Tag Archives: Gospel

Is legality the highest value?

20 Wednesday Jun 2018

Posted by in Politics, Theology

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I have a question for those who believe that fulfilling the law is of utmost importance.

Imagine it is 1861 and you live in Maryland.  A fugitive slave family has escaped slavery in the South.  They come onto your land and seek safe passage.  You encounter them.

What do you do?

Do you fulfill the law of the land that states that a fugitive slave shall be returned to their masters – knowing that this will lead to severe punishment, possibly death, and maybe even the separation of families?  Or do you give safe passage to the family on their journey to freedom, thus disobeying the law because you recognize it as immoral and destructive?  Or do you do something else?

It’s easy to point out the differences in this situation with the current immigration mess.  It’s easy to make excuses and dismiss the example I provided.  In fact, it’s easy to decide to see the world in black and white – to separate things into issues and people’s lives and believe that the two are not related – missing the messiness of the impact of this way of thinking on people’s lives.  But are you willing to answer the question given your current logical reasoning?  Are you willing to be the one who enforces this law?  If not, why not?  It’s not your job?  That’s a cop-out.  Are you willing to take a look at how the situations are similar?  To be uncomfortable?  Are you willing to be consistent in your thinking that the obeying and fulfilling the law is of utmost importance – regardless of the morality of the law?

Or how about this situation – you are Jew in Bethlehem during the reign of King Herod – the ruler of the land you reside in.  Herod declares that all male babies two years old or younger shall be killed.  The reasoning doesn’t matter.  You have a one year old.  Would you willingly hand over your child to the soldiers in order to fulfill and obey the law and the governing authorities?  What if you didn’t have a child, but you knew a traveling family passing through did?  Would you turn them in?  Why?  Or would you do what you had to do to disobey this decree in order to save the life of your child or any child?

Now imagine you are a refugee, or even just an immigrant from Central America.  Seriously, put yourself in their just a small section of their shoes.  And don’t give me the nice neat answer of “I would obey the law and follow the rules.”  You are still thinking from the safety of your life.  Imagine that the situation in your own country is not good.  Your family is in danger if they stay – you and your family could end up dead.  You decided to leave and make a journey north to America – a land known as a place of opportunity.  While so much is unknown, you determine that it has to be better than where you are right now.  You make the trip and get to the border.  What you do is illegal, but staying within the law means almost certain death.  What do you do?  What do you hope will happen?

It’s not so easy when we move past black and white thinking is it?  It’s rather messy.  Life is messy.  Law does not equal morality.  This isn’t an argument for lawlessness.  This is an argument about the morality of certain laws and what we are supposed to obey when those laws are suspect or outright immoral – regardless of who passed them or when.  This isn’t an argument about Republicans and Democrats – of who should get the blame.  That doesn’t resolve anything and is a distraction.

What we are dealing with is a difference of image – not the skin deep images of celebrity and consumerism.  No, deeper images – ones that define and shape who we are.

Is our national image shaped by this and what it stands for:

illegal_alien_border-550x275

Or this and the poem which is associated with it:

statue_of_liberty_paris_001

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
MOTHER OF EXILES. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

(Source: the New Colossus by Emma Lazarus, 1883)

Which image will we embrace?

The first image is an image of the law – cold, heartless, and concerned with security, safety, and control for some.

The second image is an image of risk, welcome, and uncertainty for all.

We can do so many things that try to make us more secure, safer, and give us the false sense of control over our lives.

The disciples in this coming Sunday’s Gospel passage are all on board with that.  They are in the sea, in a boat.  And there is a great storm brewing.  They are scared and they seek safety.  They wake Jesus up because they feel insecure and unsafe.  They are not in control.  They worry about the bad things that will happen to them.  And they ask Jesus, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” (Mark 4:38, NRSV).

Jesus doesn’t answer their question.  He doesn’t give the answer they want – “of course I don’t want you to perish.”  Nope.  He doesn’t say anything.  Hardly comforting.  Later he will call on his disciples to pick up their cross and follow him, to deny themselves.  To die.

Yet, death does not have the final say.  After Jesus calms the storms around the boat, he asks the disciples these questions – Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?

