Giving it Up: Popularity

Palm Sunday. On this day, followers of Jesus remember his humble entry into the holy city of Jerusalem, "mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey." Matthew 21: 1-11 describes the scene, but it may not be as it seems...we may see this as a glorious procession into Jerusalem, but for all of its prophetic magic (it fulfills Zechariah 9:9-10), power and strength were absent. Authors Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan have noted that on the other side of the city, Pontius Pilate was also processing in as tensions were threatening the holy city. His was an entrance which included war horses, steel, might, strength, glory, and more popularity.

And so we also may have opposite and conflicting "processions" meandering their way into our lives. On the one hand, Christians believe and remember that Jesus came in humility, fulfilling God's promise to the world. But we also want Jesus to come in power and might and popularity. We want following Jesus to be "popular," but Jesus' way is the way of the cross. It is the way of humility, service, and love of others (especially those who are not "popular"). We want Jesus to fix our problems, but the reality is that he doesn't fix them, he enters into them. During this time of festival in Jerusalem, the city "was in turmoil" (v.10). He entered into it. He did not fix it, as was Pilate's goal, with all of his power and might. Jesus strolled on cloaks and branches on a donkey as the people shouted "Hosanna!"

"Hosanna!" is a word that means "save us" or "help us." It is a term of praise as well as a prayer; this word is used only in the Bible here when Jesus enters the turmoil of the holy city.

Do you allow Jesus to enter into your life, your turmoil, humbly, or do you want him to fix everything? How are there different, conflicting "processions" in your life?

We know how this story ends. Not in the overthrow of the Roman powers, but on the cross, dying for you and me. It ends in death and resurrection, not in power and might (at least not in the way that was expected). We can use our knowledge of how this story ends to our advantage: we know that in the end, humility, obedience, and love wins. We know, as unexpected as what Jesus did was, God wins by saving us not through power and might, but love and mercy. Thanks be to God!

*Prayer:

"Hosanna in the highest!"
that ancient song we sing,
for Christ is our Redeemer,
the Lord of heaven our King.
O may we ever praise him
with heart and life and voice,
and in his blissful presence
eternally rejoice!

*"Hosanna, Loud Hosanna," United Methodist Hymnal, 278.

In Christ,

Jack

Giving Up Our Lives

We are so close to Palm Sunday, Holy Week, and Easter...This week, we find Jesus, John 11: 1-45, a mere 2 miles (John 11:18) from Jerusalem. Before Jesus enters the city to face his persecution and crucifixion, here he is in a story of his own very personal grief. In the gospels, this family in Bethany---Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, are the only individuals that are singled out as "loved by Jesus." Sure, he loved those in the crowds that followed him and his followers, but this kind of love was different; it was intimate. It was the sort of love that caused him to weep...what a story to hear just two weeks before we remember the grief caused by his own death...

There is something very poignant about his grief, as shown through his encounter with Mary, too. In John 1: 29-42, right after Jesus was baptized, two of John the Baptist's followers. John referred to Jesus as the "lamb of God," and they began to follow Jesus. Jesus asks them, ‘what are you looking for?’ and they respond with another question, ‘where are you staying?’ He replies, ‘come
and see.’ This isn't a casual exchange, but a deeply theological encounter. An alternative translation
could be:

• ‘What are you seeking, what do you hope to discover?
• ‘Where will you endure, remain – where will you not be moved from?’
• “Come and perceive, understand, experience.’

When Mary comes to Jesus, she falls at his feet, grieving for him. This moves Jesus in a real way, and he asks her a question that mimics the opening to the gospel – ‘Where have you placed him?’ Her response: ‘Come and see.’ The words are the same in the original text – ‘Come and perceive, understand, experience.’

Jesus' love for us is personal. He knows us: our pain, our turmoil, our neediness, and our fragile mortality. So, we do give up our lives to Jesus, whether we know it or not. Jesus knows us (see John 4) and loves us. The question is whether we will embrace that love or not; whether we will willingly give up our lives to follow Jesus. In our moments of pain and grief, our hope can lie in the loving hands of Jesus.



*Prayer:

Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life:
such a way as gives us breath,
such a truth as ends all strife,
such a life as killeth death.

Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength:
such a light as shows a feast,
such a feast as mends in length,
such a strength as makes his guest.

Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart:
such a joy as none can move,
such a love as none can part,
such a heart as joys in love.

*United Methodist Hymnal, 164.

Credit to Starters for Sunday, a website from the Church of Scotland. Some of this material was learned from their entry this week.

In Christ,

Jack

Giving Up Superiority

The story of the woman at the well in John 4: 5-42 is the single longest recorded conversation that Jesus has with one person. In it, the unnamed woman creates barriers between herself and Jesus. I challenge you to look at these walls she puts up, and see if you have ever done the same. If you find that you have, or are, I hope that her story helps you to deconstruct them. This seems to be a goal of Jesus', both for this woman and for you and I. He gives up his superiority in this moment to offer himself to the woman at the well.

The first barrier is prejudice. She was a woman (not valued very highly in society), and a Samaritan woman at that. Samaritan's and Jews did not get along; they had hostility towards one another. The woman said, “Why are you, a Jew, asking me to get you a drink?” The animosity she expressed was characteristic of the relationships between Jews and Samaritans. Maya Angelou wrote, “Prejudice is a burden which confuses the past, threatens the future, and renders the present inaccessible” (All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes). That’s exactly what she was doing. She was distorting the past and making the present inaccessible. She couldn’t meet Jesus because she brought prejudice into the relationship. When we evoke prejudice, we are creating a barrier between us and the life-giving water than Jesus offers us.

The second barrier is social custom. It was not custom for a Jewish man to interact with any woman in public. It was also not custom for a Jewish man to ever speak to a woman except their mother, wife, or daughter. So, the Samaritan woman at the well evoked this barrier as a wall between her and Jesus as well. Social customs may keep us from interacting with certain people. This, too, is a wall we evoke or build up that keeps us from receiving life-giving water that Jesus offers us.


The third barrier that the woman highlighted was that Jesus was an outsider to her. Jews did not travel through Samaria. In fact, Jews were more likely to go out of their way to avoid the area, even if they had to get past it. So, Jesus was an outsider; not someone the woman at the well would normally see or interact with in her country. This made it difficult for her to truly listen to Jesus. It is true that Jesus is an outsider; he is not from that area. And Jesus is also an outsider to us; Jesus is different than us; Jesus is the son of God! We tend to think of Jesus as like us, but he just is not. If we accept the life-giving water that Jesus offers us, we will be different, too.


The woman also hesitated to be honest with Jesus but, as she tells us, the readers, Jesus already knew about her. She did not want to become vulnerable with Jesus, sharing her story, and we don't like too sometimes either. But Jesus already knows us. So, we can share our story and our experience with Jesus. This can bring us peace, healing, comfort...life.

My prayer is that you can see how you can relate to this unnamed Samaritan woman at the well, and ultimately do what she ended up doing: sharing about her experience with Jesus with her neighbors. She ended up offering Christ to those around her. Maybe if we can get past the walls we put up around Jesus, we can meet with him and share about him, too.

Prayer:

Fill my cup, Lord
I lift it up Lord.
Come and quench this thirsting of my soul.
Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more;
fill it up and make me whole.

(Fill My Cup, Lord. United Methodist Hymnal, 641)

Credit to Ministry Matters, the source from which I drew the different "barriers" of the woman at the well

In Christ,

Jack

Giving Up Expectations

Nicodemus and Jesus

One of our readings for this Sunday, the second one is Lent, is John 3: 1-17. It includes one of the Bible's most famous verses: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life." This statement by Jesus comes in a late-night interview with a man named Nicodemus.

Nicodemus is a member of the Sanhedrin, the supreme council in Israel (this is the group that accused Jesus of blasphemy, for example.)  Nicodemus is seeking like so many today. He declares that
Jesus is “Come from God” – a saying normally used only of angels/messengers of God, so it hints at his believing in “something more.” At this point he is hesitant to commit himself and thinks of Jesus as only a “teacher.”

Nicodemus, settling in for a theological/philosophical discussion, would not have expected Jesus’ blunt retort in verse 3 about being born again. Jesus meant to challenge Nicodemus to think deeper about his own faith and about who Jesus is.

