In my morning devotions last week, I came across a section of 2 Kings that I don't remember reading before. Granted, as I read through the Bible again, the wilderness that begins in Number and continues through Chronicles is difficult for me, but how did I miss this?
Elisha received the mantle of prophecy from Elijah when he, Elijah, was drawn by chariots of fire to be with God in heaven. In his journeys to this point, he's already done some interesting things including calling bears from the forest to attack a group of precocious youths who had found great humor in Elisha's shiny dome of baldness.
Nearing the end of his life, Elisha is suffering from a sickness which will eventually take his life and Jehoash, the king of Israel at the time who 'did evil in the eyes of the LORD and did not turn away from (sin)...' (2 Kings 13:11) comes to visit him and weep over him because, it seems, that if Elisha leaves, the nation will be overrun with Arameans. He fears for his rule, his control and his power over the people - perhaps even losing Elisha's buffering to God's wrath.
So, on his deathbed, Elisha tells Jehoash to strike the ground with some arrows. Jehoash strikes it three times and Elisha, even in his weakened state, becomes apoplectic with the king's own weakness. "You should have struck the ground five or six times; then you would have defeated Aram and completely destroyed it. But now you will defeat it only three times." (2 Kings 13:19)
I read this passage and I kind of think to myself, "How was Jehoash supposed to know that he was to strike the ground multiple times. Even the invitation to whack the ground once seems odd, but five or six? Come on, Elisha."
But Elisha's last words are full of anger and bitterness. He is frustrated, as I read it, that this king under his watch has continued in sin just like the last kings (except for his grandfather Joash.) Perhaps Elisha felt that his life's work was a failure, that somehow these thick-headed kings couldn't trust and depend on God like they ought. Perhaps he was frustrated that even in the midst of being able to see the mighty hand of God over the people, the nation kept turning back to idols because of their power-addicted kings.
The next verse after his anger is released against Jehoash? Elisha died and was buried. (2 Kings 13:20)
What a way to die, with bitterness and anger.
But then there is this strange story juxtaposed into the narrative. It has nothing to do with the line of broken kings, only a convenient way to salvage the character of the Prophet Elijah and his place in the line of prophets of Israel.
Now Moabite raiders used to enter the country every spring. Once while some Israelites were burying a man, suddenly they saw a band of raiders; so they threw the man's body into Elijah's tomb. When the body touched Elisha's bones, the man came to life and stood up on his feet. (2 Kings 13:20b, 21)
If I understand this correctly, some Israelites were going to bury a dead man, I don't know why they didn't have a plot picked out already, and because of the raiders (not of the Lost Ark), they unceremoniously dumped his body in a preoccupied tomb - Elisha's - and when this dead man came into contact with the long-dead prophet's bones, he was given new life!
This makes me ask the question: if Elisha's bones could bring people back to life, why wasn't this tomb the most popular in all of Israel? Shouldn't there have been a long line of mourners carrying their loved ones preparing to grab a femur and bring joy back to the house?
I don't know the answer to that one, but miraculous things happen when we encounter people who are driven by God in faith. The bones of the saints seem to radiate life and hope to all the people they encounter.
What are the dark places in your life that seem to a place of death? Who are the people in your life that seem to be dropping you off in caves of the dead? Who are the people in your proximity that bring new life to you?
This week, seek out the people who you appreciate and in connecting with them, thank them for their faithfulness. Alternatively, think about the people the bring you down and drop you off alone. How can you either talk to them about this or find ways of allowing them to find paths apart from you. (Is that a nice way of putting it?)
Have an excellent day of finding dem bones.
In the next couple of days, I want to tell you a story about a faithful prophet from the 21st century who brought life to many people.
Monday, July 31, 2017
Thursday, July 27, 2017
Unbelievable
John 9:35-41
35 Jesus heard that they had thrown him out (the blind man) and when he found him, he said, 'Do you believe in the Son of Man?'
36 'Who is he, sir?' the man asked. 'Tell me so that I may believe in him.'
35 Jesus heard that they had thrown him out (the blind man) and when he found him, he said, 'Do you believe in the Son of Man?'
36 'Who is he, sir?' the man asked. 'Tell me so that I may believe in him.'
37 Jesus said, 'You have no seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.'
38 Then, the man said, 'Lord, I believe,' and he worshipped him.
39 Jesus said, 'For judgment I have come into the this world (or cosmos, in Greek - universe), so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.'
