"Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." So says Nicodemus when he comes to Jesus "by night." Nicodemus "knows" that Jesus is from God, and yet Nicodemus is portrayed in John 3 as unable to understand when Jesus speaks of being "born from above." (The Greek word means both "from above" and "again," and it is impossible to render these words in English so that both possible meanings are apparent. Nicodemus hears the literal "again" while Jesus speaks of the more figurative "from above.")
Nicodemus is a learned teacher who comes to Jesus as one who "knows." Yet he seems to leave the encounter befuddled. And I wonder how often what I "know" gets in the way of what Jesus would say to me.
In other gospels, Jesus speaks of needing to become like children in order to enter the Kingdom. Being like children probably has many possible meanings, but perhaps one of them is to not be so sure of what we know, to be open to new possibilities, to allow the Holy Spirit to show us things we've never seen before.
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Wednesday, March 4, 2009
The Gift of Reading
Students at East Franklin Elementary are happy to read their books to Emma Sledge, a senior at Upper Arlington High School. As part of her senior project, Sledge helped the students in the South-Western district school buy books at the school’s March Scholastic Book Fair. The students earned “paychecks” by meeting reading and writing goals. Sledge received a grant from her church, Boulevard Presbyterian in Grandview Heights, as well as donations from family and friends, to pay for the book project. (from the Columbus Dispatch, Eric Albrecht, photographer)
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
"Stop making my Father's house a marketplace!" says Jesus in today's reading from John. All the gospels contain a version of this story, and I learned it as a small child. As a child it seemed a simple enough story, but I find it more troubling as I get older.
The activities in the Temple -- the money changers and the animal sellers -- were integral to worship there. They allowed pilgrims who had come from foreign lands to convert their money to the proper Jewish currency in order to make offerings. And people who had journeyed far could not bring animals with them for sacrifice, but they could buy them at the temple. And none of these things were happening inside the temple proper. They were out in the courtyard, not unlike when tickets to the spaghetti supper are on sale in the church lounge.
It's a lot easier to enjoy this story when the folks Jesus throws out are evil and nasty, not at all like me. But when they are simply part of the religious apparatus, not so different from congregations taking credit cards or setting up bank drafts for paying your pledge, the story hits a little closer to home.
I take it as a given that all religion has a tendency to try to make God and God's blessings manageable. But Jesus seeks to pull us back to the core of faith, trusting ourselves to the provision of God rather than setting up systems to manage them.
As a pastor, I think that religious institutions are essential to our faith lives. But still, we need to remember where our ultimate loyalties lie, to God who is revealed to us through Jesus the Christ.
(Click here to receive the Daily Lectionary in an email each day.)
The activities in the Temple -- the money changers and the animal sellers -- were integral to worship there. They allowed pilgrims who had come from foreign lands to convert their money to the proper Jewish currency in order to make offerings. And people who had journeyed far could not bring animals with them for sacrifice, but they could buy them at the temple. And none of these things were happening inside the temple proper. They were out in the courtyard, not unlike when tickets to the spaghetti supper are on sale in the church lounge.
It's a lot easier to enjoy this story when the folks Jesus throws out are evil and nasty, not at all like me. But when they are simply part of the religious apparatus, not so different from congregations taking credit cards or setting up bank drafts for paying your pledge, the story hits a little closer to home.
I take it as a given that all religion has a tendency to try to make God and God's blessings manageable. But Jesus seeks to pull us back to the core of faith, trusting ourselves to the provision of God rather than setting up systems to manage them.
As a pastor, I think that religious institutions are essential to our faith lives. But still, we need to remember where our ultimate loyalties lie, to God who is revealed to us through Jesus the Christ.
(Click here to receive the Daily Lectionary in an email each day.)
Monday, March 2, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
I was 35 when I enrolled in seminary. As most people would probably assume, I had some personal faith experiences intense enough to prompt a dramatic career change. And yet I still often find myself participating in what God warns against in today's reading from Deuteronomy 8:1-20. "Take care that you do not forget the LORD your God..."
Now by "forgetting" I don't mean that I forget that God exists. Rather my past faith experiences recede far enough into my memory that they no longer move me to act. I take it that this is a common problem, otherwise it would not be such a common biblical theme. When we go through a crisis of faith, identity, purpose, hope, or countless others, we can have profound experiences of God's presence and guidance. But later, when things have calmed down, when God perhaps seems less present, those experiences become wispy memories. They can lose their sense of being "real."
