Bethany Church in York

Timber!

2012-02-01T23:00:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Steve O. for taking down the tree hanging over the garage. Two large limbs came out of it earlier this year, fortunately landing on the ground rather than the house. But now it is gone!

Financial Peace

2012-01-31T23:03:00.001-05:00

A promotional video for the upcoming Financial Peace University.

A Doubter's Guide to Faith (4): Evidence and Apology

2012-01-31T22:59:00.001-05:00

Audio file for listening or download.

Mark 9:14-27
John 20:19-31

“I believe. Help my unbelief.”
“Do not doubt, but believe.”

We are in the final week of our Doubter’s Guide to Faith. Our first week, we asked the question, “How can I KNOW?”. The second week, we explored the experience of pain and the absence of God. Last week, science versus faith, and whether or not evolution can co-exist with Christian faith. This week, we examine evidence for faith and the defense of the faith.

As Christianity was growing up in the Roman Empire, the empire, the culture, the powers fought back – and fought back hard. One of the early ministries in the church was the ministry of the Apologist, someone who made a defense for the faith, who explained what made Christians unique, who did so with two purposes in mind: (1) to win people to Jesus and (2) to reduce persecution.

Justin, born in Samaria, converted as an adult in the city of Ephesus, was the most famous Apologist. He is known as Justin Martyr because he was martyred under emperor Marcus Aurelius about the year 165 (ECF, 9). Perhaps his apology was not adequately effective!

His writing demonstrates some of the accusations leveled against Christians in that early era, as well as some creative, open-minded ideas towards people who do not follow Jesus. Early Christians were called “atheists” because they did not believe in the many gods of the ancient world.

Thus we are called atheists. And we admit that in respect of such supposed gods as those we are atheists; but not in regard to the most true God (Apologia I, vi; in ECF 58).

From his perspective, Socrates was just such an atheist, and, therefore, just such a Christian – without being one in name:

When Socrates tried to bring these matters to light and to rescue mankind from those demons [false gods] by the critical application of sound reasoning, then those very demons [had him executed]. ... Christ ... is the Word [reason] of whom all mankind have a share, and those who lived according to reason are Christians, even though they were classed as atheists (Apologia I, v and xlvi; in ECF 58-60).

Justin was writing his Apology for a different time, but he addresses obliquely one of the big questions today: What about good people in other religions? Aren’t Christians judgmental and narrow-minded? Justin is a resource, just one fine example of Christian people handling the question of diversity with integrity and openness.

Tertullian was a firebrand. This lawyer was converted as an adult, in the year 193, because he witnessed the death of Christian martyrs (ECF, 14). In his Apologeticus he refers to the testimony of martyrs as a demonstration of the truth of what we believe. He writes to the powers of Rome,

Your cruelty profits you nothing, though it grows ever more ingenious; it is one of the attractions of our [faith]. As often you mow us down, the more numerous do we become; the blood of the Christians is the seed [of the church]. ... when we are condemned by you we are absolved by God (Apologeticus, 50, in ECF 167).

Tertullian took the time to address some of the anti-Christian propaganda circulating in his time, among them the ideas that Christians were a secretive band of law breakers who practiced cannibalism. “This is my body broken for you.” It required some explanation:

At this point I shall reveal the real activities of the Christian ‘faction’. ... We are a body united by a common religious profession, by a godly discipline, by a bond of hope. We meet together as an assembly ... that as an organized force we may assail God with our prayers. Such violence is acceptable to God. We pray also for emperors, ... for the peace of the world .... [We] pay for the nourishment and burial of the poor, ... support boys and girls who are orphan and destitute; and old people who are confined to the house; and those who have been shipwrecked ... (Apologeticus, 39; in ECF 141-142).

Like Justin, Tertullian was writing in a different time, for a different audience. Yet, he touches on another one of the big objections people bring to the faith: Christian people, and religion in general, are responsible for so much evil. Yes, we are; the evidence is too plain and too painful. But look at history, look at Tertullian’s witness: before the church became powerful, before church and state made their unholy alliance, the church was a blessing to those who were most in need.

In our own time, the same thing happens, though it doesn’t always receive press. Yesterday, a group of our young folks and adults were at the Youth Development Center serving breakfast to the kids. And we’ve got folks doing relief and development work in Haiti and Ghana, feeding the hungry in our own community, educating children, helping people move. And throughout history, it has been Christian people who have pushed for women’s rights, built hospitals, ended child labor, abolished slavery – in ways that no other great world religion other than Judaism has done. Jesus quoted Isaiah the prophet and declared that he came to bring “good news to the poor”. In as much as we are doing that, in as much as this has been a reliable theme in the history of the church, we are doing the work of Jesus in the world.

“I believe. Help my unbelief.”
“Do not doubt, but believe.”

We’ve heard from two of the ancient Apologists of the church. I want to take some additional time to discuss some of the common questions of our time more directly.

First, many people question the reliability of the Bible and the biblical text itself. It is ancient – hasn’t it been changed or altered in transmission if not before? Our Mormon and Muslim friends, and a great many non-religious people, allege that is exactly what has been done.

The opposite is true. The Biblical text is the most reliable and accurate ancient text in existence. Yes, it was copied by hand. Yes, there are textual variants, some of which our Bibles include in footnotes. However, it is not possible to overemphasize: the Biblical text is the most reliable and accurate ancient text in existence.

Some examples, collected by Josh McDowell: Caesar’s Gallic Wars, written around 50 B.C., has only 10 early copies in existence, and the earliest is still 1000 years after the text was first written. Aristotle’s writings are preserved in 49 early texts, 1400 years after they were written. Herodotus is preserved in 8 early copies, 1300 years after they were written. The New Testament? Over 5,300 manuscripts in the original language of Greek alone, plus many other early translations. And the earliest fragments of the New Testament date to the first century, less than 100 years from when they were written.

This wealth of textual evidence makes a couple things very clear. One, the New Testament textual tradition is continuous. There is no evidence that the gospel texts were altered to support one theological view or another. Two, the textual tradition is both so early and so extensive as to make deviation from the original document extremely unlikely. There is simply not enough time for that to happen.

Second, isn’t the worship of Jesus as God a later addition, not historically supported? Scholars and skeptics have pointed to the Gnostic gospels and concluded that early Christian faith and practice was not uniform in its belief in Jesus Christ. Folks read The Da Vinci Code, which was a really fun novel and an okay movie, and believe Dan Brown’s version of history – that the gnostic position was prominent but later suppressed through the political moves of a shrewd bishop who got the Emperor Constantine on his side. Of course, the shrewd bishop (Athanasius) was sent into exile several times, so I’m not sure how effective he was at the political process! Anne Rice, author of Interview with the Vampire and now Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, describes some of the skeptical scholarship:

Some books were no more than assumptions piled on assumptions .... I discovered in this field some of the worst and most biased scholarship I’d ever read (cited in Timothy Keller, 99).

But what of the evidence in the development of the New Testament itself? Again, the New Testament was not written by second- or third- or fourth-generation believers to support and idealize the church leadership. It was written in the first generation – Paul’s letters within 25 years of the death of Jesus, Mark’s gospel in the mid 60's and John – the last to be written – before the end of the first century. This means that eyewitnesses were available – both Christian eyewitnesses and opponents of Jesus – all of whom could debunk any significant fabrication. The gospels include the first century version of footnotes, referring to eyewitnesses like “Alexander and Rufus” by name (Mark 15:21). By contrast, the earliest and most famous Gnostic gospel, the Gospel of Thomas, was not written until 175 or later, well after the four New Testament gospels were widely circulated and accepted. And, it certainly was not written by the Apostle Thomas. (See Keller, 100-103.)

Aside from the date of composition, the literary form of the gospels is clearly not fiction. Ancient fiction was not realistic; it did not include mundane details such as “153 fish” or “asleep on a cushion”. Realistic fiction has only existed for the past 300 years (Keller, 106-109). The gospels are the reports of witnesses, consistent with the literary conventions of the time, not our conventions. Luke’s gospel opens with this writing plan:

Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, 3 I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first,1 to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed (Luke 1:1-4).

“I believe. Help my unbelief.”
“Do not doubt, but believe.”

We’ve talked about the open mind of Justin, the witness of the martyrs, Tertullian’s church serving the poor. We have investigated the reliability of the Biblical text itself, particularly the New Testament and its teaching that Jesus is God. In prior weeks, we’ve addressed the relation of reason and doubt to faith, the experience of pain, and questions raised by evolution and science. There are plenty of other questions that we have not been able to touch, or that we have only briefly mentioned. But this is the end of the series, at least for now. Where do we go from here?

I hope you have seen that there are productive ways to address our doubts, ways that open new doors to faith, ways that deepen our confidence in God. I hope that, if you are struggling with some particular questions, you will find here at Bethany a community where you can raise your questions, express your doubts, and be accepted for where you are on your journey. Doubt can be a productive part of our spiritual journey.

I hope you have seen that there is more than one way to be Christian, to believe in Jesus. It is possible to embrace evolutionary theory and embrace Jesus. It is possible to believe in Jesus as the unique Son of God and Savior of the world and still hold the door open for Socrates. Speaking personally, I am less concerned about where you and I stand on these things than I am about the direction in which you and I are moving. For me, I always want to be moving toward Jesus and his cross, because, as far as I’ve come, I’ve got a long way to go.

“I believe. Help my unbelief.”
“Do not doubt, but believe.”

I love the two Scripture passages we have before us today. “I believe. Help my unbelief.” I was once asked to pray over a woman paralyzed in a horrible accident. So, I prayed for healing and – at the same time – in my mind I prayed, “God, why am I doing this? She will never get better.” Faith and doubt co-exist in all of us. The question for us is how we will choose to live. Like objecting to our partner or spouse, and yet not questioning that we are a pair, we can object to God, object to something in Scripture as we currently understand it, and still be God’s (see Keller, 113f). Perhaps we’ll discover that it is all a misunderstanding, perhaps we’ll discover that we’re wrong, perhaps we’ll live and love in tension, but we are still God’s. “I believe. Help my unbelief.”

Then, we have the Thomas story. Have you ever been stubborn in refusing something, something good? I love Thomas. He wants evidence, he wants to see and touch the wounds of Jesus. And, Jesus offers that to him. “Do not doubt, but believe.” The closest we come to touching the wounds of Jesus today is in Holy Communion and caring for the oppressed. But Thomas was face to face with the risen Lord Jesus. And he never touched the wounds. Because, at the end of the matter, it is not all about the evidence, it is all about Jesus. It’s not ultimately about the process of doubt or the work of reason. It’s the gift of faith. Will we join Thomas and proclaim, “My Lord and my God”?

Today, I invite you to come to the altar and proclaim your faith in the Lord Jesus. Don’t let your doubts deter you. Decide to follow Jesus.

Resources:
Henry Bettenson, editor and translator. 1956. The Early Christian Fathers (ECF). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Justin (in ECF)
Tertullian (in ECF)
Timothy Keller. 2008. The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. New York: Penguin/Dutton.
Josh McDowell. Evidence that Demands a Verdict. Available in extracts online. See http://www.josh.org/ and http://www.angelfire.com/sc3/myredeemer/Evidence.html

The Bishop Is Coming!

2012-01-23T20:28:00.001-05:00

Bishop Jane Allen Middleton, the spiritual leader of United Methodists from Breezewood to Wilkes-Barre, from Clearfield to York, will be with us in worship on Sunday February 5! During the Sunday School hour we'll have a breakfast reception. This pic is of Bishop Middleton dunking Rev. Dave Norris, her executive assistant at the time, at an annual conference event in 2007. And, yes, February 5 will be a fun day!

Celebrate the next karate grandma - The York Daily Record

2012-01-23T15:46:00.001-05:00

Our very own Georgia Golden! Congrats, and happy birthday! Celebrate the next karate grandma - The York Daily Record

A Doubter's Guide to Faith (3): Darwin, Science versus Faith

2012-01-22T18:06:00.001-05:00

Audio file for listening or download.

Psalm 8, excerpts (call to worship)
Ephesians 2:10 (kids)
Genesis 1:1 - 2:3 (message)

We are in the third week of our Doubter’s Guide to Faith. Our first week, we asked the question, “How can I KNOW?” and we used, alongside the Scripture, Blaise Pascal – the great philosopher, physicist, mathematician, and Christian mystic – as our tutor. Last week, we explored the experience of pain and the absence of God with John of the Cross and Mother Teresa. This week, science versus faith, with Charles Darwin. And, next week, we’ll examine evidence for faith.

One of the ancient symbols for the Christian faith is the fish. Drawn with two simple curves, it was a covert way to express a life of discipleship to Jesus in a culture that was violently opposed. Why a fish? It was an acrostic. The Greek letters for fish are the first letters of words to name Jesus, to begin prayer: Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior.

In our contemporary setting, the symbol for Darwin has become a fish, with feet, just one of the missing links. And, in a humorous twist, sometimes this fish with feet is depicted swallowing the traditional Jesus fish. Alternatively, the Jesus fish is displayed swallowing the Darwin fish. Science versus faith. If you believe one, you cannot believe the other.

It’s a divisive subject. The room temperature goes up a few degrees in some of these conversations. It put York County on the map a few years ago, as the Dover School District added Intelligent Design (the latest version of Creationism) to their science program. And many uncharitable things are said and done, in the name of Jesus, by people on either side of the debate. That, to me, is most unfortunate. Jesus said that the world would know we are his disciples, not because we agree on the creation-evolution controversy but because we love one another (John 13.35).

As with the other questions we have addressed in this series, there is so much more we could talk about than we have time for. The message notes and audio will be posted online, and references will be included as well. If you want to take things further, you can pursue those references and feel free to stump me with good questions. I don’t have all the answers.

Why has this become so divisive a subject? The rhetoric is powerful. Richard Dawkins, biologist and author of The God Delusion, wrote, “Although atheism might have been logically tenable before Darwin, Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist” (The Blind Watchmaker, p 6, cited in Miller, p 14). Then, on the other side, there are those who dismiss evolution saying, “It’s only a theory” (see Miller, Finding, post script p 13). If you believe one, you can’t believe the other. At least, that’s what the rhetoric of the conflict would claim.

Let’s step back for a moment to Blaise Pascal and our opening question two weeks ago: How can we know? Pascal offered up three ways of knowing: doubt, reason, and faith. They are all quite effective, all very important, and – at least in Pascal’s opinion – all have their place. As followers of Jesus, we believe in resurrection, which – by scientific definition is both impossible and impossible to prove. Duh! If it is possible, it is not a God-thing! Science, however, must not simply be possible, it must also be disprovable. And to put our understanding of the Bible’s creation story into the disprovable category, as something that can be verified by the scientific method, does two unhelpful things. First, it takes the miracle out of creation. And, second, it sets us up as an adversary of the scientific process.

I do not believe that people of faith need to be adversaries of science. In fact, the strong reaction against evolutionary science among evangelical Christians did not begin until the 1920s, fifty years after Darwin’s ideas were proposed (McGrath, “Science”, 7). Again, I do not come with a pile of answers, nor do I expect us all to agree. What I want to share today comes out of my own journey, my own reaction against evolutionary science, what was for me a deeper appreciation of the Genesis text, and reading and hearing the stories of evolutionary scientists who came to faith through science.

Who am I speaking with today? I am speaking to Christian people who are afraid of evolutionary theory, who believe that it goes hand-in-hand with atheism and atheism alone. I am speaking to those who embrace evolutionary science and think it is therefore impossible to embrace Jesus Christ. To you, particularly, I would offer the testimony of scientists, the wisdom of the ancient church, and a fresh reading of the Genesis text, in hopes that you can give Jesus not only your consideration but also your trust. If you are in neither group, I imagine that you know someone, several people even, who fall in one or the other.

Charles Darwin
So, let’s start with Charles Darwin, one-time theology student, then ship’s naturalist, then leading figure of one of the most significant scientific revolutions in history. In his time, there were no examples of how to embrace evolutionary theory and hold to Christian faith. It was a struggle and a grief for him to conclude that one species could evolve into a new species; it violated what his faith had taught (Sulloway).

In his Origin of Species, Darwin included three quotes on the front page. The final one, from Francis Bacon, reads, “Let no man ... think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well-studied in the book of God’s word, or in the book of God’s works; ... but rather let men endeavor an endless progress ... in both” (cited in Miller, xii). And, at the end of the book, Darwin concludes his presentation of evolutionary theory with this final sentence:

There is grandeur in this view of life; with its several powers having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that ... from so simple a beginning endless forms most wonderful and most beautiful have been, and are being, evolved (cited in Miller, 292).

Kenneth Miller, a witness for evolutionary science in the Dover School Board case, a biologist at Brown University, describes himself as “a person of faith” precisely “because of evolution” (19). He says, provocatively, “I believe in Darwin’s God” (292).

Creation science
Creation science – and intelligent design – describes itself as science. It raises a number of interesting and important questions. As to the age of the earth, it lifts up the question of apparent age. Did God make the first man and woman as infants or mature adults? Couldn’t the earth have been created with an apparent geological age that is greater than its actual age? Paleontology will retort, however, that fossils are found in all the geological eras, and ask if the earth, then, was created with an apparent age including fossils of organisms that never lived.

And, as an alternative to the ice age, creation science suggests that the great extinction of dinosaurs and the erosion and sedimentary effects of the ice age actually occurred because of the Flood and the ensuing climate change. Then, I want to ask a question of the biblical text: Were there no dinosaurs on the ark? Or, if there were, how did they fit? I love dinosaurs!

Creationists ask important questions of science. Where are the missing links and why are they missing? While scientists keep finding more of these fossil links, the mapping of genomes is viewed as much more conclusive evidence for shared ancestors (Collins, Q). Evolution actually does not teach that humans evolved from apes, just that we share a common ancestor (though that may not be much comfort!).

What about pure statistical probability? That the precisely necessary conditions existed in the primordial soup, that the correct proteins formed, that the proteins combined with others, that actual functioning parts of single cell organisms would develop. How could a purely random process result in such order and complexity when, we are told in the Laws of Thermodynamics, that the universe tends to become more and more chaotic and disorganized over time? Evolutionary science responds with two answers: (1) TIME – millions and millions of years – and, (2) limits to a purely random process, what Darwin called “natural selection”, nature’s own forces tending toward the developmental end of fitness for survival.

Creation science describes itself as science. Unfortunately, as I mentioned earlier, this takes miracle out of creation and subjects one’s faith to the scientific method and its potential to disprove.

I suggest that the approach of Benjamin Warfield would be superior. He was a leading advocate of the idea of the Bible’s inerrancy, yet he concluded, in response to Darwinism, that “any conflict between the actual facts revealed in nature and the biblical texts should lead the responsible [interpreter] not to reject a scientific account of nature nor to doubt the truth of Scripture, but to seek a better interpretation of Scripture in the light of these facts” (McGrath, “Science”, 9).

Francis Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project, and a “born again Christian” (Duncan) quotes Augustine, interpreting Genesis 1,500 years before Darwin:

In matters that are so obscure and far beyond our vision, we find in Holy Scripture passages which can be interpreted in very different ways without prejudice to the faith we have received. In such cases, we should not rush in headlong and so firmly take our stand on one side that, if further progress in the search for truth justly undermines this position, we fall with it (Q lecture; see also McGrath, “Augustine”).

Alister McGrath, who went from atheism to faith in Jesus, who has doctorates from Oxford in both molecular biophysics and in theology, describes it this way, “God created a universe that was deliberately designed to develop and evolve. The blueprint for that evolution is not arbitrary, but is programmed into the very fabric of creation” (McGrath, “Science”, 10).

Reading Genesis
We get so focused on the polarities of this debate – God or Darwin, there can be only one! – that we fail to read the creation story in Genesis 1 with respect for the nature of the story itself. It is not a scientific text. It does not address the fundamental forces that bind the universe together, it does not explain photosynthesis or digestion, it does not speak about the shared genetic material between humans and other primates. If we give all our energy to demonstrating that the Bible’s creation account is a scientific treatise, we run into a number of difficulties in the text, such as the creation of light before the creation of the sun and stars, and we put everything else the story contains at risk in a debate the text was not designed to support.

But that is not the kind of story it is. It is what I call a “campfire story”. Imagine all the kids of the ancient village gathered around the campfire calling out to the village story teller, “Tell us a story.”
“What story?”
“The one about the flood!” And he tells the story of the flood.
“The one with the talking snake!” And he tells the story of the original sin.
“The one with the beginning!” And he “begins with the very beginning”:

And the kids know the responses. They love the story, they’ve been joining the refrain as long as they can remember.

“And God saw that it was ... good”
“And there was ... evening and morning, the 1st day”

To describe a campfire story like this one as either true or false in every scientific detail misses the nature of the story. The story is designed to tell us true things at the basis of who we are, at the basis of what the world is, at the basis of who God is.

The story tells us the truth about time and work. Every day begins with evening, begins with rest. And the climax of the week is not creation but cessation, cessation of labor, “Sabbath”. Sabbath is the greatest thing God creates in this story, and Jesus tells us that it was made for us (Mark 2.27). The daily cycle beginning with rest, and the weekly cycle climaxing in rest are a powerful spiritual antidote to our frantic and addictive work. Life, success, provision does not depend on our labors. We need to learn to trust.

