Our Lamb Has Conquered

2011-12-16T05:00:00.000-05:00

Friday, December 16, 2011

I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. ~ Psalm 20:17

As Servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way: as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything. ~ 2 Corinthians 6: 4,10

Prayer: Enduring God, help us see past material possessions and wealth here on earth to center ourselves on serving you all the days of our lives. Even if we have nothing, we have all in you. Amen.

Thoughts: Today begins an experiment in trying to blog my thoughts and prayers of the Moravian Daily Text.

I laughed when I read the passage from Corinthians today, as we are truly in the middle of the Christmas shopping season. Our possessions, or often lack there of, can really be what defines us. And when it comes down to it, I know that I have more than I need. I have more food and clothes than I need. And past that, I have way more than what one really needs to live. Yet, even though I am not really poor in the worldly sense, I often feel rich/wealthy in the spiritual sense. And even though I feel that wealth, I am still shocked when others share that I help them feel rich in spiritual ways. It shocks me that I am able to do that, and it is my prayer that I continue to be able to do that as I serve others, who are often rich in possessions but poor in faith.

If Darwin Prayed

2011-03-22T15:05:00.001-05:00

Every so often, one stumbles across a new phrase which one didn't know, but upon reading and understanding it, immediately understands something you've believed all along. The phrase "evolutionary faith" is one which is going to make a major impact in coming years. As the emergent faith movement moves out of its infancy, and conservative faith realizes that its "young earth" theology is downright ridiculous, Christians of all sorts will begin to realize that deep faith is one which grows alongside other disciplines (such as science and technology) and does not see them as a threat to faith, but something which helps faith grow.

This book is a wonderful collection of a pastor's evolving prayers, which invokes his growing faith in Christ as one who calls us to grow and follow.

Check this book out if you like well written, thought(ful) provoking prayers.

http://ifdarwinprayed.com/

2011-02-26T13:47:00.003-05:00

2011-02-26T13:46:00.002-05:00

Sacred Unions, Sacred Passions: Book Review

2010-08-02T01:38:00.004-05:00

Growing up, I heard that Eskimo’s have over 100 different words for “snow”. That when your life is surrounded by snow, your language will reflect the subtle differences in the cold precipitation. It was somewhat comforting to think that at least one group of people could adequately describe something so central to their life.

Now that I am older, I know that this story I heard as a child is a myth. No group of people have 100 words for snow. But if there was one concept in life which is deserving of such an honour, it is love.

In his book, Sacred Union, Sacred Passions, Dan Brennan writes about how through the history of humanity, love has come to take on many forms. One of the least accepted forms in society is the male-female, non-sexual, relationship. This book highlights this under-developed, often misunderstood form of love in a world which desperately needs its strength.

As most “emergent” literature is today, this book takes aim at conservative Christianity, whose views of relationships and sexuality is behind the times. And while Brennan does a good job of keeping this to a minimum, while highlighting the numerous denominations who do a better job at male-female, non-sexual relationships, it is a good book to read if you are unsure as to what should be the role of people of the opposite gender in your life.

My only disappointment with this book is that it seemed to minimize the difficulties as well as the dangers of this type of friendship. In a modern world which focuses on the shallow view of human sexuality, we need direction on how to form these positive, Christ affirming relationships in such a way that sexual intercourse is not the desired outcome. (I hope this might be addressed and developed in a second book!)

Pick this book up... its worth it to help begin to change the world to have a more positive view of love, relationships and sexuality!

http://www.amazon.ca/Sacred-Unions-Passions-Engaging-Friendship/dp/0982580703/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280731568&sr=8-1

Feb 7, 2010

2010-02-07T00:12:00.001-05:00

Does anyone want to take a guess of the age of the average life expectancy is in Canada? 80.4 years is the answer. And sometimes I think we take for granted that we have such a long time to live, especially when it comes to Christianity. When we hear stories like the one we hear today, I think we’ve been told to imagine either some older teens or those who are in their young 20’s for those that Jesus called to be his disciples. While that seems “young” by our standards today, this was not the case in Jesus’ time.

The day that I moved into my first apartment in Seminary, I was introduced to a man named Meza, who was living in the building. He was from Tanzania and I was asked help show him around town, and help answer any questions he had about living in America. I was glad to help, as I was a former exchange student and knew what it was like moving into a new culture. This first introduction to Meza was something that was going to turn into a strong brotherhood. We would sit in each other’s apartments for hours while we were avoiding assignments, and allowed us to talk about all sorts of topics.

The name of the building we both lived in was called the Widow’s house, and was originally built in the mid 1700’s at the height of the Moravian choir system, where people lived according to their status in the community. The young men lived in the single brethren’s house, the singe women in the single sister’s house. The married couples lived together, and the widowed lived together in the Widow’s house. Widows had lived in that house for over 250 years. And the Moravian seminary had bought the building, but there was still 4 widow’s living there.

I remember that we celebrated the birthday of one of the widow’s one day, and after the celebration, I went back to Meza’s room to chat. Meza was amazed that this particular woman was celebrating her 90th birthday. Stuff like that just doesn’t happen often in Tanzania.

Naturally I asked my friend what the average life expectancy was in his country. He guessed that the average person in his home country lived to the ripe old age of 45. While this gave me a bit of a shock, what truly gave me shivers is that my friend was already in his mid 30’s. It struck me as very odd that Meza at 35 had already lived a great portion of his life.

Thankfully as I was doing research for this sermon, I looked up this info and found out that the average life expectancy in Tanzania was in fact 55, which gave me a huge sigh or relief, but it also showed that at the time of his birth, the age was 45. In nearly 4 decades now, with modern medicines and technology finally making its way to the middle of Africa, the life of the average person has extended 10 years.

I tried to look up this same statistic concerning Jesus’ time, and I found a wide variety of answers. While no one can be sure what the average life expectancy was in Jesus’ time, I think we can safely guess that it was in the mid 30’s. And when we combine that with the thought that most scholars believe Jesus to have began his ministry around the age of 30,

Even though we might be tempted to view Jesus and these first disciples as being on the younger side of things, we need to realize that they were, at the age of 17, already done with half of their lives.

I tell you all of this because it is my hope that you would be able to identify with the calling of these first disciples. Here they are, at the end of a long day of work with nothing to show for it. They’ve thrown out their nets a hundred times. And found little success. So they came into shore, and began to clean their nets. All those attempts must have meant they caught a lot of seaweed. So in comes Jesus, noticing a bunch of folks along the shore, he decides to use one of the fisherman’s boats to preach from. So these fishermen get to listen to the word of God as they finish their day. No one knows if Jesus finished preaching or if the fishermen wanted their boat back, but at this point, Peter and Jesus begin to interact. He challenges Peter and his comrades to go back out into the water.

At first, Peter complains. I love this part, because it fits in with my personality so well. I am inherently lazy. I don’t want to do more work at the end of an unproductive day. I’d rather just go do something else. Relax with friends, go watch a movie…something other than what I’ve been doing all day.

So Peter and his buddies go back out. Going back out means a couple things... First, it means having faith in what Jesus says. We all know about this. Having Faith in Jesus is nothing new. What’s infinitely more important is that after we have faith in Jesus, after a long day of fruitless labor, that we go out and follow what Jesus wants for us, we’re suddenly knee deep in fish, which means we’re knee deep in work. They have so much work to do that they have to call others over to help them.

Once they got back, their work wasn’t finished. Most of the markets for the day would probably be closed, and they would have had to finish salting their catch late into the night. There was a lot of extra’s that came from following Jesus command.

Now we have Peter and crew coming in from a catch so large that his boat was sinking as it came in. When it says that Peter fell to his knee’s, we might be able to imagine that Peter landed on his catch. And as he did so, he said “Go away from me!”

But Get away from me is a poor translation of the Greek. A better translation of Peter is “Get out of my neighborhood!” Peter realized that Jesus was going to have them doing a lot more than they were used to doing. And his initial reaction was to make Jesus leave so it wouldn’t be his problem.

Jesus then answers… “Don’t be afraid”. With that answer, Jesus realizes that Peter is scared of the possibilities Jesus offers. There is a common thought that people are afraid of change. This is far from true. The world changes all the time. We are not afraid of change, we are afraid of loss! The loss that they were afraid of is the loss of what they knew. One of the reasons I am always afraid of change is because it will mean that I can no longer be as lazy as I’d like to be. Following Jesus means a loss of who we are and what we are used to. Even though Jesus is telling us not to be afraid, surely we will be afraid with the changes that will happen when Jesus calls us to catch people.

This church has been fishing for a long while, and rarely have we caught enough fish to feed ourselves. We are at the stage where we are listening to Jesus on the shore, cleaning our nets. And I truly believe that sometime in the near future, Jesus is going to call us to go out can cast our nets again and we are going to be surprised with what we come up with. Jesus is going to give us a lot of work to do when we catch for him. Until then, we must work on our nets. The things essential to who we are. We need to find ways to strengthen our prayer life. We must be hospitable and generous enough to let Christ use our boats, and we must listen at the foot of Christ, listening to the word of God.

Join me in prayer:

Loving God, you have come to us in your Son Jesus Christ, you have given us your Holy Scripture as that which we are to listen to as we go about our daily tasks. We know that in the future, you will ask us to cast out our nets among the people. We pray that when the time comes, you will find us willing to follow you. Until that time comes, we sit at your feet and will listen with open ears to that which you would have us hear. Amen

The Diversity Culture Book Review

2009-09-30T14:40:00.003-05:00

http://viralbloggers.com/2009/08/the-diversity-culture-by-matthew-raley/

The book written by Matthew Raley entitled The Diversity Culture: Creating Conversations of Faith with Buddhist Baristas, Agnostic Students, Aging Hippies, Political Activists, and Everyone in Between is certainly one which seems to have a lot of expectations just from the title. Yet Raley’s book does not cover any of these specific groups, but wonderfully groups them under the umbrella of the “Diversity Culture”.

Written by a person who does not feel at home in any particular category, but would perhaps best identify with conservative evangelicals, he does a fantastic job of pointing out where they have failed in this new individually tailored culture.

In the past, the evangelical community has attempted to reach out to the people they do not quite understand by using marketing systems which were popular a decade or more ago (us church folks are always a bit behind the curve). Instead of calling for us to catch up with the curve, Raley dares us to disregard the curve altogether and replace it with Jesus’ model which comes from the Gospel of John, chapter 4 where Jesus encounters the Samaritan woman at the well.

Instead of using outdated marketing strategies which people in the Diversity Culture will smell a mile away, Raley points out three different kinds of confrontations which he feels Jesus used, which go from subtle to blunt. First is to give a new point of view. Second is to decline to agree with excuses. Third is to define options. All of these options are ones which Jesus employed with the woman at the well, which led to her declaring that Jesus is the Christ.

This is not a book for someone looking for a quick answer to convert someone who does not believe in the same things you do, although the sub title might seem to imply it. Using Jesus as a model for conversion is not an easy task, but reading this book will help give you the confidence and biblical background necessary to take on the hard job ahead.

Pentecost Sermon

2009-06-04T14:19:00.002-05:00

Today is an exciting day in the Christian calendar… so exciting that most of you are wearing the colour red as a reminder of what day it is. Today we celebrate Pentecost. 50 days after the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. 10 days after his ascension into heave. Today is the day we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit, the day the 12 apostles received the gift of tongues, the day which some argue as the first day Christianity became an actual religion. It is a day we celebrate the completion of the Trinity. Truly this is an important day for us to remember.

Now, for those of you who do not know, I have just recently graduated from Moravian Theological Seminary. I have spent the last 3 years studying scripture, learning how to preach and teach and look at things from a theological perspective. Most of the time, this ought to give me an advantage in understanding the Scripture, but in this instance, I’m not sure if it really does. You see, it seems that for those who are theologically trained, it is easier for us to identify with the 12 disciples who had tongues of fire come and rest on them. That’s the reason we pastors ask you to wear red on days like this. We want you to identify with the disciples like we do.

Unfortunately I don’t think most people identify with the 12. I don’t think we really grasp the concept of speaking in tongues…otherwise we probably wouldn’t be in the Moravian church this morning, we would be in a Pentecostal church, watching others around us speaking in tongues. The question then becomes who do we identify with? How does the story of Pentecost become the story of us?

I think we best identify with the crowd…the ones who gathered in bewilderment at the strange sound that apparently emanated from those flaming tongues. Perhaps we even are a part of the crowds who proclaimed that the disciples have had too much wine. We are the ones who listened to Peter, the rock on which Jesus shall build the church, who heard the words

“People of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. ¹⁵Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. ¹⁶No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ¹⁷‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. ¹⁸Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy. ¹⁹And I will show marvelous things in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist. ²⁰The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day. ²¹Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’

That everyone that Peter and Joel were referring to is you and I. Now, the Scripture which we read today ends without telling us what happens to the crowd. In fact, most of the Book of Acts focuses more on what happened to the apostles rather than the regular people. Its only natural for a story to focus on the people who received those flaming tongues… but it means we are stuck as congregations knowing how to function. Now over the past 2000 or so years, we’ve developed complex systems of how we “do” church. We have pages and pages of bylaws, we have unwritten rules of what it means to be a member of each and every one of our congregations… yet often we fail to look at the end of the second chapter of the book of Acts to use as a guide in how to do church.

Verses 42 through 47 state that “they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous sings were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and good, they gave to anyone as they had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.”

Now, there is a growing movement in Christianity today to get back to this type of church. The idea of communal living and helping their neighbors in a sort of new monastic movement has really caught on. In fact, next fall Moravian seminary is going to have a special guest lecture by Shane Claiborne, a person who is leading an intentional community of believers who seek to make a difference in Kensington Philadelphia. Yet, as appealing as this idea might be to some, I don’t think the answer to identifying with the first century church is to act in the same manner as much as possible. Instead the answer lies in the gospel text we heard this morning.

From John 16:13 we hear that “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”

This means that the answer to being a successful church, the answer to the question of how we identify with the crowd of believers at the very first Pentecost is to be led by the Holy Spirit. To be led into the truth. This should be both an exciting and scary journey. To be led by the Spirit means that we must be willing to go to places we never thought we would go before. Remember how I had previously said that when we pastors ask you to wear red, its usually because we want you to identify with the disciples? When you look at the red that you are wearing, you should instead identify with being led by the spirit as a community of believers.

There are really only two keys which I believe the early church gives us as a model to being led by the Spirit today. The first is the breaking of bread and the second is prayer. Take a moment to look at the family on your right and on your left. When was the last time you broke bread with them and prayed with them in a place other than church? When was the last time that together you sought to help their neighbors who had a particular need? Our challenge is to get to know one another as brothers and sisters in Christ so that we may share what we have with those who need it. I don’t know what the needs of those around you are. The only way we find out is through time together and prayer and then a willingness to follow the Spirit’s answer.

I trust that the Spirit is going to lead this congregation to do amazing things in the west side of Bethlehem. The only thing we have to do is follow.

Book Review

2009-05-12T13:54:00.004-05:00

I have recently joined a website which allows me to read books on Christianity with a postmodern twist for free, with the catch that within 30 days of receiving the book, I must write a 50+ word review of it.

The first book I received was Spirituality by Carl McColman and the following is the review I wrote.

The idea that more and more people are open to spirituality which does not come directly from the Christian church seems to be the purpose behind the 10 year reprint of Carl McColman’s book Spirituality: A Postmodern and Interfaith Approach to Cultivating a Relationship with God.

As I began reading, I must say that I found the introduction as well as the first three chapters to be rather circular. Instead of saying anything with deep interest, McColman would dance around topics like Breathing, Tillage, and Wonder by providing the etymology (the study of the origins of a word) in order to broaden the readers definition. This is helpful, but too often I found the author talking about all the different sides and angles which spirituality can take, which leads me to wonder if there is a proper path in seeking spirituality. I would guess that McColman believes any path of spirituality is a positive one.

The most interesting parts of the book are when the author writes out of his personal experience. Unfortunately these stories are too few and lead me to wonder if his spiritual experiences connect in any particular way, or if they are simply a string of experiences which lead him to act in new ways. Instead of allowing the reader to drink deeply of his own spiritual journey, we are stuck with snippets of a journey which is probably much more interesting than said or has not been reflected upon long enough to be of meaning to others.

As McColman has written other books in the “An Idiots Guide” series, I am left feeling that a better title would have been “An Idiots Guide to Spirituality”. For that is truly what this book is. The subtitle is misleading, as postmodern and interfaith are mere buzz words to catch a particular audience. Purchase this book only if you feel your knowledge of the spiritual is very low or very narrow.

An Easter Meditation

2009-04-12T13:29:00.000-05:00

Love wins.

Say it with me…

“Love wins!”

We are about to go outside to watch the sun rise on this Easter morning. This is not a victory of good over evil, or life over sin. When we go outside and feel the sun on our face this morning, we are witness to the fact that love wins.

I’m going to read some short passages of scripture and when I prompt you, I’m going to ask that we end each reading with the phrase; LOVE WINS.

Matthew 5:43-44

"You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But Jesus says to us, Love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.” From this we know: LOVE WINS

Matthew 22:36-39

Someone asked: "Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?" Jesus said to him, " "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' From these commandments, we know that: “LOVE WINS”

John 13:35

By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." This morning we declare that: LOVE WINS

John 15:9-17

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. We are your friends and will continue to abide in the fact that: LOVE WINS

Romans 5:8

But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. This morning as we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection, we are witness to the fact that: LOVE WINS

Romans 8:35-39

What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered." No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Even though these things will try to separate us from Christ’s love, we know that: LOVE WINS

1^st Corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have 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, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.

But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we have seen face to face that: LOVE WINS

Let us now go outside to finish the Easter Morning Liturgy and proclaim with every fiber of our being that LOVE WINS.

No Turning Back

2009-03-29T12:29:00.001-05:00

Have you all seen the latest Geico commercial? The one where the CEO of the company is chatting with the gecko mascot about how when people hear the name of the company, they associate it with the term “trust” and then he gets out from behind his desk and decides to try one of those “trust falls” where he expected the little gecko to catch him safely. The obvious joke is that a tiny lizard is incapable of catching a human being, no matter how much trust there is in their relationship.

I really like this commercial, mainly because in my own life, I have a difficult time trusting others in activities like these. During my many years at Camp Hope, I participated in many of these trust falls… and being a heavier guy, when I knew this was going to take place, I always did my best to pair up with someone I knew who could catch me. The only way I could place my trust in being caught was if I first placed my trust in the fact that the catcher had the right amount of strength. I always picked the right partner to catch me, and thus never ended up falling on my backside.

When I went to college, I ended up joining a fraternity, and part of being in my particular fraternity meant quite a lot of time being blindfolded as we awaited our fraternity rituals. I could never tell if the fraternity just had cheap blindfolds of if I had a really big nose, but there was always a slight gap between the blindfold and my face, allowing me to see a small amount of the ground in front of me. I remember just before the ritual which made us pledges in the fraternity, as I was being led in a blindfold, the brother stopped us and whispered into my ear: “Do you trust the brotherhood?” Of course I answered yes. Now, perhaps it was because I could see, even if it was the smallest of slivers, but I’m not sure what I would have said if I had been in complete darkness.

I share these things with you because I think it makes sense to look at the second half of today’s lesson before we look at the first. Here we have Jesus talking about being the light and that the apostles would have the light with them for only a little while longer. This isn’t exactly a statement which the apostles want to hear. If you believe the Messiah is with you, the last thing you expect him to say is that he’s leaving. Then Jesus speaks these words which we find in verse 35 and 36… “You are going to have the light just a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, before darkness over takes you. The man who walks in the dark does not know where he is going. Put your trust in the light while you have it, so that you may become children of light.” (NIV)

“Put your trust in the light while you have it.” Now that’s a statement which makes a lot of sense to me, given my own experiences, and I hope it does for you as well. We all know that it is easier to trust when we can see what’s going on and this reminder that Jesus gives comes directly after Jesus talks about the death of a seed. Now, obviously we understand the concept that a seed must “die” and be buried in order to grow and produce fruit. This is the essence of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. The light of the world is now telling his apostles that he is going to die in order to be glorified…and that those who will follow him will do likewise so that they too may glorify Jesus.

When Philip and Andrew go to speak with Jesus on behalf of their Greek friends, I’m not so sure they were expecting the reply they got. One scholar[1] calls this passage the point of no return for the apostles, and I’m just guessing here, but I think when the apostles heard what Jesus said, their throat tightened a bit and there was a knot in their stomach. They wanted to follow Jesus, but for the first time, they now realized their lives were on the line… they had crossed the point of no return.

This whole concept of crossing the point of no return is one which defines all of our lives and we have all had these moments. Maybe it was a moment of putting a large amount of your financial savings into a somewhat risky investment. Maybe it was taking a new job. Maybe it was when you said your wedding vows… It’s similar to riding a roller coaster… Initially you strap yourself in and then the coaster begins to move up the big hill… as you slowly make your way to the top, there are these stairs along the side which might give you some thought that if you did something crazy enough, you could get the roller coaster to stop and then walk down those stairs to the safety of the ground below. The point of no return comes when you are no longer being pulled up to the top, but the first cart has made it over the top of the hill and you are no longer in control of your own destiny.

This roller coaster which Jesus and the apostles were riding has just come to the pinnacle of the tallest drop. Even Jesus points out that he is a bit nervous and yet is doing this completely for the glory of God. God even recognizes this fact and tells them that God has glorified it and will do so again.

The season of Lent is full of drama… we are descending in Holy Week, a time of defeat, destruction, and betrayal. It is by no means for the faint of heart. Just as roller coasters come with a warning for those with heart conditions, Lent should have a similar warning for the followers of Jesus. That warning reads: “Those who love their life will lose it, while those who hate their lives in this world will keep it for eternity.”

This is a scary warning and I must admit that, continuing with the roller coaster metaphor, I have not yet gotten on the ride. Yet, I feel as if I am standing in the line, watching others get ahead of me. I smile politely as I let others get in front of me. I’m not fully ready to give up my own life to God’s glory and I think God knows that about me right now. God knows where we each are standing in line. I think God knows that some of us might never take the ride and that’s ok. I think God is excited because God knows that soon some of us are going to strap ourselves in for the ride of our lifetime. It all gets back to the issue of trust, which is ultimately a means for reconciliation. We get on that roller coaster because we long to take the same path which Jesus took. We long to see him after our ride is completed. We long to see our loved ones who have already completed their trip. In the end, we long to go home to a God who is so glad that we took a risk and rode the scariest ride at the amusement park.

[1] "The Point of No Return," Rev. Bethany Hull Somers, Preacher's Magazine, 2009.

A poem.

2009-02-16T15:28:00.002-05:00

This poem was given to me by two very good friends...

Old Clothes

Do you mind me approaching You in old clothes, Master?

They are so comfortable and easy.

Baggy where they need to be

they give when I move.

They are so much part of me that

I don't need to think about them.

New clothes make me self-conscious and so very careful about stains and creases.

When I go out in my new outfit

my thoughts revolve around myself.

How I look and feel,

how others think I look,

what impression I am giving.

But when I'm in my old clothes my thoughts are free,

they fly in all directions

often winging their way to You, Lord.

So You won't mind if I don't dress up to talk to You?

It's no sign of disrespect

but rather of my belief in Your understanding

heart,

Your generous acceptance of me

Just As I Am

without frills or fancies.

Thank you, Lord, for that freedom.

Grace... Its How We Live.

2009-02-15T13:52:00.004-05:00

I don't know about you, but when I hear the word grace, the first thing which comes to mind is the short prayer my brother and I are asked to say prior to every meal when we eat as a family at home. My brother and I to this day still say the same grace we were taught as children, although my favourite one comes from the one time my grandfather was asked to say grace. If I remember correctly, it was "Through the lips, past the gums, watch out stomach, here it comes, yay God!" I later learned from him that it was the "yay God" part which made it an official prayer.

Other than meal times, the word grace isn't used all that often in our every day lives. Sometimes we use the words gracious, which can mean pleasantly kind, benevolent, and courteous, merciful or compassionate[1] and we usually reserve this word for someone who does something nice for us which we didn't expect. To be gracious, or to extend grace, really means to do something which the unexpecting person does not anticipate.

The only other time I can really remember hearing the word grace on a regular basis is in our communion liturgies where we hear the words "Grace, Mercy, and Peace, from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ..." If you're anything like me, perhaps you have not really given much thought to the word grace and what it means to us as everyday followers of Jesus.

Of course, then again there's Amazing Grace, which is the theme for today and is the focal point of the message to be shared by the middle school students here in a bit. We're going to learn about John Newton, the author of the song we all know and love. Grace was something very real to him in a way which we may or may not understand. Not all of us have the same life and death situations in which grace is bestowed upon us in such a magnificent way. Not all of us go around the world as a part of our job stealing other human beings from their towns, live on a boat for long periods of time, subject to the waves of the sea. Not all of us make decisions which directly effect whether another human being will live or die. John Newton made such decisions on a regular basis as a young man and was amazed that God would extend grace to a person like himself. The grace which God extends isn't amazing in and of itself, the amazing part is that we figure it out that it has been ours the whole time.

There's one more way which the church uses the word grace, and its normally used by those of us who consider ourselves well versed in theology. It comes from one of the great theologians of our time, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who in his book, The Cost of Discipleship, makes a distinction between cheap grace and costly grace.

"Cheap grace means the justification of sin without the justification of the sinner. Grace alone does everything, they say, and so everything can remain as it was before."[2]

In a nutshell, it means that means when we ask for God's forgiveness and do not believe we need to repent from what we are doing, then we live our lives expecting God's grace to be cheap.

"Costly grace on the other hand is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a person their life, and it is grace because it gives a person the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin and grace because it justifies the sinner."[3]

That last quote about costly grace isn't exactly an easy one to understand, and if you did understand after hearing it only once, I must say I'm impressed. I wrote that sentence as I was working an overnight at St. Luke’s hospital and after I wrote it, I stood up to take a break as to how I could explain such a complex concept in more understandable terms. As I was walking around the pastoral care office, looking at people's pictures on their desks, I came across a pin in the shape of a ribbon which said: "It's the way you live!"

I want you to repeat that after me "It's the way you live!" Real grace transforms the way we live our lives. Cheap grace merely pays lip service to change. This costly grace is the first step in what I like to call the grace chain. You see, I believe, and I hope that you do too, that bestowing grace is just a part of God’s nature. When we accept that grace, we chose not only to accept it, but to live in a state of grace, which means that we are transformed from the way we used to live and show the rest of the world that we no longer live the way we used to. Hopefully the grace chain does not only end there, but that as we live transformed lives, others take notice and become curious as to why we live and act the way we do. Then we get to share the story of the grace we accepted from Jesus Christ.

