfbreeds, because they were a mixed people, Jewish and Gentiles, (goes back to Old Testament times). Along with the racial and thnic differences between them, they also had some differences in their religious thoughts/beliefs. They were both Jewish, but they had differences. Kind of like different denominations. Things that shouldn’t divide, yet they do.

Let’s read the full story found in John chapter 4:

John 4:7-26

A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.”

Avoiding Samaria

In the beginning of Chapter 4, John explains that Jesus had left the region of Judea and is heading to Galilee and John says Jesus “had” to go through Samaria.

The truth is, He didn’t “have” to, but it was indeed the shorter way to go. It is generally taught that Jews would prefer to go around Samaria than go through it. It’s like trying to go to Missippi from Georgia, you have to go through Alabama. To avoid going through Alabama we’d have to go through Tennessee. It would take a 2.5 day walking trip from Judea to Galilee and turn it into a week-long journey to go around Samaria.

How many of us, when we travel somewhere, especially locally, avoid “those places” because of the “people” we’ve heard about that live there? Usually it’s due to a different ethnic or racial group if we’re honest, the low class, crime ridden, areas of your location. We’ve been told, “don’t get caught there at night,” right? Horror stories that probably have little truth to them.

Why Was She There?

Either way, Jesus was going through Samaria to get to Galilee. He stops to rest and for whatever reason, all of His disciples leave Him there at Jacob’s well alone to go get food. While there, this woman comes up to draw water from the well. John gives us the time of day just before this interaction is recorded…it is about noon time. It is nearing, if not already, the hottest time of the day. She was there at a time outside of the cultural norm, which would have been early morning. And she was alone.

Do You Wonder Why?

Have you ever read stories like this in the Bible and thought to yourself, “I wonder why?” This is one of those stories that should call us to wonder why. Why was she there alone? Why did she choose to go when she did? Why didn’t she go at the normal time when all the other women would have gone?

And then we read in this interaction with Jesus that she has had 5 husbands, and is now living with a man that wasn’t her husband. Then we think, “oh, that’s why.”

Is She Who We Think?

What do we then tend to think about her? She’s a sinner. She’s been married 5 times and left each marriage for another man? Then we put it together that she’s an outcast, and that is why she is alone. We almost justify it in our minds…”this is what she deserves.” We read into the text what our own presuppositions might be about a woman that’s been married 5 times. It’s her fault we jump to a conclusion about her. So we judge her right? We see Jesus’s Words to her as judging her, maybe, “He’s calling her out in her sinful ways.”

I want to challenge us on how we read this story. Not to make it say something it doesn’t but to give us a new perspective that came to me about it the other day. You see, I’ve always read it the same as I have described too. But then it hit me, what if? What if she’s not the one to blame in her 5 marriages? What if she’s been the one that was hurt? She couldn’t find a man that would stay faithful to her. A man that would treat her as he should? (Women were property in those days as well). What if the men didn’t value her and only took her for what they could get out of her? What if she’s had 5 husbands and each of them passed away? Now she’s lonely. Alone. An outcast of the community because “something has to be wrong with her, right?” Who knows what stories the locals may have made up about her.

Placing Blame

Now put this same vision in your head about the last person you may have looked upon and judged their situation from the outside. What narrative did you add to their situation that might not have been the truth. How could you know the truth unless you knew the person? And maybe you needed to hear both sides of the story to discern “who’s to blame?”

What if Jesus’s words to her about being married and living with another guy, wasn’t a judgment but a recognition of her pain, her loneliness? What if He was truly being empathetic to her instead of calling her out for her misdeeds.

He Offered Her His Gift

Another thing to note about this interaction is how did Jesus introduce Himself to her? He didn’t begin with what she had done wrong, or the reason she was there alone. He offered her a gift. He speaks to her thirst for water, but He tells her He has living water of which she would never thirst again. I am reminded of his meeting with Nicodemus, a high religious character he told “you must be born again” in chapter 3 of John. Poor old Nick took it literal and asked how that was possible. Jesus meant being reborn by God’s Holy Spirit. Here we see this woman do the same. She is thinking of the literal water that Jesus is offering her. “Sir, give me this water so I won’t be thirsty again.”

The Real Thirst Quencher

What if the real thirst she had, or the quencher she needed for that thirst was not water, but was love? Acceptance? Belonging? Whether she was to blame for her failed marriages or not, she had a deeper need.

What are you needing right now? Has someone or something made you an outcast? Are you unable to “fit in?” Do you lack acceptance? Belonging? Or maybe you just know there is an internal thirst that you need quenching. You need the water of life that Jesus offers.

God says in the last chapter of Revelation, “To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life.” This is the water Jesus is offering. Not only His salvation, but also His acceptance, adopting us as His own through our faith in Him. Giving us a belonging to His own family.