The story tells us the truth about created things, about material things, about what science calls “matter”. “And God saw that it was GOOD.” But we have such a mixed up way of relating to stuff. We treat material things as if our life depended on them – when they and us receive their existence from God. We treat sexuality as unclean, when God says it is good. We litter and pollute, and when we talk about environmentalism, we forget to do so beginning with this refrain, “And God saw that it was good”. “For everything created by God is good,” Paul writes (1 Timothy 4.4), and Genesis tells us that it is the job of humankind to care for this good creation (Genesis 1.26).

The story tells us the truth about human beings. We are made “in the image of God”. What amazing and wonderful dignity! Imagine if we all truly believed that, just that one point in biblical theology? How that would change our self-acceptance issues! How that would affect our prejudices! How that would alter the way we take responsibility for the rest of creation! One implication of this doctrine, “made in the image of God”, is radical equality in the human race. Our own Declaration of Independence takes up the theme, “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” “Fourscore and seven years” later, President Abraham Lincoln quoted those lines to claim that slave and free are created equal. Sometime later, folks figured out that even women were included. All they needed to do, though, is read Genesis, “In the image of God he created them, male and female he created them” (1.27). This single theme is the bedrock of human equality and human rights in the American democracy, but we forget that its roots are in the Creation story.

The story tells us the truth about God’s Word. It is “living and active” (Hebrews 4.12). The LORD speaks the world into existence, just as Scripture itself is God-breathed (2 Timothy 3.16, “inspired” is, literally, “God-breathed”). The Creation, therefore, has a story to tell, a story of God at work, “The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork” (Psalm 19.1). And, as Scripture is God-breathed, yet shows the clear fingerprints of human authorship (3 different languages, different writing styles, and even grammatical errors), so the Creation shows both the clear fingerprints of God and the unmistakable signs of physical laws and genetic inheritance and chemical properties. Remember Charles Darwin quoting Bacon on “the book of God’s word and the book of God’s works”?

Conclusion
Now, if all we are interested in finding in this text in Genesis is a response to the questions of science, then we totally miss the most important things it is trying to communicate. Like all Scripture, it’s about God and us. It is about God’s design and purpose for us as human beings in space and time. It’s about God speaking worlds into existence, and God speaking into our world. Whatever your personal conclusions on evolution and faith, let us not miss these truths.

If you are a Christian who has been afraid of evolutionary theory and a link to atheism, I hope you see that it is possible for others to follow Jesus and affirm evolution. For you who embrace evolutionary science and believe it is incompatible with Christian faith, I hope you find in this a fresh alternative.

“Let no man ... think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well-studied in the book of God’s word, or in the book of God’s works; ... but rather let men endeavor an endless progress ... in both.”

“Let there be . . . light.”

Resources:Francis Collins. 2008. “The Language of God.” Lecture at Q conference. www.qideas.org/video/the-language-of-god.aspx

David Ewing Duncan. 20 February 2007. “The Discover Interview: Francis Collins.” Discover Magazine. http://discovermagazine.com/2007/feb/interview-francis-collins/article_print

Alister McGrath. 2009. “Science and Faith at Odds?” A Q short/Fermi project. www.qideas.org

Alister McGrath. 8 May 2009. “Augustine’s Origin of Species.” Christianity Today. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2009/may/22.39.html

Kenneth R. Miller. 1999. Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientist’s Search for Common Ground between God and Evolution. New York: Harper Perennial.

Frank J. Sulloway. December 2005. “The Evolution of Charles Darwin.” Smithsonian. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/darwin.html

R. L. Wysong. 1976. The Creation-Evolution Controversy. Midland, MI: Inquiry Press. (A creation science text)

Souper Bowl of Caring

2012-01-20T16:07:00.000-05:00

We're down to our final four professional football teams - but the winner of Bethany's Souper Bowl will be determined by YOU. Bring your gifts for our food pantry partner, the W.E.L.L., and place them in the box of your favorite of the final four teams. Joe put one more sign up on the Well in the entry - "Also Ran". You'll have to speak with him about his own favorite teams.

A Doubter's Guide to Faith (2): Dark Night of the Soul

2012-01-16T00:14:00.000-05:00

Audio available for listening or download

Job 3, excerpts (call to worship)

Genesis 1:1-5 (kids)
Romans 8:18-27, Song of Songs 5:6-8 (read for message)

We are in the second week of our Doubter’s Guide to Faith. Last week, we asked the question, “How can I KNOW?” and we used, alongside the Scripture, Blaise Pascal – the great philosopher, physicist, mathematician, and Christian mystic – as our tutor.

This week, we explore another great area of doubt and struggle, the experience of pain, suffering, and the absence of God. We’ll do so with the assistance of some new tutors, John of the Cross and Mother Teresa. Next week, we’ll look at questions of science, particularly evolution and Charles Darwin. And we’ll finish up this particular series with an examination of the evidence for faith across a number of significant areas.

Today’s focus raises more questions than can be answered in the time we have today. In fact, pain and the absence of God raises more questions than there are answers, period, at least in my own experience. But sometimes all we want is an answer, and now! A former pastor of mine, Dick Woodward, collected biblical texts that gave an explanation for suffering and had, at one point, over 50 different biblical reasons for suffering. His point? Don’t make unwarranted assumptions about the reasons for your sufferings or mine. Instead, seek God. At the time he offered this, over 25 years ago, he had not yet been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. He is now physically limited by multiple sclerosis, but teaching from his bed.

There are many questions raised of pain and the absence of God. We ask “Why?” We want to locate justice, fairness in everything. Sometimes, we are content to wait for justice in kingdom come, but other times that seems inadequate for the concerns of the moment. And, we want to know who is at fault. We’re not content with “no fault” accidents; we want to pin it on someone, anyone, even God. If you were here last week, I hope you heard that it is biblical to question God – and it can be an important part of our spiritual journey.

Again, we cannot address all these questions in the time we have today. The beginning of the academic and theological response is that we live in a world shaped not only by God’s perfect design but by the presence of sin. And, we tend to underestimate how destructive sin can be, how pervasive it is, how sin and its unintended consequences have seeped into every corner of our world. The pervasive effect of sin in the world is like DDT – a pesticide for mosquitos – now found in penguin fat, far from any mosquito territory. The apostle Paul describes “the creation itself” as “in bondage to decay” (Romans 8:21) because of human sin.

We could endeavor to unpack this language and its implications in an academic fashion. But Paul does not do that. He turns from that statement to the life of prayer and the Christian hope. And, Job certainly does not do that. While we did not read the resolution of Job together – and it doesn’t entirely resolve, by the way, much like real life – we read Job in his pain. Job has lost his fortune, his children, his health and now sits, wracked with pain, in the town garbage dump. Three friends have arrived and the four of them have sat together in silence for seven days. Job speaks first, and we hear – because we find ourselves before a remarkable poet – what Paul otherwise calls “groans too deep for words”, the Spirit of God vocalizing human pain (Romans 8:26).

Job pushes us from the academic, intellectual consideration of pain and absence to the personal and visceral, to groans and sighs too deep for words. Any consideration of pain that does not get to that level entirely ignores the human condition.

Today, we are going to address just one thing: the emotional impact of doubt, the question of the presence of God in pain and absence. Just because we do not FEEL God to be present does not mean that God is in fact absent. In fact, it is in experiences of absence that God is often most present.

The expression for this in Christian theology is “dark night of the soul”. The same expression in contemporary speech is usually used in reference to the experience of pain, but that is not what it originally meant, in the mystical work of St. John of the Cross. Dark Night of the Soul is the title of a commentary by John of the Cross on his poem of the same title, a poem that has much more in common with the Song of Songs than with Job. It draws on the ancient tradition of reading the Song of Songs as a love song of the soul for God.

En una noche oscura,
con ansias, en amores inflamada,
¡oh dichosa ventura!
salí sin ser notada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada.

On a dark night,
Inflamed by love-longing–
O exquisite risk!--
Undetected I slipped away.
My house, at last, grown still.
. . .
O night, that guided me!
O night, sweeter than sunrise!
O night, that joined lover with Beloved!
Lover transformed in Beloved!
. . .
I lost myself. Forgot myself.
I lay my face against the Beloved’s face.
Everything fell away and I left myself behind,
Abandoning my cares
Among the lilies, forgotten.
John of the Cross (1542-1591). Translated by Mirabai Starr. 2002. Dark Night of the Soul. New York: Riverhead Books. 23-28.

Not what you expected? Me neither! And, I excluded – as I did with the Song of Songs selection – the most sensual language. But both deal with the absence of God and the heart seeking God. “If you find my beloved, tell him this: I am faint with love” (Song of Songs 5:8).

But, take this road with me for a moment. When Robin and I were courting, a couple that had been married for a few years – but not many – told us that we were so cute together and that this cute, fun, nutty connection we enjoyed would not last. Now, that’s what you call encouragement! We looked at it as a challenge.

It has been almost 22 years now – doing dishes, raising children, “in sickness and health”, negotiating and worrying over budgets, facing miscarriages, going to grad school, now sending kids to college. And, yes, it didn’t just last – it got better!

We all have a few options, once we come face to face with the dull and ordinary in our love, never mind the big struggles:
love can mature, deepen, become more powerful and less about me
we can make our peace with discontent, at least until the kids grow up
we can opt out
And, if it doesn’t get better, it probably won’t last.

Robertson McQuilkin was the president of my college, and Robin’s seminary. During our time there, he retired early to care for his wife as her Alzheimer’s progressed. He had friends who urged him to put her in a home and continue his ministry. But in their private space, she was always “Lover”, even if her face was filled with confusion. “In sickness and in health”. He cared for her, he loved her – even when many days went by without her recognizing him, without an emotional connection.

Do we love the other, our partner, our spouse, or do we love the feeling of being in love? “Doesn’t God want me to be happy?” says a guy beginning an affair. “I know what true love feels like,” says a gal with a series of failed relationships. (See John of the Cross, 36.)

O night, that joined lover with Beloved!
Lover transformed in Beloved!
John of the Cross, 24
I sought him, but did not find him; I called him, but he gave no answer. 7 Making their rounds in the city the sentinels found me; they beat me, they wounded me, they took away my mantle, those sentinels of the walls.
Song of Songs 5:6-7

So, we encounter the insight and mystery of John of the Cross. The night in which Lover and Beloved finally become One is just that – a dark night. And the experience of pain and absence can become, if we allow it, something that sets us free from the pursuit of love’s pleasures to pursue the one we love.

A friend of mine had just found Jesus, and he was thrilled and excited. He said to me, “I just love this feeling. I never want to lose it.” I told him, “It is a wonderful feeling, and I am so glad for you. But if you begin to seek the feeling, you will soon discover that you are not seeking God. And, then you’ll have neither.”

“Doesn’t God want me to be happy?” “I know what true love feels like.” Let me be clear. Happiness is great! True love is wonderful! Pain and absence are painful, and we do not seek them. Much pain and absence is awful and even evil. But we are not truly alone. God-in-flesh, Jesus Christ, not only lived and laughed and loved among us, he also suffered and died for us. And even in our most desperate times, he suffers today. Even though we do not feel him in our pain, he is with us, loving us, and we can love him back.

John of the Cross writes of the experience of the dark night: “The soul must content herself with a loving attentiveness toward God, without agitation, without effort, without the desire to taste or feel him” (69). The dangers John describes are spiritual gluttony, spiritual envy, spiritual greed, spiritual anger, spiritual lust, spiritual pride – all of which make our spiritual practices and devotion to God about ME, not about Jesus. So, if we aren’t getting the feeling we want, the outcome we desire, there is something wrong, with us or with Jesus. But maybe neither is the case.

A true story: Agnes as a young girl was on fire for Jesus. She said that she wanted “to love Jesus as he has never been loved before”. She became a missionary, she experienced the joy of Jesus. Then, it seemed, God left her. In her case, this was not connected with an external suffering or pain. It was simply that God became absent, that prayer and Scripture and missionary service brought no joy. She wrote in private letters to her spiritual directors, “Deep down there is nothing but emptiness and darkness ... My God, how painful is this unknown pain ... I have no faith.” This darkness, this absence of God, continued for almost 50 years, with only one break. Today, we know Agnes as Mother Teresa, and we think of her as one who loved Jesus, and loved him in the poor, in extraordinary ways (John Ortberg).

John of the Cross talks about the dark night, in its fullness, as a rarity in the Christian spiritual pilgrimage. And Mother Teresa’s experience is certainly rare. I’m glad that I have not had to endure that kind of absence, that emptiness and darkness, for such extended periods. I’ve experienced personal pain, unexpected griefs, and some depression; but that is not the same thing as the dark night. It can usher me into that night, it can open me to receive that gift from God, but it is my choice to embrace, my choice to love God in the pain, to love God in the absence.

I don’t have “final answers,” academic or otherwise, to my questions of suffering. Why did we lose children to miscarriage? Why natural disasters? Why cancer and Parkinson’s and mental illness? Even an appreciation for the destructiveness and pervasiveness of sin is not enough, not enough for “groans that words cannot express”, not enough for silence and darkness and absence.

The only thing that is enough is God, and God is love. Job curses the day of his birth, Job wishes that he had been miscarried, and at the end of the book, God shows up. He experiences absence, and the LORD is present. Paul speaks of “groans too deep for words” and tells us that “the Spirit intercedes”. That is, in our experience of absence and pain, the Spirit of God is praying for us. The beloved in the Song of Songs seeks her lover, despite being beaten by night watchmen, she still seeks him in the dark. And, she finds him. Absence is replaced by presence.

I lost myself. Forgot myself.
I lay my face against the Beloved’s face.
Everything fell away and I left myself behind,
Abandoning my cares
Among the lilies, forgotten.

In our experiences of pain and absence, please feel free to question. And I encourage you to seek God for God’s sake, not for our own sake, not to satisfy our needs, not to make us feel good about ourselves, for God’s sake alone. Seek, and love Jesus, this Jesus who chose to enter our world and suffer with us. Seek, and love the Spirit, the Spirit who prays for us in our weakness. Seek, and love the Father, who is never absent even though we may not feel his presence.

Our pain may not go away, but we will find something deeper, Someone deeper discover at the last that we are not alone.

Resources:
John of the Cross (1542-1591). Translated by Mirabai Starr. 2002. Dark Night of the Soul. New York: Riverhead Books.
John Ortberg. 2011. “Dark Night of the Soul”. Leadership Journal, online, citing Come Be My Light, edited by Brian Kolodiejchuk, Doubleday 2007.

Thailand - 5

2012-01-16T00:07:00.000-05:00

Saturday was a welcome day of pure leisure. We spent the morning at the Maesa Elephant Camp, where we watched the elephants and their mahoots (caregivers/trainers) bathe (the elephants bathed, that is, not the mahoots); enjoyed a very entertaining show that highlighted the intelligence and humor of these magnificent animals; and took a half-hour ride on the elephants.

In the afternoon, several folks went to a Celedon factory. Celedon is a form of pottery for which Thailand is known. We say many beautiful pieces of art and some purchased a few small things. We also visited the Umbrella Village in Chiang Mae, where there is an annual festival highlighting the beautiful handmade and painted umbrellas the area is known for. Shopping, of course, happened. Some of our group went on an excursion into the city with Raylena Fields as their guide, and others stayed home and did laundry or just relaxed.

Today we are splitting into two groups to go to two different churches. One is in a rural setting and is the site of the first Thai Christian martyrs. The other is in a more “suburban” setting – a rural church that has grown over the past several years. This will give us further experiences of Christian practices in Thailand. Each community will host us for lunch, giving us an opportunity both to accept their gracious hospitality and to get to know them better.

Here’s hoping your weekend is going well. We pray for you daily.

Thailand - 4

2012-01-13T14:42:00.002-05:00

Thursday Jan 12: Today was the beginning of our study of Christianity in Thailand. Once again, we met with an ordained woman in the Church of Christ in Thailand, Ajaan Chilipan, who works in prisons and brothels and with the “least among us.” She is an amazing woman and someone in whose presence it is a privilege to be. (Greg, she was deeply appreciative of your book and of being remembered by you.) We joined the chapel service at McGilvery Seminary and had lunch with some of the students. We also visited a Catholic Spirituality Center, which is progressive, inspiring, and beautiful. Several among us walked an exquisite labyrinth there. We also visited the Henry Luce Chapel, which has a unique architecture, having been built in the shape of a lotus flow floating over water and open to the air above and below.

Friday Jan 13: We began our day with a lecture on Islam in Thailand by Ajaan Suchart, the Director of the Ph.D. program in Peace Studies and a sociology professor who is also a Chinese Muslim living in Thailand. His presentation not only introduced to Islam in Thailand but also to a project he is working on training Muslim youth in Southern Thailand in Peace-building.

We then went to a mosque in Chiang Mae, Masjid At-Tagawa, where we had a lovely lunch prepared by the women of the community. We observed Friday Prayer and then had a conversation with Ajaan Pam about Women in Islam. That generated a lot of discussion later in the evening when we got together to process the day. Today was the beginning of our introduction to Islam. We will meet with Sunni and Shiite Muslims when we are in Bangkok. Our group found the day to be very informative and an excellent learning experience, especially for those who have not been exposed to islam “up close and personal” before.

Tomorrow is a day of fun as we go to the elephant camp! Everyone is excited about this outing.

Five Generations

2012-01-11T18:02:00.000-05:00

FIVE GENERATIONS: Marie Snyder, seated left, poses with her family in this five-generation photo. Seated at right is her great-grandson, Steven Snyder, holding great-great-granddaughter Olivia Snyder. Standing are son Curvin Snyder, left, and grandson Blaine Snyder.(SUBMITTED to and printed in the York Daily Record, Jan 4 2012.)

Thailand - 3

2012-01-11T12:05:00.000-05:00

Another update from Kathy Clark, adjunct faculty, trip advisor:
Our trip to Mae Sot was a very powerful one. I will leave the individual reflections to each of the participants. But consensus is that we were blessed to be able to witness the lives of the Karen refugees and that they were so open to us. Many in the group have not yet been able to put into words what they are feeling. Celeste is sitting next to me as I write this and she says that for her it was a life-changing experience. We saw both hope and deep suffering, as well as tremendous courage. Our host, Saw Mort, from Burma Issues gave very generously of himself in helping us understand and frame what we experienced. That including sharing the work of his organization which provides education and human rights documentation within the Burmese borders and arranging for us to enter the Refugee Camp which is not something foreigners, especially Westerners, are often allowed to do.

I am attaching a few photos thanks to Celeste. I know everyone will be eager to share this experience back home, once they are able to put it into words.

Repairs

2012-01-10T16:52:00.001-05:00

The ceiling in the Gathering Place (water damage) is being repaired this week, as well as the ceiling in one of the stairwells. Thanks to Rick Morgan and Andy!

Epiphany Party

2012-01-10T16:47:00.000-05:00

Youth - and helpful adults - enjoyed the Epiphany party, with stargazing, Scripture, cake, and a crazy (and competitive) gift exchange. Thanks to Sharon and her team!

A Doubter's Guide to Faith (1): How Can I KNOW?

2012-01-09T13:59:00.003-05:00

Listen online!

Luke 1:5-20

“A Doubter’s Guide to Faith”. Today, we introduce this series with a focus on a wonderful question: “How can I KNOW?” It is the question Zechariah asked of the angel when given some incredible good news. It is a question that the wise men managed to answer with enough confidence to embark on a journey across countries and cultures to find a child. And it is a question that we struggle with to one degree or another, at some times more than others.

It is nothing new. In the first century, the apostle Paul commented, “Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Corinthians 1.22-23). Paul’s message is still true today. We’re not in the business of miracles and answers, we’re here to offer Jesus (Eugene Peterson). Yet, we all ask, “How can I KNOW?”

It’s nothing new. My children went through that “Why?” phase. Remember that? For kids, it becomes a clever conversational tool that keeps things going without end. So, with parental authority, we declare the end with “because I said so”. And that’s when dissatisfaction with the answer sets in. “Because God says so,” that’s the way it is? Excuse me? Don’t I get a say in the matter? Is there any external, observable evidence? Yes, there is. So, three weeks from now on January 29th, we’ll look at evidence for faith in a variety of areas. How can I KNOW?

It’s nothing new. In the realm of physics, proof is valid if the probability of error, of being incorrect, is 1 in 35 million – or less. That is an extraordinarily high standard, higher than many other areas of science because of the mathematical nature of theoretical physics (“Higgs ahoy!” The Economist. December 17 2011. Mobile edition, no author listed). Newtonian physics, then Einstein’s theories of relativity, and now quantum mechanics are all proven to this degree – and are all still “theories”. So, when someone objects to evolution, for example, as an “unproven theory”, they are actually confusing the definition from the perspective of science. According to Frances Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project and a Christian, evolution is “settled science” (Frances Collins, lecture at Q, 2008). And that raises some very important questions of faith, so our doubter’s guide will address science on January 22nd. How can I KNOW?

It’s nothing new. In some of those moments when we need God the most, it seems that God shows up. We experience healing or comfort or a presence. But, other times, it seems that God is absent, out to lunch, busy, uninterested. It’s an issue of pain, not just any pain, not just the pain of life, but pain of being let down, disappointed, even hurt by God. The band, The Fray, sings, “Where were you? Where were you? Just a little late. ... In the end, everyone ends up alone” (“You Found Me”. 2009. The Fray. The Fray). Next week, January 15th, we’ll focus on those experiences of absence and pain. How can I KNOW?

It’s nothing new. In fact, the Scripture makes clear that one of the reasons it is written is so that we may KNOW. “I write these things . . . so that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 John 5:13).

“Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us, 2 just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, 3 I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed (Luke 1:1-4).