Up until then conversion referred to Gentiles converting to the Jewish faith: it would have been a very confusing concept that Jews to be born again. Nicodemus’ cheeky answer shows this.

Nicodemus knows something profound about Jesus, that he is "a teacher come from God." What is surprising to me is that this is the block that he stumbles over. It is what he knows about Jesus that keeps him doubting about who he really is: the savior come to save all, offering all people new life.

But Nicodemus' struggle is real. Our struggle to know God through Jesus is real.

 “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life" is the prized verse in this passage. But moving too quickly to this verse gives the illusion that our struggle with knowing and believing can be easily reconciled.

What if before going there, we lingered more intentionally and empathetically with Nicodemus? Perhaps if we did we would begin to appreciate the real resistance we experience when we hear God’s promises.

What if those promises seem as nonsensical to us as they did to Nicodemus? How can we possibly receive those promises if we do not, finally, understand them, not at least in the way the world is accustomed to understanding?

One clue to our question appears in the work of London-based writer, Susanna Howard. She works with dementia patients, people who, in the language of science, are largely defined by irretrievable losses of neurological function: loss of speech, loss of language, loss of identity, loss of mind.

For the past six years, she has been engaged in the art of listening to the words of people who suffer with dementia. She calls the project, Living Words:

"It can be extremely hard for words to come and we validate all words and sounds that are uttered [by dementia patients] -- words and expressions that seem nonsense can in fact be directly metaphoric, or just need to be said. For example, a person will use words that wouldn't be used in ordinary conversation: 'Everything was all packed up and plopped over with'; 'These people, in to the third act'; 'Some round here are all embers'; 'They don't say much this tribe.' In not finding the 'right' word people might use replacement words without realising."

While others often see only loss, she sees a life to be honored: “I very much believe that this is life and to be embraced -- only through engaging in the darkness do we see who we really are and glimpse what this life is." When she finished her first collection of poems by a woman with advanced dementia, the woman took her hand and said, “Now you know two worlds, the one outside and the one inside in me and you must go and tell all the people.”

It was a gift, a mission handed to her under cover of that darkness, a darkness disturbed by improbable illumination.


Prayer:

Wash, O God, our sons and daughters
where your cleansing waters flow.
Number them among your people;
bless as Christ blessed long ago.
Weave them bright and sparkling;
compass them with love and light.
Fill, anoint them; send your Spirit,
holy dove and heart’s delight.

(“Wash, O God, Our Sons and Daughters,” Ruth Duck, The UM Hymnal, No. 605)

In Christ,

Jack

Credit to Starters for Sunday and workingpreacher.org, whose work this week was influential for this entry

Pancakes and Ashes

Happy Shrove Tuesday!

I have to admit, I needed to "research" a bit about what this day actually means. I have heard of Fat Tuesday and Mardi Gras, but what in the world does "shrove" mean?

A quick internet search helps a bit:

"'Shrove Tuesday' (also known in Commonwealth countries as Pancake Tuesday or Pancake day) is the day in February or March immediately preceding Ash Wednesday (the first day of Lent), which is celebrated in some countries by consuming pancakes. In others, especially those where it is called Mardi Gras or some translation thereof, this is a carnival day, and also the last day of "fat eating" or "gorging" before the fasting period of Lent...the expression "Shrove Tuesday" comes from the word shrive, meaning "absolve"."



Of course with food-eating comes party-having and perhaps some other festivities that you can imagine as part of our understanding of "Mardi Gras." Think New Orleans, beads, dancing, costumes...

So, the tradition holds that before you fast for 40 days, you have one last chance to feast before Lent begins.

I understand how much this practice may be, but I am afraid it conveys a God that does not wish for us to have fun and celebrate much. I am afraid this practice may convey a message that the season of Lent is not a joyful time, that we should not look forward to it.

Our season of Lent is derived from the time after he was baptized. Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness. During this time, Jesus fasted. But this time was far more than simply giving up food. It was a time of self-discovery, for proving himself, claiming his own identity...a time for Jesus to be equipped for ministry in the world. A time set apart to be tempted and tried, but ultimately come away from it with a strong sense of who he was.

