if the earth...a poem by Joe Miller

If the earth

were only a few feet in 

diameter, floating a few feet above a

field somewhere, people would come from

every where to marvel at it. People would walk

around it marveling at its big pools of water, its little

pools and the water flowing between the pools. People

would marvel at the bumps on it, and the holes in it, and they

would marvel at the very thin layer of gas surrounding it and the

water suspended in the gas. The people would marvel at all the

creatures walking around the surface of the ball, and in the water.

The people would declare it precious because it was the only one,

And they would protect it, so that it would not be hurt. The ball

would be the greatest wonder known, and people would come

to behold it, to be healed, to gain knowledge, and to know

beauty and to wonder how it could be. People would love

it, and defend it with their lives, because they would

somehow know that their lives, their own

roundness, could be nothing without it.

If the earth were only a few

feet in diameter.---Joe Miller.

vulnerability and protection: The biblical image of the Good Shepherd

 The biblical image of the shepherd, though not a common contemporary reference point for us, still speaks to the faithful in meaningful ways.  The 23^rd psalm and the images of Jesus the shepherd are most often associated with death, with funerals.   The image and the Psalm bring comfort to those who mourn.  Shepherd images for God were long part of the story of Israel.  Some 500 years before Jesus, Ezekiel the prophet spoke of God as a shepherd when he said:

 “For thus says the Lord God: I myself will search for my sheep, and will seek them out. ¹²As shepherds seek out their flocks when they are among their scattered sheep, so I will seek out my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places to which they have been scattered on a day of clouds and thick darkness. ¹³I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them into their own land; and I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, by the watercourses, and in all the inhabited parts of the land. ¹⁴I will feed them with good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel shall be their pasture; there they shall lie down in good grazing land, and they shall feed on rich pasture on the mountains of Israel. ¹⁵I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep, and I will make them lie down, says the Lord God. ¹⁶I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them with justice.” Ezekiel 34.

b i b l e

This is not a column about the history channel's miniseries, "The Bible" which aired in March. I commented about that in an earlier blog entry.  I shared my opinion on it. I have shared it since with people in and outside of church, who have asked me what I thought. I have a relationship with the bible. I read it. I am a Lutheran pastor, a person of faith. I hear God speak in the bible.  I hear my own story, the human story in the bible too.  I also hear both the Jewish story and the Christian story tied together by a first Century prophet named Jesus of Nazareth.  The bible says he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, died, and was buried.  On the third day he rose from the dead and appeared to his followers in and beyond Jerusalem for a period of some 40 days.  I have read the bible in many different ways; for personal faith and theological understanding; for moral guidance; for historical/literary education; for linguistic/cultural meaning; for pastoral care and counsel, for preaching and teaching; for prayer and conversation with God.  The bible is many things to me.  It is not God.  It is not perfect,but it is holy.  God's Word is heard through it.  I don't believe in biblical inerrancy.  People wrote it and translated it and rewrote it and copied it and rewrote it.  But God inspired it. It tells the world the truth about ourselves and the God who made all things by love for love.It is self-contradictory, violent, and oppressive.  It is mythological and supernatural.  It is ordinary and human.  There are universally applicable truths and there are highly contextual, culturally premodern, middle Eastern stories, norms, and values that must be understood as such.  To confuse the latter with the former has caused suffering.  It bears interpretation, to say the least.

easter

Why do you look for the living among the dead?   Why do we get stuck in bad habits and unhealthy patterns of behavior?  Why do we let nostalgia and fears hold us back from experiencing the present in its fullest?  Why do bad memories haunts us? Why do mistakes, regrets, secret sins, failures, and losses prevent us from enjoying the life God has given us?  We are haunted by pasts we cannot change and an unknown future that ends in death.  The older we get the more life is behind us.  More memories, fewer hopes.  Harder to make amends as time goes by.  Why do we look for the living among the dead?  Because we have learned what to expect.  We have learned that life is a journey from birth to death. We have learned that we cannot survive death.  It is inevitable. So we live as best we can. And along the way there is both joy and sorrow, pain and pleasure. We seek the pleasure and the joy where we can find it.  We lament “Why me?” when pain or grief overwhelm us. We swing between the pendulum, from the joy of living to the fear of dying.  We avoid the latter as much as we are able by sheltering ourselves in our small, comfortable worlds. We keep the threats at a distance, taking few risks, preferring to watch death on television as entertainment or distant news. Why do you look for the living among the dead?  Because we know that life is lived in one direction, a direction that leads to the grave. But Easter tells another story. It is the story of what happens when the sun came up. But Easter began in the hours before that…in the darkness before the dawn.

