Those of you visiting Better Living for the first time might be interested in checking out some blog post series I've written in the past:
Why I Believe Christian Faith is True
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six
Prayer: The Essential Conversation
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six
Part Seven
Habits of the Heart
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
When Tragedy Hits the Innocent
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
The Promise and the Perils of Democracy
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
40-Days to Servanthood: Day 4
Servanthood is the clearest sign of greatness.
We underestimate the power of servanthood. But imagine the impact on the disciples gathered with Jesus during that fateful Passover meal when He washed their feet. All eyes would have been on Him as He put His robe back on and returned to His place. Hanging on His every word, they heard Him say:
“Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them” (John 13:12-17).
One of the most interesting characters in history is George Washington. Twice, first at the end of the American Revolution and then at the end of his second term as our first President, Washington walked away from the implicit offer of lifelong executive power. People wanted him to become the king of America. But he refused, setting a precedent for the peaceful transition of political power that has become the tradition of the United States and the model after which every country desiring to establish democracy has patterned itself since. Washington showed restraint and thereby established his greatness as a political leader. He saw that anyone who would achieve great things must be, first and foremost, a servant.
This is especially true for the follower of Jesus Christ. No Christian can ever delude herself into thinking that she’s bigger than the Savior Who died on a cross and rose from the dead to give us new and everlasting life with God. The servants of Christ follow Him into acts of humble service, whether obscure or celebrated. They know that servanthood is the clearest sign of greatness.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet” (John 13:14).
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
Reading Tea Leaves at Althouse
The blog of Ann Althouse interests me in part because of what she writes and how well she writes "on the fly," which is to say like an ideal blogger must write. (I don't think that I'm the ideal blogger, by the way.)
But what also interests me about Althouse's blog is that she has such a large audience that the comments section of each piece she writes is something of a measure of what people care about and how intensely.
As of this writing, Althouse has what I would describe as five major posts today: one dealing with an article from today's New York Times detailing the major revision of a standard Art History college textbook; the death of Dana Reeve; one on the question of whether attention deficit was really a disorder; the presidential prospects of Rudy Giuliani; and the implications of the new South Dakota law for possible changes or reversal of Roe v Wade.
Frankly, I would have expected the tragic and untimely death of Dana Reeve, who so helped her husband, the late Christopher Reeve, only to learn that she had lung cancer within a year of his death, would have elicited the most comments. While I didn't think the Art History post would receive massive attention, in spite of Althouse's interesting spin on the story, I had been intrigued by The Times article myself and figured some folks would find it as worthy of attention as I did.
Conversely, I expected almost no conversation about Giuliani's potential candidacy and as to the abortion issue, I thought that there would be some conversation, but not that much. I sense that most Americans share the attitude of the first President Bush when it comes to abortion, irrespective of their views on the subject. Bush, during his term in office, told an aide briefing him on the latest abortion brush-up, "I hate this issue."
I thought that the piece on attention deficit disorder would elicit a number of comments.
But my projections about what would be the hot-button issues for readers of Althouse's blog turned out to be almost completely inaccurate. Right now, the comments count stands as follows:
But what also interests me about Althouse's blog is that she has such a large audience that the comments section of each piece she writes is something of a measure of what people care about and how intensely.
As of this writing, Althouse has what I would describe as five major posts today: one dealing with an article from today's New York Times detailing the major revision of a standard Art History college textbook; the death of Dana Reeve; one on the question of whether attention deficit was really a disorder; the presidential prospects of Rudy Giuliani; and the implications of the new South Dakota law for possible changes or reversal of Roe v Wade.
Frankly, I would have expected the tragic and untimely death of Dana Reeve, who so helped her husband, the late Christopher Reeve, only to learn that she had lung cancer within a year of his death, would have elicited the most comments. While I didn't think the Art History post would receive massive attention, in spite of Althouse's interesting spin on the story, I had been intrigued by The Times article myself and figured some folks would find it as worthy of attention as I did.
Conversely, I expected almost no conversation about Giuliani's potential candidacy and as to the abortion issue, I thought that there would be some conversation, but not that much. I sense that most Americans share the attitude of the first President Bush when it comes to abortion, irrespective of their views on the subject. Bush, during his term in office, told an aide briefing him on the latest abortion brush-up, "I hate this issue."
I thought that the piece on attention deficit disorder would elicit a number of comments.
But my projections about what would be the hot-button issues for readers of Althouse's blog turned out to be almost completely inaccurate. Right now, the comments count stands as follows:
Abortion post: 62 commentsWhether this is an accurate measure of the interests of the American people in these subjects today is one question, of course. But there can be little doubt that among Althouse's readers--and I wouldn't even hazard a guess as to their characteristics, there's a desire for a feisty, respectful discussion about abortion and little impulse to discuss art or the Reeve tragedy. I have no idea what that means, if anything.
Giuliani: 47
ADD: 39
Art book: 7
Dana Reeve: 5
40-Days to Servanthood: Day 3
[The congregation I serve as pastor is on a Lenten journey to what Christians call servanthood. Our members are going through these daily readings. I hope that readers of Better Living will find them helpful, too. All Scriptural citations are from the New Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted.]
Servanthood is an active way of living.
Pastor John Maxwell tells the story of a man moved by the preaching he heard during worship one Sunday. He stood up and called out to God, “Oh, Lord, use me! Use me!” And then, thinking of the implications of his offer, he added a proviso: “In an advisory capacity.”
We’ve said that God’s prime goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus and that what this means above all, is that you become a servant. That may seem fine, even laudable, in the abstract. But, we need to ask the same question that five-centuries of Lutheran Catechism students have been taught to ask when confronting the basics of our faith in Christ: “What does this mean?” The answer may determine whether we really want to be used by God or not.
On the night He was to be arrested, Jesus gathered with His twelve closest followers to celebrate the Jewish Passover. But before they prayed or ate, Jesus did a strange thing.
In those days, whenever guests came for dinner, the head of the household saw to it that their feet were washed. There were no paved roads in those days. Most travel was done by foot. And because of the hot Judean sun, everybody wore sandals. Footwashing was a soothing and practical act of hospitality. But it was also work delegated to the lowest of slaves. (John 13:1-11)
Yet, Jesus grabbed a pitcher of water, poured it into a basin, and grabbing a towel, set out to wash the twenty-four dusty feet of the apostles. At first, Peter tried to prevent Jesus from washing his feet. Writer Richard Foster says that Peter wasn’t being humble. Instead, his demurral “was an act of veiled pride. Jesus’ service was an affront to Peter’s concept of authority. If Peter had been the master, he would not have washed Jesus’ feet!” Jesus though, dared to put servanthood into action.
Servanthood is more than an attitude. Servanthood is an active way of living.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet...” (John 13:5)
Servanthood is an active way of living.
Pastor John Maxwell tells the story of a man moved by the preaching he heard during worship one Sunday. He stood up and called out to God, “Oh, Lord, use me! Use me!” And then, thinking of the implications of his offer, he added a proviso: “In an advisory capacity.”
We’ve said that God’s prime goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus and that what this means above all, is that you become a servant. That may seem fine, even laudable, in the abstract. But, we need to ask the same question that five-centuries of Lutheran Catechism students have been taught to ask when confronting the basics of our faith in Christ: “What does this mean?” The answer may determine whether we really want to be used by God or not.
On the night He was to be arrested, Jesus gathered with His twelve closest followers to celebrate the Jewish Passover. But before they prayed or ate, Jesus did a strange thing.
In those days, whenever guests came for dinner, the head of the household saw to it that their feet were washed. There were no paved roads in those days. Most travel was done by foot. And because of the hot Judean sun, everybody wore sandals. Footwashing was a soothing and practical act of hospitality. But it was also work delegated to the lowest of slaves. (John 13:1-11)
Yet, Jesus grabbed a pitcher of water, poured it into a basin, and grabbing a towel, set out to wash the twenty-four dusty feet of the apostles. At first, Peter tried to prevent Jesus from washing his feet. Writer Richard Foster says that Peter wasn’t being humble. Instead, his demurral “was an act of veiled pride. Jesus’ service was an affront to Peter’s concept of authority. If Peter had been the master, he would not have washed Jesus’ feet!” Jesus though, dared to put servanthood into action.
Servanthood is more than an attitude. Servanthood is an active way of living.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet...” (John 13:5)
Monday, March 06, 2006
More on the Chieftains
Some may have read this post in which I mentioned the Chieftains. Today, the practitioners of traditional Celtic music appeared on NPR's Talk of the Nation, a brief portion of which I caught. I was at least correct when I spoke with my friends that they are an Irish ensemble. But of course, the Proclaimers are the group who gave us I'm Gonna Be 500 Miles. That twosome is from Scotland.
40-Days to Servanthood: Day 2
[The congregation I serve as pastor is on a Lenten journey to what Christians call servanthood. Our members are going through these daily readings throughout Lent. I hope that readers of Better Living will find them helpful. All Scriptural citations are from the New Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted.]
Above all, God means for you to be a servant.
Yesterday, we established that God’s goal for you is that you become like Jesus. But when He came to the world, what was Jesus like?
Paul tackled this question in a letter that appears in our New Testament. There, the apostle urges the members of the first-century church in the city of Philippi to think and act like Jesus in their life together:
“Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians 2:5-11).
You see, Jesus had nothing to prove. He was God. So, when a crowd, impressed that He had filled their bellies with food, chased after Him to force Him into becoming the sort of king they wanted, He refused them (John 6:22-40). When the crowds who welcomed Him on the first Palm Sunday pressed Him to throw the Roman conquerors out of Jerusalem, Jesus again refused. He would be a King on His own terms, a Servant King. Jesus served in small ways--turning water into wine at a Judean wedding (John 2:1-12)--and in the very biggest way of all, giving His life on a cross. But, confident of Who He was, He had no need to “throw His weight around,” coercing people into following Him. He lovingly served others and as a result, many wanted to follow Him.
Because of your confidence in the risen Jesus, you can dare to live like Him. Above all, God means for you to be a servant.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself...he took on the status of a slave...” (Philippians 2:5-11, The Message)
Above all, God means for you to be a servant.
Yesterday, we established that God’s goal for you is that you become like Jesus. But when He came to the world, what was Jesus like?
Paul tackled this question in a letter that appears in our New Testament. There, the apostle urges the members of the first-century church in the city of Philippi to think and act like Jesus in their life together:
“Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians 2:5-11).
You see, Jesus had nothing to prove. He was God. So, when a crowd, impressed that He had filled their bellies with food, chased after Him to force Him into becoming the sort of king they wanted, He refused them (John 6:22-40). When the crowds who welcomed Him on the first Palm Sunday pressed Him to throw the Roman conquerors out of Jerusalem, Jesus again refused. He would be a King on His own terms, a Servant King. Jesus served in small ways--turning water into wine at a Judean wedding (John 2:1-12)--and in the very biggest way of all, giving His life on a cross. But, confident of Who He was, He had no need to “throw His weight around,” coercing people into following Him. He lovingly served others and as a result, many wanted to follow Him.
Because of your confidence in the risen Jesus, you can dare to live like Him. Above all, God means for you to be a servant.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself...he took on the status of a slave...” (Philippians 2:5-11, The Message)
Sunday, March 05, 2006
Serving in the Wilderness
[This message was shared with the people of Friendship Church during worship celebrations on March 4 and 5, 2006.]
Mark 1:9-15
Today, I want to look at two verses in our Bible lesson, verses 12 and 13. The Gospel of Mark, from which our lesson is taken, leaves out alot of the things that two other Gospels, Mathew and Luke, tell us about Jesus being tempted by Satan in the wilderness. In spite of that, he also includes things in these two verses that aren’t in those two other books. Let’s just read those two verses together out loud:
One Fourth of July weekend, we were entertaining my extended family at our place in northwestern Ohio. One afternoon during that weekend, most of the gang had gone off exploring as my dad and I stayed behind at the house to let the little ones take naps. We were having a great time. Then the phone rang. It was my wife’s step sister, sobbing, with shocking news: My wife's father had just been diagnosed with cancer; he probably wouldn’t live another six weeks. Whiplash.
From Mark’s account of Jesus’ temptation, we see that the same sort of thing happened in Jesus’ life. If it happened in the life of God-in-the-flesh, then you know we aren’t exempt from the whiplash of events either. When it happens, we must learn to rely on the same Father on Whom Jesus relied while He was in the wilderness.
