Thoughts and Ruminations

Sunday, December 4th, 2011 Vineyard Central Church Norwood, OH

Main passages: Isaiah 40:1-11 Psalm 85:1-13 (though the RCL suggests Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13, which I make an object lesson in the sermon)

I think the best place to begin today is with Isaiah 40, to do the best we can to walk into the world of the author, to observe, listen, and consider what we may encounter.

As obvious as it must sound, the first thing we notice is that this is Isaiah 40.
If we sat down and read the Book of Isaiah from beginning to end in one sitting, we’d notice there is a distinct difference in tone between chapters 1-39, and chapter 40 on. The first 39 chapters give a strong message of Israel’s unfaithfulness, unwillingness to follow the way of God. The prophet reminds them multiple times that this has not gone unnoticed by God. He uses the voice of God to say piercing things,

“’I reared children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its master, the donkey its owner’s manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.’ Woe to the sinful nation, a people whose guilt is great, a brood of evildoers, children given to corruption! They have forsaken the LORD; they have spurned the Holy One of Israel and turned their backs on him.”

The first 39 chapters read as a testament of the prophet using every literary device, every means of persuasion possible in an attempt to bring Israel to their collective knees, to consider their way of life, to repent, and to live differently. Along the way, a very clear portrait of God emerges that is uncomfortable and necessary for Israel to hear; and uncomfortable and necessary for us to hear today along with them.

God is not aloof, is not ignorant of what is going on. God has been patient for a very long time, hoping (desperately so), that the people he redeemed would turn back. But eventually, because God loves them, because God has called them to be a light to the nations, his anger boils over and he shatters their society, drives them into exile at great loss of life, loss of dignity, great cost. God does this, and he does this because he loves them.

So this is the immediate context we hear Isaiah 40 in today. And because the tone is so different and the way the narrator talks about God’s judgment in the past tense, longing for restoration, most biblical scholars believe Isaiah 40-55 were written about a hundred years later than the first 39 chapters. This was a common practice in the Jewish community, to continue the tradition of a prophet, to write in their name, with the community affirming the words over time as valid and truthful.

And so, Isaiah 40 gives a message of hope, “Comfort, comfort my people…speak tenderly to Jerusalem, that she has served her term, that her penalty is paid.”

The prophet uses strong language here to give his hearers hope. “Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain.”

This is Hebrew apocalyptic language. It’s used time and time again in the Scriptures. “The heavenly bodies will be shaken, the sun darkened, the moon turned to blood,” one passage says. “See, I will create new heavens and a new earth,” another passage says. “The wolf will live with the lamb,” says another. The writers don’t actually mean that God hates mountains and valleys and wants everything level, don’t actually mean that the sun will cease to exist, or the moon drip with blood. They don’t mean that God’s going to throw the universe in the trash and start over from scratch.  And they don’t mean that wolves are going to suddenly cuddle with cute little soft lambs.

All of those passages are the Hebrew way of saying, “God’s going to do something big again. God is going to make things right. The powerful will recognize their relationship with the weak, and they will live in community again. God will make things right.”

The prophet continues: “All people are like grass, and all human faithfulness is like the flowers of the field…the grass withers, the flower fades. (but the word of our God will stand forever)”

These words remind the hearers of their mortality, and raise awareness of how quickly we forget the restoration of God and return to our old ways that we find more comfortable. “So remember that you are like grass, here today and gone tomorrow,” the prophet reminds us.  And our faithfulness, while beautiful and full of sweet aroma like the flowers of the field, is not the center of reality.  The strength of human effort is downplayed. But the intent is NOT to empty the possibility of human faithfulness, to diminish the impact of serving God. No, the intent is to exalt God, to give glory to the eternal God, which draws us to fall to our knees, adore Him, and confess over and over again, “God, you know better than we do how we were created to live. We are confused, our minds and hearts are darkened, twisted by selfishness and rebellion.”

With this emphasis established, the writer can shift back again to comfort, “Bring good news,” he says. Say to the towns of Judah, “Here is your God!” See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power, and his arm rules for him…he tends his flock like a shepherd: he gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those who have young.”

God has been wrathful and condemning in his great love, and God will be gentle and compassionate in his great love.

That is a significant lesson that the Israelite people needed to hear, and we need to hear in our day as well. It is a reminder of the full love of God, which includes the full spectrum from the most gentle, affirming touch all the way to ripping entire societies apart in their unfaithfulness; death, pain, and the displacement of millions of people.

Our second lectionary passage of the day is an important object lesson that brings this issue into full focus. So if you would turn to Psalm 85 with me.

I want to say two things here about the lectionary with this being one of the readings for the day. First, I love the sense of unity felt in the use of the lectionary, knowing that millions of brothers and sisters are reading the same passages and praying together with the same themes. I love that as the Earth turns and we all experience Sunday over a 24 hour period, we are reading, praying, and thinking together on similar themes. This is a great gift. But I feel extremely frustrated at times with the lectionary because those who set it up have a knack for seeking out comforting passages and omitting, avoiding sharper passages. Sometimes, it’s hard to read their intent, other times, I’m sure I read into their selections something that isn’t there, and other times, like today with Psalm 85, it is SO OBVIOUS.