Now, I realize that we are all in different stages of our walk with Christ. But I thought it would be a wonderful opportunity in worship this morning for us each to have the chance to lay something on the communion table later on during the time to pray. While the offering is collected, I’d like you to think of something you’d like to accept God’s grace on… something that you’d like to offer…something that you’d no longer like to live with. If there’s something in your life that you have already offered to God, and you’d like to write it down as a reminder that you’ve already given it over to God, feel free to do that too. There is a blank index card in each of your bulletins. If you so desire, I'd like you to write that thing on your card which you desire to place on the alter. You will be invited to come forward during our time of prayer.

Let us now not only offer our financial offering, but let us also contemplate that in our lives which we would like to give over to God as we seek to accept God’s grace.

Let us pray… God of grace, so often we forget how amazing you are and so often we are afraid of what our lives will be like in the freedom which can only be found in you. Thank you for all you have given us and thank you for everything you will continue to give. Give us strength to continue to show that same grace to our neighbors and to our enemies. It is that grace which will change the world from one of hate into one of love. From despair to one of reconciliation. From a world of laws to a world of peace and justice. Now let us spend time in silence, and for those of us who desire, let us come and bring up our cards with that which we desire to place in your hands, giving it up for you to bear for us.

Harmonious to Dwell

2009-01-24T15:39:00.002-05:00

Today was a long time coming... About a year ago, Brother David Melby-Gibbons and I were talking out in the hallway about Moravian music and how important it is to our worship. As we are both interested in church planting, we were dreaming up ways to take our wonderful Moravian theology, which comes mainly from our hymns, and looking for new ways to play them in worship settings which would not normally have an organ as the main instrument.

After a lot of prayer and thought, an event/group which David named "Harmonious to Dwell" was formed. With the wonderful gifts of David and his wife Christie, Shanti Pradhan, Nola Reed Knause, and Gwyn Michaels, the event was amazing... when God leads, amazing things happen.

We began with worship in which we looked at a number of our favourite Moravian hymns and listened to them in new ways. Then at our prayer time, we each took a coloured balloon according to our musical gifts, filled it with our breath and prayers, and broke into small groups based on the many gifts we each brought to the table. Then we spent 30 minutes or so taking a beloved Moravian hymn and re-imagined it with new words, tune, and or music. It was amazing to hear. (Hopefully I'll be able to load the video of each song)

Then we had a presentation on how to write hymns and a session on the importance of copyright laws and resources. Then we stopped for a quick pizza lunch, and broke out again into small groups, this time with the intention of writing a completely new hymn. Our theme was Faith, Love and Hope and the tune we chose to help guide us was that of 538 (For the Beauty of the Earth).

Here is the hymn which was written by the group! We hope you enjoy it. And we hope you feel free to use it in your own congregational setting.

~ New Creation to Behold ~ (this hymn is sung to the tune of 538 of the Moravian Book of Worship)

Long ago, hearts filled with praise; fathers, mothers were ablaze.
As we travel on today, in faith trusting for the Way.
This blest gift now soothes the soul, heals, forgives and makes all whole.

Wand'ring daily, place to place, hoping we might glimpse God's face.
Love for others lives in us, as we follow Christ Jesus.
God is love that casts out fear, love that brings the kin(g)dom* near.

God's law: love to free us all, from our own despair and shame.
Loving God but harming kin, we repent in Jesus' name.
Through Your love, empower all, to fulfill this sacred call.

Humble Presence, spirit-known, with the love of God's grace shown.
Hope propels us to the day when the old has passed away.
As Your story we unfold, new creation to behold.

* We have written "kingdom" this way to emphasize "kin"

The hopes and fears of all the years...

2008-12-28T14:38:00.002-05:00

I found it very difficult to get "in the Christmas spirit" this year. Perhaps it was the stress of writing my most important paper of my seminary career, or perhaps it was learning a new language I will rarely use, or maybe it was the fact that it seems that the Christmas season started so early that I automatically turned myself off from wanting to be in the good and cheerful Christmas mood. Perhaps you had similar feelings this season. Maybe you had to run around getting everything ready so your family would have the perfect holiday that you were unable to experience it the way you wanted. Perhaps a loved one was brought to the more immediate presence of our Savior, and that made the season especially difficult. There are many reasons we all have for not experiencing Advent and Christmas the way we hope to. I'm not going to pretend to have any answers to why this season is sometimes the most difficult. I don't think there is an easy answer for everyone, but I must say that I took comfort in reading the scripture passages for today.

I took comfort because I have come to realize that the words of prophets while seemingly daunting and perhaps even scary, have a strange comfort for me. The prophet Isaiah was the voice of some of the most prophetic visions of the coming Christ and those visions were not exactly what we would consider warm and mushy visions of God. Between the 50^th and 53^rd chapters of Isaiah, we get the following prophecies. Isaiah saw visions of the Savior who would be beaten, mocked and spit on, (50:6) One who would be rejected and despised by people (53:1-3) One who would die for our sins (53:4-6) and be "numbered with the transgressors" (53:12). While these visions might seem to be dark and sad, we still have Isaiah who greatly rejoices in the Lord…his whole being shall exult in God. For someone who has seen such terrible visions and has dreamed terrible dreams, we learn that the prophet still has this amazing hope because in the end, he knows the purpose behind it all.

That brings us to the Gospel of Luke, which is filled with prophecy from the time of Moses to the very moment Jesus was blessed. The author of the text wants to make an important point to show us that Simeon was "Guided by the Spirit". This is crucial to understanding the text because it means to tell us that the next words are not his words, but are words which are far greater than he could ever come up with on his own.

To understand Simeon's context, I want you to imagine the baptism of a small child or the confirmation of a young adult in our own church. This would be the part where the pastor lays their hands on the child and gives a word of blessing. Only we pastors today try to speak only positive words in order to bless. Rarely, if ever, do we hear a pastor say negative words in a blessing, which I'm guessing is because we as pastors are scared that they might come true and therefore we only stick to the good, positive blessings. The Holy Spirit doesn't allow him to do that. That is the sense of humor of God. It had been revealed to Simeon that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Messiah. I'm pretty sure that he might have worked on what words he would say for a long, long time. I know I wouldn't leave those important words to chance. I'd be stuttering the whole time. So imagine Simeon, a very old man who knew that he would be dying soon, once he saw this child, wanting to say the words he had been rehearsing for years…perhaps even decades, and the Holy Spirit giving him new words to say right then and there.

When we think of the most famous words which the Spirit has spoken, we think of "This is My Son, whom I love, with Him I am well pleased".(Matthew 3:17) But we rarely think of this sentence which comes from Simeon… "This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed – and a sword will pierce your own soul too."

These aren't easy words to swallow and its my guess that we rarely think of them concerning our Lord and Savior, yet here they are, confronting us this morning. These words are quite scary if you think about them. The words speak of the rising and falling of many…about our inner thoughts being revealed…and a sword will pierce our own souls…

I want everyone to open up their hymnal and turn to page 282…we're going to sing only the first verse of this hymn.

"O Little Town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie;

Above thy deep and dreamless sleep, the silent stars go by.

Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting light;

The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight."

The last line of this verse of one of our favourite Christmas hymns sums up well the words which Simeon speaks. The hopes and fears of all the years are met in Christ. They will cause the rise and fall of many…our inner thoughts will be revealed… and a sword will pierce our souls. Until this spring, I would have told you that these thoughts scared me too. The idea that Christ is the sign who will reveal our inner thoughts really and truly scared me. No one knew my sins. I had gone my whole life thinking that God knew my sins and that was ok…no one else needed to know…and on some level, no one ever asked me to confront my own sins. This April, I spent a few days with Brother Jim Hicks, the president of the western district. We went out into the woods of Wisconsin for one afternoon and there my brother confronted me with the fact that I am a sinful man and I tell you it was difficult. It wasn't much of a two sided conversation…mostly because I sat there realizing that if I wasn't going to allow my sin to be revealed, I was not going to be effective as a pastor, as a leader, or even as a Christian. We spent a few hours outside in the cold of the Wisconsin spring…most of the time we just sat in the silence…I think we were both thinking of our sins and how we need to be revealing them to one of our fellow sisters or brothers in Christ.

"A parent who loves their child knows there are times when the child will be angry at them for being corrected. A mature parent takes no comfort in rebuke. A mature Christian takes no pleasure in preaching repentance or challenging Christian infants that they are stagnant in their faith. Yet, the mature parent or Christian is willing to operate if necessary—even if the razor is double-sided; even when the pain is deep."[1] Brother Hicks did that for me earlier this year…and I am eternally grateful to him for it.

As this year ends, I hope that you have someone who will help you confront your sins. Perhaps you have already had someone do that in your life…if you've had someone do that with you, I'd love to hear your story. If you haven't. I hope you can look around this room and realize that there are people who will love you no matter what your sins are. As this year comes to an end and a new one begins, we must realize that while our fears are realized in Christ, so is our hope. When the sword pierces our own soul, we become part of the many who will rise in Israel. This is an amazing blessing which has come to the world…In our own dark streets, shines the everlasting light of Christ. A few days ago when you held up that bees wax candle, you signaled to the world that you wanted to be confronted by the light of Christ. That you wanted you sins to be seen by Christ so that they can be forgiven. It is my hope that you will all continue to shine that light into the world…confronting and being confronted in this new year. Amen.

[1] One Family Outreach Jerry Goebel. http://onefamilyoutreach.com/bible/Luke/lk_02_22-40.html

Christ the King 2008

2008-11-23T14:17:00.001-05:00

Does anyone here know the name Carl Gustav? No? Let me tell you some of his titles, perhaps it will help you figure out who he is. Carl Gustav is the Lord and Master of the Order of the Seraphim. He is Lord and Master of the Order of the Sword. He is the Commander Grand Cross of the Order of the White Rose. He is the Grand Cross of the Order of the Redeemer. Did that help any of you? Well, Carl Gustav is more commonly known as the King of Sweden and during my senior year of high school, I lived in his kingdom. Have any of you lived in a kingdom?

Fortunately for me, Carl Gustav isn’t a king with any real powers. Most of his duties are ceremonial, but for the most part, people still admire and respect him. Because of this, I don’t really know what living under the authority of a king with actual power is like. I don’t know what it would be like to live in a kingdom where the last and final word was that of the King. In fact, as Americans, on some level, we are taught that to disagree with our leaders is a positive attribute. I’m going to go ahead and assume that most of us have disagreed with our out going president at some point in the last 8 years.

Over the past few weeks, I have had the opportunity to ponder what it would be like to live under another person’s kingship. What came to mind was the fact that whether or not we actually know the king on a personal level, we would undoubtedly know what the King expects of us. Whether out of love or fear, we would most likely do things which would please the King in order to gain his favour. We would know which laws were in place for the good of the public, and which laws were considered treasonous and going against the good will of the monarchy. All of these things would help to keep us in line, doing the things which would please our ruler.

This sounds well and good if our King is good. If our King isn’t so good, it might be rather unpleasant. Now, at this point, after hearing the gospel lesson for today, as well as listening to my sermon so far, it might be fairly safe to assume that you know where my sermon is going to go from here. Perhaps you’re thinking that I’m going to talk about feeding the hungry, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, and taking care of and visiting the sick. These things are the heart of the good news, and after spending just a few months here in this congregation, I can honestly say that you are doing your best to live it out. Through the new Angel Food ministry program, you are seeking ways to provide food to the hungry. I’ve witnessed how you all have welcomed Christie, previously a stranger, into the life of this congregation. It is evident that you all care about orphans in Africa who cannot clothe themselves, and you are raising money to do that. And every week since I’ve been here, in the announcements, I hear about the concentrated effort the church is making in order to reach out to those who have not been here in a while, and while that’s not being sick in the traditional sense, it is certainly sick in the spiritual sense. Congratulations. You are all doing things which are at the heart of God’s kingdom.

Now I’d like everyone to open their bulletin and pull out the nametag and either slip it into the nametag you’re currently wearing or stick it somewhere on your shirt. Each one of you is now wearing the name Jesus. I ask you to wear it now to remind you of two things. First is to remind you that you as a part of this congregation are doing your best to live in a way which Jesus, our King, desires. The second thing is to remind you that when someone outside these walls, who doesn’t know what Jesus’ Kingdom is all about, realizes that you are a member of this Kingdom, they do not see the same thing as you.

The question I hope you are asking yourself is: “What do they see when they come to realize that I am living in God’s kingdom?” Unfortunately sisters and brothers, the answer is not nearly as positive as the way we see ourselves.

There’s a book out by two authors entitled “unchristian: What a new generation really thinks about Christianity… and why it matters.”

The authors identify six different areas which non-Christians use as reasons for not becoming a part of the body of the church. They say that the church is hypocritical, too focused on getting people saved, that we are anti-homosexual, we are too sheltered, that we are too political, and that we are too judgmental.

These are the six main perceptions of Christians from those who are not Christians. Some of them are true, some are not, but whether or now we think they are true, it is how we, followers of Christ, are perceived.

The first is that we are Hypocritical, which is the perception that Christians say one thing but live something entirely different. To be fair, we are all, at some point, hypocrites, but as people living in God’s kingdom, we are held to a higher standard by those outside the faith. There’s a story about a 24 year old single mother who went into a church, and she found that lots of advice and thoughts were shared with her, but the church members kept reminding her that she had no husband, and that she ought to have one…unfortunately, some of them were divorced and the young mother took those giving her advice to be hypocrites. This perception needs to be changed. We as people living in God’s kingdom need to work at being transparent about our flaws and act first, talk second. (pg 41)

The second perception is that we are insincere about loving people and concerned with only converting others. As Moravians, I’m going to guess that most of you feel that we’re really low on the “Christians who try to convert others” scale. This is probably a safe thing to say, but we are called to make others disciples of Christ. The question is not if we should be doing it, but how we go about doing it. Our new perception must be that we are people who cultivate relationships and environments where others can be deeply transformed by God. (pg 67)

The third perception is that we Christians show contempt for gay’s and lesbians. As I’m sure anyone who watches the news, this is a center issue, known as proposition 8, in California. It is church members who have funded the opposition to this bill, and now the homosexual population are especially hostile towards people of faith. As people in Christ’s kingdom, we are to show compassion and love to all people, regardless of their lifestyle. We don’t have to agree with them, but we must love them. (91)

The fourth perception is that we are very sheltered. Non Christians consider us boring, unintelligent, old-fashioned, and out of touch with reality. They consider Christians to be caught in a Christian “Bubble”. Raise your hands if you think you have more non-Christian friends than Christian friends? This is one of the toughest battles we face as we grow in faith. The longer we are Christians, the fewer non Christian friends one has. The new perception we must cultivate is that we as Christians are engaged, informed, and offer sophisticated responses to the issues people face in their every day life. (121).

The fifth perception is that we are too political. This definitely comes from what we now know as the “religious right”. Currently, there is a movement of the religious left which is trying to gain momentum as a response to the conservative movement. If you’re a part of my Sunday School class, you would know that we’re looking at different ways which Jesus was political but how we might not be a member of a particular political party. We must be characterized by respecting people, thinking biblically, and finding solutions to complex issues. (153)

The sixth and finally perception is that we are too judgmental. We are seen as prideful and quick to find fault in others. It is unfortunate that we do this. The truth is that we are all judgmental. The Children’s Chat today was a thinly veiled attempt to point out how we are judgmental about things like clothing, lifestyle, anything which makes a difference between “us and them”. The new perception we must show the world is that we show grace to the world by finding the good in others and see their potential to be Christ followers. (181)

Perhaps you are now wondering, after all these things have been identified, why I think they are important. After all, I have already mentioned what is at the heart of the Gospel. If we’re doing the work of Jesus, what does it matter what others may think? It matters because if we cannot begin to overcome our image, we will have trouble fulfilling another commandment Jesus gave us, which is to make more disciples. If the negative perceptions and realities of the citizens of God’s kingdom (that’s code for you and me) are mainly what people see when they know we belong to Christ, then we cannot begin to make them disciples, and therefore, cannot have them join us in doing the work of the kingdom.

As I come to an end of this sermon, we are going to rise and sing a hymn, and then, once it is over, we are going to greet one another. But this time, we will be greeting one another, hopefully with a new view for two reasons. The first is that when you put it on, I want you to remember that Christ’s kingdom is within you. The second reason is that I hope that we all begin to change the perception that non Christians have of us by us doing a better job of seeing Jesus in others. When we combine the feeding of the hungry, clothing the naked, and visiting the sick with an attempt to change the way we as Christ followers are perceived, is when I think we will see the kingdom of Jesus become alive in ways we have yet to imagine.

The question is, can we do this? Can we continue to do the things God calls us to do in today’s scripture while trying to be transparent about our flaws so as not to be viewed as hypocrites? Can we be truly interested in other people, inviting them into not only a relationship with God, but with ourselves as well? Can we show more compassion and love to people with whom we disagree? Can we offer sophisticated responses to the issues people face in their every day life? Can we show that we are biblically literate and share it in a meaningful, transformative way? Can we show grace to the world by finding the good in others and see their potential to be Christ followers? I think we can, and I hope you will all join with me in taking a step on the right path, by standing and greeting everyone around you, not by viewing their name, but by trying to see Christ in them, for that is how we best see Christ’s kingdom. Amen.

A New Map

2008-11-16T00:26:00.003-05:00

One of my favourite TV shows was the West Wing. It is no longer on the air, but one episode featured a cartographer trying to get those with political power to accept a map which basically puts the "south" on the top of the map and the "north" on the bottom. This is the map that is shown above. This is all well and good for getting us to think about how we can equate North with good and south with bad...among other things...but today I came across a website which has hundreds of maps according to hundreds of different statistics.

http://www.worldmapper.org/index.html

Check it out. Play around with the different maps...they are amazing to view. Especially try looking at the maps which track Disease. Africa becomes the biggest continent while others shrink...very interesting stuff.

Today's Sermon on Baptism/Stewardship

2008-10-19T12:44:00.001-05:00

Any Sunday which a congregation has the opportunity to celebrate baptism is certainly a day to rejoice. The fact that baptism is something to be celebrated is by far one of the strangest things we do as followers of Jesus Christ. The words which are spoken in the baptismal liturgy are not ones to be taken lightly. We say that in the sacrament of baptism, “through grace and the power of the Holy Spirit, we are united with Christ, cleansed by his saving work, enter into the fellowship of the church, and are called to a life of faith and willing obedience.” This is a statement which if lived out, means that we are not called to live the life or an ordinary person. We are called to be different from those who seek lives of wealth, lives of place and power. Instead, we are called to lives of sacrifice, lives of service, lives of stewardship.

If this is the case, then you might be wondering why we’re using a gospel text which is traditionally used to talk about taxes. Countless sermons have been preached on “Render unto Caesar’s what is Caesar’s.” Now of course we don’t have a Caesar today, but we can easily substitute the word government or president. When these sermons are preached, we tend to applaud Jesus’ wisdom in a moment of confrontation. Unfortunately, this is where the bulk of sermons seem to end, on feeling ok about giving what we need to the powers that be.

I wish we had a recording of Jesus answering those who were trying to trap him. Because I think Jesus paused for dramatic effect when he said “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” I think he paused so that the full force of the conclusion of his words would be felt by everyone listening. “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s… and to God what is God’s.” “While there is a strict parallelism between the two halves of this statement, they are by no means of equal significance, because Caesar’s role is so vastly inferior to God’s. That is, Jesus is not saying, ‘There is a secular realm and there is a religious realm, and equal respect must be paid to each.’ The second half of Jesus’ statement practically annuls the first by preempting it.”[1] Yet rarely do we focus on giving to God what is God’s.

Why is this so? Why is it difficult to focus on giving God what is God’s? I mean, I’m pretty sure everyone in this room can give the answer of what belongs to God. It’s taught to us in Sunday school. EVERYTHING belongs to God. Because our answer as Christians is engrained into the way we already think, we sometimes lose the fact that the concept of giving to God what belongs to God is a call for total commitment unlike anything the rest of the world has ever known.[2]

The fact that we have the word God on our money has done us a great disservice in our stewardship of the things that are God’s. Somehow we assume that because God’s name is printed on it, that money is really all we need to give. But, my brothers and sisters, money is not what it is that is stamped with God’s image. It’s us! It’s You and it’s me! When we say everything is God’s, it is not something we can do in part. We cannot give our minds but not our hearts. We cannot give God our muscle but not come to worship or education classes. We can’t simply give God an hour or two a week. God longs for us to give everything. All 168 hours per week. While many of us give only 2% of our income, others 10% of it, God desires 100%.[3]

For me, the most interesting part of this Gospel text today is not the fact that Jesus is so clever as to avoid the trappings of those who would cause him harm, but that Jesus isn’t taking part in the whole financial system that Rome would have everyone be in. Neither Jesus nor his followers pulled out a Roman coin to help make the point Jesus was trying to make. When Jesus and the disciples practiced stewardship (giving everything to God and not partaking in the prevalent economy), they had to sacrifice (disciples leaving their families and friends); they had to serve others, even when they didn’t want to (Jesus had them serve the 5000 when the disciples wanted to send them away).

This type of stewardship, this type of sacrifice, this type of service begins during our Baptism. A few minutes ago, all of you proclaimed that you were baptized into the death of Jesus. Your old selves were buried with him in your baptism, when you repented of your sins, so that we might be raised to live a new life. Not only that, but you were reminded that through your baptism, you were placed in a covenant relationship, not only with God, but with the rest of the people who have made the same commitment. Every Sunday I have the privilege of leading worship and I get to look out into the pews and see the worshipping faces of a hundred people who are connected by the baptismal covenant. That connection is stronger than death because that baptismal covenant is life! It is Love! And every day we get to show love to the world around us through our stewardship of everything God has entrusted to us. In the multitude of ways in which we serve one another, in how we sacrifice ourselves for our neighbor because Christ did everything for us already.

[1] Douglas R.A. Hare. “Matthew: Interpretation, A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching.” John Knox Press, Louisville. 1993. Pg 254.

[2] Ibid pg 255.

[3] Brian Stoffregen. Exegetical Notes. (Available online) http://www.crossmarks.com/brian/matt22x15.htm

Pictures of Meza's kids and some of their friends

2008-10-19T12:26:00.000-05:00

Hospitality Sermon

2008-08-24T14:04:00.002-05:00

As surely as god lives, I must tell you that we in our Western culture fail at hospitality. It isn't because we don't try, but it seems is mostly due to convenience. One of the things this congregation is currently working on is the gift of hospitality, but until I went to Tanzania, hospitality was really more of a concept rather than something I had ever fully experienced or even offered.

As you may recall, a few months ago I invited myself into your homes for a meal as I challenged you to do something Christ did in order to help you experience what it means to have Christ live in you more fully than you already knew. Truthfully, I have no idea who took up that challenge, but for the people who took me into their homes, one of the byproducts it produced was hospitality. Now, the next time you are a guest in someone else's home, take notice of all the things your host does for you.

Usually a good meal is the center of such hospitality. If you are staying the night, fresh linens and clean towels are usually also a crucial ingredient in being a good host. I say these things to you because while I spent the month of July in Tanzania, two things happened which opened my eyes to the meaning of hospitality. The first thing which happened was that on my first night there, I opened my Bible to the first page and began to read. Normally I prefer to read the Gospels because I love reading the parables, but because the friend I was staying with had told me to prepare for a lot of dust, a little free association reminded me that God created Adam from dust, and so I began reading from Genesis.

Reading the Hebrew Scriptures from Africa gave these words new life for me. Stories about flocks of animals were no longer stories when you're walking down the dusty road and have to wait to pass because a young boy is shepherding 30 goats past you. Or in the city where I was staying, Mbeya, which is in a valley between two mountains, every morning when I would go for a walk, I would look at the mountains in amazement, not just because of their beauty, but because the top third was covered in a thick cloud. When you look at it, you cannot help but think this is what Mt. Sinai looked like when Moses went up to meet with God.

Then when I came to Genesis 18, my eyes were opened again to something we might normally overlook. The parts of Genesis 18 which we didn't read today deals with the three visitors telling Abraham that his Wife would have a son within a year, and Sarah, who is hiding and listening in on the conversation, laughs.

So many sermons focus on the faith, or lack there of, of Sarah. They go on and on and on about how she laughed about conceiving a child due to the fact that she was 80 years old. But today, we did not listen to that part of the story because we need to focus on the hospitality which Abraham and Sarah displayed in their old age.

In our culture of convenience, we tend to show hospitality of food by sharing where we obtained our food from. You might say, "I got these steaks from Wegmans" to show your generosity. Of if you really like the person, you might say "I got this cake from L&M" (a famous local bakery). But in the time of Abraham and Sarah, and still to a large degree in Tanzania, hospitality is shown in a different way.

For example, instead of buying Prime Rib, you would buy a live chicken, carry it home, and then prepare it for your guest that night. Not only would you give your guest a room to sleep in, but that usually means kicking someone out of their room while you are there, so that they might sleep on the floor so you can rest. If you're staying for a longer amount of time, you might offer to put your guest's clothes in the laundry, but in Tanzania, it means an hour of scrubbing dirty clothes in a bucket of dirty water on your hands and knees and then hanging them up to dry. Here we might offer a shower with our fluffiest towels, and there it means boiling a pot of water so that you can get all the dust off your body with warm water. I'm not sharing these things with you in order to make you feel bad about how we do hospitality in our own culture, but to let you know the magnitude of the hospitality found in Scripture.

When Abraham saw the three strangers, he and his family went above and beyond what was required. Just a quick side note. In Swahili, the word they have for stranger, mgeni (m●gay●nee) is the exact same word as guest.

Abraham brought water to his guests so that they might wash their hands and feet, (remind you of Jesus?) had Sarah bake bread using 6 gallons of flour. He also had a calf prepared for the 3 strangers and brought them milk and curds. This is truly a feast! Just to get a bit of perspective, this is approximately the amount of bread that Sarah baked for just one of the guests (at this point, I revealed 12 loaves of bread and passed them around the congregation. Everyone took a chunk and passed it around. There was pleanty left over from the 65+ people there). If you wanted to make the equivalent amount of pancakes, that would be about 192 pancakes per person.

For anyone wondering why Sarah and the servants did most of the work, while Abraham merely got the water, let me tell you a quick story. The first week I was with my friend and host, he took me around the dusty city and we visited some of his friends and other pastors. A pastor's salary is about $175 a month, which boils down to about $5 per day. When we would go visiting someone else's house, after we exchanged greetings, the women of the house would leave and go and buy the guests and the men of the house a soda as well as prepare a small snack, of which the cost was well over 10% of a day's wages. During that time the man of house would engage us in conversation, and when the food was prepared, he would pour water over our hands to cleanse them both before and after the meal. It amazed me that the same traditions which can be found in the earliest parts of the Bible are still carried out today, even if we replace milk and curds with Coke. These small feasts of hospitality are amazing events which lead us to showing grace, love and humility to our guests.