the sixth day. a meditation for the night

It is Good Friday.  The Sabbath has already begun, for darkness has fallen here tonight.  But at the hour of his death, on the day of preparation for the Sabbath, on the day when the Passover lambs were slaughtered in Jerusalem, it was still Friday and the sixth day of the week.  According to the story of creation, the sixth day is the day we were born.  On the sixth day, God said let us create humans in our image.  In the image of God, God created them.  Male and female.  And God said, “it is very good.”  On the sixth day, human kind comes into existence.  It is the final creative act, according to Genesis.  For on the 7^th day, God rests.  The work of creation is completed and yet, there is a deeper reality at work that threatens; the darkness and chaos press against the goodness and the light.  They threaten to drown what God has made in the struggle for power and control.  Made in God’s image, we imagine ourselves too much like gods. Selfishly greedy, with insatiable appetites for more than our fair share that must be protected by violent opposition toward any human threat to our liberty.  The current debates in our culture over guns and gays is about power and control. Who has it?  Who should have it?  Me, you, them, us, the government?  In our superior egotism, we forget our vulnerability, our fallibility, our mortality collectively earned and evenly distributed to all.  We forget that what we do unto others, we are doing to ourselves.  We let the chaos and the darkness in.  In our politics, in our private thoughts, in our foolish games, we let the darkness overwhelm us.  We let the chaos of a thousand mass shootings, of unending war, of intractable poverty, of tyrannical injustices too many to name, too painful to ignore and too entangling to fight overwhelm us.  To avoid the nakedness, we cover ourselves in shame.  We say “there is no God” while we play and work and self-medicate with toys and sex and food and drugs and treadmills and unworthy, vain pursuits.  We run from the light like blind moles emerging from winter’s earthen depths only to retreat at the touch of the sun’s rays.  We shop and watch and drive at the expense of hungry, dying children.  We take sides and blame and judge to protect ourselves and hold our own power over them.  We cast out, we oppress, we abuse and neglect.  We lash out and ignore.  What have we become but the shadows of our true selves? No longer innocent babes.  We have grown up, but we have not matured. We have not embraced the truth of our identities.  When faced with the reality of the God who dwells with and in us, we put him to death.             

On the sixth day, the man of God, the son of God, the Word of God who was with God in the beginning, is put to death on a cross.  It is no surprise. He is shamefully executed by the government and religious powers. Their authority was established by the will of the people who cried out, “Crucify him.” He was betrayed and abandoned by those who knew and loved him best. On the sixth day, the crowning achievement of God’s good creation goes the way every single one of God’s children has gone; by the way of death; death that is the fruit of human sin; turning away from God to serve ourselves.  “We have no king but Caesar,” is to admit total infidelity to the creator God and full allegiance with Tiberias—who called himself son of God.  On a Friday afternoon, the sixth day, darkness and chaos close in and push God out, swallowing Him up and ending His life.  They extinguish the light of the world.  They lay waste the bread of life and pour out the living waters.  And as he hangs on the cross, life draining from his broken and pierced body he says, “It is finished.”  That which God started on the sixth day of creation, divine fellowship with humankind,  is completed in the death of Jesus. God enters creation and loves creation so completely that God dies with creation; so that creation can be fully restored, healed, made whole.  On the cross, God makes peace with us.  The darkness and chaos, so close at hand, has been overcome by the one who is closer; for God is in the breath, the water, the food, the human bonds of kinship and love we give and receive every hour of this mortal life. We are not alone in our living or our dying.  Jesus finishes the work of creation by claiming death as the portal out of the darkness and chaos and into the light and life of God. Tomorrow, we must rest.  Because, on the 8^th day the new creation begins.  

this is holy week

This is Holy Week.  A week set apart by the church to observe Jesus' last week in Jerusalem; his last supper, betrayal, arrest, trial, crucifixion, and death  We will hear the passion story twice this week.  On Palm Sunday and on Good Friday. In my congregation, we will gather three more times between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday.  We will observe old rituals, tell old stories, do strange things together.  We wave palm branches, lay hands on heads and anoint them with oil for healing, wash feet, sing old hymns and pray in the dark.  We will observe corporate silence. Why do we do these things in the same manner that they have been done for 20 centuries? Why do we focus a week on Jesus' suffering and death? Is it our fascination with morbidity?  A lot of entertainment revolves around death. According to A.C. Nielson, the average child will see 8,000 murders on television before they reach age eighteen.  I've not seen it, but the hit show "the walking dead" is all about a sort of zombie apocalypse. In a violent culture, the crucifixion of Jesus is not shocking.  It is also not a deterrent.  Neither the death penalty nor the violent nature of humanity has been swayed by the crucifixion of Jesus. Are Christians called to nonviolent resistance to injustice or to protect the vulnerable by whatever means are necessary?  This is a good question for another post.   In a country that makes heroes everyday of soldiers who risk and give their lives "for others", Jesus' death is not that courageous or valiant either.  Jesus, according to many, was innocent and suffered as a substitute for the guilty--you and me, sinners that we be. He imputed our guilt before God and the state of Rome, so that we might impute his innocence.  He takes on our nature, that we might take on his.  In this way, he atones for our sin and reconciles us with God. Somehow Jesus'death involves us. It's significance is not understated. Over a billion people profess some form of Christian faith in the world.  

what is youth ministry?