Perhaps this all too common an experience helps explain why there is a regular need for faith renewal, for seasons such as Lent where we reconnect to our own faith stories as well as to the faith story of Scripture. May Lent be a time of renewal for all of us.
Now by "forgetting" I don't mean that I forget that God exists. Rather my past faith experiences recede far enough into my memory that they no longer move me to act. I take it that this is a common problem, otherwise it would not be such a common biblical theme. When we go through a crisis of faith, identity, purpose, hope, or countless others, we can have profound experiences of God's presence and guidance. But later, when things have calmed down, when God perhaps seems less present, those experiences become wispy memories. They can lose their sense of being "real."
Perhaps this all too common an experience helps explain why there is a regular need for faith renewal, for seasons such as Lent where we reconnect to our own faith stories as well as to the faith story of Scripture. May Lent be a time of renewal for all of us.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
"Where did you get to know me?" So says Nathanael to Jesus when they first meet. He is startled when Jesus seems to already know something about him. I suppose that this story is a way for John's gospel to impress us with Jesus' divinity, his ability to observe Nathanael as only God could do. But I am captivated by Nathanael's question.
The desire to connect with God is a desire to know and to be known. I long to know God better, and the most frustrating faith moments for me are when God's seems distant and removed. But I often try to keep part of myself from God. To be fully known is to be completely vulnerable. Perhaps that is why Nathanael's question grabs me so. Perhaps I imagine him to be frightened at the prospect that this Jesus can see into him so easily.
Most of us keep secrets even from those who know us best. It is difficult to trust someone so fully that we can be totally vulnerable to them. Perhaps a part of faith is learning to trust God to the point that being fully known doesn't seem frightening.
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The desire to connect with God is a desire to know and to be known. I long to know God better, and the most frustrating faith moments for me are when God's seems distant and removed. But I often try to keep part of myself from God. To be fully known is to be completely vulnerable. Perhaps that is why Nathanael's question grabs me so. Perhaps I imagine him to be frightened at the prospect that this Jesus can see into him so easily.
Most of us keep secrets even from those who know us best. It is difficult to trust someone so fully that we can be totally vulnerable to them. Perhaps a part of faith is learning to trust God to the point that being fully known doesn't seem frightening.
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Thursday, February 26, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
"Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" So says John the Baptist in today's gospel reading. Presumably these were joyful words, for when the Baptist repeats them to some of his followers on the next day, those followers leave John and go with Jesus. They have found something greater.
As we enter in the the season of Lent, I can't help but ponder the excitement those first disciples must have felt when they heard, "Here is the Lamb of God!" And then I contrast this with the austerity often associated with Lent.
No doubt "giving up" something can be a way of drawing closer to God. But often Lent seems to be dour for dour's sake. I wonder, wouldn't it be much better if, rather than thinking about what to "give up," we thought about what practices, activities, or changes in our lives might help us hear afresh the good news that "Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!"
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Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Ash Wednesday Meditation
Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 (Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21)
Meditation
I realize that this is not the case for some of you here tonight, but for me, the Great Depression is something I know only from the history books. It’s one of a long list of things that occurred somewhere way back in the recesses of time, when things were very different, nothing like they are today.
Now despite pithy sayings such as “The more things change, the more they remain the same,” it is easy to think that certain things have been permanently relegated to the dustbin of history. Many of us probably assume that modern medicine means there will never again be anything on like the Black Death that swept across
And when I took history in my school days, I learned that events like the Great Depression were relics of the past. Thanks to government regulation of the market, FDIC to protect people’s money in the bank, and a whole host of government programs forming a substantial, social safety-net, scenes such as those described in Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath simply could not be repeated. Yes there will be economic ups and downs, but never anything like that again. And then came our current economic meltdown.
Now I’m not saying that we’re doing to have another Great Depression. I certainly hope and pray that won’t happen. But some economists have said that it could happen, that it is a real possibility. I tend not to believe such dire predictions, but that may be simply because of my own optimism, or maybe even because of my deeply ingrained notions that such a thing could never happen again.
It’s funny; we tend to snicker at the certainties of past generations while we imagine that our own certainties are valid. As a society, we think ourselves smart enough, advanced enough, sophisticated enough that we aren’t like people from history who thought World War I was the “war to end all wars.” We can chuckle at predictions from the less than 200 years ago suggesting that if humans ever invented a vehicle going much over 40 miles an hour, our bodies would come apart under the stress of such a thing. We know better. Our predictions would never be so foolish.