Listen again to the words from 1 Peter 4:7-11."The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear minded and self controlled so that you can pray. Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sin. Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. Each one should use whatever gift they have received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in various forms. If one speaks, they should do so as one speaking the very words of God. If anyone serves, they should do it with the strength God provides, so that in all things God should be praised through Jesus Christ.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, I do not know if I will ever have the privilege of preaching to you again, so please take what I say now to you to heart… If you are to help transform the world into that which Jesus Christ calls us, you must love each other deeply. You must offer hospitality to one another not out of duty but out of joy. Use the gifts which you have been blessed with to serve others. And in all these things, praise and glorify our Lord. When you do these things, God will take care of the rest. Amen.

Halfway through my trip

2008-07-15T05:14:00.002-05:00

Ah, I am officially halfway done with my time in Tanzania. So far it has truly been a learning experience. Everything is so different from what life is like back in the states. This is not going to be much of an update, other than to say I will be traveling to some other towns with Meza as a part of his job is taking him to sit in on his students as they teach class at secondary schools in other parts of the country. I doubt I'll be able to access my email until the 25th or maybe up to the 27th. The best way to contact me is via text message. If you know the number, feel free to send me something...although it's appreicated if you do it early in the morning...as I'm 8 hours ahead of you all time wise.

Have a good week everyone!

My first week...

2008-07-09T10:45:00.002-05:00

July 2... Wow what a long day. I was up at 5:45am in PA only to go to sleep at 9pm the next day. My flights were thankfully uneventful with little conversation except for a few minutes with a 30 something Indian woman who was on a business trip. She was in the fashion business and was on a trip to check on some locations back in India after some flooding in the area. I asked her why she went into the business and she answered quite refreshingly with "to piss off my dad". It was a shockingly sincere answer to give a stranger. When I landed in Dubai, I got an iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts and no food...my goal was to eat as little food as possible so I would avoid using the plane/airport toilets. Always good to avoid such things in my opinion. I got through Tanzanian customs without a problem and found Meza right away. I exchanged money and went to our hotel which had a full sized bed, toilet, showers with only one temperature, and a tv which got Fox sports. It seemed quite nice, although the neighborhood would have been considered a slum, although I later found out that all neighborhoods are similar here. Then we went into Dar Es Salaaam to buy a bus ticket for the next morning for Mbeya. People were shouting out that "here comes a white person" in Swahili which I found rather strange...like people couldn't tell on their own. After getting our ticket, we went to dinner overlooking the Indian Ocean. On the way back to the hotel, our taxi was hit by a small bus who was trying to merge into our lane, but it only moved the side view mirror a bit. No damage was done. I passed out from being so tired once we got back to the hotel.

July 3... Up at 5 am to get the bus to Mbeya. It took about 11 or so hours to get there. We stopped only three times, once to pee, which everyone, males, on a wall, once for lunch, and another one function break in the afternoon. The farther you get from Dar, the worse the roads get, as well as the conditions of the house. About 3 hours outside the main city, you see a lot of mud brick and thatched roof houses, which is really only upgraded by a tin roof with fairly brittle bricks. The slum I mentioned yesterday is not really a slum, but how everyone lives. When I arrived at Meza's house, he showed me around and I have a small room to myself with a nice sized bed. They showed me the toilet, which is a nice hole in the ground and no TP, although it arrived the next day. Meza lives with his wife, 3 kids, and two or three brothers in law. A very crowded house, but cozy.

July 4... Woke up about 8am this morning and went to watch the boys play with the soccer ball I brought them. The two oldest set up goals about 5 meters apart and tried to score on one another. Shortly after watching I walked to the store down the road with Rafael, one of Meza's brothers in law who speaks English quite well. We bought bread and butter, which was expired and we had to go back, and something else, which I didn't catch. Meza was awaiting us when we got back. He was on his way to work and said to relax, so after breakfast of 2 pieces of bread and a hard boiled egg, I went back to bed, hopefully ending any jet lag. I woke up around 4pm where lunch was waiting for me. As a guest, it seems that I am to eat alone or with Meza, while everyone else either waits until I am done or they eat in some other room in the house. It is very interesting to experience what it means to be an honored guest.

All of the doors in this house squeak, and not only that, but they all squeak differently, which means you can tell which door opens and closes or who is in the toilet. It makes me realize how much privacy I enjoy and how much I like to be sneaky in my own life. My first thought was to buy oil for the doors, but I think that might be a bit presumptive. Also, everytime I walk into the living room, Meza's mother in law leaves. It was all very strange to me. I asked Meza at dinner why this happened, and he said it was normal. This afternoon, I took a walk and Joseph followed me around the block. When I came back, I played some futbol with the kids in the neighborhood who tried to impress me with their English skills.

July 5... What a long day. I didn't sleep very well because in the middle of the night, all the neighborhood dogs howl and bark. Meza tells me that they are kept inside most of the day, but at night, they are free to roam. Today, Meza and I went into town. We stopped at the bank, then had breakfast at a local place known for their world recipies, which mostly included parts of animals which I wouldn't normally consider delicious. I stuck with scrambled eggs and toast. We took a dali-dali, which is short for 5-5 which is how many shillings it used to cost, now it costs 250 shillings, which is about 25 cents a ride. On the way home, we stopped at two houses and sat for a while. As a guest, the host usually provides soda and perhaps a snack, which if offered, one should eat generously to avoid making the host feel bad. Sometimes the host eats too, but if they do, the women never eat when the men do. After we made it home, we took a short rest and went to the home of Meza's best friend, who was very friendly. We talked about some of America's strange customs, like feeding ducks in a park, or how our houses are so big that the houses the people here live in are only as big as a garage, and cold like one too. While all this is true, it was hard to take in with an open mind. I never considered myself very patriotic, but I felt it at this moment. I feigned humility, but was difficult to sit through. The whole day was filled with people...which is hard for me as an introvert. Hopefully I will get some alone time on Sunday.

July 6... Last night I began reading Genesis. Surely the garden of Eden was in Africa, if Adam was truly made out of dust. Everything here is covered in dust. Meza wore his nice black shoes to church, but after the 10 minute walk, they were a nice shade of dust.

Church, other than the music, was uneventful. I said a few words of greeting, and after that, listened with little understanding. I found out the sermon was on Matthew 11. Next time I will bring my bible so I can read along. After the service, they auctioned off a cake, which Meza won, although I think he only won because I was there. Then we went off to lunch and to get a paper downtown. We ended up staying all afternoon because of a gospel fest. All good music. Then we went to an internet cafe closer to home.

I began reading some of Thomas Merton's work today. It is called the book of hours, and it compiles a lot of his work into a traditional catholic prayer book. I think so much of his wisdom is going to be found during the rest of my time here in Tanzania.

It is true what Jeff told me... it takes you a few days to truley begin a vacation. Once you get over your apprehensions, like going to the bathroom over a hole in the ground, things get much easier and you are able to relax. This next week will hopefully be relaxing and filled with learning new things.

July 7... The room is cold...nearly freezing. I got up early to walk outside so I could warm up. Johanna, the youngest boy joined me for my walk. We returned to watch Haggai play futbol. Then Johanna took me on another walk. He took me to visit his old neighborhood and some old friends there. We were invited in and they were very gracious. After ten minutes of forced conversation, I tried to leave, only to realize that they were making me breakfast, bread and butter with hard boiled eggs and tea. Joyce, a girl who spoke English quite well, ran to her mother to tell her I was hoping to leave and to hurry up. I felt very embarrassed. Johanna, thankfully, did not know how to be treated as a guest even more than I did, so we all laughed at him as he tried to peel his egg and when he drank the tea while it was still very hot. At six years old, he did not know what he was in for. It still bugs me about how women do not eat while men do. Outside of the home, it seems that men and women are equal, but once we are inside, it all changes. Hospitality and feminism have so many different meanings. On the other hand, one of Meza's brothers in law did my laundry, so maybe there is hope yet.

Once we made it home, Meza was off to work so I took a nap. When I woke up, I asked Lwiza, Meza's wife, if she could show me how to cook ugali, which is a stiff porridge, a staple food here. She of course said yes, but everyone laughed at me because men shouldn't know how to cook. I will attempt to make some when I return for the people in Riverside.

In the evening, we went to the market and bought meat as well as maybe the heart or lungs. It tasted ok during dinner.

July 8... It was 1 celcius last night. Thankfully I doubled up on pants, wore shoes to bed, and covered myself in Jay's mosquito net. When you use it improperly, it provides decent heat. Thanks Jay, you may have saved my life! Today was relaxing, I read the book of hours, wrote Tina, my host mother in Sweden, and played with the kids during their break from school. In the afternoon, I took a walk to a new part of town. Some people are very nice and greet me with a respectful greeting. Others go an extra mile and say it in English and others still shout "white" in Swahili, which makes me uncomfortable, even a bit scared, although I know I am not in any danger. What a learning day... will hopefully write more as time allows... Thanks for reading!

Off to Africa

2008-06-30T11:00:00.002-05:00

Well, I'm off to Tanzania for the entire month of July. I hope to keep being able to blog so I don't need to write one big one at the end of my trip. I'll be visiting Meza, a friend who studied at the Moravian Seminary with me. Most of my time will be spent with him and his family in Mbeya, although we will hopefully do a little bit of traveling together.

I hope you all have a wonderful summer. I know I will.

Last Sermon at Riverside

2008-06-29T11:02:00.001-05:00

One of the first things that happened to me upon my arrival here in Riverside was a change in the colour of my thumb. Up until this point, the only colours my thumb had been were regular flesh, and black and blue, when I accidently hit it with a hammer. That all changed because when Jeff and Kris went on vacation and to Mississippi, as one of my tasks was to water the plants outside and inside the parsonage. Suddenly my thumb had turned green and as I reflect on my time spent here in Riverside, I have come to realize the position of student pastor means that a green thumb is necessary. Even more so, as followers of Christ, we are all called to be gardeners, people who plant seeds.

You see, for me as a student pastor, one of the best parts of my job is that I get to scatter seed as far as I can. Whether it is in a children’s chat, teaching a Sunday School class, preaching a sermon, building a labyrinth, having a shared meal, writing a newsletter article, discussion during a committee meeting, working with the confirmation class, or even during a short conversation while shaking hands at the end of a worship service, all of these moments are times when I hope I have scattered seeds which will eventually yield some amazing fruit. The disappointing part of being a student pastor is that a year is rarely long enough to really nurture such seeds so that they may bear fruit.

But between my joys and disappointments in my own gardening role is the life giving role in which you all play within God’s garden because the truth of the matter is that your pastors are not the true gardeners. Each and every one of you are the people who should be planting the seeds in the lives of your friends, your neighbors, your loved ones, every person you meet in the store, while you walk your dog, while watch a baseball game. Every moment we have to interact with another person is another chance to plant a seed which God will give water and light to in order that it yield fruit to be harvested for God’s kingdom.

Now remember the first scripture which we read today? Jesus tells us to enter through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life and only a few find it.” I think that when we combine both of these scriptures, we can gain a better understanding of how we can plant our seeds in good soil so that we don’t just go about scattering our seed in thorny places where they will not take a good root.

As we try and walk that narrow path, we realize that the soil on the sides is incredibly fertile. The only problem is that this path is difficult to find. Almost everything in our own culture tells us that we should take the easy route in life. Instead of making a meal at home, we have countless fast food restaurants which offer to take the time and energy out of preparing the meal. Instead of taking mass transportation because it is more of a hassle, we all drive places individually so we can get there as quickly as possible. We spend more time in front of the television than sharing stories with our sisters and brothers in Christ. There are times in which we argue with one another in order to avoid doing the right thing because the right thing is hard to do while arguing is the easy way out.

Doing something hard over something easy is what God calls us to each and every day we decide to follow Jesus. Christ raises the bar! He does not allow us to buy our salvation with money or works. He calls us to follow and then continues on ahead of us, wondering if we will try to catch up.

When I was in college, the degree I cared most about was my political science degree. My first two years were taught mainly by the head of the political science department who was considered to be a fairly easy teacher. He would post the notes of every lecture he gave and would create the tests right from his notes. And while he did not require you to attend class, if you attended every class and had a B or higher average, you didn’t have to take the final. For two years, I thought his classes were the best thing going. I always got a B in each of his classes and never had to take a single final. If I wanted to take the easy road for an example in this story, my point could be how important it is just to show up, but the easy way is not the best way.

During my junior year, we got a new professor in the Political Science department. This professor said that every class you missed, your next paper would lose 5 percent of the grade. If he thought most of the class didn’t do the required reading, he would give the class a pop quiz. Not once did he simply lecture from the notes he took from the stuff we already read…the new professor actually was ahead of us in our discussions and learning. He did not require us to regurgitate information we could find in the library, he wanted to see if we could think for ourselves. At the end of the semester, I had a C minus in this class. It was the lowest grade I ever got in college. I probably should have been disappointed with myself, but the truth of the matter is that I thought it was the best class I ever had. In fact, the next semester I took another one of our new professors classes because of how much I learned. I was challenged in ways I had not been before, and it was a great thing.

Sadly, when I look at my senior year of political science classes, I again had the teacher I had my first two years and I fell back into mediocre work. It is the perfect example of how one of my teachers planted a seed of thorns and one teacher planted a seed which would have deep roots if they were not so close together. I have to constantly struggle with the thorny bush my first professor planted. It is the seed planted in my soil which makes me lazy, which makes me only do what I need to do instead of doing the hard thing which will cause me to be a better person. And thankfully, I still have the seed along side of it which calls out to me to push myself to learn even if it is hard, even if my grade will not be as high.

After the service today, when you’re having lunch with a family member or a friend, I challenge you to share a story in your life in which a seed was planted in good soil and it produced an unexpected yield in your own life. It is when you share these stories, it is like eating the fruit which was once a small seed. It has been planted, grown, nurtured and finally shared. When that’s done, you have more seeds which will hopefully find their way to fresh soil and you can continue following Jesus down the narrow road.

To wrap this up, I just want to thank you all for your warm gifts of hospitality and the love which you have shown me over the last year. I will never forget the time we all walked in God’s garden together. It was a wonderful experience for me and I will always look back on my time here as fruitful. Amen.

Wordle Sermon

2008-06-26T10:19:00.002-05:00

This is my latest sermon put into a word cloud. Thanks to Wezlo for finding this. Putting one's own work into this medium really is just plain awesome for those people who struggle to make art.

Romans 6: 1-13

2008-06-22T13:21:00.001-05:00

I want everyone to go ahead and find their pulse. Everyone got it? Good, now wipe your forehead and say “phew”. I want to congratulate you. You are a resurrected being! Repeat after me: “I am a resurrected being! I am alive in Christ!” Believe it or not brothers and sisters, this is a very important distinction between us and the rest of the world. When we are baptized, we are making a public statement that we are a resurrected person. Not everyone can make such a seemingly outrageous claim. In fact, it appears that most Christians fail to embrace living a resurrected life and this is a very sad thing.

There are a lot of excuses we can use for failing to embrace living a resurrected life in Christ. We can say that we were baptized at such a young age that we don’t remember what it means to be baptized. We can say that our western culture allows us to be purchasers of faith instead people who truly seek to be disciples. We can blame TV evangelists, the liberal media, the government, or even other denominations or faiths. Because of this, it seems as if it is easier to continue to live in sin and ask for forgiveness than to be a bearer of grace to the rest of the world.

For the most part, I assume that the sins which we all normally pray forgiveness for are what we might know of as the 7 deadly sins which are Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, Anger, Greed and Sloth. If none of those are particularly meaningful to you, an Archbishop in the Catholic Church has recently added 7 more sins to the list. They are Environmental Pollution, Genetic Manipulation, Accumulating Excessive Wealth, Inflicting Poverty, Drug Trafficking and consumption, Morally Debatable Experiments, and Violations of Fundamental Rights of Human Nature[1]. If you somehow still find yourself thinking those are fairly easy to avoid, Gandhi has his own version of 7 deadly sins. They are Wealth without Work, Pleasure without Conscience, Science without Humanity, Knowledge without Character, Politics without Principal, Commerce without Morality, and Worship without Sacrifice[2]. If you’re anything like me, I know that I’ve fallen prey to more than a few of these sins. In fact, there are only two which I’m pretty sure I haven’t done, which are genetic manipulation and morally debatable experiments, and that’s only because I’m not smart enough to figure out how.

Fortunately for us, if we are baptized and have a pulse, we do not need to continue to keep on committing those sins and asking forgiveness. Please don’t think I’m saying that we need not ask for forgiveness any longer, because when we do slip up, we must still ask for God’s grace and forgiveness, but I’m saying that God calls us to a higher standard. The second half of verse 13 calls us to “offer ourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of our body to God as instruments of righteousness.” What this does is take the things which could be small stumbling blocks in our faith journey and transforms them into stepping stones.

Peter is my favourite example of a person who turned a potential stumbling block into a stepping stone. When he denied that he knew Christ three times, the moment the rooster crowed, he could have allowed himself to stay dejected, hating himself for being so selfish. Instead, he allowed the grace of God to overpower his sin, and allowed his initial denial to lift him to new heights in his discipleship.

If you find in your life that you are always envious of your neighbor’s flat screen television, one way of making such envy into a stepping stone is to get rid of the TV you have and find another way to spend your time or perhaps you could simply start by getting rid of cable. If you find yourself with more wealth than you really need, give it away so that it cannot hold power over you. Or if Gandhi’s lists of sins, which border on the spiritual more than the physical, are more difficult for you to keep, find a way to turn one of them into a stepping stone. Gandhi’s last sin, which is Worship without sacrifice is by far the most intriguing sin to me. Sacrifice as worship is an amazing thing which we hopefully think about every day when we make it a point to take up our cross and follow Christ. When we sacrifice, that old part inside of us which was prone to sin will die and make us a better disciple. The trick is to actually allowing it to die. I heard a story of a person who realized that when they were sinning and they were not allowing their sin to be a stepping stone, they would say words which are normally part of a funeral service. Upon realization that their sin was getting the best of them and not allowing Christ to shine through them, they would say “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Rest in peace."[3]

One of my favourite movies is the Shawshank Redemption and I think it does a wonderful job of giving us a visual example of what it means to give a tiny funeral to our sin each and every day. You see, in a funeral, some pastors as they say the words, Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, will sometimes sprinkle some soil on the top of the coffin. In the Shawshank Redemption, the character played by Tim Robbins, has slowly been planning his escape from prison. Every day he scratched a little bit of a hole in the wall in order to escape his cell. Every day when he was out on the yard, he took the dirt and dust created by digging the hole, put it in his pant’s pocket and let the dirt go as he walked the yard. Every day he allowed a little bit of the thing which held him as an innocent prisoner to return to the earth, and after many many years, he was free. Morgan Freeman’s character then quipped that his friend’s favourite part of every day was releasing that dirt and dust every day into the yard.

That’s the same way we should feel every day when we turn our sins into something which glorifies our risen savior. When we are able to say, even though I sin, I will use this moment to show how great God is. When we are able to do that, we are truly living a life which tells the world we are resurrected with Christ.
[1] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7287071.stm
[2] http://www.deadlysins.com/features/gandhi.htm
[3] Brad Braxton. Dead and Alive. http://www.csec.org/csec/sermon/braxton_4502.htm

Seeking God First – Matthew 6:24-34

2008-06-09T10:17:00.001-05:00

The Hebrew Scripture has 613 commandments in it. Most of us only know about 10, and even then, we have a difficult time remembering all of them. Thankfully, the Gospels have Jesus reinforcing only two. To love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. That’s easy to remember and hopefully leads us to better relationships with God and every other person in our lives. But there are other commandments which Jesus says which we either choose to ignore or have such a difficult time living, that we don’t even bother to try.

The Gospel lesson for today comes at the tail end of the Sermon on the Mount. Most of us have some idea as to its beginning, Blessed are the poor in spirit… blessed are the meek…blessed are the peacemakers… Then there’s that wonderful part about being the salt of the earth and the light of the world. These parts make us feel good about who we are as disciples of Christ. We tend to forget about the latter parts, because they’re much more difficult to understand, and even harder sometimes to live.

The commandment that Jesus offers us today is, in my opinion, one of the hardest things a follower of Christ can attempt to live out. What is this commandment? It comes from verse 25 and continues at verse 31. Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink: or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food and the body more important than clothes?... So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first God’s kingdom and God’s righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

That’s tough. In fact, most scholars and preachers do a very good job of deflecting the point of what Jesus was saying. They say “Jesus' challenge is (also) not a mandate for stupidity and irresponsible planning. It is about having a clear goal and setting up the path in a way that takes us there and not down the side alleys of spending too much time thinking about ourselves”[1] This type of thinking allows us to still be members in good standing in the church of consumerism and keeps us from living in the Kingdom of God which Jesus calls us to.
Instead, our “middle-class culture always wants it both ways on almost everything; a little of this and a little of that; a world of both-and. That’s not Jesus’ instinct about the kingdom. His view is that it’s either-or. Don’t even try to live it otherwise.”[2]

This passage then, is really about stewardship and in fact, it would be extremely easy to link what Jesus is saying to giving of our money in order that it no longer control us. While this is true in some senses, I believe it misses the point of what Jesus wants us to hear. If we only focus this on clothes, food and money, “we subtly succumb to the illusion that we are the only sufficient stewards, not an invisible God. Life in the kingdom demands that this be reversed.”[3]
In fact, a couple of chapters later, we see the disciples succumbing to the same illusion. Shortly after the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus sends out the 12 to drive out demons and perform miracles. Upon their return, we get to read the story of the feeding of the 5000. The disciples want to send the crowds away because they are thinking about stewardship. They could not afford to pay for meals for so many people. Can you imagine Jesus smacking his head when his disciples mentioned that? Why are they still worrying about where their food will come from?
In fact, it seems to me that we in our contemporary church fully live within that model. We worry so much about our own stewardship of the things God has blessed us with, that we tend to forget the stewardship of God, who provides every basic necessity. Seeking God will lead to miracles, worrying about how you will pay for it will lead to disappointment.

I’m sure all the trustee’s right now are shaking their heads and thinking I have no idea what I’m talking about. Even though Jesus says that when we seek first the kingdom of God and all of the other necessitates will be given to us (v 33), “we know that our money problems will not all be solved by an unquestioning confidence in God. Even Paul, whose confidence in God was unbounded, often went hungry and without shelter (2 Cor. 11:27). What Paul learned from his deprivations was that God was greater than his needs (Phil. 4:11, 13).”[4]

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, we cannot simply learn about what Jesus is talking about. We must live the experience. When you are thinking about having your neighbors over to your home for dinner, but have put it off because you haven’t got food which is going to show off your talents in the kitchen; Jesus says, thank God for the peanut butter and jelly you’ve got in your pantry and have them over anyway. The fellowship is much more important than the food. It is putting God’s righteousness as your first priority and your own worries and desires second.
Putting your own desires second is not exactly the easiest thing in the world to do. Sometimes it produces amazing miracles, and other times, miracles which are less than exciting. Two weeks ago, I was Sunday night and the Flyers were playing the Penguins in the conference finals. I had preached a sermon earlier that day, which for some reason tired me out more than normal, and all I wanted to do was sit and watch the game in peace. I picked a seat which didn’t have anyone around me, and the only thing on the bar was a bill for someone’s tab. It appeared that I wasn’t going to be bothered there, so I sat down, ordered some food, and began watching the game. About five minutes into the game, I found out why there was a bill in front of the seat next to me. The drunkest guy in the bar was outside having a cigarette and had decided to stumble back inside and where does he sit? Right next to me.

I do everything in my power to give off a vibe that said I don’t want to talk to anyone. I didn’t take my eyes off the screen, I kept my arms crossed and I tried my best not to laugh when my drunken neighbor started getting into a funny conversation with 3 people on the other side of the bar.

But it’s not like this guy didn’t try to get me to talk. He asked me my name, shook my hand, but I was a stone wall and he moved on. For the next five minutes, this guy was verbally beaten up by the three men and somehow, the drunk guy started talking about the Tet Offensive and Vietnam and how these guys had no idea about anything and ended up getting quite upset. The bartender came over and yelled at the guy, but it really didn’t help. And all I can think to myself is, didn’t God know that I wanted a nice quiet night of watching the Flyers?

Then out of no where, this drunk guy mentions Hosea 4:6. Which is “My people are destroyed from a lack of knowledge.” Right after he quotes Hosea, which is a fairly obscure book in the Bible, he turns around and asks me what I do for a living. Still not wanting to talk to the man, I tell him I’m a preacher, hoping that would scare him off. Unfortunately, that was an invitation for him to have a conversation with me. He ended up doing most of the talking. In his drunken speech, he told me a lot of information about himself, and what I needed to do in order to become a good preacher. Some of the stuff was good information, other was complete nonsense. Then, about 45 minutes later, he starts talking about King David. How he sent the husband of the woman he lusted after off to his death and how God still said that David was a man after his own heart. My drunken conversation partner realized how profound God was and just left the bar. He was in such sheer amazement of the character of God…

Well, I watched the last few minutes of the second period and decided to leave for home. I had too much excitement for one night. After I closed the door to the bar, I turned around to see the drunken man sitting on a bench. I had to walk by him as I headed for home. As I walked by him, I noticed that he had urinated all over himself. He was wearing a grey t-shirt and it was quite noticeable. At this point, I took pity on him and tried to say goodnight. I then realized he was talking to God. Well, he stopped that conversation and began talking to me again. He kept poking me and eventually he grabbed my hand. He said that he wanted to pray. He took my hand and put it on his chest, about 3 inches away from the stain on his t-shirt. He was holding on to my hand pretty tight and began praying. I was holding on tightly too, but only because I didn’t want his hand to slip down a few more inches. Shortly after that, he finished his prayer, I said goodbye, went home, and used a lot of anti-bacterial soap to wash my hands.

It was not the relaxing night I had hoped for, but I went to bed, wondering how I was going to tell my friends what had happened to me. I told some people over the next few days, and at that point, it was nothing more than a gross story about the drunken guy at the bar. Well, I went back to the bar a few nights later to again watch the Flyers. I sat down in the same seat, although this time there was no bar tab next to me. Sometime after the first period, the man arrived, slightly more sober than he was the last time we met.

He asked me if I understood that it wasn’t him talking to me that night. That he was just a messenger. We spent another hour talking about how he spent time in prison, how he had prostate cancer, how he didn’t expect to live much longer, but that he felt God was keeping him alive because God still needed him. He told me that he sure as heck hoped that I wasn’t the last thing God needed him for and that he didn’t ever want to see me again in this bar. I have yet to go back to the bar, but that’s only because the Flyers lost the series.

Perhaps my story doesn’t illustrate my point as much as I had hoped, but to me, I realized that when I want God to give me the night off and some time to relax, I am not seeking God’s kingdom first. Luckily, God’s kingdom found me that night in the form of a person who really wasn’t hoping to be the messenger. The moral of the story is that we really do need to always be seeking God’s kingdom, even when we don’t feel like it.

[1] First Thoughts on Year A Gospel Passages from the Lectionary. Pentecost 2. William Loader. http://wwwstaff.murdoch.edu.au/~loader/MtPentecost2.htm
[2] Matthew 6:24-34. By Mark Labberton. http://www.goodpreacher.com/shareit/readreviews.php?cat=12
[3] Ibid.
[4] Douglas R. A. Hare. “Matthew: Interpretation: A Biblical Commentary for Teaching and Preaching.” John Knox Press. Louisville. 1993. Pg 75, 76.

