A nine year old girl took me up on the offer to close a meeting in prayer. Then she asked me what she should say. I have always preferred long, involved ritualistic phrases that circle around the point six or seven times and sound like they could be part of some kind of magical incantation.
I told her to say something like, "Lord, see us safely home. Amen."
I began our children's time in church with a deliberate, prolonged silence. I had half the congregation looking around with me when I glanced up in the air, when I looked to the doors to the right and left of the sanctuary, wondering what was going to happen. I had a couple gesture for me to get on with it. I couldn't see the kids faces because I was having too much fun watching the adults.
The punchline was about listening for Jesus when in prayer.
Tonight, we had a prayer service for Al, who died this past week. I think I mentioned him in a previous entry. Not sure what I said exactly, the Spirit was giving me utterance along that path. Had a little trouble finding the end when I go freeform like that.
I was kind of hoping for an inspired grand finale after those little vignettes but I got nothing. That kind of makes sense though. Prayer isn't something in need of a grand finale or a complex opening. Let me take the format of a good Christian Reformed Church sermon to wrap it up, three points and a question...
Point 1: K.I.S.S. or "Keep It Simple Stupid"
Point 2: K.O.L.S. or "Keep On Listening Stupid"
Point 3: Know what you need to pray, but haven't got the words? The Holy Spirit will fill in the vocabulary. The Spirit will even pray when we are too deep in our own shit to pray for ourselves.
So what's the question? Did I really need to break up this mini-sermon with a crude word like s**t? No, will you just do it? Will you just pray? It's how we talk to Jesus.
Amen.
Sunday, April 29, 2012
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Non-Violence
There is a group within the church hoping to declare the PCUSA "non-violent" at the next General Assembly. Being who I am, I asked something about us being able to be non-violent because we have other people to be violent for us.
I am having trouble with this concept. Ghandi was non-violent, against the violence of the British. Martin Luther King Jr. was non-violent, against the violence of the Southern White Political Establishment. Nelson Mandela was non-violent, against the violence of the white imposed racial separation of apartheid. I am not sure how we hold to non-violence when there is not a great evil-a great evil willing to use violence-to be overcome.
I noticed in the previous examples that non-violence was practiced against white people in every case. I, as a white man, find it ironic that our church, which has a majority of white faces, is seeking to coopt the very strategy that has been used against us time and time again.
OMG! I am judging whites by the color of our skin!! Doesn't feel too good, does it?
We are coming up on the first anniversary of the Navy Seals finally killing Osama Bin Laden. How much violence against our country was prevented by the use of violence against him?
One of my predecessors at the church was a practitioner of non-violence. He went from here to the South to march with MLK Jr. and the others who gave everything, even their very lives, to force change.
WWJD, What Would Jesus Do? He would get violent when the need arose, as when he drove the money changers out of the temple. And at the Sermon on the Mount, he said, "Blessed are the Peacemakers...", a blessing that, for me, belongs squarely on the shoulders of Law Enforcement Officers, Peace Officers, in this country.
I don't have answers. I am still struggling to ask the right questions. Maybe non-violence is the stance that the church ought to take. I still need to know a lot more about what that would look like and how we'd use the non-violence to change a world desperately in need of change.
Peace, how hard it is...
I am having trouble with this concept. Ghandi was non-violent, against the violence of the British. Martin Luther King Jr. was non-violent, against the violence of the Southern White Political Establishment. Nelson Mandela was non-violent, against the violence of the white imposed racial separation of apartheid. I am not sure how we hold to non-violence when there is not a great evil-a great evil willing to use violence-to be overcome.
I noticed in the previous examples that non-violence was practiced against white people in every case. I, as a white man, find it ironic that our church, which has a majority of white faces, is seeking to coopt the very strategy that has been used against us time and time again.
OMG! I am judging whites by the color of our skin!! Doesn't feel too good, does it?
We are coming up on the first anniversary of the Navy Seals finally killing Osama Bin Laden. How much violence against our country was prevented by the use of violence against him?
One of my predecessors at the church was a practitioner of non-violence. He went from here to the South to march with MLK Jr. and the others who gave everything, even their very lives, to force change.