I’m reminded of the old Gatorade commercials, as disturbing as they might have been, but as they had advertised themselves as the “thirst quencher” they ask the question, “Is it in you?”

So I ask you, is the Holy Spirit, the water of life, the cleansing waters of God’s Holy Spirit in you? Do you want it if not? He’ll end that thirst for you right here and now. It’s not something you can earn.

Notice Jesus didn’t tell the Samaritan Woman, “go, fix your life, then come back and I will give you the water you seek.” No, He told her He is the source of that living water, and if she’d ask, He’d give it to her.

Do you want that living water? Do you want that missing part of you to be filled? If you do, pray and ask God to fill it for you. Trust in the work of Jesus Christ on the Cross to provide for you a way to be made right with the Father, by faith not works, and ask Him to give you His Holy Spirit, to live within you from now until eternity.

A Challenge

I leave you with a challenge, whether you are currently a believer or unbeliever. Remember to see through the outward appearance of situations and look for the real need they might have. Whether this woman was the sinner we generally behold her as, or if she was simply the victim of a hard life. She needed love. She needed acceptance. She truly needed a community to belong to. And that is the calling of the Church. To share God’s love to the deserving and undeserving alike. The truth is we are all undeserving, yet God so loved each one of us that He offers us His living water, through Jesus.

Exploring Churches in the Metaverse

There’s a big scary thing out there, to some, called… ”the metaverse!” That’s right, there are some that are fearful of it for various reasons…some good some not. But what I wanted to share was my experience of my first week in the metaverse. It’s a place I’d wanted to explore for some time and finally took the dive when purchasing a set of Oculus Quest 2 goggles.

I most wanted to explore it for ministry purposes. I don’t do much gaming these days…though I did join in some paintball fun in “Rec Room,” a metaverse platform. I’d watched videos of VR Church’s services and listened to the “Church.Digital” podcast for some time now and was always fascinated by the idea of church in the metaverse. This is what is scary for some… ”can we do/be the Church in the metaverse?” I’m not going to answer that here, only share my experience from my first week, and more specifically my first Church activities there.

Real quick, let me share with you that there are basically two ways to share your message for churches, on these platforms. Some basically stream their in-person events to their meta “world” and others actually use the avatar feature and inhabit the place themselves. The bonus of inhabiting the place as a “living avatar” versus the “streaming service” is it allows real interaction in real time. Some do have avatar “hosts” or “campus pastors” to fill that void as well.

My first day was Monday, and after getting my account setup and all that goes along with that and sharing the device with my wife, Allison, I was finally able to jump into the metaverse via the Altspace platform. (One of the most popular, created by Microsoft). It wasn’t long after getting my avatar setup that I found the first church event, “Living Room Church.” They describe themselves as, “Living Room Church is a safe space to ask difficult questions, find community, and share life together.” “Possibly my people,” I thought.

I joined Living Room Church right at the start time of 8PM EST. The platform doesn’t allow you to join events early, and I am usually a “get there early,” kind of guy. So, at 8PM I was there…. alone. I hung around about 5 minutes and gave up. I went out, and a few minutes later I saw people were in the room, (shown on the events page), and so I jumped back in. I was welcomed by a guy named Dave. He is a nice dude that actually serves in Life Church’s world in Altspace as a host. We struck up conversation with me explaining why I was there, and him telling me of his experience as well. I almost left early because my headset was dying, and he mentioned I could just plug it in and use it if I had a long enough chord. Yep, that worked.

Another lady came over and the three of us conversed. After a few minutes we went into the “living room” of the world we were in, (a normal Altspace template…not a full custom build as some do). There the pastor gave us the general welcome words and then invited the same lady I was talking with, “Bernice,” the cue to sing for us. And she did a beautiful hymn I believe it was…not one I was familiar with. Then the pastor, “Rev ZeeTee,” began the lesson by pulling up Scripture on the media player in the room. He read the verses, gave us his thoughts on them, and then asked what we thought about it. After some silence, you know that awkward silence, someone shared. Eventually, I shared my thoughts on it. And around the room people shared what they thought and how it spoke to them. Everything shared was truly from the heart, and eventually we lead into prayer requests. And we ended the “service” with prayer. After that it was general conversation, and I met with the Rev to talk about what he was doing there and learn a little from him while also sharing my own story. I ended the night with 4 or 5 new friends from around the states. A great, fulfilling, experience for me.

The rest of the week I found little time to get on and explore, but I did hop into a few of the other platforms, make new accounts and avatars for them, and venture around a little in them. But I focused on Altspace trying to learn how to set up our own, “Innovate World,” most evenings as I had free time. It takes some learning for sure.