Engage us

2008-04-26T17:27:00.003-05:00

(This sermon is based on the following scripture verses, 1 Samuel 17: 37b-55a; 1 Timothy 4: 4-16; Matthew 15: 21-28)

When I was 14 years old, a student pastor came to my congregation and discipled me as to what it means to live life as a Christian in the world. We met on a weekly basis for almost a year, and I learned a lot about life, about ministry, about sharing things with a brother in Christ, things I might not normally share with just anyone. It was during that time that I first heard God calling me to ministry. For the next 3 years or so, I did a lot of work within my home congregation to see what it would mean to become a pastor within the Moravian church. Unfortunately what I had thought that it meant to be Christian was not true. I had thought that it meant being smart, being well educated, preaching a good sermon, go to a lot of meetings in order to keep the building well maintained. It was actually kind of fun to do this stuff, but it got old really quickly.

Then, when I was 18, I spent a year abroad in Sweden and other than Christmas Eve, did not spend a single day in church. It was great! I made tons of new friends, most of who did not go to church, spending lots of time outside in the summer, relaxing in the winter, just having a wonderful time. When I came back to the United States, I went right off to college, where I joined a fraternity and lots of clubs. There was so much good stuff going on in my life, and I didn’t miss going to church at all.

One day, I was driving around as a part of my internship when I saw a Moravian church. I hadn’t been in a church in over 3 years, and something made me go back. I’m not sure what made me go, other than God. But that really isn’t the point of me telling you this part of my life. I told you this because I want to highlight the first verse we read this morning from 1 Timothy. It states that everything God created is good.

Now, if you read the first 3 verses of the chapter, which I urge you to do, you might be compelled to say that I am taking this verse out of context, but I want to tell you that one of the reasons we lose a lot of young people in church today is directly related to the fact that we as the church do a poor job of telling our younger members that everything God created is good, and sometimes that includes things which the church fails to recognize. Sometimes the church as a whole tends to say that things like music are bad, or that perhaps certain types of food are bad, or even something like sex can be negative. As a teenager, when we realize that these things in and of themselves are not necessarily bad, but that the church tells us they are, the logical conclusion is to stop attending church. If you ever do decide to go this way, you are not alone. I certainly did it, as do so many other people in our generation. But the important thing we as youth must do is continue to bring positive things which we know God created into contact with the church, in order to broaden the influence we have in the world.

I have a question for the youth today. Did you notice that what the 3 scripture verses had in common? Any guesses? That’s right… they all have youth in them. Last weekend, I went to a conference with a wonderful speaker named Mark Yaconelli who works specifically with youth.
During his presentation, he told us what we needed as youth leaders to do to engage youth today with Christianity. Most of the time we as leaders and elders think that the simple fact of having a youth group means that you are sufficiently engaged. Unfortunately, that is not true. Instead, there are 4 things that we as pastors, teachers, elders and friends must do in order to engage you in the life of the church.

The first thing we need to engage you with is the sense of Wonder. Can you imagine the sense of wonder which David had as he faced Goliath? Heck, the whole army of Israel was captured by wonder. Here is a 9 foot tall man, which is about two feet taller than Yao Ming, covered head to toe in armor with a pretty serious looking sword. I imagine that young David pretty well understood what it means to stand in Wonder, especially with the sure knowledge that God was going to be with him as he defeated this monster of a man. Regrettably, as a young person in the world today, I think it is very difficult to be in awe of anything. We spend so much time in front of screens that things happening in the world rarely intrigue us as they should. Whenever we go somewhere, we are always in a rush, always hurrying, almost never stopping long enough to be in awe of the wonders around us.

Mark Yaconelli told a wonderful story about his four year old son Joshua, who realized that his father was always rushing him to the next place he had to be. Joshua wanted to stop and look at rocks or bugs or whatever else caught his eye. So one day they were sitting around at dinner when this little child told the family that he started a new club, called the Slow Club. He was the only member, but the members of the Slow Club were committed to doing nothing fast. Everything would be done slowly, being sure to take one’s time and to be in wonder of everything around it. Mark thought it was cute, but didn’t actually join his son’s club. He went around for years, continuing to do everything at a fast pace, just like he had always done. Then, one day when they were at a camp, when young Joshua was about 10 years old, the lunch bell rang and the whole camp started to run towards the dining hall. Mark tried to hurry his son, knowing that all the good food would be gone if they didn’t hurry up… But his son invited his father with a one day pass into the Slow Club. As they slowly walked to the mess hall together, they saw a pair of rabbits, they saw lizards sunning themselves by a pond, they took in the beauty of the world around them, and for the first time, Mark, who had always been rushing his son everywhere he needed to be, realized that his son was right, and that he needed to spend more time in Wonder of the things which God created. Ever since that one walk to lunch, I believe Mark has been a member of the Slow Club.

The second thing we need to engage our youth in is a sense of heartbreak. Perhaps this seems to be a confusing quality which we should be exposing our young men and women to, but I will tell you today that it is probably the most important. In fact most parents do everything they can to avoid showing children that heartbreak is a part of what it means to be a Christian. But to engage a person in heartbreak does not mean to allow them to date and go through a bad break up. To have your heart break is to see the people which our world pushes to the margins. The gospels calls these people the poor, naked, hungry and thirsty. We must see the margins and empathize with them. Our heart must break at their condition, and we must see Christ in the people the world tells us are unworthy. The second part of engaging someone in heartbreak is to not simply to give money to those people, but to actively spend time with them, to spend part of your life’s journey on their own journey. Doing this leads to the third thing we must engage our youth in today.

We must be engaged in experiences of healing. The gospels are filled with stories of healing. We even read one of them today. A young girl was healed because of the faith of her mother. Healing can take on many forms. Sometimes it is made manifest in physical healing, sometimes spiritual. One of most profound ways an adult can engage their children in healing is through the act of forgiveness. I recently watched a movie on the Amish mothers of the girls who were killed in the school shooting. They immediately forgave the shooter who killed their young children. This is definitely a lesson we all can learn from, but those women, mothers of slain children, engaged the world in a lesson of healing. They knew they could not heal if they did not forgive. If our youth are not engaged in this, they will have a difficult time practicing it when they are leaders in the church.

The last thing we must engage our youth in is Freedom. By all accounts, Philadelphia is the birthplace of freedom, but I’m not speaking of political freedom, or the rights afforded to us in the constitution. Instead, we must be engaged with freedom in Christ. This is a different way of living which is very foreign to the world today. We must show each other that we do not live for ourselves, but for each other, because Christ lived for us.

If we listen to the words Paul wrote to Timothy, he said, “Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives tales; rather, train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.” I personally take freedom from the world a bit more radically than most. I love the book of Acts where we get a taste of how the first church lived, where they sold everything they had, worshipped daily, giving to those in need, and shared meals together. I wish I were brave enough to do something like that, but we can start by taking small steps of living free from the world and instead start living free in Christ. Perhaps it starts by getting rid cable TV, or perhaps it means having more meals as a family at home. However you wish to engage the young men and women in your life, showing them that there is a different way to live is extremely important.

Now, I want all the youth to stand up and face the rest of the congregation. I want you to repeat what I say to the people who promised to nurture you into Christian maturity when you were baptized.

Repeat after me:
Engage us/ in what it means/ to live life/ as followers of Jesus.
Engage us/ in the wonders of God/ and the beauty of the world.
Engage us/ in heartbreak./ Show us the margins of the world/ and how to love them.
Engage us/ in experiences of healing./ Showing us how to forgive/ people who have hurt us.
Engage us/ in freedom from the world/ and how to live a godly life.
Engage us/ please/ Engage us.

Amen.

Olympic Protests

2008-04-15T10:51:00.001-05:00

I am fascinated by the way certain groups draw attention to their cause. Most recently, there have been protests during the Olympic torch relay. Apparently these protests have worked; because high powered political figures have either publically committed or are considering boycotting the opening ceremony. Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister of Great Britain has said he will not attend because of China’s stance on Tibet. George W. Bush is still thinking about missing the opening ceremony, but has said that he will attend the games in order to support the Americans who are competing.

I don’t know if China even cares about such things. Perhaps in a world where a subtle public shame technique is important, but everyone who has any training in political science knows that all politics are local and such small stunts are meaningless for real change. It is the equivalent of saying “I support the troops but not the war in Iraq.”

Instead, most coverage of this issue has put the athletes in the forefront of a political battle which they seem to dislike. Half of the athletes seem to have little to no knowledge of current affairs while the others who do pay attention don’t want politics to get in the way of their performance. I guess if I was a world class athlete, I might feel the same way, but since I’m not, I can’t.

It’s time for our athletes to stand up and say, “I know I’m one of the best swimmers/soccer players/softball players/runners/athletes in the world and I have a pretty good chance to show the world yet again that the country I come from allows me to perform at my best. Because of this, I cannot compete because the Olympics are not being held in a place where this is true for all of its citizens.”

When we come from countries which promote such high standards, we ought to live up to them, even if our politicians don’t. For many athletes, this is their one shot at greatness, and sadly, I think it is wasted by the fact that they are competing. By my theory, you’re pretty good if you even make it to the Olympics…but you’re the best if you can turn them down for what you know is right.

If you leave politics up to politicians, you fail to live in a democracy. The same goes for allowing politicians to dictate what happens to athletes. If there is a single athlete who chooses not to compete because of their beliefs…there may be hope for the system after all… but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Community can change the world

2008-04-13T13:22:00.003-05:00

My favourite part of the movie “the Matrix” is the part when Neo goes to see the Oracle. As he is waiting in her living room, he encounters a young child who is holding a spoon. The child has the spoon in one hand and appears to be making the spoon bend merely by using the powers of the mind. Neo stands a few feet away in sheer amazement. After completing lots of training, he realizes that he does not have the same capability that this young boy has. The child catches Neo staring. It seems that Neo is caught between two realities. One is that surely this must be a trick; while the other reality is that he knows that it is not, but doesn’t know how to explain it. The boy hands Neo the spoon and allows him to try. He stares at the spoon for a moment, concentrating really hard. Finally Neo gets the spoon to bend ever so slightly before it goes back to its original shape. The child smiles and tells him the secret. It is easy to bend the spoon however you like once you realize that there is no spoon. I’m pretty sure that this simple phrase is immediately lost on Neo, because it was spoken by a child, and in the other room, the Oracle, who was much more important than this child, was waiting. The interesting thing is that the oracle was the one who told him no, while the child gave him the answer to changing the world. Only when Neo realized that nothing in the world could hold him back was he truly able to master it.

Truly I tell you, the first Christians whom we read about in the book of Acts learned that when they no longer conformed to the ways of the world, the people of God grew in number every day. Nothing was able to control them once they realized this.

What made this community so different? The way that all the believers were together and having everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as they had need. Every day they met in the temple, they broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. Surely this is different than what it was living in a hippie commune or having the state impose Communism upon the people. Instead, this was the people who feared and loved God coming together and realizing that there is no spoon. That if they lived a life that told the people around them that “the world” has nothing to offer, that there was no spoon, then the things of the world would be defeated.

For those of you who have gone to Mississippi, you know about what it means to experience a community inspired by God. Every day there is opportunity to gather together to worship, everyday there is an opportunity to work for something other than our own money, and I think, most importantly, the opportunity to eat meals together and enjoy each others company. As I’m sure anyone in this congregation will tell you who has been to Camp Victor, this intentional community is a world changing thing.

In fact, the earliest Moravians were intentionally living in this different community in the hopes to not live according to the values of the world, but instead wanted to live as if the Kingdom of God was present here on earth. During the time of Comenius, this community lived as part of the “hidden seed”. Unfortunately we do not have much information because they were persecuted for their beliefs, but I think we must believe that their community lived differently than others around them, because otherwise that small, hidden seed, would not have made it to Herrenhut. When they finally did make it Herrenhut, the Unitas Fratrum was able to live out this intentional community the way God desired. In fact, their community drew people from many other faith communities to the Moravians because they saw that the way they lived was very similar to the way the early Christians in the book of Acts lived. Unfortunately, all these different faith communities were at odds with each other as to truly live together. The community only thrived when they lived out this life AND they learned to put aside their differences and love each other.

The whole idea that we have to love each other is more about action than thought. The neighbors of First Moravian Church of Riverside must be able to see that we love each other and more importantly, we love them, which does not include them coming through our doors as the first step. They need to come to the realization that we are not living for ourselves, which is what our entire American culture preaches, but we are living for Christ, and thus we are living for each other because we know that Christ dwells in each of us.

I have no definite answer my friends, to how we go about making visible our community of love. All I do know is that Jesus said that we, his followers, are the salt of the earth and that we are the light of the world.

These two statements are the pinnacle of what it means to belong to the people which God has set apart. Starting with Abraham, God calls us to be separate, to live differently than the rest of the world thinks we should live. The rest of the Hebrew Scriptures are filled with stories of how we have fallen short of being the people God calls us to be. Then we finally get to the New Testament, and we find Jesus, the son of God who sets people apart to be Holy. Jesus spends his ministry telling those around him what it takes to be set apart, what it means to be holy, what it means to not be of the world.

It is an awesome undertaking which can be fulfilled in an infinite number of ways. The epistle lesson for today talks about how we are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God so that we may declare the praises of him who called us out of darkness into God’s wonderful light. Because we have received this mercy from God, I do know that simply giving money to a charity or food to a food bank is not enough. Instead, we must dine with the poor and the hungry. Be in fellowship with those among us whom the world considers undesirable, even if it means personal or professional disgrace. Great is our reward in heaven when we are able to live out that calling.

We must be continuing to reflect on our own community within this congregation and look to see the impact we are making on the people around us. One of the great things about this congregation is the rich family context which has been built up for many years. The early Christians who we are looking to model this morning saw themselves as a family. “Family is the dominant social model as well as a metaphor which Jesus uses to engender a specific kind of behavior.”[1]

The family model for Christian community can be a difficult one to live within. There are two main problems to building this community. First is that there are really only two ways to gain entrance into a family. You can either be born into a family or marry into one. The second obstacle is when Jesus says that he came to set a son against his father, or a daughter against her mother (Matthew 10:34-37). This might make us think that Jesus is against family, but in fact, it is showing us that in order to really be a family of believers, we must put aside allegiance to our own family and build relationships which have Christ at the center, which is what any congregation should truly be. And yet, with Christ at the center of our family, we must do everything we can to love one another. If we chose to be nice in order not to hurt one’s feelings, we will continue to be shallow in both faith and in community. Loving each other sometimes saying things which hurt, which bring about frustration or struggle, but those times are when the Sprit grows in us, it deconstructs us and admonishes us, allowing for a deeper walk with God.

This weekend, the men of this congregation went on a retreat and learned about family. We recalled times and relationships which were meaningful to us and almost everyone had a story of some sort of struggle between siblings. Because we are brothers and sisters in Christ, we must not think that everything we say must be “nice” because it hinders growth. I’m willing to guess that all of us at some point in our lives have been told the “truth in love”, even when it hurt. We must seek to do that more often, to be the community in love. “Community is the place where our limitations, our fears and our egoism are revealed to us. We discover our poverty and our weakness, our inability to get along with some people, our mental and emotional blocks, our affective or sexual disturbances, our seemingly insatiable desires, our frustrations and jealousies, our hatred and our wish to destroy. An experience in prayer and the experience of being loved and accepted in community, which has become a safe place for us, allows us to gradually accept ourselves as we are, with our wounds and all the monsters. We are broken, but we are loved. We can grow to greater openness and compassion; we have a mission.”[2]

That mission is to show the world that there is no spoon. The spoon in this case our individuality in which we attempt to exist. Once we realize that our individuality does not exist, but our love is show in the way that we love each other. When this community becomes greater than our individuality, we are a force that will change the world. Amen.

[1] Joseph Hellerman. The Ancient Church as Family (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001) pg 70.
[2] Jean Vanier, Community and Growth, 2nd Ed. (New York: Paulist Press, 1989) pg 26-27.

Another Tom Visit...

2008-03-11T16:22:00.003-05:00

Tom came by this afternoon in seemingly high spirits. He believes he has found some decent part-time work. He came in and we chatted for about 30 minutes. It is especially interesting that now he no longer simply complains about his own life, but he asks me about mine and seems genuinely interested. I told him about my struggles with the ordination review committee and he told me that in his book, I'm already ordained. That comment really makes me happy. If only we had a couple theologically trained homeless people on the committee, we'd be golden.

Tom also told me that he has acquired a few more misdemenor tickets for loitering, jay-walking, and riding the train without a ticket. Tickets which I doubt I could get on my own. Would a cop give me a ticket for asking for money outside of a WaWa? Would they fine me for hopping a median of a highway? Would they give me a ticket for riding the train with an unpunched ticket? Or would I simply get warnings because of me being middle class?

I think on one of my days off sometime soon, I'm going to ride the train all day and see what happens. Or perhaps I will someday have the courage to beg for money to see how I'm treated. I need to first work up the guts to do it to see what happens. I don't know if I'd ever actually get sent to jail for it, but who knows... its a hard thing to overcome pride.

New Sins!!! Thank you Catholics!

2008-03-10T21:04:00.003-05:00

The Catholic church is an interesting beast. All this talk over what is a sin and what isn't... but this news article came from the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7287071.stm today and I found it interesting.

Apparently some Archbishop has taken up the task of moderninzing the list of what sin is.

The original 7 deadly sins are

Pride
Envy
Gluttony
Lust
Anger
Greed
Sloth

While these are still things we should not do, this Archbishop has added to the list. I like some of them...

Enviromental pollution
Genetic manipulation
Accumulating excessive wealth
Inflicting poverty
Drug trafficking and consumption
Morally debatable experiments
Violation of fundamental rights of human nature.

Now, I've read two articles on this and already seen a few jokes about the current Pope being a former Nazi youth, especially in the area of "morally debatable experiments and a violation of fundamental rights of human nature" But all that aside, I like the way that these new sins are headed. I find that unlike the original 7 deadly sins, these are sins of corporation. It means that I commit sin by both driving a car on my own, but also as a population, we add to pollution by not pushing for the strictest/highest standards for a car's mpg.

So a question to the 5 or so people that actually read this blog... which of the newest "sins" do you find most intersting and why?

Romans 8:1-11 Sermon

2008-03-09T11:53:00.002-05:00

I’m sure that most of us here today have done what I did when I first listened to the text from Romans. I scratched my head, thought that Paul really wasn’t kidding when he said he was bad with words, and got to thinking that the point of this passage was that because of God sending the Holy Spirit, Christ now lives in us who are his followers. This isn’t exactly new knowledge to those of us who have been going to church most of their lives.

There is that song most of us learned at camp or in VBS called I’ve got the joy joy joy joy, down in my heart. Well, I’m not going to serenade you with the rest of the song, but the third verse talks about us having the love of Jesus in our hearts. Because we are able to quickly understand this so quickly and from such a young age, it seems to me that the older we get, the farther away we go from actually living it out.

I’m going to read to you again the last 3 verses of today’s lesson, but this time from The Message.

But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about.

But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells - even though you still experience all the limitations of sin - you yourself experience life on God's terms.

It stands to reason, doesn't it, that if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus, bringing you alive to himself? When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ's!

I especially like the last sentence. With his Spirit living in you, your body will be as alive as Christ’s! That’s a big statement to live with. When Christ’s spirit lives in us, we will be alive in the same way. We must no longer think of ourselves as individuals, but realize that we are only important because of our relations with others. Because if Christ had not had others around him at all times, if it were not for the sins of others, Christ would not have needed to be. If this is the case, I think we must begin to act as Jesus acted.

A few weeks ago, we heard Jeff preach about the difference between living as Christ has already been resurrected or simply waiting for Jesus to return. We must do more than mentally reflect on that idea everyday… Instead, we must act out that idea every day we are alive in Christ.
With that in mind, we must all do our part to think of the things which we truly admire most about Christ and act upon them. When Jesus said that we will do greater things than he did himself, we must really believe in that and make every attempt to act upon that belief.
As you ponder the thing that you might do in your life because Christ lives in you, I’m going to share with you what it is I hope to do. Some of you I’ve told about this already, but now I think I’m finally able to go about doing it.

The thing I admire most about Jesus was the fact that he was able to meet people and invite himself into their home for a meal. The fellowship that happened around the table, the sharing of stories, the whole idea that Jesus forced hospitality has always amazed me. It was reinforced to me a couple of times this week, which is why I’m bringing it forward to you today. The first way was in my studying for this message, when one of the authors I read said that “renewal in Christ is not simply an individual affair. In fact, it is not primarily an individual affair at all. It is a matter of renewal through membership in a new community.”[1]

The second way this was reinforced to me this week was by one of my favourite authors and preachers. Many of you may remember the video we watched during our stewardship campaign by Rob Bell. I was finishing his latest book when he ended with a story about how he always noticed that Jesus was always at someone else’s house, sharing a meal, drinking their wine, laughing and telling stories. Because of this, Rob Bell attempts to invite people over to his home to do this same thing.

Unfortunately for me, I am unable to have people over to the place where I am currently residing, and have yet to really figure out a way to still have a meal and good conversation with most of you. Well, I realized that my hope in doing this would not be fulfilled unless I let the Christ who lives within me do the talking. With that being said, over the next 16 weeks, I really want to come over to your house and have a meal with you. I’ll give you more information in the bulletin about this once Easter is over, but I want you to keep it in the back of your mind. I think it will be an exciting way for us all to practice the things we are going to be focusing on this year, Evangelism, Hospitality, and Healing.

There is another main point in this story that must be brought to our attention. It is the concept of forgiveness and freedom in Christ. It comes from the first two verses of Romans 8, which talks about there being no condemnation for those who are in Christ.

There is a story of a man who has lived in a small town his whole life. He had grown up in a church that preached hell, fire and brimstone. He stopped attending church once his parents no longer forced him to go. He lived out most of his adult life trying to do the best he could, although there were apparently some things that he was not particularly fond of. One day he drove by a local church which hung a banner which simply said, “No Condemnation.” The man continued to drive by that sign everyday going to and from work, he passed by it every time he went to the grocery store, every time he went to pick up his kids from school. He didn’t believe it. The church always condemns someone. They always have someone to blame. He continued to drive by that sign every day, and every time he passed it, he felt angry, because it was not what he experienced as a young man.

One week, this man had a particularly rough time. His boss had chewed him out over some small misunderstandings, his ex-wife called him complaining about late child support, and his current significant other called to say that his current relationship wasn’t going anywhere, so she was going somewhere else. As he drove past the church at the end of that week, he saw the sign that said “No Condemnation” in a new light, with new hope.

When Sunday morning came around, he snuck into the back of the church a few minutes after the service began. Unfortunately for him, the last pew on both sides was filled, so he had to sit on the end of the fourth row from the back. As he watched, he saw this man all dressed in black lead the service while some people sang, some people read, some people did very little of either, but that everyone spoke the bold text in the liturgy.

Finally in the liturgy, it came to the point where everyone was confessing. “We confess that we have done wrong.” And the man said to himself, A HA! I knew it…here it comes…the condemnation I knew the church has always had. The liturgy continued… “We have done wrong, lived for ourselves, turned from our neighbors, refused to help others, ignored the pain of the world.” The anticipation in the man was killing him. He waited for the words of his old preacher about those people who have done wrong going to hell. He waited for the preacher to say that only the good people who fully follow will go to heaven. He waited for those words, because once he heard them, he was going to get up and leave…

But he never heard those words, because the next words out were the words of Romans chapter 8. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” The divine intention for Christ's church is NO condemnation. NO condemnation of either the self, or the other. For St. Paul, the church is the place where the world, as God intends it to be, is accessible to humankind. The church reveals the world as it has been transformed by the Cross of Christ. The world where there is no condemnation. Here the prodigal child of God is always welcomed home--no questions asked. Here we celebrate the grace and mercy of God made known to us in Christ Jesus. A grace that knows no boundaries. A mercy that has no restrictions. A love that always includes, never excludes.[2]

I wish I knew the ending to the story of the man I just told you about, but I don’t know it. What I do know is that we must write the ending because Christ lives in us. Christ moves in us. Christ has our being in us. And because of that, we must not have any condemnation in our hearts. We must live as if forgiveness is real and it must be taken seriously. Amen.

[1] Paul Achtemeier. “Interpretation: A Bible-Commentary for Teaching and Preaching: Romans. John Knox Press, Louisville. 1985. Pg 135.
[2] The Rev. Sid Burgess. Sermon entitled “Bama Bubba” preached on October 8, 2000. Available online at: http://www.day1.net/index.php5?view=transcripts&tid=209

UniMix!

2008-03-05T19:52:00.002-05:00

I lead our Wednesday night service today. This season of Lent we have been going over the Lord's Prayer and today's topic was "Give us this day our Daily Bread". Having just completed this years 30 hour famine sponsored by World Vision (http://www.wvi.org/wvi/wviweb.nsf/) I thought it would be neat to speak a bit about what millions of starving people eat every day. In the 30 hour famine leadership guide, it has a recipe for something called UniMix, which is as follows.

40% Beans -- mashed. (I used 4 cans of Navy Beans)
30% Corn meal. (I used 3 cans)
10% Vegatable Oil (1 can)
10% Sugar (1 can)
10% Powered Milk (1 can)
Add water as necessary till it has an oatmeal/porridge like consistancy.

I then divided it up into 2 oz containers and gave them out to taste during a part of the liturgy. One person got up out of the pews to drink some water. I must admit that it doesn't taste very good. Heck, even the recipe says it isn't going to taste like what we are used to. A bunch of people made excuses for not eating it. Others just said they weren't up for that type of adventure.

All in all, I think we do a poor job of asking God to provide us with what we need on a daily basis. We really don't want to be in unity with our brothers and sisters in Africa because it would mean giving up a lifestyle we have grown comfortable with.

One of the questions that was asked today is "How do we go about giving up the things we don't really need?" I don't have an answer really, but I do remember a quote I read recently, although I don't remember who said it. It was, "it is far easier to give things up in big steps than small ones." I don't know how much truth there is in that statement, but I think you have to try it to find out.

Conclusion

2008-02-21T20:51:00.003-05:00

So its idiot looking time. It wasn't Tom who showed up at the church the other day. It was apparently some new guy asking for money who wore almost an identical outfit.

Tom actually showed up this afternoon. I learned he likes grape soda.

I also learned that I shouldn't be so quick to think poorly of other people.

Phew. Big weight off my shoulders.

Oh, and thanks for the comment from the anon. person who commented. Its appreicated.

