Hello, folks…

I’ve been preparing for the Good Friday Pilgrimage at the building all week and thought I’d share a little about it for those who can’t make it. Good Friday stuff is actually a bit difficult for me in one way… it’s supposed to be about the death ad burial, but not really move on to the resurrection. When I was growing we really spoke of the death without the resurrection. I don’t know if was because we were afraid of ending one day’s story on a less than happy note, or if we simply didn’t know how to sit and mourn for a time. Oh sure, “blessed are those who mourn,” but that doesn’t mean much when there’s a happier ending to skip along to.

The death was cruel and the scattering disciples were in the lowest place, far beyond anything they might have imagined. My family has heard me talk about it a thousand times, but I really feel for old Thomas, the one to whom we’ve giver the moniker of “Doubting” for so long. When Thomas stood face-to-face with that grave, he had no happier chapter to skip over to.

Thomas was central in an interesting story that you can find in John 11. When Jesus was ready to go to Lazarus, his friend in Bethany who was sick, his disciples were more than a little concerned. Some of the folks who lived over that way wanted to kill Jesus! How could he go there? It was a very natural reaction… self-preservation. After all, they’re the followers of Jesus. Their fortunes are fairly tightly bound together.

But here comes our “Doubter” with a manly sounding reply fit for any John Wayne movie I’ve ever seen… “If dying is good enough for my Lord, it’s good enough for me.” (That’s a paraphrase by the way.)

Yes, Thomas the “Follower,” the “Brave,” the “Committed” was ready to stand by Jesus even in death. He was banking it all on his Lord. I’ve never seen the story of “Following Thomas” or “Loyal Thomas” in any of the children’s curriculum books for Sunday School. But that who he was…

And then Jesus did die, and Thomas didn’t die with him. I can’t imagine the shame and hurt that that one would feel standing outside that tomb. To have believe so much about yourself, yet alone what you believed about the corpse that is laying inside. That’s bone crushing pain, folks. That’s an edge to which I don’t think I myself have even been pushed. It’s no wonder that he doubted his friends when they made such a crazy claim, telling him it wasn’t over… Jesus is alive again. I would think that he’d relive as much shame as he would experience a new joy at such an announcement.

Maybe we need a day every year when we sit outside a tomb, and not an empty one. The resurrection just might demand it of us. We just might hesitate to slap an epitaph like “Doubter” on anyone else.

Painting by Andrea Mantegna

Hello, church family…

One of today’s passages is 1 Corinthians 11:23-26…

“For I pass on to you what I received from the Lord himself. On the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this to remember me.” In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant between God and his people—an agreement confirmed with my blood. Do this to remember me as often as you drink it.” For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord’s death until he comes again.”

Today is Maundy Thursday, and many of you may not be familiar with the term. It’s the day in the liturgical calendar to remember the “last supper.” I’ve had lots of good conversations about remembering the supper since coming to CiB. We all share a host of various backgrounds… some of grew up celebrating the supper weekly, some monthly, some almost daily. Some of us passed trays, some received it from a priest, some practiced intinction (dipping), and still others drank from a single shared cup.

The great thing about all these traditions is that the reasons for each are almost always identical. Some celebrate the supper weekly to keep the meaning safe-guarded from obscuration, while others celebrate monthly to safe-guard the meaning from redundant emptiness: the intent being to safe-guard. Some pass trays to feel community involvement, while others want to walk and hand it to one another to have community involvement. It’s similar to Buddhist monks shaving their heads to avoid pride and Eastern Orthodox priests never cutting their hair to avoid pride. Who’s right? Yes. That particular question doesn’t work in that instance. It’s not that “right” doesn’t exist, it’s just that it doesn’t grab onto the situation and demand any kind of uniformity. Still, isn’t it amazing how we all want the same thing? Our values are identical even though our methods differ.

One of the funniest supper controversies I heard about was when a particular congregation switched to white grape juice to protect their new carpet. They had a church split.