It’s interesting to see the way Mark describes Jesus’ going into the wilderness. Matthew and Luke use two different words that mean “led.” Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, they say. But Mark says that Jesus was driven into the wilderness. In fact, the word translated as driven in our Bible renders the Greek word, ekballo. It's a compound word: Ballo, from which we get our word ball, means to throw and ek means out. Literally, Jesus was thrown out into the wilderness by the Spirit of God!
Have you ever felt as though you were thrown out into the wilderness?
Did you ever think that it was God Who did the throwing?
I got fired from a job once. It happened about a year before I started seminary. After that, I went to another job and things were going okay there, though I was far from happy.
It was at about this time that I fell in love with Jesus, was appointed to our congregation's Church Council, and I began to sense God calling me to become a pastor. But that concerned me. One night, after a council meeting, I spoke with our pastor. I told him that I thought that maybe I was being called to pastoral ministry. “Uh-huh,” he said. “But...” I muttered. “But, what?” he asked me. “But I got fired from my last job and I’m not really excited about this one,” I told him. “Yeah?” “I don’t want to be going to seminary if there’s even the slightest chance that I’d be doing it just to run away from jobs I don’t like.” My pastor fixed me with a stare and then asked me this: “Have you ever thought that your getting fired from one job and landing in another one you didn’t like was God’s way of saying, ‘Quit messing around and start doing what I want you to do?’”
I’m convinced that God drove me into the wilderness so that I could learn to rely on Him and learn to do His will. If you feel that you’re in the wilderness today, God may very well be the One Who drove you there for His purposes.
Mark says that Jesus was thrown out into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan. Think about that for a second: The Spirit of God drove Jesus to a place where He would be tempted to sin by Satan. Did the Holy Spirit want Jesus to sin? No. Only the death of a human being completely unblemished by sin could pay the price for the debt we all owe for our sin. The Spirit had a different reason for driving Jesus to His confrontation with Satan.
Pastor Brian Stoffregen points out that “when teachers...give tests, [they’re] not trying to flunk [their students], but to help discover what they know.” If every student in a class flunks a test, a good teacher knows that it’s time to do more teaching.
Stoffregen goes on to say, “I believe that this is God’s purpose in times of testing [us].” So, even when Satan is tempting us to walk away from God, as He tempted Jesus in the wilderness, God is using that same event to teach us, strengthen our characters, and shore up our faith. Just like Jesus, you and I have missions. Just like Jesus, we’re called to be servants of God. And if we’re to fulfill our missions of servanthood, we will need to undergo and pass the tests that life sends our ways.
There’s one last thing I want to point out about our lesson. It ends by saying, “The angels waited on Him.” The word translated as waited literally means served. The angels served Jesus, the One Who said that He came not to be served but to serve all of us; the One Who washed the feet of His disciples on the night of His arrest; the One Who died on a cross for all of us.
Here’s the point: Whenever we go through the wilderness times of our lives, God sends servants to help us through. And He sends all of us who follow Christ to be those servants who help others in their wilderness times.
True story: Joe had just learned he had cancer. Joe’s wife called the pastor and after chatting for a time called the husband to the phone to talk. They spoke briefly, but the pastor knew his empathy only went so far. So, after putting down the phone, he called Bill, a cancer survivor in the congregation. The Pastor knew that Joe would need his listening ear and the prayers of the congregation to help him face whatever loomed ahead. But he was also wise enough to know the limits of his own competence. He asked Bill to reach out to Joe. Bill was the servant who helped Joe make it through the wilderness.
Another true story before, one I’ve told before: A man in my former parish died. While I visited his widow, several other people visited too. People from the church and the community were dropping off food to help the family during a period when nobody felt like preparing dinners. Between her tears, the widow dabbed her eyes, smiled at me, and said, “There’s a lot of love in that refrigerator.”
We respond to the amazing and undeserved love of Jesus Christ, a love that gives new life to all who dare to turn from sin and turn in trust to Him, by offering up lives of servanthood to God and others. Over the next forty days, this will be our emphasis, our call, and our passion. In just a few moments, I’m going to ask you to come forward now. Sign the pledge indicating your continuing commitment to the mission of Friendship, your intention to read the daily readings on servanthood twice a day for the next forty days, and to get involved in your own ministry of servanthood.
In the wilderness:
Mark 1:9-15
Today, I want to look at two verses in our Bible lesson, verses 12 and 13. The Gospel of Mark, from which our lesson is taken, leaves out alot of the things that two other Gospels, Mathew and Luke, tell us about Jesus being tempted by Satan in the wilderness. In spite of that, he also includes things in these two verses that aren’t in those two other books. Let’s just read those two verses together out loud:
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.As this verse begins, Jesus must have suffered from a kind of whiplash. One moment, He’s being baptized by John when the voice of the Father tells Him, “You are My Son, the Beloved; with You I am well pleased.” Then, immediately, He finds Himself in the wilderness being tempted by Satan and surrounded by wild beasts. Things went from wonderful to frightening in a matter of seconds. That’s sort of like life, isn’t it?
One Fourth of July weekend, we were entertaining my extended family at our place in northwestern Ohio. One afternoon during that weekend, most of the gang had gone off exploring as my dad and I stayed behind at the house to let the little ones take naps. We were having a great time. Then the phone rang. It was my wife’s step sister, sobbing, with shocking news: My wife's father had just been diagnosed with cancer; he probably wouldn’t live another six weeks. Whiplash.
From Mark’s account of Jesus’ temptation, we see that the same sort of thing happened in Jesus’ life. If it happened in the life of God-in-the-flesh, then you know we aren’t exempt from the whiplash of events either. When it happens, we must learn to rely on the same Father on Whom Jesus relied while He was in the wilderness.
It’s interesting to see the way Mark describes Jesus’ going into the wilderness. Matthew and Luke use two different words that mean “led.” Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, they say. But Mark says that Jesus was driven into the wilderness. In fact, the word translated as driven in our Bible renders the Greek word, ekballo. It's a compound word: Ballo, from which we get our word ball, means to throw and ek means out. Literally, Jesus was thrown out into the wilderness by the Spirit of God!
Have you ever felt as though you were thrown out into the wilderness?
Did you ever think that it was God Who did the throwing?
I got fired from a job once. It happened about a year before I started seminary. After that, I went to another job and things were going okay there, though I was far from happy.
It was at about this time that I fell in love with Jesus, was appointed to our congregation's Church Council, and I began to sense God calling me to become a pastor. But that concerned me. One night, after a council meeting, I spoke with our pastor. I told him that I thought that maybe I was being called to pastoral ministry. “Uh-huh,” he said. “But...” I muttered. “But, what?” he asked me. “But I got fired from my last job and I’m not really excited about this one,” I told him. “Yeah?” “I don’t want to be going to seminary if there’s even the slightest chance that I’d be doing it just to run away from jobs I don’t like.” My pastor fixed me with a stare and then asked me this: “Have you ever thought that your getting fired from one job and landing in another one you didn’t like was God’s way of saying, ‘Quit messing around and start doing what I want you to do?’”
I’m convinced that God drove me into the wilderness so that I could learn to rely on Him and learn to do His will. If you feel that you’re in the wilderness today, God may very well be the One Who drove you there for His purposes.
Mark says that Jesus was thrown out into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan. Think about that for a second: The Spirit of God drove Jesus to a place where He would be tempted to sin by Satan. Did the Holy Spirit want Jesus to sin? No. Only the death of a human being completely unblemished by sin could pay the price for the debt we all owe for our sin. The Spirit had a different reason for driving Jesus to His confrontation with Satan.
Pastor Brian Stoffregen points out that “when teachers...give tests, [they’re] not trying to flunk [their students], but to help discover what they know.” If every student in a class flunks a test, a good teacher knows that it’s time to do more teaching.
Stoffregen goes on to say, “I believe that this is God’s purpose in times of testing [us].” So, even when Satan is tempting us to walk away from God, as He tempted Jesus in the wilderness, God is using that same event to teach us, strengthen our characters, and shore up our faith. Just like Jesus, you and I have missions. Just like Jesus, we’re called to be servants of God. And if we’re to fulfill our missions of servanthood, we will need to undergo and pass the tests that life sends our ways.
There’s one last thing I want to point out about our lesson. It ends by saying, “The angels waited on Him.” The word translated as waited literally means served. The angels served Jesus, the One Who said that He came not to be served but to serve all of us; the One Who washed the feet of His disciples on the night of His arrest; the One Who died on a cross for all of us.
Here’s the point: Whenever we go through the wilderness times of our lives, God sends servants to help us through. And He sends all of us who follow Christ to be those servants who help others in their wilderness times.
True story: Joe had just learned he had cancer. Joe’s wife called the pastor and after chatting for a time called the husband to the phone to talk. They spoke briefly, but the pastor knew his empathy only went so far. So, after putting down the phone, he called Bill, a cancer survivor in the congregation. The Pastor knew that Joe would need his listening ear and the prayers of the congregation to help him face whatever loomed ahead. But he was also wise enough to know the limits of his own competence. He asked Bill to reach out to Joe. Bill was the servant who helped Joe make it through the wilderness.
Another true story before, one I’ve told before: A man in my former parish died. While I visited his widow, several other people visited too. People from the church and the community were dropping off food to help the family during a period when nobody felt like preparing dinners. Between her tears, the widow dabbed her eyes, smiled at me, and said, “There’s a lot of love in that refrigerator.”
We respond to the amazing and undeserved love of Jesus Christ, a love that gives new life to all who dare to turn from sin and turn in trust to Him, by offering up lives of servanthood to God and others. Over the next forty days, this will be our emphasis, our call, and our passion. In just a few moments, I’m going to ask you to come forward now. Sign the pledge indicating your continuing commitment to the mission of Friendship, your intention to read the daily readings on servanthood twice a day for the next forty days, and to get involved in your own ministry of servanthood.
In the wilderness:
- Our call is to rely on God.
- When we do, we’ll also be called to resist the temptation to walk away from God and pass the tests of character God sets before us to shape us for our missions in life.
- And, just as God serves us and cares for us as we make our ways through life, we’re called to be servants of God who bring His care and comfort to others.
40-Days to Servanthood: Day 1
[Today, the congregation I serve as pastor begins a Lenten journey to what Christians call servanthood. Our members will be going through these daily readings for the next forty days. I hope that readers of Better Living will find them helpful. All Scriptural citations are from the New Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted.]
God’s goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus.
God has set apart every person He’s called to follow Jesus Christ “to become like his Son, so that the Son would be the first among many brothers” (Romans 8:29, Good News Bible).
Impossible? Outrageous? Presumptuous? Maybe. After all, Jesus was (and is) not just a human being, but God. “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible...all things have been created through him and for him...in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell...” (Colossians 1:15-19).
But I’m not making this up. God means for you to become like Jesus.
Jesus is the prototype of a new human race. This is what the apostle Paul was talking about in First Corinthians 15 when he effectively designated Jesus the new “Adam.” “For as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ” (First Corinthians 15:22). Sin infected the human family when Adam rebelled against God. Because human beings are the pinnacle of God’s creation, the only one of God’s creatures to bear “the image of God” (Genesis 1:26-28), all of creation bears the burden and the signs of our rebellion against God.
But God means to give fresh starts to all who turn from sin and surrender to Jesus Christ (Second Corinthians 5:17). Jesus is the new Adam, the resurrected first example and the pioneer of the new human race of which God invites all people to be a part.
In Christ, we are born anew (John 3:3). But just as our physical births are only the beginnings of our lives, so our spiritual births only begin our lives in Christ.
God’s goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him.” (Romans 8:29, The Message)
God’s goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus.
God has set apart every person He’s called to follow Jesus Christ “to become like his Son, so that the Son would be the first among many brothers” (Romans 8:29, Good News Bible).
Impossible? Outrageous? Presumptuous? Maybe. After all, Jesus was (and is) not just a human being, but God. “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible...all things have been created through him and for him...in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell...” (Colossians 1:15-19).
But I’m not making this up. God means for you to become like Jesus.
Jesus is the prototype of a new human race. This is what the apostle Paul was talking about in First Corinthians 15 when he effectively designated Jesus the new “Adam.” “For as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ” (First Corinthians 15:22). Sin infected the human family when Adam rebelled against God. Because human beings are the pinnacle of God’s creation, the only one of God’s creatures to bear “the image of God” (Genesis 1:26-28), all of creation bears the burden and the signs of our rebellion against God.
But God means to give fresh starts to all who turn from sin and surrender to Jesus Christ (Second Corinthians 5:17). Jesus is the new Adam, the resurrected first example and the pioneer of the new human race of which God invites all people to be a part.
In Christ, we are born anew (John 3:3). But just as our physical births are only the beginnings of our lives, so our spiritual births only begin our lives in Christ.