We are all doubters. And, God wants us to have confidence, to KNOW. So, how do we get there?

Blaise Pascal is my “patron saint” and his writing is a great resource for the “theory of knowing”. He describes it in this way (one form of many, Pensées):

Doubt. Reason. Faith.
Skeptic/Philosopher. Mathematician/Scientist. Christian.

Pascal was offering the three primary ways to knowing – doubt, reason, and faith. He did not attempt to remove any one of them from human experience. In fact, he used all three, and he was all three – skeptic, mathematician and scientist, Christian. Today, we tend to view these ways of knowing as in conflict with each other, but for Pascal they were complementary.

Doubt: Question everything. René Descartes, known for his “I think, therefore I am” sound bite, met with Blaise Pascal in 1647 (Tomlin). Thinking, for Descartes the great philosopher, was about questioning.

“We shouldn’t question God.” I’ve heard the phrase over and over, usually from people in pain of some kind, usually from people who dearly love Jesus. But it doesn’t match the biblical witness. Zechariah questions God, and he still gets the son promised to him (Luke 1). Abraham questions God extensively – asking 8 straight questions about the justice of God in Genesis 18. Job questions God, even issuing the ancient equivalent of a summons, legal action against God for mismanaging Job’s life. And, when the LORD shows up, the LORD declares that Job was right (Job 31, Job 42).

So, doubt, question. And, know that doubt won’t get you to God on its own.

Reason: Logic, evidence. Christians believe that we are created in the image of God and that must include the mind – all our doubts and all our reasoning skills. The last thing that Jesus would want us to do is check our brains at the door. When Jesus was asked a question – like many others, a trick question – he responded with, “What is written in the law? How do you read it?” (Luke 10:26). Jesus expects us to do our homework! And, if we haven’t done it, he’ll push us back to it.

So, reason, explore evidence. And, know that reason won’t get you to God on its own.

Faith, likewise, has its limitations. Faith won’t help us in calculus or with the discovery of the Higgs bosun (the latest subatomic particle) or even a Super Bowl victory – at least, not on its own. Pascal understood the limits of each way of knowing and was skillful at pointing out the limitations of doubt and reason.

Pascal wrote: “Put the world’s greatest philosopher on a plank that is wider than need be; if there is a precipice below, although his reason may convince him that he is safe, his imagination will prevail!” (Cited by Tomlin).

“The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing . . . . It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason. That is what faith is: God perceived by the heart, not by the reason” (Pensées, 423-424).

Søren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher, captured this idea with his phrase “the leap of faith”. He understood that no matter how close we came to God with reason or with doubt, like the logarithmic curve approaching its limit without ever reaching it, there is a gap that can only be crossed with faith, by “God perceived by the heart.”

If you were to ask me about my relationship with Robin, about whether or not she loved me, I could respond with the path of doubt. That does not mean I doubt her love, but that I arrive at a conclusion because I question everything. When she wrote me that cute love note, was it because she wanted something from me or does she really just love me? When she baked my favorite oatmeal raisin cookies – a recipe in her family for generations – was the appropriate response, “So, whaddya want?” or a recognition of her love?

The path to knowing Robin, for me, is the path of faith. It is a simple thing: Every time I have trusted her, I have found myself loved, not manipulated. The more I trust her, the more I know I am loved. It is perception by the heart.

How can I KNOW? Doubt, reason, faith. If it is God you want to know, ask your questions, examine the evidence, and realize that – at the end of that search – the leap of faith awaits you, the perception of the heart is necessary. It is knowing as loving, experiencing.

The main Hebrew word for “know” is a word for knowledge that comes from intimacy, from experience. That’s why to know “in the biblical sense” has entered English as an expression for sexual love. While sexual love is only one dimension of that Hebrew expression, it emphasizes knowing as loving and experiencing. “You will find me if you seek for me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29.13).

If you want to know this God, a God whom Pascal describes as “hidden” (Tomlin), you won’t manage to do it by reason and doubt, by evidence and argument alone. God is not the “God of philosophers and scholars” but the passionate, intimate, and personal “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob”, “God of Jesus Christ” (Pascal, 913; Tomlin). You will only find this God by seeking with all your heart, perceiving with the heart, by knowing as loving and experiencing. That’s how the wise men were able to find Jesus – they started with evidence and reason and finished with love.

Some practical steps toward perceiving God with the heart, or growing in that perception in this new year:

First, face yourself honestly. Pascal’s word for the human condition is “wretchedness”. He writes, “If our condition were truly happy we should not need to divert ourselves from thinking about it” (Pascal, 70; cited in Kreeft, 169). We are so busy ignoring our mortality, diverting ourselves from our wretchedness, that we are too busy and too preoccupied to seek God. Face yourself honestly, reduce the clutter in your life, and get ready to meet with God.

Second, get into the Scriptures. You may have a hundred and one arguments and reservations and questions with the book. It is still God’s book, and reading it puts us in touch with God. Since it is written so that we can “know”, it stands to reason that reading it just might guide us on the path to knowing God by faith. Where to start? With the gospels, the Jesus stories, with Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the central stories of the book. As Pascal writes, “[Jesus] can only be found by the ways taught in the Gospels” (913).

Third, practice prayer. But, I’m not even sure I know God yet! I haven’t resolved my philosophical issues or answered my personal questions! I don’t even know how to pray! What God desires is a personal relationship with you, and that involves two-way conversation – Scripture and prayer. If you don’t have a prayer of your own, use one of the prayers of the church. Use the Lord’s Prayer, the “Our Father”. Use the psalms, the first prayer and song book of Israel and the Church. Use a hymn or song from worship. Pray it morning and evening. Pray it at your meals. Practice prayer.

Fourth, connect with the people of God. The church is full of imperfect people . . . and a wonderful God. And it is pretty easy to tell the difference! Get into the life of the church, get into a group, become part of a ministry team, join a mission project . . . and in all these connections you may find yourself face to face with God.

Blaise Pascal grew up in the tradition of the church – Scripture, prayer, the people of God. But it wasn’t until he was an adult, over 30 years old, that he met Jesus. On November 23, 1654, Jesus met with him, “from about half past ten to half past midnight”. He wrote about it, in sentence fragments, and sewed the parchment into his jacket, wearing it above his heart. “Fire. My God and your God. Total renunciation.”

It is a visionary experience that I have never had. For that matter, I never followed a star to the Christ Child or heard from an angel in the temple. But I have learned to perceive God by the heart, and to do so without neglecting the important work of doubt and reason. I invite you to this journey, to seeking God with all your heart – to honestly face yourself, to get into the Scripture, to practice prayer, to connect with the people of God. And I believe that Jesus will meet with you.

Resources:

Eugene Peterson. One of many books!
Frances Collins, lecture at Q 2008
The Economist. “Higgs ahoy!” December 17 2011. Mobile edition, no author listed.
The Fray. “You Found Me”. 2009. The Fray.
Blaise Pascal. Pensées. Translated by A. J. Krailsheimer, 1966. London, England: Penguin Group.
Peter Kreeft. 1993. Christianity for Modern Pagans: Pascal’s Pensées Edited, Outlined and Explained. San Francisco: Ignatius Press.
Graham Tomlin. Winter 2006. “Profiles in Faith: Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)”. Knowing and Doing. The C. S. Lewis Institute. Electronic edition.

Thailand - 2

2012-01-09T13:52:00.001-05:00

Some pics (Blanca and another student) and an update, below, from the faculty advisor. Blanca is having a great time!

Sunday January 8:
Today was a day of fun and relaxation and several optional activities. Some folks began the day with Sarah Kim teaching and leading them in meditation. Sarah is very skilled at this and the request came from our conversations with Buddhist monks about their meditation practices. Some used the morning as an opportunity to sleep in, especially after such a long day yesterday.

We went together to Sunday morning worship at the First Church of Chiang Mae, one of the congregations associated with the Christian Church of Thailand, which is affiliated with the United Church of Christ as a united and uniting church. We were warmly welcomed and sat together in a special section for visitors that had headphones providing an English translation of the service. We followed the worship service with lunch out together. Then the participants had a free afternoon. Several chose to have Thai massages that were unanimously declared wonderful. In the evening, we went to the Sunday night walking market inside the gates of the old Chiang Mae city and finished the evening with dinner at a Thai buffet. It was a fun and relaxing day and came at a good time in our overall schedule.

We may be out of email touch for the next couple of days. Tomorrow afternoon, we are heading to the city of Mae Sot which is on the border of Thailand and Burma. There we will visit a Burmese refugee camp, an NGO called Burmese Issues that focuses on the internally displaced people inside Burma, and a school and medical clinic that serve the Burmese population in the area. We will spend two nights at a resort outside of Mae Sot and the rest of the time touring and learning about the situation and peace-building efforts in the area. It will be a very full few days. I am unsure whether or not we will have internet access while there, but will certainly email you upon our return in a few days.

Everyone is well, taking good care of themselves, and looking out for each other. We hope that you are well, too, and pray that it is so.

I’ll be in touch again in a few days. Until then, abundant blessings!

Thailand

2012-01-07T11:02:00.000-05:00

On Tuesday morning at 3:30 a.m., Blanca and other students from Lancaster Theological Seminary headed out on a journey (including almost 24 hours in the air) to Thailand. They join students from another seminary on a three week cross cultural study of religion and Christianity in Thailand. Pics from the LTS sending service, at the chapel: Juan and Myra (from First Spanish UM Church, York), Jim and Blanca, JP; Blanca and the team from LTS. An update from Thailand, by the faculty instructor Kathy Clark, sent on Friday:

Today was dedicated to the study of Buddhism, with a very interesting and informative lecture in the morning and a “field trip” in the afternoon to Wat Doi Sutep. A wat is a Buddhist temple and this particular temple is near the top of the mountain outside Chiang Mai that we can see directly across from our place of lodging on the campus of Payap University. We rode to the temple – up a winding and steep mountain road – in the “cattle car” that transported us from the airport when we first arrived. Did I describe that already? It is a large, covered truck (large enough to hold many heads of cattle), open in the back, with pull down-steps for getting on and off, and benches along the sides for seating. I am not sure whether or not it has any shock absorbers, but it seems not. Thomas dubbed the ride “Six Flags Over Chiang Mai.” It was an adventure.

The ride up the mountain offered spectacular views of the city of Chiang Mai, as did the overlook from the temple. The temple itself is the wealthiest in Chiang Mai and, while it is a working temple with a community of monks, it is also a very popular tourist attraction. Ajaan (Professor) John Butt led us on a tour of the temple, explaining the religious and cultural influences on Thai Buddhism, the theological significance of the ornate architecture and symbols, the historical development of Theravada Buddhism, and the meaning of the rituals we observed. He also narrated the life of the Buddha by showing and explaining a beautiful mural that adorns the walls. He is extremely knowledgeable and an excellent communicator, so much so that perfect strangers joined our group to listen in.

There are 300 steps leading to the temple. The majority of the group opted to walk up (and back down) the steps, while a more reasonable group of us opted for the elevator. (J) As a result of the physical exertion in the hot sun, and the lingering impact of jet lag, we have some very weary travelers today.

Moving into 2012

2012-01-07T10:52:00.000-05:00

A team of 8 folks helped Barb and Isiaah move on December 31. Congrats to Barb on the new place, and thanks to the team for the hard work (and fun)! The pics: Jim P., our packing engineer; Sharon unloading; Isiaah posing. It was a nerdy crew. Caleb and Jim L. were talking about inertia and the coefficient of friction.

Christmas Eve

2011-12-29T23:03:00.000-05:00

Scenes from Christmas Eve - caroling at Victor's Italian Restaurant, fellowship at the Grantley fire house, our "living nativity", and the Bethany Bells. It was a beautiful night, with Holy Communion and Candlelight, and a wonderful time of celebrating the mystery and joy of the Incarnation - God made flesh in Jesus Christ.

Christmas Baskets

2011-12-29T22:57:00.000-05:00

31 more meals were given out - turkeys, milk, eggs, celery, bread, cranberry sauce, green beans -- the works -- to local families through a partnership with the United Way. Thanks to Josie and her team!

Christmas from York Habitat for Humanity

2011-12-26T11:52:00.000-05:00

Well this holiday season is definitely one of the best ones that York Habitat has seen in several years!

We received the Clinton estate settlement check for over $66,600 combined with the RAYAC sponsorship check of $25,000 all in one day made it a very joyous day!

But the blessings continued with Veterans Build grants coming in with over $16,000 in Nov. and Dec. There is even more joyous news with the fact that the appeal is over $8,000 ahead of last year at this time with the donations flowing in daily. Plus we just mailed another 800 appeal letters in hopes of reaching even more supporters.

On the family side of things, the past two weeks saw three families racing to reach 50% of their sweat equity hours in hopes of being assigned their home; three more families completed their Good Faith hours and yet another family finished all of their hours. That's FIVE families who reached milestones just before the holidays. Wow!

On the construction site, we put the disappointments of HARB's ruling behind us and successfully got our East Poplat St. subdivision passed, our permits and our Certificate of Occupancy all in three days after struggling for months. What an amazing way to end the year!

York Habitat has had so many blessings to be thankful for this past year! Our ministry has come so far these last twelve months. The successes and triumphs are due to the endless compassion and dedication shown by our Board, our volunteers, our donors, our families and our staff. There are not enough words to express my thankfulness to be part of such a truly awesome ministry and mission!

I believe this whole year has taught us the true spirit of Habitat and how we are blessed to have the opportunity to affect lives in such positively beautiful and meaningful ways.

May the joy of the season stay with you and your loved ones the whole year through for you truly are a blessing to others!

In the spirit of Habitat,
Debbie Krout-Althoff
Executive Director
York Habitat for Humanity

Jingle Bells!

2011-12-23T18:27:00.000-05:00

Just love it! Find the strip online.

Kids Praise debut

2011-12-20T21:50:00.000-05:00

Our Kids Praise group debuted this past Sunday in both worship services. They were great! Thanks to Laura and Marsha for getting this started!

Advent Luncheon

2011-12-20T21:47:00.000-05:00

At the last luncheon, Jerry sang and played for us - and we had another round of great food! Thanks to all!

Audi A8 TV Commercial - "Baseball"

2011-12-20T21:41:00.000-05:00

Used this humorous video to illustrate the "recognition problem" of John 1.1-28.

Jesus' Family Album (4): The Beginning

2011-12-20T21:35:00.000-05:00

John 1:1-28
Audi ad (video), “Baseball” (unrecognized greatness)

My dad, in the CIA, disguises ... (story). Small things, low-tech things, were the easiest way to conceal your identity, to make yourself unrecognizable. Here in John’s gospel, Jesus has a recognition problem. “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not recognize him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him” (John 1.10-11). John tells us that everyone, Gentile – “the world” – and Jew – “his own” – did not recognize Jesus. Was he undercover? But, as Maverick said, in the movie, “Everyone has a tell.” Was this a “Where’s Waldo?” visual puzzle? Or, is it plain as day, like the food we can’t find in the fridge, like the Audi Baseball ad, but we’re missing it?

One would think that for Jesus to go from being fully God, and God alone, to also being fully human . . . one would think that some “tell” would remain, that something would be held in reserve, that Jesus would pull out his “ID” and say “ta-da” and we would all ohh and ahh with reverence and amazement. But, no, he is so ordinary, so unremarkable, so normal.

So, while Jesus has a recognition problem, maybe that is the whole idea. Not in the sense of a disguise, but that Jesus, “the Word”, the Idea, the Message of God became fully and totally flesh. And there was no compromise. Jesus retained no superpowers. Surely, he healed, but there were other healers, and he taught his disciples to heal. He became fully human, and subjected himself even to death. Even now, as the Resurrected Lord, he remains in human flesh. That is radical and total “incarnation”, an old word that means to “become flesh”.

Why? Why embrace such extraordinary measures? The text gives us a few answers to this question:

• It is in Jesus’ “fullness” (God and human) that we receive “grace upon grace” (1.16).
• Jesus is the one who makes God known (1.17).
• In Jesus we encounter the glory of God (1.14).
• Through Jesus we receive power to become God’s children (1.12).

Jesus chose to become fully human. The recognition problem, if there is a problem, is ours – not his. He’s done exactly what he wanted. But, for us to miss out on recognizing him means that we miss out on grace, on knowing God, on God’s glory, on being part of God’s family. That’s serious stuff to miss out on. It is imperative that we recognize Jesus! Otherwise, all this glory goes to the dogs, like Pickles chasing around the priceless baseball (Audi ad reference).

Isaiah the prophet declares, “The ox knows his master, the donkey his owner's manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand” (Isaiah 1.3; see Raymond Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, p 428). John reminds us that it is not just Jesus’ own, the Jews, who did not recognize him, but the entire world, the Gentiles as well. Albert Schweitzer wrote of Jesus, “He comes to us as one unknown”, meaning not just that he is unrecognized, but that he is entirely different, even subversive, in his arrival and presence (see Beverly Roberts Gaventa, with John Dominic Crossan, “The Challenge of Christmas: Two Views”, The Christian Century, Dec 15 1993, 1270-1280).

We’ve been looking at Jesus’ family album and family tree in the openings of the four gospels. This week, we discover a family tree more immense than we expected. Just yesterday, I was reading in a fun science analogy book, A Bee in a Cathedral, and saw a line about a grove of quaking aspens in Utah that share a single root system and are genetically identical – they are actually a single organism, weighing over 6000 tonnes (2011, Joel Levy, Buffalo, New York: Firefly Books, p.105). In John’s gospel, instead of a specific individual in Jesus’ family tree, we find ourselves, all of us, “the world” and “his own”, all invited to recognize Jesus and “become children of God” (1.12).

This passage goes on to give us some guidance on recognizing Jesus. It is peculiar guidance, negative guidance. When John was asked “Who are you?”, he knew what they were asking. He understood the subtext. “I am not the Messiah.” “Are you Elijah?” “I am not.” “Are you the prophet [that is, Moses]?” “No” (John 1.19-21).

No. No. No. John knew who he was NOT. It makes it so much easier to recognize others for who they are when we aren’t stuck with a fantasy about ourselves. We have those childhood fantasies of being faster or smarter or better. But, sooner or later, someone comes along and outperforms us. We have to learn that, no, we might be fast but we aren’t the fastest; we might be smart, but we aren’t the smartest; we might be good, but we aren’t the best.

But even as adults, fantasies persist. I am indispensable . . . to my boss, to my family. Now, I’m not talking about our unique contributions to our families and work places. I’m talking about our fantasies: “If I don’t do the laundry, no one in this house will have a stitch of clean clothes to wear.” “If you want it done right you just have to do it yourself.” Really? Are you sure about that?

And, pretty soon, we go from being indispensable to having what people call a “Messianic complex”. Now, it is not a flattering expression. It does not refer to being like Jesus. It refers to being indispensable and whining about it. Indispensable and not properly appreciated, respected, honored, compensated, whatever. Jesus never seemed to complain about this recognition problem, but we do, don’t we? We all like a little recognition, and recognition is an effective motivator for good, hard work, for success.

And John, Jesus’ cousin who was profiled in the opening of Mark’s gospel, is focused not on himself, on defining his role, on clarifying who he was. His answer to all the questions was “not me” “nope” “no”. He’s not down on himself, he’s just up on the one coming after him. He’s not refusing a compliment, he’s just clear that he’s not the One. A little later in John chapter 1, he is the first one to recognize Jesus, calling out, “Look, the Lamb of God!”. He actually says, “I myself did not know him” (1.31-33). John didn’t know Jesus at first – perhaps he knew him as cousin, but not as Lamb of God. John only received this knowledge from God, and he was only able to receive it because he was not fixated on a fantasy, not the indispensable savior, and he knew it. “No. No. No.”

And so the one who came as one unknown was made known to the one who was clear about what he was not.

The Congo

2011-12-20T21:31:00.000-05:00

Our United Methodist Board of Church and Society provided training in justice, advocacy, and faith in the Congo for our Christian brothers and sisters. Check out the complete story!

More than 100 people attended the General Board of Church and Society’s restorative justice seminar in Democratic Republic of Congo’s North Katanga Episcopal Area last year. The seminar, supported by the Human Relations Day Offering, was developed to empower United Methodists in the Congo to be advocates for justice.

At the outset, participants agreed that the training should motivate them to share information with their community, train people on the church’s mission in society and increase the church’s impact on their community.

Seminar topics ranged from rape and sex abuse in the DRC, child soldier issues and working with them, HIV/AIDS, and home-based care and other restorative justice issues. Participants also learned about the structure of the United Methodist Church, the Social Principles, alcohol and drug prevention, and dealing with health and wholeness issues.

Kids Praise

2011-12-17T12:30:00.000-05:00

Our newest music ensemble - our children - preparing to sing this Sunday! They practice twice a month during the Sunday School hour, and they will sing in both services this week.

Celebrate the Children

2011-12-13T22:58:00.001-05:00

The kids from our Bethany Christian Learning Center sang for this past Monday's Advent luncheon. Thanks to all the families who came for the show, and thanks to Wanda and our great BCLC staff. One more luncheon to go, next Monday at noon!

Newsletter meditation

2011-12-13T22:43:00.000-05:00

Mother Mary’s song in Luke 1:46-55, the Magnificat, is an amazing gospel proclamation. It praises God’s saving power and describes that power at work on behalf of the poor, the oppressed, the hungry, the humble – and at the expense of the rich, the powerful, the wealthy, the arrogant.

My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for he has looked with favor
on the lowliness of his servant.
. . . .
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud
in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful
from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
. . . .