The passage for today highlights two important elements in our sharing of the supper tradition: remembering and announcing. Both those elements focus on Jesus. We are recalling to mind, each time we join the supper (either weekly, daily or monthly) that Jesus has made our reconciliation a priority over all his other personal concerns. We remember a great price paid by One to assure the salvation of many.

We also announce. Now, that’s a little more difficult for me to wrap my mind around. When I was growing up we talked about remembering a lot. But announcing? That’s what the preacher does! That’s what door-knockers do on weekends! Yes, both preachers and evangelists announce, but so does the whole of the community when we gather at the table. The table is our pulpit and the gifts of God are the welcoming fare. The message is that we share the moment, share the faith, share the Lord, share the sacrifice and love of such a One.

I’ve shared the supper in many different contexts with many different Christians. I have been with folks who celebrated quarterly, monthly, weekly and daily. I’ve passed trays. I’ve received the wafer on my right, up-turned palm and drank from the chalice. I’ve celebrated with watered down Coke and vanilla cookies in Africa, and I’ve celebrated with saltines and Welch’s in Texas. I’ve stood with Episcopals and sat with Baptists. I’ve celebrated the supper with Altar Wine and with Black Currant juice. I know that many of you have celebrated the supper in times of war, on peaceful vacations, and lots of places in between.

May we always be a remembering and an announcing people. Let the traditions come and go, to be remembered and forgotten. Let’s raise many cups and one cup. But whatever we do, let’s keep the focus on Jesus. After all, he’s the one who has invited us the table.

Good morning, church family…

This painting is by Anthony Falbo, and is a “cubestraction.” I guess that’s his way to work cubism and abstraction together. If you get bored this week, Google the “last supper.” I found many different character interpretations including Star Wars, Donky Kong (video game) and the Justice League (super heroes)… hmm.

Our passage is a deep one, with many streams of thought, and something about Falbo’s style helped me enter the scene. So much is happening to Jesus at this time that it fits the artist’s “surreal” interpretation.

One of today’s passages in the lexicon is John 13:21-35…

“Now Jesus was deeply troubled, and he exclaimed, “I tell you the truth, one of you will betray me!” The disciples looked at each other, wondering whom he could mean. The disciple Jesus loved was sitting next to Jesus at the table. Simon Peter motioned to him to ask, “Who’s he talking about?” So that disciple leaned over to Jesus and asked, “Lord, who is it?”

Jesus responded, “It is the one to whom I give the bread I dip in the bowl.” And when he had dipped it, he gave it to Judas, son of Simon Iscariot. When Judas had eaten the bread, Satan entered into him. Then Jesus told him, “Hurry and do what you’re going to do.” None of the others at the table knew what Jesus meant. Since Judas was their treasurer, some thought Jesus was telling him to go and pay for the food or to give some money to the poor. So Judas left at once, going out into the night.

As soon as Judas left the room, Jesus said, “The time has come for the Son of Man to enter into his glory, and God will be glorified because of him. And since God receives glory because of the Son, he will soon give glory to the Son. Dear children, I will be with you only a little longer. And as I told the Jewish leaders, you will search for me, but you can’t come where I am going. So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

Stop and think for a moment about the emotions that must be swirling through Jesus’ heart… he’s about to be betrayed, he knows who will do it, his disciples are too thick to simply understand what he’s saying and offer a little empathy, and he’s right there on the eve of his crucifixion. That’s enough to take your appetite away. Read a little further in John 13 and he even knows that another of his followers is going to deny him in not too distant future.

But he’s got this focus… he doesn’t give into the feeling of being alone in room full of people. They may not totally be on the same page he’s on, but he loves them. And that love is the point… it’s the thing to be emulated, it’s the “proof in the pudding.”

His “new command” is not so new in its essence… “love your neighbor” has been around for a quite a while by then. It’s new in its basis of authority and example: love as I love. Jesus calls on them to love one another as he has loved them, which is love irregardless of their inability to understand what’s happening around them, their inability (and maybe a little bit of refusal) to understand his coming death, and all the other short-comings they’ve so famously put on display: constantly arguing about personal supremacy, haughtily turning away mothers and their children, etc.