WWJD, What Would Jesus Do? He would get violent when the need arose, as when he drove the money changers out of the temple. And at the Sermon on the Mount, he said, "Blessed are the Peacemakers...", a blessing that, for me, belongs squarely on the shoulders of Law Enforcement Officers, Peace Officers, in this country.
I don't have answers. I am still struggling to ask the right questions. Maybe non-violence is the stance that the church ought to take. I still need to know a lot more about what that would look like and how we'd use the non-violence to change a world desperately in need of change.
Peace, how hard it is...
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Wasn't Even Thinking About Death
In yesterday's post, it was a reflection about heaven. I really didn't have anyone in mind that prompted that choice of topic. But today, it seems strangely prophetic. A friend of mine and member of my church died this morning. I found it to be a shocker, because word in the church was that he had some good choices coming that were going to make things better.
But, while there is plenty I don't know, I do know that it isn't up to us.
I don't have a lot of the profound or reflective in me this evening. I miss Al. I was given the privilege of being with his family. The thing is, heaven didn't help too much...at least not yet.
I've been around a lot of pastors and fellow Christians who have their eye on the prize. Their theology, their focus, their aim is on the life after this one. But I fear that can undercut the sacred space of this life if we are too focused on what is to come.
Life is poorer here with Al's death. His family and friends are left to pick up the pieces and try to move on. And while I thank the Lord for heaven and eternal life won for us in Christ Jesus, I thank God even more for the gift of Al's presence in my life.
And I know in my heart that I didn't appreciate that gift nearly as much as I do now that it is gone. I hope and pray that heaven will be a place where I get to feel that appreciation for the people God has put in my life without first having to experience their loss.
I don't know much, except that Jesus is walking with me. I know that more profoundly now when I need Him more. I am not feeling so indestructible at the moment. I am glad God made me worthy to receive this gift of faith. Al was a living testimony to it. I hope I can continue to live in the faith in a way that would make him proud of me.
But, while there is plenty I don't know, I do know that it isn't up to us.
I don't have a lot of the profound or reflective in me this evening. I miss Al. I was given the privilege of being with his family. The thing is, heaven didn't help too much...at least not yet.
I've been around a lot of pastors and fellow Christians who have their eye on the prize. Their theology, their focus, their aim is on the life after this one. But I fear that can undercut the sacred space of this life if we are too focused on what is to come.
Life is poorer here with Al's death. His family and friends are left to pick up the pieces and try to move on. And while I thank the Lord for heaven and eternal life won for us in Christ Jesus, I thank God even more for the gift of Al's presence in my life.
And I know in my heart that I didn't appreciate that gift nearly as much as I do now that it is gone. I hope and pray that heaven will be a place where I get to feel that appreciation for the people God has put in my life without first having to experience their loss.
I don't know much, except that Jesus is walking with me. I know that more profoundly now when I need Him more. I am not feeling so indestructible at the moment. I am glad God made me worthy to receive this gift of faith. Al was a living testimony to it. I hope I can continue to live in the faith in a way that would make him proud of me.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Will Heaven Be Boring?
My greatest fear about eternal life is boredom. I know, it should have something to do with whether or not claiming to be Jesus' Annoying Henchman is a way to get me sent to the eternal tanning salon, but it isn't. Because I am a Calvinist, and I'm okay...I know where I'm going on judgment day...
But my image of heaven has never been thoroughly thought through, more of an impression really, that of a eternal tranquility, a forever 70 degree day when the sun is just perfect and the humidity is low and God has forever banished the pollen to the nether reaches. Boring as watching paint dry...but hopefully in a really comfy hammock in a pristine back yard that never needs mowing.
Today, I was driving back from a conference through Eastern Pennsylvania. My radio choices were a variety of popular music stations or Christian talk. I am a denizen of the tri-state area. Christian talk isn't usually my first choice, being a pastor and all, but I got this one pastor on a station out of Lancaster who was given an interesting question.
"What is your favorite feeling?"
Doing 65 on Route 78 munching on slightly stale trail mix wasn't mine, so I kept listening for a better answer.
The radio preacher's answer was a feeling of 'accomplishment', like finishing the last thing on a 'to do' list (he confessed to a type 'a' personality), but just that sense you get when you've done something well and good.