To varying degrees, most of us buy into the myth of progress. Now when I say the myth of progress I don’t mean that there haven’t been real advances in the course of history. The medical, technological, and political advances of history are very real. Generally speaking, our lives are considerably better for such progress. But the myth of progress falsely believes that such advances will inevitably lead to a day when we solve all problems and insure that life goes well for everyone. The myth of progress essentially believes that human beings have limitless capacity, and when those capacities have reached their full potential, all will be right with the world.
When I was in seminary, I had a professor who had an interesting definition of sin. He said that sin was distortion. Now this professor’s field was pastoral care, the practical discipline of helping, caring for, and counseling people as they deal with difficulties or transitions in their lives. This professor said that human beings are created with significant and wonderful capacities to do many things. But they are also created with significant limitations. In his words, humans are both “gifted” and “finite.” But sin distorts appropriate knowledge of who we are. Some individuals fall into the distortion of thinking they are worthless and capable of little. But as societies, and especially American society, we tend to fall into the distortion or sin of denying our limits, our finite nature.
And so bankers and financiers can fall prey to their own foolish beliefs that they have the markets figured out and managed to the point that there is no where to go but up. People can lose their life savings because of their faith that certain companies are too big, too well run, too carefully diversified to ever go bust. And politicians of all stripes can cling to the certainty that their ideology can solve all the nation’s ills.
And now we once again enter the season of Lent. As we do, we rehearse an ancient liturgy. As we receive the mark of ashes as we hear once more the words, “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” It is a call to remember who we truly are, creatures, creatures with tremendous gifts but with very real limitations. It is a call to remember that God alone is God, and we are not, contrary to what any myth of progress might claim.
God alone is God, and we are God’s creatures. No progress, no advance, no technological achievement, no political program will ever change this, and in a way, both scripture readings for this evening call us to remember this. The gospel reading, a portion of the Sermon on the Mount, warns people about using religion to achieve that they want. In these teachings, Jesus calls us to align our hearts, our lives, with God.
And the reading from Joel is particularly stark in warning people to “return to Yahweh.” Now some may hear these verses in formulaic, mechanical fashion. “Go to church, be moral, and good things will happen.” But I understand these verses to be much more basic, calling us to remember who we are, calling us to return to true relationship with God as creatures –wonderful, gifted, and beloved creatures, but finite, limited creatures – dependent on our Creator, dependent on God’s love, God’s grace, God’s mercy.
“Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
I've always liked the book of Jonah, the second half of which is today's Old Testament reading. The ending of it strikes me as funny, when God chastises Jonah's temper tantrum over the mercy shown Nineveh. "And should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals?" And also many animals? What an odd ending. But given that Nineveh's king made the animals fast along with the people, I suppose that God has heard their cries as well.
More interesting to me is what happens when Jonah has done his prophetic duty, in admittedly minimalist fashion. The king orders all people and animals to fast and put on sackcloth, saying, "Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so that we do not perish." And God does turn from that anger. "When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it."
God here acts in ways I don't often attribute to God. God changes God's own mind. Actually, God "repents." I did a study on Jonah not too long ago and I recall that the Ninevite king's hope that God would "change his mind" is literally a hope that God would "repent," and God does "repent" I suppose Bible translators just can't bring themselves to write "God repented."
Christian theology has usually pictured God as unchanging and immovable. But here the Bible explicitly speaks of God turning and repenting. Now I would be a little troubled by an image of a capricious and wavering God whose behavior might change on a whim. But don't relationships require at least a little dynamism, a little sense that each partner in the relationship responds and reacts to the other? And I wonder if my relationship with God wouldn't be more fulfilling, if I thought of that relationship in more dynamic terms.
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More interesting to me is what happens when Jonah has done his prophetic duty, in admittedly minimalist fashion. The king orders all people and animals to fast and put on sackcloth, saying, "Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so that we do not perish." And God does turn from that anger. "When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it."
God here acts in ways I don't often attribute to God. God changes God's own mind. Actually, God "repents." I did a study on Jonah not too long ago and I recall that the Ninevite king's hope that God would "change his mind" is literally a hope that God would "repent," and God does "repent" I suppose Bible translators just can't bring themselves to write "God repented."