When we expand that understanding of his love to all the folks he’s loved along the roads and byways for their last three years together we find that he loves in spite of a myriad of sexual sins, thefts and dishonesties. He loves enough to welcome and touch the least deserving and to eat with the least appetizing… he has loved them enough to have earlier in John 13 took the demeaning role of a foot-washer to make their meal more pleasant.

His displays of love oscillate from momentous expressions that change people’s lives to little moments of hugging a child or wiping someone’s feet before dinner. His love encompasses life, and it becomes the standard, the mark of belonging. It is the expression of that kind of love, his love, which proves his presence in the life of anyone claiming to follow after him. May we be driven by that kind of focus, driven to emulate the One who loves even when in the midst of gut-wrenching betrayal and aloneness. May we have the strength to carry such a burden.

Howdy again, folks…

One of today’s passages in the lexicon is Mark 11:15-19…

When they arrived back in Jerusalem, Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out the people buying and selling animals for sacrifices. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves, and he stopped everyone from using the Temple as a marketplace. He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer for all nations,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves.”

When the leading priests and teachers of religious law heard what Jesus had done, they began planning how to kill him. But they were afraid of him because the people were so amazed at his teaching. That evening Jesus and the disciples left the city.

The painting above is a fresco done by Giotto di Bondone (1304-06), and must be the most angry Jesus I have ever seen. Look at Jesus holding that whip, his laser-like attention on that merchant… wow! In a world of Precious Moments and various cheesy images of Jesus floating around it sometimes takes a painting like this to help us remember who we’re dealing with.

Jesus cared very deeply about the people around him, and when he arrived at the temple that day he found that the abusers had moved in and set up shop. The temple was to be a place of prayer, a place where people came and received goodness, a place where they met God. Instead, they arrived to find a “den of thieves,” a group of unscrupulous folks waiting to cheat and rob them.

I’ve often wondered what Jesus would find in the courts of my own heart… would he find a place of prayer where the people with whom I interact find all good things, or something else. Have I allowed the courts of my heart to be populated with the market’s values, where everyone is a bargain or a ruse, where people are seen not by what they need, but by what they might provide?

Jesus wasn’t mad necessarily that things were being sold, but that people were being cheated and robbed, cheated and robbed in a holy, sanctified place. This week I want to reflect on my own valuing of people. I can make a list a mile long of all the things that make me mad throughout a given day, but are they the things that make Jesus mad? Are my values lined up and in tune with Jesus enough that I am able to recognize a person’s worth and be so moved to anger by the injustices within my reach?

No, I’m not advocating a new brand of Jesus-driven popular violence in our streets or workplaces. That day was a special day, when the Lord of the house arrived and did some much needed cleaning. But I would like a nice slice of that kind of courage and wisdom that can recognize the times when I must speak and act on behalf of another person. I would like to voluntarily do some cleaning in my own courts.

My prayer today, on this Tuesday of Holy week, is for all our hearts to beat ever more in tune with the heart of One who so passionately loved people.

Hello, everyone…

I hope that Holy Week presents you with an opportunity to enjoy some prayer and meditation on our great Lord, and the many things that surrounded those momentous days of his life, so long ago. To help with that, I’m going to share some art that has been made through the centuries of our faith, art that helps us see and share in the stories of our Lord’s life.

One of today’s passages in the lexicon is John 12:1-11…

Six days before the Passover celebration began, Jesus arrived in Bethany, the home of Lazarus—the man he had raised from the dead. A dinner was prepared in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, and Lazarus was among those who ate with him. Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it, wiping his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance.

When all the people heard of Jesus’ arrival, they flocked to see him and also to see Lazarus, the man Jesus had raised from the dead. Then the leading priests decided to kill Lazarus, too, for it was because of him that many of the people had deserted them and believed in Jesus.

As I was reading this passage I was struck by this woman’s wisdom and intuition. It seems that from the many different accounts that the apostles were still not clued into Christ’s coming death, even after Jesus spoke of it so many times. They seem so caught off guard by the coming events… but not this woman, she’s ready and she’s doing what she can to prepare Jesus for the coming trials.