(Make a quick skim read of the Psalm and take a guess at what the Lectionary folks omitted)

When manipulating the passages so obviously like this, one has to ask, what is their purpose? I had seen this pattern before in the Lectionary and wondered when it was brought together; who shaped the passages for reading? Is this pattern several hundred years old? I wasn’t surprised to find after a bit of research that the Revised Common Lectionary was brought together in 1994. That date is telling. I also wasn’t surprised to find that the RCL was an ecumenical effort (Catholic and a variety of Protestant communions), and one of the markers of ecumenical works tends to be an appeal to the lowest common denominator that everyone can agree on.

Maybe more important, though, is the wider issue of belief. One of the most distinct beliefs across our society that’s been in vogue for at least the last 75 years or so is that if God loves you, he would never do anything that brings you pain, would never hurt you. And if that was the Biblical message, that would be well and good. But it’s not.  The Biblical message is that God loves us deeply, relentlessly, desperately, and that God will stop at nothing to bring about his kingdom.

It also seems to me that the most comfortable people of the world are the ones who love to read the Jeremiah 29:11s of the Scriptures over and over again. This also fits with the shapers of the RCL being Western, powerful people. Yet those in the world without power, being crushed, used by wealthy empires to maintain their way of life; it is those people who cling to passages on God’s judgment on sin. Why? Because those passages give them an outlet for their pain, gives them questions they can ask they didn’t know they had, channel their frustration to show them how to pray so they don’t become embittered and hopeless.

We need this reminder most here in Advent. Because the people on the eve of Jesus’ birth were NOT comfortable. They were occupied by the most powerful military in the world, taxed into the ground, with the system of taxation carried out by wealthy Hebrew persons grinding their fellow citizens into the ground. The people of Israel were groaning, suffering, longing, and Jesus’ mother Mary (one of those marginalized people) didn’t offer words of consolation to comfortable people:

“He has performed mighty deeds with his arm;
he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
He has brought down rulers from their thrones
but has lifted up the humble.
He has filled the hungry with good things
but has sent the rich away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
remembering to be merciful
to Abraham and his descendants forever,
just as he promised our ancestors.”

Luke 1:51-55

So, I want to emphasize how desperately we need to hear the part in Psalm 85 that the Lectionary-shapers omitted. It is a voice of pleading, of weeping, of desperate humility, of throwing oneself at the feet of God, of looking unseemly, not-together.

“Restore us again, God our Savior, and put away your displeasure toward us. Will you prolong your anger through all generations? Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you?”

How does the psalmist, speaking for Israel, plan to respond to God? “I will listen to what God the Lord says; he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants- but let them not turn to folly.” Another way to say that last sentence is “God promises peace to his people- his faithful servants- IF they do not turn to folly.” Surely his salvation is near to those who fear him. There is much wrapped up in those two last sentences.

When God’s people fear him, value him, cherish his authority and voice above all other voices, obey and act on that voice, and do it together; wonderful things result.

And then comes this beautiful image, “Love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. The LORD will indeed give what is good.”

There’s a conversation that often comes to mind for me when thinking of the tensions described above. It involves one of my heroes, Clarence Jordan, co-founder of Koinonia Farm in Georgia, in conversation with his brother, Robert. Clarence approached his brother Robert Jordan (later a state senator and justice of the Georgia Supreme Court) to ask him to legally represent Koinonia Farm. Robert responded to Clarence’s request:

“Clarence, I can’t do that. You know my political aspirations. Why, if I represented you, I might lost my job, my house, everything I’ve got.”

“We might lose everything too, Bob.” Clarence said.

“But it’s different for you,” Robert responded.

“Why is it different?” Clarence said. “I remember, it seems to me, that you and I joined the church the same Sunday, as boys. I expect when we came forward the preacher asked me about the same question he did you. He asked me, ‘Do you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior?’ And I said, ‘Yes. What did you say?’

“I follow Jesus, Clarence, up to a point.”

“Could that point by any chance be- the cross?”

“That’s right. I follow him to the cross, but not ON the cross. I’m not getting myself crucified.”

“Then I don’t believe you’re a disciple. You’re an admirer of Jesus, but not a disciple of his. I think you ought to go back to the church you belong to, and tell them you’re an admirer not a disciple.”

“Well, now,” Robert said defensively, “if everyone who felt like I do did that, we wouldn’t HAVE a church would we?”

“The question,” Clarence said, “is, Do you have a church?”

So, like Clarence and Robert, we are presented with a couple options in our life. Do we choose a genteel Christianity that says all the right things, that goes out of our way to read comforting passages that avoid responsibility and reinforce our way of life, that stops short of a willingness to give of ourselves with all of who we are? Or do we choose a Christianity that follows Jesus and obeys him, willing to be stretched, and willing to be broken, willing to care enough about the brokenness of the world that we are driven to our knees in prayer?

This world is very, very sick; but SO full of potential for healing and joy.

May we turn our gaze off ourselves and towards our Creator.
May we have the courage to come to terms with and embrace the full spectrum of God’s love.
May we be shaped by this love to pour our lives out in service to God, to play a role in the healing of God’s world.

Amen.

“Indy!  No!”

