Life | Jason Vana

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Small Actions, Big Impact

June 13, 2011 in Life with 12 Appreciated Comments

This past weekend, I finally got around to watching a movie that has been sitting in my iTunes over a year, waiting to be watched – Defiance.

It’s the true story of the Bielski brothers, Jewish inhabitants in World War II Nazi-occuppied Eastern Europe, who escaped into the Belarussian forests and lived there for over three years. They ended up building a community in the forest, where Jews from all over Europe fled in order to hide from Nazi ghettos and concentration camps. They built homes, came up with systems for food and clothing, built a hospital and school, and lived in the midst of war.

They gave the Jews a life of freedom they could not experience anywhere in Europe – and they weren’t even planning to.

Entering the Brokenness

June 9, 2011 in Life with 11 Appreciated Comments

Over the past few days, I’ve come face to face with a lot of people’s brokenness.

I’ve had a few young men share their struggles with pornography with me. I’ve had a student of mine tell me she confronted her family about some issues, only to have it blow up in her face. I’ve read about friends trying to come outside the walls they’ve built up, facing the frustration of nagging sickness and trying to figure out how to handle relationships that are falling apart.

Brokenness is a part of our lives.

We all have our issues, our faults, our failures. We all have those areas where it seems we just can’t do anything right. We all suffer with the pains of betrayal and loss and dashed dreams.

We all are broken.

Birthing Hope in Darkness

June 7, 2011 in Life with 16 Appreciated Comments

The past few weeks, God has been teaching me about hope.

This hasn’t been some deep, theological study where I’ve pulled out my 500 pound concordance or multiple commentaries to get some historical background on the subject. I haven’t scoured the internet looking for other people’s thoughts on hope, or even looked up the original Hebrew and Greek meanings to get a better understanding of what the biblical authors meant when they said hope.

My lessons on hope haven’t come from study.

They came from learning to navigate through the betrayals and accusations, the unanswered prayers and the prayers answered with a simple “no,” the loss of dreams and loss of a livable income, the threat of losing loved ones and the plans that have gone askew. They were learned by being in circumstances of hopelessness, discouragement and fear.

They were learned through living.

Choose to Create, Not Criticize

June 6, 2011 in Life with 23 Appreciated Comments

Having been in church leadership for over eight years, I’ve ran across my fair share of complainers.

It seems no matter what you do, nothing is right. The music is too loud. Or too soft. Or that the small groups aren’t relational enough, or there isn’t enough studying going on. Maybe the youth group doesn’t do enough fun stuff, or it’s all fun and games and no teaching. Maybe the outreaches are too community service-oriented and not enough street preaching. Or maybe the bulletins aren’t fancy enough and giving off the wrong impression of your church. Maybe the sermons are too long, or too short, or too preachy and not enough teaching. Maybe there aren’t enough service opportunities, or you are being asked too often to serve. Maybe the walls aren’t the right color, the carpet isn’t plush enough or the entrance isn’t inviting enough.

Or maybe, just maybe, these people have grown tired of the whole church system and believe there is a better way of ministering to others.

At some point, we’ve all been there. We’ve complained about the way things are going, pointing out the faults and shortcomings in what is being done and taken the time to voice our opinions about what should be done.

We’ve all been the critic.

Rebirth

June 3, 2011 in Life with 18 Appreciated Comments

You probably can’t tell from this blog, but I love to write poems. It used to be the main way I would process my thoughts and emotions, before I started journaling and blogging.

There’s just something about sitting down with a notebook, working out your thoughts in a way that conveys what you’re thinking while also being artistic that appeals to me.

So today, I thought I would share one of my poems with you that holds a lot of meaning for me:

It sparked my return to Christ.

Back in December 1999, right before finals week my sophomore year of college, I was sitting in my dorm room, watching TV when all of a sudden, an idea popped in my head for a poem. As I jumped off my bed, grabbed a notebook and started scribbling, I didn’t even realize what was going on. I wrote this poem without knowing what it was about. I didn’t even know what “rebirth” meant at the time, but it stuck with me all Christmas break and sparked an interest to get involved in a Christian group on campus.

The rest, they say, is history.

Continue Reading…

A (Short) Break from Writing

May 31, 2011 in Life with 30 Appreciated Comments

Yesterday, I didn’t write a blog post.

I thought about it. I felt the discipline monster rise up in me and tell me I had to. I debated, I contemplated, I worried some blogging ninja would hunt me down and teach me a lesson (they do exist, you now). I evern wrote a post on Sunday that I could easily have published yesterday.

But in the end, I decided not to.

I had a lot going on this weekend. I didn’t want to have to write a post for Tuesday on my day off. I didn’t have two posts in me to write on Sunday to get ahead. But most importantly,

I needed a break.