I was a Lutheran youth a few years ago.  My congregation had a small youth group. We did stuff together. We had a youth room with old couches in it.  We went to youth events.  We played games and occasionally read the bible and prayed.  We had fun.  As a youth, I taught Sunday school and vacation bible school to younger kids. Congregational youth ministry formed me as a Lutheran Christian and influenced my calling to become a pastor.  I do not write this today to disparage the good youth ministry that congregations are doing.  I write to encourage congregations that do not think they have youth or youth ministry anymore.
As an adult, I have led youth groups.  I have been a youth camp counselor. In my first call as a pastor, I served a large Lutheran congregation in youth ministry. We had fun.  What I discovered, though, was a problem. Congregation-based youth ministry is costly.  It can be exhausting and frustrating.  You plan an event only to have it overshadowed by several other local youth activities; sports, dances, band, etc...You try to get spiritual with kids and they mentally check out. When you're together, the fellowship is fun. But consistency and the constant need to "entertain" in order to garner attention and commitment can make a youth worker feel like their spinning their wheels.  Congregational youth ministry can be amazing.  I know some outstanding youth ministers doing bold formation work with kids.  But the stakes are getting higher as we realize how alienated emerging generation of youth are from church culture. So few teens and twenty-somethings are connected/committed to churches; some polls say less than 20% consider themselves affiliated with a religious group. We all know that the fastest growing religious category in the U.S. is the "nones". So what do we do?

3 things I learned from Jesus today and a last thing

I am a believer.  I read the bible daily.  Sometimes I learn.  Sometimes I don't.  I am a Pastor of a Lutheran church.  I gather a small group of adults together to pray and listen to the bible on Tuesdays.  We are not flashy.  It is not entertainment.  We are not trying to be relevant or attract a crowd.  We are trying to live faithfully, like God matters to us.
I read from the Gospel of Luke today.  It was a short passage from the fifth chapter of a gospel we started reading in December.  It said this:  "Once when Jesus was in one of the cities, there was a man covered with leprosy.  When he saw Jesus, he bowed with his face to the ground and begged him, "Lord if you choose, you can make me clean."  The Jesus, stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, "I do choose.  Be made clean." And immediately the leprosy left him.  And he ordered him to tell no one.  "Go,"he said, "and show yourself to the priest, and as Moses commanded, make an offering for your cleansing, for a testimony to them."  But now more than ever the word about Jesus spread abroad; many crowds would gather to hear him and to be cured of their diseases.  but he would withdraw to deserted places to pray. (Gospel of Luke 5:12-16.)
I think it is unfortunate that a bible story like this one is not better known.  There is something in there for everyone, believer or unbeliever. This is what I learned today:

the bible: the movie.

I read the bible.  I have been a student of it for most of my adult life.  I am not a scholar, though I am a practitioner. I am a Lutheran Christian and a Pastor.  I read and think about and interpret the biblical story for personal faith and for the community of faithful people to whom I am called as pastor. The bible tells the story of a people and their God.  It is the story of the Israelites and the Christians.  It is a story of emerging ancient near eastern monotheism that began over 3,500 years ago.  There is a good it of human history in the bible. And the bible has had an impact on western civilization like nothing else.  Not even the invention of the electric light has had as much of an impact on the world.   

I am watching "The Bible" on the History channel, the five-week miniseries meant to visually depict the biblical narrative from cover to cover.  A daunting task. For people familiar with the bible, you must provide enough details from the text to make it worth watching.  For the unfamiliar, you can't get bogged down in too many characters and details.  If the Harry Potter series took eight full length motion pictures to tell it, the Bible is going to take more than five.  

So the trouble with the series is that they are only able to give their audience an edited version of the bible.  And the editing room is where the story goes off the rails for me. The choices to omit or ignore characters, plots, themes, and language tells another story. What they don't show us matters as much as what they do show us in understanding the larger meta-plot.  For example, the highlight Samson and skip Deborah.  They skip the story of Hannah and Samuel's birth---a story that clearly influences the Christmas narratives. If you omit something or someone from the Old Testament, its going to impact your telling of the New Testament story. 

Their version of the bible is much more anthropocentric than the bible itself. That is, the people drive the story. I might suggest that the movie is lacking a main character, a protagonist.  One would think that the LORD, YHWH, GOD, would fit the bill.  But God remains largely hidden, silent, and elusive; speaking only occasionally through the rants of strange men or acting in an occasional violent miracle.  And it has been difficult to connect emotionally with anybody they have portrayed. Neither Moses nor David evoke any strong feeling. If they are Israel's heroes it's impossible to understand why. Thus far, violence is the primary driver of the story. There is violence in the Old Testament. But there is also love and mercy present too. They have chosen violence, because our culture expects to see violence. So, it is a version of the bible people might want to watch, as opposed to a bible people don't want to read.  The series is not theological, which might appeal to the public even if it betrays biblical integrity. God voice is found in the pages, but rarely on the screen.

My hope for any people watching the series is that you read the books from which these stories come and find out what the story means.  Finally, the bible is a community's scripture. It is not meant for individual consumption in front of the flat screen. Find others to watch it with and discuss.  And if a question comes up, ask someone who might know.  

          

coming home

Luke 15. The Homecoming

Then Jesus said, "There was a man who had two sons. The younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.' So he divided his property between them. A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. But when he came to himself he said, 'How many of my father's hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands." ' So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. Then the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his slaves, 'Quickly, bring out a robe — the best one — and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!' And they began to celebrate.

Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.' Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. But he answered his father, 'Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!'Then the father said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.'"