OK, maybe the tradition of this day makes a bit more sense to me now. If Lent is to be an intense time of self-discovery, sacrifice, prayer, and a re-commitment to God, maybe one more day of "carelessness" makes sense...

But I believe this tradition marks just who we are as human beings. The way we think of Lent as a transaction (I will sacrifice 40 days as long as I get just 1 day of "carelessness"), points to our need for grace and mercy. We are human beings in need of that; we are in need of a God who offers us this time to be strengthened through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, knowing that Christ himself did as well. And Jesus died too, just as we will.

Ash Wednesday points to our humanness, our limitations, and just how much God loves us. We will not live forever in this world in these bodies. We were born from dust, and to dust we will return. We have hope that this life we will be made new one day, that we will be raised up by the power and mercy of God, but Wednesday, and throughout Lent, we ponder our humanness. We contemplate that we are not there yet, that we need a God who comes to us now in our humanness.

So eat your pancakes today, receive your ashes tomorrow. Be reminded of your limitations, your need for grace. We are invited to be strengthened by God during this time in the wilderness of our own lives. May God grant you peace and mercy through this season of Lent.

Prayer:

God of Lent,

As we enter this time of sacrifice, self-discovery, prayer, repentance, of drawing closer to You, grant us peace, grant us wisdom, grant us courage for the road ahead. Strengthen us, mold us, make us new by your grace and mercy. Through Jesus Christ our Lord and the power of the Holy Spirit, Amen. 

In Christ,

Jack

Happy Saint Valentine's Day

Today is a day reserved for the color pink, candy, flowers, hallmark cards, a special date night, and the sharing of love between 2 people (or if you are a child in school, the obligation to share your candy with the whole class). That is all well and good, but these things do not reveal who Saint Valentine truly was.


What the Hallmark cards won't tell you is that Saint Valentine was a holy troublemaker -- he was imprisoned, beaten, and brutally executed.

Valentine's day wasn't always about candy, flowers, and pink hearts...

Valentine was a priest in Rome in the 3rd century AD. He was known for assisting Christians persecuted under Claudius II. After being caught marrying Christian couples (a big no-no, for they were sought after as "rebels" to Rome) and helping Christians escape the persecution, Valentine was arrested and imprisoned. It is very plausible that it is from these actions that the romantic elements of Valentine's day emerged -- but far more than a romantic, Valentine was a revolutionary.

There are many legends of Valentine -- that he courageously refused to pay homage to the imperial gods, being faithful only to Christ, and that he resisted war, subversively marrying young couples preventing the men from going to war (the emperor Claudius believed unmarried men made better soldiers so married men were spared the horrors of war).

Although Emperor Claudius originally liked Valentine, he was condemned to death when he tried to convert the emperor. Eventually, Valentine was beaten with stones, clubbed, and, finally, beheaded on February 14, 269 (or 273, the year is debated but somehow we all agree on February 14).

In the year 496, February 14 was named as a day of celebration in Valentine’s honor.

But here is one of my favorite stories -- Valentine became friends with the daughter of his captor. Just before he was executed, Valentine healed the blind daughter of the jailer, restoring her vision -- a dazzling act of enemy-love. As the legend goes -- on the day of his execution, he left the jailer's daughter a note signed: "Your Valentine" ... undoubtedly sparking what has become a classic Valentine's tradition around the world -- of sending little notes to people we love (or people we would like to love).

Perhaps even more faithful to Valentine would be to write a note to someone who might be an enemy or who might be a most unlikely, subversive friend. Try that today. And sign it as he did, "Your Valentine" -- I'm sure it will make ole Valentine smile down on you... or blow you a kiss from heaven...for he was a revolutionary lover of people...a holy trouble-maker.

A Prayer for Holiness of Heart
By Howard Thurman
(United Methodist Hymnal, No.401)

Lord, I want to be more holy in my heart.
Here is the citadel of all my desiring,
where my hopes are born
and all the deep resolutions of my spirit take wings.
In this center, my fears are nourished,
and all my hates are nurtured.
Here my loves are cherished,
and all the deep hungers of my spirit are honored
without quivering and without shock.
In my heart, above all else,
let love and integrity envelop me
until my love is perfected and the last vestige
of my desiring is no longer in conflict with Thy Spirit.
Lord, I want to be more holy in my heart. Amen.