The Greek word for “lowliness”, above, is one of the words used to translate the Hebrew term “ani” and “anawim” (plural), a word for the lowly, humble, oppressed, poor, miserable. And, Mary is drawing upon this powerful theme in the Hebrew Scripture of God bringing salvation for the lowly, delivering the oppressed, giving judgment for the poor, and seeing – using an intensive form of repeating the verb – our distress.

“I have indeed seen the misery of my people” (Exodus 3.7).
“You deliver a humble people” (Psalm 18.27).
“I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me” (Psalm 40.17).
“Maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute” (Psalm 82.3).
“But this is the one to whom I will look, to the humble and contrite in spirit” (Isaiah 66.2).

We experience misery and pain – that’s being human. And we experience the joy of salvation, the gift of God’s presence and comfort, the surprising reversal of fortunes. That’s grace. But we must not put Mary’s song on the purely spiritual level. These themes in Scripture are for concrete experiences of abject poverty and total destitution, and are most often found tied to Israel’s historical experiences of slavery in Egypt and exile in Babylon. It was in that moment of total loss that Israel’s faithful discovered that they were loved and cared for in the worst of circumstances, that they were, like Mary, “favored” (Luke 1.28, 30).

Santa

2011-12-12T11:26:00.000-05:00

Jesus' Family Album (3): Mother Mary and Uncle Zechariah

2011-12-11T21:48:00.000-05:00

Luke 1:46-55 (call to worship)

Isaiah 61:1-4 (kids)
Luke 1-2, selections (message focus)

We’ve been looking at Jesus’ family album, through the origin stories in each of the four gospels. The first week of Advent, we looked at Matthew and found a portrait of Father Joseph. The second week, we looked at Mark’s gospel and found a portrait of Cousin John, all grown up. Today, we look at Luke’s gospel, together with Matthew the only gospels to record any story of Jesus before his baptism as an adult. Unlike Matthew, Luke focuses not on Joseph but on Mother Mary. And, Luke includes the family connection with John by introducing John’s parents as well.

Did your family ever have two moms pregnant at the same time? In our family, Robin was pregnant with Caleb (our second) at the same time that her sister Marcy was pregnant with Tony (their first). Tony was born a month before Caleb. A generation before, Robin’s grandmother had her third child, Mark, one of those late life surprises, only one year before Robin’s sister was born, two years before Robin.

In cases like that, comparing notes on first words, crawling, walking, potty training, teething, and – eventually – driving, is just what you do, particularly in the family and even with other parents whose children are close to yours in age.

Luke flips back and forth between Zechariah and Elizabeth, the parents of Cousin John, and Mary, mother of our Lord. In their case, there is a six month delay between parallel events.

The angel Gabriel announces the birth of a son to Zechariah. Six months later, Gabriel announces the birth of a son to Mary. Mary visits with Elizabeth, living in the Judean hill country, staying for three months, and leaves for home in Galilee before John is born. John is born, Zechariah – his tongue finally loosened – sings praise to God, and the child grows. Jesus is born, the angels sing praise, and the child grows. The parallels in structure, and even in the language of the original Greek text, are striking. (See program insert of chart from Fitzmyer, 313-314.)

There is parallelism between John and Jesus, but not equality. Though both are agents of salvation, and both sent from God, Jesus is after John (conceived 6 months later) and is greater than John. John is “great before the Lord”, Jesus is “Great”. Zechariah and Elizabeth are “righteous”, Mary is “favored”. (See Fitzmyer, 315.) Zechariah is “troubled” (1.12), Mary is “deeply troubled” (1.29), an intensive form of the word (Brown, 288).

By this parallelism without equality, Luke tells us that John is prophet, Jesus is Savior and Son of God. The parallelism also introduces differences between the parents, particularly between Zechariah and Mary, and some implications for the life of faith.

The Blessing of Belief:
In both of these parallel stories, the blessing of belief plays a prominent role. To Zechariah, the angel declares, “Now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur” (1.20). And, to Mary, Elizabeth exclaims, “Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord” (1.45).

So, is being mute a curse? And is being able to speak the blessing? No, and no. Being mute is the sign. Zechariah needed an additional sign – the angel announcement wasn’t enough – and God, kindly, provided. Mary too was given a sign, but not because she asked for one. She was simply told, “Your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God” (1.36-37). (See Fitzmyer, 313-314.)

Is being mute a curse? Well . . . maybe. Imagine not being able to speak to a friend about your miracle baby! However, it was also a sign. Finally, when his tongue was loosed, all he could do was offer praise, and not for the gift of speech but for the gift of his son John, for the gift of God’s mercy, for the gift of the coming Savior from the house of David.

So, what is the blessing?

Maybe we are missing the point. The Greek expression for blessing in 1.45 is an adjective, a descriptive term, rather than a verb form. It is describing Mary as blessed rather than actually blessing Mary. It is the difference between “You are blessed!” and “Bless you!” In the New Testament, it is often the recognition of deep joy. As, “Blessed are the meek for they will inherit the earth.” That beatitude is, in some English translations, “Happy are the meek”, because it is a description, it “recognize[s] an existing state of happiness or blessing” (Brown, 333-334, on makarios). Though, for me personally, “happy” is not deep enough for the joy of meek ones oppressed by the strong or lowly ones rejected by the important.

And, this matches the context. We do not find a reference to any concrete blessing. What we do find is Mary joyful. Joyful to join God in this work: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (1.38). Joyful in declaring God’s praise: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (1.46-47). Joyful for an unseen reality in which the powerful are brought down and the lowly lifted up, an unseen reality in which the hungry are filled and the rich are empty (1.52-53), an unseen reality that will be manifested in that “great and terrible day of the Lord” (Joel 2.31).

The blessing of belief.

And, the Grace of the Gospel:
Twice in the course of these parallel stories, the Greek root for “gospel” or “good news” is used. Both times, it is in the mouth of angels. First, Gabriel tells Zechariah, “I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news” (1.19). Second, to the shepherds, an unnamed angel declares, “I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people” (2.10).

Interestingly, the shepherds respond with belief. Mary, responds with belief (though the actual Greek term is not used in relation to her). But Zechariah, the priest, the religious professional, does not believe the gospel. What happens to him? Does he miss out on grace? Is he forever rejected? “I am bringing you bad news of great judgment for all the people.”

Good thing I’m not God. If I offer someone something and they don’t receive it, I’ll pass it along to someone else. “You don’t want the last piece of pie? Well, then I’ll eat it myself!”

God still answered Zechariah’s prayer (1.13), a prayer he never believed would be answered! Now, faith in prayer is important. It is important but not decisive. Only God is decisive, only God is sovereign, only God rules. And though we often struggle to understand how that works, what we learn from this story is that the Gospel is truly Gracious.

Of course, to acknowledge that it is all about grace means that we acknowledge that it is not all about me. Instead, it is all about God. I love this line from Isaiah: “All our righteous acts are like filthy rags” (Isaiah 64.6). Even at our best, we are nowhere near good enough. Zechariah? No worse than me. God is gracious. This is truly “good news”. And, once we really get that, once it gets hold of us, we won’t be able to stop praising God. Like Zechariah, we’ll be come evangelists ourselves.

Resources:
Raymond E. Brown. 1977, 1978. The Birth of the Messiah: A Commentary on the Infancy Narratives in Matthew and Luke. New York: Doubleday, Image.

Fitzmyer, Joseph A. 1982-. The Gospel According to Luke I-IX: Introduction, Translation, and Notes (Anchor Bible 28). New York: Doubleday.

Christmas Dinner

2011-12-11T00:38:00.000-05:00

Wonderful food, great fellowship and fun! Ho, ho, ho! Merry Christmas! (More pics later.)

Raise the Roof!

2011-12-11T00:32:00.000-05:00

Thanks to AllType Roofing for the excellent - and quick - work! And to the foresight of those who gave to the church through their estate so that we could fund an emergency project like this.

The Meaning of Shabbat

2011-12-08T17:21:00.000-05:00

From a Jewish worship and prayer book:

"The meaning of Shabbat is to celebrate time rather than space. Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on Shabbat we try to become attuned to holiness in time. It is a day on which we are called upon to share in what is eternal in time, to turn from the results of creation to the mystery of creation, from the world of creation to the creation of the world."

Practice - with joy - the Sabbath!

Dance then

2011-12-06T22:12:00.000-05:00

Sarah and her sisters, Holly and Faith, shared their gifts during our second Advent luncheon (Mondays at noon). Thanks for your beautiful gift!

Dance

2011-12-06T22:10:00.000-05:00

Lindsey shared her gift of dance in both services this past Sunday. Emily and Danna had a little fun after the service!

Audi A7 TV Commercial - Spring Cleaning

2011-12-05T00:00:00.000-05:00

Played this wonderful video during the Sunday message as an example of "Prepare the way", one of the themes of Advent and a focus of the preaching of Jesus' cousin John.

Jesus' Family Album (2): Cousin John

2011-12-04T23:56:00.000-05:00

Isaiah 40:1-11 (kids)

Mark 1:1-8 (message focus)

This Advent, we are looking at the opening of each of the four gospels and leafing through Jesus’ “family album”. Last week, we looked at Matthew’s gospel and Father Joseph. This week, we open to Mark and Cousin John – probably a couple times removed; all we know for certain is that their mothers are related. In the next two weeks, we’ll look at Luke and John.

The opening verse of Mark’s gospel is a title (Taylor, 152; Boring, 47): “The Beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God”. It is the beginning of something, not the end. That is, there is more of the story to come. It is the beginning of the gospel, a term used throughout the Scripture for the good news of a king’s victory, for the good news of deliverance for God’s people.

Picture a sports bar in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on the night the Packers won the Super Bowl. When they sealed the victory, it was “good news” and the crowd cheered. It was the gospel of the Green Bay Packers. For Packer fans, they hope it is only the “beginning” of that gospel, that the current undefeated run will continue.

Picture Libya when they heard that Gaddafi was dead. Cheers, flag waving, guns fired in the air. It was the gospel of a new Libya. And, it is only beginning, hopefully continuing not with a new dictator but with development and deliverance for all the people of that land. Do you see how important “gospel” is in this bad-news-world? We crave this sort of news, and when we get it, there is nothing but praise.

Gospel: Good news of deliverance and victory – through Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

But each true gospel story begins with preparation. Behind the scenes, anonymous labor. Or, public disapproval and extreme pain. The Arab spring traces its beginning to Tunisia, particularly to a young street vendor who doused himself in gasoline and lit himself on fire in protest before the local government building. The Packers victories come at a much more modest personal cost, but one that requires extensive planning, long term commitment, and practice, practice, practice. Allen Iverson: Eat your words.

In this Scripture, the preparation begins with a mash-up, a composite, of several Scriptures, from Exodus 23:20 (in the ancient Greek version familiar to Mark), Malachi 3:1 (in Hebrew), and Isaiah 40:3 (in ancient Greek) (Taylor, 153):

See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way;
the voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
“Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.”

This language recalls the ancient tradition of town visits by emperors or kings. In our setting, when the president comes through town, the motorcade shuts down streets and people line the road. In the ancient world, when the victorious king comes to town, when the object of the gospel praise is on the way, a new road is built, made beautiful with trees and construction, and the entire town turns out to greet the king outside of the town – in the wilderness – and escort him into town to cheers. In fact, this is one of the key New Testament images for Jesus’ coming again, for what we expect in the season of Advent, a word that means “coming”. (See N. T. Wright, 129.)

Take a look at this video of “preparing the way”: Audi A7 Commercial - “Spring Cleaning” (available on YouTube). Of course, we are not here for Audi, though they have borrowed biblical language and imagery. “Ready the road” (Audi). “Prepare the way.”

In the case of the Bible, however, the messenger stands in the wilderness – far outside of town – and calls out, “Ready the road.” Here in Mark, he shows up, not in a luxury suit but in camel hair and leather. In the playful language of Nadia Bolz-Weber, Jesus’ cousin John shows up “looking as though he might possibly be on the corner of Main Street and Broadway holding a cardboard sign with ‘Will Preach for Wild Locust and Honey’ scratched on it” (The Hardest Question website).

The outfit is strange to us, and it was strange in John’s time. But it was not without precedent. In fact, he is dressed just like prophet Elijah, who is referred to in the opening Scripture quote sequence of verses 2-3 (Malachi particularly). And, for a people who had not heard from a prophet for 400 years, John was a big deal. Everyone turned out to hear him.

The strangest thing about John was not his outfit, or even his food. It was his message: “Proclaiming a repentance-baptism (Taylor, 154) for forgiveness of sins” (1:4). Jews did not come for baptism. They are God’s chosen people; they are saved already. Gentile converts to Judaism were baptized – they actually baptized themselves. But here, people come and are baptized by John, or one of John’s disciples – and not with a do-it-yourself baptism. And, the people who come are Jews, God’s faithful people, each of them confessing their sin in public! And, the baptism is not just about confession and forgiveness; it is also about the coming of Jesus. “Coming after me is one stronger than I; I am not worthy to bend down and loosen the thong of his sandals” (1:7). (See Taylor, 155, on the uniqueness of John’s baptism).

Prepare the way. “Ready the road.” For John, the preparation is an action, confession-and-repentance-baptism. And, in that, to experience the cleansing, the forgiveness, of God. If we want to be ready for the coming of Jesus, for the coming of one “stronger than” John – even in all his strangeness and power – then it is crucial that we get down to business with God in the matter of our sin. Note, however, that this is not about our guilt, but about God’s grace; not about how miserable we are but about how merciful God is: “for the forgiveness of sins”.

Prepare the way. “Ready the road.” For what? A new Audi? For whom? “One stronger than I”. This language of “stronger” reflects the power dynamics of Mark’s gospel. In 3:27, Jesus speaks of “binding the strong man”, a reference to taking on and defeating the Devil, and plundering hell for the glory of God. This is a dramatic reference to and anticipation of Jesus as “Judge and Saviour of the End Time” (Taylor, 156). Jesus’ arrival means that the Devil’s day is done: The brokenness of our families and world, the power structures that maintain inequality, the sins of greed, lust, and pride ... all of this, as strong as it is, can’t stand against Jesus.

When we look around, we might ask, “Did he really come?” The world is still full of inequality, greed, brokenness. Did the stronger one show up to bring evil to an end? John tells us that Jesus comes and brings the Spirit. “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit” (1:8). In the broader range of the Scripture, we learn that the Spirit is God’s gift for the in-between times in which we live. Jesus has come, Jesus is coming. Evil is brought to an end, evil is yet to be brought to an end. In between, we have the gift of the Spirit.

Today, in Jesus’ family album, we take a look at Cousin John, wild-eyed, weirdly-clad prophet with food issues. Yes, he’s in the family album. But he knows whose family it is. “It’s not about me,” John says. “I am not worthy.” It is all about Jesus, the coming Lord. It’s all about Jesus, the stronger one and Savior. It’s all about Jesus, the giver of the Spirit. And, it is only the beginning of the good news.
Resources:
Taylor, Vincent. 1953. The Gospel According to St. Mark. London: MacMillan & Co. Ltd.

Boring, M. Eugene. 1990, January 1. “Mark 1:1-15 and the Beginning of the Gospel” [Electronic version]. Semeia, 52, p 43-81.

Wright, N.T. 2008. Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church. New York: HarperOne.

Audi A7 Commercial - “Spring Cleaning” (available on YouTube)

Bolz-Weber, Nadia. 2011 Nov 27. “Go Ahead, Judge a Book by its Title”. The Hardest Question (website). http://thehardestquestion.org/yearb/advent2gospel-2/

Christmas Craft Bazaar

2011-12-03T11:20:00.000-05:00

Lots of fun, neat crafts, and terrific food! Thanks to the Craft Guild!

York Wallcoverings to employees: Surprise! You're going shopping! - The York Daily Record

2011-12-03T11:07:00.000-05:00

York Wallcoverings to employees: Surprise! You're going shopping! - The York Daily Record

Bethany's own Lorri was one of those pleasantly surprised.

Alandro!

2011-11-30T21:59:00.000-05:00

The angel Alandro, stationed in Bermuda, stopped by our first Advent Luncheon to share his fascination with kings. Luncheons are Mondays at noon.

Hanging of the Greens

2011-11-30T21:48:00.000-05:00

A wonderful worship experience last Sunday evening, featuring the meaning and story behind various symbols of the season. That's Michael and Sara under the mistletoe and JoAnn and Brooke placing the creche. Thanks to Ruth for coordinating everything!

Jesus' Family Album: Father Joseph

2011-11-30T21:37:00.000-05:00

Isaiah 64:1-9 (call to worship)

Mark 13:24-37 (kids)
Matthew 1:18-25 (message focus)

A few weeks ago, I was on fall study retreat. We – me, Jim, Steve, and our dog Spooky – were at Steve’s farmhouse, a home that has been in the family for generations. He found the old photos of his parents, grandparents, and great grandparents in the attic and put them up in the dining room. It’s a mini-portrait gallery that tells the family story, that reveals a little bit about who Steve is.

The opening of each of the four gospels is a little like that family album. We have portraits of Jesus’ family; we get a sense of who he is by who he comes from. Matthew and Luke have extended openings, a series of stories that takes place before Jesus grows up and begins his active ministry. Matthew focuses on Joseph; Luke focuses on Mary. Mark and John leap right into Jesus as adult. Mark dives into the story of Jesus’ cousin John, who baptizes Jesus. John (the gospel) also refers to cousin John, but opens the gospel by zooming out to get a perspective on Jesus in the world from the beginning.

Today, we look at Matthew’s gospel and Father Joseph. Interestingly, there is almost nothing about the pregnancy and birth. All we have are a couple lines:

“His mother Mary was found to be with child” (1.18)
“She had borne a son” (1.25)

The next story, the story of the visiting Wise Men or Magi or “three kings” appears to have taken place when Jesus is a young toddler (2.16, “two years old and younger”), rather than a newborn. And, in that story, the parent on whom Matthew focuses is Joseph.

This particular passage has puzzled readers with its language around marriage and divorce, so we need to take a few moments to clarify that. English lacks the appropriate language for the ancient Jewish customs, and New Testament Greek does as well, for that matter. “When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together” (1.18) and “He planned to dismiss/divorce her quietly” (1.19).

The typical wedding process in the early first century had two steps, usually separated by a year. In the first step, the bride (often at the age of 12 or 13) is promised to the groom in a public ceremony with witnesses, but the bride continues to live in the home of her parents until everything is ready for the groom to take her to his home. During that time, they are considered married, in legal terms, even though the marriage is not typically consummated until the second celebration. Adultery during this period would typically result in divorce. (See Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah, pp 123-124.)

It is during this waiting period that Joseph learns that Mary is pregnant. We, as readers, are let in on the secret that this is “by the Holy Spirit”, but Joseph is unaware. From his perspective, Mary has been unfaithful.

The opening of Matthew’s gospel is a genealogy, typically a boring list of names by generation. Matthew is a skillful writer and theologian, however. His opening words, literally in Greek, “the book of the genesis of Jesus the Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (1.1). The genealogy proceeds, listing fathers and sons, and including four scandalous relationships – four women – along the way. Matthew completely ignores the four great Hebrew matriarchs of the Genesis story in favor of the stories of these women: The first posed as a prostitute to get pregnant by her father-in-law, the second was a prostitute, the third was a foreign woman who popped the question to her future husband after uncovering him in his sleep, and the fourth woman was either coerced or complicit in adultery.

Then, at the very end of the genealogy, Matthew abruptly drops the father-son sequence and adds a fifth woman: “Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus the Christ” (1.16). He avoids referring to Joseph as the father of Jesus and raises the question of scandal that was in the mind of everyone in Jesus’ village: Jesus as illegitimate child, mother Mary as adulteress, father Joseph as shamed.

We are familiar with scandal today. It seems we read a new one in the news every other week. “Now the birth (genesis in Greek) of Jesus the Christ took place in this way” (1.18; see Brown, “Annunciation”, 483 and Bruner, 23). The linguistic cue ties the reader to the genealogy and the scandals. Since the ancient world revolved around honor and shame, in much more significant ways than we do, Joseph’s shame was a big deal. It is an ending-of-the-world deal.

In the traditional cycle of advent Scriptures, the first week’s gospel reading is devoted to Jesus’ preaching on the “end”, the “apocalypse” – the sun darkened, the stars falling, the elect gathered, the end coming. Watch! Stay awake! In this case, these are not the words of Chicken Little, these are not words to ignore, these are the words of Jesus himself.

While our message series is structured differently this year, we still encounter this theme. Joseph’s life, everything he imagined it would be, all the things he expected to share with Mary – it is all over. He can divorce her and, maybe, start over, maybe find someone else to love. He can marry her and live with the stigma, the shame, for the rest of his life. It is a real grief, a profound pain, a gut-wrenching decision.

Joseph’s shame was a really big deal. The “honorable” thing to do was to expose and punish the person who caused the shame, to expose and punish Mary. But instead of pursuing his lost honor, Joseph chooses kindness and mercy. He resolves “to divorce her quietly”. Not that divorce is ever private, and in the ancient world in which a woman’s livelihood depended on a man, Mary would have been condemned to an extraordinarily difficult life. But Joseph does not wish to humiliate Mary to recover his own honor. No wonder Matthew calls him a “righteous man” (1.19). He is not obsessed with his own honor; he is not defensive. His sense of justice is shaped by mercy and compassion.