I want to be like that; I want to have Mary’s discernment and intuition. I pray that we each could better intuit the move of God in our own lives, and also in the swirl of life’s currents all around us.

I’ll be sending you Sunday’s prayers very soon… and if you’re not familiar with the art, it’s from a collection called “Jesus Mafa,” an endeavor to set the great events, parables and teachings of Christ completely in a North African context. I’ve been a fan for years, and will probably share one or two more from the collection throughout the week.

Communion…

This is a long one, folks… sorry. These last weeks I’ve been sharing more from the heart during our message times. I know “where we’re going,” but I’m not locking into a specific route to get there in the message time. My hope was that we’d have a more conversational feel and you’d hear me less “scripted.” But that also means that I don’t really have notes that are easily blogged. Hopefully we’ll be pod casting again soon and this will be far more streamlined as a process.

Talking about communion today we weighed two ideas: the sacramental view of communion and the “shared life” view.

The sacramental view has a lot to recommend it. You can see and hear the concept of the “sacred” in the word sacramental. And it’s the sacredness that we’re going to hold onto as tightly as possible.

I really faced the question of teaching about communion first when I had began starting new churches in East Africa. What would I teach? I was fully armed with devotional thoughts and scriptural references for the meaning and essence of communion, but what about the practice? I was raised in a church fellowship that severely circumscribed communion… we had a specific day and a specific type and bread. We had an authorized number of prayers to use and a fixed time to be able to sing. To deviate from those parameters was to toy with the future of your very soul.

Then, having helped form a new community of faith, what would I teach them about such parameters and practicalities? My response was a combination of the history of church practice, but on a foundation of thoughtful engagement of scripture. I was intrigued by moving some of those familiar passages from my childhood context and trying to squeeze them back into context of Jesus’ impending departure and an explosive initiation of the earliest church.

Let’s start at the “Last Supper,” that Passover meal shared by Jesus and his closest group of disciples. The context is an annual feast, a yearly celebration of God’s graces and deliverances. The elements are familiar and at hand as a part of the feast. The innovation that Jesus brings is not in the elements at the table, a date or recurrence of the feast, not even in the basic point of the feast, which is “to remember.” The innovation is in what those gathered are there to remember.

Paul picks this up later in another discussion of keeping feasts when he sanctions the keeping of feasts but cautions Christians to remember that Jesus has now become our Passover Lamb… there is an intended shift in how God’s deliverance is to be recalled at the table. By all that we have recorded in the Gospel accounts we can’t see even a hint that Jesus expects the disciples to remember him in those elements any time other than the annual occurrences of the Passover. He simply says, “when you do this…” and then heads to the garden.

Now, the explosion of followers in Jerusalem in Acts chapter 2 occupies their time with several things: the apostles teaching and “breaking bread.” The breaking bread part is one that stumps us a bit. I was taught while growing up that there are two breakings of bread here, one simply refers to a shared meal and one refers to a sacred remembrance of Christ. How do we tell the two apart? Well, there’s a vague way to infer from the surrounding text. But the fact remains that Luke did not choose to differentiate these two events in any explicit way.

So, the earliest followers began by taking the community table very literally, very often. Christ was the host who would literally “prepare a table for me.” (That’s my own allusion to Psalm 23.)

Then came the persecution when those same Christians are wholesale driven from Jerusalem. How did this affect the table? By chapter 20 of Acts we find Paul visiting a group of followers in Troas, and they have settled into what seems like a weekly meeting at the table. Again the “breaking of bread” language is used and a congregation’s practice seems fairly well solidified: they met at the table weekly, on the first day of the week.

We have an annual feast, a daily gathering and a weekly meeting. And then there come the centuries, the varieties of practices. Churches have met daily at the table, weekly, monthly, and in a few instances not at all.

Back in our years of student ministry in Alabama I spent some time mulling over the sacramental view of communion versus the shared life experience of the table. See, the sacramental practice views communion (more fairly called the Eucharist in a sacramental discussion), as a tangible expression of God’s grace that is distributed by the Church. It’s one of many ways that God’s saving grace is communicated directly to people through the vehicle of the Church. Literally, the Eucharist as a sacrament is the handing out of God’s grace. I don’t think I can buy into a full sacramental view.