God’s goal for your life is for you to be like Jesus.
Bible Passage to Ponder: “God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him.” (Romans 8:29, The Message)
Saturday, March 04, 2006
On Reading 'Team of Rivals': The Dangers of Sanctimony
I read at a glacial place even under the best of circumstances. But recent demands on my time mean that for several months now, I've been working my way through Team of Rivals, Doris Kearns Goodwin's group biography of Abraham Lincoln and the people who surrounded him in his Cabinet.
Some of the less complimentary critics are right when they say that Goodwin doesn't cover any new ground here and doesn't advance some revolutionary thesis. But having read many biographies of Lincoln--including those by Sandburg, Lorant, Oates, and Donald--there is one thing to be said for Goodwin's portrait of Lincoln: No one has done a better job of giving us a sense of the sixteenth President as a person. Donald's biography is the best one out there still, I think, but Goodwin's Lincoln is supremely accessible. You can see him and hear him as though he were in the room with you.
And the close-up is flattering. Goodwin doesn't focus our gaze on an icon, but on a real, imperfect human being. Nonetheless, we see that Lincoln was, no matter what misgivings others may have had about this successful backwoods lawyer with no executive experience when he came to office, the ablest, wiliest, most honest, and most tactful of the Republicans who vied for the party's 1860 presidential nomination. (All of whom he invited to be part of his administration.)
Before reading Goodwin's book, I hadn't known much about the men in Lincoln's Cabinet. New York's William Seward, to me, is the most extraordinary of the lot, a cigar-chomping proto-Al Smith who one might have expected to have adopted an attitude of bitterness toward Lincoln as Smith would take up seventy years later toward Franklin Roosevelt. Instead, Seward and Lincoln became great friends, bound together by a commitment to the country, common sense, and good humor.
The person I come away from Goodwin's book disliking--a sentiment she obviously shares--is Salmon P. Chase, the one-time Ohio governor who served as Lincoln's first secretary of the treasury.
I had been prepared to like Chase. As a young Cincinnati lawyer, he courageously fought against slavery. But the brush with early fame must have gone to his head. It infected Chase with such overwhelming ambitions for the presidency that he acted duplicitously during his political career. Although many were able to see through him, Chase lived in such denial that he seems never to have understood what a sinister character he had become, hiding the truth from himself behind a veneer of sanctimony and faux-Christian righteousness.
Of all the temptations to which Christians can fall, the most destructive may be self-righteousness and spiritual pride. Righteousness, from a Biblical perspective, isn't moral perfection. It's about having a right relationship with God. And that is a free gift God grants to all who turn from sin (repent) and trust in Christ. The bumper sticker has it exactly right: Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven.
Chase thought he was perfect and proceeded to act duplicitiously in advancing his ambitions, even encouraging a campaign for the 1864 nomination that attacked Lincoln while he served in Lincoln's Cabinet.
Yet, like another prominent hypocrite of American history--this one not of a religious, but a philosophical stripe--Thomas Jefferson, it would never have done any good to confront Chase for his hypocrisy. That's how high his walls of denial and self-delusion became.
Jesus once said that only one sin was unforgivable, the sin against the Holy Spirit. Generations of Christians have wondered what that means exactly. In a way, the sin against the Holy Spirit isn't a specific sin. It's really just the wall we erect between ourselves and our conscience when the Spirit tries to point out deficiencies in our characters and are the wrong we've done.
According to Jesus, the Spirit tries to do two very important things to us. The first is to convict us of our sin, showing us our need of a Savior. The second is to convince us that by simple confession and surrender to Christ, we can have a right relationship with God.
But because of our very human desire to "be like God," Christians can sometimes become self-righteousness, convinced of their own holiness, and unable or unwilling to pay heed when the Spirit tries, sometimes through our best friends, sometimes through our reading of the Bible, to convict and convince us.
Chase, whose career started out with such promise, appears to have built up such walls within himself. The picture of him that emerges from Kearns' book reminds me of something Irving Stone wrote of a later sanctimonious politician, William Jennings Bryan, who was nominated for President three different times by the Democrats:
Lincoln, like Chase, had ambition--a friend once said that Lincoln's ambition was "the little engine that never stopped." He also had, as Kearns demonstrates, great self-confidence. And though Lincoln was no Christian, he had that greatest of all Christian virtues, which Chase apparently lacked, humility.
I'm not done reading Goodwin's extraordinary book even now. But I'm finding it not only enjoyable in itself, but enjoyable too for the lessons it teaches.
Some of the less complimentary critics are right when they say that Goodwin doesn't cover any new ground here and doesn't advance some revolutionary thesis. But having read many biographies of Lincoln--including those by Sandburg, Lorant, Oates, and Donald--there is one thing to be said for Goodwin's portrait of Lincoln: No one has done a better job of giving us a sense of the sixteenth President as a person. Donald's biography is the best one out there still, I think, but Goodwin's Lincoln is supremely accessible. You can see him and hear him as though he were in the room with you.
And the close-up is flattering. Goodwin doesn't focus our gaze on an icon, but on a real, imperfect human being. Nonetheless, we see that Lincoln was, no matter what misgivings others may have had about this successful backwoods lawyer with no executive experience when he came to office, the ablest, wiliest, most honest, and most tactful of the Republicans who vied for the party's 1860 presidential nomination. (All of whom he invited to be part of his administration.)
Before reading Goodwin's book, I hadn't known much about the men in Lincoln's Cabinet. New York's William Seward, to me, is the most extraordinary of the lot, a cigar-chomping proto-Al Smith who one might have expected to have adopted an attitude of bitterness toward Lincoln as Smith would take up seventy years later toward Franklin Roosevelt. Instead, Seward and Lincoln became great friends, bound together by a commitment to the country, common sense, and good humor.
The person I come away from Goodwin's book disliking--a sentiment she obviously shares--is Salmon P. Chase, the one-time Ohio governor who served as Lincoln's first secretary of the treasury.
I had been prepared to like Chase. As a young Cincinnati lawyer, he courageously fought against slavery. But the brush with early fame must have gone to his head. It infected Chase with such overwhelming ambitions for the presidency that he acted duplicitously during his political career. Although many were able to see through him, Chase lived in such denial that he seems never to have understood what a sinister character he had become, hiding the truth from himself behind a veneer of sanctimony and faux-Christian righteousness.
Of all the temptations to which Christians can fall, the most destructive may be self-righteousness and spiritual pride. Righteousness, from a Biblical perspective, isn't moral perfection. It's about having a right relationship with God. And that is a free gift God grants to all who turn from sin (repent) and trust in Christ. The bumper sticker has it exactly right: Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven.
Chase thought he was perfect and proceeded to act duplicitiously in advancing his ambitions, even encouraging a campaign for the 1864 nomination that attacked Lincoln while he served in Lincoln's Cabinet.
Yet, like another prominent hypocrite of American history--this one not of a religious, but a philosophical stripe--Thomas Jefferson, it would never have done any good to confront Chase for his hypocrisy. That's how high his walls of denial and self-delusion became.
Jesus once said that only one sin was unforgivable, the sin against the Holy Spirit. Generations of Christians have wondered what that means exactly. In a way, the sin against the Holy Spirit isn't a specific sin. It's really just the wall we erect between ourselves and our conscience when the Spirit tries to point out deficiencies in our characters and are the wrong we've done.
According to Jesus, the Spirit tries to do two very important things to us. The first is to convict us of our sin, showing us our need of a Savior. The second is to convince us that by simple confession and surrender to Christ, we can have a right relationship with God.
But because of our very human desire to "be like God," Christians can sometimes become self-righteousness, convinced of their own holiness, and unable or unwilling to pay heed when the Spirit tries, sometimes through our best friends, sometimes through our reading of the Bible, to convict and convince us.
Chase, whose career started out with such promise, appears to have built up such walls within himself. The picture of him that emerges from Kearns' book reminds me of something Irving Stone wrote of a later sanctimonious politician, William Jennings Bryan, who was nominated for President three different times by the Democrats:
To one of his political lieutenants who showed him his facts and figures which proved that his stand [on a particular issue] had been wrong, Bryan replied calmly: "I am always right."That seems to have been Chase's attitude as well.
Lincoln, like Chase, had ambition--a friend once said that Lincoln's ambition was "the little engine that never stopped." He also had, as Kearns demonstrates, great self-confidence. And though Lincoln was no Christian, he had that greatest of all Christian virtues, which Chase apparently lacked, humility.
I'm not done reading Goodwin's extraordinary book even now. But I'm finding it not only enjoyable in itself, but enjoyable too for the lessons it teaches.
Friday, March 03, 2006
First and Only Pass at This Weekend's Bible Lesson: Mark 1:9-15
[At least once each week, I try to share some of what I've been studying and thinking about as I explore the Bible lesson the congregation I serve as pastor will be using for our weekend worship celebrations. Because of an heavy writing schedule--I'm working on our congregation's daily Lenten readings--and the Ash Wednesday start of Lent, I am late in getting these notes online this week. I hope that both the folks of Friendship Lutheran Church, the congregation I serve as pastor, and others will find it helpful.]
The Bible Text:
9In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 12And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
14Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”
Some Comments:
A good chunk of this text for the First Weekend in Lent has already appeared in Bible lessons appointed for earlier weeks of the Church Year that began on November 27. My focus this weekend will be the verses we haven't touched on yet, Mark 1:12-13.
Remembering a basic principle of Biblical interpretation, context impacts content, let's consider context. This entire lesson is sandwiched between Jesus' Baptism, where the voice of the Father affirmed Jesus' status and ministry to Jesus, and the beginning of His ministry.
Jesus' temptation in the wilderness has something to do with both sides of that sandwich. The heavenly affirmation fortifies Him for the wilderness and all the challenges to come, including the cross.
The Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness. The verb is evocative. Jesus is driven away from what must have been a comfortable and comforting moment into the wild places. (There, he will even be met by what Mark describes as "wild beasts.")
Pastor Brian Stoffregen suggests that Mark's account of Jesus' Baptism describes our lives after we are baptized. I think that he is onto something!
Though, in Baptism we're assured of God's affirmation and presence in our lives, we still must face life in the wilderness. The Spirit-driven person--the person who has surrendered to Jesus Christ--won't always have it easy. Check that, will almost never have it easy. This is true even if the outward circumstances of their existence are comfortable. There will still be "wild beasts" with which they must deal. I'm not referring to struggles with "infidels" out there. Most people, honestly, couldn't care less about the spiritual struggles of those committed to following Jesus Christ. Many friends of Martin Luther King, Jr., for example, found it quaint that he actually recoiled at his own marital infidelities. No, I'm talking about the interior spiritual struggles that are a constant part of the lives of anybody who is intent on following God. Get closer to God and you see just how perfect He is and how hard it is without utter dependence on Him. The temptation is to throw up our hands and say, "Sod it all!" Without constantly renewed dependence on God, that's exactly what we'll do!
Pastor Luke Bouman, based on lectures he heard given by Professor Fred Neidner of Valparaiso University, offers the intriguing suggestion that our traditional understanding of "the wilderness" in reading about Jesus' temptation may be all wrong. Because Moses was called to lead the people of Israel while watching his sheep in the wilderness regions of Midian because God shaped His people in their forty-year wilderness wanderings, Bouman suggests, the wilderness is "a holy place."
While I understand where Bouman and Niedner are coming from in their interpretations of the wilderness in the Biblical witness, I find their arguments unconvincing. In the Genesis 2 account of creation, the disordered chaos from which God makes life and on which peace and order are imposed, is not a roiling, stormy sea as in the Genesis 1 account, but a wild and dangerous desert wilderness.
God can carve Edens from wilderness, of course.
God can also meet us in the wilderness. That was what happened to Moses and the people of Israel.
But it doesn't alter the basic estrangement from God and danger to humanity, spiritual and otherwise, represented by the wilderness.
Jesus was driven into the wilderness, I believe, in order to taste something of the estrangement of humanity from God that came after the fall of Adam and Eve when they were driven east of Eden.
The fact that the wild beasts apparently don't assault Jesus doesn't represent the re-establishment of Eden-like harmony between human beings and God's creation, although it may foreshadow the Old Testament prophecy about the lion living at peace with the lamb. (Question: Which is Jesus? The lion? The lamb? Both?) But I think that the beasts more likely represent all the opposition Jesus will face, including that from Satan and from evil. In First Peter, Satan is described as "a roaring lion searching for who he may destroy."