To this righteous man, the angel appears and gives him two words: The first thing the angel says, “Do not be afraid” (1.20). The world ending? Don’t be afraid. Your life is over? Don’t be afraid. Things are uncertain. We can’t be sure about what will happen. But we do not have to be afraid.

The angel tells Joseph not to be afraid. Then, the angel tells him what we as readers already know: “The child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” This is no scandal (good luck convincing your friends, though) – this is a God thing, a grace thing, a Holy Spirit miracle of new life. Frederick Dale Bruner comments, “Every conversion is a virgin birth. ‘With human beings this [new life] is impossible, but with God absolutely everything is possible’ (Matt 19:26)” (p 24, italics his). His point is that there is a parallel between this incredible miracle of Christ becoming flesh, of “the virgin will conceive”, and Christ being conceived and born in our lives today. As Charles Wesley wrote in that great carol, “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing”, Jesus is “born to give us second birth”.

In addition to these two words for Joseph, the angel also gives the baby two names. The first name, “Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins” (1.21).

The second name, “Emmanuel”, means “God is with us” (1.23). It comes from a story in Isaiah of a king who was afraid of the world ending, afraid of two superpowers who were prepared to divide and conquer Judah. Isaiah declares, “If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all” (Isaiah 7.9). Like Joseph, king Ahaz has reasons to fear. Unlike Joseph, Ahaz doesn’t seem to get the message, doesn’t seem to accept that God our Savior is indeed with him, with you, with me, with us.

“If you do not stand firm in your faith . . . .” I suggest that Joseph is a model for standing firm in faith, in two particular ways:

When everything was falling apart, he chose to live on faith, not fear.
When everything went wrong, he did not protect his own honor but practiced compassion.

With Jesus, Savior, with Emmanuel, God with us, that new life, that second birth, can be ours.

Decoration Day

2011-11-30T21:30:00.001-05:00

Last Saturday, a great team turned out to "deck the halls". Thanks to all, especially Bob and Marc for coming in early with the trees!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-22T20:22:00.000-05:00

The United Methodist Women, coordinated by Kitchen Ministry director Josie, prepared 31 Thanksgiving baskets, including turkeys, for local families including several of our own Bethany families. Blessings to all!

Confirmation!

2011-11-22T20:19:00.002-05:00

Eight young people were confirmed and/or baptized this past Sunday! Thanks to all the mentors, and to Sharon, our Youth Ministries Director! Check out the full photo album!

First pic (9:00 Traditions worship): Caleb, with mentor Casey; Brooke with Linda; Brad with Gary; Derek with Danny; Zach with Jim; Sharon.

Second pic (11:15 Celebrations worship): mentor Crist with Austin, Shanelle with Danna, Brittany with Sharon, Pastor JP

Third and fourth pics: Baptism of Shanelle and Austin

Fifth pic: "Derek, remember your baptism and be thankful. The Holy Spirit work within you that, being born of water and the Spirit, you may be a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ."

The young people then served Holy Communion and baptismal remembrance to the church.

All in All

2011-11-22T20:11:00.000-05:00

1 Kings 18:21 (children)
Ephesians 1:15-23 (message)
Confirmation and Baptism of young people

Message in notation form only

Structure of English translation/Greek:

Prayer, part 1, Thanks (1.15-16)
Thanks for

your faith in Jesus
your love for the saints

Prayer, part 2, Request (1.17-19)
Pray that God
give you spirit of wisdom & revelation = eyes of heart enlightened
so that you may know

the hope to which he has called you (1.12, 1.18, 4.1, 4.4)
the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints (1.11, 1.14, 1.18)
the greatness of his power-power-power-power (4 synonyms)

Power of God, part 1, Christ exalted (1.20-21)
Power to work in Christ when God
raised him from the dead
seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places
above rule, authority, power, dominion
above every name named in this age and age to come

Power of God, part 2, Christ ruling (1.22-23)
[God]
put all things under his feet
made him head over all things for the church
which is his body,
[which is] the fullness of him
who fills all in all

1.19, with the four synonyms for power in bold: “what is the immeasurable [with the Greek root “hyper”] greatness [with the Greek root “mega”] of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his mighty strength.” (See G.D. Cloete and D.J. Smit, June 1, 1988, “Exegesis and Proclamation: Preaching from the Lectionary”, Journal of Theology for Southern Africa, p 59-67 [Electronic edition, http://web.ebscohost.com] – p 59).

Thanking God for your faith in Jesus –
“hear Christ and his story” (Austin)
the witness of Sharon and your mentors

Thanking God for your love for the saints –
Halloween snow - snow and limb removal
YDC meals - sharing love and compassion with the Youth Development Center

The three interlocking themes of the prayer request, all around resurrection:
hope – Eph 1.12, 1.18, 4.1, 4.4
inheritance – everything that is God’s is ours
“Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (Eph 1.3)
power – resurrection, new life
"Fullness", difficult translation and syntax questions:
filled by/with, and full manifestation of

Christ’s fullness in the church ... elsewhere, Christ is described as filling the world and filling God’s people individually. If you want to encounter Christ, all three arenas are important – meet him personally, meet him through the church, meet him in the world. A spiritual life that does not include the church misses a crucial dimension of Jesus. A spiritual life that does not connect with the world misses a crucial dimension of Jesus. A spiritual life that does not involve a personal encounter with Jesus lacks a crucial dimension of the fullness of Jesus.

"All in All"
contemporary English expression – not the same as the Scripture
all things considered, neglecting details ... often negative details
“All in all, it’s not so bad”

only two uses of the expression in the NT
Eph 1.23
1Co 15.28, also in context of Christ ruling over all

not in the apostolic fathers (Hermeneutika’s BibleWorks software)

Augustine, Confessions, I.III.3, electronic version
3. Since, then, thou dost fill the heaven and earth, do they contain thee? Or, dost thou fill and overflow them, because they cannot contain thee? And where dost thou pour out what remains of thee after heaven and earth are full? Or, indeed, is there no need that thou, who dost contain all things, shouldst be contained by any, since those things which thou dost fill thou fillest by containing them? For the vessels which thou dost fill do not confine thee, since even if they were broken, thou wouldst not be poured out. And, when thou art poured out on us, thou art not thereby brought down; rather, we are uplifted. Thou art not scattered; rather, thou dost gather us together. But when thou dost fill all things, dost thou fill them with thy whole being? Or, since not even all things together could contain thee altogether, does any one thing contain a single part, and do all things contain that same part at the same time? Do singulars contain thee singly? Do greater things contain more of thee, and smaller things less? Or, is it not rather that thou art wholly present everywhere, yet in such a way that nothing contains thee wholly?

Mission recognition

2011-11-22T20:04:00.000-05:00

The United Methodist Women recognized JoAnn for her years of service as church secretary and honored her with a mission gift in her name! Congrats JoAnn!

Confirmation Banquet at Victor's

2011-11-19T20:58:00.002-05:00

We had our final confirmation group study, on Spiritual Leadership, today, followed by a banquet for confirmands and mentors at Victor's, the location where we worshiped from 1905-1925. Thanks to Sharon, our youth ministries director, for making arrangements, to all the mentors who have given so much to these young people, and to these young people who are offering so much to our congregation and community! And thanks to the folks at Victor's for a fabulous meal, great service, and making the whole process easy. Check out the calamari in banana pepper cream sauce when you go!

Haiti report

2011-11-17T15:15:00.000-05:00

We were privileged to have Jodi, Barb, and Nancy from the Haiti Partnership with us this past Sunday. Great to hear the story, and an exciting ministry to connect with!

Thanksgiving Baskets

2011-11-12T22:19:00.000-05:00

Food is being collected for Thanksgiving and Christmas baskets, given out to neighbors in need. Please check the list - twice! - and share in this outreach.

Team Day

2011-11-12T22:17:00.000-05:00

Today's team day featured teaching by District Superintendent Rev. Mark Webb on "The Heart of a Leader". Teams, including folks from our partner Salvar El Alma, also had time to pray and plan together. We closed with a light lunch. Thanks to all who came!

Wedding Bells!

2011-11-12T22:15:00.000-05:00

Congrats to David and Bri, seen dancing with the ring bearer and flower girl. And, thanks to Gregg for the pic!

Bethany Christian Learning Center Sunday!

2011-11-11T20:56:00.000-05:00

The BCLC kids sang in both services this past Sunday. Thanks to Wanda, the BCLC director, and to her staff. Thanks as well to all the families who rearranged their schedule when the original date was postponed due to snow.

Vocal Ensemble

2011-11-11T20:52:00.000-05:00

Students from Marsha's vocal studio sang in worship this past Sunday! Thanks to them and their families for making our All Saints and Learning Center Sunday so special!

Feel the Love

2011-11-10T13:03:00.000-05:00

Notes only for this past Sunday's message:

1 John 3:1-3

Declaration: We are God’s children
Jesus’ baptism, “my son, the beloved” (Mark 1.9-11)
Spirit of the Son teaches us to call God “Abba” (Galatians 4.4-7)

Anticipation: We shall be like him for we shall see him as he is
Resurrection
Creation: Human as God designed us to be (“image”)

Transformation: Purify themselves as Christ is pure
Not driven by dread but by hope
Robin coming home

Not driven by rules but by love of the one we behold
Story of son caring for father in his final illness ... staying awake
Tattoos on the Heart

Retreat Nugget

2011-11-05T20:47:00.000-04:00

One phrase from Zechariah the prophet that I chewed on during my study retreat:

"Prisoners of Hope"

Amazing expression! Check out Zechariah 9:12.

Lumberjacks

2011-11-05T20:45:00.001-04:00

Thanks to those who helped remove limbs at the parsonage. And, you didn't spook the dog!

Fall Fling!

2011-11-05T20:37:00.000-04:00

Great fun and great food! Thanks to all who helped out!

Study Retreat

2011-11-02T09:48:00.000-04:00

At Steve's farm for a wonderful week of study and renewal. These pics, including one showing Jim, Steve, and Spooky, is from Monday's walk. Thanks for your prayers and your feedback as I prepare message themes for the coming 6 months!

Winter Fall

2011-10-31T15:26:00.000-04:00

Thanks to all who made it out on Sunday to help our homebound and neighbors with limb and snow removal.

Snow and the Schedule

2011-10-29T19:31:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow, Sunday October 30, we will cancel the 9:00 service and the 10:15 Sunday School hour. Our expectation is that the parking lot, to be plowed tonight, will harden and freeze in the early morning cold. With the sun up, it should be safer by 11:15.

We are inviting everyone who is able to join us at 11:15 for a brief song service followed by going out as teams to help with snow and limb removal in our neighborhood. Bring your shovels and saws. Eat a hearty breakfast. Curvin Snyder will coordinate an initial list of persons nearby who could use some help. Please contact him if you have any suggestions. We’ll do whatever work we can with whomever is able to come.

This Sunday, we’ll not just have a service. We’ll DO A SERVICE!

The Bethany Christian Learning Center program is postponed to next week, Nov 6. We will also be recognizing our 50 year plus members on that day.

Susquehanna Conference receives gift from Mississippi Conference

2011-10-27T10:43:00.000-04:00

Bishop Middleton has received a letter from Bishop Hope Morgan Ward of the Mississippi Conference. It includes the following message:

Grace and peace to you today.

Here in Mississippi we continue to keep you and your conference in our thoughts and prayers as you recover from the devastating floods last month. We are placing in the mail today a check for $50,000 in the hope that people in your episcopal area will be comforted and helped through the recovery.

Just as we have been helped by the overflowing generosity of the Susquehanna Conference in the recovery from Hurricane Katrina, we want to be engaged with you in this time of need. Pennsylvania has been the number one state in volunteers in the long recovery here.

With gratitude for your partnership in the ministry of Christ,

Bishop Hope Morgan Ward,
Mississippi Conference,
The United Methodist Church

A photo of Bishop Middleton and Mike Bealla in grateful recepit of the the check is posted in the showcase section of the susumc.org conference website.

Jerry Wolgemuth, Director of Communication
Susquehanna Conference, The United Methodist Church

Consecration Sunday meal

2011-10-26T21:57:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Khris and her team for the wonderful celebration meal, and to everyone who made fresh commitments in generous discipleship. It was a great day!

Wedding!

2011-10-26T21:47:00.001-04:00

Aaron and Tina, married this past Sunday. Congrats!

Women's Group Banquet

2011-10-20T15:22:00.000-04:00

The United Methodist Women met for a covered dish meal, including several gentlemen, and a presentation on Chile and the World Day of Prayer. Thanks to our guest presenter, Judy!

Pick a Caption

2011-10-18T13:41:00.000-04:00

Some pics from the wedding/reception venue for my neice Renee (west of Nashville, TN - not local). Peacocks and the mill wheel gears. Beautiful place and a fun day ... create a caption!

All, Jesus' Spirituality of Wealth (2): First, More

2011-10-18T12:56:00.000-04:00

Psalm 37:1-11 (call to worship)

Matthew 13:44-45 (kids)
Matthew 6:1-4, 19-34 (message focus)

Last week as we examined this Scripture, we focused primarily on the themes in the first section, the section preceding the Lord’s Prayer. We looked at the strings attached, so often, to issues of wealth and giving. And, we see that Jesus acknowledges those strings, urges us to cut the strings that bind us, and urges us instead to bind ourselves to God by our giving. Giving, godly giving, unites us with our Father God.

I told the story of the young person in our church who prepared their offering envelope. On the “name” line they wrote “Dear Father God” – because it is not about us but about our Father who sees in secret. For “amount” they wrote, “25¢”. For “what special offering” they wrote, “Monies”. Because where their treasure is, there their heart will be also. “Lead with your treasure”; let it unite you to “Dear Father God”.

Today, we continue exploring this section, with more of a focus on the second half of this teaching, the section following the teaching on prayer and fasting.

These messages consider Jesus’ spirituality of wealth, a tremendously important aspect of his teaching. As I mentioned last week, Jesus spoke about work, business, and money more than he talked about heaven or hell. Jesus is concerned that all of our lives be fully devoted to God.

These messages also prepare us for Consecration Sunday, next week, with our District Superintendent, Rev. Mark Webb. As part of worship next week, Rev. Webb will lead us a prayerful and worshipful devotion of our wealth – whatever stuff we have – to God. Later in the worship service today, Ray Sandy, a member of our council, will provide a report on our giving, from the perspective of our discipleship, our following Jesus. Each week in worship, we give back to God. We do this in worship because we believe that this is part of our discipleship and part of our worship. If it was just about funding programs of a non-profit organization, we could charge membership fees or do a hundred other things that organizations do to raise money. But it is not just about funding. It is about giving back to God as an act of worship.

Before we dive into this second section, a couple introductory matters:

There are four parts, which Frederick Bruner describes as

The two treasures
The two eyes
The two lords
The two anxieties (Bruner, 319)

Thematically, we’re going to extend the “strings attached” language to more reflection on slavery and freedom. Last time, we saw how godly giving binds us to God. This week, we discover that godly giving sets us free.

Part 1, the two treasures, treasures on earth or treasures in heaven: We spoke about this last week, so I’ll expand with a couple quick references. Once more in this gospel, Jesus uses the phrase “treasures in heaven”. It comes in Matthew 19:16-22. A rich young man comes to Jesus and asks, “What must I do to have eternal life?” After a few moments of conversation, Jesus tells him, “If you want to be perfect/mature, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven”.

What do you say to that? We mostly look for wiggle room. Jesus wasn’t speaking to every disciple, but to one particular young man who needed to do this for the sake of his soul. In all that look for wiggle room, we miss that Jesus is speaking about the economics of righteousness and the kingdom of God. It actually is simpler to sell everything. To live out the values of the kingdom and retain the title to stuff – no matter how much or how little we have – is much more complicated. If you give it all away, there is no question where your treasure is. Can you keep some, and not be tied to it?

This is where the biblical teaching of the tithe comes in. Jesus typically focuses on the fact that everything we have comes from God and belongs to God. The larger biblical tradition offers tithing – giving a tenth – as a practical way to consecrate everything to God, as a way to live in the complicated situation of having stuff that really isn’t ours, that really belongs to God. “If the part of the dough offered as first fruits is holy, the whole batch is holy” (Romans 11:16). When we give God a portion, the first portion, a significant portion, a tithe, we become able to hold the remaining portion in trust for God. I put together a list of frequently asked questions about tithing and included it in the worship program today, along with a couple Consecration Sunday visual tools to guide our prayers this week as we consider growing in our giving practice, particularly our percentage giving, in the coming year.

Part 2, the two eyes, either light or darkness. This is notoriously difficult to understand. It views the metaphorical eye as a lamp, not as a lens. It speaks of the body as “full of light” or “luminous” by virtue of the eye (Bruner), rather than speaking of the road, path, or home as brightly lit by the sun or streetlight. What I suggest is that Jesus points out that what we focus our eyes on impacts our soul. If we obsess about what we don’t have, about scarcity, that is going to shape our soul with darkness. If we focus upon the gift of God in Jesus Christ, on plenty, we will be full of light.

Part 3, the two lords, God or “Mammon”. This section uses language from the relationship of slave and master, or servant and master. The word “Mammon”, a name used here for the god of wealth, reminds us that wealth or property has a spiritual power. There is no reference to how much or how little we have, but a simple acknowledgment that too often our possessions – or those we hope to possess – possess us.

“Mammon” comes from the Hebrew root “amen”. “Amen” is not just a word that we append to prayer, but a word for what we trust (Thayer). Our money has a saying on it: “In God we trust”. That begs a very important question: “Which god? Money or Jesus?” Bruner translates this verse, “You cannot possibly serve God and Gain”. John Chrysostom’s comment: When God says “not possible”, don’t you say “possible” (Bruner, 325).

Part 4, the two anxieties, for life, food, drink, clothing or for God’s kingdom. First, the practical – worry doesn’t accomplish anything. Take it one day at a time, don’t get ahead of yourself in your worrying about tomorrow. [Story: Paying for two college educations, tithing, peace.]

Second, a promise of God’s extravagant care. God cares for us more than the birds, and they eat a lot. The purple martin eats its weight in insects on a daily basis – 7000 mosquitoes a day! A hummingbird drinks twice its weight in nectar every day. (See http://www.birdola.com/bird_facts.htm ). God cares for us more than flowers, and they are more extravagantly clothed than the most glorious royals. It is amazing to see Jesus use such extravagant images for the care of God in a section in which he warns us against the worship of Gain. God only calls some to voluntary poverty, and God delights in beauty and God delights in extravagant giving to us. No wonder discipleship includes “excelling in the grace of giving” (2 Corinthians 8:7, NIV). No wonder, in the language of Psalm 37, with which we began the worship hour, the psalm continues beyond our reading to say, “The righteous are generous and keep giving. . . . They are ever giving liberally” (Psalm 37:21, 26). Becoming generous is becoming godly. [Story: Our own folks who struggle to put food on the table ... and who are among the most generous people I know.]

Third, a priority, the kingdom of God FIRST in our lives. The drive for “more”, the pursuit of Gain, the worship of Mammon only pushes godliness and righteousness out of our lives. More is not God’s way forward. God’s way forward is “first”. And there is no “second”. Jesus just tells us that if we put God first, then we can let God take care of everything else. It is not an invitation to laziness or irresponsibility, but a call to actively devote everything in our lives to the kingdom . . . everything, as extravagantly as God gives to us.

[Story: Jesse in the grocery story with the lollipop.] But too often we find ourselves to be slaves of Gain, and Gain is a hard master. Our fists are clenched. We hold tight to everything we’ve got. Giving sets us free. Giving sets us free from the pursuit of more. Giving sets us free from worry about necessities. And, giving binds us to God. This week, I want to encourage you to pray over your next step to freedom, to God, by giving. May our whole bodies be “full of light”.

Resources:

Frederick Dale Bruner, 2004 (1987), Matthew: A Commentary, Volume 1:The Christbook, Matthew 1-12, revised and expanded edition, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
Thayer’s Greek Lexicon in Hermeneutika’s BibleWorks 6.0
http://www.birdola.com/bird_facts.htm

All, Jesus' Spirituality of Wealth (1): Pulling Strings

2011-10-11T09:41:00.000-04:00

Luke 17:11-19 (children at the altar)

Matthew 6:1-4, 19-34 (message focus)

The Scripture we selected today is focused on the spirituality of giving. But it is interrupted, right in the middle, by Jesus’ teaching on prayer. Most of the time when we think about money, we think about it as solely a worldly thing, as having nothing to do with our spirituality. But Jesus teaches on money, takes a break to talk about prayer, and then goes back to money, or, more properly, generosity.

Here at Bethany, in our membership vows, we ask each person, “Do you commit yourself to consistent growth in a spirituality characterized as giving, faithful, and real?” Over the next few weeks, we will be exploring what Jesus says about wealth from a spiritual perspective. It is a spiritual thing. If it has nothing to do with God, then why would we want it at all? But we persist in a schizophrenic spirituality, keeping spiritual things in their appropriate box while we deal with the real life of work, paying the bills (or not), all completely separate from our faith.

Jesus talked about work, business, and money more than he talked about heaven. Jesus is concerned that all of our lives become fully devoted to God. We hear this, but mostly ignore it, because it seems so impractical.

So, let’s take this passage for starters. And, let’s look at one of the themes that Jesus teaches about wealth. He teaches us – and it should be obvious – that the exchange of wealth often comes with strings attached. Did anyone ever offer you a gift, but it really wasn’t free? They wanted something from you, something in exchange.