I desire to always honor and participate in the sacredness, but not the mitigating role of the community. Can we find another way, a way that holds to the sacred and yet participates instead of mitigates. I want a sacred, shared life way.

In Alabama our family had a Sunday tradition. Every Sunday after worship we went to the same restaurant: The Blue Burrito. (If you’re ever in Montgomery, Alabama, check it out!) And every Sunday we tried to invite folks from our church family to join us. We’d invite folks we knew and loved connecting with, and we’d invite those we didn’t know as well to get to know them better. We loved it. I often called it “my true communion.” I talked about how those Sunday meals satisfied the need for shared life… until. There was a person at our church who I am ashamed to say that I really didn’t like that much. That person picked up on our communion tradition and invited their self right along with us, week after week after week.

Have you ever noticed that you can’t eat with a person you don’t like? The stomach tightens up, etc. I thought this was proof positive, the kind of experiential reality that authenticated my commitment to the shared life and not the sacrament… the shared table was wise, the shared table was truth.

After all, you could sit in a worship service and share pass some plates without pause while hating someone sitting across the room from you. Things at the Blue Burrito were cool until that person invaded my weekly sanctum and my words were thrown right back in face. Suddenly I realized that shared life must be under sovereignty, the sacred must also have its place.

I was expected to love that person, the one who had come uninvited into our meal. Not loving was not an option left to me. What I was learning was that our guest list must always include the divine, and that is also sacred and also truth. The two ways must come together to be one way.

So now we gather together weekly to share life, to worship, to commune, and we do our best to keep God at the top of that guest list. If we don’t, then every other name on the list suffers. Our communion each week includes the breaking of bread. We are not handing God’s grace out to one another, but plunging in together to remember, celebrate and revel in that grace.

Most Sundays we celebrate communion by intiction, which is dipping the bread into the cup. Weekly we walk forward together, we hold the elements and they pass between us. We share words of hope and blessing while sharing the gifts of the table. All senses engaged as we move, taste, smell, speak and listen. On the first Sunday of each month we remember other roots of our heritage and pass trays between us and hold the elements to take them together in unison. All this is to hold onto the active sharing while keeping the sacred front and center.

Plan on variety coming into our midst… one Sunday we may have multiple tables to share in smaller groups. On another Sunday we might pass trays. Regardless of the method we use on any day, our goal is the same: we gather around the table to love one another, and under God’s sovereignty to present a table to the world at which all may come and feast on the most soul-satisfying fare to be found.

An Affirmation of the Nicene Creed

What are some of the things that we as church family believe and affirm? We are asked that question often, and we are admittedly a little anxious about our answer. We aren’t anxious because we have a lack of belief. In truth, we have a rich faith and belief tradition in this congregation’s past, present and in, God willing, its future. We are anxious because that question is sometimes a pretext to hurtful, judgmental divisions. Within our faith and belief tradition we have always affirmed the richness and strength of our diversity. Our congregants come from many great faith traditions such as American Baptist, Catholic and Pentecostal, just to name a few.

But even in our diversity we still find ourselves standing, as a congregation and as individuals, within two thousand years of amazing Christian community. Standing within that “great cloud of witnesses,” as the writer of Hebrews calls it (See Endnote #1), means that even in diversity we still belong to one another; we are in this together.

One of the unifying fixtures of our greater faith community has been the creedal statement. We at Church in Bethesda, with others who have spanned the globe, generations and church traditions, affirm the Nicene Creed of the 4th Century. The Nicene Creed reads as follows:

   We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

What does it mean to affirm a creedal statement?

The intent of affirming an ancient yet living creedal statement is not to condemn or exclude someone who does not immediately understand or support every line of the statement. It is an effort to help others understand the flow of belief and faith which frames our own faith today.

To affirm the creedal statement is not to bind it upon each person who fellowships with us as a test for “rightness” or one’s value as an individual believer or as a member of our community.