When the younger son demands his inheritance this is what happens.  He basically says, “You are dead to me”.  The Father must liquidate his property to divide the inheritance.  He must sell land in Israel.  If you happen to own some, you do not sell land in Israel.  It is the most precious commodity.  Selling it is scandalous.  Did he get top dollar?  Not likely.  Liquidation required that he take what he could get.  Somebody stole that land.  Everyone in the household should be angry.  No father would have allowed his younger son to demand such a thing.    He should be disowned for this. Instead, the father meets his demands and lets him go.    And then this son squanders the money on parties, booze, and women.  When he hits rock bottom, he’s feeding pigs and eating their scraps.  Feeding pigs is dirty Gentile work.  He has made himself unclean. He’s hungry.  Finally, he comes up with a plan to head for home and beg for a job.  Are you kidding?  Has he no shame?  Is he sincere in his contrition or is he coming up with the right words to say to win over his father?

The Father sees him coming and runs out to him, embraces and kisses him, insists on welcoming him back into the family with full honors and privileges.  No head of household would dare run like that or hug and kiss his dirty son.  This Father is a complete fool, bringing shame on his entire family.  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.  After what has transpired, the son would most certainly not be welcomed by the community, let alone the father. He is an outcast now.  He rejected  his family identity.  So, they are not expected to receive him as a member of the family again.  And then the father insists on restoring his identity as son with robes and a signet ring, the seal of his sonship.  

The elder son is angry and acts in a way that we might expect.  If his brother returns and is welcomed back, the remainder of the father’s inheritance will have to be shared with him.  The elder son is being cheated out of his half.  The younger son brings shame on the entire family, having lived as a gentile. The elder son’s words betray his resistance to the father’s insane behavior; For years I have worked as a slave for you and never disobeyed your command. Yet you have never even given me a young goat to have a part with my friends. But when this son of yours comes home, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you kill the fatted calf for him!”          

In the context of this story, the Prodigal son is Jesus.  The Pharisees are the elder brother.  Accused of eating with sinners, Jesus says that God rejoices over one repentant sinner more than 99 in need of no repentance.  Jesus will be crucified by Gentiles, a sign to his people that God has rejected and cursed him.   I was lost.  I was dead.  Jesus has been accused by the pastors of eating with tax collectors and sinners.  That is to say:  He is not living the way a good religious teacher should.  He is failing to fulfill the law.  He is jeopardizing his own relationship with God by spending time with the wrong people. He spends more time with people outside of the religion than inside.  His behavior will get him killed. But he will live again.  Jesus is the Prodigal son.  He was dead and is alive again.  Lost and found. 

The elders are those who see themselves as obedient slaves to God.  They are not liberated children, but slaves obeying a master’s commands.  Many people think God is a taskmaster and religion is their obedient service.  They do not get this Father.  He is not a slave driver. He loves his children enough to let them go far away from him and come back again.  Love sets us free.  Love welcomes us home. 

 This story suggests that God the Father accepts both the unrighteous sinners, with whom Jesus spends his time; and the righteous religious leaders. God loves both of them.  Pharisee and tax collector.  Saint and sinner.  Addict and counselor.   Who are you in this story? Are you the Prodigal son? Have you abused your freedom with choices that have taken you away from God?   Have you pushed away from those who love you?  Have you walked away, citing irreconcilable differences?  Have you abandoned others to please yourself?   Have you let your selfish ambition, your pride, your folly, your ego, your appetite for destruction prevent you from living the good life?   Have you made choices that you regret, choices that have hurt others?  Are you trying to find your way back home, back in, back to the way things were?

Are you the elder son?  Hard working.  Dependable.  Responsible.  Right. Do you judge those who have made a mess of their lives, saying they get what they deserve?  Have you abandoned others because they have made bad choices?  Do you avoid people who are abusing their bodies?  Have you felt unappreciated, unrewarded for good behavior?  Should bad behavior be punished and good behavior be rewarded?  Is that the game of life for you?  Has your sense of rightness and responsibility prevented you from enjoying what you have?  Are you expecting God to reward you for a good life? 

Jesus knows us.  Knows the human condition so well and describes us with such honesty here. Still, we can’t believe the end of this story.  The end of the story is a Father embracing both of his sons and welcoming them in because love reaches further than we can go.  Love digs deeper than we can bury ourselves.  Love is the home we can never really leave. 

Finally. this is a story about a homecoming, a welcome home party.  How do we go home?  If home is where we are loved fully and unconditionally.  If home is the place you have left, the place to which you long to return. If home is where you are safe and secure.   If home is where your family welcome s you , embraces you ,kisses you, feeds you, accepts you as you are.  How do we go home? 

We need a home.  We need to be welcomed like those sons are welcomed. We need to turn off the voices in our heads that count ourselves as less than worthy or better than anybody else.   You are no better or worse than anyone else.  We are the same.Brothers,  Sister. Children.  Rebels.  Lost.  Hungry.  Hopeless causes.  Egotistical busybodies.   We need to hear these words. God is always with us. Everything that God has is ours.  We are always welcome.  Nothing we can do can make God loves us less.  God lets us go and receives us back again.  Everyday.  Every week.     Every Sunday is a homecoming.  