The old Latin expression quid pro quo describes this kind of exchange, meaning literally, “this for that”. I give you this. You give me that. A Non Sequitur comic (July 24, 2004, by Wiley Miller) showed a giant squid and a chef sitting at a booth in a seafood restaurant. The squid says, “So it’s a deal then .... I’ll provide the ink for your menus and you’ll take calamari off it.” The title: “Squid pro quo”.

This past week I heard a friend comment that politicians should be forced to wear their endorsements just like NASCAR drivers. Why? Because we all assume that the obscene amounts of money raised in presidential and other campaigns comes with certain strings attached. We become a bit cynical, and the campaign cycle is just getting started.

And, this past Wednesday in the men’s lunch group, we read Proverbs 22:7 – “The borrower is the slave of the lender.” Talk about a string – the borrower responds like a puppet on a string, the borrower feels like a person at the end of his rope. Ever been there?

Jesus teaches us that the exchange of wealth often comes with strings attached.

Like the teaching on prayer, which began with how not to pray, Jesus teaches on giving by teaching how not to give. Don’t give like hypocrites, don’t give to get the praise of people. If that’s all you want, if that’s the string you want to pull, you’ve got it ... but you’ve got nothing before God. That is not godly giving. Godly giving is not about me. Godly giving is not about increasing my prestige. Godly giving is not about binding the receiver to me in loyalty or devotion. Godly giving is about . . . binding ourselves to God. Godly giving doesn’t attach a string to the gift. Godly giving attaches a string to our souls and ties us to God:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matthew 6:19-21).

Some notes from the Greek text:

In verse 1, when Jesus warns us against righteousness done to be noticed by other people, the root for “noticed” is the word theathenai, the root for our English term “theater”. And the Greek word for “hypocrite” is a word for a performer, an actor. (See Bruner, 283, and Thayer Lexicon in BW6.0.) Our prayer is not to be theatrical. Our fasting is not to be dramatic. Our giving is not to be performance. It is all for God, all about God.

Such spirituality comes with strings attached. It is designed to get us noticed, to give us prestige points. But, the text tells us, “they have received their reward”, or, more literally, that “they have been paid in full”. It is a business term (Bruner, 284, and Thayer). And it means that there is no further payment coming. Performing for the crowds doesn’t get God’s attention.

But it goes even further. It is not just about performing for crowds. It is also about interior performances. Frederick Bruner writes, “Not only should there be no external trumpets, but there should not even be any internal music” (285). Jesus said it this way, “When you do charity, don’t even let your left hand know what your right hand is doing” (Bruner’s translation of 6:3, p 284).

The language of performance is such a powerful thing in our lives. Get an “A” and get $5. Score a goal and get a Slushee. Put on a good interview and get the job. Buy a diamond and get a kiss, because “every kiss begins with ...” This turns every encounter in our lives into a transaction, a transaction that can be quantified, measured, by wealth or performance. Talk about performance anxiety, stage fright.

The question becomes not whether wealth comes with strings attached, but what strings shall we choose? Do we choose the God of “Mammon”, and seek to build up treasures here and now? Do we choose the God of the approval of others, of prestige or influence? These are demanding gods, gods that require our performance and offer very little in return, with no guarantees. Or do we choose the kingdom of heaven, Jesus’ kingdom, a kingdom of grace and love?

Jesus wants us to cut the strings, the purse strings, that bind us to Mammon or Influence or Approval. He reminds us that those things fail – moths (nature at work), rust (time at work), thieves (people at work) (Bruner, 321). John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople, wrote that those who want more aren’t able to enjoy what they have “by reason of not feeling confident about the security of them, and because with their whole mind they are intent upon what they have not yet seized” (Bruner, 320).

Jesus wants us to cut the strings and to tie ourselves to God, to “the Father, who sees in secret and will reward” by putting our treasure in the kingdom of heaven and anchoring our heart there. Sometimes we – caught up as we are in the economic exchange, in the worldly power of wealth – interpret this reward from God in pure economic terms. But this is no economic transaction. Jesus addresses God as Father, Jesus puts us in the family. (See Brunner, 285.)

I do not play goal keeper on a soccer field, but I do teach kids how to play. I tell them that when they are goal keeper, they have a super power – they can use their hands. When they use their feet to clear the ball, I remind them, “Good job! Use your hands!” One of the phrases that describes good goal keeping technique is to “lead with your hands”, especially when diving for the ball.

Jesus gives us a similar simple direction for discipleship in the area of wealth, for a spirituality of wealth. It is simple, practical, brilliant: Lead with your treasure. So often, we will tell ourselves to “lead with your heart”. It is not bad advice. Jesus just takes a step back and says that our hearts are where are treasure is. So, “lead with your treasure”. If your treasure is in your 401(k), then some of the recent years haven’t been very good for your heart. If your treasure is in a recently purchased home, the current market is bad news for your heart health. Now, planning for retirement and owning a home are wonderful things, but they must not be our treasure. If our treasure is in heaven, that is, with God, then . . . well, as Jesus said, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21).

One of our children here at Bethany got this whole passage clearly. I have no idea which of the children in our church did this, but several months ago one of our kids prepared their offering envelope. On the “name” line they wrote “Dear Father God” – because it is not about us but about our Father who sees in secret. For “amount” they wrote, “25¢”. For “what special offering” they wrote, “Monies”. Because where their treasure is, there their heart will be also. “Lead with your treasure.”

There’s no performance anxiety in that spiritual practice. Instead, there is a link, deep and powerful, to a loving Father God. That’s the gift of giving, that’s why holy generosity does for a soul.

The amazing thing in all of this is that God’s treasure is with you and me here and now. We are worth so much to God, we are worth the divine life itself, we are worth the cross. In so many ways, we are not worthy. That’s in our own selves, that unworthiness. But from God’s perspective, it’s all worth it. That’s why we celebrate this holy meal today. (Holy Communion).

Flood Recovery at Ray & Nan's

2011-10-08T20:57:00.000-04:00

Michael led the Praise Team in serving our neighbors through Servants Inc. - this time one of our own - in flood recovery work. Thanks to Laura for joining us. The pics (taken with phone) show material removed from the basement. David and Julie not pictured.

Nobel Prize to a United Methodist Leader

2011-10-07T20:34:00.000-04:00

From the QuickLink of the Susquehanna Conference, The United Methodist Church:

LIBERIAN PRESIDENT, A UNITED METHODIST, RECEIVES NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

By Sam Hodges
Managing Editor, United Methodist Reporter

Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a United Methodist who spoke at the 2008 General Conference in Fort Worth, has won the Nobel Peace Prize with two other women leaders. She was honored with women's rights activist Leymah Gbowee, also from Liberia, and democracy activist Tawakkul Karman of Yemen-the first Arab woman to win the prize.

Ms. Sirleaf, 72 and nicknamed "Iron Lady," was elected president in 2005, becoming the first democratically elected female leader of an African nation. Liberia had been ravaged by civil war in the years before her election, and Ms. Sirleaf ran as a reformer and peacemaker.

Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu was among those cheering her Nobel recognition, and crediting her with leading the country to greater peace and stability.

"She deserves it many times over. She's brought stability to a place that was going to hell," said Archbishop Tutu, according to an Associated Press report.

Ms. Sirleaf said Friday from Monrovia: "This [award] gives me a stronger commitment to work for reconciliation. Liberians should be proud." When she spoke to the 2008 General Conference, Ms. Sirleaf emphasized her religious heritage. "I feel at home with you, members of my United Methodist family," she said.

Ms. Gbowee won for organizing women "across ethnic and religious dividing lines to bring an end to the long war in Liberia, and to ensure women's participation in elections."

Ms. Gbowee has a long record of championing women's rights, with an emphasis on fighting the crime of rape.

Ms. Karman is a journalist and longtime advocate for human rights and freedom of expression in Yemen, and has worked to oust the regime there.

Trail to the Summit

2011-09-27T18:28:00.001-04:00

Hiked the Peters Mountain Trail with a friend, Jon Bausman, pastor of Aldersgate Church, while on the York District Clergy retreat.

New Member

2011-09-27T18:23:00.000-04:00

Dick, presented by Curvin, joined Bethany this past Sunday during our 9:00 service. We are blessed!

Block Party Pics

2011-09-27T18:19:00.001-04:00

Thanks to all who helped out with the big day, and to Kim's Karate for their demonstration.

The Lord's Prayer: Us

2011-09-27T18:10:00.000-04:00

2 Chronicles 20 (Jehosaphat and the choir - moments with the children)
Matthew 6:5-15 (message focus)

Review:
how not to pray, how to pray
ADDRESS: Intimacy, family, community, divinity
REQUESTS: Your name, kingdom, will

LOCATION: “On earth as it is in heaven”
Not only closes out the first set of 3 requests but redirects the prayer to “on earth”; to human problems and needs; to what God’s name hallowed, kingdom come, and will done may look like.

Keeps this prayer from being super spiritual, a spirituality that neglects physicality. Forgiveness and deliverance can be read in a purely spiritual way. What of “daily bread”?

Eugene Peterson on Oxyrhynchus (Egypt) and the meaning of “epiousion” (daily), daily as in “fresh baked” (Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading, 2006, pp 141-150).

The first three requests dealt with heavenly matters, matters that find their origin and ideal in that realm. The second three requests deal with earthly matters. Jesus reminds us that it is not only appropriate but fitting and right to pray for these things.

But, as we discovered in the address to “OUR Father”, we see here the presence of the entire community. The requests are for humans in community, for “on earth” as “one earth”. “Give us”, “Forgive us”, “Deliver us”.

The language of this prayer thus pushes back against two persistent destructive tendencies in spirituality:
to spiritualize faith so that we neglect or marginalize the “earthly”
to privatize faith so that we neglect or ignore the community

This, indeed, was the biggest complaint of Israel’s prophets: Israel practiced their religion but they removed from it all its impact on earth and the human community. They practiced their religion but made their peace with economic and social patterns that took advantage of the poor, and a justice system that favored the wealthy and powerful. “Love the LORD your God” is incomplete without “love your neighbor”. (See Bruner, 305.)

REQUESTS:

“Give us today our daily bread”
Already discussed above
Bruner: “It is possible to be more spiritual than God. Why would the Jesus who fed his five thousand not want us to pray for the feeding of our six billion?” (306)
Note: is for daily bread, not for “cake” or extras ... invites us to participate in feeding the poor

“Forgive us our debts” (see Bruner 308-310)
rabbinic thought: a system of merits and demerits, of credits/debits
Luther: “we are up to the ears in sin”
Struggles with self-esteem ... unforgiven, unforgiving people?

“as we forgive”
Matthew 5:23-24 So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.

“Lead us not ... but deliver us” (see Bruner 312-315)
minefield
deliver = “snatch” (Bruner),
“drag out of danger” (Moulton, Analytical Greek Lexicon, 1978)
evil or Evil One - Greek noun is not specific, therefore the phrase is open to ALL forms of evil (systemic, demonic, internal)

CLOSING:
The ending added by the church: “for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory for ever”
Otherwise, we have begun with “Father in heaven” and ended with “evil one” (Bruner)
Invitation to free prayer (Bruner) ... add the specifics of our lives, pray our lives to God

Resources:
Frederick Dale Bruner, 2004, Matthew: A Commentary. Matthew 1-12, The Christbook, revised and expanded edition, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

Harold K. Moulton, editor, 1978, The Analytical Greek Lexicon Revised, Grand Rapids: Zondervan/Regency Reference.

Eugene Peterson, 2006, Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

The Lord's Prayer: Your

2011-09-24T21:23:00.001-04:00

(Notes only this past week) 1 Kings 18:41-46 (moments with the children)

Matthew 6:5-15 (message focus)

Fall ROOTS series.

There is so much in this text. Jesus starts out by telling us how NOT to pray. Don’t pray to put on a show. Prayer is talking with God. It is a private thing. It is not to make us look good. And, don’t treat prayer as work – the more you pray the more God hears. We aren’t supposed to wear God out with whining or negotiating. The best prayer is simple and direct.

Then, he teaches us how to pray. He gives us a great gift, “The Lord’s Prayer” or the “Our Father”.

Robin, Jesse’s birth, praying "The Lord's Prayer"

ADDRESS: “Our Father who art in heaven”
Intimacy: “father”, “abba” used as the intimate term for fathers by both children and adults (Bruner, 295).

Family: Jesus invites us into the family, “our father”, makes us children
Jesus’ term, “my father” or “the father” ... never “our father”

Community: our

Malachi 2:10 Have we not all one father? Has not one God created us? Why then are we faithless to one another, profaning the covenant of our ancestors?

heavens (plural form, as “skies” above all people)

Divinity: heavens

REQUESTS: all about God, and all answered by God (not us)
Name hallowed
“The President of the United States”
Hallow: Hebrew kavod, “glory”, gravitas (Bruner, 298)

Kingdom come
“You rule!”
Expectation – fully manifested, end of days

Will done
“Have it your way” (Burger King)
Submission

LOCATION: “on earth as it is in heaven”
Imagine a world

“There is some kind of exciting invisible world at work in perfect obedience to God, where God’s name, kingdom, and will are treated with the respect they deserve. Morever, this phrase asks us to believe that something like heavenly worship and obedience can also touch earth.” (Brunner, 304-305)

CONCLUSION
Faith: The hallowing of the name of God the Father
Hope: The coming of the kingdom of God’s Son
Love: The doing of God’s will by the power of his Spirit
(Brunner, 305)

Resources:
Bruner, Frederick Dale. 2004. Matthew: A Commentary. Matthew 1-12, The Christbook, revised and expanded edition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

Breakfast reception

2011-09-16T22:57:00.000-04:00

Thanks to JoAnn for her years of excellent ministry as secretary! And to Khris and team for the great breakfast.

Block Party 2011 - Rescheduled

2011-09-16T22:52:00.000-04:00

Now set for Saturday, September 24, 2011

10:00 AM-1:00PM

Rain or Shine

(In case of rain, the event will be held indoors.)

Everything is FREE for children 12 and under

One FREE Back to School kit for every child 12 and under

Bounce House, Games, Crafts,

Face Painting, Food

Ball Walk

Kim’s Karate Demonstration

From last year's Block Party.

Flood Story

2011-09-14T13:31:00.001-04:00

From Dona L, last Thursday - Thanks for sharing!

Yesterday I was evacuated from my office position through the hospital. The creek rose so fast we had 15 minutes to get out through a fence that was cut for escape. My car was left behind as I walked up Mt Rose Ave hill towards the apartment.

When I got to the corner of the alley and saw my home I broke down and cried. I was wet inside and out, tired and exhausted but thankful for the strength in my body to get me safe with my faithful dog, Cooper. We often take for granted so many little things.

I am thankful to be safe, thankful for the electric that came back on, thankful for God's Grace to yet help me through another storm and challenge in my life.

It takes a lot to scare me, but I was scared. Walking through the evacuation route, up the hill in the rain I was on auto pilot. Not thinking other then one step at a time. When I turned that corner and saw my home it hit me how fortunate my life has been.

I do not know if my car is damaged and do not care. Cooper and myself are okay. I ate yet another meal of green beans and zucchini from my lil city garden, turned the faucet for water to drink, shared my rice with Cooper, enjoying the comfort of my life. Another example of the abundant love God has offered to me.

In your prayers of thanks, make sure my life is included. I am blessed by strength, love of family and friends and neighbors. I have food to eat, and a certainly my reward for these challenges will someday be offered.

Flood Response

2011-09-14T13:28:00.002-04:00

From our District Superintendent, Rev. Mark Webb, an excerpt on flood response, availability of assistance and the call for volunteers. Please do pass along any flood info to the church office.

Friends,

I hope everyone is well and beginning to dry out. We have received reports of various levels of flooding throughout the district with most issues being wet basements and leaky roofs. However several communities have been hit hard in spots and we will continue to discern needs and offer appropriate responses. In other Districts there is significant damage and loss in the Wilkes-Barre District and damage to churches and homes in the Lewisburg, Harrisburg, New Cumberland, Williamsport and Wellsboro Districts.

In talking with Larry Siikanen, Disaster Response Coordinator for the Annual Conference, there are things you need to know and can do to help your folks and the community move toward clean-up and restoration.

1. The Annual Conference through the Mission Board is in the process of hiring 3 people to coordinate the clean-up throughout our conference. It is hoped that they will be in place within a week. One of the three persons will be dedicated to coordinate work in mid-conference, another in the northeast and north, and a third in the south and west as needed. Those names will be available to you as soon as they are in place.

2. As people begin to return home and you know of needs for clean-up from the flood, please take their contact information and either send them to Larry at: lsiikanen@susumc.org or call him at: 570.898.8710. You can also send the information to the District Office and it will be forwarded on to Larry. If your whole area is in need of help, let Larry know that. The needs don’t have to only be your parishioners, but folks in your neighborhood. Larry and the coordinators will begin to coordinate teams to come in and evaluate and then work to try and get VIM/Work Teams into the area.

3. If you have people that want to help or if your church wants to organize VIM/Work Teams please coordinate that through Larry. He will be able to know where the teams need to be deployed.

4. Many have asked about offerings for flood relief. You and or your church can make a donation to the Susquehanna Flood Relief Fund. Please mail to:
Susquehanna Conference, Attn: Finance Office, P. O. Box 2053, Mechanicsburg, PA 17055
Write in the memo line: "Susquehanna Flood Relief Fund #63660"

5. Mission Central is prepared with thousands of cleaning buckets. More are on the way from Sager Brown in LA. They will be working with Larry Siikanen to assess the damage and get the buckets out to folks.

6. If you and your congregation have not been affected by the flood or if you want to help assemble Cleaning Buckets you can call Mission Central at: 717.766.1533. You can make donations directly to Mission Central both in materials and monetarily. You may donate online at www.missioncentral.org by clicking the word "DONATE." Follow the latest developments at www.missioncentral.org and www.facebook.com/mission.central

One of the things the United Methodist Church does best—and one thing our Conference and District does well—is help each other through VIM/Work Teams. Cleanup and rebuilding will take months. We need to be in this for the long haul as usual in a disaster and we will do so! Please plan over the next months to mobilize as many teams as possible to help throughout our conference. This is the connection at its best!!!!!

Please keep me informed of the situation and the needs in the church and area you serve and please share this information with your congregations.

My prayers continue to be with you.

Mark

God and Geopolitics (2): I Tremble Within

2011-09-13T22:39:00.000-04:00

Lamentations 1:1-3, 1:4, 3:21-26 (call to worship)

Habakkuk 3:1-19 (message focus)

Last week, I mentioned that I chose Habakkuk because the prophet is dealing personally and theologically with a situation that has parallels to our experience of September 11. The parallels are limited, but the theological questions he faces are common – judgment, justice, revenge, the end of all things, the clash of cultures, wrath, mercy, God.

I remember that morning, watching the news shows and shocked and riveted by the “breaking news”. Robin kept telling me that the buildings were going to fall. And, I kept saying that they wouldn’t. I remember the surge of patriotism, seeing the flag everywhere – even those of us who don’t typically display the flag were doing so – we focused on being “one” as a nation (at least for a little while). I remember talking with a trucker who had been making delivery in NYC the day before. I remember Dolly Parton, at the Washington July 4th concert event, offering up her personal brand of shock and awe for the troops entering Afghanistan. I remember the revenge fantasies – why don’t we just nuke ‘em all. I remember the fear of the other, particularly Arabs, and the pain of my Muslim and Arab friends – who, just like me, were entirely shocked and appalled by the attacks.

I appreciate the Bible more and more. I am amazed by how human God’s Book really is. Did you hear Habakkuk say, “I wait quietly for the day of calamity to come upon the people who attack us” (3.16)? Talk about a revenge fantasy! Of course, it is not all he says, and it is not the end of the matter. In the beginning of this short book, Habakkuk makes clear that he and his own people have some judgment coming, and deservedly so (1.13). Perhaps that is the source of the wisdom of Proverbs, which the Wednesday lunch group looked at this past week: “Those who are glad at calamity will not go unpunished” (Pro 17.5b). So, in this chapter, he prays, “In wrath may you remember mercy” (3.2).

Much like the opening section, this passage has Habakkuk speak and God respond. Unlike the opening section, this ends with Habakkuk speaking and the middle – God’s response – is “heard” (3.16, 3.2, “shema”) but not in words. It is a vision; in the context of the book it may well be the vision the LORD refers to in chapter 2: “Write the vision ... so that a runner may read it” (2.2). Today we’ll begin by diving into the vision, first two images for God and then two origins for God.

Images: Warrior and Storm, overlapping and inter-woven
The image of God as Warrior is ancient, and difficult (Hiebert). We have to set it alongside Jesus as Prince of Peace. We’re not going to sort that out this morning. The Warrior image is tied to redemption, to the deliverance of slaves from their oppressors, to the story of Israel, “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Hosea 11.1, Matthew 2.15). It can be made self-serving: God likes me, I don’t like them, so God the Warrior will now destroy them. The prophet does not fall for that temptation. Instead, with humility, he prays, “In wrath, remember mercy” (Heschel).

The Storm image (how appropriate for our recent weather events) is mixed in. The arrows become lightening strikes. Mountains writhe. The moon stands still. Some storm! And, the warrior-storm vanquishes the Sea – that ancient image for chaos, evil, and danger, “Here be dragons!” “You trampled the sea with your horses, churning the mighty waters” (3.15).