40 Some Pharisees who were with him heard him say this and asked, 'What? Are we blind too?'
41 Jesus said, 'If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.'
I came across this episode in my devotions this morning, and I wondered if there are any more difficult passages in John. Here are the difficulties:
1. Jesus healed this man on the Sabbath, which was a great difficulty for the Pharisees who would preach to Jesus not heeding 'God's word.' There is a tasty irony with this.
2. The blind man has been thrown out of the presence of the religiocracy for presuming to 'lecture' the Pharisees about theology. (9:30-33) His new found 'sight' has given him courage.
3. Vs. 38 is not in some early manuscripts.
4. Vs. 39 is very confusing from the original language, and beautiful at the same time. A better way of translating (in my opinion) would be ... 'so that those who can't understand will understand, and those that think they understand will become blind to understanding.'
5. What are the Pharisees blind to?
6. This is a great twist of phrasing by Jesus: If you were physically blind, you would not be guilty because you wouldn't have seen me. But because you claim that you understand, your sin sticks with you.
Let's give these difficulties a shot. I am no master at Greek, but the text speaks so well to us when we use it in this passage.
Much of the difficulty that comes from understanding the Pharisees is that we don't have a Christian group like them in the 21st century. Or do we? The Pharisees believe in rigid, fundamentalist reading of scriptures and of course their own interpretations. In order to be in a right relationship with God, every jot and tittle must be followed. There were so many idiosyncrasies, that no one in their right (or wrong) mind would be able to memorize and follow them unless they simply ceased to live. Because Jesus healed this person on the Sabbath, one of the most pre-scripted commandments given, he was considered guilty of breaking the commandment. Unbeknownst to the unbelievers, the Word of God was accused of not fulfilling the written word. At the end of the previous chapter, Jesus, after claiming to be part of the creation process before Abraham, is given a death sentence and stones are picked up. Pharisees are always trying to kill Jesus.
There are certain groups of 21st century Christian Pharisees who are so incredibly bent on following the rules, they actually miss the point of their own religion. You've probably heard these before: "Make sure you stay 'pure' before marriage, because if not..." "Make sure that you tithe to the church, because if you do not, you are making an idol out of money, and then..." "Make sure that you respect your elders, go to church on Sunday, don't kill unless you are in the blessed-by-God military; no stealing, lying, coveting - because if you do, you'll go to..."
Heaven's sakes. It's no wonder Jesus gets frustrated with most of religiocracy and offends them time and time again for their spiritual blindness. It's not as if the commandments are a bad thing - quite the opposite actually, they are the perfect tool for understanding life in relationship with God and community - but they have no use in truly seeing (understanding) what God is all about. When Jesus heals the blind man on the Sabbath, it is in response to the blindness of the disciples who still believe that physical ailments are punishments by God on an unbelieving world. "No," Jesus responds, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him!' (John 9:3)
The blindness, our true lack of vision in life for God, is only removed by an encounter with Jesus, not an interview with the Law. The love and mercy of God in Christ Jesus stands in stark contrast with the unforgiveness and dis-grace that the Law can bring, and when the man who was once blind asks the truth to be revealed, Jesus responds, 'That day is here. You have seen him and recognize him - right here, right now in front of you - before your eyes!"
How difficult that is for Pharisees. To have their whole world of power, privilege and prestige crumble before them by the words of the visible Son of Man! Is it not the same for us? Inside all believers is an inner Do-It-Yourself-Christian that sits like a tiny gold idol in the shape of ourselves near the throne of our hearts. It is painful to give all power and dominion to God - to believe and worship, right then and there. When we encounter Jesus and his word, we are released from our spiritual blindness! And we see and understand!
This scripture is so much less about the man-who-was-once-blind (especially if you read it in some of the early manuscripts where vs. 38 is not there) and so much more about the walking Word of God standing in the midst and confronting all of our unbelief that keeps us blind. And we still hold desperately to that blindness because it seems so much easier to try to keep the Law than to hand the Law back to God.
Now that we have understood, it's time to give up our spiritual blindness. In the midst of spiritual sight, new, hesitant steps can be made going forward. It's almost like learning to walk again. Once you have your sight, everything changes.
God bless you as you believe and worship the one who brings sight back to the world!
Monday, July 24, 2017
Put That Away
As parents, we've all been there. As children, we've all done that. As humans...