Understanding why the Spirit drove Jesus into the foreboding wilderness can be seen in that phrase, "tempted by Satan." The verb--peirazo in the Greek of the New Testament, is like a coin with two sides of meaning:
In the wilderness, Jesus was driven to utter dependence on the Father. In our after-Baptism lives, we too will either depend on the Father or experience spectacular failure, the result of relying on ourselves, others, or our feelings in the face of being assaulted by the wild beasts of life.
In the midst of being tempted and tested, Jesus was served by angels. The word angel, in Greek, means messenger. The angels are messengers from God. The New Testament tells us also that they can bring ministry (diakosune) or service, calling them "ministering spirits."
God always sends help to us in the wilderness. Sometimes that help may be supernatural, as was true of Jesus. Often, it comes in the form of people. In the movie, The Color Purple, one character tells another, "When you walked in the room, I knew there was a God."
Psalm 23 says: "Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they comfort me." In the wilderness, a place of danger and temptation, Jesus fortified Himself for a ministry of loving self-sacrifice by relying on the Father and experiencing the help of the angels. Surely, there is a message in that for His followers.
The Bible Text:
9In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 12And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
14Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”
Some Comments:
A good chunk of this text for the First Weekend in Lent has already appeared in Bible lessons appointed for earlier weeks of the Church Year that began on November 27. My focus this weekend will be the verses we haven't touched on yet, Mark 1:12-13.
Remembering a basic principle of Biblical interpretation, context impacts content, let's consider context. This entire lesson is sandwiched between Jesus' Baptism, where the voice of the Father affirmed Jesus' status and ministry to Jesus, and the beginning of His ministry.
Jesus' temptation in the wilderness has something to do with both sides of that sandwich. The heavenly affirmation fortifies Him for the wilderness and all the challenges to come, including the cross.
The Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness. The verb is evocative. Jesus is driven away from what must have been a comfortable and comforting moment into the wild places. (There, he will even be met by what Mark describes as "wild beasts.")
Pastor Brian Stoffregen suggests that Mark's account of Jesus' Baptism describes our lives after we are baptized. I think that he is onto something!
Though, in Baptism we're assured of God's affirmation and presence in our lives, we still must face life in the wilderness. The Spirit-driven person--the person who has surrendered to Jesus Christ--won't always have it easy. Check that, will almost never have it easy. This is true even if the outward circumstances of their existence are comfortable. There will still be "wild beasts" with which they must deal. I'm not referring to struggles with "infidels" out there. Most people, honestly, couldn't care less about the spiritual struggles of those committed to following Jesus Christ. Many friends of Martin Luther King, Jr., for example, found it quaint that he actually recoiled at his own marital infidelities. No, I'm talking about the interior spiritual struggles that are a constant part of the lives of anybody who is intent on following God. Get closer to God and you see just how perfect He is and how hard it is without utter dependence on Him. The temptation is to throw up our hands and say, "Sod it all!" Without constantly renewed dependence on God, that's exactly what we'll do!
Pastor Luke Bouman, based on lectures he heard given by Professor Fred Neidner of Valparaiso University, offers the intriguing suggestion that our traditional understanding of "the wilderness" in reading about Jesus' temptation may be all wrong. Because Moses was called to lead the people of Israel while watching his sheep in the wilderness regions of Midian because God shaped His people in their forty-year wilderness wanderings, Bouman suggests, the wilderness is "a holy place."
While I understand where Bouman and Niedner are coming from in their interpretations of the wilderness in the Biblical witness, I find their arguments unconvincing. In the Genesis 2 account of creation, the disordered chaos from which God makes life and on which peace and order are imposed, is not a roiling, stormy sea as in the Genesis 1 account, but a wild and dangerous desert wilderness.
God can carve Edens from wilderness, of course.
God can also meet us in the wilderness. That was what happened to Moses and the people of Israel.
But it doesn't alter the basic estrangement from God and danger to humanity, spiritual and otherwise, represented by the wilderness.
Jesus was driven into the wilderness, I believe, in order to taste something of the estrangement of humanity from God that came after the fall of Adam and Eve when they were driven east of Eden.
The fact that the wild beasts apparently don't assault Jesus doesn't represent the re-establishment of Eden-like harmony between human beings and God's creation, although it may foreshadow the Old Testament prophecy about the lion living at peace with the lamb. (Question: Which is Jesus? The lion? The lamb? Both?) But I think that the beasts more likely represent all the opposition Jesus will face, including that from Satan and from evil. In First Peter, Satan is described as "a roaring lion searching for who he may destroy."
Understanding why the Spirit drove Jesus into the foreboding wilderness can be seen in that phrase, "tempted by Satan." The verb--peirazo in the Greek of the New Testament, is like a coin with two sides of meaning:
One of the things I tell my Catechism students is: Either God gets His way or God gets His way. God can even take the shenanigans of those who might try to lure us into wrongdoing and turn the experience of resistance and struggle into something that will strengthen our characters. As Martin Luther points out in The Small Catechism, God never tempts someone into sin. But God will use whatever temptation we face to prepare us for the next steps in our lives.
- Temptation: Allurement by Satan into rebellion from God's will and ways.
- Testing: God using the circumstances of a life in order to test faithfulness, not so much for God's benefit, but for that of the one being tested.
In the wilderness, Jesus was driven to utter dependence on the Father. In our after-Baptism lives, we too will either depend on the Father or experience spectacular failure, the result of relying on ourselves, others, or our feelings in the face of being assaulted by the wild beasts of life.
In the midst of being tempted and tested, Jesus was served by angels. The word angel, in Greek, means messenger. The angels are messengers from God. The New Testament tells us also that they can bring ministry (diakosune) or service, calling them "ministering spirits."
God always sends help to us in the wilderness. Sometimes that help may be supernatural, as was true of Jesus. Often, it comes in the form of people. In the movie, The Color Purple, one character tells another, "When you walked in the room, I knew there was a God."
Psalm 23 says: "Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they comfort me." In the wilderness, a place of danger and temptation, Jesus fortified Himself for a ministry of loving self-sacrifice by relying on the Father and experiencing the help of the angels. Surely, there is a message in that for His followers.
My Battle with Cliff Clavin Disease
A confession: I suffer from Cliff Clavin Disease. You remember Cliff Clavin, the insufferable mail carrier played by John Ratzenberger on Cheers.
Cliff loved factoids. Even if they weren't factual. Especially if they weren't factual.
A sampling of Clavinisms:
I'm sure that more than one person muttered in my direction words similar to those of Frasier Crane, another Cheers regular, who once told the Boston mailman, "Hello in there, Cliff. Tell me, what color is the sky in your world?"
It's a little known fact that Cliff Clavin Disease is genetic. And I can prove it. My grandfather, for whom I'm named, used to love clipping items from the newspaper that he found fascinating, tucking them into his wallet, and then expounding on them. When met with disbelief, he could quickly display his evidence.
But, just like Cliff, that didn't stop him from slipping in more than a little fiction with his facts. Like the times he claimed that while serving as a lowly Army NCO in Panama in the 1920s, he had seen military intelligence outlining Japanese plans for attacking Pearl Harbor.
Or his assertion that, in fact, Franklin Roosevelt had not died of a cerebral hemorrhage, but shot himself with a small pistol while posing for his portrait in Warm Springs. (When I presented this assertion as gospel truth during an elementary school history class, my teacher looked at me as though I had two heads and proceeded to correct me.)
Unfortunately, my mother may have been an enabler for my own surrender to this penchant for factoid (and fictionoid)-sharing. When I was little, she maintained a scrapbook of A.O. Leokum's "Tell Me Why" features from our local newspaper just for me. After you've wowed people with your knowledge of a few "little known facts," it becomes addicting and sometimes, you can't resist throwing in a few clinkers.
Through the years, my affliction has been both blessing and bane, mostly bane, I suppose. When the game, Trivial Pursuit, first came out, my friends were caught up in the fad and so, were eager to play. It didn't take long before they stopped the mere mention of the game in my presence, though. That's because when we did play, once it came to be my turn, that was pretty much the end of the game. People would screech at me in disbelief and disgust: "Who knows junk like that? You're not human!"
But, like Cliff and my grandfather, those clinkers--at times, big ones--have gotten thrown into my pronouncements on little known facts. When I was about eight, friends visited my family and at some point, I made an assertion about Abraham Lincoln that was wildly untrue. My parents might have let the whole thing slide had I not been so all-fired pushy about it. My mother finally pulled out an encyclopedia and showed me the facts. I paused for a second and pronounced, "They wrote the book wrong."
I'll never forget the day, back in my twenties, when I argued vehemently with a co-worker that a certain insurance company was owned by JC Penney. When she told me that she had just left a job with said insurance company and knew what she was talking about, I was in too deep, I guess. I told her that she was simply wrong.
Thankfully, in recent years, I tend to try to only assert things I know to be true. Experiences with being wrong, growing up a little, and my faith have probably all played a role in this "softening."
But, occasionally, haplessly, unintentionally, the Clavinisms slip out.
Last weekend, my wife and I went out to dinner at a local Max & Erma's with some old friends. As we waited to be seated, I saw a poster for a concert by the Chieftains. "Oh, the Chieftains," I said knowingly. (Or so I thought.) "Who are they?" one of our friends asked. "They're an Irish group," I said. (So far, so good. They do play Celtic music.) Then came the clinker: "They did that song, 'I Would Walk 500 Miles.'" "Oh."
Nothing more was said. No harm, no foul, I guess. But as articles about the Chieftains' upcoming concert in Cincinnati appeared in the local papers, no mention was made of 'I Would Walk 500 Miles.' I went to the Chieftains' web site. No mention of the song there either. So, I went to Google and learned that it wasn't the Chieftains who did this song.
Sometimes for me, it isn't a matter of "open mouth, insert foot," but of "open mouth, see what comes out."
Fortunately, I've learned that there is a cure for Cliff Clavin Disease: When you don't know what you're talking about, it's always better to keep your mouth shut!
And be prepared to be corrected when you're wrong.
UPDATE: Thanks to Glenn Reynolds for unleashing another one of his instalanches on this site. To all visiting by way of Instapundit, feel free to roam around here for a time. You might find other interesting stuff. Thanks for dropping by!
ANOTHER UPDATE: Dr. Melissa Clouthier, whose web site is called Dr. Melissa Clouthier, has linked to this post. (She refers to me as "a guy." It's the same designation given to me by the husband of a woman whose car I hit some thirty years ago when, tired and distracted, I ran a red light. As we sat in the back seat of a police cruiser, I heard him say to his wife, "This guy probably doesn't have any insurance." I did. In spite of eliciting that bad memory, I really appreciate the link, Melissa!)
Melissa said that she laughed out loud at my post and went on to talk about her own battle with CCD. Very funny! By the way, the truly funny person in my family can be found here.
YET ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks to Meep Meep Meep Meep Meep and Steve Baxter of Things That Make Me Think for linking to this post!
STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: Joe Sherlock at The View Through the Windshield has linked to this post. Thanks, Joe!
AND STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: Bobby Rozzell was kind enough to link to this post. Thanks a lot!
AND STILL YET ANOTHER UPDATE: (This one being added on the evening of March 19.) Phil Gerbyshak has linked to this post. Phil challenges readers to "make it great!" Thank you, Phil.
Cliff loved factoids. Even if they weren't factual. Especially if they weren't factual.
A sampling of Clavinisms:
"If you were to go back in history and take every president, you'd find that the numerical value of each letter in their name was equally divisible into the year in which they were elected. By my calculations, our next president has to be named Yellnick McWawa."To tell the truth, I was afflicted with Cliff's Disease before Cheers premiered in 1982. While I hope that my factoid-spouting has had a bit more credibility, I was deluging people with "little known facts" almost from the womb.
"It's a little known fact that the tan became popular in what is known as the Bronze Age."
"I wonder if you know that the harp is a predecessor of the modern day guitar. Early minstrels were much larger people. In fact, they had hands the size of small dogs."
I'm sure that more than one person muttered in my direction words similar to those of Frasier Crane, another Cheers regular, who once told the Boston mailman, "Hello in there, Cliff. Tell me, what color is the sky in your world?"
It's a little known fact that Cliff Clavin Disease is genetic. And I can prove it. My grandfather, for whom I'm named, used to love clipping items from the newspaper that he found fascinating, tucking them into his wallet, and then expounding on them. When met with disbelief, he could quickly display his evidence.
But, just like Cliff, that didn't stop him from slipping in more than a little fiction with his facts. Like the times he claimed that while serving as a lowly Army NCO in Panama in the 1920s, he had seen military intelligence outlining Japanese plans for attacking Pearl Harbor.