(My thanks to Shane Claiborne for providing some information which I have shared here in this post)

Epiphany: Servants of the Lord

"Happy are those (Psalm 119)  who choose life (Deuteronomy 30:19), for we are God's servants (1 Corinthians 3:9). You've heard it said ______, but I say to you_______ (Matthew 5: 21-37)." These are all sayings from our readings this week. Strung together, they point us towards a God who is trying to speak direction into our lives. 

Jesus speaks to those as the interpreter and fulfill-er of Scripture. He has not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is demonstrative of the intricacies around interpretation of Scripture. We pit Jesus against the law, without remembering Jesus’ own words, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill” (Matthew 5:17). Jesus himself shows us how the complexity of making sense of faith is inherent to having faith.

We live in a world of black and white, right or wrong, left or right. Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said, but I say to you.” But to paraphrase Jesus as saying, “I am right and you are wrong” would be the equivalent of Jesus saying to God, “you were wrong.” Jesus engages in the hard work of the necessity of Scripture to be reinterpreted for new times and places. This is when the words of the Psalmist should come to our lips, “O that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes!” (Psalm 119:5).

The less talked about character in all of these kinds of these right/left, black/white, right/wrong debates is God. We forget that adherence to certain claims, and particular ways of being in the world are not just your opinions, your beliefs, but also reveal who you think God is. When was the last time you connected what you said and what you did with who God is for you? Our actions and our words reveal our theology.

The antitheses are all about choosing life. In this section of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists that life is threatened when anger and judgment and insult take hold of your life. Life is threatened when we engage in these certain activities mentioned. Women, for example, Jesus insists, are not culture’s for the taking. Life is threatened when women are consistently reduced, even discarded, based on their capacity to satisfy privileged and patriarchal needs and their capacity to bear children. Life is threatened when you do not follow through with oaths you make.

In other words, Jesus is saying that interpreting the law is far more complex than you make it out to be. And if your interpretations lead to death -- the silence of voices, the discounting of one's sacred worth, the disrespect and demeaning of entire groups of people, the labeling of people -- then you have to think long and hard about what it means to be a disciple of Jesus, to choose life, to be one of the happy ones.

If “choose life” was the test case for what we did and said, the canonical marker, if you will for disciple-speak, we may pause before we lash out in anger and fear. We might take a moment before we label someone pro-life, pro-choice, pro-abortionist, (or anti all of those things). We might stop and think, is what I am about to say and what I am about to do something that would be recognizable as life-giving, life- upholding, life-empowering?

There is an alternative, and the poet Marilyn Maciel tells me what it is:

i
you
us
them
those people
wouldn’t it be lovely
if one could
live
in a constant state
of we?
some of the most
commonplace
words
can be some of the biggest
dividers
they
what if there was
no they?
what if there
was only
us?
if words could be seen
as they floated out
of our mouths
would we feel no
shame
as they passed beyond
our lips?
if we were to string
our words
on a communal clothesline
would we feel proud
as our thoughts
flapped in the
breeze?*

What if we chose life? What if we were one of the happy ones? What if we were truly a servant of God? What if we took Jesus' words on the Mount and let them transform our lives?

Prayer:

O God, send your Spirit upon us and light our path

that we may travel the road you have prepared for us

enable our hearts and minds to more fully understand

your goodness and your grace.

Help us break free from ideas that no longer bring life,

that we may embrace the life-giving work of your Spirit.

Challenge us to forsake paths that ask little of us,

and help us resist the evils and temptations of this world,

that we may truly follow the way of kingdom living. Amen.**

*"clothesline," poem by Marilyn Maciel. Published in Patti Digh, "Life Is a Verb: 37 Days To Wake Up, Be Mindful, And Live Intentionally." (Rowman & Littlefield, 2008), 42.

**posted on the Ministry Matters website. http://www.ministrymatters.com/

In Christ, 

Jack