Every person’s faith journey is at once extremely personal and also inextricably bound up with those with whom we live, work, play and worship. To affirm a creedal statement is to respect that connection. To not hold that statement as a litmus test for fellowship or individual worth is to respect our diversity.

Think of the Nicene Creed as one of the many anchor points that we have as a community at Church in Bethesda within the greater community of Christians through the ages. Historically and theologically it helps people within and without our community to understand where we are coming from and where we are going. Our understanding and use of the ideas within the creedal statement are somewhat fluid and porous as we interact with its truths and its mysteries, but even as we leave our individual impact on the statement we affirm its integrity and authenticity. We grant the Nicene Creed a gift of “life,” to be a living, growing and interactive part of our life.

How does the creed operate without binding us?

Need an example of how we affirm a creed but not be bound by it? Let’s talk about the historical language of the Nicene Creed; it’s completely male oriented. The creed’s age and place in history means that the male image is predominant, but it does not mean that we at Church in Bethesda believe God to be exclusively male, nor the Holy Spirit to be male. God is above and beyond language, above and beyond sex. We do not use the male imagery and language exclusively at Church in Bethesda.

Ultimately we are dealing with the use of doctrine in a community of faith. We are struggling to join the rich tradition wrestling with doctrine, living doctrine and some instances changing or creating doctrine as we experience God in our communities, scripture and individual lives. But we do not do this in a void; we come as a collection of individuals to this rich history called Christianity.

It’s not a password to get in the door or positions of power…

You are not required to make a personal statement of belief or support of any specific interpretation of the Nicene Creed to be in fellowship at Church in Bethesda. We only hope you will join us in this dynamic experience and journey through the faith which we’ve individually and jointly inherited. We are heirs of this great treasure together.  (See Endnote # 2)

We come from many different Christian traditions to form Church in Bethesda, and we come with varying experiences and attitudes towards “creeds” and creedal statements. Some of us grew up loving and reciting creeds, and others (me included) grew up in traditions that taught them to be inherently bad and a part of a misinformed practice. The truth of the creeds worth and authenticity will reside in the veracity of its ideas and the handling of it by living, creative human beings.

Whatever the individual’s background, we are each invited to experience the creed and envision a way forward with it. Our way forward will be free and open, enlivening and creative. A creedal statement, after all is said and done, is simply a collection of words, inherently worth little more than the paper or pixels with which it’s printed. Human beings are the image of God. Amen.

Helpful Definitions

Affirm
Verb, to express agreement with or commitment to;
uphold; support: to affirm human rights
Creed
Noun, any system or codification of belief or of opinion
Begotten
Adjective, (of offspring) generated by procreation;
“naturally begotten child”
Incarnate
Adjective, embodied in flesh; given a bodily, esp. a human, form
Catholic
Adjective, universal in extent; involving all; of interest to all
Apostolic
Adjective, of or characteristic of an apostle; pertaining to or
characteristic of the 12 apostles; derived from the apostles in
regular succession
Baptism
Noun, a ceremonial immersion in water, or application of
water, as an initiatory rite or sacrament of the Christian church

*All definitions pulled from www.dictionary.com, and each was chosen for its appropriateness to the discussion at hand.

Endnotes:

1 Hebrews 12:1 NIV, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”  The writer of Hebrews has been listing great examples of faith, male and female, from the Old Testament stories so readily familiar to the letter’s first recipients. Today we can include the great New Testament examples from Elizabeth, Zechariah, Mary and Joseph, Anna, Simeon and the Apostles, right up to the wonderful examples of faith in our families and all around us. We are caught up in a beautiful, pan-generational, pan-millennial, and pan-global faith story. Our names have been added to that colorful, exciting list of characters.

2 Romans 8:12-17 NLT, “So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children. And since we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.”  Paul is writing to the Christians in Rome about the reality of being “in Christ.” It is a re-orientation of life which impacts our relationship to God and to one another.

Message notes from December 30, 2007…

As we end the year 2007 and prepare at the last moments before our New Year’s fast and prayer vigil, we take an opportunity to reaffirm two things about people at Church in Bethesda as individuals. First, that each person is highly valued, and that secondly, each person is very much needed.