Saturday, I set out a plan to visit multiple churches on Sunday, as I have taken a couple weeks off to explore other ministry tools and avenues, including the metaverse. Unite 180 Worship, VR Church, Life Church, and Cornerstone were definitely on the agenda. A full day of church hopping.

I think it was 9AM that I joined Unite 180. They are a church out of South Africa…lead by a white English-speaking pastor. They were the “streaming” kind of church, making use of a template space. I was greeted by two hosts, one not so talkative and a lady that shared most of the needed information…one being that the service itself wouldn’t start for 24 minutes… (I didn’t come in right at 9AM as I had learned my lesson quickly). I walked up some stairs to the “balcony” space and was met by a gentleman that spoke to me, named Doug. He spoke and shared how he was church hopping too. He was a 57-year-old gentleman from Washington state. We hit it off good, as he was a kind gentleman and a talker. Dave, (from Life.Church), showed up here too. When service started, we went in. Because it was video, there was no real interaction after the initial introductions to the avatar hosts. The pastor on the screen also failed to mention the metaverse church when he spoke of the many other campuses, including “online.” I didn’t stay for the message as the intro, worship, giving, time took a while to get through, and I had other places to go.

I visited, “House of Grace,” on my next stop. They are using the same template space I have been working on for the Innovate Church space, but setup differently. I was late into the beginning of the service, again being video streamed. I think someone might have welcomed me, but we didn’t converse. Oh, and Doug was there already too. Here, the pastor did mention their metaverse world and said he had even been there the prior Sunday and how good of an experience he had. Props to that pastor for recognizing the people in the space as congregants of his church family.

After House of Grace, I took a break knowing Life Church would be on a little later. But I didn’t make it to Life Church as Allison and I had some good conversation, and we ate lunch. I already knew Life Church is a streaming church with avatar hosts like these others anyway. The problem with this, like Doug and I had been talking about earlier, is the fact we can watch a streaming video on our TV anytime we want. While we appreciate there are avatar hosts and “community time” following these video services, it just isn’t why we are in the metaverse.

VR Church was coming up soon, and so I was excited to finally be in there with one of the originating, innovating, churches, that I knew was avatar taught…not video streamed. Sadly, DJ Soto, the pastor, wasn’t in this space today. I also got Allison to join me in this one as I thought it would provide the best “meta-church” experience… (i.e., what is possible). She anxiously joined me lol. (She’s not comfortable with the interaction just yet). VR Church custom builds their world. So, we started out in an outdoor space with a video screen and stage setup. Alena, one of the pastors, lead the service along with an 80+ year old gentleman, former traveling evangelist, “Mr. Pete.” Long introduction and welcome on the screen detailing much of their metaverse world, (they have worlds in several platforms and games), and a video of worship music. Then we were off to the “teaching space,” via walking through a water fall or teleporting by a button.

In the teaching area it was built as a small city, and the teaching was on Matthew chapter 6, the entire chapter verse by verse. We had to “walk” around the city to the various Scripture reading sets, and mostly Alena shared her thoughts on each section of Scripture. Volunteers generally read the Scripture for the group. It was interesting for sure, but more of a free flowing, “this is what I think,” kind of teaching versus a sermon. All good for some and not for some. You be the judge.

We took a little break after VR Church. That’s one thing about wearing the Oculus, you need a break after an hour or two for sure.

After about an hour I hopped back on and joined, “Faithbase VR Church.” I’m not sure where they are from, but the female pastor brought the heat for sure! Super good message, “Over the Hump,” about not giving up on various situations when you are truly almost, “over the hump.” This was indeed an urban style teacher/church with maybe a Pentecostal flavor. The world was created by them, and you spawned in the parking lot basically, and had to walk some distance to get into the church space. It was like walking up to and into a modern church building. The sanctuary space was rather sparse but had a large video screen in the center with two smaller screens on the outside edges. Seats were the typical cloth covered chrome seats. She taught as an avatar from the stage. And again, she taught with passion for sure! The message was so great I tried to find a recording on YouTube to no avail.

My last church to visit for the day was Cornerstone Church from California. A physical, multi-campus church, with the metaverse world as well. I think someone greeted me shortly after I spawned there, but I also joined there with Doug again as I had visited the world he’d created before the church time. Here they had a world they had fully designed themselves with a rustic open top sanctuary space. They had a “live” avatar host along with video music up front. They hold multiple group meetings in the metaverse as well on other nights/days. For the teaching, we had to go outside and walk to the outdoor teaching space. Again, similar “modern” style chair setup with large video screen up front. They did also have a communion table out, which to me was awesome. I stayed part way through the teaching but left early…even though I really wanted to see/participate in communion with them. I was tired.