I guess there's a part of us that always likes to be distracted. The present moment in which we live can, at times, seem droll, or routine - dull enough to want to be somewhere else. When Gen Xers were entering our 'boring years' (simply the years when all teenagers exclaim 'I'm bored...' when they haven't been stimulated for eleven seconds) we turned to video games like Atari or Nintendo with various games like Pong and Asteroids. Amazingly, we'd play for a little while and then turn it off because, frankly, shooting spinning rocks in dual color on an old Zenith TV was not really that much different than being bored in real life.
Each successive generation of teens has their own escape from the tedium of life. I won't expound on the ways we deviate from the real to the unreal, but in the last ten years or so, the obvious method of escape is through handheld devices. Some people, teenagers and older people included, are incapable of being without this digital security blanket. So much so that putting them down for even a few moments might cause an existential crisis of life. We've learned to live somewhere else. Our energy has been focused not on being present but being distant. When we ride public transportation, silence reigns because wifi has filled our ears as the headphones go in.
After dutifully neglecting the chores at hand, it's almost like my mom used to shout down the basement steps, "Put that thing away!" Enough blasting away at two dimensional spinning rocks and enter the real world where people are waiting to be part of your life AND where your chores need to get done.
If you are anything like me, I get snared by the stories and the actions of Jesus and neglect the narratives of his heritage. For instance, this story came through in our staff Bible study they other day. In 2 Samuel 4-6, Israel's comeuppance occurs when their arrogance precedes them in battle. Because they'd been losing to the Philistines, they decided to bring the ark out because they know that God's glory rests within. Thus their thinking: we'll just 'use God' to show those filthy Philistines a thing or two about our God. Unfortunately, we find out that the Israelites haven't been exactly faithful to their God - they've got their own false gods in their tents, Baals and Ashtoreths, household gods (foreign gods) of power and sexuality. The people are really in no position to expect anything from the true God because they have turned away.
And the unthinkable happens. Unlike Indiana Jones' assessment of the Lost Ark of the Covenant, the army which carries the ark is not invincible, and the Israelites find that out first hand. The Philistines capture the ark.
As the story goes, the ark is taken back to Ashdod (Philistine city) and placed in their own temple at the foot of their god, Dagon, who, during the night, falls over because the power of God rests in the ark. It's as if the false god is bowing down to the real God. Anyway, various maladies occur to the Philistines and they eventually send it back to the Israelites who are quite thankful that God's power in the ark has returned.
Samuel, Israel's prophet and leader, had to speak to his people about their distraction - turning away from the God of the past, the future and especially the present.
Then all the people of Israel turned back to the Lord. So Samuel said to all the Israelites, 'If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines. So the Israelites put away their Baals and their Ashtoreths and served the Lord only.
Notice the wording. Samuel told the Israelites to 'get rid of'' their foreign gods of power and sexuality (fertility) but the people 'put them away.'
There's a big difference. As humans, we seem to always want to have the 'what if' power. What if I really need that later? What if that particular object seems to give me power over my insufficiencies?
Here's the other side: what if the distractions of life pull us so far away from reality, that we don't actually experience the true majesty of who God is? Maybe this is the moment when we return to the Lord with all of our hearts and serve him.
I'm not suggesting that we throw away our Smartphones, or get rid of all technology; that's just plain stupid, but their is moment in every day where we can certainly pull our noses back to the present and live the life that God gives us, here and now; this time and place.
Good luck with getting rid of distraction!
I guess there's a part of us that always likes to be distracted. The present moment in which we live can, at times, seem droll, or routine - dull enough to want to be somewhere else. When Gen Xers were entering our 'boring years' (simply the years when all teenagers exclaim 'I'm bored...' when they haven't been stimulated for eleven seconds) we turned to video games like Atari or Nintendo with various games like Pong and Asteroids. Amazingly, we'd play for a little while and then turn it off because, frankly, shooting spinning rocks in dual color on an old Zenith TV was not really that much different than being bored in real life.
Each successive generation of teens has their own escape from the tedium of life. I won't expound on the ways we deviate from the real to the unreal, but in the last ten years or so, the obvious method of escape is through handheld devices. Some people, teenagers and older people included, are incapable of being without this digital security blanket. So much so that putting them down for even a few moments might cause an existential crisis of life. We've learned to live somewhere else. Our energy has been focused not on being present but being distant. When we ride public transportation, silence reigns because wifi has filled our ears as the headphones go in.