I utter this phrase multiple times a day.  Indy is our cat.  Indy does not like boundaries.  Indy needs boundaries (and continual reinforcement of them), so he can interact with our environment in healthy ways.

I have seen households where cats are not given strong, reinforced boundaries, and I’ve seen households where cats who previously had boundaries had those boundaries relaxed, and I’ve seen cats in the latter regress in behavior back to a selfish baseline that existed pre-discipline.  A chair in our living room bears battle scars from the training process for our Indy.

“Indy!  No!”

I reinforced Indy’s boundaries this morning as he tried to drink the water I had just given to our basil plant.  Today, I did not feel the need to give a more strong quick reminder through a bump on his nose or a stinging of his backside.  He got the message right away today, and his look of guilt showed me he knew what he was doing.  Other days, after a verbal rebuke, he gets an insolent “I’m going to do whatever I want right now look” and proceeds to not care what we say.  He cares pretty quickly when the left hand of justice reaches for the spray bottle of water or reaches out to spank.

Today, like other days recently, my thoughts shifted to reflecting parenting afterwards (a wife 14 weeks pregnant with an already proportional little human being inside will do that to you).  I quickly recalled my knowledge of children, which is fairly extensive, and a reminder that you don’t have to be a parent to have a deep enough experience with children to have something to say about their capacity to know and understand right and wrong, self-giving and selfishness.

You see, children (and adults too) are more like our dear little Indy than we would like to confess.  We like to think human beings are a higher order being than other animals, that we have a greater natural capacity to know what is good and to choose it.  For a well-trained child or adult, this is certainly true, being made in the image of God and all.  But a child who has not received rigorous, intentional, loving discipline is nearly exactly like our cat. They don’t know what is healthy or unhealthy, they need to be reminded that “Dirt water is not sanitary, and the water is intended for the basil and not for you, thankyouverymuch.”

Children without boundaries strongly reinforced look like the vast majority of people in our culture; drifting aimlessly through life, driven primarily by their own desires and curiosity; which upon very basic reflection are driven in large part by selfishness.

I’d like to spend a little time below showing how my perspective is shaped by my Christian commitment because I think it is of vital, central importance to understanding human beings and specifically children.

Scripturally, we are told that humans are created by God, in God’s image, and therefore because our Creator is so innovative and compassionate and intentional, we have a built-in capacity to know what is good and eventually to run towards it.  This is our created identity, which we should identify as an identity built into humanity a long, long time ago.

Humanity since our creation has displayed, however, a history of desire, of innovation, of creative capacity gone amuck.  We have taken the powerful created identity given to us and twisted it to serve our purposes, which are bent toward selfishness.  As a result, generation after generation after generation for millenia have built human societies, religions, and perspectives of the world that have enshrined greed, selfishness, and self-determination as virtues to be pursued, not vices to be avoided.  Geneticists tell us that our genetic heritage as people is, yes, relatively stable, but also yes, deeply impacted by environmental conditions and social pressures.  The most cutting edge geneticists today suggest that the impact of the surrounding environment on the human organism are deep enough that they penetrate even into the building blocks of our genetic code.  To reinforce, our environment doesn’t just affect how different parts of our genetic code express themselves, our environment changes our genetic code.  This happens normally over multiple generations, yes, but this does not make this reality any less real or meaningful.  This research is interesting because it reveals a significant parallel between genetics and Scriptural teaching.  Practically, the upshot is the following.  The Scriptures teach of a great rebellion of humanity against our Creator.  This great rebellion has been so deeply embodied and pursued that the “natural” state of humanity is now rebellious, dark, and selfish.  The Apostle Paul put it like this in the letter to the Romans,

“For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened… Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

- Romans 1:21, 28-32

Do you follow the contours of Paul’s thought?  We knew God, but we forsook God’s wisdom and knowledge about us, so our thinking became futile and our foolish hearts were darkened.  We have become filled with every kind of wickedness.  We are full of envy.  Although we may have some awareness that we’re functioning in unhealthy ways, we not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.  What is implied in every stage of Paul’s thought here is a process.

A number of theologians have paired this Romans passage with the beginning of Genesis to describe what they see as a “fall,” to show the story of Adam and Eve as some irreparable break that made humans immediately disgusting in the eyes of God.  Beyond the fact that this interpretation denies that the creation story is a poem (not rigorous human history about an actual event) it also is a refusal to let the story speak for itself.  Theologians, because of the beliefs they bring to the story, twist the meaning of the story to fit their understanding rather than letting it speak to them on its own.  The story is one of rebellion, yes, but it is also one revealing God’s compassion, and humanity’s ability to choose the pathways of God again (and again, and again, and again) over our own ideas and pathways.

When one accepts the above interpretation of the story of creation, the Scriptures explode with life in ways we had not had eyes to see before. We find horrific and beautiful repetition on these themes of rebellion, God’s compassion and discipline, and choosing the pathways of God again (and again, and again, and again).  The Scriptures are not about the futility of human beings and our inability to be holy, primarily; but instead are about the rebellion of human beings and the lack of desire to be holy.  This lack of desire is heavily affected by generational rebellion, by a long line of ancestors who valued their way more than their Creator.  This is why God reminded the Israelites in Deuteronomy

“Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them. Remember the day you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb, when he said to me, “Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children…Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the LORD is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other. Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live long in the land the LORD your God gives you for all time.”