Now for something completely different, 9/11. I was at a police chaplain's conference where, in this tenth anniversary year of 9/11/01, the presenter showed a brief remembrance of the event. It rips my guts out to this very day.
What does this have to do with heaven? It is not so much about heaven as it is about 'accomplishment'. I listened to guys who spent months at Ground Zero, at the dump site on Staten Island, with the First Responders, with the Union guys who did the recovery and repair, some of whom are feeling the health effects today. And I can only try to experience their sense of accomplishment vicariously, on the edge. I did my bit, but that pales.
The accomplishment of those guys as chaplains, those First Responders, those workers on the sites in NYC, Washington, and Pennsylvania, those leaders of our nation on every level, those people of our nation and around the world, who opened their hearts and minds and accomplished a task of love and grace and caring for God and neighbor, that's the stuff of heaven.
But the real joy of heaven is that we will feel that sense of accomplishment without having to live through the earthbound hell of what real sin can do to us.
We can do for others every day of our lives, we don't need stress and crisis to motivate us, but it gets old after awhile. That is the infection of sin in our attempts to live as Jesus would want us to. Then a real hellstorm comes and, by the grace of God, we rise to the occasion, rise HIGHER than the occasion, and we overcome.
We did it after 9/11, we did it after Hurricane Katrina, we are doing it two years after the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. But it is a window of time, between 12 and 24 months, before the wave of accomplishment begins to subside.
Now imagine a place where the wave of accomplishment never subsides and we don't need sinful events to trigger a sense of accomplishment in the kind of life we should be living every day. If you can put yourself in that place, I do believe you can taste the edge of heaven.
But my image of heaven has never been thoroughly thought through, more of an impression really, that of a eternal tranquility, a forever 70 degree day when the sun is just perfect and the humidity is low and God has forever banished the pollen to the nether reaches. Boring as watching paint dry...but hopefully in a really comfy hammock in a pristine back yard that never needs mowing.
Today, I was driving back from a conference through Eastern Pennsylvania. My radio choices were a variety of popular music stations or Christian talk. I am a denizen of the tri-state area. Christian talk isn't usually my first choice, being a pastor and all, but I got this one pastor on a station out of Lancaster who was given an interesting question.
"What is your favorite feeling?"
Doing 65 on Route 78 munching on slightly stale trail mix wasn't mine, so I kept listening for a better answer.
The radio preacher's answer was a feeling of 'accomplishment', like finishing the last thing on a 'to do' list (he confessed to a type 'a' personality), but just that sense you get when you've done something well and good.
Now for something completely different, 9/11. I was at a police chaplain's conference where, in this tenth anniversary year of 9/11/01, the presenter showed a brief remembrance of the event. It rips my guts out to this very day.
What does this have to do with heaven? It is not so much about heaven as it is about 'accomplishment'. I listened to guys who spent months at Ground Zero, at the dump site on Staten Island, with the First Responders, with the Union guys who did the recovery and repair, some of whom are feeling the health effects today. And I can only try to experience their sense of accomplishment vicariously, on the edge. I did my bit, but that pales.
The accomplishment of those guys as chaplains, those First Responders, those workers on the sites in NYC, Washington, and Pennsylvania, those leaders of our nation on every level, those people of our nation and around the world, who opened their hearts and minds and accomplished a task of love and grace and caring for God and neighbor, that's the stuff of heaven.
But the real joy of heaven is that we will feel that sense of accomplishment without having to live through the earthbound hell of what real sin can do to us.
We can do for others every day of our lives, we don't need stress and crisis to motivate us, but it gets old after awhile. That is the infection of sin in our attempts to live as Jesus would want us to. Then a real hellstorm comes and, by the grace of God, we rise to the occasion, rise HIGHER than the occasion, and we overcome.
We did it after 9/11, we did it after Hurricane Katrina, we are doing it two years after the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. But it is a window of time, between 12 and 24 months, before the wave of accomplishment begins to subside.
Now imagine a place where the wave of accomplishment never subsides and we don't need sinful events to trigger a sense of accomplishment in the kind of life we should be living every day. If you can put yourself in that place, I do believe you can taste the edge of heaven.
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