These are deep questions for us.  And they are Gospel too.  Why are we afraid?  What do we fear?  Do we believe that Jesus walks with us – with all of us?  Do we believe that Jesus walks with these refugees too?  Or is Jesus just reserved for us on this side of the wall?

What does it mean to follow Jesus?  What does it mean to love our neighbors?  To welcome the stranger?  When have we been strangers and been rejected?

What is Jesus calling us to?

Have you still no faith?  Guess what – we can’t have enough faith on our own.  If it’s about us and our faith, what we know about God, our safety, our security, our control – then we’ll just end up failing and dead.

Faith is a gift from God.  It comes to us because we can’t go to it.  Faith isn’t just head knowledge, but it moves through us and causes us to respond.  To pick up our cross and follow Jesus.  Especially in the storms of life.  When there is danger all around us.  Faith moves us forward – in risk, in welcome, and in uncertainty.  Faith means we are not in control and we aren’t going to fool ourselves into believing we are.  We are safe, but in a different way – we are in God’s hands. That regardless what happens to us, God will not forget us.  And God offers us a promise – resurrection.  New life.  Transformed life.  Changed life.  Risky life.  Invitational life.  Life.

“These aren’t people. These are animals”

18 Friday May 2018

Posted by in Theology

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“These aren’t people.  These are animals.” President Donald Trump said this.  The debate is whether he said this in relation to only a specific gang or in relation to all immigrants.  The context seems to point towards a reference to the gang, but previous comments by him leaves the door open to raise the question.

Regardless of who he is referring to, it is wrong to refer to anyone as an animal – no matter how terrible they may be.

Why?  Where do we draw the line?  Who is considered an animal and who is considered a person?  And if they are an animal – what can be done to them?

I wonder what the president thinks about the people we work with and do ministry with at Flying J.  Are they animals?  They aren’t immigrants.  They are citizens.  But they come with many challenges. Many are homeless or living in their vehicles.  Some are ex-convicts.  Some have health problems.  There are families with children.  Some work, some can’t.

When we do ministry at Flying J twice a month, we start with an assumption – that everyone we encounter is a person, has value and worth, and is a child of God.  We provide the limited resources that we have – we make sure people get a shower and can do their laundry.  Being clean is important.  It is a way to bring dignity to a person.  It is a way for a person to feel human again.  To be seen as a person.  To be seen and not smelled.

We bring people over to Denny’s and sit down as a large group, hand people a menu and ask people what they want to eat.  Choice is important.  It’s not much, but having a choice on a menu is a way of empowering people who don’t have much power over other things in their life.  When we empower people with choice, we are saying that they have value and worth.  That they are capable of making decisions.  That they are human.

We sit with our friends and talk and laugh and share.  We share information.  We share jokes.  We share life.  We hear stories and we tell stories.  And we offer respect, a listening ear, and remind people of their humanity.  We proclaim boldly a counter cultural message – that a person’s value isn’t tied to material things, how much money they have, where they live, what they do for a job, or anything like that.  Their value and worth come from the fact that they are human.  We proclaim that God loves them and that they are not alone.

We do this because we are followers of Jesus.

Jesus spoke often about the value of people.

“Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?” ( Matthew 6:26)

“Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. But the very hairs of your head are numbered. Therefore do not fear; you are of more value than many sparrows. ( Matthew 10:29-31)

“What do you think? If any man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go and search for the one that is straying? And if it turns out that he finds it, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine which have not gone astray. Thus it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones perish.” ( Matthew 18:12)

“What woman, if she has ten silver coins and loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me for I have found the coin which I had lost!’ In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” ( Luke 15:8-10)

Beyond this, there is the parable of the Good Samaritan.  (Luke 10:25-37)  There is Jesus talking about the second commandment – to love your neighbor as yourself.  (Mark 12:31)

The list could go on.  I didn’t even talk about the Beatitudes. (Matthew 5:1-12)

In only one place in the Gospel do we see a reference to Jesus calling someone a dog – Matthew 15:26.  Yet, even in the interaction with the Canaanite woman, Jesus still heals.  There are great commentaries on this passage of Scripture that are well worth reading.  The point here is that Salvation is open to more than just the people of Israel – but also to all Gentiles.