Secret Spirituality

Repentance.  When Lu Lobello returned from active duty in Iraq, he was haunted by the memory of one particular incident.  Early in the takeover of Baghdad, his marine unit had shot up a suspicious car that turned out to contain civillians,the Kachadoorian family. Only the mother and a daughter survived, all the men were killed.  Lobello was discharged from the Marines due to actions related to his suffering from PTSD.  He eventually researched what happened to the survivors in the Kachadoorian family.  They had moved to California and lived not far from Lobello.  Through a reporter who had written about the Kachadoorians, a meeting was arranged.  The conversation was awkward, but the mother and daughter, both Arminian Christians, told Lobello that they forgave him and welcomed him as a son and brother.(Excerpted from Christian Century, February 6, 2013.

He sought them out.  Why?  We don’t know why.  I suspect, at least, he was sorry, ashamed, suffering under the weight of guilt.  They gave him a gift.  They released him from the self-affliction of guilt and they welcomed him as a member of their family.  In Christian love, he became to them like the ones he had taken from them.  Love keeps no record of wrongs.   

praying

Lord Jesus, teach us how to pray.  Amen. 

Lake George from Inspiration Pt.

My family loves the Adirondack mountains.  It is our place for retreat twice a year. We hike to this place; inspiration point.  It’s not a hard climb, takes 45 minutes to get up there.  But the view is awesome.  On a beautiful spring day, we can sit up there for an hour in complete silence. Serenity, beauty, fresh air, Lake George, peace.  It is our semi-annual high.  It energizes us, brings clarity of thought, reduces stress and anxiety, and gives us time together in God’s presence. We are free to be.  It’s never hard to go there, always hard to leave. I often say I could live there.  Retire there one day.  Buy a cabin. Sit on the porch. It’s a dream.  If you have a place like this, you know what I mean.  If you don’t, I recommend you find one.        

One of the recurring themes in Luke’s story about Jesus and his disciples is the theme of prayer.  It is mentioned more than in the other gospels.  In major scenes, Jesus prays:  At his baptism.  Before he chooses the 12 disciples, on the mountain, and on the cross.  Jesus prays.  He tells a parable, only found in Luke’s story, about a friend who knocks on a friends’ door at midnight, seeking some bread so that he might offer food to a guest who has come to his house.  Prayer, he says, is like asking a friend, at an inopportune time, to give you a gift so that you might give that gift to someone else.  Prayer is like obtaining food for someone else.  Prayer is like being in between someone who has what someone else needs.  Prayer is a point of access.  Prayer is advocacy, speaking up for someone else, being their voice.  Prayer is inconvenient, too.  It is the midnight cry in a crisis moment.  It is the “sorry to have to bother you with this, but…”  Prayer is, “I need your help, so that I can help someone else.”  It’s knowing where to turn in a moment of need.  It’s knocking on the door.  Prayer is not relaxing meditation apart from the world on inspiration point.  It is an action verb. It is movement. It is an intervention, a confrontation.  

Many of us pray.  In times of trouble, need, confusion, fear, grief.  We pray for help.  And in times of joy, celebration, and blessing we pray in thanksgiving.  I suspect we have been taught to pray at meals, maybe at bedtime, less likely in the morning.  Maybe you have a few prayers memorized.  Maybe you fold your hands and bow your head and kneel at your bedside.  Maybe you pray out loud, alone in your car.  Maybe you just don’t pray.  If God is God, doesn’t God already know what I’m going to say, what I’m thinking?  What’s the point?  Prayer can seem passive, verbal, cerebral—in my head. Prayer is sort of nice, but not messy or dangerous. We don’t think of prayer as risk.  We think of it as duty or comfort. 

Lent begins Wednesday. So, it’s Confession time. I’m not sure about prayer in my own life. I don’t know if I pray enough. I keep trying.  Prayer sometimes feels more like a chore or duty and something I skip or forget to do. I rarely know for certain that a prayer I prayed is answered.  I don’t even try to make those connections. I have been a student of prayer for a long time. I’ve read about prayer, talked and taught about prayer, practiced various kinds of praying.  I’m not sure I understand it much better than when I was a child, though.  Is it effective? If not, is that a reflection on me or God?   I’m still learning. Sometimes prayer has been intimate and profound, spiritually energizing, exciting. I have prayed in groups, with a partner, on behalf of one person or many people.  I have prayed in front of large crowds and in a small, dark, silent space.  Pastors  are invited to and expected to pray.  But I don’t always have the words. 

Psalm 51. for Lent

Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your steadfast love;

according to your abundant mercy

blot out my transgressions. 

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,

and cleanse me from my sin. 

For I know my transgressions,

and my sin is ever before me. 

Against you, you alone, have I sinned,

and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you are justified in your sentence

and blameless when you pass judgement. 

Indeed, I was born guilty,

a sinner when my mother conceived me. 

You desire truth in the inward being;

therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart. 

Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. 

Let me hear joy and gladness;

let the bones that you have crushed rejoice. 

Hide your face from my sins,

and blot out all my iniquities. 

Create in me a clean heart, O God,

and put a new and right spirit within me. 

Do not cast me away from your presence,

and do not take your holy spirit from me. 

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,

and sustain in me a willing spirit. 

Then I will teach transgressors your ways,

and sinners will return to you. 

Deliver me from bloodshed, O God,

O God of my salvation,

and my tongue will sing aloud of your deliverance. 