Ugh

2008-02-20T12:18:00.002-05:00

Tom just came by the office and rang the doorbell. Jeff saw him and called him over to his office. I had just left Jeff's office from our weekly meeting and he told me his patience and wallet were running low with him. Well, I waited with Mary in her office for Tom to come over when he was done talking with Jeff. Apparently it was a quick meeting because when we weren't watching, he quickly left and didn't come. We only saw him as he rounded the corner of the church building. I don't know what they talked about. But I'm guessing that he isn't going to make it to church for dinner tonight.

This sucks.

I don't really blame Jeff, although I want to. But I think its something that is part of a larger problem within Christianity. If we can't solve the problem in a few steps and the person doesn't go away, then we are ill equipped to do anything else.

I have often wondered what gospel people read. What good news do we share with other people who come to us. How often do we fail to go out to the people that don't or can't ask? If being a pastor means only helping the people who attend worship on a regular basis, I don't want to do it.

Why is it so bloody hard to get other people on board for living our lives the way Jesus wants?

Some thoughts...

2008-02-18T20:41:00.004-05:00

Tom just came by the office tonight. I had just had finished a bible study on Matthew 13:10-17. I'm using this book named "Solo" which is the Message in lectio divina format. I decided to randomly open to a page, and the first one I went to was Matthew 5. If you don't know, those are the beattitudes... which I tend to shrug off as Matthew spritualizing something which wasn't meant to be. I prefer Luke 6 which is named "the sermon on the plain" (feel free to check my old blogs for my sermon on that passage) and I feel deals with what Jesus said in a very simple manner.

But during the bible study, there was a question that said, "...what insights has God given you in recent weeks as you have interacted with his message. What have those truths led you to do?"

A few weeks ago, the answer was to give up my belt. Today, the answer was to give up my jacket. Tom has apparently been harassed by some gentleman who is trying to take what little money Tom has to buy drugs. Now, I don't know if its true or not, but the end of the story is that Tom had his coat taken from him. Wow, way to kick a man when he's down. I don't know if its wrong of me as a pastor to hope someone goes to hell, but I'm pretty sure that taking a coat from a homeless man in the middle of winter is sufficient for a one way pass.

As we drove back from McDonalds, I couldn't help but think of the strange job I am preparing for. One where in the span of 10 days, I can be in a conference in Chicago, then spend time with a family who just lost their husband/father and the mother doesn't know how to tell her 3 children (while Jeff was with the mother, I spent time with the kids. They made me valentines which I posted on my door), to being in a bible study where a woman prayed outloud for the first time other than saying the Lord's Prayer, to having dinner with a homeless man. You sure don't get that doing a regular 9-5 job.

"You anoint my head with oil..."

2008-02-14T20:41:00.003-05:00

I just arrived back at my office after a short plane ride back from Chicago. They conference saved the most interesting things for last, which is nice, as usually you hear everything they have to say in the first day, and the rest of the time, you go over what you can already figure out for youself.

First, during one of the breakout sessions, I decided to go to the more advanced church planters group, as I felt I had a decent handle on the sessions they were teaching for my own group. Instead, I went to a session on discipleship as a way of life. It was good because it taught us how to train disciples using Matthew 28:16-18.

The leader of the group said that there are 7 principals in discipleship as a way of life.

● Unity is in community
● Obedient life (teach to obey, not teach for knowledge)
● Vision of Jesus, assurance of faith
● Worship – Spirituality
● Doubt is human nature. (When Jesus was on the cross, he had two people next to him, one who doubted and one who believed. Those people are both within us.)
● Mutual Relationship
● The Word of God

I realize that this isn't as fleshed out as I would like it to be, but I plan on creating a program of sorts (while not having it be a formal program) which I will work on with a few people in my next church assignment. I look forward to seeing where this is going.

Then, right before our closing meal, we had a worship service. I had previously disliked the other worships because all of the songs we were singing were quite shallow theologically. Every single song we sang was about my relationship with Jesus, not once did we sing using the words "we" or "us". So I didn't have high expectations for this service.

Well, we had a wonderful message by one of the church planting directors, who preached about the 70 who were sent out by Jesus. That this moment was our fanfare, as we would recieve little out in the real world. Then, each of us who were new to the church planting mission were asked to stand, and while some leaders came around and anointed us with oil, others who have been out in the church planting field laid hands on us and prayed for the start of our ministry. It was extremely moving. So often in the church do I feel I am required to be the person who prays for others while no one prays for me.

Overall, I have found a renewed hope in inter-church dialogue and have felt called more and more to the church planting mission field. I don't know where I will end up, but I do know now, more than ever, that God has something big in store for me.

Ready...Fire...Aim...

2008-02-13T21:36:00.003-05:00

The Moravian director of church planting says that a good church planter lives by the motto, Ready, Fire, Aim. I like this motto, as it does not spend as much time aiming, but shoots, then aims before they fire again. They try, and if it works, they keep their aim where it is, if not, they are free to take a look at how close they came to what they were shooting at.

That being said, the past few weeks I have noticed in my own conversations with others, that I have been talking more and more about the Christ who is a revolutionary. I seek to be a disciple of the Jesus who calls us to leave everything we know and follow wherever he goes. The other side of the coin in the church is that it seems to be a pastor, one must be comfortable with evolutionary change.

I wish I knew how to juggle both Revolution and Evolution in a way which would best service others who seek to be Christ followers. They keep telling me that prayer is the most important aspect of church planting...perhaps it is time I started taking that to heart and made it more of a focus in my ministry.

Church Planting Seminar in Chicago

2008-02-12T22:38:00.004-05:00

Today was the first day of the church planting seminar put on by the ELCA. It wasn't particularly interesting as the church planting class I took in Ashland, Ohio.

Today we made sure we had a sure theological grounding to be a church planter. It turned out that most of the ELCA planters would one up each other on who had the dirtiest quote from Luther. Now, I am not one to shun cursing, but to think that people who don't preach the gospel ought to be run out of town and have dung thrown at them... thats a bit extreme. Back to the theological background. We did this exercise which had us think of positive theological statements for church planting. So many of the phrases that were offered up to the group were in "churchese" which is language only people who have grown up in the church would understand. I realize that I'm probably a decent offender when it comes to this, but in this setting, it became very evident that most of the people here were going to be planting churches for people who already have some church background.

Then, one gentleman offered this gem up to the group. When we were talking about what we as church planters are not, he said, "we are not people who's theology can be placed on a bumper sticker. Had you said this to me a few months ago, I would have agreed in full, but recently, I saw a bumper sticker put out by my collegue Suzanne's church http://www.thebarnlv.org/loading.html which simply states "Love Wins." which I just love. Now, I still have a strong distaste for hokey theology or cheesy statements which are a big part of Christian culture, but to say something like "Love Wins." is bad theology is just crazy. It seems to me that often we make theology so complex in order to never have to live it because we need to spend more time understanding it all. Something as simple as "Love Wins." makes a great bumper sticker as well as gives us little to learn and lots to do.

Other than that, the small group of Moravians have had some wonderful conversations with each other and the new director of church planting, Fred Lehr. Sometimes in our conversations over meals, it is quite clear to see how different our thinking is between the modern and post modern church, but I am happy that he is willing to engage in the conversation, as I have met other people in church leadership who simply dismiss the post modern movement.

Tomorrow will hopefully be more practical. We did get a paper to fill out which would help us create a 6 month plan, but as it will be at least 18 months before I get out into the church plant, I did not place a high priority on it just yet.

An Interesting Question

2008-02-11T17:51:00.000-05:00

Its a warm 2 degrees here in Chicago today. Suzanne and I arrived around noon for a 3 day seminar for church planters. We got in, dropped off our luggage and went out for a walk to a local grocery store for lunch and for me to get tooth paste, as security found me trying to sneak more than 3.4oz of Crest onto the plane. I tried to argue that even though it was a 6oz. container, it was more than half gone. I might have pushed harder, but I quickly remembered that airport security could have me strip searched, and I quickly bid goodbye to my toothpaste.

Upon our return to the hotel, I found my roommate in the room. He is from India, but currently working in the middle of NJ. We talked about quite a bit in a short time. Family, faith, church planting. He was telling me of the struggles of the church in India when an interesting question came up.

He said that the Christians in India used to start schools, hospitals, or other ways of interacting with the community in order to do outreach/evangelism. Now-a-days, those institutions are being taken over by secular or by other faiths. So if the way which we as Christians used to show the love of Christ to others is not as accessable as it was in the past, what ways can we continue to show that love?

I think that'd be a neat question to have the people who read this blog answer.

The Belt Off My Waist

2008-02-07T11:58:00.000-05:00

I never answer the doorbell at the place where I'm staying. Living in the Catholic rectory has meant I don't get any visitors. But it was Ash Wednesday and I assumed that since none of the priests were in the house, I should probably answer the door and tell the person where to find them.

To my surprise, it was Tom, the homeless man who has been coming by. He was surprised to see me, as he was apparently looking for the priest. He had also come by my office that morning, looking to tell me that he didn't steal keys from the church, which apparently one of our members accused him of, but must have found them, as he didn't say anything to me. Well, he told me the story and asked if I had any work for him. It was almost 9 at night, to which the obvious answer was no. But as I stood there talking with him, I noticed something which I never had before about Tom. He was using a legnth of rope (one of those stringy but very tough pieces of rope you might find at a construction site) as a belt. While he was telling me his story about the keys, I quickly took off my belt (I'm glad he wasn't paying attention, because it might have looked a bit suspect) and gave it to him. He said he hadn't had a new belt in a long time. More years than he could remember.

I only own one belt, so I went out and bought a new one this morning. It took me an hour to get to the department store and back. And I was perfectly content to just let this story go untold. No one needs to know that I gave my belt to this guy, but yesterday, I felt that Ash Wednesday was just some silly holiday which we celebrate to show everyone else we are followers of Christ. I figured it had no biblical basis, and therefore, shouldn't be celebrated.

Then I remembered this prayer which I'm just going to assume most other Christians say every so often in corporate prayer. "We confess to you and to one another, and to the whole communion of saints in heaven and on earth, that we have sinned by our own fault in thought, word, and deed; by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart, mind and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others as we have been forgiven."

Then when I got back to the office after buying a new belt, I told the story to Mary and another person in the office. Afterwards, she warned me about not getting scammed. Ugh. What person reads the gospels and worries about getting scammed? I think when we focus on not being scammed, we take our minds off of what we have left undone.

Maybe I would have given my belt anyway. I don't know if that prayer helped me remember or not, but I wish life were as simple as praying or preaching it and just having other people do it. That way, I wouldn't be the only one who does it because I'm paid to do so.

Super Sunday

2008-02-03T12:28:00.000-05:00

As far as weeks go, this is certainly a Super one. Tonight is the Super bowl, and Tuesday was upgraded this year from Super Tuesday to Super Duper Tuesday. With all of the excitement, it’s hard to focus on the ordinary, mundane aspects of life. This isn’t always a bad thing, but when we equate elections and football with things that are super, we lose sight of those things which are really extra ordinary.

If you paid attention to the bulletin today, you will notice two things are different. The first is that each bulletin has a name tag in it. If you haven’t done so already, I would like to invite you to put it on. The second thing that is different is that we did not have a time to greet one another. I specifically removed it from its normal place in order that now when you stand up to greet one another, you might do so with new eyes; that when you look at the person whom you are greeting this morning, you see Jesus.

So now, I invite you all to stand up and greet each other.

Let me read to you the story of Jesus Transfiguration.

“Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, “This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!” When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Get up and do not be afraid.” And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone. As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, “Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”

Up until this point, Peter, James and John, and I’m sure the rest of the disciples thought of Jesus as just an ordinary guy who had some great thoughts on how to live life. Yes, there were some impressive miracles in there, but this was the point in which Jesus which changed these three men’s lives. They finally realized that Jesus was the Son of God. It is something which we tend to take for granted. We all just assume that Jesus is the Son of God. It isn’t exactly a startling statement to make to a bunch of believers. The opposite is true today though. So often we seem to forget that Jesus was a regular person.

I gave you all nametags today because we need to begin to see Jesus in the ordinary, non Super days of our life.

On Friday, there was a man waiting in the hallway of Hahle hall when I arrived. He needed money for the train. He had been here a few months before when his wife kicked him out of the house. This time, he had come to collect his things, which wasn’t much. Everything he had was in a bag not much bigger than this. I gave him the money he needed for his train ticket, and as I was walking him out the door, he asked if we had an extra umbrella, as you will remember that it was raining quite heavily on Friday. Well, I took him into the sanctuary and went to the umbrella rack and let him have his pick. So if someone notices that their umbrella is no longer there, please speak to me, I owe you a new one.

Well, I got back to my office and a friend from college happened to call me. I told him the story I just told you, but when I got to the part about this man asking for money, he couldn’t help but ask, “Well, what did you do?”

The answer is, of course I gave him the money. Now, I have to admit that I do such things for a purely selfish reason. I can’t even tell you this mans name because I forgot it just a few seconds after he told it to me, but I gave it to him because I saw Jesus and someday, when I am dead, I will stand in front of the Transfigured Christ and be called to account for my actions. I want Jesus to say to me, thank you giving me money for the train. Thank you for sharing a meal with me at McDonalds when I came to you homeless and out of jail. Thank you for caring about the people I care about, the people who are not considered Super, but plain, ordinary people who need a little help.

When you look around this room, and when you leave this worship today, I hope that you see everyone wearing a name tag that says “Hello, my name is Jesus.” Care for each other in that manner. Go home from here and read a gospel before getting ready for the football game. Realize that when people saw Jesus, they invited him into their homes for a meal. Realize that when people saw Jesus, they wanted to hear his story. Realize that when people touched Jesus, they expected to be healed

Then, realize that when you see other people, you need to see Jesus in them and invite them into your home for a meal. Realize that when you see other people, you want to know their life story and be a part of it. Realize that when you touch other people as Jesus, you can expect some aspect of life to be healed.

This is what we need to intentionally start doing my brothers and sisters. Too often we fail to see Jesus in the people around us. The people who are lonely and seeking companionship. We need to look at each other and say I want to share my story with you, because that’s what happened when Jesus was around other people. If we do not make an active effort to see those around us as Jesus, there is very little point in understanding Jesus to be the Christ, for you cannot have one without the other.

Kiva.org

2008-01-29T12:44:00.000-05:00

The Ooze is one of the websites I check out on a daily basis. It is usually filled with interesting conversation, although one fellow did say the following: "Hey underdog... i saw your blog. Let me just say that before you write or type one more word in your blog. That you have have become completely utterly irrelevant. Go sprinkle some water on a baby. peace."

Either way, I figure if I'm annoying in such a wonderful way, I'm doing my job. But I came across a wonderful article on Kiva.org, which provides microloans to a wide number of people all throughout the world. But I think the best part of it is that once the people you have donated money to repay the loan, you get your money back to reinvest in someone elses future.

So far I've donated to the following people.

The Mshikamano Group, which is 4 carpenters in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. $50

Luisa Luaao who runs a grocery store in Samoa. $25
and Serita Papalii who makes and sells pancakes in her village in Samoa. $25

Its a worthy cause to donate to. Be sure to check it out.

Unity Sermon 2008

2008-01-24T20:50:00.000-05:00

Let us pray: God of faith, God of hope, God of Love, we come before you this evening in a way in which we do not normally worship you. Keep our ears, eyes and hearts open to your message for each and every one of us, that we might grow closer to you, and to our neighbor next to us. In Jesus name we pray.

This is a unique service for many Christians to attend. Unity in worship is a concept in which we sometimes pay lip service to, yet we rarely do things as a community of believers which makes a large impact on the rest of those around us. Luckily, today in the little town of Riverside, we have at least 5 major faith communities which have enough sense to come together, put aside our normal style of worship and join in praise and adoration of a loving God.

I need everyone here today to do me a favor. You see, I am still a seminary student and because of that, there is always a little bit of fear in ordained clergy that I might get too heretical in what I preach. So I need you to watch all the clergy up front here to see if they nod in agreement with my theological statement or if they hang their heads in disgust.

God does not change. God is the same forever and ever. From the Alpha to the Omega. God is immovable, steadfast, and without end. Our God is eternal, from everlasting to everlasting.
Ok, give me a thumbs up if they seemed to be in agreement, a thumbs down if they were disgusted, or a wavy hand to let me know if they tried to appear as stoic as possible. Ok thank you. I wanted to get the theological test out of the way so we could get to the theme of today’s service.

Pray without ceasing.

There are so many ways to view this passage. We can view this passage as a way in which we attempt to make everything we do a prayer, to try and see through God’s eyes every moment. Some might view this passage and think they need to become a priest or monk or a nun and spend their day worshipping God. Or perhaps you try to pray without ceasing by noticing the holy in everything. Be it seeing Jesus in the homeless person on the street or the dandelion growing up in the cracks of a sidewalk.

There is another way to pray without ceasing. There are many groups who hold 24/7 prayer watches. My own denomination did it for 100 years in Germany, and only stopped because of war. In fact, there is a group in England which heard of the Moravian 100 years of continuous prayer and decided to start one of their own, which was great, except for the fact that when he started advertising it, he would mention that our denomination had died, because he assumed once we stopped praying, we no longer existed.

While both of these are good ways to improve your prayer life, I’m not terribly concerned with them on this day of unity. Remember how I stated earlier that God doesn’t change. That is still true, but our God is all about change, and that vehicle of change is prayer. When we pray, we are asking for a change in the way things are! and we are asking for things to change in a way which we know we cannot do on our own. When we pray, we are saying that we know our own knowledge about the situation is limited and we need the help of the Holy Spirit to change us, to change the situation, to change others thoughts, to interact with the world in such a way that God’s will is made manifest. Paul’s challenge, in my view, to always be joyful, to pray without ceasing, to give thanks in all circumstances, as it is Gods will for us in Christ Jesus is a challenge for us to seek change and to be followers of that change, no matter where it takes us in life.

Prayer as agent of change is probably not something most of us think about when we gather at a service for Christian unity. Change tends to create disunity rather than bringing God’s people together. Normally when we think of change, we create groups which separate us. I’m sure that most of us can recall a time in our churches where change has caused one group to be upset with another, or has two groups to form a third group who didn’t like either option. An experience of change creates both unity and disunity.

The question we must ask ourselves, as a diverse group of believers in Jesus Christ, is, if it is our experiences which create both unity and disunity, what then can we seek which only promotes unity? The answer, I believe, comes from one of my favourite theologians.

Deitrich Bonhoeffer says that it is not experience that binds us together, but faith.[1] He continues by saying “God has acted and wants to act upon us all, this we see in faith as God’s greatest gift, this makes us glad and happy, but it also makes us ready to forego all such experiences when God at times does not grant them.”[2]

The gospel lesson we read today reinforces this fact. When Jesus is praying for all believers, it is not that they will all have the same experience, but that all who believe, all who have faith, will be one. If, then, it is faith that is to be the theme of our prayer of change, we must seek Gods will with the knowledge that we will receive an answer which might differ from everything our previous experience has led us to believe.

To me, this is an exciting concept. There is beauty in the uncertainty of how God will respond to our prayer. We must always be in prayer in order that God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven, with the knowledge that most of the time, that prayer means we must change our own ways in order to be in line with God’s plan. It started with Abraham, whom God asked to change everything he ever knew, to leave his country in order to bless the generations which would follow him. It continued when Jesus called his disciples, some were fishing in their boats, others were collecting taxes, but when Jesus called, they changed what they thought they would be doing for the rest of their life to follow. John 17 is Jesus’ final prayer for his followers, he prays for change in our hearts, that God will be in us as God is in Christ… the only thing left for us to do is continue to ask for that change.

Let us close in prayer: Eternal God, we share a long history and living witness with many who are like us and many more who are not. Help us to recognize our brothers and sisters and the countless ways which you bless us all. Change our hearts to your will. Give us hands and feet which will gladly become callused because of our faith in your wisdom. Sharpen our eyes to see need in our neighbor. Make us delighted listeners of the stories of your majesty. And above all, continue to be steadfast in patience, as so often we fail to do these things which we ask for. In Jesus name, Amen.

[1] Dietrich Bonhoeffer. “Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community.” Translated by John W. Doberstein. Harper & Row Publishers. 1954. Pg 39.
[2] Ibid

What do you want?!?!

2008-01-21T11:36:00.000-05:00

The Bible that I read for my own personal devotion is a New International Version. I tell you this because it is the version from which I start reading the scripture, and when I first read it, a question Jesus asks has stuck in my head all week. I tried to block it out and think of something else to preach on, but I haven’t been very successful. I’ve been sick all week with what others have named the “Katrina Cough” and because of that, I’ve tried to weasel out of writing what God wanted me to say. I have twice tried to rewrite a sermon I had given 2 years ago, but just yesterday morning, I went to a small discussion group in a Baptist church and suddenly realized what the Spirit wanted me to say.

The version that we read from the pulpit, the New Revised Standard Version has in verse 38 Jesus asking “What are you looking for?” It is so philosophical. That question makes me sense that Jesus already knew the answer of these two men. It feels as if Jesus can just turn around and look into someone’s soul. That isn’t such a bad view of Jesus, but my translation has Jesus asking a different question with a different edge to it.

Let me set up the story again for you. The day before, Jesus had just been baptized by John. John knew then and there that this was the Lamb of God. He had seen this dove descend upon Jesus after the baptism and heard God’s voice reaffirm this thought. This was certainly an exciting day. The very next day, Jesus was passing by John, apparently all alone, when John the Baptist saw him and told two of his own disciples, “Look, the Lamb of God!” With those five words, the two disciples of John left him and began to follow Jesus. In my version, it doesn’t say how long it was, but eventually Jesus turned around, saw them following and asked “What do you want?!?!?”

When I read this question, it does not penetrate the soul like in the NRSV. It’s rough, it’s got an edge. It’s blunt. Jesus even seems a little annoyed that these two people are following him around. What do you want? He asks… let me answer your questions and leave me alone. It seems pretty clear that John the Baptist knew what Jesus was all about, but Jesus didn’t quite know himself just yet.

They didn’t ask Jesus a religious question. They didn’t ask about salvation, justice, politics, love or hate, right or wrong. They simply wanted to know where he was staying. Jesus still doesn’t give an exact answer… his reply is “come and you will see” There is no, meet me at the corner of Washington and Bridgeboro later in the evening. Just come, and they spent the day with Jesus.
The best part of this story is its blandness. The gospel writer does not record anything really special happening on this day. None of the conversation that happened the rest of the day made it into the gospel. Just the few sentences I just told you about. To me, the remarkable thing happens is the day after the two disciples spent the day with Jesus. Andrew is so excited about this man they call Jesus that the first thing he does is find his brother Peter and tells him that they have found the Messiah, they have found the Christ.

My original intent was to preach the rest of this sermon on evangelism. I hoped that I would get others excited about the workshop that was supposed to start yesterday but nobody signed up for. I wanted to be energetic about what we had just learned; how we were practicing to be like Andrew and tell our friends and family that we too have found the Messiah. Unfortunately I cannot go in that direction this morning, but it does allow me to think a bit more freely about something else. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

He is the perfect character to discuss in relation to today’s Gospel story. Many people tend to equate Dr. King to Jesus. He was such a revolutionary leader, he inspired, he lead, he dreamed. But I don’t see this preacher playing the role of Jesus. I see him in the role of Andrew. I imagine that one day, God asked Martin, “What do you want?!?!” and he replied, “where are you staying?” Jesus then answered back, “Come and you will see.”

And so Dr. King followed where Jesus was going. He followed the God of Israel who called to let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never failing stream (Amos 5:24). He followed the man from Nazareth to bring healing to the disenfranchised. He followed the Holy Spirit who gave power to the multitude to do mighty works in Jesus name.

When Jesus asks the question, “What do you want?!?!” What will we answer? Will we be put off by his tone? Will we decide to meet up with him sometime in the future, but not follow right away? Or will we seek where Jesus is staying and follow him no matter where he goes? Within each of us lies the potential to be like Andrew, to be like Dr. King. Unfortunately, we tend to say we love God but pick a funny way to show it. Rarely do we share with enthusiasm that we have found the Christ and we have chosen to follow his teachings. Rarely do we stop following the path we wanted to take on our own and take up the new path which God leads us down together. If we do not do the rare thing, if we do not come and see where Jesus is going, we will continue to find it difficult to tell others that we have found the Christ. We will see sharing where Christ is going as a chore instead of a gift.

Dr. King saw Jesus’ question of” What Do You Want?!?!” as a gift. I want to go where you want to go. I want to see what you see. I want what you want. I want to follow, and I want everyone else to know that I’m doing it.

Mississippi ~ Day 1

2008-01-07T16:46:00.000-05:00

Today was the first day of actual work here in Mississippi. We are staying in Ocean Springs at Camp Victor, which is a very nice facility for 212 people to sleep and eat while they do work. As far as the work goes, we're in a town thats fun to say, but I can't even begin to spell. Maybe I'll try and take some pictures next time I'm out. We only got to work a half day today due to a bit of the Lutheran team leader not knowing what he's talking about. He said there would be stuff for us to do, but instead, we got to fill in holes with dirt and level out the ground. It was good to do, but not really needed. Then the cement truck arrived and we got to help pour concrete into large columns. Once that was done, we had no more work to do, so we went out to Biloxi in order to see the 3 houses that the Moravians financed and built in conjunction with Habitat for Humanity. We expected the completed houses to have residents, but they did not seem to have any. Apparently the Habitat project manager did not use very good quality materials, as we could notice a lot of mistakes. I hope who ever moves into those houses finds them to be good, because they will not make it through the next big hurricane. Such is life I guess.

More to come in the next few days.

Nativity

2007-12-21T16:57:00.000-05:00

I really like nativity scenes. We have one at the rectory which is very beautiful which I'm sure someone spared no expense in buying it. I just really really really hate the fact that in almost all nativities, there is the baby Jesus with his arms outstreached. Granted, I'm not around babies most of my day, but I'm willing to bet that most of them don't hang out with their arms spread wide open. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm guessing Jesus didn't do it either. I've been on the lookout for a nativity set for a couple years now, and there are one or two out there which doesn't have the baby Jesus looking for a hug, but of course, those figures are bland and have almost no detail. Why can't anyone make one where Jesus is like any other baby? Is that so freaking hard to ask?

Caroling 2007

2007-12-17T13:53:00.000-05:00

Pastor Jeff and gang are leading the carols from the front of the room while others are sitting among the nursing home residents. About 6 songs were sung at each of the 4 homes we went to on that Sunday afternoon, but the first one was the only place we had cookies for everyone (FYI sugarless cookies in the nursing home are hot commodities).
Here is Kris, helping out one of the residents to find the song on the page. When she got into place, she whipped everyone into shape and got things in order very quickly.
This is a great picture. It seems to capture everyone's mood this afternoon.
Here is our 2007 Morning Star soloist. She sang the first verse for this member (whose name I don't know) at the Mason's retirement community.