Christian theology has usually pictured God as unchanging and immovable. But here the Bible explicitly speaks of God turning and repenting. Now I would be a little troubled by an image of a capricious and wavering God whose behavior might change on a whim. But don't relationships require at least a little dynamism, a little sense that each partner in the relationship responds and reacts to the other? And I wonder if my relationship with God wouldn't be more fulfilling, if I thought of that relationship in more dynamic terms.
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Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
Last week a CNBC reporter screamed on the Chicago trading floor that he did not want his money going to bail out irresponsible homeowners for their stupid mistakes. Speaking of the same situation, New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote, "The greedy idiots may be greedy idiots, but they are our countrymen. And at some level, we’re all in this together." (NY Times, Feb. 19, 2009) "I" versus "We." We always live with some tensions between the self and the group, but Americans often seem more enamored with the self than the group. We're rugged individualists, self-made men and women, the products of our choices and decisions. Even when we claim a "We," it is often an individual choice to belong to a group or movement.
The reading from Deuteronomy 6:16-25 speaks of a different sort of "We." The people of Israel are told to respond this way when their children ask questions about the commandments and statutes given by God in the wilderness. "We were Pharaoh's slaves in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand." Jews still repeat these words today. "We were Pharaoh's slaves..."
"I" was never one of Pharaoh's slaves, and neither were any of those who continue to repeat these words, at least not in any literal sense. Yet identity as the people of God comes from claiming the "We" God gives to us.
Jesus says that if wish to be his followers, we must deny ourselves. (Mark 8:34) I wonder if this might be connected to becoming part of God's "We."
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The reading from Deuteronomy 6:16-25 speaks of a different sort of "We." The people of Israel are told to respond this way when their children ask questions about the commandments and statutes given by God in the wilderness. "We were Pharaoh's slaves in Egypt, but the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand." Jews still repeat these words today. "We were Pharaoh's slaves..."
"I" was never one of Pharaoh's slaves, and neither were any of those who continue to repeat these words, at least not in any literal sense. Yet identity as the people of God comes from claiming the "We" God gives to us.
Jesus says that if wish to be his followers, we must deny ourselves. (Mark 8:34) I wonder if this might be connected to becoming part of God's "We."
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Monday, February 23, 2009
Musings on the Daily Lectionary
Deuteronomy 6:1-15 speaks of God's commandments and calls Israel to "Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." When I read these words, I was immediately taken back to the Sunday School class taught yesterday by Prof. Brad Binau. He talked about the historical situation at the time of the prophet Elijah, how as Israel became settled farmers and herders in the land there was a tendency to forget God in the day to day.
Dr. Binau noted that this God Yahweh is a wonderful God in a big crisis, when you need to win a war or escape from slavery. But in the more mundane living of daily life, the worries about rain and crop growth, other local gods seem to be the way to go. Israel maintained their regular worship of Yahweh, but turned to the local customs and rites in order to ensure the crops and herds. Dr. Binau also noted that we often live in much the same way, worshiping God on Sunday but serving other "gods" the rest of the week.
I know that I tend to look for God in the big and grand moments. I want visions, clarity about where our congregation should go, moments of deep and keen insight. But if God, and not other gods, is the God of moments big and small, perhaps I need to heed the words of Deuteronomy and recognize God at home and away, when lie down and get up. I need to keep God and God's ways somehow close to me at all times, even if I don't take to wearing a phylactery. And much of my spiritual endeavors over the past six months or so have focused on this, on becoming more aware of God's presence in the moments of the day.
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Dr. Binau noted that this God Yahweh is a wonderful God in a big crisis, when you need to win a war or escape from slavery. But in the more mundane living of daily life, the worries about rain and crop growth, other local gods seem to be the way to go. Israel maintained their regular worship of Yahweh, but turned to the local customs and rites in order to ensure the crops and herds. Dr. Binau also noted that we often live in much the same way, worshiping God on Sunday but serving other "gods" the rest of the week.
I know that I tend to look for God in the big and grand moments. I want visions, clarity about where our congregation should go, moments of deep and keen insight. But if God, and not other gods, is the God of moments big and small, perhaps I need to heed the words of Deuteronomy and recognize God at home and away, when lie down and get up. I need to keep God and God's ways somehow close to me at all times, even if I don't take to wearing a phylactery. And much of my spiritual endeavors over the past six months or so have focused on this, on becoming more aware of God's presence in the moments of the day.
(Click here to subscribe to the Daily Lectionary.)
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