Or his assertion that, in fact, Franklin Roosevelt had not died of a cerebral hemorrhage, but shot himself with a small pistol while posing for his portrait in Warm Springs. (When I presented this assertion as gospel truth during an elementary school history class, my teacher looked at me as though I had two heads and proceeded to correct me.)
Unfortunately, my mother may have been an enabler for my own surrender to this penchant for factoid (and fictionoid)-sharing. When I was little, she maintained a scrapbook of A.O. Leokum's "Tell Me Why" features from our local newspaper just for me. After you've wowed people with your knowledge of a few "little known facts," it becomes addicting and sometimes, you can't resist throwing in a few clinkers.
Through the years, my affliction has been both blessing and bane, mostly bane, I suppose. When the game, Trivial Pursuit, first came out, my friends were caught up in the fad and so, were eager to play. It didn't take long before they stopped the mere mention of the game in my presence, though. That's because when we did play, once it came to be my turn, that was pretty much the end of the game. People would screech at me in disbelief and disgust: "Who knows junk like that? You're not human!"
But, like Cliff and my grandfather, those clinkers--at times, big ones--have gotten thrown into my pronouncements on little known facts. When I was about eight, friends visited my family and at some point, I made an assertion about Abraham Lincoln that was wildly untrue. My parents might have let the whole thing slide had I not been so all-fired pushy about it. My mother finally pulled out an encyclopedia and showed me the facts. I paused for a second and pronounced, "They wrote the book wrong."
I'll never forget the day, back in my twenties, when I argued vehemently with a co-worker that a certain insurance company was owned by JC Penney. When she told me that she had just left a job with said insurance company and knew what she was talking about, I was in too deep, I guess. I told her that she was simply wrong.
Thankfully, in recent years, I tend to try to only assert things I know to be true. Experiences with being wrong, growing up a little, and my faith have probably all played a role in this "softening."
But, occasionally, haplessly, unintentionally, the Clavinisms slip out.
Last weekend, my wife and I went out to dinner at a local Max & Erma's with some old friends. As we waited to be seated, I saw a poster for a concert by the Chieftains. "Oh, the Chieftains," I said knowingly. (Or so I thought.) "Who are they?" one of our friends asked. "They're an Irish group," I said. (So far, so good. They do play Celtic music.) Then came the clinker: "They did that song, 'I Would Walk 500 Miles.'" "Oh."
Nothing more was said. No harm, no foul, I guess. But as articles about the Chieftains' upcoming concert in Cincinnati appeared in the local papers, no mention was made of 'I Would Walk 500 Miles.' I went to the Chieftains' web site. No mention of the song there either. So, I went to Google and learned that it wasn't the Chieftains who did this song.
Sometimes for me, it isn't a matter of "open mouth, insert foot," but of "open mouth, see what comes out."
Fortunately, I've learned that there is a cure for Cliff Clavin Disease: When you don't know what you're talking about, it's always better to keep your mouth shut!
And be prepared to be corrected when you're wrong.
UPDATE: Thanks to Glenn Reynolds for unleashing another one of his instalanches on this site. To all visiting by way of Instapundit, feel free to roam around here for a time. You might find other interesting stuff. Thanks for dropping by!
ANOTHER UPDATE: Dr. Melissa Clouthier, whose web site is called Dr. Melissa Clouthier, has linked to this post. (She refers to me as "a guy." It's the same designation given to me by the husband of a woman whose car I hit some thirty years ago when, tired and distracted, I ran a red light. As we sat in the back seat of a police cruiser, I heard him say to his wife, "This guy probably doesn't have any insurance." I did. In spite of eliciting that bad memory, I really appreciate the link, Melissa!)
Melissa said that she laughed out loud at my post and went on to talk about her own battle with CCD. Very funny! By the way, the truly funny person in my family can be found here.
YET ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks to Meep Meep Meep Meep Meep and Steve Baxter of Things That Make Me Think for linking to this post!
STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: Joe Sherlock at The View Through the Windshield has linked to this post. Thanks, Joe!
AND STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: Bobby Rozzell was kind enough to link to this post. Thanks a lot!
AND STILL YET ANOTHER UPDATE: (This one being added on the evening of March 19.) Phil Gerbyshak has linked to this post. Phil challenges readers to "make it great!" Thank you, Phil.
A Treat: Listen to Lewis
Justin Taylor of Between Two Worlds has several links to radio talks given by C.S. Lewis. The first of the presentations to which Taylor links became Mere Christianity, my favorite book of all time! (Thanks to John Schroeder of Blogotional for linking to BTT.)
Bolsinger: Of Repentance, Ash Wednesday, and Lent
Writes Tod Bolsinger, one of my favorite bloggers:
Repentance is literally to “change your mind.” In the famous words of Dallas Willard, “To reconsider your strategy for living based on the news of God’s Kingdom that is available in Jesus.” And that is what Lent is for, to reconsider your strategy for living. To begin a new process of deep consideration and reflection about your life. To reconsider what it means to follow Jesus, to plumb the mystery of Good Friday and Easter Sunday. To reconsider what your strategy for living should be, based on this good news.I'm late in linking to this piece. But read the whole thing!
And it all begins with this: Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. You are not an angel. You are not a mere soul or disembodied spirit. You are human, you are mortal, you are deeply dependent on the God who formed your body from the humus of the earth and breathed life into you with his kiss. God has come to you, in Jesus, O Creature, and called you to have life eternal with him. And so, with ash on our foreheads and the taste of bread and grape on our tongues, we begin a holy lent.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
So, We Look Like Dorks: An Ash Wednesday Message
[The following message was shared with the people of Friendship Church on Ash Wednesday night, March 1, 2006. It was inspired, in part, by a message first published in 2003 at homileticsonline.com.]
Matthew 6:1-21
I can remember, back when I was in elementary school, seeing the Catholic kids who had gone either to early or noontime Ash Wednesday services and then shown up for class. They’d have these ash marks on their foreheads and I thought how dorky they looked! I thought to myself, “I wouldn’t want to have that on my forehead!” I was dorky enough without giving the other Protestant kids another reason to make fun of me.
Years later, when I attended seminary, the Imposition of Ashes happened during the chapel service on Ash Wednesdays every year. One Ash Wednesday, I missed the service. Everybody else in all my classes had the mark of the cross on their foreheads for the rest of the day. There I was with a naked forehead! I felt like a dork for not having ash marks on my forehead then.
In both instances, I was more concerned about what others thought of me than about where I was in my relationship with God.
In His words to us tonight, Jesus has a few things to say to people like me, people more concerned with appearances than with the substance of their lives and their relationships with God. Here’s a sampling:
Lent, which we begin tonight, is a time of spiritual renewal. As we prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus on Easter, Lent, this humanly-created season, is designed to help give us something to really celebrate when Easter Sunday morning rolls around.
Tonight, we agree together to use the next forty days to crucify the things that separate us from Christ and in doing so, to experience the birth of a new self.
Or at least, to begin to catch sight of the new selves we who follow Jesus will one day be.
Those new people God is making of us won’t worry about making good impressions on others or whether we look like dorks or not. Our new selves will be motivated simply to respond to the free gifts of forgiveness, life, and love that God gives to those who surrender to Jesus.
In a movie called, The Apostle, Robert Duvall plays a Southern preacher who revitalizes a church in a Louisiana town. I won’t go into the whole plot. But in the scene that I remember most fondly, Duvall and others in the church bought bags and bags of groceries for people who couldn’t afford them, then went to their houses, placed the food on their front porches, knocked at their doors, and then ran like crazy to avoid detection. Every time they ran away, they had to stifle giggles with each stride.
That scene conveyed something of the joy that belongs to those who respond to God’s love for them with acts of service and sacrifice, not to be noticed, but just to tell God, “Thank You.”
Quaker theologian Richard Foster is right, I think, when he says that every hidden act of service to others and of devotion to Jesus Christ, “sends ripples of joy and celebration through any community of people.” During our ‘forty days to servanthood,’ you and I are going to explore and I hope experience, what it means to be a people who send those ripples of godly joy and Christ-rooted celebration through this community!
When we come forward for the imposition of the ashes on Ash Wednesday, we...
Dorky or not, “ashes to ashes and dust to dust” is an honest statement that we make about ourselves tonight. But we also confess our faith that all who believe in Jesus Christ will rise again to live with God forever! Like Job in the Old Testament, we can say that after all our skin has been destroyed, our own eyes will see God!
Tonight, we wear the ashes and we remember both our mortality and the resurrection that belongs to all who follow Jesus.
Matthew 6:1-21
I can remember, back when I was in elementary school, seeing the Catholic kids who had gone either to early or noontime Ash Wednesday services and then shown up for class. They’d have these ash marks on their foreheads and I thought how dorky they looked! I thought to myself, “I wouldn’t want to have that on my forehead!” I was dorky enough without giving the other Protestant kids another reason to make fun of me.
Years later, when I attended seminary, the Imposition of Ashes happened during the chapel service on Ash Wednesdays every year. One Ash Wednesday, I missed the service. Everybody else in all my classes had the mark of the cross on their foreheads for the rest of the day. There I was with a naked forehead! I felt like a dork for not having ash marks on my forehead then.
In both instances, I was more concerned about what others thought of me than about where I was in my relationship with God.
In His words to us tonight, Jesus has a few things to say to people like me, people more concerned with appearances than with the substance of their lives and their relationships with God. Here’s a sampling:
“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven...In other words, Jesus says, no show-dog religion in His Kingdom!
“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others...
“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others...
“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting...”
Lent, which we begin tonight, is a time of spiritual renewal. As we prepare to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus on Easter, Lent, this humanly-created season, is designed to help give us something to really celebrate when Easter Sunday morning rolls around.
Tonight, we agree together to use the next forty days to crucify the things that separate us from Christ and in doing so, to experience the birth of a new self.
Or at least, to begin to catch sight of the new selves we who follow Jesus will one day be.
Those new people God is making of us won’t worry about making good impressions on others or whether we look like dorks or not. Our new selves will be motivated simply to respond to the free gifts of forgiveness, life, and love that God gives to those who surrender to Jesus.
In a movie called, The Apostle, Robert Duvall plays a Southern preacher who revitalizes a church in a Louisiana town. I won’t go into the whole plot. But in the scene that I remember most fondly, Duvall and others in the church bought bags and bags of groceries for people who couldn’t afford them, then went to their houses, placed the food on their front porches, knocked at their doors, and then ran like crazy to avoid detection. Every time they ran away, they had to stifle giggles with each stride.
That scene conveyed something of the joy that belongs to those who respond to God’s love for them with acts of service and sacrifice, not to be noticed, but just to tell God, “Thank You.”
Quaker theologian Richard Foster is right, I think, when he says that every hidden act of service to others and of devotion to Jesus Christ, “sends ripples of joy and celebration through any community of people.” During our ‘forty days to servanthood,’ you and I are going to explore and I hope experience, what it means to be a people who send those ripples of godly joy and Christ-rooted celebration through this community!
When we come forward for the imposition of the ashes on Ash Wednesday, we...
- acknowledge that without Jesus’ grace and our faith in Him, we would stand under God’s condemnation;
- that we’re completely dependent on God; and
- that repentant, we can turn away from the sin that would kill us and turn to the God Who loves to give us life.
Dorky or not, “ashes to ashes and dust to dust” is an honest statement that we make about ourselves tonight. But we also confess our faith that all who believe in Jesus Christ will rise again to live with God forever! Like Job in the Old Testament, we can say that after all our skin has been destroyed, our own eyes will see God!
Tonight, we wear the ashes and we remember both our mortality and the resurrection that belongs to all who follow Jesus.
Two Things to Give Up for Lent: The View from Her
Jan, at TheViewfromHer, has suggestions for two things that Christian bloggers can give up for Lent. In fact, they're two things of which all of us in the Christian camp, bloggers or not, are guilty. We would do well to deep-six them not only during Lent, but all the time!
A Song About Grace for This Ash Wednesday
Here are the words to another song, apart from those mentioned here that get at what grace is like:
Wide open are Your hands[The text was written by Bernard of Clairvaux, who lived from 1091 to 1153. It was translated into English by Charles Porterfield Krauth, who lived from 1823 to 1883. The melody, Leominster, was composed by George W. Martin, 1828 to 1881.]
To pay with more than gold
The awful debt of guilt and sin,
Forever and of old.
Ah, let me grasp those hands,
That we may never part,
And let the power of their blood
Sustain my fainting heart.