We are each highly valued here at this place. In Luke 15 we find three stories which fill the chapter, three stories of lost things: a lost sheep, a lost coin and a lost child. In the each instance there is a determination to reconnect with the lost thing/person, and there is a clear valuing of the lost. We read the first of three stories together in worship, Luke 15:1-7…

“Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such sinful people—even eating with them!

So Jesus told them this story: “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders. When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ In the same way, there is more joy in heaven over one lost sinner who repents and returns to God than over ninety-nine others who are righteous and haven’t strayed away!”

In the context of the chapter there are people angry with Jesus because he is concerned about the “wrong” people, he values too many and he values them indiscriminately. His response is a story about how the one is sometimes valued even in a moment above the many. Now, as we talk about membership here at CIB we’re not talking about “lostness” and being found, but we will take time to assert the value of each “one.”
Whether we’re looking at the story of one sheep, one coin or one child, we are affirming the basic fact that we value one another as individuals, inherently worthy and good. We are each worthy of pursuit and calling into the fellowship of family and community.

We underscore this idea because as we talk further in 2008 about community issues we know that there will be some individuals who have various differences with our normative practices and community affirmations. No one is ever going to be put to a litmus test of right thinking or right doctrine to enjoy our full fellowship and love.

Possibly of even greater importance is the second thought, that each person is needed. And I mean, NEEDED! 2008 is the year when all of our church family is needed to become active and participatory in congregational activities and campus stewardship.

It’s time for each of us to do some serious soul searching and reflection on our gifts and abilities that we bring to the whole… where will each of us be best equipped to serve the others?

For the theological base of this important idea we turned to Ephesians 4:1-16…

“Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God. Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father, who is over all and in all and living through all.

However, he has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ. That is why the Scriptures say, ‘When he ascended to the heights, he led a crowd of captives and gave gifts to his people.’

Notice that it says ‘he ascended.’ This clearly means that Christ also descended to our lowly world. And the same one who descended is the one who ascended higher than all the heavens, so that he might fill the entire universe with himself.

Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.

Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.”

Besides being one the “great” passages referred to in discussions of spiritual gifts it is also a wonderful text on the value of diversity and our coming together, each as a needed individual to the whole. Notice those closing words, “As each part does its work, it helps the other parts grow…” What a beautiful image of our growing together in mutual service and encouragement!

The year 2008 will probably come be known by many different things, but we will hopefully be holding tight to these truthes… that we are each valued and needed by and for the whole.

There are no disposable people in God’s creation.

Well, this is pretty late coming as I am officially two weeks behind on blogging message notes. sorry about that, folks.

For the last Sunday of Advent we spent some time hearing from folks present about special Christmas memories. I shared a story about my most memorable Christmas wish as a child; I wanted the official Alien action figure/monster. You can see me with it to the left with my Coke radio. I wanted that thing so bad and begged and begged and begged… and I got it!

I was on top of the world until I went to bed that night and discovered his face and whole head glowed in the dark. It slept in my closet, with the door closed, always.

We heard lots of stories, some connected to the amazing Alien movies and others having more to do with family ornaments and traditions. We heard the stories of special parents and friends who enriched our lives and loved us so much.

What did it really have to do with Advent? Well, just like our reminiscing about our Christmases past, folks once sat and reminisced about the arrival of Christ and all those momentous events. What “special memories” do you think Elizabeth and Mary shared at parties? Did Zechariah and Joseph stand around the grill and laugh about their various angelic visitations… Joseph having emerged relatively unscathed compared to Zechariah’s muteness.

Listen to these opening words from the gospel of Luke, “Many people have set out to write accounts about the events that have been fulfilled among us. They used the eyewitness reports circulating among us from the early disciples. Having carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I also have decided to write a careful account for you, most honorable Theophilus, so you can be certain of the truth of everything you were taught.” How fun! With whom did Luke sit and reminisce? What was it like hear the stories from those involved?

This Christmas we remembered. Our stories are a part of a long, amazing list of stories. Christ truly has come, is here and comes again. Our stories keeping rolling along.