Who has value as a person?  Who gets to decide who has value?  And who gets labeled?

Do we follow what Scripture says about each person?  Or do we follow the way of the world – where value is assigned based on whether someone is a part of the right group or not.  If a person can be considered an animal, then what is to hold us back from treating that person like an animal.

Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’ Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’

(Luke 10:25-37)

Treating people with respect and dignity is easy when they are just like us – having the same skin color, nationality, language, belief system, ideology, etc.  It’s easy to love a neighbor when they are essentially just like you.  But what about those that are different.  As the lawyer asked – who is my neighbor?  Are they a person?  Especially if they are different.  Especially if they have different skin color, language, nationality, economic status, abilities, sexuality, gender, age, legal status, criminal background, etc.

Who is my neighbor?  Is your neighbor a person?  Or an animal?

Are you going to follow Jesus, or someone else in determining who is your neighbor and how you are to treat them?

I choose Jesus.  How about you?

Rejecting the Gospel

15 Tuesday May 2018

Posted by in Theology

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Why do people reject the Gospel? Do people reject the Gospel?

I think there are people who do.  Some reject the Gospel knowing full well what they are rejecting.  Some reject it because what they thought was the Gospel is different from what they are hearing for the first time.

What is the Gospel?

The easiest way to describe it is that the Gospel is the best news in the history of creation – that there is nothing that you can do to earn God’s love or earn your way to spending eternity with God.  Why?  Because we are broken and don’t know what a right relationship with God looks like – how could we, we are broken.  We’ve never seen it the way it should be.  Instead, God reaches out to us, sets things right, and invites us to participate in relationship with God.

So why would anyone reject this?

Fear, control, knowing.  Many people are afraid of letting go of control – or the idea that we are in control.  Many people are afraid of not being in control of their life.  Many people are afraid of not knowing what God’s plans are for our lives and where God might send us and have us do.

Many people would rather be in control of their lives – or think they are in control of their lives.

But Jesus calls us to death – death of self, death of being in control, death of knowing.  These are scary things if you have never faced death or had a crush with death.

Following the Gospel means that we aren’t in control and really, if we are honest with ourselves, it means we recognize that we never were in control, ever.

Following the Gospel means having the lies we are told and tell ourselves about ourselves ripped from our hands as we grasp onto them like a security blanket.  In their place, we are invited into a journey – not when we are ready, but when we are called.  We’ll be equipped with what we need as we go – that’s how God works.

Are you willing to be out of control?

Jesus Wept

11 Friday May 2018

Posted by in Theology

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John 11:35 is a short passage.  Depending on the translation, it is anywhere from two to four words long. It is most commonly translated as “Jesus wept.”  The other variation is “Jesus began to weep.”

That’s it though.  No diving in.  Just a statement of fact.

The context here is that Jesus dear friend Lazarus has died. And we read that Jesus cried.

Does anyone else find it strange that this is the only place in the Bible that talks about Jesus crying?

Correction – there is one other reference.  It’s Hebrews 5:7, which states:  “In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. ”

But you don’t get the same feel as in John 11:35.

But again, I find it rather odd that Jesus only cried once during his three-year ministry.

Apparently, Jesus was macho man – never cried, except for the death of a dear and close friend.

I wonder how Jesus reacted to each person that rejected him and the Good News?  How many times was his heart-broken by “disciples” that followed him until it was too difficult.  How many times did he feel like he was gut punched by “friends” who rejected him, betrayed him, and turned away from him.

How many poor, hungry, sick, and dying people did he encounter?  How many times did he witness people being stifled and dehumanized by groups in power who demanded the letter of the law?

And we’re supposed to believe that he only cried once?  Really?

I think he cried often.  I think the world broke his heart many times.  I think his heart was broken by some of the closest people to him and he wept for them.  I think he experienced great sorrow when someone rejected him and the Good News that came from him.  I think he groaned heavy sighs of sorrow each time he was confronted by people who were convinced they were right and Jesus was wrong – people who had no openness to the Good News.