-Deuteronomy 4:9-10, 39-40

Do you hear the words I bolded above?  Be careful, do not forget, teach, remember, learn to revere, teach, acknowledge, take to heart, keep.  Why?  So that it may go well with you and your children.  The exhortation here in Deuteronomy is an acknowledgment of the darkness, the rebellion, inherited confusion of the people.  But the exhortation does not, does not say “You are unable to change, and must only cry out for forgiveness and God will forgive.”  The writer of Deuteronomy does not settle for that lesser, sad perspective that Martin Luther proclaimed as gospel.  No, the writer(s) choose to call the people out of their inherited habits into a new way of inherited habits that are intended, generation by generation, to bear witness in thought, word, and deed to a different way of being in the world.  The  Israelites are to live this way “so that it may go well with you and your children” in way that calls all who observe back to what they were created for.

So, the Scriptures talk about created identity (1).  The Scriptures talk about choices to deny and twist that identity (2).  The Scriptures show the generational quality of those choices (2a), where people become darker, become filled with wickedness, become envious.  And the Scriptures show a God who continually calls people out of that darkness(3), to embody practices and habits that lead them back into the light (3a), to become filled with goodness, to become self-giving, to choose to kneel before God to listen and obey.

So, geneticists and the Scriptural community agree; we are who we are most significantly because of a pattern of living that we have inherited from our ancestors from our present parents all the way back into primordial history.  What we desire is “borrowed” from those who shape us.  In other words, there isn’t a single thing we desire on our own.  What is most natural to me is that way because of the culture surrounding me.  And if I discover that what has seemed to be natural (violence and sexuality are two central things that come to mind) is in fact unnatural, I must commit myself and my children (and if my children follow, their children and children’s children) to the pursuit of what is natural.  Along the way, we affirm that some of those desires will not feel natural until multiple generations have pursued the life given by the authority of God.

All of the extended thoughts above have been a prolonged riff in support of the same theme I stated above:  our children (and our cats) don’t know what is good and right to do and be by themselves.  Our children need boundaries, they need the strong word of their mentors and parents, and they need further reminders beyond words from time to time that shock them out of their complacency and worldview to consider another (i.e. spanking, and other essential tools).  The more I think on this subject as we steadily march toward parenthood, the more the need to have a solid commitment to all of what I have said above is revealed.  However the intricacies of parenting work out (because every child is, in important ways, unique), I must remember, I must remember, I must remember to “Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the LORD is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other. Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live long in the land the LORD your God gives you for all time.”

Teacher, author, and theologian Stanley Hauerwas understands the importance of tradition, habit, and strong communal remembering in a powerful way.  It shows up over and over again in his thoughts.  A story of Stan’s interactions with a couple seems most fitting to conclude,

Stan was walking across the Quad at Notre Dame one morning when he spotted some friends, a married couple, both Jewish, walking nearby and joined them. Knowing that they had a son about to be of age he asked, “When is the Bar Mitzvah?” The couple replied, “Well, we are not sure. We want Jacob to decide for himself that he wants to be Bar Mitzvah’d. He hasn’t decided yet.” Stan retorted,“So, there have been 5750 years of Jewish history, Jewish suffering, so that this twelve year-old can make up his mind? Could he have a mind worth making up if he does not know his parents stand for something?”

Amen brother.  May we stand for something, and shape the desire of our children toward their Creator.  Along the way, may our children shape our desire toward our Creator.  When we practice this shaping together, we bear witness of a way of life worth living, a life patterned toward our ultimate joy and fulfillment.  May it be so.

“Humble Yourselves, Discipline Yourselves, Be Steadfast”
1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11

…we have no reason to fear what even the most powerful empire in the world can do to us or the most well-placed bullet because we get to bear witness to a powerful love.  It is this awareness, this belief that has led followers of Jesus into the darkest, most violent places on Earth to proclaim and live the transformative message of Jesus and the way of life he redeems us to.  Or, it has led followers of Jesus into parts of our society that aren’t necessarily desirable, has led us to desire healing and hope in places of brokenness.

Believing this message should, I emphasize should lead Christians to look at their society around them, searching for places and relationships of brokenness that we can then move towards, engage with; instead of separating ourselves from, insulating ourselves from brokenness.  Unfortunately, the pattern of response to brokenness in Cincinnati, like many cities, is people abandoning, leaving behind, running away from darkness because we don’t like to feel uncomfortable, insecure, stretched, or frustrated.  People move into an ever-increasing ring of suburbs to find a place of security, leaving behind communities falling apart.  We then build beltways and interstates that keep us from having to see and engage those communities on a daily basis, and they slide into our subconscious; only coming up when we are forced to detour through them.

Precious few churches choose to obey the courageous call of Jesus to seek out places of brokenness and put down roots there.  This community of Cincinnati Church of the Brethren and our community Vineyard Central have attempted to be faithful to the call of God in this way.  But it has been rough going, for us and for you.