Confirmation retreat

2007-12-11T13:14:00.000-05:00

This was the morning session on baptism. The afternoon session focused on communion. The sessions went fairly well with some good questions on the sacraments and what they mean for us in our lives.
The afternoon was spent on the beach in the middle of December. We then played some 2 hand touch football (my team won). We then walked on the boardwalk where some ladies sang Christmas carols on the empty stage while the gentlemen wasted their money on arcade games.
For the past month, I have been cutting out words from magazines I've been collecting. I gave them the theme of God's relationship with humanity and our own relationship with other people in light of our relationship with God. Below is what they came up with. Click it to make it bigger to try and read it.
All in all, I hope the class members had a good time and learned something about the sacraments and how they relate to them in the world.

Decorating for Advent

2007-12-07T12:17:00.000-05:00

Moravian Candle Wrapping is usually done by the women's circle. The bee's wax is the purest of candles and is usually wrapped in red, which symbolizes the blood of Christ. At Riverside Moravian, two others colors are used, white, which symbolizes the purity of Christ (which is supossed to be the bee's wax, but oh well) and the green, which symbolizes the eternal. All in all, its done to make the tray look nice and I think they do an excellent job.

Here are two pictures of the sanctuary. The first is Jeff (my supervising pastor) and he is hanging the stars which have names of local children who need gifts this Christmas. The second picture is the back of the sanctuary all hung with garland and Moravian stars. The men's group is looking up to make sure everything is hung properly. It seems everything is in place.

Some recent pictures of the church's Advent women's breakfast.

2007-12-04T21:14:00.000-05:00

Dale checking the breakfast meal to make sure it's done. He's careful not to let a single burnt corn flake be eaten.
What could he possibly be up to?
Some of the conversations at the annual womens breakfast.

Clothed in Christ

2007-12-01T12:56:00.000-05:00

Carlton Pearson is the name of the man I stayed up till 2am on Thursday night to watch. He is a Pentecostal preacher, a superstar in the evangelical world. The story which MSNBC portrayed starred a pastor who started his ministry by preaching hell, fire, and brimstone and he was quite good at it. Then one day he watched a T.V. news program where he saw refugee’s in Africa, mostly women and children, whose eyes seemed to have no soul. Carlton broke down in front of the television and cried. Soon after he came to the conclusion that hell was not the traditional place he had been taught, it was no lake of fire with the weeping and gnashing of teeth. He decided that hell was something we experience here on earth and that in the afterlife; everyone was with God in heaven. Before any of your thoughts jump to the idea that I will be preaching on universal salvation, please don’t worry. That is not my intention, as this doctrine can be as divisive as any other major issue the church faces today. But I want to tell you more about the reason I stayed up so late that night.

I stayed up late watching because I couldn’t fall asleep. Truthfully, I haven’t been able to sleep very well as of late and because of that, I have been spending more and more time in my office. This Thursday, I had just finished a great meeting where a committee of lay members gives me critical feedback. I was in my office for about an hour after this meeting when a man walked into the building. He walked right past my office like he didn’t know where he was going. I recognized him immediately. It was Tom. A homeless man who had come by the church a month or so ago, looking for a meal. We went out to McDonalds and shared a meal. I bought him a gift card, gave him some money for the bus and then he left. I doubted I’d ever see him again.
Reflecting on that though, I realize it wasn’t my brightest moment. Why would a homeless man not come back to a person who had given him food and money…but this isn’t a story about my mental mistake.

This time, Tom and I went back to McDonalds and I picked his brain about his life, the people who helped him, the people who didn’t, the places he lived, we talked about his faith, the jobs he had held and the time he had spent in jail. I shared my grandiose ideas about helping him and others who found themselves homeless. I told him my dream about what I thought God’s rule on earth would look like. We ended our meal by me asking him to come back to my office in a few weeks. As we drove back to the church, Tom asked me what I was going to be doing tomorrow. My hospitality was beginning to wear out and I told him how busy I was going to be. Hoping that, as it neared 10 o’clock at night, Tom would be as anxious to leave as I was. I had $10 in my hand ready to give him once we both got out of the car…but Tom didn’t get out of the car. I waited outside in the cold wearing sandals and a t-shirt, silently cursing him to get out of the car so we could both part ways.

One minute passed…
Two minutes passed…
Three minutes passed…

Finally Tom got out of my car and asked me what was taking so long. I told him I was just waiting for him. I gave him the money I had for him and was about to turn around when he started patting his coat pockets. He said that he had forgotten his hat. We checked the car and my office to no avail. He suggested it must still be at McDonalds. He said we could leave it. Gas was so expensive; he didn’t want to make me drive the two mile round trip to get it. I wasn’t about to let him go into a cold night without his hat. But I had figured Tom out. Tom wanted something else, I just hadn’t figured out what... His hat was somewhere hidden in his coat. Maybe he wanted more fries…I don’t know…but I took pity and decided to humor him. As we started to drive back, Tom commented on how quickly the car heated up.

AH HA!!! The Truth is revealed. I fell for it. The ol’ lost my hat trick so Tom could stay warm for a few more minutes. Who could blame him though? It was definitely cold outside. When we arrived back the restaurant, I decided to let Tom stay in the warm car and go inside and “look” for the hat. I had already determined to even ask the manager if it was there, just to give Tom another few moments in the warmth. I knew it was already in the car, so what difference did it make if I didn’t find it. I walked past the table where we had sat, getting ready to speak to the manager…only to find Tom’s wool hat was scrunched in-between the wall and the seat… just where he had left it.

I felt like Balaam’s faithful steed. I picked up the hat, got back in the car and started home. I dropped Tom off at the train station and just before Tom got out of the car, I apologized for not being able to help him more. He shocked me by saying it was okay and that I had already blessed him greatly. Little did he know all the thoughts that ran through my mind as we drove that night. It was that very moment when part of today’s scripture became very real to me. Jesus had just gotten out of my car. It was quite humbling.

As it approached 2AM on Friday morning, I realized why I could not fall asleep that night. I needed the lesson that hell can be found right here on earth reinforced to me in a powerful way. Tom spends a lot of his life in hell here on earth, and in the short hour or so we were together, my own mind and bias helped contribute to that hell, even if I never acted on it.

Remember how I said universal salvation is a divisive doctrine? Well, it got that bishop kicked out of the mega church he built. He was defrocked as a Pentecostal bishop and he lost thousands of many influential friends. Life as he knew it was over and he was in his own personal hell.
Fortunately for Carlton Pearson, another pastor in California heard of his downfall and invited him to come and speak to her congregation. At the end of the service, that loving pastor poured some warm water into a basin, asked the defrocked bishop to remove his socks and shoes, knelt down, and washed his feet.

The last verse of the 13th chapter of Romans says: Clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ.
The pastor who washed the feet of the former bishop was already clothed in Jesus Christ. She saw that he was in Hell and needed a bit of heaven. Tom, without knowing I was in a self imposed hell, released me by blessing me for feeding him and giving him money to ride the bus and stay warm.

What will happen to us when we decide to clothe ourselves in Jesus Christ? What will we do if we see others around us in their own version of hell? Will we remove our clothes of Jesus and give them the love of God which surrounds us?

This whole idea of treating each other, and most notably, the people who need the most compassion, as if we were already in heaven is striking. In the gospel lesson today, (Matthew 24:36-44) we realize that Jesus is talking about his return, when his reign will begin. Scholars say that the fact that Jesus doesn’t share the day or the hour of his return is a sign of grace. A sign which allows us to practice what we hope heaven to be like. As the Advent season begins today, I hope you make an effort to bring someone a piece of heaven here on earth in a very personal way. It’s the difference between feeding the homeless and staying in the kitchen while they eat and cooking for the homeless and actually sitting among them and sharing the meal. What difference will we each make because we are clothed in Jesus Christ? The possibilities are endless and limited only by those things which put in our own way.
Amen.

Great Advent Calendar

2007-11-29T11:43:00.000-05:00

This is an advent calendar passed on to me by Wezlo (see links on right) which was made by one of his church members. Her name is Anne Goodrich, is a graphic designer and website is http://www.goodrichdesign.net/ and if you would like to print out this wonderful Advent Calendar for free (Thanks Anne!!!) you can do so at http://goodrichdesign.net/AdventGivingCalendar.pdf

The creative idea behind this calendar is to give gifts instead of recieving gifts. On December 3, you give 5 cents for every pair of jeans you own and on December 8, you give 3 cents for every light switch and on December 25, you are asked to give 15 cents for every gift you recieve. This idea is awesome. I hope my readers will print one out and comment on (at the end of the season) how much they have given. Let the giving begin!

Trying to stop being so selfish...

2007-11-28T14:37:00.000-05:00

In the last week or two of every month, I find myself in the church secretary's office helping her (Mary) fold, staple and address the monthly newsletter. Today, we were halfway through the approximately 240 newsletters and our discussion turned to a homeless man who came to our door earlier in the month. Most of the time, anyone looking for food or shelter or just help in general are sent to the Lutheran church down the street, as they hold the money for our local ministerium to give out, but instead, Mary called me and asked me to talk to him.

Tom hadn't eaten in a day and decided to ask for help because it was the first day of the year it had gotten really cold. He was looking for money to catch a bus to the shelter a few towns away. I took Tom in my car to the local McDonalds (his choice). We chatted over the meal, and I asked him for a little bit of his life story. I asked him about how he survives, how he finds food, how he finds money, the things I deemed important to someone who has no place to live. Before we left, I bought him a $25 gift card for more food and as we were leaving (he refused to let me give him a ride) he said he might stop by the church on Sunday. I then said something rather stupid. I said no. I said I didn't want him to come back.

I didn't say it because I didn't want him in the building. I never got around to saying why, cause he started to walk away after shaking my hand. I meant to say I didn't want him to come just because he felt obligated from my generosity, I wanted him to come because he wanted to. It is a shame this moment of stupidity came across to Tom, but that is that and we have not crossed paths since.

Upon coming back, I had the brilliant idea that something needed to be done for people like Tom. He needed a way to make more than $10 a day by asking for spare change. He needed a place where he would be fed, keep warm during the day, and I think most importantly, a job which would work to accomadate his schedule.

I spoke to my supervior, and he agreed that ideas need to be looked at. I spoke to another pastor about the idea, and he gave me a lead or two. I also asked the husband of a friend in Seminary who I thought might know something about this type of thing. I was given a few places to look, but I realized something about myself which I really don't like. I realized that I want the credit for the idea. I want to be the one who gets the glory for the concept, for the work...and it feels awful. I've guarded my idea from many others because of my selfish pride and would have given only lip service to God for the idea had it ever been developed more.

I hope that will change. I hope I start broadening my idea out a little more. One to give others an opportunity to help me in the creative challenges of working on this idea. I also hope that by offering up my ideas, it helps me to release some of the selfishness that I have within me. If I truly believe in community, I really ought to give the community of God the credit for the idea. And hopefully the 7 or so people who read my blog will be able to give insight from their own God given perspectives.

So here is to being less selfish and hoping ideas will come from the communities I belong.

A conversation I had about my last sermon.

2007-11-26T13:21:00.000-05:00

The following conversation is between me "Tjenafitta" and another pastor in NJ. It started as a comment to my last sermon, which is below this post, entitled "I AM" It was a conversation filled with a lot of learning which will hopefully make me read some stuff I had not considered.

baptistwes: nonononononononononononononononono
baptistwes: the Trinity has no "parts"
TjenaFitta: What do mean the trinity has no parts?
baptistwes: I read in your blog - Father, Son, Holy Spirit are different "parts" of the Trinity
baptistwes: my prof at college would scream, NEIN!!!! at anyone who said that
baptistwes: freak people out
TjenaFitta: as opposed to?
baptistwes: Persons
baptistwes: there's no parts in the Trinity, as that would divide the ousia
baptistwes: 1 ousia, 3 hypostasis
TjenaFitta: I don't know greek
baptistwes: roughly interpreted, "1 essence of being, 3 centers of personality"
baptistwes: It sounded like what your friend was doing was modalism
TjenaFitta: Thats what I said. They are all part of the same essence. I don't like the word persons because it implies that they are actual persons and I don't believe them to be
baptistwes: nonononononononononoooo
baptistwes: they are persons
baptistwes: just not (with the exception of the incarnate Son) human
baptistwes: parts means that the Trinity can be divied up
baptistwes: it was one of the huge fights in the early Church
TjenaFitta: So different persons means it can't be divided up, but parts can?
baptistwes: yup
TjenaFitta: don't buy it
baptistwes: that's why the language came down the way it did
TjenaFitta: Yes well, language is a bitch and doesn't always work out the way we hope
baptistwes: because if you have "part" of something, you don't have the something - you have part of something
baptistwes: but if you're encountering the Son, you're not encountering part of God - but God
baptistwes: that's the reason for the language
TjenaFitta: Well see...now thats the first time you made sense
baptistwes: sorry, needed to work to get there
baptistwes:
baptistwes: but that's the reason for the langauge
baptistwes: it's also why modalism doesn't work
TjenaFitta: modalism?
baptistwes: umm
baptistwes: saying that God isn't truly tri-une - he just interacts with Creation in different "modes" we call "Father, Son, and HOly Spirit."
baptistwes: Your statment here is why I was saying "parts" divides the divine essence: "And Tony told me that when we look at the Greek text, we see that the Holy Spirit and Jesus are things belonging to God. It is similar to saying my arm is its own separate thing, but it is still a part of my overall body."
TjenaFitta: eh, I don't know. I mean, I can't remove my arm as a part
baptistwes: Rigth
baptistwes: but the Holy Spirit isn't a part - the Holy Spirit is God
baptistwes: The metaphor of applying "parts" to the Trinity is incorrect, for exactly that reason - an arm isn't human - it's part of a human
baptistwes: that's not True for the Trinity
TjenaFitta: right, but my overall point is not that at all. I'm saying that God isn't any of these names. Any of the words we attempt to use are not really discriptors of what God is
baptistwes: right, but when you're dealing with Trinitarian and Incarnational issues you have to be REALLY careful with language
baptistwes: Because "God the Son" is a fundamentally different metaphor than "God is peace"
baptistwes: or "I AM justice..."
baptistwes: One is a descriptor of essence, the other is a descriptor of an attribute
TjenaFitta: perhaps. But at this point, I would switch your positions. I would say that justice is essence and son is an attibute
baptistwes: Yah, the jumps language
baptistwes: it goes back to the term "hypostasis" when the Trinitarian formula was developed
baptistwes: "essence" is how God his relational nature to us in the persons of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
baptistwes: "justice" is an abstract - The Holy Spirit is a communicative hypostasis
baptistwes: a person
TjenaFitta: My entire hope is that we as humans do not do that. If we are "doing unto the least of these" and God is within us, then justice, peace, love, etc are the essence of God by which we are doing them
baptistwes: again, you're using language different
TjenaFitta: Well of course I am
baptistwes: OK, switch "essence" to "nature" in your sentence, then it works
baptistwes: when you're talking about the Trinity - you do NOT want to use the term essence loosely
baptistwes: I'm drilling you on this because this is at the very heart of what makes Christianity distinctive from other religions...
baptistwes: when we're talking about the Trinity - it's best to play the language game with the rules the Church worked out over it's history
TjenaFitta: Ok...well, I can totally say that I just used a wrong word on the 'parts v. persons' cause I have never heard that argument, but I agree with it. How I work out for others that they are not actually humans is not going to be easy, but ok...
baptistwes: say "personalities"
TjenaFitta: but otherwise, I don't think God gives a hoot over essence or nature
baptistwes: my Orthodox friends would cringe but say, "OK"
TjenaFitta: if God is omni-everything, then it all works
baptistwes: eh
baptistwes: God is Shiva?
baptistwes: nah
TjenaFitta: Thats not what I'm saying. I'm saying that if God is essence and nature, then what difference does it make in how it's said?
baptistwes: Soteriology
baptistwes: what Protestantism seems to have forgotten is that the language of the Trinity and the Incarnation took play entirely in the context of "How has this God, revealed in Scripture saved us?"
TjenaFitta: ok
TjenaFitta: So all I'm saying, in the long run, is that God saved us because God loves us.
baptistwes: sure
baptistwes: but that love is Revealed in the very essence of the Trinity
TjenaFitta: And I would still argue that the essence of love is revealed in the nature of Christ
TjenaFitta: I realize that the pervious comment is either mind blowingly genius or mind numbingly stupid, but it's all I've got
baptistwes: yes, but the nature of Christ is contingent on the Trinity too
TjenaFitta: But we just got done discussing that the nature of Christ and the nature of God and the nature of the HS are all the same thing
baptistwes: essence are the same
baptistwes: or...well nature too depending on how you're using it
baptistwes: Jesus is the Incarnate Son - the idea that he's fully God is dependant on Trinitarian theology
baptistwes: the Trinity is "one essence/three centers of Personality" the Incarnate Son is "two essences/one center of Personality"
TjenaFitta: First, I really like this idea of personality over person
baptistwes: k
TjenaFitta: and none of the things I believe seem to be contridictory to the ideas you've described...
baptistwes: that's get's weird too - say "center of personality"
baptistwes: what's that?
baptistwes: I'm describing Calcedonian orthodoxy - it's the theology of the creeds
TjenaFitta: but I want parishioners (as well as myelf) to focus more on doing Godly things for others, not worry about the nature or essence of God
baptistwes: Matt, orthodoxy and orthopraxy have to be intertwined - if you don't have them together you veer off into various culdesacs and heresies
TjenaFitta: I agree completely, but right now, I don't see much orthopraxy, which I deem to be the more important of the two
baptistwes: Think about it, "Godly things for others" is a command which comes from Jesus - the Incarnate Son - who demonstrates that calling by doing what? Taking on human flesh and not considering equality with God as something to grasp on to
baptistwes: You don't have orthodoxy either - ask someone in your church is Jesus' soul was human or divine...
baptistwes: braid them together
baptistwes: Orthodoxy is the boundary-markers of the Church....we let it go at our own peril and we make it into something else (intellectual spirituality) at out own peril
baptistwes: Part of the problem is that when we hold on to the Trinitarian language loosely, or pick it apart to figure out "how it works," we loose the mystery of God.
TjenaFitta: Ok. I get that. But I don't think I loosened the boundaries of orthodoxy by saying God is love or God is peace by asking people to remove human constructs like father, shepherd, lamb, etc. I think God being truth or love enhances the mystery of God, not the other way around
baptistwes: Right, but you equated it with Trinitarian language - and that's where you loosened up
baptistwes: it's different
baptistwes: put it this way
baptistwes: when you're dealing with Justice, are you dealing with the fullness of God?
TjenaFitta: I think so
baptistwes: (actually, that's a bad one because "Justice" is actually a greek goddess...)
baptistwes: Really? then what about mercy? or forgivness? or love or hope, or creativity or...
TjenaFitta: Yes to all of those
baptistwes: but creativity isn't the fullness of God
baptistwes: becuase God is also just and loving and kind and vengeful
TjenaFitta: exactly
baptistwes: but when you deal with the persons of the Trinity you deal with the fullness of God...
baptistwes: Because the Son is just and loving and kind and vengeful
TjenaFitta: No, when we deal with the fullness of God, we put them in the persons of the trinity
baptistwes: right
baptistwes: because the persons of the Trinity are each all those things as they are in eternal relationship with each other
TjenaFitta: wait...you can't agree with what I said because I meant it to be contradictory to what you said
TjenaFitta: let me rephrase
baptistwes: go ahead
baptistwes: Have you read Pelikan?
TjenaFitta: I mean that when we deal with the fullness of God, which is all joy, peace, vengence, love, etc, all bundled up...We just happend to put them in the persons of the trinity because that is easy for us to do.
TjenaFitta: No
baptistwes: no
baptistwes: that's not what we do
baptistwes: Because mercy and vengance and love and justice don't each describe the fullness of God
TjenaFitta: wait
TjenaFitta: I'm not saying that one individually does at all
baptistwes: but when you start talking about "fullness" in conjunction with the Trinity - that's what you end up saying
baptistwes: The Father is "fully God"The Son is "fully God"
baptistwes: the Holy Spirit is "fully God"
TjenaFitta: No
baptistwes: justice is....an attribute
TjenaFitta: love is fully God, justice is fully God, vengence is fully God...plus all other "attributes"
baptistwes: no, see you're using the langauge like, "Love is fully of God"
TjenaFitta: no, there is not a "of" in my statement
baptistwes: love is fully God....no - love is a descriptor of God
TjenaFitta: In your way of thinking yes
TjenaFitta: but not mine...
TjenaFitta: because I am saying that God is both fully love and vengence and joy and fustration
baptistwes: but you're talking about attributes again
TjenaFitta: I don't think so. I think father is the attribute
baptistwes: "fully God" in Trinitarian language deals with the persons
baptistwes: I want you to pick up Pelikan's history of the Christian Tradition series...I'll read it with you
TjenaFitta: Oh wait...I did read part of that...but it's in PA
TjenaFitta: Sorry, I read your name wrong
baptistwes: The problem is that I'm playing the language game according to the rules the Church has set out - you're playing a new game
TjenaFitta: I realize that and that is part of what I wanted to highlight
TjenaFitta: I think God cringed when the fathers first started to describe who God is
baptistwes: Yah, see - the only way I can say that is if I didn't think the Holy Spirit has guided the Church
TjenaFitta: In my mind, I can balance the two. I believe they were acting out of intelect and not love. Otherwise, they wouldn't have had those conversations
baptistwes: Don't cringe at the Fathers - they weren't the abstractors sitting in ivory towers that the West has imaged them
baptistwes: No, that's not a fair reading of them at all
baptistwes: not at all
TjenaFitta: Well, I would have had to read them a lot more to give them a fair anything
baptistwes: These were people who make our piety, love, and charity to the world look like plastic jewelry - they did what they did because they believed in the in-breaking Kingdom of Jesus and wrestled with the Scriptures as they did so
TjenaFitta: All I'm saying is that they were doing unto others because that is what God calls us to...but then they stopped and tried to figure out the nature of such things, and got lost from actually doing the things that got them there in the first place
baptistwes: No
baptistwes: see that's exactly what they didn't do
baptistwes: that's a modern division
baptistwes: the statement you made can't be historically supported
TjenaFitta: of course not. I just said I can't treat them fairly
baptistwes: but then why make the statment?
TjenaFitta: Cause you're trying to bring in stuff I have no reference to and I'm only trying to work with what I know of the scriptures and how I feel God wants us to act
baptistwes: But the only way to read the Scriptures is within the communion of Saints - you gotta spend time with them before you dump them
TjenaFitta: Ok...let me type a bit...
baptistwes: k
TjenaFitta: The fathers had piety, love, charity... and then got together to figure it all out in terms for everyone to understand. Yes?
baptistwes: no
baptistwes: The two were concurrent, always, even the New Testament reads that way
TjenaFitta: Ok, even better actually
baptistwes: why?
TjenaFitta: All I'm trying to say about what I understand about myself and the people in my congregation via my sermon is that they need to actually realize that God is those things and that is how we need to start living if we really want to figure out the nature/essence/personality of God
baptistwes: sure, but what I'm trying to point out is that part of that discovery has to be a deliberate process of looking back through history and listening to the folks to did this before us
TjenaFitta: Yeah, but I have this insane idea that we can all be church fathers and mothers by traveling the same path. Instead, I feel as if we (people in my congregation) act as if we need not take the journey because it has already been walked
baptistwes: Yah, but I'm not sure your "cure" is any better than the "disease"
baptistwes: we're not all church fathers and mothers, but we're still on the same journey - and the rituals and sacred language of the Church are supposed to bind us to that path - the problem is that somewhere in the 20th century the Church kept doing all the same stuff and yet no longer had a clue WHY...
baptistwes: dead ritual
baptistwes: the best cure is to reinvigorate, concurrently, a passion for being the hands and feet of Christ and a passion for being incorporated back into story through the ritual practice of the Church
baptistwes: with things like...the labyrinth
baptistwes: or communion, or catechism, or baptism, or the church year, or feasts...etc...
baptistwes: but you gotta do them both at once.

Christ the King Sermon

2007-11-25T14:39:00.000-05:00

Anyone care to guess at the most well known Shakespeare quote of all time? “To be or not to be” is one of the questions which seem to speak to the very nature of who we are. It speaks about life itself.

This week is Christ the King Sunday. During worship, we are to celebrate the reign of Christ. It can be celebrated in a number of fashions. One might understand this celebration in the future tense, that Christ WILL BE king after Armageddon or whichever end times scenario one might chose to believe and then a new world is created. Or you can celebrate this day as Christ was the King of the Jews… giving place and power to what he accomplished during his lifetime on earth. Or perhaps you can celebrate the day as it is written, without a tense…Christ THE King. Just leave it at that and not give it much thought.

But to simply do any one of these is an offense to the Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer of life.
My roommate during my second year of Seminary is one of my best friends. One afternoon while we were writing papers, he frantically called me into his room. As I rushed down the hall, I saw him jumping up and down at his window, looking at the sorority house across the street. Two Jehovah’s witnesses, dressed in their traditional white shirt and black pants, were on our neighbor’s porch talking to four or five girls. You could tell by their body language that they were not looking to convert that day, and we presumed that these two men would be stopping at our house next.

We rushed downstairs to the living room to our big bay window and peered excitedly out the window. If you haven’t caught on already, this is a seminary student’s dream… Two unsuspecting people trying to convert you walking into the home of two theologically trained students. It’s the thing dreams are made of. Never in my life have I been so excited about a theological conversation. When we saw the two men leave the sorority house without getting past the porch, my roommate and I fixed the curtains and pretended to watch a TV that wasn’t on, waiting patiently for the knock on our door. Tony was frantically tapping his foot and I had already chewed off three fingernails in the excitement. A minute passed and still there was no knock at our door. We both looked out the window only to find that they had crossed the street and were getting into their car and driving away. Tony and I were heart broken. We had, in two short minutes, prepared for the biggest event of our seminary careers. Neither of us got any work done the rest of that day and we never brought up the moment again.

Then, in early September of this year, I called my former roommate, who had moved back to North Carolina, to see how he was doing. He told me that a few days ago; two other Jehovah’s witnesses had come to his door. It didn’t turn out to be as exciting as what we had originally hoped for that afternoon, but it did make him stop and do a bit more research about the trinity. (In case you didn’t know, Jehovah’s witness’ believe that Jesus was not God, but just a holy man.) Well, Tony looked up in his Greek bible one particular verse from Matthew 28. Verse 19 says “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” And Tony told me that when we look at the Greek text, we see that the Holy Spirit and Jesus are things belonging to God. It is similar to saying my arm is its own separate thing, but it is still a part of my overall body. A different part of the same essence. God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are different parts of the same thing.

Now, the question you must all ask yourself is why did I just spend the last five minutes explaining the concept of the trinity on a day which should focus mainly on Christ the King? Every English teacher knows the answer to this question. It is because Christ the King is not a complete sentence. It needs a verb…it needs action.