After dutifully neglecting the chores at hand, it's almost like my mom used to shout down the basement steps, "Put that thing away!" Enough blasting away at two dimensional spinning rocks and enter the real world where people are waiting to be part of your life AND where your chores need to get done.
If you are anything like me, I get snared by the stories and the actions of Jesus and neglect the narratives of his heritage. For instance, this story came through in our staff Bible study they other day. In 2 Samuel 4-6, Israel's comeuppance occurs when their arrogance precedes them in battle. Because they'd been losing to the Philistines, they decided to bring the ark out because they know that God's glory rests within. Thus their thinking: we'll just 'use God' to show those filthy Philistines a thing or two about our God. Unfortunately, we find out that the Israelites haven't been exactly faithful to their God - they've got their own false gods in their tents, Baals and Ashtoreths, household gods (foreign gods) of power and sexuality. The people are really in no position to expect anything from the true God because they have turned away.
And the unthinkable happens. Unlike Indiana Jones' assessment of the Lost Ark of the Covenant, the army which carries the ark is not invincible, and the Israelites find that out first hand. The Philistines capture the ark.
As the story goes, the ark is taken back to Ashdod (Philistine city) and placed in their own temple at the foot of their god, Dagon, who, during the night, falls over because the power of God rests in the ark. It's as if the false god is bowing down to the real God. Anyway, various maladies occur to the Philistines and they eventually send it back to the Israelites who are quite thankful that God's power in the ark has returned.
Samuel, Israel's prophet and leader, had to speak to his people about their distraction - turning away from the God of the past, the future and especially the present.
Then all the people of Israel turned back to the Lord. So Samuel said to all the Israelites, 'If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines. So the Israelites put away their Baals and their Ashtoreths and served the Lord only.
Notice the wording. Samuel told the Israelites to 'get rid of'' their foreign gods of power and sexuality (fertility) but the people 'put them away.'
There's a big difference. As humans, we seem to always want to have the 'what if' power. What if I really need that later? What if that particular object seems to give me power over my insufficiencies?
Here's the other side: what if the distractions of life pull us so far away from reality, that we don't actually experience the true majesty of who God is? Maybe this is the moment when we return to the Lord with all of our hearts and serve him.
I'm not suggesting that we throw away our Smartphones, or get rid of all technology; that's just plain stupid, but their is moment in every day where we can certainly pull our noses back to the present and live the life that God gives us, here and now; this time and place.
Good luck with getting rid of distraction!
Thursday, July 20, 2017
It's Time
Winter, in Australia, should usually be written about in the context of quotation marks. It's not as if I am a stronger person for surviving particularly difficult winters in the Midwest of the United States, but I hold back smirks when some of my neighbors complain about the 'freezing cold' of the South Australian 'winter' season. Take today, for instance, the twenty-first of July - in essence, the very middle of 'winter.' The sun is shining; it's a beautiful 18 degrees C. which is the equivalent of 64.4 degrees F. according to my online temperature translator. I translate that as an amazingly gorgeous day.
And yet, I sit in my office typing with cold fingers, stocking cap affixed tightly to my head, sweatshirt and coat warming my body. I can't seem to warm up and even the body fat that I've accumulated in the 'winter' seems to have no insulation properties. Thus, I suffer from both the cold and being seasonably overweight. I'm not going to find the ideal height to body fat translator for that one.
A few days ago, my eldest daughter, Elsa, after returning home from a trip to Cambodia with a team called Grow Ministries, wondered how cold I was. Recently, our furnace had gone out in the house (we'd been without heat for a week) and I had stooped to using Greta's hot water bottle in the shape of a fuzzy blue bear, filling it with boiling water and placing it on the inside of my pocketed sweatshirt. This is how the conversation went.
Elsa: Dad, are you really that cold?
Me: Yes, Elsa. You've had the benefit of spending ten days in the tropics. I, on the other hand, am freezing my hands off.
Elsa: Getting weak in your old age?
Me: So much better to hear from someone who shares the name of the Ice Queen.
Elsa: (rolls her eyes.) So what are you doing?
Me: I'm warming my hands up. (holding up the hot water bottle between my hands)
Elsa: Oh, I see, did you fill the other one up and put it in your sweatshirt?