The Warrior image is tied to the drama of redemption, particularly (in this vision) redemption from Egypt with “pestilence” and “plague” (3.5). The Storm image is tied to the drama of creation. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was formless and void and darkness covered the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God hovered over the waters” (Genesis 1.1-2) ... God triumphs over Sea and brings order out of chaos.

The two images are rooted in the stories of Redemption and Creation.

These two images are, in their language, anchored either in history or in nature (creation). God acts in history. God acts in the real physical world.

And these images remind us that salvation is not accomplished without justice. Sometimes we ask, “Why doesn’t God just forgive us and be done with it?” For God, salvation cannot come without justice – thus the cross. God can forgive because justice has been done.

Origins: Teman and Paran
I use the term “origin” loosely, but don’t have an alternative to propose. I use it to describe the answer to the question, “Where are you from?”, not to make a statement about the Eternal God. In this vision, God is from somewhere, two different places in particular, places that have quite different meaning and value in ancient Hebrew culture.

“God came from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Paran” (3.3). Teman is a city in Edom, named for a grandson of Esau, and part of a never-ending biblical family feud. (See Genesis 36.11, Jeremiah 49.20, and Obadiah 1.9). Esau was jealous of his brother Jacob and vowed to kill him. Their descendants – Edom and Israel – shared a border and it was rarely peaceful. Paran is the Sinai wilderness, where Israel wandered in the wilderness, met with God, and received the Law. Paran is also important in the ancient history of Edom. It is the region in which Ishmael was raised by Hagar (Genesis 21.21, c.f. 1 Kings 11.18). Ishmael was brother to favored Isaac and became father-in-law to Esau. And, over and over, whenever Paran is mentioned, whether in connection with Israel or Edom, it is a place where people go to “get away”. In itself, it is not the destination. There’s nothing “there” but other wanderers.

Note that neither Jerusalem nor its mountains Zion or Moriah are mentioned. When the prophet tells the people that salvation will come, he makes it clear that salvation will come from an unexpected source. It will not be from Jerusalem, from the establishment of priests and kings, from the center of Jewish culture and commerce.

Put together, these “origins” tell us that salvation comes from the “fringe” – from the other person that we’d rather reject, in the barren wilderness.

One of the casualties of 9/11 has been conversation between Christians and Muslims, between Arabs and the West. In many ways, we have accepted the idea of the “clash of cultures” (see Q interview with Imam Feisel of the “Ground Zero Mosque”). The whole idea has problems: It is often portrayed as Christian versus Muslim, but the USA is not monolithic when it comes to faith ... we Americans are not all Christians. And, biblically, Christians are to love their enemies.

Two years ago in Memphis TN, a mosque bought property across the street from Heartsong UM Church. Pastor Steve Stone and the folks of the church determined from the beginning that Jesus expected them to love their neighbors. So, they put up a sign: “Heartsong Church welcomes Memphis Islamic Center to the neighborhood”. The congregations got to know each other, friendships developed. When mosque construction was behind schedule, the church welcomed their neighbors to use their space for Ramadan prayers for the whole month, and church members served as greeters. They did not minimize the significant theological differences between the Christian faith and Islam. They just believed that following Jesus means really loving our neighbors. And if the prophetic vision describes God and God’s salvation as coming from Teman and Paran, then we must not close the door to relationships with those who are “other”, who are unlike us, whose very presence could make us uncomfortable.

No wonder Habakkuk responds, “I hear, and I tremble (quake) within (belly, womb); my lips quiver (tingle) at the sound (voice)” (3.16). He desires salvation, but it is so OTHER. God shows up as Warrior and Storm, entirely out of our control. Salvation comes from the fringe, not from the center. God runs with the wrong crowd. No wonder Habakkuk quakes and quivers, no wonder that – in anticipation – he cries out “In wrath remember mercy” (3.2).

But this wild vision does something else for the prophet. Remember that he is facing calamity of his own, and calamity for his nation. And God is not promising an immediate salvation, a solution that makes me happy now. So, what do we do in the meantime? How do we deal with the interim between today and the day of salvation? In chapter 2, the LORD tells Habakkuk “the righteous live by faith” (2.4). We don’t get Habakkuk’s response until the end of chapter 3:

Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will exult in the God of my salvation (3.17-18).

That’s Habakkuk’s statement of faith. He chooses to rejoice in God even when there is no cause for joy in his life and country. He chooses to celebrate God’s salvation even though he is still waiting for it.

Resources:

Heschel, Abraham J. 1962. The Prophets: An Introduction, volume 1. New York: Harper & Row.

Hiebert, Theodore. 1996. The Book of Habakkuk: Introduction, Commentary, and Reflections. In The New Interpreter’s Bible, volume VII.

Gabe Lyons and Imam Feisel. “The Future of Muslim and Christian Relations in the West”. Conversation presentation at Q 2011.
http://www.qideas.org/video/the-christian-and-muslim-divide.aspx

Smietana, Bob. September/October 2011. “Peace Be Upon Them”. Sojourners Magazine, 40:9, 16.
http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=magazine.article&mode=printer_friendly&issue=soj1109&article=peace-be-upon-them

9/11

2011-09-09T15:48:00.000-04:00

In both services this Sunday we will take time to pray, with grief and hope, on the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attack. Check out stories of The United Methodist Church in response to 9/11. Pic is from a 2005 visit to Ground Zero, NYC.

Block Party 2011

2011-09-05T22:33:00.001-04:00

Postponed because of regional flooding.
Saturday, September 10, 2011

10:00 AM-1:00PM

Rain or Shine

(In case of rain, the event will be held indoors.)

Everything is FREE for children 12 and under

One FREE Back to School kit for every child 12 and under

Bounce House, Games, Crafts,

Face Painting, Food

Ball Walk

Kim’s Karate Demonstration

Pics from last year's fun (a cool day in mid-October).

Coin Drive

2011-09-05T20:29:00.000-04:00

Thanks to everyone for participating in our August Kids' Coin Drive for our children's mission partners - The United Methodist Children's Home in Mechanicsburg and Building Solid Foundations (books for school libraries in Apam, Ghana). We broke the wheelbarrow "bank"!

Dance

2011-09-05T20:27:00.000-04:00

It was great to have Lindsey share her gift of liturgical dance in worship with us this past Sunday! Thanks so much! Forgot my camera, so this is off the phone.

God and Geopolitics (1): The Wicked Surround the Righteous

2011-09-05T20:18:00.001-04:00

Psalm 37:1-11 (call to worship)
Habakkuk 1:1 - 2:5 (message focus)

I selected Habakkuk for this season – the approach of the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attack – because Habakkuk is dealing personally and theologically with a situation with some parallels to that of our nation. I say “some parallels” because every event and situation are unique. The theological questions he faces have something in common with the conversations about judgment, justice, revenge, the end of all things, the clash of cultures, grace, faith, and God that were and are part of our response to 9-11 and the continued war on terror. It even includes reference to an international debt crisis and employment and wage issues. To me, the most remarkable thing about biblical prophecy is not prediction of the future coming of Christ (which is admittedly amazing) but the ability to speak timeless truth. Today I am not going to draw all the parallels. I encourage you to take some time to read the three chapters of this book this week. Today, we’ll focus on Habakkuk’s dilemma, his crisis of faith in his own time.

We know nothing about Habakkuk the man. He is referred to in one other book, not in the Scripture, but that tells us nothing about him personally (New Oxford Annotated Bible introduction; Abraham J. Heschel). All we have is this book, and the book gives us nothing to locate it in history except the reference to the rise of the Chaldeans – in Babylon, modern Iraq – a reference that places Habakkuk in the southern kingdom of Judah. It opens with a dialogue, a conversation, between Habakkuk and the LORD, first the prophet speaking and then God responding – which we read this morning. It continues with five “woe’s”, traditional oracles of judgment. And, it concludes with a prayer in song form, clearly meant for use in worship. That final prayer-song will be our focus next week.

The dialogue reflects on the justice of God in an unjust world. It addresses the question, What if God uses evil people to mete out justice? Isn’t that inherently unjust? And that was one of the main reasons I connected with Habakkuk as I reflect back ten years to the events of the 9-11 attacks. I remember Christian religious leaders in our nation declaring that those attacks were the judgment of God upon our nation. Then, and now, I found the remarks, personally, offensive. And the fact that Osama bin Laden likewise viewed the attacks as the judgment of God? Well, that gives cause for pause. At this point, of course, the parallels break down. Habakkuk’s ministry took place 2600 years ago and the historical situation was quite different. Though the questions, the theological questions, the faith issues, have some overlap. We’ll focus on Habakkuk and his faith.

READ Habakkuk 1:1 - 2:5 with two voices.

How long? Habakkuk is shocked by the violence and injustice of his time. “How long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? Or cry to you, “Violence!” and you will not save?” (1.2). “The law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous – therefore judgment comes forth perverted” (1.4).

We read this in the paper almost every day. A pastor is convicted for “sexting” a teenage girl in the congregation. Another politician is caught with his pants down. A police officer gets hooked on coke. Party leaders are accused of systematically using public funds for political campaigns. A couple judges are accused of closing down the county youth detention center, funneling kids to private centers, and taking $2.6 million in kickbacks. Young people – children, really – are shot and are shooting others. “Road rage” and “going postal” enter our vocabulary. An armed man attacks children and a teacher at an Amish school.

“Judgment comes forth perverted.” And these things are all the more difficult when it is our cultural leaders, those who are supposed to represent our integrity, virtue, and values, who are so publically perverted.

But if Habakkuk is shocked by the violence and injustice in his own land, he is about to be stunned by God’s retort. “Look at the nations, and see! Be astonished! Be astounded!” (1.5). The Chaldeans? The instrument of God’s justice in the world? But even the LORD declares, “Their justice and dignity proceed from themselves” (1.7) and “Their own might is their god!” (1.11). We know of people like this, people who think they are exempt from the rules, people who really believe that they are exceptional because they are powerful. And an entire nation of prideful, powerful people who take pleasure in causing pain and suffering are to be God’s instrument of justice? Astonished, astounded? Indeed.

Why? Habakkuk responds with our question: “Why are you silent when the wicked swallow those more righteous than they?” (1.13). It is the age-old question based on the idea that all things must be accounted for in life, that we should and do get what we deserve, that our relative righteousness is our merit . . . a view of life and justice that is as entirely ignorant of the ways of God’s grace as it is of the mysteries of God’s justice. Here is a clue to the mysteries of Habakkuk, and to the mysteries of our big questions of global politics and local economics: Grace and Justice cannot be separated.

Habakkuk stations himself as a watchman, “to see what he [the LORD] will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint” (2.1). Note: the Hebrew text reads “what I will answer” while other ancient texts read “what he (the LORD) will answer”. The Hebrew reading fits best with the dialogical pattern of the text.

The LORD gives Habakkuk a vision, but Habakkuk does not give us the details. “It speaks of the end”, it is worth waiting for. The righteous are vindicated, the proud get their just desserts. Otherwise, just when we’d like to know the details of the program, Habakkuk is silent.

The church sign, from the era of a walking community, not visible at the speed of a car – or even a runner.

“Write the vision . . . so that a runner may read it” (2.2). BIG print is required. This is a road sign for God’s people in a hostile, violent, and unjust world. What’s on it? Not the details of the vision, but – like any bill board – the broad strokes: “The righteous [the just] live by their faith. . . . The arrogant do not endure” (2.4-5).

“The righteous live by their faith”? What does Habakkuk mean by that statement? We are much more familiar with the New Testament quoting this text and placing it in the context of personal salvation. Its location in the context of global justice – its original location! – throws us off. One dimension seems readily apparent: The righteous live by faith in God’s justice, even when there is so much evidence to the contrary, so much violence and perverted judgement in the world. We trust in God’s justice and wait for it, even if we have to wait to the end of days.

Another dimension – and the one that the New Testament was importing – is that we do NOT live by our own righteousness. That, of course, is what Habakkuk assumed would be just: “The wicked surround the righteous” (1.4). “Why are you silent when the wicked swallow those more righteous than they?” (1.13). To live by faith means that we trust not only in God to bring judgment, but in God to bring grace, because we cannot depend on being more righteous than our neighbor or our enemies.

This remains a very difficult thing today. I speak with many people who are disillusioned with the injustice and violence in the world and the moral inequity of good people who are struggling when the arrogant are apparently blessed. Despite our desire, you cannot have it both ways. If we want to trust in our own righteousness, in being “more righteous” than others, then we have to accept injustice in the world. If, however, we do not accept injustice, then we need to recognize our own contamination with injustice and live by faith in God and God’s grace.

This dialogue, this conversation, between Habakkuk and the LORD teaches us several things.

First, when we consider justice, we must allow for some matters to be settled at the end of days. “If it seems to tarry, wait for it” (2.3). This waiting is an expression of trust, of faith.
Second, God accepts what Habakkuk assumes, that justice (and judgment) is a manifestation of God. “The LORD has made himself known, he has executed judgment” (Psalm 9.16).
Third, when we envy the wicked, whether that is the envy of desire or of revenge, we must, as today’s psalm says “not fret” because it “leads only to evil” (Psalm 37.1-11). “The arrogant do not endure” (Habakkuk 2.5).
Fourth, we must live by faith, not by our own righteousness. Living by our own righteousness is the quickest route to pride, and “the arrogant do not endure”. We put our faith in the righteousness of God, the judgment and mercy, the grace and justice, poured out in and upon Jesus Christ on our behalf.

As it turns out, it is a good thing that Habakkuk doesn’t give us the details of his vision. If he had, we’d spend all our time dissecting that instead of paying attention to the large print on the bill board: “The righteous live by faith.”

The waiting in the text (“if it seems to tarry, wait for it”) is not passive or idle. It is LIVING, making choices, doing what is just and right, not giving in to the pervasive violence and selfishness that surrounds us. It is living, conscious that, in the end, God will overcome; justice will win out; the world will be transformed, made new, made right. It is living by faith, putting our trust in this God of justice, and joining God in victory, even now.

Habakkuk stations himself as a watchman, “to see what he [the LORD] will say to me, and what I will answer concerning my complaint” (2.1). We looked at what the LORD said, the message of the vision. But we do not hear – at least in this portion of the text – Habakkuk’s response. God’s message begs one of the prophet, and from us. Will we live by faith?

Resources:
Heschel, Abraham J. 1962. The Prophets: An Introduction, volume 1. New York: Harper & Row.

Confirmation Field Trip

2011-08-31T22:50:00.000-04:00

Our confirmands and mentors went on a "church history field trip" this past Saturday to Camp Curtin Memorial-Mitchell United Methodist Church in Harrisburg. We were delighted to hear from Rev. Bradley and Mrs. Davis about the story of the church - located on the site of the largest Civil War training ground, a Civil War hospital that served both the Blue and the Grey, and the story of the merging of an historically Anglo and historically African-American congregation. And, they are involved in some powerful ways in their community, including providing housing for homeless families.

Making Meaning (2): Timing Is Everything

2011-08-31T22:45:00.000-04:00

Mark 1:9-11 (moments with the children)

Ecclesiastes 3:1-15 (message focus)

The beautiful poetry of Ecclesiastes 3 invites us to consider the important questions of time and eternity. St. Augustine devotes 27 pages, Book 11 in my printed edition of his long-form prayer, The Confessions, to these very themes, “Time and Eternity”.

He writes:

In the eternal, nothing can pass away but the whole is present. . . . Who will hold the heart of man, so that it may stand still and see how steadfast eternity, neither future nor past, decrees times future and those past? (285)

What, then, is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I want to explain it to someone who does ask me, I do not know (287).

My mind is on fire to understand this most intricate riddle (294).

Most of the time, though, our focus is not on these kinds of philosophical questions. We’re focused on getting through the day – work, dinner, household chores, music lessons, sports practice. And, a small delay – an auto accident stalling traffic, a missing back-to-school form, the kids needing attention – throws everything off. We’re so focused on getting through the day that we fail to enjoy it.

Or, we’re obsessed with deadlines – the term paper, the quarterly financials, the newspaper. We’re so obsessed with deadlines that we fail to live.

Or, we anticipate being, if not elsewhere, then elsewhen. Maybe it is the future: Things go poorly and we wait “for the other shoe to drop”. Things go well and we can’t wait to do it again. I have a friend who tells me that whenever he is eating one meal, he is thinking about the next one. Maybe it is the past: I wish that things could be the way they “always” were – a sentimentality that Ecclesiastes calls “unwise” (7:10). C. S. Lewis, in his The Last Battle, describes Susan as being in a hurry to get to a certain age and then, once she reached that age, trying in vain to stay there as long as possible.

“Turn! Turn! Turn! (to Everything There Is a Season)”, by Pete Seeger

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time to every purpose, under Heaven

A time to be born, a time to die
A time to plant, a time to reap
A time to kill, a time to heal
A time to laugh, a time to weep

Welcome - Work - Wait

Welcome – Rhythm and Beauty: Ecclesiastes does not provide us a morose dropping of the “other shoe”. Ecclesiastes, as cynical as it is about human fate, and while it is certainly not syrupy sweet, does not drip with bitterness as it contemplates the times and seasons of human life. Instead, the ancient Teacher offers wisdom in the form of the rhythm of the seasons. We don’t control when winter comes, though we can be ready with shovels, salt, and a warm jacket. And, when winter comes, we can treasure the icicles hanging from the gutters, the sparkle of the snow after hardening over night, the cadence of scoop-toss down the driveway or walk. Insisting that it is not winter is counter productive. Living as if it is summer – turning on the air conditioning in the winter – is just plain stupid.

Likewise life. There is a time to be born and a time to die. There is a time to break down, and a time to build up. There is a time to mourn and a time to dance. We have zero control over those times, those seasons, and when they come into our lives. But we can learn to dance in rhythm (Davis, 184). “God has made everything beautiful in its time” (3:11). Unfortunately, some of our translations change the word beautiful to “suitable”, a shift in meaning that removes wonder and focuses instead on functionality. Functionality is good, but the wonder must not be overlooked. God has made everything beautiful in its time. Welcome it.

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time for every purpose, under Heaven

A time to build up, a time to break down
A time to dance, a time to mourn
A time to cast away stones, a time to gather stones together

Work – Word and Flesh: “It is God’s gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil. I know that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it” (3:13-14).

There are two interesting things about these verses. First of all, the work of human beings (which does not last) is placed along side the work of God (which endures). Second, the lasting work of God is described in terms familiar in the Jewish tradition, but not in relation to work. This phrasing shows up in Deuteronomy 4:2 and 12:32 in relation to the Torah (Davis, 184), the law, the covenant . . . God’s revelation, God’s Word: “You must neither add anything . . . nor take away anything” and “Do not add to it or take anything from it”.

John’s gospel describes Jesus as “God made flesh” (John 1:14). These lines from Ecclesiastes suggest that our work – though in itself it does not endure – our work has the potential of joining God in making Word into human Flesh, of bringing revelation to manifestation. We can’t control the times that come into our lives. We can’t do work that endures. As Ecclesiastes points out, there is always someone to come after us and mess it up (2:18-19). But when we work toward God – whether it is doing dishes or paving streets – we give flesh to Word.

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time to every purpose, under Heaven

A time of love, a time of hate
A time of war, a time of peace
A time you may embrace, a time to refrain from embracing

Wait – Time and Eternity: “God has put eternity in their hearts” (3:11). The translation of this phrase into English varies greatly. We have “eternity” and “a sense of past and future”. Well, which is it? The ancient Hebrew language did not have a word that corresponds directly to the English word “eternity”. This word, ‘olam, comes closest. It is a word for lots of time, time beyond calculating. It can refer to great antiquity – distant past, long dead, ancient hills – or to indefinite futurity – “for ever”, “everlasting arms”, “without end”, “redeemed at any time”, “perpetual reproach” (BDB Hebrew Lexicon). It is used in 3:14, “I know that whatever God does endures forever.”

We are locked in time, but eternity is in our hearts. We need to be, to some degree, outside of time. Augustine points out that measuring time necessitates being outside of it. How can you measure the past when it no longer exists? Unless, of course, you are able to step outside of time by means of memory. And, how can you anticipate the future when it does not yet exist? Unless, of course, you are able to step outside of time by means of expectation (The Confessions, Book 11 “Time and Eternity”, chapters 20-21, 26-28).

We are locked in time, but eternity is in our hearts. “God has done this so that we should stand in awe before him” (Ecclesiastes 3:14). The Biblical term for this is “wait”, “wait on the LORD”. It is not waiting, as in fidgeting in line at the grocery store behind a person who has 7 more items than are appropriate for the express line. It is waiting as in letting go of time and practicing trust. It is waiting in the present, not stuck in the past or the future, because “with you, today is eternity” (Augustine, 11.13.16, p 287). It is waiting that makes us conscious, not of how much we have to do and how little time we have to do it. No. This waiting makes us conscious of eternity and the presence of God (see T. S. Eliot, cited in Davis, 185). Only then do we discover that there is actually enough time for everything that is important in life. Because God has appointed a time, a season, for every matter.

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time for every purpose, under Heaven

A time to gain, a time to lose
A time to rend, a time to sew
A time of love, a time of hate
A time of peace, I swear it's not too late

T. S. Eliot writes,

Time past and time future
Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious is not to be in time
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden,
The moment in the arbour where the rain beat,
The moment in the draughty church at smokefall
Be remembered; involved with past and future
Only through time is time conquered.
(Four Quartets, cited in Davis, 185)

Today we remember and celebrate Holy Baptism. It is one of those special and powerful moments in which eternity overlaps in the present in an intense and personal way. It is an opportunity for each of us to say “Yes” to the presence/present of God in Jesus Christ.