I told you that story because calling Christ, and by proxy, God, a king severely limits the true essence of the divine. Calling Christ merely a king usurps the power of the Holy. One whose power is displayed in weakness; glory in humility and exaltation in transforming suffering[1]. Instead, there is only one time in the whole Bible where we learn the true essence of the trinity and the answer, surprisingly, does NOT come from Jesus, but instead it is God speaking to Moses. When Moses speaks to the burning bush and asks the name of God, the reply is simply “I AM.” The answer that humanity first receives from God is not Father, King, servant, lamb, or shepherd. Those are all useful names, but they are not the true being of God. Instead of using names, nouns, if you will… we must realize that we belong to a God of action. We belong to a verb. God says “I AM” because it opens up an infinite amount of possibilities to which we have very few words for. When we speak of God or Jesus Christ or the Holy Spirit, we are speaking to all that is within the realm of possibility. When we say God is love, God responds with “I AM love.” When we say God is hope, God replies with “I AM Hope.” When we say God is justice, God replies with “I AM Justice.” When we say God is peace, God exclaims “I AM Shalom”.
What action do you associate with when you are in the presence of the Holy? When you take off your shows and stand in front of the burning bush, what words does your heart place in your mouth?

Right now, I would like you to stand if you are able and as I speak the words which God spoke to Moses, I invite you to then fill in the rest with the responses that your heart gives. Feel free to repeat a response if that is what you feel called to respond with as the same word for a different person has many different meanings. If your heart doesn’t lead you to any words, it is always acceptable to stand quietly in humble adoration.
I AM...
I AM...
I AM...
I AM...
I AM WHO I AM says God.
So be it.
[1] Otto Dreydopple Jr. Back of Moravian Bulletins for Sunday, November 25, 2007.

First picture!

2007-10-29T18:48:00.000-05:00

This is my first attempt at uploading a picture to my blog. This is the the church in which I am currently serving as student pastor. First Moravian Church of Riverside NJ.

Common actions, radical ideas

2007-09-01T14:51:00.000-05:00

When I was younger and went to Camp Hope[1], I realized that there were very few times in which I as a camper had control over what went on during the week. But there was one or two times during the week in which campers got to have a feeling of control. The meals where your cabin set up the dining hall were the times when you as camper had a lot of power. You decided who you get to sit with, who gets to be the “hopper” (For those of you who have only attended Hope’s Buffet period, the hopper is the person who goes and gets the platters of food.) and you had the ability to save seats for your friends that were not in your cabin and if you were lucky, you got one of the coveted seats in front of the fan. All this time at camp and I never realized that doing this was going against Jesus’ teaching about places of honor. In fact, when I really give it some thought, almost every single time I’ve had people over to my home, I rarely invited people over whom I didn’t want there. Perhaps this is simply something we might overlook because it is not something we engage in anymore; having huge banquet where the whole town is invited is a relic of the past. Who would want to have a party where they hung out with people they didn’t like? I know I’ve never liked eating a meal at Camp where I wasn’t surrounded by people who made me feel good.

Instead, Jesus calls us to surround ourselves with four different people when we find ourselves in a moment of celebration. The people we ought to be celebrating with are the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind (Luke 14:13). Now, just by a show of hands, does anyone in here think if they were to have a party this afternoon that they could honestly find four these four people without considerable effort? The problem which we run into if we really want to follow Jesus’ words is that we live in a country where our taxes and charities are already tending to the poor, lame, crippled and blind and although we can always do more to care for them, I’m not sure that we can live out the meaning of this gospel message if we seek to live this out literally. Instead, we need to realize that Jesus wasn’t just talking about people who were physically impaired but people who were spiritually impaired…people who have extra obstacles in their lives which they need help in overcoming if they are to eat a meal with Christ Jesus.
On Tuesday night, those of us on the outreach committee are going to meet to discuss how we can invite the spiritually poor, the spiritually blind, to begin a journey to meet a God who cares about who they are. We on the committee are going to be getting to know the families of the Vacation Bible School students who do not have a church home. Those on the committee are going to spend the next few months eating meals and getting to know those families, with the intent of sharing the love which only Christ can put in someone’s life. Some might consider this to be evangelism, and I guess if you think of it in the strictest sense of the word, it is, but part of the reason which we prayed the liturgy for Thanksgiving was because it is thanksgiving which is at the heart of the gospel story. We are able to give thanks by living the gospel by sharing something as simple as a meal, but more importantly, it is communion with God. Jesus isn’t asking us to fix everything in their lives; he just wants us to treat the people we don’t normally interact with like they are the most important people we know. We are being asked to be friendly, generous, gracious, and comforting to people who might never repay the favor. This sort of hospitality is a sign of acceptance, it tells us that we see other people as equals; it is a way of cementing fellowship.

Hospitality is something I’ve always been quite curious about. Last summer when I was working as a chaplain in the hospital, the word hospitality was used almost every day. One of my fellow chaplains used the word quite often and made it a goal to be as hospitable as possible. To be honest, I had no idea what the word meant. I thought it was being as nice and welcoming as possible to the people who were in the hospital. Sometimes it was something like getting an extra blanket or pillow, or other times it was getting a nurse or something along those lines. It always struck me as odd that this person was trying so hard to work on hospitality because she was already the most hospitable person I knew, at least when it came to being a good hostess. Then, just yesterday, I finally read a definition of hospitality that made sense to me. It wasn’t so much about an action as it was a way of life. Hospitality literally means in Greek, love of a stranger[2]. It doesn’t seem like an outrageous thought, but it really is a radical action.
There is another radical idea in the first half of the story today which I find extremely interesting which I always seem to fail at doing. Again, it’s another common, biblical concept which is fairly hard to live. It’s the idea of the first shall be last and the last shall be first, it is the idea that we are to live humble lives in order that we may be lifted up to places of honor by those who notice such humbleness. As I was studying some of the scholars about this text, I was extremely surprised to find a quote by a Greek historian by the name of Plutarch. I was surprised because I was supposed to read this text for my first semester in college, but I never got around to it. In fact, it stayed by my bed for all four years and I still never finished it, as I only read it when I had trouble sleeping. As far as I was concerned, Plutarch was the better than any sleeping pill on the market. But Plutarch said that “it is the small, apparently trivial act in which character is most accurately reflected.” And Jesus is calling us to be humble instead of choosing things which honor ourselves.

I know I used to try to do such things, but secretly, I was hoping for recognition. I was trying to outsmart others by being humble. I would try to be the last person to receive food in a community meal, and unlike in Jesus’ example, I did not receive recognition for it. Not that it’s such a bad thing, because now looking back, I’m much happier that I did not receive positive reinforcement for something I was doing selfishly. But around the same time as I had the idea to be the last in whatever line I was in, which I rarely do anymore, I started doing something which seems to work much better for me. I started holding the door open for people whenever I could. I started holding the door open for people at church, and then moved out to stores and restaurants. I’m almost always the last person to enter a building and I have to tell you, you learn amazing things about people when you do something as simple as holding a door for them. You learn who knows your name and whose name you know. You learn who is truly appreciative of small acts of kindness as well as who doesn’t want to look or speak to the person doing such a simple act. You also learn the people who you admire because they’re either willing to stand outside in cold or hot weather with you, or will hold the door open for you when you’re able. I did this at my home congregation for 3 years, every Sunday…and the last thing I learned is that if you do something for three years and suddenly leave, the church will soon buy an automatic door opener. (True story)

The challenge for all of us is show someone hospitality, to love a stranger this week on the simple grounds that God loves them too. Hold a door open for the rude person who knocked into you in the store… share a meal with someone that you know doesn’t belong to the family of God; do something, even if you know in your heart that you’re not doing it for the right reasons. Fake it till you make it. It doesn’t always matter why right now so long as it makes a difference in your life at some point and I hope that you come back to me next week and tell me a story about what you did, because even if it didn’t make a difference now, it might someday, and that is when we learn that our love is worth it. Amen.

[1] http://www.camphope.org/
[2] Fred Craddock. “Luke” Interpretation Biblical Commentary series. John Knox Press: Louisville. 1990. Pg 178

A new idea of education

2007-08-25T11:59:00.000-05:00

Today is a day in which we as Moravians are called to pray for public education as well as our Moravian educational institutions, lifting up students and educators that their minds, bodies and spirits be open to the many things they will experience in the upcoming year. While this is something we all as Christians ought to be doing regularly, I found it very interesting that today’s Gospel lesson has both teachers and students playing a prominent role. In fact, verse ten tells us right away that Jesus was teaching in a synagogue. And it is a verse that most of the time we normally overlook to get to the more interesting parts of the story, where Jesus is healing a woman on the Sabbath. But it seems to me, that the reason the Moravian church has survived for as long as it has is mainly due to the importance placed on both teachers and students.

One of my favourite figures in our Moravian heritage is Jan Amos Comenius. I spoke a little bit about him earlier in the children’s message. He did more than simply add pictures to textbooks; his passion was education for all people throughout their whole lives. While that isn’t exactly the most exciting concept to us today, in the 17th century, very few people had access to education. It was mostly reserved for only the wealthiest males with very few females. Comenius’ revolutionary concept said that learning should be fun, for everyone, from the youngest children to the oldest adult.

Now, I would be shocked if this once radical idea was something any of you disagreed with. Education has become so common that we take it for granted, and our Moravian run schools have become so popular that they are considered some of the best private schools around. The fact that education has become the norm is a good thing, but the influence we have as people of faith is becoming weaker every year and I think it is time that we need a new radical view of education which is meaningful to everyone involved.

So the question we must ask ourselves is what exactly is it that we as Moravians can do to change the way people learn? I think the answer lies by simply rearranging the words in this congregation’s mission statement. Instead of teaching all by reaching all, perhaps we all ought to be thinking of how we can reach all by teaching. I believe that this can be done not by establishing schools or just hoping to bring more people into our churches by fancy programs. Instead, we need to work on building relationships which can enrich both our lives and the life of those we teach.

There is a man at the church where I am currently serving who is 82 years old. For the past four or five years he has designed the set for VBS. Normally, this isn’t exactly the hardest of tasks except he paints 12 cardboard panels which are four feet wide by ten feet high all by hand. He spent the next two weeks painting this huge scene that looked absolutely fantastic. Unfortunately for the church, this is the last year in which he will be doing all of this hard work, and I asked him what he would be doing with his free time. He answered me by telling me that he wasn’t really sure. One of the things I’m going to suggest to him, because he still wants to be active, is teach some of the kids who are interested in art to do some of the amazing art work which he has spent countless hours on. Its something where education isn’t measured in the number of things learned, it’s where education is the time spent with people and building meaningful relationships.

One of my own personal pet peeves with the modern culture is that we pride ourselves on how individualistic we can be. And even though I like to spend a lot of time alone, the times in which I have learned the most about anything are the times when I have been mentored by someone who gave me the gift of allowing me to be around then when they were doing things I admired. It is because of this type of education that I am speaking to you today, and I think it is this type of education that is going to make us better disciples of Christ.

There are more than just practical things that can be taught and learned. And as important as it is to learn practical things, such as art or sewing or how to do woodwork, we must be all be students of people who have deep spiritual roots. Who is it in your life that you have admired in you’re life because of their love of God and their love for others?

When I first thought of this question, I thought it was rather smart. Of course, I was asking it from my own perspective, but when I started asking people who were a few years older and wiser than me, I realized that most of the people they looked up to had already gone to the more immediate presence of our Lord. So the question we need to ask ourselves is who is it in this room that we admire for their devotion to God? Look around…really… taking a second to look at your brothers and sisters in this room and let your heart tell you what it is which you admire about them. Have you ever appreciated the way someone read the scripture or the liturgy, how they brought a bible story to life because they’ve read it so many times? Have you been moved when a person in your bible study prayed such a wonderful prayer and perhaps thought to yourself that you could never say such beautiful things to God? Have you ever been impressed with how someone always seems to be at worship, week after week, year after year, because you know they really love Jesus Christ? Well, the thing that you need to do next is find the courage to find that person after the service and share with them that gift from the Holy Spirit which you see in them. And when someone comes up to you and says that they notice the Spirit working within you, the greatest gift that you can ever give someone is to ask them to be a part of what God has already given you. If they have noticed that you are gifted in prayer, ask them to join you for your next time of devotion. If someone notices how good you are with tools, invite that person to help you the next you fix something. If someone says you have a gift for teaching, invite them to teach a Sunday school class this year.

Starting this type of education is difficult in its own right. Having the courage to point out the gifts that God gave other people is not always the easiest thing to do, but it’s a good first step. The second step is that mentoring relationship where you share your knowledge with the person who seeks it, and in the process, you get to know each other better, as you will get to know God better. The third step, in my opinion, is the hardest of all. I got this idea from the last place I would have ever imagined to bring into the church…my fraternity. We had four responsibilities which we were to follow, and I think that three of them fit in. These three were to spend time, take pride, and replace yourself. We already spend the time doing things which we feel bring us closer to God. Taking pride in those things means that are willing to share it with others because we know that it is all because of God that we have those gifts. But replacing our self is usually the most difficult. It is taking the things we have learned from others and then finding someone else who is receptive to the things you are going to share with them. That is the most difficult part of the learning process…starting the third generation of student teacher interaction is the one that means you are doing it right.

I went to a church planting seminar at the end of May this year and I believe that Pastor Sayward attended the same conference a year before I did. One of the stories that the presenters told us was of a pastor who challenged his church of half a million people which were broken up into small groups to grow by 50,000 people within the next 6 months. It didn’t seem like the easiest of tasks, until you realized that each small group had about ten people in it, and all each group had to do was to find one person to share the love of God with. Now, as Moravians, we don’t work with such large numbers, but if we spend the time with people, first with our own brothers and sisters, and then actively seek out one other person to share our gifts and love with, we will have a movement which will fill our hearts until it overflows.

Radical Interpretation

2007-08-19T10:33:00.000-05:00

My first sermon at First Moravian Church of Riverside NJ. August 19, 2007.

As I sat at my desk on Tuesday afternoon, trying to relax a bit after an exhausting morning of Vacation Bible School, I was checking to see if anyone had commented on my latest blog entry. Once I realized that no one had left me any comments, I began to poke around the blogs of strangers whom I had never heard of. The name of a person’s blog will come up on the screen for maybe two seconds, and if the title sounds interesting, I try and click it before it disappears. The first blog that I clicked that day was called “A Roman Thought.”[1] And I checked it out, hoping it might be thought provoking. Luckily for me, it had a video posted from an apparently well respected atheist. I watched a ten minute clip of this man attempt to deconstruct the concept of religion. To be honest, he did a pretty decent job of getting his point across, but as I listened to what he had to say, I couldn’t help but think how wonderful it was to hear his argument on a week when the Gospel lesson is about Jesus’ message spreading division among the people.

If you think about it, very few of us want to believe that the work of God is one that divides people. Instead, we tend to recall some of the nicer scripture verses. Blessed are the peace makers, for they will be called children of God (Matthew 5).Or perhaps we like to think of Jesus saying “my peace I leave unto you, my peace I leave with you” (John 14:27) Both of these verses, plus many others, talk about the peace that Jesus brings. So when we read verses about how Jesus’ message is going to bring division, it seems quite easy to dismiss them and not bring them into our lives. But it’s my own belief that it is these hard to swallow verses which challenge us to be the disciples God wants us to be.

The real question then is, how do we view such harsh words in a way that conveys the love and grace which comes from Jesus Christ. It is not an easy task. Perhaps we need to first ask if we can find love and grace in passages in which Jesus is, to be quite frank, pissed off. Jesus is warning us about a crisis, but this crisis is not an emergency, but instead is an occasion of truth and a precise time to make a decision about life.[2] How amazing would our lives be if we viewed all of our moments of crisis as moments of the truth of God? The truth of this passage is that Jesus is not simply calling us to be agents of division for the purpose of causing trouble, but instead we will inevitably cause division because we are speaking truth in love which most people do not want to hear.

If you remember the last song we sang, Obey-O, we sing about obeying God, even when it’s hard. I think this is one of the most important lines sung during VBS this week. When Jesus calls us to love God and love our neighbor, he isn’t trying to simplify the 10 commandments into the 2 easiest, instead, these laws of love are the hardest to live by. They will bring disunity, division, judgment, even destruction, as well as the Fruits & Gifts of the Spirit.[3] I wonder if such gifts will be evident in the kids that went through vacation bible school this week. I wonder if they’ll remember to obey the law of love, even if it causes disunity in the family. Will the students remember to love illegal aliens when their parents blame them for all of our countries problems? Will they love someone different from them when the world tells them to hate? Will they share everything they have when common sense tells them to covet as much as possible?
This is a radical interpretation of the law of love. Too often we choose to love only when it is of benefit to us. I love the word radical because it often conjures a negative image of what religion can do to the world. We use the word radial Muslim to describe terrorists, and when we hear about radical Christians, our thoughts go to fundamentalist Southern Baptists, very rarely do we say that radically living a life of love is a positive thing.

Instead, the great temptation of Christianity is always to have sugar coated Christianity with a sugar coated gospel, with a sugar coated cross, and to eliminate this great call to discipleship for the world. Our greatest temptation is that the cares, riches and pleasures of this life become more important than the call of Jesus Christ. And so the security of family and friends, jobs and homes and vacations become more important to us than Christ and his mission. The result is watered down wine; it is watered down whiskey; it is middle class Christianity; it is complacent Christianity; it is comfortable Christianity. Come and sit in our soft padded pews and worship Jesus Christ with your personal style of music and comfort.[4]

When we become comfortable with discipleship, when we strive only for unity in our beliefs, we do not grow as Christians. As Moravians, we pride ourselves upon the fact that when it comes to the non-essentials, we have the liberty to think and act as we believe best, but too often we neglect to concern ourselves with the Essentials, the things which should be of utmost concern in our daily lives. What are those things which we believe to be essential? The grace of God the Creator, the saving work of God in Jesus Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as well as the faith, love and hope on part of humankind, are all central in our beliefs. If we are not living out these things which we say are central to being a disciple, we are not living the radical life to which we are called.

Now, I need to say, that I gave a lot of thought and prayer to the scripture verses that were read today. It is certainly not the verses I would have picked to share my first sermon, but I did feel the need to preach about the radical message of love with Jesus brings us. Radical isn’t something we need to stay away from, its something we need to embrace. I challenge you to go home from this time of worship today and read the whole 12th chapter of Luke. Read it to figure out why Jesus was so upset. Read it to find out how pointless storing up our treasures are, how silly it is to be greedy. Read it with an open heart as to what it means to live a life of radical love. It’s a really simple concept really. But simple doesn’t mean easy. It doesn’t mean that loving the way Christ calls us to love will be an easy road, it will be filled with people who stand in our way, it will bring division in our family when they don’t understand that we are choosing to love others instead of doing something which pleases only ourselves.
Please don’t think that I’m saying that I’m better than anyone else. In fact, nine times out of ten, I’m one of the biggest offenders in not loving as Jesus calls me to love. But I figured that I’d use this first sermon to have all of you help me to do a better job at it. And it is my hope that we will all keep it in the front of our minds to share that grace which God has so freely given us with others. If that isn’t radical, I don’t know what is.

[1] http://www.aromanthought.com/
[2] Fred B. Craddock. “Interpretation: Luke.” John Knox Press, Louisville. 1990. Pg 166
[3] Laterally Luke, by Brian McGowan, Anglican priest in Western Australia
[4] "Christ Brings Division," Pastor Edward F. Markquart, Grace Lutheran Church, Seattle, Washington.

The Difficulty of Faith ~ July 22, 2007

2007-07-20T20:12:00.000-05:00

The first word that Abraham hears from God is the word leave. Leave your home, leave your country, leave your family, leave everything you have ever known to be true in your whole life. Leave, for an unknown land, and I will then make your family great. Abraham gets this message when he is 75 years old. He doesn’t get a visit from God either, he just hears a voice. If this happened today, most of us would probably just dismiss Abraham as a crazy old man. We would say that he should be put in an old folks home. We’d say all sorts of strange things about him, the people that knew him probably laughed at such a notion, that Abraham was going to follow the voice that was in his head is absurd. There is only one thing more absurd than telling people that you believe God is talking to you, and that is acting on it. How many of us actually act on the strange thoughts that run through our heads? Even if we think about acting on some of the things we think about, we run them by other people, making sure that our ideas aren’t as crazy as they might seem. Abraham doesn’t do this. He just accepts the fact that God is going to make him the father of all generations.

This is when we pick up in the story of Abraham and his wife Sarah. Sarah is almost 100 years old and has still not born any children for her husband. Obviously, she believes that she cannot have a child, and quite frankly, who can blame her? Is there anyone in this room today over the age of 60 that would still want to do all the work that comes with having a child? My guess is that very few of you, if any, would want such a thing. The faith that had originally sustained Abraham and Sarah was long gone. So much so that when this stranger stops by to visit, they laugh at him, they laugh at the idea that the God they once believed in would actually fulfill the promise made so many years ago. It is my guess that Abraham and Sarah didn’t actually believe the stranger until she started to show the signs of pregnancy. And understandably so, because as we grow older, we think that we are wise enough to know when someone is telling the truth or not.

This is the difficulty of faith. That faith used to fill us, and yet, as we age, it seems to disappear from view. It is quite similar to when we are children, believing in something like Santa Klaus or the Easter Bunny. At a young age, we are naïve enough to believe anything we are told. Then as we grow older, when we have had more experience at all that life has to offer, we become jaded, so much so that we start to not believe anything that we once thought might have been true. Have you ever gotten to the point where not only do you not have faith in something, but you begin to believe that anyone who believes in it is disillusioned? I’m pretty sure that this is what Abraham and Sarah were feeling. They know that God keeps most promises, but maybe one or two are forgotten, or perhaps fulfilled in different ways, like Hagar bearing Abraham’s first child. Maybe the promise changed, maybe it wasn’t meant to be, so many different maybes, that they were not sure what to believe.

When I look at the situation with Abraham and Sarah, I am reminded of our Moravian church and the long history that we have had. As the oldest protestant church in the world, we have been around quite a long time. In most non Moravian circles, we are described as a church that was important a pretty long time ago, but in modern times, seems to be pretty irrelevant. Sure, we have moments of goodness, we do some good out in the community, we have some mission work, but we aren’t anywhere close to where the church was when Zinzendorf was around. We are missing something that the church once had, and I think that thing is faith.

A couple of weeks ago, I spoke with your pastor about this congregation. He was telling me about all of you, and about how loving a congregation this is. We spoke of his hopes for the congregation as Gordy will be ending his interim position. When I was reflecting back on our conversation for this sermon, I realized that as a whole, most of our churches are filled with loving people, we have a lot of hope for the future of the church, but something tells me that we are generally lacking in the faith department.

That begs the question, what is faith? Earlier in the liturgy we made a profession of faith, saying that we believe in God, the father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. We professed belief in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, all things that we as Christians must have faith in. To me, it seems that we have gotten too comfortable with the thought that saying those words together means that we have faith. What good is a public profession of faith if we are only doing it in the presence of fellow Christians? While it does have some good, I must say, believing that such a statement is sufficient to call us people of faith is misleading.

True faith though, is more than a statement, but it something I have found extremely difficult to define in words. One of my favourite quotes on faith is from William Sloane Coffin. He writes in his book Credo: "I love the recklessness of faith. First you leap, and then you grow wings." That is the essence of what Abraham and Sarah do in the story today, they took a leap at the age of 75, and it took them nearly 25 years before they grew those wings. Abraham showed that faith is more than words, it is an action. That leads us to take a look at everything we do in our lives and see if it is something we are doing out of faith or something we are doing merely because we ought to do it. Are we walking off cliffs and letting our wings bring us down, or are we merely taking the stairs down, descending at our own pace? One of my favourite stories about the early Moravian mission movement is how the missionaries who came to the Caribbean islands brought very little with them, but when they did bring something, one of the few things they took with them was their headstone. That, my brothers and sisters, is a faith that very few of us are living today.

I wish that I could tell you that such a faith is possible if we just pray for it to happen. Of course we need to pray for such a dynamic faith everyday. But just because we pray for it doesn’t mean we simply receive it.

About few weeks ago, I was listening to the radio and heard the following quote. This person said that when we pray for something like patience, we do not simply get our patience meter refilled so that the next time we are in a tough situation, we will not be anxious, instead, God when we pray for patience, God grants us more situations for us to be patient in, thus learning as we go. I believe that the same is true of faith, we do not simply receive faith every time we pray for it, but instead, God grants us more times for us to radically live out the faith that we profess.

This last January, we had a class on Evangelism where we did a little bit of role playing. If any of the church members are here who went to the last synod meeting, you’ll remember what I’m talking about. Two people were given a situation in which one person could attempt to show their faith by talking to the person across from them. My friend got the role of playing a poor person on the bus who was asking for money, and I was the person who he was going to ask. Apparently, the scene was supposed to take place with me giving the person only a few dollars, maybe the spare change from my pocket, and then hoping he would go away. Instead, I pulled out my wallet and without looking at what was in there, pulled out a hundred dollar bill. Now, I knew it was a hundred dollars because of where I keep my money in my wallet, but completely threw my friend off guard. Now, perhaps I only gave him the money because I knew I would be getting it back, or because I wanted to impress my friends by whipping out a hundred dollar bill. I wish that I could tell you that I was carrying that much money when someone came up to me and really needed it, but I can’t do that. But I do know that someday, when someone does ask me for something, when God shows me an opportunity to live out my faith, that I am able to give more than just the spare change in my pocket, that I am willing to do something big, to do something reckless, that my faith in Christ comes through.

In the coming days, weeks and months, allow for God to speak to you. Allow God to guide you in a way in which you are uncertain of the outcome. Allow yourself to leap without looking. Next time a stranger asks you for money, think less about how they might spend it on booze and think more about how your generosity will shock what they think about Christians. Living our lives as people of faith is difficult. Abraham and Sarah did it, even in their old age. I’m pretty sure that we can do the same thing if we simply see the opportunity in front of us. Amen.

No Excuses ~ Sermon for Palmyera Moravian Church tomorrow.

2007-06-30T20:39:00.000-05:00

Country Roads, take me home, to the place, I belong, West Virginia, Mountain Momma, take me home, Country roads…

When I was in the 8th grade, my mother’s favourite singer switched from Harry Chapin to John Denver. Every long trip my family took to New York, every day after soccer practice, anytime I was in the car, there was a pretty good chance that my mom had a John Denver CD playing. I remember the day my mom bought her first John Denver CD, the first few songs I thought were slow and boring. It took me a while before I began to like his music, but now, after listening to his music over and over and over again, I have a real appreciation for his lyrics. In fact, I spent many trips in the back seat of the family van daydreaming about hitch hiking across the country and just seeing where the road would take me. But, no matter how many times I listened to one of his songs, no matter how many times I wanted to just pick up and go, I never did. I have tons of excuses, it would be very dangerous, I didn’t have any money, it would make my family scared not knowing if I was safe, for all those reasons, plus a few others, I never had the nerve to just up and go.