Third Sunday of advent, “Holding Tight” 

Passages… Isaiah 35:1-10, Psalm 146:5-10, James 5:7-10, Matthew 11:2-11, Luke 1:26-55. It does help to have them read as a background! ON Sunday morning we had a collected reading of pieces from each passage all wound together.

I apologize that’s Thursday before these notes from Sunday’s message are being posted, but I didn’t really prose out the notes last week. Instead, I just put down ideas and thoughts. So, I’ve tried to tie them up a little for you before posting. I also didn’t get the ending out on Sunday because some candles I left in the foyer took a life of their own and I saw someone run by the doors of the Sanctuary with a plate of fire towards the end my the message time, and I lost every thought but that flaming, running image. Anyway, here you are… 

Blessed are those who don’t allow themselves to be unconvinced? I am intrigued by the passage in Matthew 11:2-11. Jesus makes an interesting statement that I’ve struggled to hold onto all week.

It’s an episode in the life of John the Baptizer, now imprisoned. He has a burning question… Is Jesus the One, the One of whom all is foretold? Or do we keep waiting? 

And Jesus uses the language of Isaiah and Messianic prophecies to say, “Yes, I am the One for whom you’ve been waiting.” And then a cryptic statement, “God blesses those who do not turn away because of me.” What? Why not, “God blesses those who accept me?”

Jesus seemed to know that there was something going on, that though he would do the Messiah thing in the language of the prophets, recognizable by the signs, something would not be as the people expected… blessed are those who hang tightly to him, anyway. 

Here’s how I came around to stick on this particular passage as I read the scriptures allotted for this day, the Third Sunday of Advent.  I was thinking about all the salvation language of Isaiah and the Psalms… real live enemies, and how that differs so much from our daily realities. And as we confront that difference we have to ask then how we will relate to salvation: Physically? Spiritually? Nationalistically? Psychologically? A blend of one, two or all? And I wrestled that question around until Jesus’ words started to sink in… Jesus isn’t blessing those who figure it all out perfectly, only blessing when all the details and expectations and contexts line up perfectly… but he’s blessing those who recognize him and hold on to that, no matter the offense or cost or stumbling.

Blessed are those who hold on. Blessed are you when Jesus doesn’t say the right thing, according to your sense of whatever, but you stay. Blessed are you when Jesus doesn’t argue your point of view, but you stay. Blessed are you when Jesus is allowed to be Jesus… and you hang on. 

And it doesn’t take too long being around Jesus for the tension to mount and something to be said or to happen that might make you want to walk… blessed are you when you stay put. Jesus might speak your language one page and reject it the next. Jesus might carry your personal banner for one parable and then tout your neighbor’s the next… you know, the neighbor you don’t really like. Blessed are you when Jesus has the freedom to be Jesus.

It would have been so easy to just say, “Yep. Go tell John that I said, ‘It’s me.’” Instead, in a round-a-bout way, Jesus says, “Yes, I’m the One you’ve been waiting for, but it might not be as easy as all that.”  

Today, this week… we’re waiting for the right One, but that One might not be exactly what we’re expecting. So we hold onto the truth that Jesus is the One, and we grant him the freedom to move in this place and move in us, to the glory and will of God. And so the passage from James starts to make more sense, waiting with the patience of the prophets… who so often did not see the reality of their own visions, but held tightly to the promises of God.

I though this week of a C.S. Lewis quote I read on his birthday just a few days ago. It’s from the end of The Last Battle, the final book of the Narnia series. The scene is set when a group of Dwarves consistently refuse the blessings of Aslan, and others around them can’t figure it out. They can’t understand because it’s a matter of faith and not of certainty. It’s a matter of acceptance, not coercion or even persuasion. The dwarves have closed their minds to the any and all things not just to their liking, and in doing so, find nothing to their liking. 

“You see,” said Aslan. “They will not let us help them. They have chosen cunning instead of belief. Their prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out. But come children. I have other work to do.”

Blessed are those who don’t allow themselves to be unconvinced. Blessed are those who hold tight.