O Lord, open my lips,

and my mouth will declare your praise. 

For you have no delight in sacrifice;

if I were to give a burnt-offering, you would not be pleased. 

The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit;

a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. 

Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;

rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, 

then you will delight in right sacrifices,

in burnt-offerings and whole burnt-offerings;

then bulls will be offered on your altar.

forty days.

Lent is forty days.  Seven weeks. It starts tomorrow, Ash Wednesday.  It ends on the night before Easter. But you don't count Sundays. Every Sunday is a little celebration of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. So, Sunday is always a feast day.  Christians don't fast on Sundays.  Ash Wednesday falls in a different week every year, because Easter moves.  Easter is determined by the lunar calendar; it falls on the First Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox.  Winter's darkness is coming to an end. Life and light return.  
Ash Wednesday is not about cigarettes, but you might quit smoking.  One of the disciplines of Lent is fasting; abstaining or giving up certain habits, foods, etc...Discipline is hard.  If it weren't, it wouldn't take discipline. Ash Wednesday is the ritual marking of the forehead with ashes in the sign of the cross.  It symbolizes our mortality, our creaturehood, that we were all "made from the dust" and will one day return to the dust of the earth. It is good to know this. Transiency and mortality means today is the day. Seize it. Live today as if it could be your last or most important.
Ash Wednesday is also a visible reminder that there is dirty, black darkness---sin---in our hearts and minds, in the world. We make a mess of things. Every now and again I need to be reminded that I am not just a good person trying to live a good life.  I benefit all the time from many privileges that I take for granted; from my skin color to my education, I have received good things that others have not.  Not by my own doing.  I am not self-made. Also, I take advantage of those privileges in ways that negatively affect others, in ways that are too often hidden from me.  I have money to buy things I don't need, while my neighbor does not have enough money for heat,food, or shelter. I should try and rectify that in some way. A bible word related to Lent is "to repent", a verb which has to do with self-transformation, changing directions, turning around. Sometimes, we need a do-over, a second change, a U-turn.  Lent is a reboot, a fresh start.  
Also, Ash Wednesday remembers the cross.  Jesus died.  God died with him. But life continues. Because death is not final. It need not condition the way we live. We are not the walking dead.  We are alive with potential for goodness and love. We can avoid destructive, toxic things and embrace life-giving things.  
So, for forty days Christians reflect on what it means to be a creature in the world.  They do so in physical ways.  Because for Christians, being spiritual is a physical experience.  We connect to God, not through transcendental meditation, but through physical means. And that is what Lent is about; restoring a connection with God. God, according to the bible, loves us. We call  relationship with God communion.  A lot of Christians observe Ash Wednesday with a service of worship. You could go.  Many churches welcome guests, especially for Lent. Whether you attend or not, here are forty ways to do Lent and restore communion with God and others.

searching

search

Google.  Bing. Yahoo.  We search. We are searching all the time.  For recipes.  For answers to questions.  For knowledge.  For news.  For images. For friendships.  We are searching in a new way today, using amazing tools that give us access to an ever-expanding world of information.  We are searching.  What we find may or may not be what we are looking for. We find what is out there, because when we search something inevitably pops up.  All of us have searched for a thing and found something else. We are aware that one must be careful what one searches for, lest you get something you don't want to find.
I read a story about searching this morning.  It is a bible story.  From the Gospel of Luke, New Testament.  It is the only story in the New Testament that features neither an infant nor an adult Jesus. It features a 12-year-old Jesus and his parents, Mary and Joseph.  They have gone up to Jerusalem for the Passover festival.  Passover is the cultural and religious festival celebrating that story of Jewish liberation from Egyptian slavery recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures, book of Exodus.  It is the story of Moses, the ancestral God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (YHWH, by Hebrew name), the Egyptian Pharaoh, and the enslaved people of Israel.  It is a story of political power and a coup d d'etat, through which GOD overcomes the power of Pharaoh and liberates His people.  It is the story of God's compassion for an oppressed people and their release.  They become refugees and asylum-seekers. They spend 40 years in the wilderness before occupying the land of Canaan, where Israel is established through war.  The Passover story is the heart of Jewish faith, believing in the liberating compassion of GOD for God's people.

gun violence and the common good

I have said nothing about the gun violence issue. I am not a gun owner. I don't believe I will ever own a gun. I don't think I need one. I do not hunt. I do not participate in shooting sports. I trust the police for my protection. I've never been robbed. I'm not afraid.
Since the public consciousness has been reawakened by the shooting of children in an elementary school in Connecticut, a debate has ensued. I have stayed out of it. I have an opinion like everyone else, but I'm not sure it matters all that much. As a Pastor, I have not used the pulpit to address the issue. But I am glad that I am part of a church with leaders who are speaking to it. There was a rally in the state capitol in Harrisburg last week about gun violence and one of the Bishop's in our region (Claire Burket, Southeastern PA synod) was a speaker. I am glad she was there. Her faith compelled her to speak out against gun violence and in favor of increased government regulations to reduce it in PA.
Here's my two cents today. Gun violence is a problem in this country. I don't think there is one solution that will satisfy and eliminate it. I'm concerned about guns. But I am equally as concerned about violence. What causes it? How can we reduce/prevent it in civil society? The peoples' right to own firearms is protected in the Constitution. This freedom comes with a tremendous cost, as do all freedoms. One of the costs is the possibility that people will die a violent death at the hand of a lawful gun owner. We must count the costs as a nation. Thousands of people die by gun fire in the U.S. every year. When two dozen children are slaughtered in a first grade classroom in a small town, everyone pays attention. I am the father of a first grader. I wept for those families who lost children in the week before Christmas. 