Wide open are Your arms,
A fallen world to embrace,
To win to love and endless rest
Our wayward human race.
Lord, I am sad and poor,
But boundless is Your grace;
Give me the soul-transforming joy
For which I seek Your face.
Draw all my mind and heart
Up to Your throne on high,
And let Your sacred cross exalt
My spirit to the sky.
To these, Your mighty hands,
My spirit I resign.
In life, I live alone to You;
In death, am Yours alone.
More on Don Knotts and Barney Fife
Danny Miller has a wonderful post on Don Knotts and the character he played on The Andy Griffith Show, Barney Fife.
Danny was kind enough to link to my post on Knotts, here.
But I had to respond to his characterization of what I wrote about Knotts' comic persona. "Following Knotts’ death," Danny wrote, "Christian bloggers [and here, he linked to my piece] weighed in on the spiritual impact of Barney Fife."
I wrote to Danny:
[By the way: What is it with my Twelve-Steps obsession today? It's like the unintended theme of the day, probably appropriate on Ash Wednesday.]
Danny was kind enough to link to my post on Knotts, here.
But I had to respond to his characterization of what I wrote about Knotts' comic persona. "Following Knotts’ death," Danny wrote, "Christian bloggers [and here, he linked to my piece] weighed in on the spiritual impact of Barney Fife."
I wrote to Danny:
Actually, though I appreciate the link, Danny, I don't think that I "weighed in on the spiritual impact of Barney Fife."I recommend Danny's personal appreciation of Knotts.
What I was trying to say, perhaps ineffectively, is that if one wondered at the appeal of a faith that calls on us to admit our foibles and weaknesses, as both Judaism and Christianity do, one might consider the appeal of the Barney Fife character.
There is nothing heroic about him, at least not as heroism is classically defined. It's his transparent weakness that gives him his appeal. And Barney is at his most lovable when, his humanity on full display, he acknowledges the weaknesses he tries so to hide and breaks through to some new insight about himself and about life.
For the Jew and the Christian, faith and life begin when we can, like the Twelve Steppers whose program was taken straight from the Bible, admit that we are powerless to overcome our own compulsions and that we need our Higher Power.
[By the way: What is it with my Twelve-Steps obsession today? It's like the unintended theme of the day, probably appropriate on Ash Wednesday.]
Ash Wednesday Ruminations on Grace
Richard Lawrence Cohen has a clever story, The Grace Store, about a guy who looks for grace online. I urge you go to his site and read it right now. Go ahead, I'll wait for you here.
Okay, wasn't that good? Richard is a terrific writer.
But, of course, Richard's wonderful bit of microfiction begs the question, "What is grace, exactly?"
I took that as my topic in a micro-sermon that I wrote for the Comments section of Richard's blog [additions or revisions are bracketed]:
By the way, I think that my favorite lines in the Norman song are in the bridge:
Okay, wasn't that good? Richard is a terrific writer.
But, of course, Richard's wonderful bit of microfiction begs the question, "What is grace, exactly?"
I took that as my topic in a micro-sermon that I wrote for the Comments section of Richard's blog [additions or revisions are bracketed]:
Richard:UPDATE: Richard and I have continued our dialogue on this subject of grace. He responded:
Okay, since I consider "grace" sort of my specialty, get ready for some preachifying, Lutheran-style.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, martyred by the Nazis [for his opposition to Hitler] said that God's grace is free, but that it will cost you your life.
I've always pictured it like this: Our arms are filled with all the stuff that we falsely think can give us life. You know, stuff like status, power, a reliance on money to measure self-worth, sexual conquest, racial or ethnic domination, and so on. These are things which the world, at various times and in various places, tells us will help us to "earn" a sort of transcendent, meaningful, or at least, a "comfortable" life.
In fact, we like the thought of earning life through this stuff because if that's the way things operate, then we are in control. We become our own Gods.
But then along came Jesus, Who--if you believe the New Testament's witness about Him--was sinless and yet, on the cross, voluntarily accepted our separation from God the Father and the life He gives. (Separation from God, in the end, is what sin is.)
On Easter, Jesus shows up, risen back to life--something seen by more than 500 people--and He says, in effect, "You can have life from the only One Who capable of pulling off resurrections. All you have to do is let go of the dead idols you're holding and take hold of my living hand."
Dead idols imprison us, causing us to do horrible things to others and to ourselves. Renouncing them, giving up on the life we once thought held so much meaning, is a kind of death. (The New Testament speaks of crucifying the old self.) But when we throw in with Christ, the NT teaches, we grab onto the only one who can give life and proved it on the first Easter.
You can't earn the life Jesus offers. All you can do is put down your dukes and quit fighting.
The word for grace in the Greek of the New Testament is "charis," from which we get the word, "charity." That word pretty well sums up the Christian notion of "grace."
It also sums up the Jewish notion of grace, as witnessed to in the first testament. This goes all the way back to Abraham of whom Genesis says, "Abraham believed and God reckoned it to him as righteousness."
In other words, like everyone who puts down her or his dukes and surrenders to God's free offer of life, Abraham didn't earn God's grace. Abraham wasn't righteous first, obeying a holy rule book, and then, lo and behold, found himself accepted by God. Things happened in reverse order: Abraham trusted God's acceptance of him, willing to go to some unknown country at God's direction. and God said that his trust was all he needed.
When Jesus says, "“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news,” He's effectively saying, "Grace is available. Drop all that stuff you're carrying, the stuff that you think gives you life but actually sucks it out of you, and latch onto me! I'll give you the life you've always been looking for."
The Twelve Steppers have it right in their first two steps, which really just summarize this business of emptying one's arms of idols and then, filling up on God: 1. We admitted we were powerless over [fill in with your favorite idol here]; 2. We came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
Three songs really convey what I mean by grace better than I have here:
Grace by U-2.
Carry the Weight, composed by Larry Norman. It's been recorded by Ringo Starr and by Lost and Found, among others.
Amazon... I mean, Amazing Grace, written by the former slave ship captain, John Newton, who lived everything he writes about in that song. [You'll have to read the Comments on Richard's blog to understand the allusion here.]
This is how I picture grace.
End of sermon.
Mark
Mark: Thank you. The Bonhoeffer quote is the perfect expression of the idea I was trying to approach in the post. And in mentioning people who have had to pay for grace, I was specifically thinking about people who have recovered from longterm addictions that ruined large percentages of their lives. Your picture of laying down idols is a most appealing one; I'm wondering, though, if there isn''t a negative side of renunciation too -- having to give up the ordinary joys and pleasures and loves of a decent worldly life -- giving up one's family, as I think Jesus said, in order to follow God.I replied:
I know "Amazing Grace," of course. Embarrassed to say I don't know that U2 song or the other one. Musically I'm trying to return to the 80s -- the 1780s.
Again, Mark, I thank you for making this wise and serious -- and hoped-for, frankly -- contribution to the discussion.
Richard:Then, Richard wrote:
First of all, I was wrong about the title of the Larry Norman song. It's actually, "Weight of the World." I love the chorus:
You carry the weight
The weight of the world
It's breaking you down
On your back like a boulder
Before it's too late,
Get rid of it, girl,
Get it off of your shoulder
I know you've been used
But you gotta lose the weight of the world.
You raise an interesting point when you write, "I'm wondering, though, if there isn''t a negative side of renunciation too -- having to give up the ordinary joys and pleasures and loves of a decent worldly life -- giving up one's family, as I think Jesus said, in order to follow God."
The passage to which you refer, I think, is the one in which Jesus says, “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26). Those words are jarring until we learn that the word translated in English as "hate" is a Semitic comparison. Jesus is talking priorities here. He neither wants us to give up our families or the pleasures that family living affords. (Thank God!)
The Gospel of John says that as He was dying on the cross, Jesus Himself thought about His mother, commending her to the care of "the beloved disciple," almost universally thought to be John, the Gospel writer. Here is a post in which I tell the story of a woman whose "dedication" to her family amounted to a kind of God-obscuring and I would say, joy-killing, idolatry that was harmful to her family. I was so taken with her words when she told me this true story twenty-five years ago!
The connection between addiction and idol-worship is so close that as I grow older, I'm becoming more convinced that they're synonomous. Life can be so painful and challenging sometimes, that the allure of addictions is understandable. So is their intractability. All of which makes grace more amazing. (Or amazon, as the case may be.)
I love your post and I'm so thankful that we can have these sorts of discussions on your blog, Richard!
God bless you!
Mark
And you, Mark.I thought that Richard's point about "soft addictions" was important and told him so:
Your comparison between addiction and idolatry is very apt, I think. And not only addiction in the literal sense, but the "soft addictions" (TV, work, spectator sports, entertainment, pets) that so many of us depend on to get us through the days.
Yes, that was the Gospel verse I was thinking of.
And now to read that post of yours...
Richard:Conversations like this are what make blogging so unique and special.
Your identification of what you call "soft addictions" is profound.
The Genesis account of humanity's fall into sin says that the serpent was the most subtle of all creatures. Sin is subtle.
It happens whenever otherwise benign or even wholesome pursuits are done at the wrong times, in the wrong ways, in the wrong places, with the wrong people, or to excess.
The difficulty in dealing with "soft addictions" is that they appear so benign. They don't seem like addictions or like sins.
But their effect on us is like that of the small amounts of water that flow through the Grand Canyon, slowly and inexorably wearing the rock down.
One example of "soft addictions" is what Neil Postman was talking about in his book, Amusing Ourselves to Death. The otherwise benign and necessary impulse to relax and to be entertained or diverted in the midst of a busy life slowly gives rise to a mentality of always wanting to be entertained and of impatience with anything that doesn't please us...and immediately.
The result can be an indifference to others that is coldhearted and in effect, hatred. Or, we can become inveterate thrill seekers, searching for a new "buzz" in our relationships, in our purchases, in the stuff we put into our bodies, and so on.
Yet, the entertainment addiction is so soft, so subtle, that suggestions about its dangers are seen as downright weird.
These are subtle evils and hard to overcome.
But, I believe, grace can and does overcome them.
Mark
By the way, I think that my favorite lines in the Norman song are in the bridge:
It all comes down to who you crucifyWow!
You either kiss the future or the past goodbye
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Does Our Praying Do Any Good?
I've urged prayer about the Darfur situation repeatedly. Does such praying do any good? I believe that it does. In one of the posts from my Power of Encouragement series, I talked about a fantastic book on prayer, written by the late Frank Laubach, whose launching of the worldwide Laubach Literacy Movement began as a practical result of prayer.
In his book, Prayer: The Mightiest Force in the World, first published in 1946, Laubach shared some of his passion for praying for world leaders:Laubach is right, I'm sure. Just as I feel that the prayers of people both inside and outside of the Eastern Bloc finally brought an end to the evil of Soviet Communism, I believe also that prayer, which calls down the power and grace of the God we know in Jesus Christ is our most potent weapon in seeking that God's will is done "on earth as it is in heaven"!
We do not "persuade God to try harder" when we pray [for world leaders]; it is our world leaders, our statesmen and church men [sic] whom we persuade to try harder [through our praying]. We help God when we pray. When great numbers of us pray for leaders, a mighty invisible spiritual force lifts our minds and eyes toward God. His Spirit flows through our prayer to them, and He can speak to them directly [italics mine].
We can do more for the world with prayer than if we were to walk into Whitehall, London, or the Kremlin in Moscow, and tell those men what to do---far more! If they listened to our suggestions, we would probably be more or less wrong. But what God tells them, when they listen to Him, must be right. It is infinitely better for world leaders to listen to God than for them to listen to us.
Most of us will never enter the White House and offer advice to the President. Probably he will never have time to read our letters. But we can give him what is far more important than advice. We can give him a lift into the presence of God, make him hungry for divine wisdom, which is the grandest thing one man ever does for another. We can visit the White House with prayer as many times a day as we think of it, and every such visit makes us a channel between God and the president.
"You may have thought the terrible situation in Darfur couldn't get worse, but it has."
That's the assessment of Peter Takirambudde, executive director of the Africa division of Human Rights Watch, quoted in today's New York Times. Already, more than 200,000 civilian people have been killed in the Darfur region by the murderous janjaweed, ill-disguised functionaries of the Sudanese government, in a campaign of genocide. Many thousands more have been displaced.
Now, the janjaweed are carrying their campaign of terror into Chad. Still, the international community does little. The African Union has a force there, but as the Times article notes:
The Times article goes on chillingly:
ANOTHER UPDATE: John Schroeder of Blogotional has linked to this post. I appreciate it, John, and I enjoy the rich diversity of posts on your site.