All in all it was an interesting week visiting more than six different churches without leaving my home and interacting with multiple real live people in the process. There were a couple churches I visited, or thought about visiting, that didn’t have many people…or any in them…so if I entered, I didn’t stay. That would be one piece of advice I’d give the churches…if you are scheduled to begin at a certain time, make sure someone is there in that first minute. And for us visiting, it might pay to hang out a little longer than five minutes to join in with others. If I hadn’t checked back in on Living Room Church, I would have truly missed my best experience of the week with likeminded friends.

Stay tuned as I may have a follow-up post to this blog on some of my learning and expectations as a metaverse church visitor.

Your Facebook Live/Video Audience isn’t “All That”

Church, Business Leaders, and Communicators,

During these times we’ve all jumped on the video bandwagon on social media. Many of us have no clue what we are doing, and yet that shouldn’t hold us back either. But that’s not what this writing is all about.

Today, I wanted to talk to you about your audience, more specifically, the audience that Facebook or Youtube tell you you have. When looking at the insights for your videos, each has their way of telling you some numbers. And come on, be honest, the bigger the number the happier we are, right? But, what good is a number if it doesn’t speak the truth to you? Zero. So, real quick I wanted to use Facebook as an example, using my own more “popular” videos I’ve posted recently on my own church page.

The bottom line here is you need to understand the metrics on your FB and YT message performance. If you don’t understand them, then you can’t truly grade how well your message is connecting. The numbers can mislead you easily.

So, these numbers below are from MY two best “performing” videos on our church FB page:

undefined — The numbers you are likely to see up front are the estimated reach numbers. However, we should pay more attention to the 3-second views and average watch time to really get the truth about our audience.

Reach – 373 and 643

3 Sec Views – 217 and 358

Ave Time Watched – 17-sec and 13-sec! 😭

The same goes for the “Ads” you paid for. I created one that ran for 7 days (Very targeted less than 2 miles and specific demographics):

Reach – 1,770

Impressions – 3,238 (means it simply showed up in the feed)

3 Sec Views – 451

Ave Time Watched – 2-secs! (of a 15 second video of still images).

In Innovate Church’s case, we have a whole 92-person page audience to begin with, so I don’t expect big numbers on anything. But, if I were to quickly glance and think nothing about the Facebook is giving me, I’d be thinking a lot more highly about our recent videos than reality leads me to…hence continuing to under perform my hopes and goals for posting.

So, while we have a captive audience at home right now, and we all have the internet, it doesn’t mean we are getting our message to them just because Facebook or YouTube give you some numbers that appease your ego. There is more to those numbers up front that you have to dig in to.

On a positive note, keep working on what you are putting out there and keep posting. The audience will build but you need to keep your eye on the real metrics to build upon. Getting started at anything is usually a slow process.

A Year of Changes

If you’ve been to this site before you may be shocked at what you’re seeing now. “Where’d the pictures go? I thought this was a photographer?” My apologies if that is you. Consider this just part of my changes.

Two years ago, I began the New Year with the plan to reconnect with my faith, communication with God, and decided I would lay my photography aside for at least the first ninety days. Ninety days has quite frankly turned into two years now. And while I still fantasize about the business dream from time to time, I simply don’t have the time due to the journey the Lord has set me on.

I would say that the Lord blessed my decision inlaying aside my photography dreams in 2018. I’d volunteered as a youth pastor for almost twenty years and then finally the paid director position opened up seemingly out of the blue at our church. In July 2018, I was hired on and immediately hit the ground running hard. This was my real dream job!

I jumped in with a Summer’s worth of activities that kept us hopping and breathed new life in the ministry at that church. We began a full renovation of the youth space, new curriculum for the year, and real communication efforts were being made. All in all, great improvements due to the passion I had for the ministry. Things were awesome!

Then another change hit, eventually coming to a head at the beginning of 2019. Various events, trainings, and a word from the Lord set me in a new, never dreamed of, direction. The Lord called me to plant a new kind of church. Our church, at the time, felt it better that I leave them in January to begin my journey, and in this I witnessed that the Lord was at work giving me the needed time off from that responsibility so that I could delve into this new journey.

In my “day job,” things also changed. My superior moved to a new position which then opened his position for me to move into. I did what was best and took the opportunity to move up as well. This too has been a blessing in many ways.

High overview

So all of this is why I’ve taken down the photos I’ve made over the past few years, and why I’ve left the photography business…for now. At the end of November we finally opened up our “basement” church in our home after spending a couple of months renovating it and making it ready for folks to come in.

I am so looking forward to the changes the Lord is going to bring in 2020 for us. What I hope to do here is provide encouragement and teachings that may help you in your journey. So, stay tuned and be praying for us if you don’t mind.

Peace and Merry Christmas to you and yours!