Me: (looking down) Uh, no, Elsa. That's not a hot water bottle. That's my stomach. Thanks for noticing.
Elsa: I didn't mean that... um...what I meant to say was...
It's time.
Time to once again go through the pain of hand to hand mortal combat with my shrinking metabolism which has withered with age. The tire gaining tread around my middle needs wearing, but I know that with the tending comes effort and sweat and finding extra time in 'winter' when I'd rather be sitting on the sofa reading books and munching on tortilla chips.
As I reflect on the weight I've gained and the extra pressure I'm putting on joints, not to mention that I'm significantly slower running around the track, I also see the metaphor approaching me rapidly.
It's time to shed the extra weight of comfort that I have in my faith life. It's time to start exercising my faith and putting it through the spiritual paces. I've been trying to think of any biblical person who had a comfortable faith. Moses. No. David. Not so much. Esther. Talk about a crisis of faith. Prophets? Give me a break. And yet my own fallback position in life is to pray for comfort and ease. Thus, both the breastplate of righteousness and the belt of truth need to be adjusted.
Last week, I was having coffee with a friend, and as we sat in the foyer of the shop ruminating about faith, life and other matters, the question of spiritual growth came up and in the midst of conversation, I tried to think back about the last time I did my devotions that did not involve preparing a sermon. When was the last time I read the Bible with the lenses of spiritual training? What has the Bible come to mean to me?
This week, in our fourth week on the Luther's Solas (Grace alone, faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, scripture alone and glory of God alone), I tried to think of the perfect metaphor for what the written word of God is. So often, we look at the Bible and have been trained to see it as a map, or a guidebook or at its worst, a self-help tome. But the written word, which contains the living Word - Jesus Christ - is...
A forge.
It is the consuming fire which burns us alive and burns within us with purifying force the power for living a life worthy of Christ's name. With all forges, the heat is increased by the bellows which push more and more air into the flame stoking it to consume and melt the hardest of substances. But this forge needs more than one person, someone to pump the bellows, which is why we must continue to be in dialogue with others with regards to how we read and see the scriptures, or we will fall into the trap of, what William Willimon, Bishop of the Methodist Church says is, 'a dangerous, individualistic, personal reading of scriptures that uses only personal experience and ideas to validate their own opinions and ideas.'
This week, find another person to discuss with you this Bible verse from Hebrews 4:12 - For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Answer these questions together:
1. Why does the author of Hebrews worry more about the sharpness of the word, rather than a description of the tool?
2. What is the difference between soul and spirit? Why does the word need to separate them/
3. What are the thoughts and attitudes that are judged by the word of truth in the written scriptures.
Put yourselves through some spiritual training.
It's time.
And yet, I sit in my office typing with cold fingers, stocking cap affixed tightly to my head, sweatshirt and coat warming my body. I can't seem to warm up and even the body fat that I've accumulated in the 'winter' seems to have no insulation properties. Thus, I suffer from both the cold and being seasonably overweight. I'm not going to find the ideal height to body fat translator for that one.
A few days ago, my eldest daughter, Elsa, after returning home from a trip to Cambodia with a team called Grow Ministries, wondered how cold I was. Recently, our furnace had gone out in the house (we'd been without heat for a week) and I had stooped to using Greta's hot water bottle in the shape of a fuzzy blue bear, filling it with boiling water and placing it on the inside of my pocketed sweatshirt. This is how the conversation went.
Elsa: Dad, are you really that cold?
Me: Yes, Elsa. You've had the benefit of spending ten days in the tropics. I, on the other hand, am freezing my hands off.
Elsa: Getting weak in your old age?
Me: So much better to hear from someone who shares the name of the Ice Queen.
Elsa: (rolls her eyes.) So what are you doing?
Me: I'm warming my hands up. (holding up the hot water bottle between my hands)
Elsa: Oh, I see, did you fill the other one up and put it in your sweatshirt?
Me: (looking down) Uh, no, Elsa. That's not a hot water bottle. That's my stomach. Thanks for noticing.
Elsa: I didn't mean that... um...what I meant to say was...
It's time.
Time to once again go through the pain of hand to hand mortal combat with my shrinking metabolism which has withered with age. The tire gaining tread around my middle needs wearing, but I know that with the tending comes effort and sweat and finding extra time in 'winter' when I'd rather be sitting on the sofa reading books and munching on tortilla chips.