Now, the janjaweed are carrying their campaign of terror into Chad. Still, the international community does little. The African Union has a force there, but as the Times article notes:
The United Nations Security Council has agreed to send troops to protect civilians, but they will take months to arrive. In the meantime, President Bush has said, NATO should help shore up a failing African Union peacekeeping mission there, but a surge of violence has chased tens of thousands of people from their homes in recent weeks.The janjaweed are now apparently intent on taking advantage of the chaos in Chad, where a civil war is already happening.
The Times article goes on chillingly:
If unchecked by international intervention, this complex and volatile mix of government forces, allied militias and at least a half-dozen rebel groups in a remote region awash with weapons will almost inevitably lead to disaster, said John Prendergast, a senior adviser at the International Crisis Group, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization, and an expert on the Darfur conflict.Something must happen to stop this expanding slaughter. Somebody must lead. All of us must speak out. Some suggestions:
"The principle strategy of all these actors, both state actors and proxy militias, is to displace people in order to destabilize and undermine the support base of your opponent," he said. "We are going to see an increasing spiral of displacement on both sides of the border and an increasingly dangerous environment for humanitarian workers."
- Write to NATO, asking the group to act now. (natodoc@hq.nato.int)
- Write to the President, asking him to push NATO on a circumstance he has already described as "genocide." (comments@whitehouse.gov)
- Pray for peace in that part of Africa and that once restored, aid workers can get relief to the victims of genocide in Sudan and Chad. Because our wisdom is limited, pray that God will send His wisdom and counsel to all the leaders in this situation, including those of the outlaw Sudanese government and their janjaweed allies and that He will also open their wills and minds to His guidance. Ask that God will similarly guide the leaders of the NATO nations, the United Nations, and our own country in this matter.
ANOTHER UPDATE: John Schroeder of Blogotional has linked to this post. I appreciate it, John, and I enjoy the rich diversity of posts on your site.
"How To Write Good"
Alex and Brett of Rebelution share 24 Tips for How to Write Good. Very funny. (Thanks to Matt Brown of Good Brownie for leading me to this post.)
You're Invited to Participate in 40-Days to Servanthood
40-Days to Servanthood is the not-so-original name we've given to a special Lenten emphasis at the congregation I serve as pastor, Friendship Lutheran Church near Amelia, Ohio. (In suburban Cincinnati.)
Starting with the First Sunday in Lent, March 5, members of Friendship will be using short daily readings, which they'll be urged to read twice each day: once in the morning and once before going to bed at night. Each of the readings, almost all less than 400-words in length, will explore a single, important teaching about Christian servanthood and be capped by a Bible passage to prayerfully consider.
There will be other activities at our congregation throughout Lent, each designed to help us adopt Christian servanthood as our lifestyle.
But I hope that readers of Better Living who aren't Friendship members will find the daily readings helpful. I believe that even small acts of service, rendered in the Name and with the love of Jesus Christ, can transform our world.
I hope that you'll join us as we strive to live as authentic servants of Christ!
Starting with the First Sunday in Lent, March 5, members of Friendship will be using short daily readings, which they'll be urged to read twice each day: once in the morning and once before going to bed at night. Each of the readings, almost all less than 400-words in length, will explore a single, important teaching about Christian servanthood and be capped by a Bible passage to prayerfully consider.
There will be other activities at our congregation throughout Lent, each designed to help us adopt Christian servanthood as our lifestyle.
But I hope that readers of Better Living who aren't Friendship members will find the daily readings helpful. I believe that even small acts of service, rendered in the Name and with the love of Jesus Christ, can transform our world.
I hope that you'll join us as we strive to live as authentic servants of Christ!
Monday, February 27, 2006
Your Right to Be Wrong
[Steve Goodier of Life Support Systems has written another gem, copied below. Steve is a gifted writer. You can read other things he's written, sign up to receive his emailed inspirations, and order one of his books here.]
A humorous story has it that a newly appointed young clergy person was contacted by a local funeral director to hold a graveside service at a small country cemetery in Iowa. There was to be no funeral, just the committal, because the deceased had no family or friends left in the state.[This message is found in Steve Goodier's book, Deciding How to Live]
The young pastor started early to cemetery, but soon became lost. After making several wrong turns, he finally arrived a half-hour late. The hearse was nowhere in sight and cemetery workers were relaxing under a near-by tree, eating their lunch.
The pastor went to the open grave and found that the vault lid was already in place. He took out his book and read the service. As he returned to his car, he overheard one of the workers say, "Maybe we'd better tell him it's a septic tank."
Why is it we make our biggest mistakes in public? And some people can't avoid it...former hockey goalie Jacques Plante wonders, "How would you like a job where, if you made a mistake, a big, red light goes on and 18,000 people boo?"
But we should never give up our right to be wrong. Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment. It is your right to be wrong. "No (one) ever became great or good except through many and great mistakes," said William E. Gladstone. Great mistakes are opportunities for great learning. And great learning makes for great living.
You have a right to be wrong. And if you are to build a great life, you have a duty to make great mistakes. If possible, laugh at them. Always learn from them. And try to make sure your next mistake is one you haven't made before!
The Appeal of Don Knotts' Comedy Persona: The Last Gets to Be First
Virginia Heffernan writes insightfully of the appeal of Don Knotts' comedy in The New York Times:
And so can we all, because in spite of our achievements or our pretenses to the contrary, we must recognize that, in the end, we aren't in control of our lives very often.
For the Christian, about to enter the Lenten Season of spiritual renewal, Heffernan's assertion that Knotts' "talent for abasement became a source, paradoxically, of great authority," displayed in the comedic persona he developed, resonates.
We follow a Savior God, Jesus, Who, "though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:6-8). Jesus' authority was underscored by His surrender to the will of God and the limitations of humanity.
He shows us and also tells us that the last will be first and the first, last.
I'm not trying to baptize either Knotts or his characters as some models of Christian discipleship. I have no idea where he was at spiritually.
But if you're wondering why anyone would find Jesus' call to put God first, others second, and ourselves last compelling, the enduring appeal of Knotts' comedy persona may help to explain things. Barney et al. were at their worst when they tried, against all reason and common sense, to be masters of the universe. We laughed at the absurdity of it.
It was when these characters accepted their lots and considered what they could do for others that they were at their best. They became heroes not by heroic pretense, but by submission to their own limitations. Think of The Incredible Mr. Limpet, in which Knotts' hapless character was consigned to live the life of a fish, a life for which he initially wished partly to get away from a badgering wife. Yet in his fishiness, improbably, Limpet became a hero.
Or, consider this episode of The Andy Griffith Show, cited by Heffernan:
It worked. For a decade-and-a-half in the sixties and seventies, the last did become first as Knotts carried off best-supporting-actor Emmys and had a run of successful movies that his friend, Andy Griffith, didn't get.
Good job, Don!
UPDATE: Thanks to those who've come this way via Hugh Hewitt's site and thanks to Hugh for linking! Feel free to...ahem...explore this site. (That's a subtle hint.) You're likely to find some stuff you enjoy or that will at least, I hope, make you think.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks to Pastor Jeff for his link to this piece!
YET ANOTHER UPDATE: Thank you to Julana of Life in the Slow Lane for linking to this post!
One by one, Mr. Knotts mocked the pretenses of the comic actor who often has his eye on nobler pursuits. In the nervous man, he reveled in the discomfort that most comics tend to pass off as indignation or savoir-faire. As Barney, he satirized swagger and self-importance. Finally, on "Three's Company" in the late 70's and 80's, he sent up the comedian's hypersexuality, which is often his pride. Mr. Knotts, over and over, was willing to play the desperate, pathetic low-man-on-every-pole. He did it so well — never forsaking his persona and trying to seize the lead, as nearly all major comedians do these days — that his talent for abasement became a source, paradoxically, of great authority. By revealing but never indulging these pretenses, he enlightened everyone he worked with, and his audiences.Even in his performance as the TV Repairman in Pleasantville, a character endowed with the inexplicable power of being able to send Toby Maguire and Reese Witherspoon into the faux-world of a 1950s sitcom, Knotts was the "desperate, pathetic low-man-on-every-pole." In the end, he was unable to order Maguire back into the real world or to do anything about the changes which Maguire and Witherspoon wrought in Pleasantville. Barney Fife would have understood.
And so can we all, because in spite of our achievements or our pretenses to the contrary, we must recognize that, in the end, we aren't in control of our lives very often.
For the Christian, about to enter the Lenten Season of spiritual renewal, Heffernan's assertion that Knotts' "talent for abasement became a source, paradoxically, of great authority," displayed in the comedic persona he developed, resonates.
We follow a Savior God, Jesus, Who, "though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:6-8). Jesus' authority was underscored by His surrender to the will of God and the limitations of humanity.
He shows us and also tells us that the last will be first and the first, last.
I'm not trying to baptize either Knotts or his characters as some models of Christian discipleship. I have no idea where he was at spiritually.
But if you're wondering why anyone would find Jesus' call to put God first, others second, and ourselves last compelling, the enduring appeal of Knotts' comedy persona may help to explain things. Barney et al. were at their worst when they tried, against all reason and common sense, to be masters of the universe. We laughed at the absurdity of it.
It was when these characters accepted their lots and considered what they could do for others that they were at their best. They became heroes not by heroic pretense, but by submission to their own limitations. Think of The Incredible Mr. Limpet, in which Knotts' hapless character was consigned to live the life of a fish, a life for which he initially wished partly to get away from a badgering wife. Yet in his fishiness, improbably, Limpet became a hero.
Or, consider this episode of The Andy Griffith Show, cited by Heffernan:
On "The Loaded Goat," a winning episode of "The Andy Griffith Show," it's Barney who saves the day. Playing an achingly melancholy song on his harmonica, he leads a dangerous goat, which has swallowed dynamite, out of town.When you think about it, this ultimate acceptance of who they were, a staple of Knotts' characters, mirrored a decision he must have made about himself early in his show business career. He wasn't good-looking. He couldn't sing or dance. His voice could be grating. So, he laid aside pretense and fashioned himself into the best version of himself--at least on screens large and small--that he could be.
It worked. For a decade-and-a-half in the sixties and seventies, the last did become first as Knotts carried off best-supporting-actor Emmys and had a run of successful movies that his friend, Andy Griffith, didn't get.
Good job, Don!
UPDATE: Thanks to those who've come this way via Hugh Hewitt's site and thanks to Hugh for linking! Feel free to...ahem...explore this site. (That's a subtle hint.) You're likely to find some stuff you enjoy or that will at least, I hope, make you think.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks to Pastor Jeff for his link to this piece!
YET ANOTHER UPDATE: Thank you to Julana of Life in the Slow Lane for linking to this post!
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Darren McGavin Dies
My favorite McGavin role was that of the cynical and manipulative professional gambler in The Natural.
Christians Not Acting Like Christians
Christians are recovering sinners. But it appears that some would rather not recover.
Smart Sex
Jan at TheViewfromHer has some interesting things to say on what constitutes "smart sex." It reminded me of an Arthur Rouner book I read a number of years ago (Struggling with Sex) and of a message that incorporated Rouner's ideas, which I shared two-and-a-half years ago. The message was called God and Sex and you can find it here.
Called to Clarity
[This message was shared with the people of Friendship Church during worship celebrations on February 25 and 26. The theme was suggested by the work of the staff at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church, Burnsville, Minnesota.]
Mark 9:1-10
A few days ago, as I was preparing for today’s worship celebration, I told my son, who was working on the Keynote presentation for today, that I was considering using the song, I Can See Clearly Now, written and first performed by Johnny Cliff back in 1972, at the end of the message.
That’s because as our Bible lesson opens, Jesus tells the twelve apostles “there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come [into this world] with power.” Then, lo and behold, Jesus takes His three closest followers, Peter, James, and John, up on a high mountain with Him and they do see God’s kingdom come to them with power. I could just imagine them singing, "I can see clearly now..."
The only problem with cuing up the song for you today, though, is that while Peter, James, and John did see Jesus transfigured before them, and they did see two figures from the ancient past, Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus, and they did hear the voice of God the Father telling them to pay attention to what Jesus had to say, it would be awhile before they saw clearly. Some things would have to happen before they understood just what they were seeing.
Those of us privileged to be living today have the benefit of being on the Easter side of Jesus’ cross. The result is that you and I can look back at the Transfiguration of Jesus, or as the original Greek of the New Testament puts it, the metamorphosis of Jesus, when the glory of His God-ness shone, and we can see some things clearly that Peter, James, and John couldn’t see at all. I want to talk about three of them with you today.