For one thing, we’ve found that we don’t have the tools to be able to handle pain and brokenness very well, because we’ve been shaped by a gospel of pain avoidance.  Several weeks ago, I heard a story from a man named Scott Dewey that connects with this truth.  Scott is a follower of Jesus, and Scott caught a vision to move to the slums of Bangkok, Thailand with his wife.  There are any number of preventable diseases there in the slums that primarily result from unclean drinking water.  Scott wanted to solve those problems, and bring hope to the slums.  So they said, “Here I am Lord, send me” and they went.  Three years later Scott rolled over in bed one morning and said to his wife, “Melanie, I can’t do this any more.  There’s too much pain here.”  After three years, they hadn’t solved the unclean water problem and Scott had been crushed by the pain and darkness of life in the ghetto.  Scott, however, chose to reflect on his thinking instead of just abandoning the place, and he came to one crucial awareness.

They had entered that neighborhood to do ministry for people there.  They had come with a gospel they believed provided hope.  And Scott realized as he thought about the pain and darkness crushing him that the people who had lived in that ghetto all their lives had a greater capacity to deal the with the pain and still find little cracks of hope than he did.  Scott found out that the gospel and the community he came from was one that was not familiar with pain, did not seek out pain, struggle, and brokenness and therefore he didn’t have the resources to deal with the pain there in Bangkok.  What Scott learned was that the people he had come to minister to were in fact ministering to him in how to live with pain and suffering.  What Scott learned through them was a fresh understanding of the gospel that does not bring hope through avoiding pain but through embracing it and finding God in the midst of it…

Link to full text here.

Since Jesus prayed centrally, “God, may your kingdom come and your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” and Cincinnati Church of the Brethren’s place on earth that you have chosen is Walnut Hills, Cincinnati, with Wendell Berry ringing in our ears, beyond all the sexy ideas about mission and growth; maybe the most important, most essential quality of your work as a congregation is actively and thoughtfully learning the stories of the people here in Walnut Hills, gaining the trust of the people of Walnut Hills, and seeking to follow the Lord as Shepherd for this place. It’s letting our mission be determined by our place, and committing to a place for an extended period of time, intentionally being present in a way that deeply listens, invests, and prays for God’s will to be done in our place.

Our Vineyard Central church family in Norwood is struggling through this very issue too. We have a sexy phrase that we’ve created and put up on our website: “Practicing resurrection in West Norwood and encouraging it everywhere.” Now, if we want to move beyond the sexy phrase and listen to the wisdom of Berry, practicing resurrection IN WEST NORWOOD means establishing west Norwood as the focus of our ministry. We have said West Norwood will be our place. In order for this to have a practical reality, we must spend a significant amount of time in West Norwood. This does not necessarily mean we have to live there, but it does mean we need to deeply invest there.

A number of us, because we want a more natural flow to this commitment, have moved into the neighborhood; in theory, because living IN WEST NORWOOD means we will more easily practice resurrection there. But we find a significant barrier comes up whether we move in or not: we don’t know the people here, we may not share the same desires as the people here, we don’t know the story of the community, the story of the people, we lack the connection needed. We don’t know the place where we are.

Full text of the sermon here.

There’s a group of men gathering twice a month here in Norwood.  Our gathering is built around the opportunity and responsibility of deeper relationship with one another, and we are reading small digestable chunks of Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline out loud to one another and spending time reflecting on what we hear.  It is a simple series of acts; conversation, listening, reflection, consistent commitment to gather. But that kind of simplicity carries significant power.  A men’s group I was a part of for five years before we moved to Cincinnati was one of the most transformative influences in my life.  We grew in how to be more committed followers of Jesus and we grew in how to be better men.  Different young men passed in and out of the group, but the group consistently got together; week by week, month by month, year by year.  For that I say thank you to Jason Suter, Abe Halterman, Pete Acker, Matt Schwartz, Jamie Hewitt, Ben Dinkle, Mike Gilbert, Andy Hostetler, Jered Simmons, and several others.  I clearly set up the order of names to reflect the sheer masculinity and crushing truthiness of said Jason Suter.  No accident there.  Beyond jokes though, I would not be the man I am today nor the follower of Jesus I am today without this group.

So I know how powerful  the simple acts of conversation, listening, reflection, and a consistent commitment to gather are.

Last night in gathering with my brothers Kenny Havens and Matthew Wheelock (a smaller group than usual, but no less important), I felt some of the same power and potential for change in our time together.  A common thread between the Virginia group and the Cincinnati group thus far has been Foster’s book Celebration of Discipline.  His writing and wise guidance has opened up my world of understanding.  In Virginia, we read through the book; then a workbook entitled Celebrating the Disciplines that led us beyond intellectual understanding and into practice, which is very consistent with Foster’s guidance and, I should say, with the responsibility of the Christian life beyond intellectual belief and into bodily practice.  We read slowly.  Carefully.

One passage from last night struck me again in a powerful way.  I have abandoned now the evangelical belief that human beings are incapable of transformation and unable to do anything other than to cry, “God, save me!”  I have embraced what I believe to be a message much more worthy of evangelizing about, which is that human beings are deeply depraved and desperately in need of God, and upon kneeling before our Creator we first hear, then practice the fact that we are very capable of faithful, joyful, consistent life!  Instead of leading me away from the Scriptures, embracing this message has led me ever deeper into the Scriptures, and I have found this expressed clearly, obviously, beautifully, convictingly, over and over and over again.