As I reflect on the weight I've gained and the extra pressure I'm putting on joints, not to mention that I'm significantly slower running around the track, I also see the metaphor approaching me rapidly.
It's time to shed the extra weight of comfort that I have in my faith life. It's time to start exercising my faith and putting it through the spiritual paces. I've been trying to think of any biblical person who had a comfortable faith. Moses. No. David. Not so much. Esther. Talk about a crisis of faith. Prophets? Give me a break. And yet my own fallback position in life is to pray for comfort and ease. Thus, both the breastplate of righteousness and the belt of truth need to be adjusted.
Last week, I was having coffee with a friend, and as we sat in the foyer of the shop ruminating about faith, life and other matters, the question of spiritual growth came up and in the midst of conversation, I tried to think back about the last time I did my devotions that did not involve preparing a sermon. When was the last time I read the Bible with the lenses of spiritual training? What has the Bible come to mean to me?
This week, in our fourth week on the Luther's Solas (Grace alone, faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, scripture alone and glory of God alone), I tried to think of the perfect metaphor for what the written word of God is. So often, we look at the Bible and have been trained to see it as a map, or a guidebook or at its worst, a self-help tome. But the written word, which contains the living Word - Jesus Christ - is...
A forge.
It is the consuming fire which burns us alive and burns within us with purifying force the power for living a life worthy of Christ's name. With all forges, the heat is increased by the bellows which push more and more air into the flame stoking it to consume and melt the hardest of substances. But this forge needs more than one person, someone to pump the bellows, which is why we must continue to be in dialogue with others with regards to how we read and see the scriptures, or we will fall into the trap of, what William Willimon, Bishop of the Methodist Church says is, 'a dangerous, individualistic, personal reading of scriptures that uses only personal experience and ideas to validate their own opinions and ideas.'
This week, find another person to discuss with you this Bible verse from Hebrews 4:12 - For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
Answer these questions together:
1. Why does the author of Hebrews worry more about the sharpness of the word, rather than a description of the tool?
2. What is the difference between soul and spirit? Why does the word need to separate them/
3. What are the thoughts and attitudes that are judged by the word of truth in the written scriptures.
Put yourselves through some spiritual training.
It's time.
Tuesday, July 18, 2017
Seeing the Future
Sunday morning worship was exciting.
When I was growing up, I don't think I would have ever written that sentence out loud. It's not as if I didn't appreciate the congregation; they were completely amazing people, but there were times when Sunday mornings seemed tedious, like going to a necessary teeth cleaning at the dentist. I already knew what was going to happen: we would chant the liturgy, the pastor would give a twelve-and-a-half minute sermon which would go through the same pattern of every other sermon ending with Jesus miraculously being raised from the dead to give us new life... Alleluia. Someone old would read the scriptures. We would sing a few hymns played gustily by an organist who had been there as long as anyone could remember, her white shoes sitting beside the organ, stocking feet rushing around the foot pedals.
And then my parents would talk for what seemed hours, while my brother and sisters and I would moan noisily like zombies wanting to go home to eat.
That is not the definition of Sunday morning excitement.
I loved that congregation - still do - but something happened this last weekend that I'll treasure for quite a while. I think we can call it...
Seeing the future.
A lot has been said about the demise of Christianity in the West, and although Australia is one of the most secularized cultures in the world, I saw a glimpse of how God is moving us forward, out of the doldrums of strict traditionalism (but with theological steadiness) to a place where God meets us in a new way in worship.
On Sunday, the 10:30 service started in its normal procession; a crowd of people speaking before the service and an entire mass of humanity showing up fifteen minutes later after the announcements have gone by, but then I introduced our worship leaders for the day:
The de Wit family.
Wynand and Marilene and their four children: Wian, Divan, Miane and Anmare, had prepared to lead all parts of the service. I had met with them at their house twice to go through the service and they were ready, especially Wian and Divan who are about eight and six years old, and their sisters who are three and two. The de Wit's are originally from South Africa and speak Afrikaans fluently. As we visited their house, the two youngest girls would flit back and forth between Afrikaans and English. It was fascinating to listen to, like being on the other end of an intercontinental telephone conversation.