The first is this: We can’t capture God! We woke up this past Wednesday morning to the news that the Askariya shrine, one of the holiest places in the world for Shiite Muslims, had been bombed. It was apparently the act of Sunni Muslim insurgents. Immediately, thousands of Shias hit the streets calling for revenge. Others took that revenge and since the shrine was bombed, a tit-for-tat war has resulted in more than 90 mosques being attacked. Several Islamic clerics have been killed or kidnapped.
As I read and heard this news, I thought of the members of those Alabama churches whose places of worship were recently destroyed by arsonists’ fires. None of those folks demonstrated or called for revenge. In fact, in all of the press accounts I’ve read, the members of those churches have said one thing repeatedly: We pray that God will forgive the people who did this.
Why did they react in this way? Jesus’ call to forgive as we’ve been forgiven is one reason, to be sure. But there’s another one, I think: These Christians understand that those buildings were just buildings. God doesn’t live in buildings made with hands, King Solomon said at the dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem back during Old Testament days.
This is a truth that Peter didn’t understand on the Mount of Transfiguration. “Teacher,” he said, “let’s build three dwellings, one dedicated to You, another to Moses, and the third to Elijah.” The word Peter uses that’s translated as “dwelling” is skene in the original Greek. It can mean booth, house, tent, tabernacle, or place of worship. Peter wanted to create a place that would somehow capture the glory of God. Then, presumably, people could go to this place and soak up the glory whenever they wanted it. But that simply can’t be done. God’s glory is seen not in buildings or the trappings of religion. It’s seen in the lives of those surrendered to God.
Maybe that’s why, as soon as Peter started babbling about putting up some buildings, God the Father set him straight, pointing Peter to Jesus and saying, “This is My beloved Son, listen to Him.” We can’t capture God. But we can allow ourselves to be captured by Him. We can surrender to God-come-to-earth, Jesus Christ, and experience Him living with us every moment of every day!
Here’s another thing that Peter, James, and John couldn’t see up on the Mount of Transfiguration: We can’t say that we really know Who Jesus is until we submit to the cross. As Jesus and the three apostles were coming down the mountain, He ordered them not to tell anybody about the amazing thing they had just witnessed until after He had risen from the dead.
This past week, I received a note from the grandmother-in-law of a young woman, Kendra, for whom we’ve been praying. She reported that Kendra is now in remission from her cancer and doing well. She said that it’s wonderful to see Kendra holding her baby, living a normal and happy life. While each of us can be grateful that God has answered our prayers for this young woman and her family, unless we or members of our families or close friends have been through similar experiences, we can’t really know the sheer joy and relief that Kendra and her loved ones are feeling these days.
On the mountain, Peter, James, and John saw the glory of the coming of God’s kingdom to the world. But they couldn’t yet fathom how wonderful it would be when that kingdom came into their own lives. That’s because they couldn’t see the terrible price that Jesus would pay so that the kingdom could come to each and every one of us. “The wages of sin is death,” the Bible tells us. Though He was completely sinless, Jesus took those awful wages--our wages--on the cross.
And what the three apostles weren’t yet ready to know that day was that the only way for the free gifts of forgiveness and everlasting life to come to us is if we go to Jesus’ cross and say, “Lord Jesus, crucify everything in Me that isn’t as pure and holy and wonderful and pulsating with life of God as You are. Every ambition, every desire, every impulse, every thought that doesn’t come from You, kill it off, and keep killing those things off, even though it may pain me to part with them, for as long as I’m living. I don’t want anything to prevent Your kingdom from being mine for all eternity!”
There is a final thing that the three apostles couldn’t see clearly, which we can see, if we dare. In his book, Ruthless Trust, Brennan Manning speaks of a man named John Kavanaugh who sought clarity about what to do with his life.
As part of his search, he volunteered to work for three months at "The House of the Dying" in Calcutta, India, a place founded by Mother Teresa. The very first morning he was there, Kavanaugh met Mother Teresa. She asked him, “What can I do for you?” He paused to think and then asked that she pray for him. “What do you want me to pray for?” she wondered. “Pray," he said, "that I have clarity.” Her abrupt response took him aback. “No," she told him, "I will not do that.” When he asked why not, she told him, “Clarity is the last thing you are clinging to and must let go of.” When Mr. Kavanaugh observed that she seemed to have the kind of clarity he wanted, she laughed out loud and told him, “I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God.”
Jesus, Peter, James, and John had a mountaintop experience that was so beautiful they may have wanted to stay there forever. But there was life to be lived. There were crises to be weathered, hardships to be endured, relationships to repair, diseases to heal, tears to dry, abuses to be confronted, wars to be faced, decisions to be made. What they needed and what we need in facing the everyday challenges of life here in the lowlands, away from the mountaintop, isn’t clarity. What we need is trust, trust in the God Who has proven the infinity of His love for us through the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The third thing that we can see that the apostles couldn’t see that day is this: This side of heaven, God isn’t going to show us the future. Nor will He give us a time on earth free of problems. But if we will trust Him, He’ll guide us and empower us.
God will give us lives which at their end, will be worthy of those words which I’ve already told you many times I long to hear from our Lord more than any others. They're words of which I know I will be completely unworthy if I'm forced to stand before God alone in my sins. But, I dare to believe that I will hear Him say them if I trust in Christ: “Well done, good and faithful servant!”
Johnny Cliff sang that he could see clearly now the rain was gone, along with all pain and bad feelings. In Christ, we can see those things will be true for us too...in eternity.
For now, though, there are three other things we can see clearly:
[The true story about Mother Teresa is in a message prepared for this weekend by Pastor Paul Gauche.]
Mark 9:1-10
A few days ago, as I was preparing for today’s worship celebration, I told my son, who was working on the Keynote presentation for today, that I was considering using the song, I Can See Clearly Now, written and first performed by Johnny Cliff back in 1972, at the end of the message.
That’s because as our Bible lesson opens, Jesus tells the twelve apostles “there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see that the kingdom of God has come [into this world] with power.” Then, lo and behold, Jesus takes His three closest followers, Peter, James, and John, up on a high mountain with Him and they do see God’s kingdom come to them with power. I could just imagine them singing, "I can see clearly now..."
The only problem with cuing up the song for you today, though, is that while Peter, James, and John did see Jesus transfigured before them, and they did see two figures from the ancient past, Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus, and they did hear the voice of God the Father telling them to pay attention to what Jesus had to say, it would be awhile before they saw clearly. Some things would have to happen before they understood just what they were seeing.
Those of us privileged to be living today have the benefit of being on the Easter side of Jesus’ cross. The result is that you and I can look back at the Transfiguration of Jesus, or as the original Greek of the New Testament puts it, the metamorphosis of Jesus, when the glory of His God-ness shone, and we can see some things clearly that Peter, James, and John couldn’t see at all. I want to talk about three of them with you today.
The first is this: We can’t capture God! We woke up this past Wednesday morning to the news that the Askariya shrine, one of the holiest places in the world for Shiite Muslims, had been bombed. It was apparently the act of Sunni Muslim insurgents. Immediately, thousands of Shias hit the streets calling for revenge. Others took that revenge and since the shrine was bombed, a tit-for-tat war has resulted in more than 90 mosques being attacked. Several Islamic clerics have been killed or kidnapped.
As I read and heard this news, I thought of the members of those Alabama churches whose places of worship were recently destroyed by arsonists’ fires. None of those folks demonstrated or called for revenge. In fact, in all of the press accounts I’ve read, the members of those churches have said one thing repeatedly: We pray that God will forgive the people who did this.
Why did they react in this way? Jesus’ call to forgive as we’ve been forgiven is one reason, to be sure. But there’s another one, I think: These Christians understand that those buildings were just buildings. God doesn’t live in buildings made with hands, King Solomon said at the dedication of the Temple in Jerusalem back during Old Testament days.
This is a truth that Peter didn’t understand on the Mount of Transfiguration. “Teacher,” he said, “let’s build three dwellings, one dedicated to You, another to Moses, and the third to Elijah.” The word Peter uses that’s translated as “dwelling” is skene in the original Greek. It can mean booth, house, tent, tabernacle, or place of worship. Peter wanted to create a place that would somehow capture the glory of God. Then, presumably, people could go to this place and soak up the glory whenever they wanted it. But that simply can’t be done. God’s glory is seen not in buildings or the trappings of religion. It’s seen in the lives of those surrendered to God.
Maybe that’s why, as soon as Peter started babbling about putting up some buildings, God the Father set him straight, pointing Peter to Jesus and saying, “This is My beloved Son, listen to Him.” We can’t capture God. But we can allow ourselves to be captured by Him. We can surrender to God-come-to-earth, Jesus Christ, and experience Him living with us every moment of every day!
Here’s another thing that Peter, James, and John couldn’t see up on the Mount of Transfiguration: We can’t say that we really know Who Jesus is until we submit to the cross. As Jesus and the three apostles were coming down the mountain, He ordered them not to tell anybody about the amazing thing they had just witnessed until after He had risen from the dead.
This past week, I received a note from the grandmother-in-law of a young woman, Kendra, for whom we’ve been praying. She reported that Kendra is now in remission from her cancer and doing well. She said that it’s wonderful to see Kendra holding her baby, living a normal and happy life. While each of us can be grateful that God has answered our prayers for this young woman and her family, unless we or members of our families or close friends have been through similar experiences, we can’t really know the sheer joy and relief that Kendra and her loved ones are feeling these days.
On the mountain, Peter, James, and John saw the glory of the coming of God’s kingdom to the world. But they couldn’t yet fathom how wonderful it would be when that kingdom came into their own lives. That’s because they couldn’t see the terrible price that Jesus would pay so that the kingdom could come to each and every one of us. “The wages of sin is death,” the Bible tells us. Though He was completely sinless, Jesus took those awful wages--our wages--on the cross.
And what the three apostles weren’t yet ready to know that day was that the only way for the free gifts of forgiveness and everlasting life to come to us is if we go to Jesus’ cross and say, “Lord Jesus, crucify everything in Me that isn’t as pure and holy and wonderful and pulsating with life of God as You are. Every ambition, every desire, every impulse, every thought that doesn’t come from You, kill it off, and keep killing those things off, even though it may pain me to part with them, for as long as I’m living. I don’t want anything to prevent Your kingdom from being mine for all eternity!”
There is a final thing that the three apostles couldn’t see clearly, which we can see, if we dare. In his book, Ruthless Trust, Brennan Manning speaks of a man named John Kavanaugh who sought clarity about what to do with his life.
As part of his search, he volunteered to work for three months at "The House of the Dying" in Calcutta, India, a place founded by Mother Teresa. The very first morning he was there, Kavanaugh met Mother Teresa. She asked him, “What can I do for you?” He paused to think and then asked that she pray for him. “What do you want me to pray for?” she wondered. “Pray," he said, "that I have clarity.” Her abrupt response took him aback. “No," she told him, "I will not do that.” When he asked why not, she told him, “Clarity is the last thing you are clinging to and must let go of.” When Mr. Kavanaugh observed that she seemed to have the kind of clarity he wanted, she laughed out loud and told him, “I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God.”
Jesus, Peter, James, and John had a mountaintop experience that was so beautiful they may have wanted to stay there forever. But there was life to be lived. There were crises to be weathered, hardships to be endured, relationships to repair, diseases to heal, tears to dry, abuses to be confronted, wars to be faced, decisions to be made. What they needed and what we need in facing the everyday challenges of life here in the lowlands, away from the mountaintop, isn’t clarity. What we need is trust, trust in the God Who has proven the infinity of His love for us through the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The third thing that we can see that the apostles couldn’t see that day is this: This side of heaven, God isn’t going to show us the future. Nor will He give us a time on earth free of problems. But if we will trust Him, He’ll guide us and empower us.
God will give us lives which at their end, will be worthy of those words which I’ve already told you many times I long to hear from our Lord more than any others. They're words of which I know I will be completely unworthy if I'm forced to stand before God alone in my sins. But, I dare to believe that I will hear Him say them if I trust in Christ: “Well done, good and faithful servant!”
Johnny Cliff sang that he could see clearly now the rain was gone, along with all pain and bad feelings. In Christ, we can see those things will be true for us too...in eternity.
For now, though, there are three other things we can see clearly:
- that we can’t capture God, but we can be captured by Him;
- that we can only know Jesus when we submit to the crucifixion of our sinful selves; and
- that in this life, few things will be clear, but our call will always remain the same, to trust the Savior Who died and rose for us.
[The true story about Mother Teresa is in a message prepared for this weekend by Pastor Paul Gauche.]
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