I want to quote the passage from Celebration of Discipline in its fullness so you can see how important it is too.

“There is a saying in moral theology that ‘virtue is easy.’ But the maxim is true only to the extent that God’s gracious work has taken over our inner spirit and transformed the ingrained habit patterns of our lives. Until that is accomplished, virtue is hard, very hard indeed. We struggle to exhibit a loving and compassionate spirit, yet it is as if we are bringing something in from the outside. Then bubbling up from the inner depths is the one thing we did not want, a biting and bitter spirit. However, once we live and walk on the path of disciplined grace for a season, we will discover internal changes.

We do no more than receive a gift, yet we know the changes are real. We know they are real because we discover that the spirit of compassion we once found so hard to exhibit is now easy. In fact, to be full of bitterness would be the hard thing. Divine Love has slipped into our inner spirit and taken over our habit patterns. In the unguarded moments there is a spontaneous flow from the inner sanctuary of our lives of ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control’ (Gal 5:22,23). There is no longer the tiring need to hide our inner selves from others. We do not have to work hard at being good and kind; we ARE good and kind. To refrain from being good and kind would be the hard work because goodness and kindness are part of our nature. Just as the natural motions of our lives once produced mire and dirt, now they produce ‘righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit’ (Romans 14:17).”

Foster, Celebration of Discipline pgs 8-9

Thank you, God, for the influence of all of these men guiding me from a stunted, mostly empty gospel without transformative power to a gospel that proclaims the reconciliation of all creation and the capability of humanity to leave darkness and live joyfully in the light!

Our Vineyard Central church community is gathering this afternoon for worship, prayer, and fellowship. Through Lent, we are dwelling in Psalm 22 and a “word” of Jesus from the cross to guide our worship. One brother, Greg York, will be reflecting today on the Psalm and Jesus’ word “Today you will be with me in paradise.”

In preparing my spirit for our time together, as I’ve traveled to and from work this week on the bicycle, I’ve tried to be mindful of that word of Jesus.

“Today you will be with me in paradise.”

I have let it repeat over and over in my mind. I have spoken it out loud. I have said it in cadence with the circular strokes of my pedaling. As the phrase has settled in my spirit, I have been impressed at the core commitment it displays. Radical forgiveness.

The context of the “word” is the interactions of two dying men being crucified with Jesus. One mocks him, and the other defends him. In response to the basic defense of the one (being “rightly” executed for being a violent threat to the Roman regime), Jesus, in the midst of his intense physical and emotional pain, reaches out in forgiveness to the man. Without making a statement on the man’s depravity, Jesus draws the man into an embrace that will transcend the death they both are about to experience. What a gift!

This reminded me of a story I had heard awhile ago that illustrated the powerful embrace of forgiveness. The story was first told to psychologist Jack Kornfield by the director of a nearby rehabilitation program for violent juvenile offenders.

One 14-year-old boy in the program had shot and killed an innocent teenager to prove himself to his gang. At the trial, the victim’s mother sat impassively silent until the end, when the youth was convicted of the killing. After the verdict was announced, she stood up slowly and stared directly at him and stated, “I’m going to kill you.” Then the youth was taken away to serve several years in the juvenile facility.

After the first half-year the mother of the slain child went to visit his killer. He had been living on the streets before the killing, and she was the only visitor (in jail) he’d had. For a time they talked, and when she left she gave him some money for cigarettes. Then she started step-by-step to visit him more regularly, bringing food and small gifts.

Near the end of his three-year sentence, she asked him what he would be doing when he got out. He was confused and very uncertain, so she offered to help set him up with a job at a friend’s company. Then she inquired about where he would live, and since he had no family to return to, she offered him temporary use of the spare room in her home. For eight months he lived there, ate her food, and worked at the job.

Then one evening she called him into the living room to talk. She sat down opposite him and waited. Then she started, “Do you remember in the courtroom when I said I was going to kill you?” “I sure do,” he replied. “I’ll never forget that moment.” “Well, I did it,” she went on. “I did not want the boy who could kill my son for no reason to remain alive on this earth. I wanted him to die. That’s why I started to visit you and bring you things. That’s why I got you the job and let you live here in my house. That’s how I set about changing you. And that old boy, he’s gone. So now I want to ask you, since my son is gone, and that killer is gone, if you’ll stay here. I’ve got room and I’d like to adopt you if you let me.” And she became the mother he never had.

This story reminds me that forgiveness is not an emotional decision, where one must emotionally feel at peace before forgiving someone we believe has wronged us and/or others. Forgiveness is a posture toward others that transcends our emotion. We make a decision, which establishes firmly within us that our emotions will not rule us. We let our decision lead us. The emotions catch up later. May I pursue such a commitment.

I love it (in a very painful kind of way) when wise leaders remind me of the danger of considering and valuing only my perspective and that of those most like me. I honestly can’t help it that I spend all day with me, so that’s that. As my father in law would say, “It is what it is,” and that is true. Being with me all day long is not ever a negative thing because it’s as involuntary as my heart beating. But the other half of the above reminder is much more wounding, because it’s SO much more comfortable and easy to be with those most like me; and it unfortunately is not involuntary but chosen every day. It does feel natural, but Jesus has already informed me in a million different ways the scathing truth that so much of what feels natural to me is that way because I’m rebellious and depraved and don’t know better until I humble myself and listen.