With great aplomb, Marilene and Wynand spoke the call to worship, the confession and blessing; the boys read the lessons - Divan reading from his children's Bible. Miane helped with the offering and it was a true blessing to the congregations for a three year old girl to lift the offering bowl up onto the altar, not as entertainment, but as a look into the disciples in our midst no matter their age. Her small legs walked next to me to the altar and with a great big toothy grin, she pushed the heavy bowl up onto the edge. Excitedly, she walked back down the steps to the congregation who was preparing for the Lord's Supper next.
The boys, Wian and Divan, were Communion attendants. Each of them held onto the brass tray containing the wafers which I, and another member then distributed.
Wian looked up to me between settings and through gapped teeth smiled at me and said, "Pastor Reid, I just have to let you know, I'm not that mad that my brother's plate is bigger than mine." I almost started laughing out loud.
But then, as Wian served me the wafer from his own eight year old hand, he said, "This is the body of Christ given for you Pastor Reid." He paused and added: "I've never been this proud in my whole life...
I'm never going to stop sharing my faith."
The congregation didn't hear these words, but they have been tattooed onto my heart. If only every young person in every congregation could feel valued enough by being engaged in all worship services to pronounce that their faith is an outflowing of their lives. If only we, as church leaders, could see the small disciples in our midst who are desperate and longing to share whatever gifts they have to practice the faith. Should we not be doing things like this every Sunday?
I have opened up the calendar for families to put their hands up on Sundays to lead worship - families of all flavours, one, two or three generations taking part in bringing Jesus to all of us. I'm already into September with volunteers.
What a vision for the future!
When I was growing up, I don't think I would have ever written that sentence out loud. It's not as if I didn't appreciate the congregation; they were completely amazing people, but there were times when Sunday mornings seemed tedious, like going to a necessary teeth cleaning at the dentist. I already knew what was going to happen: we would chant the liturgy, the pastor would give a twelve-and-a-half minute sermon which would go through the same pattern of every other sermon ending with Jesus miraculously being raised from the dead to give us new life... Alleluia. Someone old would read the scriptures. We would sing a few hymns played gustily by an organist who had been there as long as anyone could remember, her white shoes sitting beside the organ, stocking feet rushing around the foot pedals.
And then my parents would talk for what seemed hours, while my brother and sisters and I would moan noisily like zombies wanting to go home to eat.
That is not the definition of Sunday morning excitement.
I loved that congregation - still do - but something happened this last weekend that I'll treasure for quite a while. I think we can call it...
Seeing the future.
A lot has been said about the demise of Christianity in the West, and although Australia is one of the most secularized cultures in the world, I saw a glimpse of how God is moving us forward, out of the doldrums of strict traditionalism (but with theological steadiness) to a place where God meets us in a new way in worship.
On Sunday, the 10:30 service started in its normal procession; a crowd of people speaking before the service and an entire mass of humanity showing up fifteen minutes later after the announcements have gone by, but then I introduced our worship leaders for the day:
The de Wit family.
With great aplomb, Marilene and Wynand spoke the call to worship, the confession and blessing; the boys read the lessons - Divan reading from his children's Bible. Miane helped with the offering and it was a true blessing to the congregations for a three year old girl to lift the offering bowl up onto the altar, not as entertainment, but as a look into the disciples in our midst no matter their age. Her small legs walked next to me to the altar and with a great big toothy grin, she pushed the heavy bowl up onto the edge. Excitedly, she walked back down the steps to the congregation who was preparing for the Lord's Supper next.
The boys, Wian and Divan, were Communion attendants. Each of them held onto the brass tray containing the wafers which I, and another member then distributed.
Wian looked up to me between settings and through gapped teeth smiled at me and said, "Pastor Reid, I just have to let you know, I'm not that mad that my brother's plate is bigger than mine." I almost started laughing out loud.
But then, as Wian served me the wafer from his own eight year old hand, he said, "This is the body of Christ given for you Pastor Reid." He paused and added: "I've never been this proud in my whole life...
I'm never going to stop sharing my faith."
The congregation didn't hear these words, but they have been tattooed onto my heart. If only every young person in every congregation could feel valued enough by being engaged in all worship services to pronounce that their faith is an outflowing of their lives. If only we, as church leaders, could see the small disciples in our midst who are desperate and longing to share whatever gifts they have to practice the faith. Should we not be doing things like this every Sunday?
I have opened up the calendar for families to put their hands up on Sundays to lead worship - families of all flavours, one, two or three generations taking part in bringing Jesus to all of us. I'm already into September with volunteers.
What a vision for the future!
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