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time for every purpose, under Heaven
. . . I swear it's not too late
Resources:
Ellen Davis. 2000. Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs, Westminster Bible Companion. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press.

Augustine. Translated by John K. Ryan. 1960. The Confessions. New York: Image, Doubleday, Bantam.

Pete Seeger, “Turn! Turn! Turn! (to Everything There Is a Season)”

Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Lexicon. (Electronic version integrated into Hermeneutika’s BibleWorks).

Dinner Church

2011-08-31T22:39:00.000-04:00

Enjoyed our final - of two - dinner church experiences scheduled on Sunday evening August 21. Thanks to Khris for handling the meal prep and to Michael for leading musically!

Making Meaning (1): Chasing Wind

2011-08-26T12:00:00.000-04:00

08/21/2011 Bethany (Holy Communion)
John 3 (moments with the children)
Ecclesiastes 1:1-14 (message focus)

I love Ecclesiastes. I’ve turned to it – for years – when I’ve felt depressed. And, no, that’s not why we’re looking at it today; I set this focus months ago during study retreat. But a depressed or sad person reading this book? It seems counter-intuitive; the book is such a downer. Even ancient rabbis weren’t sure whether this book should be included in the Bible at all (Davis, 159). So, I appreciated the note by one of the scholars, Ellen Davis, who reports that one of her students, who suffers from clinical depression, says that Ecclesiastes is like “slipping into a warm bath” (Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs, Westminster Bible Companion, 2000, Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, p 159).

It is full of cynicism about life and meaning. Death is the ultimate leveler, and death is the end – the writer imagines no life after death, no resurrection, no ultimate justice. Since fools and wise men both die, since the righteous and the wicked likewise perish, neither path is superior, both are pointless, “vanity of vanities”, “empty of empties”, a “chasing after wind”. Since death is the end, you might as well find some way to enjoy life, to eat, drink, and be merry, because it is the “gift of God”. Or, to put it in the cynical vision of Ecclesiastes, it’s the best God has to give. Or in the words of Jack Nicholson in the movie, “as good as it gets”, so go with that (Ecclesiastes 2:24-26, 3:19, 5:18-20, 8:14-15, 9:7-10).

I love a joke from Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar: A man travels across the world to meet the wisest man in the world, a guru in India. After many trials he finally finds this man in his mountain top retreat and asks him his pressing question: “What is the meaning of life?” The guru’s response, “A teacup.” “A teacup?” “Well, it’s not everyone’s cup of tea.”

I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind (Ecc 1.14).

How many roads must a man walk down before you call him a man?
How many seas must a white dove sail before she can sleep in the sand?
How many times must the cannon balls fly before they are forever banned?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Despite all the cynicism, the book contains its own contradictions. It is a well written text, poetic and philosophic, yet he writes, “Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh” (12:12). He despairs that “there is no enduring remembrance of the wise or of fools, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten” (2:16), yet – through this book – the writer is remembered for over two thousand years. (See Davis, p 160.)

It’s a clue that even the cynicism of Ecclesiastes, an ancient deconstructionist, like postmodern deconstruction, ultimately deconstructs itself. And, then what?

And, the Teacher is clear-eyed about evil. People are oppressed, and no one comforts them. Oppressors have power, and face no justice (4:1-3). People work hard, but it is only out of envy (4:4). We work in order to eat, but our “appetite is not satisfied” (6:7). Those who live on dreams and hope find that more dreams only bring more burdens and worries (5:3). Others are wistful for the past, for the golden days, but Ecclesiastes concludes that this is “not from wisdom” (7:10). He despairs that so much of what happens in life seems random: “Time and chance happen to all” (9:11). And he describes this insufferable evil: “The same fate comes to everyone” (9:3); humans die, just like animals (3:19)!

Even when he tells us “Remember your creator in the days of your youth” (12:1) he tells us to do so before we die – and uses over 15 metaphors to refer to aging and death, concluding, as usual: “Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher, all is vanity” (12:8).

All is vanity . . . and a chasing after wind.

How many years can a mountain exist before it’s washed to the sea?
How many years can some people exist before they’re allowed to be free?
How many times can a man turn his head
and pretend that he just doesn’t see?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

I love Ecclesiastes, what Eugene Peterson (Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work, 1980, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans) describes as a book of “nay-saying”. There’s no room for pious talk that is disconnected from real life. There’s no room for religion that ignores reality and truth. And there’s no space for a spirituality that is all about me – my vision of justice, my idea of what is right, my thoughts on goodness and beauty and truth, my search for answers, my need for a miracle. It is a book that humbles us, that strips away all the bad religion that we’d rather cling to and directs us to God and God alone . . . just because God is God, not for answers, not for miracles. This work of “nay-saying” is paired in Jewish worship with the Feast of Tabernacles, a feast of plenty, celebration, and a great big YES (Peterson, 162). Before we get too excited about what has happened to us, about what God has done for us, let’s not forget that it is not about us at all.

When we come to the Table today, we come to the cross of Jesus, his body and blood given for us. This is no statement about us, our goodness, how much we deserve this, how our religion has prepared us for this moment. In fact, we don’t deserve grace. This is about Jesus, not us. Jesus joined us in our fate. He died, just like the animals, just like the little dead bird I saw on the East Maple Street sidewalk yesterday.

How many times must a man look up before he can see the sky?
How many ears must one man have before he can hear people cry?
How many deaths will it take till he knows that too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Back in 1997, Bob Dylan performed at a Catholic church congress. Pope John Paul II did what I want to do today (Wikipedia, “Blowin’ in the Wind”). He put Dylan’s song in conversation with John’s gospel, with Jesus’ statement, “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8). And, to admittedly deconstruct the deconstructionist Ecclesiastes, I want to put this in conversation with Ecclesiastes. “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity, a chasing after wind.” In both Hebrew and Greek, the languages of Ecclesiastes and John, the word for wind is the same as the word for spirit and for breath. Jesus is clearly having fun with some word play. Ecclesiastes is too serious for that. But my suggestion is that once we get over ourselves and all the empty things, the vain things, we obsess about and focus on, we just might be ready to be filled with the wind of God. Chasing wind won’t get us there, but when we discover that we are empty, we just might be ready to be filled.

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Resources:
Ellen Davis. 2000. Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs, Westminster Bible Companion. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press.

Eugene Peterson. 1980. Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans.

Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein. 2007. Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar: Learning Philosophy Through Jokes. Abrams Image.

Bob Dylan. 1962. “Blowin’ in the Wind”.

Wikipedia, “Blowin’ in the Wind”. 2011-08-20.

Formation

2011-08-19T09:23:00.000-04:00

Of all the things that contribute to my formation as a disciple of Jesus Christ, being part of a smaller group is one of the most significant. Here at Bethany, we talk about discipleship in the overlapping spheres of “worship, community, and mission”. In smaller groups, we live in Christian community and grow together in the likeness of Jesus. We have lots of opportunities to do this: Sunday School (soon to launch the fall season), the Cottage Bible Study, men’s lunch or breakfast groups, and evening home groups (soon to launch an additional group this fall). A couple groups that I am connected with have been reading from the Bible’s wisdom tradition, a lunch group from Proverbs and a breakfast group in James. There’s plenty of thematic overlap.

On guarding our speech:

When words are many,
transgression is not lacking,
but the prudent are restrained in speech
Proverbs 10:19

The tongue is a fire . . . a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
James 3:6, 8

On anger:

Fools show their anger at once,
but the prudent ignore an insult.
Proverbs 12:16

Your anger does not produce God’s righteousness.
James 1:20

And, from James, on both themes:

Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.
James 1:19

The Scripture is a living text in which we hear God speak today. I encourage you to make plans to be part of one of our smaller groups this fall.

Turns of Phrase

2011-08-17T23:19:00.000-04:00

While away on our long weekend, Robin and I read from G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown mystery tales. It is our first foray into the writings of this distinguished "man of letters" a century ago in England. A couple remarkable sentences:

The moon with her scimitar had now ripped up and rolled away all the storm-wrack ("The Secret Garden").

The menu . . . was written in a sort of super-French employed by cooks, but quite unintelligible to Frenchmen ("The Queer Feet").

He had never done anything - not even anything wrong ("The Queer Feet").

Refreshment

2011-08-16T18:18:00.001-04:00

Robin and I enjoyed a wonderful long weekend away at the shore. Thanks to Shirley and Chris for preaching and to our staff for their great work! (In the second pic, a horse is centered in the distance ... visible when you view the larger file.)

Lasting Legacy: Kids, Moms, and Dads

2011-08-09T11:44:00.000-04:00

Psalm 127 (call to worship)

2 Kings 2:1-15 (moments with the children)
Deuteronomy 6:1-13 (message focus)

Read an article this week on the civil disobedience of Israeli women who bring Palestinian women out of the occupied territory so they can swim in the Mediterranean Sea. Despite living only an hour from the shore, these Palestinian women could not otherwise cross the security border and had never seen the sea. The inspiration of these Israeli women? Rosa Parks and her leadership in the Montgomery bus boycott. And where did the inspiration of the Montgomery bus boycott come from? Martin Luther King, Jr., a pastor in the community, learned a lot about civil disobedience from Gandhi. And, Gandhi read the gospels and modeled many aspects of his live on Jesus. That’s quite a legacy.

The Scripture is full of legacy stories and legacy training, though – as I mentioned last week – not a ton on parenting (at least not in the categories in which we are familiar with discussing parenting). Last week, we explored the parent-child attachment with the basic relational guidance sketched out in the Scripture. This week, we look at lasting legacy. For those of us who have children, that work of crafting a legacy begins in the relationships at home, begins with our children. For all of us, though, this is an important consideration. We each have a desire to “make a difference” in the world, the workplace, the kids’ sports program, the flower bed. And, it is little things that make a difference, not frenzied effort, over work, or noses to grindstones:

It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
for he gives sleep to his beloved.
Psalm 127:2

If you see me as I am being taken from you it will be granted.
2 Kings 2:10

And, swimming in the sea ...

And, a simple thing that creates a lasting legacy for families: A story by Eugene Peterson (translator of The Message Bible and a church planter and pastor in Bel Air MD), told in his memoir, The Pastor: He writes of his wife, Jan, being asked to speak at an event in Texas. During the discussion, she was asked, ‘“Do you have any pearls of wisdom that you can give us for raising our children?” Her answer: “Have a family meal every evening”’ (2011, p 195).

With each couple, as we prepare for a wedding, I get around to talking about an article I read years ago ... The behavior that correlates with long term relationships is the greeting and departing kiss. Small things make a big difference.

One of the great passages on creating a lasting legacy is in Deuteronomy 6. Deuteronomy is Moses’ “swan song”, his last sermon before his death. That’s legacy time. He provides here the center piece for daily life in the Jewish tradition – note the focus here is on daily life, not weekly worship, but the household and the workplace. That’s where legacy is built. You want a spiritual legacy for your family? Bringing them to church is important, but living the faith at home and at work and at the dinner table, and talking about it with the kids, is absolutely critical.

Deuteronomy 6:4 is the traditional “Shema”, the first and last prayer of the day for an observant Jew:

Shema, Y’Israel, Adonai ...
Hear, O Israel, the LORD your God, the LORD is one [LORD alone].

The next verse (6:5) is the central command in all the Scripture:

And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might.

heart (lavav) - inner self, mind/memory; the centered and thinking self
soul (nephesh) - seat of emotion; the passionate self
strength (m’od) - muchness; the energized self

Talk - recite them, talk about them at home, on the way, lying down, getting up. This is not talking about commands, this is talking about love, about loving God and being loved by God. There is no abstraction here, no idle theology – just love, love stories. I’m so grateful that there is a new bud on the hibiscus. The heavy rain and wind of last week broke off all the buds and blossoms, and I thought we were done for the year. Thanks, God. The other day, in conversation with some other folks, I was struck by the gift of forgiveness that is our in Jesus. Do you ever keep a “scorecard”, a record, of the things others have done that hurt you? Has anyone ever kept a scorecard on you, brining up to you the things you “always do”, not letting you get a chance at a fresh start? The scorecard against us was nailed to the cross along with Jesus, because he loves us and forgives.

Write - Robin and I, while translating Greek, ... “Eye Heart U”
doorposts - measuring kids height
- let the Scripture measure us, cause us to stand up tall
- bringing everything into alignment, reinforcing, not detracting

This “writing” is not about the text but about the love. A life full of love for God, full of God’s love for us. For Moses’ swan song, he urges us to be lover and beloved, lover of God and beloved of God. That reality can structure our day, be our first and last prayer. “I love you, Jesus.” And, listening, hear him say, “I love you.”

When the day comes that I die and my family gathers to tell stories with the pastor, I expect they’ll say something about loving soccer, gardening, cooking. But I hope they will describe me in terms of my greatest loves – them and Jesus. That’s what I want as my legacy. As Paul writes, in his poem-hymn on love, “Three things remain: Faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13).

Resources:

Israeli and Palestinian women - story in “God’s Politics” (a blog):
http://blog.sojo.net/2011/08/04/inspired-by-rosa-parks-israeli-and-palestinian-women-take-a-swim/

Eugene Peterson, 2011, The Pastor: A Memoir, New York: HarperOne (Harper Collins).

Dinner Church

2011-08-02T14:05:00.000-04:00

We had our first Dinner Church experience on Sunday night. Our text was Genesis 32:22-32, Jacob wrestling with the LORD and walking away blessed and wounded. It ends with the tradition of not eating meat around that portion of the hip which corresponds to the location of Jacob's injury, his pain. As I reflected, in our group reflection process, on what God was saying to me . . . I heard the need to look at pain in my past with fresh eyes, to look for the presence of God where I may not expect to find it, and to find in that pain a memory of God's touch.

Then, on Monday, while reading in Eugene Peterson's memoir, The Pastor, I came across a poem he wrote during a time of pain in his own life:

Flash floods of tears, torrents of them,
Erode cruel canyons, exposing
Long forgotten strata of life
Laid down in the peaceful decades:
A badlands beauty. The same sun
That decorates each day with colors
From arroyos and mesas, also shows
Every old scar and cut of lament.
Weeping washes the wounds clean
And leaves them to heal, which always
Takes an age or two. No pain
Is ugly in past tense. Under
The Mercy every hurt is a fossil
Link in the great chain of becoming.
Pick and shovel prayers often
Turn them up in valleys of death.

(2011, pp 206-207, New York: HarperOne)

Trust versus Mistrust: Kids, Moms, and Dads

2011-08-02T13:56:00.000-04:00

Ezekiel 18:2-4

Ephesians 6:1-4

Grandma’s joke:
The 10 year old butterfly collector
Bookstore purchase: How to be a good Moth-er

When I turn to the Bible for texts focusing on parenting, I come up short, a little like the young man looking for butterfly advice in a book on being a “mother”. The list is very short, and it seems to include a number of difficulties, like the instruction to kill (by throwing stones) any children who are disrespectful or disobedient to their parents (Deuteronomy 21:18-21). There’s no record of that happening. Maybe the instruction was a way to say: “Solve your own household problems out of court.” Anyone here ever been disobedient or disrespectful to parents?

So much of the conversations around parenting (and to all of us who are someone’s child – the conversations around adjusting as adults to what we experienced as kids) have very few, if any, connections to Scripture.

Do you let your child cry herself to sleep, or do you pick her up when she cries? We received some very definite and authoritative advice on this question, and it didn’t work one bit. And there isn’t any advice in Scripture on this one.

We hear a lot today about age-appropriate toys, games, books, movies, and even discipline. What kind of consequence is appropriate to permit? You cross the street holding the hand of your five year old, but you give your 18 year old a license to drive a car. Somehow, in the intervening years they are supposed to acquire not just the physical and technical skills to drive a car, but the ability to anticipate what others will do on the road – including some downright crazy maneuvers – and the ability to separate risks. If we never stop hand holding, they will never learn. But the Bible gives us no concrete guidelines for age-appropriate processes. In the ancient culture of the Biblical world, adolescence didn’t even exist. You were a child or an adult; this in-between experience of adolescence is fairly new in human culture.

When it comes to child development, the Bible has one small text – the only one that I have found – that stands out. Luke 2:52: “Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and people”.

When it comes to developmental psychology, of which I am far from an expert, I appreciate the first stage articulated by Erik Erikson, “Basic Trust versus Mistrust”. He places it in infancy, when we are figuring out whether or not we can trust our caregivers to be reliable. When dad leaves the room, has he disappeared forever? Will he ever be back? I found this really peculiar as a parent. So, I’d duck out of a room, wait for the kid to cry, step back in and the crying would stop, then I’d step out again . . . . I was just experimenting, trying to figure this thing out, not trying to give my kid a complex.

What is important, from the developmental perspective, is the development of a healthy parent-child attachment that can deal well with the anxiety of separation, that can live in hope.

While the Scripture doesn’t address many of the specific questions raised by parents today, at least not directly, it does address the parent-child attachment (which we’ll look at today) and leaving a legacy (which we’ll look at next week). On attachment, the Bible makes it clear to parents that

it is not all about me (the parent)
it is about children becoming independent actors, independently responsible

It is not all about me
Little House on the Prairie, “whose daughter is she now?”

As parents, it is too easy to fall into the trap of validating our selves as parents and as people through the success of our kids. If the kids don’t succeed, then we have failed. That’s a huge burden to put on our kids! And, it perverts God’s design for the family. As parents, it is far too easy to view our children as little “mini-me’s” and to overlook their unique identity. Our kids are part of us, and they are NOT us. Parenting children is not about giving them what we would have wanted as a kid, but about giving them what they uniquely need.

Children obey your parents in the Lord. This is about God, not about me as parent. If it was about me, then my whims and wishes would be paramount, and I would be free to provoke my children, to demand without reason. But, no, the text tells us, “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:1-4). It is not about me, but about God. And the training, discipline, discipleship, I offer is not so that my children follow in my footsteps but so that they follow Jesus.

It’s about children becoming independent actors, responsible
“The parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge” (Ezekiel 18:2-4). In experience, the proverb shows its basic truth. It effectively conveys reality. Addiction, poverty, diabetes, heart disease, abuse, academic and professional success – all these things seem to run in families. But this is where the value of this proverb ends. It is not a proverb about accountability and responsibility. It is a proverb about observed reality, about tough things that run in families.

The truth about accountability and responsibility, though, is that each of us are independent actors, independent moral agents. On the day of reckoning, my children will be responsible for their choices and I will be responsible for mine. But, no matter how much I love my kids, I will not be responsible for theirs.

And again, it is not all about me.

On attachment, the Bible makes it clear to children (all of us) that

it is not all about our parents
it is about me taking responsibility for my life

It is far too easy, in adolescence particularly, to be adversarial with our parents, sometimes just because we feel like it, sometimes because our parents say or do something stupid. (As a parent, I can admit to quite a few stupid things.) When the Scripture says, “Obey your parents in the Lord,” the point is not that obedience and honor is generally due to parents because they are always honorable (we aren’t) or because they are parents and they said so (I wish!). Obedience and honor to parents is supposed to be part of our devotion to God.

Now, it is important to note that some parents are abusive. The Scripture makes very clear that abuse of children not only breaks God’s heart; it incites God’s wrath. In those cases, the parent has broken the covenant, a covenant designed to include mutual honor.

As adults, still adjusting to our childhood, whether in jest or in truth, we’ll talk about the investment we’ve made in therapy to get over, to recover from, what our parents did. Our parents do have a powerful role in making us who we are, but becoming an adult is becoming responsible for our lives, responsible for our choices. Hopefully, we can receive the best of what our parents have to offer us and leave some of the baggage of family history behind. (That’s what I’m hoping for my own kids.)

This personal responsibility is a big deal. The prophet says that we don’t have to live out the consequences of our parents’ bad choices; we don’t have to inherit addiction or abuse. That is wonderful, freeing news. But this responsibility is also a bit terrifying: “It is only the person who sins that shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4).

There is One who has taken accountability and responsibility for us, One who is uniquely qualified to do so, Jesus Christ the Righteous. Today, we are invited to attach ourselves to him, to put our trust in him. (Holy Communion)

Hol-e

2011-07-30T18:41:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Steve and to Zeigler Concrete for helping us fill our hole in the parking lot!

Children

2011-07-28T14:50:00.001-04:00

My child, do not forget my teaching,
but let your heart keep my commandments;
for length of days and years of life
and abundant welfare they will give you.
Proverbs 3:1-2

We had a wonderful week of Vacation Bible School! Thanks to Laura and Bob for coordinating, thanks to everyone who served during the week, thanks to all who prayed, thanks to all who cared for young children at home, thanks to all who gave toward the Mission Central project!
We believe that kids are central to what God is “up to” in the world. We believe that children have so much to give and so much to teach. We believe that caring for Jesus’ little ones is caring for Jesus.

And, we believe that the Word of God in all its wisdom will make a practical difference in our lives, in the lives of children, in the life of our entire community. We believe that fathers, mothers, grandfathers, grandmothers, have valuable gifts and a priceless legacy to share with the coming generations. We believe that, as the body of Christ and the people of God, we are called to transform our world – starting with our community – with the grace of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

There’s lots ahead for children and families. Contact Laura, our children’s ministry director, for information or to help in the ministry.

Vacation Bible School presentation

2011-07-27T23:43:00.001-04:00

Thanks to those who helped out with the breakfast reception; to everyone for the wonderful hospitality; to Gregg for leading music; and to everybody else for their prayers, serving, and support!