The Sign in the Wine

Signs, signs everywhere signs. We are inundated with signs.  Signs point the way, give direction, tell us where we are, where we aren’t.  Signs welcome us or tell us to keep out.  Signs bear messages, some favorable, some unfavorable.  Signs are visual cues, reminders, and attention- grabbers.  Signs advertise and entice.  They provoke or they seek to console.  They convey a public message.  We see so many signs, we ignore them.  Sometimes with consequence.   Signs organize us, give order to things.  Keep us moving along.  People say, “it’s a sign” when they mean that something means something else—that an occurrence is pointing to another reality altogether. People sometimes look for signs—signs of change in the seasons of life.  Signs signal when something is about to happen or when something has happened to which we ought to pay attention. 

When Jesus Came to the Jordan River

When Jesus came to the Jordan river to be baptized by John he did not follow the crowds.  They came for a show.  They came to be aroused from their spiritual slumber.  They came for a sign of hope that God had not abandoned them in their plight.  They came for healing, for forgiveness, for cleansing from the sin that separated them from the salvation of their God.  They came because John cried out and they heard his voice crying and they heard their prophets’ voices in his voice and they believed that in His baptism they would find faith and the promise of God for God’s people.  They came because they needed to come.  They came because of a longing---a longing that escapes us in this culture of immediacy and access and now and comfortable living.  They longed because they lacked, they longed because they tasted hunger and thirst and death.  They longed because they were weary from oppression and abuse.  They longed because that’s all they could do.

When Jesus came to the Jordan river to be baptized by John he did not follow the crowds.  He did not come to join the community in the wilderness.  He did not come to make amends, get his life right with the LORD, if you will.  Jesus came to reveal Himself to the world.

there will be signs

On the first Sunday in Advent, the gospel of Luke has Jesus describe a series of global crises, political and ecological, that signify the end of the world.  Far from disastrous,however, they represent redemption and peace for God's people. These were people who experienced the dark side of these disasters.  They were the vulnerable ones, like the Haitians in Hurricane Sandy. They were the ones already beaten down, acquainted with suffering. But Jesus insists that life may get worse before it gets better.  Ah, good news for the new year.  We, on the other hand, disregard the tragic news we see. We have come to believe that the end is no nearer now than it was then.  Signs?  Not really. Just more of the same on planet earth.  

We have seen natural disasters and floods, tsunamis and super storms.  We have witnessed nations at war.  We have experienced terrorist attacks, hijacked planes, suicide bombers, death squads, drone strikes, covert operations, and all manner of violence.  Israel is still at war with its neighbors.  For thousands of years.   What we see every day:  These are not signs for us of an impending global theological crisis.  We do not wait expectantly for divine intervention.  We seriously doubt the Mayan prophecy or any prophecy about a coming end.  We have seen catastrophe on the nightly news. Jesus was not as well informed as we are.  They did not have mass media attention to every daily crisis that occurs on planet earth.  Now there are climate scientists, Bill McKibbon and others, who believe that global warming is fundamentally altering ecology.  Polar ice melt, record heat waves, droughts, floods, etc…all signs of a human caused disaster.  More doom and gloom.  And yet, we are still here.

That first generation of Christians expected Jesus to come and usher in the final judgment, the end of the age, the new creation.  They expected divine intervention, a miracle of biblical proportions, salvation, rescue.  When those first Christians experienced the destruction of the temple, and the death of the first generation, a new crisis emerged.  The crisis of when?  The previous crisis, the identity of the Messiah, had been resolved by Jesus.  But then they had to address his absence and the delay in his return. They had the stories of Exodus and exile to give them consolation and courage.  Those stories told them they had forty to seventy years.  That’s how long their ancestors had waited.  But even longer still:  Between the Exodus and reign of David—five hundred years.  Between David and the Exile, about  five hundred more. Between the exile and Jesus about five hundred more.  The Jews were not unaccustomed to waiting.  Much scripture commends them to wait.  From one crisis to the next, from generation to generation, they wait for the Lord.  They wait with hope.  Hope that God’s promises will be fulfilled.  Promises to end hunger, thirst, suffering, and death.  Promises to bring an end to violence and war.  Promises to bring peace and justice for the least and the greatest.  The promise of a Kingdom ruled by God’s anointed Son.  The Promise to be fully present, visible, accessible, real.  The promises of order, beauty, abundant provision, work and rest, friendship and love---promises made in the beginning and affirmed again and again. The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel.   I think the Jews brought the gift of patience and an unyielding hope in God to the earth.  They brought the possibility of divine/human relationship, through prayer and the written word, to life.  They survive because they wait with hope in a day that is yet to come. So, too, the Christian people continue in hopes of a coming day of salvation, of peace, of new life. But I fear we grow weary and weak with time.   