It’s because of John Denver that I understand the responses that the two people gave in the Gospel lesson today. They want to go, they want to follow Jesus, but they’re not quite ready, there is something holding them back. Two of them have pretty good reasons for not leaving just yet. Heck, they probably thought that the reason was commanded by God, honoring their father and mother was an extremely important value in their society and because of that, surely Jesus would understand their thinking. Even more, in the lesson from the Hebrew scripture, we hear about the prophet Elijah calling Elisha. When Elisha is called, he first asks if he can go in from the field and say goodbye to his parents, and he is granted permission. After saying his goodbyes, he sets out following Elijah. It’s pretty safe to say that these two “want to be followers” would have known the commandments and the story of Elisha. I’d even go so far to say that these two felt confident that Jesus would see how much they desired to honor the scripture and be truly impressed.

Today, we have the benefit of knowing the answer that Jesus gives. Jesus tells these two that they can’t make excuses if they really want to follow him. Jesus even tells them that if they decide to go and then look back, they are not fit for the service of God. Perhaps this is Jesus reminding the two men of Lot’s wife turning into a pillar of salt, proving that just having knowledge of the scripture does not translate into doing the right thing in the eyes of God.

A few nights ago, in my own personal time of study, I was reading up on some of the differences between our Moravian church and that of other Protestant churches. There is a term, coined by Martin Luther, which is considered by most people, whether they know it or not, to be one of the basic principals for being a Christian. The term is “SOLA FIDE” and it means, “By faith alone.” Most churches, even most of our own, preach and teach that all we need is faith and we will be saved. While it is a lovely concept, the truth is that the early Moravian church did not believe this to be true. What our ancestors believed is that faith without love is not faith at all.[1] Listen to that again… “Faith without love is not faith at all.” If we look closely at the gospel lesson for today that is the heart of what Jesus is saying to these would be followers. He is calling them to the carpet for their beliefs. Jesus realizes that they have faith. They have probably been waiting their entire lives for Jesus to come to them. They have been expecting it, but when they are called to action, called to love, they fail. Jesus doesn’t say that their faith has saved them. He says that when they are called to action, to love Jesus by literally following him, he will not listen to their excuses.

This is not the Jesus most of us think of when we tell others about our Savior. We like to think of Jesus as a kindly fellow who forgives us our trespasses, who has infinite patience for our impatience, who is not annoyed when our actions fail to live up to our faith. The Jesus that we read about is a bit darker. We don’t hear Jesus with a “my way or the highway” attitude. “Such a pushy, authoritative Jesus is not popular today.”[2] You either put your faith into action or you don’t. It is that simple.

Now, I could very easily tell a story of a person whose love and devotion to Christ made them to follow Jesus when the times were tough, when push came to shove, they left everything they ever knew and followed Jesus, even to martyrdom. I wish it were the truth that I could tell you I was able to live out my John Denver inspired dream of just hitch hiking across America, following God where ever the Spirit took me. But that story ends with me spending a year in Sweden where I did more running away from God than following Jesus. What I do know is that when Jesus calls us to ministry, when we feel something put on our hearts, to do the work of building up the body of Christ, we need to follow that call.

One of the biggest frustrations for me are people who say the phrase, “Yes, But.” Yes, that’s a good idea, but we’ve tried it before and it didn’t work out as we had hoped. Yes, I want to follow Jesus, but I have some other things that I need to take care of before I can go. There was a woman in the last congregation I served who’s heart was just like that of the would be disciples. She wanted to do so much, but she never thought she was ready. The intriguing part of this gospel story is that Jesus doesn’t care if you are 100% ready to follow. He just wants you along for the journey. When I read about the calling of Jesus’ disciples, I believe that most of those followers had very little idea about what it is that they were going to do. They became faithful disciples by going around town and telling people about the awesome work of God. Then, I imagine, at night, they came back together, ate dinner with each other, and talked about what happened that day as they did God’s work. That’s when the true discipleship happened. When they were together and learned from each other about what God had done in their own lives that day. Theoretically, that is why we are here today. We have come together to worship God and share our stories of how God is working through us. If you don’t feel like God is doing such a thing in your own life, Jesus is telling us today that there is no excuse. We must follow, we don’t have to do it well, but we must follow, because that is all that Jesus asks of us.

Now, I want to end with some selected words from another song by John Denver. The lyrics are from Rocky Mountain High. Listen to the words, and see if you can make a connection between the young man in the song and what God really wants us to be like when we accept the call to follow Jesus.

He was born in the summer of his 27th year,
coming home to a place he’d never been before,
left yesterday behind him, might say he was born again,
might say he found a key for every door.

Now he walks in quiet solitude the forest and the streamsSeeking grace in every step he takesHis sight has turned inside himself to try and understandThe serenity of a clear blue mountain lakeAnd the Colorado rocky mountain highI've seen it rainin' fire in the skyYou can talk to God and listen to the casual reply.
Rocky Mountain High.

Amen.
[1] Craig Atwood. International Theological Dialogue. Issue No 4, May 2005. Pg 47.
[2] Spencer, F. Scott, "'Follow Me,' The Imperious Call of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels," Interpretation, 2005.

Unity Sermon

2007-04-24T09:36:00.000-05:00

The following sermon is being entered into a contest after I brush it up a little bit.

Each denomination does or did something particularly well. In my studies at seminary, I have come to realize that Methodists are great at revival, Baptists are extremely familiar with the bible, and Pentecostals are well known for their manifestations of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. The denomination that I belong to, the Moravians, are known for their mission movement that started in the late 1720’s. Over the next half century, missionaries were sent from Germany to remote parts of the world like South Africa, Nicaragua, Labrador, and the Caribbean Islands. I could tell you the whole mission movement story, but I’m really not concerned about that this morning. I want to tell you the story behind the Moravian mission movement, and it fits perfectly with the Scripture theme for today.
What exactly does it mean to pray without ceasing? I looked for direction from a number of biblical scholars, theologians, pastors and lay people. Almost every single one said that the reality of prayer without ceasing was impossible. We have to sleep, we have to work, we have to do the things that need to get done in order to live our lives…that is our reality. We cannot pray without ceasing! Because of that impossibility, the great thinkers of our time, or at least the people who have enough time to write things down, say that we do our best to live prayerful lives. When we love our neighbor as our self, when we are feeding the poor, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and those in prison, that is when we are praying without ceasing, even when we sleep. I must tell you, that for quite a long time in my life, I really thought that this was true, if I could just give my life over to God’s mission work, then I could achieve a life that kept me connected to God every hour of every day. God would be so happy because I was doing everything that was asked of me and thus I would live a great life. I would meet a wonderful woman to share my life with, have two and a half great kids, and maybe even win the lottery, if God really wanted me to. Heck, I’d even give more than 10% of those winnings to the church.
There is another school of thought on how to pray without ceasing. It’s a literal way of thinking, and that we utter prayers to God through our whole day, which is only possible if we were living in a monastery or living out in the woods by ourselves. The problem then is that we have no Christian community or Christian mission. We take the idea of praying every moment we are awake so far that we neglect our duties as servants of Christ.
So far, these ideas haven’t met my ideal for what I think pray without ceasing ought to look like, and I hope that they don’t satisfy you either. I think the answer lays a long way back at the beginning of the Moravian mission movement. Those people living in Germany did something that most of us might find impossible to believe. The community of Christians there prayed without ceasing for over 100 years, stopping only because of the First World War. It started with about 48 people, most likely 24 men and 24 women. Two men or two women would go into a room together for an hour and pray. They had personal prayers, prayers from the community, prayers for the world, for those who were sick, for their leaders, for people who had yet to encounter God, and for everything else they could think of. Over the course of time, the number of people praying increased, but the fact of the matter is that the community never stopped their prayer to God and because that community lived the scripture, amazing things happened, things that could not have happened if it weren’t for the power of prayer.
Now, there is a very important person missing from the story I just told you. I doubt that many of you know much about him, he isn’t one that history seems to look favorably upon. In fact, one of the most under-rated lessons that I ever learned in all my years of school is that history is written by the winners in life. The man that is missing from the story which takes place in Germany lost a battle just 60 miles from here. You have all probably heard of the winner, and his name is Heinrich Muhlenberg. Towns, hospitals and schools have been named after him, but nothing is named for the loser, Count Nicholas Ludwig von Zinzendorf.
Prior to my research about the fight that these two gentlemen had, I only knew the story from the losing point of view. When I read up on what Muhlenberg and others had to say about Zinzendorf, I realized that the reason Zinzendorf lost was not due to what he was fighting for, but more the way in which he went about it. Since Zinzendorf was a nobleman, I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that he was probably a bit snobby, stubborn, and intimidating man who didn’t realize that the fact that he was of noble birth meant absolutely squat on this side of the Atlantic. It seemed that Muhlenberg just wanted to argue for the pure sense of arguing, and it would appear that the Count really wasn’t too interested in winning the argument that day, and decided to drop the issue.
What is that issue? It is the same issue gathers us here today. Christian Unity! You see, back in Germany, that small group of people who started praying 24 hours a day had now been praying for about 15 years straight. With the knowledge that God was working through those Moravians in prayer, Zinzendorf had come to Pennsylvania with the intent of uniting the many different denominations into the broader banner of Christianity. That movement failed. Pennsylvania was supposed to be a place where any religious group could come and find freedom to practice, why then would they want to lose the things that make them unique? Now, I’m not saying that if Zinzendorf had won that verbal argument, we would no longer have denominations today and I don’t think that Muhlenberg was against Christian unity. What I am saying is that these two men’s personalities and ideas about the future of the church made them to be enemies.
I only tell you that story because in this gathering of Christians today, I see something different. I see a desire for unity between Christians, a desire for a bond that says our differences are less than our hope. Our hope to live out the mission of Jesus Christ. Our hope to worship God together, not as Lutherans, Episcopals, Pentecostals, Methodists, or Baptists, but to unite as Christians. Our hope not to be known for our differences in theology, but to be known as Christians by our love. (PAUSE)
Brothers and sisters, the question we must then ask ourselves is how important is prayer in the interfaith community? Do you pray for one thing while the person next to you prays for something completely different? Do you pray in hope that the person next to you might be praying the same thing? It is my belief that individual prayer is not enough, just as prayer in the midst of our worship gatherings is not enough. We need to pray without ceasing as a community, we need to place our collective hopes and fears at the alter of the Lord in prayer.
Now, I don’t know how many of you know this, but I have asked some of the leaders of this group to find a number of people to begin 24 hours of prayer for this community and for the future that this ecumenical group might have. My hope is that this group here today can turn those 24 hours of prayer into a full week. There will be a sign up sheet in the back of the sanctuary. See what happens when you put your prayer life on the line, see what happens when the community spends all their time with God.
As the choir sings our last hymn, if you so desire, I ask that you come forward, take a stone from the ushers up front, and lay it down on top of mine. Let us build join together as Christians and build an alter to God in the name of our risen Lord and Savior. Then I will open in prayer, and as the spirit moves, we will share our prayers with each other and with God. Let us to begin a prayer that will continue on for a full week, and let our lives be open to the work that Holy Spirit will lead us towards. Amen.

John the Baptist Sermon ~ first person

2007-04-24T09:32:00.000-05:00

Repent! For the Kingdom of God is near! Why are you here? What is your purpose for having gathered together here today? I will tell you my purpose. My purpose is to prepare a straight path for the Lord. Many of you know me as the baptizer, but those close to me call me John. I was invited here this morning to explain what it means to be baptized and to enter into a covenant with God.

Let me begin by telling you a bit of information about myself. Your pastor tells me that you heard the story of my birth on December 24th. How my aunt Mary came to visit my mother Elizabeth while they were both pregnant. Until her death, my mother loved to tell me the story about how I leapt in her womb when Mary, who was pregnant with my cousin Jesus, arrived at our house. During my childhood, I spent many summers with Jesus and his family, but as my parents were very old, they passed away just before my 10th birthday. Because my father was a priest, he had special connections with a religious group known as the Essenes, a well known but separatist Jewish community. I was sent to live with them until I was able to care for myself.

While I was with the Essenes, I lived a meager, humble life, filled with religious training. We slept under the stars and lived far from major cities. When we were not studying, we scrounged for food, where we mostly ate locust and wild honey. It is not a very satisfying diet, but it helps us remember that everything we receive comes from the Lord our God.

When I was in my late twenties, I left the community who had raised me and began to fulfill the role which God had planned for me. I was to clear a straight path for the Lord, baptizing those who repented of their sins and desired to live a pure and Holy life before God. Crowds would come and find me on the banks of the Jordan River, preaching on the books of Moses and from the words of the prophets. Many who heard my voice were struck with the fear of the Lord and came into the river to repent of their sins.

After a year or so of doing this, some of the Pharisees came down to the river to hear what I was saying. They came to me and argued that because they were descendants from Abraham, that God had a covenant with them, and repenting their sins and being baptized was pointless. I told them that being a descendant from Abraham was nothing, they are a dime a dozen. God could raise stones to be his descendants, but instead wants us to repent from our evil ways, that we produce fruit that is ripe from our repentance. Of course, they scoffed at me, but I kept on preaching, knowing in my heart that I was fulfilling the work of God.

Then, one day, as I was preaching alongside the river, baptizing all who desired to repent, I saw a man still standing on the side of the river, waiting for all others to leave. Once everyone had left, he walked into the water towards me, his eyes never leaving mine. Once he got closer, I knew at once that it was my cousin Jesus. We had not seen each other in many years, but I could remember his eyes as if we had seen each other only yesterday. As he approached me, I had a feeling that it was Jesus who the Lord God had sent me ahead of. That it was my cousin Jesus who was sent by God to save the world. I felt completely unworthy, that Jesus was asking me to baptize him, clearly, it was him who should be baptizing me. Jesus simply smiled and told me that I must be the one to baptize him. Suddenly the feeling of unworthiness was gone, and I agreed.

I took Jesus next to me and put one hand behind his back and the other on his chest. I brought him down into the water, keeping him down until he was nearly out of breath. I lifted Jesus out of the water and as he gasped for breath, time seemed to get slower, seeming to almost stop. At that very moment the heavens seemed to open up and the Spirit of God came down in a dove and said “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” Just thinking about it gives me the shivers.

I went on baptizing others who repented of their sins, but nothing ever came close to that same moment, when new life was given to Jesus. When your pastor asked me to speak to you this morning, I immediately asked myself why me? Why would you want a baptizer to speak on a day that most people understand as preparation for communion. That’s when I opened you’re book of worship to the ceremony for confirmation, it is very interesting document. If you look closely, the title is Confirmation AND Affirmation of baptism. It seems to me that we all tend to overlook the second half of the title.

Since my death, baptism seems to be taken for granted by some. When I first learned of people being baptized as infants, I almost lost my head. Then I realized that this act of confirmation is really a day in which you stand in front of the church, remember your baptism and recommit to that covenant. But what exactly does covenant mean?

Through the action of baptism, you are saying that you choose to belong to God. I must ask the question, how do you go about into the world letting people know that you have been baptized? Perhaps we could pour water on our heads every hour, walking around with wet hair. Or, it is my understanding that you receive certificates when you are baptized, I guess you could go around showing others that paper, but that doesn’t seem very practical. When I was baptizing, we had no such way of identifying others as being baptized, which is why it is so important to be in a church, in relationship with others who have been baptized, so that we are able to be in the presence of others who are united with Christ, are cleansed by his saving work, and enter into the fellowship of the church with those are called into a life of faith and willing obedience.

Alex, Brianna, and Zach, you have all taken an important step in your journey of faith. The ritual of the affirmation of your baptism is not one to take lightly. You have presented yourself before God and before the members of this church to affirm your belief in God as your Creator, in Jesus as your Savior, and in the Holy Spirit as your sustainer. You have pledged to turn away from sin, evil and selfishness in your thoughts, words and actions, serving God all the days of your life. This is by no means an easy task, but those who are here today have also covenanted with you to help you do those things. Use them, as God has put them in your life for a reason.

Before I leave you today, I was hoping that we all might take a walk down to the Delaware River and take a moment to remember our own baptism, but since I’m really the only one with clothing that can get wet, I think we will pass on that idea. Instead, it is my hope that everyone in the congregation will come forward as the final hymn is sung, taking a moment to place their hand in the water and bringing a drop to their head, remembering your own baptism, and what it means to be a Christian, baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

What Does Winning Look Like?

2007-01-24T23:06:00.000-05:00

This has been the question that has been bugging me recently in regards to Iraq. Years ago, President Bush stood in front of a huge banner that said “mission accomplished” Which I guess is true, because that “war” ended. Operation Iraqi Freedom is over and done with. I believe we’re now either in OIF IV or maybe even V. It’s a strange measurement. Winning is obviously not killing the most people; otherwise this would have been over years ago. Winning is not removing Saddam Hussein from power, because we can check that box off too. Winning is not simply bringing about Iraqi democracy, having democratically elected officials or having them establish a constitution. Vice President Cheney was clear about the fact that these goals were accomplished in a recent article on CNN.

With all this in mind, what does the President think needs to be accomplished in order to chalk this one up in the win column? What possible models do we have to look at in the past 100 years for what victory looks like? Well, I might be missing a war or two in here, but lets take a look…We have Afghanistan, Desert Storm, Bosnia, Somalia, Vietnam, Korea, World War II, World War I. Of these 8 wars, there is only one where I can think that we won the war, stayed in that country, and didn’t have any more trouble…and of course, that would be WWII. Of course, it took 40+ years for the whole country to get back to normal, but surely the President doesn’t think that we will be there for that long? Heck, we still have a huge military base there. Those other 7 wars that I mentioned, we didn’t stick around, or we lost, or we’re still fighting. The cultures are extremely different, and it seems like those countries are in it for the long haul. Something that I hope we are not planning on.

There is no “win” in war anymore. There is no more good side and bad side. However good our countries intentions are does not make up for the fact that we are injuring and killing civilians by the thousand. Just because we do it by accident doesn’t make it alright.

Since there is no real “win” situation, how can you cut and run? How can you lose if anything you do is not winning? The people in Iraq will always be at war with the United States as well as themselves as long as we are fighting. The only way to stop the fighting is for us to stop and pray that we haven’t hurt a young child in a way that will lead him to become the next Osama. Just declare victory and go home.

Article to read

2006-12-27T08:36:00.000-05:00

Another great article on MSN about going green. Check it out. Its good to see a big corporation be an advocate for this. I still don't do it very well, but I'm working on it.

http://boomers.msn.com/articleGH.aspx?cp-documentid=376469&GT1=8903

Should Politicians take their Oaths on a Bible?

2006-11-28T12:28:00.000-05:00

Here is my emailed reply to the author of this article. http://www.townhall.com/columnists/DennisPrager/2006/11/28/america,_not_keith_ellison,_decides_what_book_a_congressman_takes_his_oath_on

Very interesting article you have written. I enjoyed reading it, but I do not agree with your view. I am not a Muslim, in fact, I am a seminary student seeking ordination. Because of this, the bible is near and dear to my heart. That being said, I would love for every politician to put their hand on the bible when taking an oath, but in reality, its not good for politics.
For the sake of ease, lets look at the people who have been caught in scandal in the past decade. If you had known that they were going to do what they did, would you have let them say that oath on the bible? Would you have let Clinton do it if you knew about his indescritions? I doubt it.
When our politicians manipulate symbols of faith in order to make voters feel comfortable, we all lose. If they really swore on the bible, they would be acting quite differently. I'd rather them just stop the smoke screen, stop acting and start doing what the bible says.
That being stated, a bit less seriousness to my statement. It would probably be better if politicians were made to swear their oaths on different objects depending on what issues they ran on. If you recieved money from PAC's, take your oath with their symbol. If you ran with strong emphasis on enviromentalism, take your oath with a tree. If you ran as a hawkish Christian, take your oath with a bible and a gun. At least that way I know they do not plan on turning their swords into plowshears and spears into pruning hooks.

Even NASA thinks the enviorment is in the pits...

2006-11-22T13:04:00.000-05:00

Before reading the rest of this blog, check out this article from Reuters. http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=reutersEdge&storyID=2006-11-21T143055Z_01_L21794788_RTRUKOC_0_US-ENVIRONMENT-CLIMATE-HANSEN.xml&rpc=92

If you're too lazy to read it, it really boils down to the fact that NASA, our countries top scientists, say that if we don't take steps to address global warming, we're going to be in a lot of trouble. Now, quite frankly, I don't know how our President can not believe doing this would be the best thing for our country, but even if he believed he believed that the earth was getting cooler, it would still be to his benefit to believe these scientists.

I believe that the greatest failure of this administration, as far as the economy is concerned, is the fact that instead of inviting economic growth by giving money to new companies in emerging fields which could help wean this country off of oil, he has always believed that we ought to "stay the course" even when it comes to the old ways of the economy.

What does this lead to? If you've read any of my previous blogs, you'll see that there are a number of new, innovative ways which companies are harnessing renewable energy all across the world. But what it really comes down to is that it there are very few of these companies in the US, and the few that are, are being told by the President, along with "evangelical" (I hate that term to describe televangelists) leaders like Jerry Falwell, that supporting things like renewable energy is going to possibly damage the economy. Maybe I'm just not good at economics, but I would guess that supporting these companies would help our economy, as well as it would protect this wonderful earth that God has given us dominion over.

Call your local state representative, ask them to make your state use 35% renewable energy by 2015.

Another great energy resource

2006-10-05T15:19:00.000-05:00

This is quite an amazing breakthrough in power generation. It’s safe, easy to deploy, and not harmful to the environment. Hopefully we can see these in north amertica soon.
A Scottish company will deploy sausage-shaped tubes off Portugal to create the world’s first commercial wave power plant, providing electricity to 1,500 homes from 2006, a partner in the Scottish firm said on Friday.
Ocean Power Delivery (OPD) will build the wave farm about three miles off Portugal’s northern coast, near Povoa de Varzim, OPD’s Norwegian backer Norsk Hydro said.

OPD will deliver three wave power generation units with capacity of 2.25 megawatts to Portuguese renewable energy group Enersis for million, but the project could be expanded significantly, Norsk Hydro said.
OPD’s Pelamis P-750 wage energy converter is an elongated metal unit that looks like a big semi-submerged sausage, with hinged segments that rock with the sea, up and down and side to side, pumping fluid to hydraulic motors that drive generators.
The power produced by the generators is fed into underwater cables and brought to land.
A letter of intent for a further 30 Pelamis wave machines for a total of 20 megawatts before the end of 2006 was also signed, subject to satisfactory performance by the initial installation, Hydro said.
“If all goes well, many additional sites producing up to a total several hundred MW could be developed along the coast,” Norsk Hydro said.
“We see this order as just the first step in developing the Portuguese market, which is anticipated to be worth up to a billion euros over the next 10 years,” OPD Managing Director Richard Yemm said in the statement.
OPD is also in talks with Scottish Power, which has shown interest in installing a wave farm in the United Kingdom, Hydro said.
The European Union requires 22 percent of electricity consumption to come from renewable energy sources — such as solar, wind and wave — by 2010. Renewables currently meet about six percent of European demand, Hydro said.

Save the earth...one lightbulb at a time

2006-08-31T09:15:00.000-05:00

1. If every one of 110 million American households bought just one ice-cream-cone bulb, took it home, and screwed it in the place of an ordinary 60-watt bulb, the energy saved would be enough to power a city of 1.5 million people.
2. Compact fluorescents emit the same light as classic incandescents but use 75% or 80% less electricity.
3. A $3 swirl pays for itself in lower electric bills in about five months.4. Compact fluorescents, even in heavy use, last 5, 7, 10 years. Years. Install one on your 30th birthday; it may be around to help illuminate your 40th.
5. The single greatest source of greenhouse gases in the United States is power plants–half our electricity comes from coal plants. One bulb swapped out: enough electricity saved to turn off two entire power plants–or skip building the next two.
6. In terms of oil not burned, or greenhouse gases not exhausted into the atmosphere, one bulb is equivalent to taking 1.3 million cars off the roads.
7. Last year, U.S. consumers spent about $1 billion to buy about 2 billion lightbulbs–5.5 million every day. Just 5%, 100 million, were compact fluorescents.
8. In the next 12 months, starting with a major push this month, Wal-Mart wants to sell every one of its regular customers–100 million in all–one swirl bulb.
9. Early CFLs cost $25 per bulb (and still paid for themselves in electricity savings). The light they produced was bluish or pinkish, or varied; the phosphor coating had to be refined. The ballast–built into the bulb rather than in a separate fixture, as with traditional fluorescent tubes–hummed and didn’t cycle the electricity quickly enough; it had to be made electronic and miniaturized. Costs came down, as did size. The same wizardry that gives us Hallmark birthday cards that play “Love and Happiness” makes possible CFLs at $2.60 instead of $25.
10. A 60-watt classic bulb and a 15-watt swirl are identically bright–the swirl just uses 45 fewer watts. Source: FastCompany

My response to Fox Sports article on why Football is better than Soccer

2006-07-11T20:19:00.000-05:00

Out of the 30 or so ideas, only one of two of them are decent...here are my responses...

Why Futbol is better than Football.

● Champion of the World…not just the United States of America and Canada, while attempting to exploit Mexico and Japan.

● Overtime give both teams an equal chance.

● Having the World Cup every four years makes the championship more prestigious.

● A third place match is just another way to make more money and watch a great game. It’s a surprise that we haven’t thought of this yet.

● It’s great to see Americans get pissed because France can beat them in a sport.

● Futbol pitches don’t have cheerleaders…this allows for more room for seats, so the fans can get much closer to the field.

● Futbol does not have scantily clad women who are paid to cheer…this is true…but what they do have is painted on bikini wearing fans that do it for the love of the game.

● Magic Spray is better than going back to the locker room to get an injection of pain killers so a player can finish the game.

● Football is played for 5 seconds…rest for 40 seconds…play for 5 seconds…rest for another 40. Must be exhausting.

● Players don’t need a helmet to head butt someone.

● Players play offense and defense…very few American football players can do that.

● Quarterbacks slide so not to get hit…futbol players slide to knock someone on their ass.

● Leave it to Football to make fun of the kicker…who quite frankly, is usually underpaid for someone who kicks the ball for the winning points in close games.

● Not allowing unlimited substitutions shows us what an athlete is made of. Futbol players don’t take breaks after every tough play.

● At least in Futbol…when someone is offside, the play is in action. How smart can a player be if they line up offside from the beginning?

● Leave it to America (and maybe Japan’s Sumo wrestling) where overweight players is something to be proud of.

● Futbol has more blood…Ask the American captain.

● In Futbol, the plays are changed on the fly. You don’t set up and try to figure it out before the play starts.

● Instead of trying to get better, America just says that if we lose to Ghana, we should quit. Great attitude.

● No commericial breaks. 45 straight minutes of action per half.

● Futbol fans are better at math. While Football fans have their time counted down, Futbol fans can figure out how much time is left on their own.

● One referee cannot perfectly keep track of 22 players on the field. If the ref didn’t see it, it didn’t happen. In the NFL, you have at least five referees for 22 players and they still can’t get it right. They have to use a replay because they can’t do it on their own.