The danger, you see, of only being around and listening to those most like us is how we marginalize the perspectives, challenges, and needs of those not like us. When these other voices consistently remain outside our self-built walls to maintain group identity, we can be tempted to believe they do not exist. At the very least, the longer we ignore others in this way, the more their voice fades in importance for us.

In the below quote from his book The Dangerous Act of Loving your Neighbor, Mark Labberton lays bare the temptation of tribalism and calls us to see others as Jesus did; being willing to honor those must unlike us (like the Samaritan woman at the well), believing that in thoughtful listening, we will be affected and changed. There is much power in naming, and much positive, redemptive, painful value in being careful of how and who we name that which we see.

We name what we see in terms that reflect value, meaning, position, relationship…the problem is that you and I name without caution, justification or reason – let alone justice – as we move through life every day. Most naming occurs in ordinary moments, It happens as we respond to fellow drivers, as we stand in line, as we meet people, as we watch tv, as we read the newspaper, as we look at our peers…it is the most ordinary stuff of daily human interaction. In our name for one another for better and for worse, lies the evidence of what is in our hearts. Our distorted sight of God, ourselves and our neighbors leads us to name wrongly…when a human being is mis-seen and then mis-named, the soil of injustice reveals its destructive fertility.” (111-112)
- Mark Labberton -

This quote stands in a long line of others testifying to me like a living crowd of witnesses, leading me to change what I have always considered to be true. One of the things I am now coming to believe is that a church’s legacy is best defined by asking the questions,

“If our presence ceased to exist in this neighborhood tomorrow, how would we be remembered? Would we be remembered as a subculture that required others taking the risky step of approaching us to become like us, or as an open culture of embrace defined by simple acts of care and companionship?”

Last Sunday evening, our  house church launched into our first gathering of a new direction for us.  We’ve oriented our practices around sharing a meal together, a time of prayer following the Common Prayer book, and a journey chapter by chapter through the gospel of Matthew. As it happens, this first week, we focused on the first chapter of Matthew, which immediately leads to sighs from those familiar with the chapter. Those people are aware that the bulk of the chapter is taken up by the author’s genealogy of Jesus, which often leads to one of two options for people,

1) Read until the first name you stumble over (likely Amminadab), then quickly (quickly) move on, or
2) Pretend like it doesn’t exist (becauseit’sobviouslyboringandChristianityshouldn’tbeboring) and jump right into verse 18 and the birth narrative.

If we engage either of these two options, we’re the better for it, right? I mean, what can really be in a genealogical list? Glad you asked! Our study leader for the week, Steve Ring, gave us some important context issues to be aware of that transform the Matthew genealogy from a ho-hum borefest into a really meaningful section of the gospel that foreshadows the focus of the ministry of Jesus.

First, the author of Matthew emphasizes, right from the beginning, Jesus as Christ (Greek for the Hebrew term Messiah—meaning anointed, in the sense of an anointed king). Jesus is presented as the long-awaited Messiah, expected to be a descendant and heir of King David, so the genealogy seeks to demonstrate this line of descent. Thus, Matthew begins by calling Jesus son of David, indicating his royal origin, and also son of Abraham, indicating that he was a Jew.  Son more broadly means descendant, so the author is trying to establish that Jesus is the “Jew’s Jew” by invoking those two significant names.  If this is all we could learn about the genealogy, it would still be pretty vanilla (and still worth skipping?).  But, on two points, it isn’t.  Not by a long-shot.

First, the genealogy is grouped in three parallel groups of fourteen, fourteen, and thirteen.  And for those interested in the names embedded in the genealogy, strictly speaking, it is inaccurate, it would not pass muster in a historical textbook. And this is important because it gives us a moment to be aware of the difference between ancient histories and modern histories.  And the fundamental difference is that ancient documents weren’t written like today’s textbooks, and it would be a mistake to interpret them as such (are you listening, Ken Ham and Answers in Genesis?)  Instead they were written more often to make a statement or have a purposeful meaning.  In Matthew’s genealogy, he leaves out four kings of Judah in the middle, and in the last group, somehow pulls off only thirteen generations in 620ish years, which, given that ancient near eastern folks *ahem* got busy often, isn’t likely.

Second, and I would say  most important, in a genealogy that is supposed to establish from the beginning Jesus’ cred as the one who will rescue Israel from their enemies (the main task of the Messiah), the author commits two atrocious, unpardonable “sins.”  One, he mentions women in the genealogy.  And two, all of those women are from *ahem* unsavory backgrounds.  In Jesus’ lineage are Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary.  Tamar was a prostitute with unknown ethnicity, Rahab was a Canaanite, Ruth was a Moabite, Bathsheba was a Hittite, and Mary was an unwed virgin? woman with a fantastical story about where the baby came from.