We do not wait.  We do not hope. We fear.  We demand and we expect, but do not trust.  We want what we want when we want it and we want it now. We try to secure ourselves against the threats of the world. And when we fail to do so, we despair. We are anxious, in an age of worry. We shop to acquire things to fill our restlessness. We toil away at trivial things.  We make much ado about nothing.  We major in minor things. We protect ourselves.  We fear dying and death, because we do not trust what is yet to come.  We must begin to hope again.  We must begin to hear and trust God’s promises again. Christ will come to us.  Christ will raise the dead.  Christ will end the wars.  Christ will feed all people at a banquet that never ends.  If death and destruction must come first, let them come.  For God will finally act.  God will save us. 

So, what shall we do?  Wait. Practice patience.  Pray. Give and share, forgive and right wrongs because these are kingdom of God activities. Boldly bless people by your words and by your works. But mostly, I invite you, I challenge you to wait.  Wait for God.  Expect God to show up in your life, in your days, in your ordinary and extraordinary moments. Pause.  Breathe. Enjoy silence.  It is enough that you are chosen and loved by the creator. It is enough that God waits on you, waits for you. Jesus is waiting for us.           

   

Advent

Advent is a Latin word meaning “coming”. We do not use this word in normal speech.  No one says, “This Friday is the advent of my sister, who will be visiting from Rochester.”  One does not say to a potential guest, “When shall we expect your advent?”  The arrivals gate at Philadelphia airport does not announce the advent of flight 5143 from Phoenix.   No, Advent is a church word.  And a very good one at that.  A word that ought not to be relegated to the church’s ancient past, to the history of our religion, or to the catholic and apostolic churches like ours who stubbornly insist on following this old calendar of seasons and feast days. It is the beginning of the church’s year, the four Sundays before Christmas, December. This word, Advent, is a Christian word, part of the Christian lexicon.  It is part of our speech because it describes a particular event or events to which we find ourselves inextricably bound as believers.  “Advent” is always and forever pointing us to the story of a peculiar coming, an extraordinary arrival, a surprising visit.  For the Advent that we announce to the world is the Advent of GOD.  The divine creator, YHWH, the LORD, the Savior of Israel, comes.  GOD comes to us.  Once, long ago, in the town of Bethlehem of Judea, a son was born to a Virgin named Mary and her betrothed Joseph.  His birth marked the Advent of GOD.  And of course, one must ask a good question; from whence did he come?  Where was GOD before the Advent of this child?  What about this particular moment establishes God’s Advent in a way that distinguishes it from God’s coming before or since?  For surely, Christians have proposed that this Advent was exclusive, unique, special, and unequivocal (a word which here means, without equal comparison).   According to the Gospels, the birth of Jesus marks the Advent of God’s coming to God’s people in an unprecedented way.  This” Advent” was anticipated by Israel, God’s chosen people, and announced by the ancient prophets.  We must acknowledge that the Advent of God in the birth of Jesus was, at least initially, an exclusive Advent.  God came to God’s own people, in a way that was anticipated by their prophets. And yet God’s own people failed to recognize it.  (So said someone who had not failed to recognize it.)  Certainly, some people recognized Jesus as God’s Son, as the Messiah, as the Savior long promised. Failure to recognize God in the Christ, we are told, was a sign from God that validated the Advent experience, precisely because the coming of God in Jesus was NOT globally decisive.  One did not expect the Messiah to come in the vulnerable form of an infant.  One did not expect the Messiah to die on the cross at the hands of the very government Messiah was supposed to usurp.  God’s Advent was hidden and revealed in the flesh of a man.  Advent was subtle, yet not totally unnoticed. 

God’s coming to us in the infancy of Jesus gives us due pause; not in the powerful storm or the mighty army does he come, but in a baby boy wrapped in strips of cloth, lying in an animals’ feeding trough.  In poverty. In vulnerable mortality.  In human family and political controversy.  In Israel, but to the earth.  God’s Advent requires a context, a container, a place.  But it is not containable or limited to that place.  God’s Advent became a global reality over hundreds of years.  Because God’s Advent in Jesus Christ continues…it happened once and continues to happen.  Because somehow, some way, during this season of the year, God makes His way to you and me.   The peculiarity of Advent, the unprecedented and divine nature of it as that one cannot predict what it might do to you.  This year, perhaps, you may experience Advent in a way you have not before.  As if something new were about to begin, as if a birth was about to occur in your own life.  This Advent may mark a beginning for you, a way of experiencing God that you have not had before.  It is forever possible that Advent might happen to you or for you this year.  We anticipate, we hope, we expect.  We worship.  We give.  We receive.  We celebrate.  We sing.  We pray.  We wonder.  Advent is so much more than a countdown to Christmas.  It is the announcement of God’s arrival in Jesus of Nazareth.  It is the announcement that God has come for you and for me.  God has sought us out.  God has invaded our privacy.  God has visited our homes.  God has met us on the road.  God has shown up, disguised as one of us.  This Advent we will hear the remarkable story.  We will travel with Mary and Joseph.  We will gather with shepherds and angels.  We will witness the birth.  We will tell the good news.  God will come to you.  May you readily receive the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Amen.