Genealogies, if seeking to be effective in establishing someone’s claim to a title to a specific group (especially a nationalistic title), went out of their way to present their line as pure and unadulterated by any foreign or lesser influence.  And yet, in what seems like a commitment to shooting himself in the foot, the author weaves in unnecessary (women) and impure (nationality and moral choices) elements.

So it seems the author is intentionally ineffective in making his case for the sake of establishing a larger point; that women deeply matter and that Israel’s job isn’t to celebrate or seek some pure national identity, but rather to pay attention to an old command of God to Isaiah from their history,

It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob
and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth. (Isaiah 49:6)

That passage from Isaiah was a reminder of an even more ancient word from God to Abraham, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.” (Genesis 12:2)

What is invoked in general in those two passages is given specific form in the commands of God to the people of Israel in how they are to treat foreigners in their society over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

Maybe the most comprehensive command comes from Deuteronomy 10:17-19

For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.

The focus is always on how Israel’s habits and lifestyle as a society witness to God’s love for the whole world; of how the created can re-connect with the Creator in meaningful ways.

So the vision for Israel was an ancient one of a people saved from slavery to create a society that would be a living example for others to view and imitate; one that would lead the world out of rebellion and into faithful care. The major trouble with this vision is how easily we humans forget this call and settle for a lesser, what seems “more natural” vision of a society where we only embrace people like us and honor those with the most wealth, those who “have it all together,” and celebrate some mythically “pure” ethnic identity. Israel, historically, fell deeply into that temptation and even invented their own folk religion that marginalized other ethnicities, elevated the wealthy religious and social elite, and sought to purify their society through purging it of the sick, the prostitutes, the addicted.

Jesus in his ministry cast down the idol of Israel’s false religion, invoked some ancient commands of God for a different vision, and gave new teachings about how we pursue God’s great society of blessing. And so even here, even in this boring genealogy of Jesus, we see the author (who likely had his own idols of religious and social purity painfully exposed by Jesus) embedding in this story the “new” way of Christian being (that’s really an ancient way intensified and reinterpreted).

So I ask, is our Christian faith one determined by Jesus, one defined by an openness to the margins of our society, one with habits of giving our lives for those not like us, or is it one of seeking an ever intensified expression of ethnic and religious purity? Do we spend more time defining ourselves over against “those people over there” or serving and living life alongside “those people we are among”?

These are troubling, deeply challenging questions for me that call me to place the whole of my life under the gaze of God and cast off all that hinders what God desires to bring about.

These are also deeply important social questions in an American society deeply enmeshed in debates and beliefs about the “outsider” and how we engage them. Christian faith is not to be lived in a vacuum, not to focus entirely on the afterlife at the expense of this life, is not to settle for lesser visions. Our world is deeply divided on these very issues of ethnic and religious purity, and lives hang in the balance that will be lost if the Christian gospel has nothing to say about these very “earthy” matters.

May we pursue the answers to these questions together.

I will delete that
stupid
addictive
Facebook game.
And that other one too.
I will re-orient my time and my desires
to fit the kingdom of God,
which as I understand it means
I will spend more time face to face
with my wife
with my neighborhood
with my church community.
I will communicate with persons of consequence beyond these circles of relationship;
city, county, state, national, and international leaders.
I will carve out time to “do” nothing but think and scheme
and renew my imagination
and be reminded of my responsibility
in humility
to cherish God above all else
(thanks John Piper!)
I will remember
I will remember
I will remember!
that my imagination, desire, and energy
should be channeled into meaningful outlets,
and you, Facebook games,
are NOT included.
Go be played elsewhere.
You’re not welcome here anymore.
Click “X” Nathan.
It’s for your own, your marriage, your church, your neighborhood, and your world’s good
And not just good like, “Man, that Skyline chili was good!”
(which isn’t possible anyways)
but good like, “This is very good!”
from the Creator’s mouth..

Lucadoize:
a) the practice of immediately ripping a passage out of its historical, social, and narrative context and pretending like we can do with it what we want.
b) making the Scriptures beholden to us rather than ourselves beholden to the Scriptures
c) also known as pious ignorance

usage “to Lucadoize” or “Lucadoizing”
example, “Wow, that was a real Lucadoizing of that passage!”

What Max Lucado has done over and over again as an author. Quote a passage, make a couple initial remarks, then rip the passage completely out of its original context and cram it into our story, whether it fits or not.

i.e. In the story of Jesus calming the storm, Max would immediately move to ask, “What is the storm in your life that Jesus needs to calm?” or the stoning of the woman caught in adultery, Max would ask, “What are the ‘stones’ others are throwing at you in your life?” In passages like Lamentations 1, Max might ask, “What are the feelings of exile you’re feeling in your life? We might then run with those instructions and think, “At an office birthday party, am I consistently the last to get a piece of cake, and when I do, it’s a corner piece with lots of icing and I really don’t like icing all that much so I feel isolated, excluded, and alone?” Or in my case, “Do you believe your manager unfairly singles you out to sweep the floor in the kitchen? Focus on those feelings of exile, so that God may enter in.” It’s an effective strategy in terms of Max selling a ton of books, and it’s affected a whole lot of pastor’s preaching, but I would suggest it’s generally employed where we either don’t understand a passage or it makes us feel uncomfortable and we find a way to get around it.