I think this because Jesus was both fully God and fully human.  This is a part of what it means to be human – to experience great sorrow and to cry.  And I think it happened more than just at the news of the death of a dear friend.

I think Jesus cried a lot.

 

What the Gospel is

10 Thursday May 2018

Posted by in Travel

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What is the Gospel?

Have you really thought about what the Gospel is and is not?

Here is your fair warning – you may not like the result and what it means for your life.

Is the Gospel something that offers us only comfort and security?  Is it something that confirms our beliefs and matches up with what we believe about the world?  Is it something that matches up with our political stances nice and neatly?  Is it something that never addresses touchy subjects?  Is it something that never addresses controversial topics?  Is it something that never challenges us?  Is it something that is can be claimed but makes no other claims on our lives?  It is something that is never political, but only used as a weapon in the ongoing partisan political wars for power over people?

There are many who proclaim this type of gospel.  There have been many who have proclaimed this message for many centuries.  It’s the gospel of don’t rock the boat.  It’s the gospel of comforting the comforted and ignoring the afflicted.  It’s the gospel which is used as a weapon for political expediency.  It is a gospel that is not the foundation of life, but merely just another tool to be used to our own ends.

The Gospel was never meant to be comfortable.  It is uncomfortable and inconvenient.  It is radical in nature because it flips the world right side up.  The Gospel calls into question our loyalties and allegiances.  It smacks us in the face more often than we prefer.  We try to put it away when it becomes uncomfortable and is in conflict with our preferences and beliefs.

The Gospel isn’t about membership – it is about discipleship.  It’s not safe – it risks bringing the world’s shame on itself.  It’s not wrapped in any flag, any nation, or any politician – it supersedes all of these things.  It is not the avoidance of death, but rather calls us to death.

But the Gospel is more than a political platform for some political party.  It is more than just some nice sounding rhetoric that we can voice and then set aside and do what we were doing.  It is a message of life – transformed life, renewed life, restored life.  It is a message of resurrection – that which comes after death.  The Gospel calls us to death – death of our egos, our loyalties, our desire to be right, our judgements, our separation from others, our ideologies, our desire to be strong and mighty, our sins, our brokenness.

When we encounter the Gospel, it changes our lives in uncomfortable and lasting ways.  And it causes conflict.  The conflict arises because the world’s ways are revealed to be empty promises that lead and end with death.  And the world doesn’t want us to see this for what it is.

It is only in the death of these things that resurrection can happen – where the Gospel is truly revealed.  And the resurrection that Jesus offers is life giving.  Where else are we to go to receive this kind of life?

The answer is this – no where.

Proclaiming the Gospel in the midst of other gospels

13 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by in Church, Theology

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Lately I’ve noticed many articles, interviews, programs, and media that focus on death, division, destruction, scoring political points at the expense of opponents, keeping people out, conflict, stress, anxiety, theft, cheating, infidelity, and more.

That’s a heavy load to carry.  This is the gospel message of the world and our culture.  A message of sin and death.  A message that says there is no escape from these things – that you are going to drown in a message that will bring you down and destroy you – unless you are strong enough to swim.  The bad news is that you aren’t.  That’s why we are also bombarded by messages that tell us that we aren’t good enough, but no worries – have we got just the right product, service, politicians, treatment, pill, move, job, significant other, car, house, etc for you!

And it’s a lie.

Being exposed to these messages is sad.  It is even more sad when Christians spread these same messages through social media posts, articles, conversations, and more.

What gospel are we proclaiming?  Do we willingly proclaim a gospel of hopelessness and death by what we post and share, by insisting that we are right about everything, by pointing or giving the finger to those who we identify as enemies or worse?  Where is the Gospel in this?

What Gospel are we proclaiming in our daily lives, in our social media posts, in our conversations, in the ways we live our lives, in how we see other and refer to them and label them, in who we pray for and what we pray about?  What Gospel are we proclaiming in the leaders we choose to represent us in religious and secular matters?  What Gospel are we proclaiming when we proclaim that the nation’s salvation can only come through this political party or that one and only with this leader or that one?  What Gospel are we proclaiming when we set our standards so low that even a serpent couldn’t get under the bar that is set so low.

I wonder what gospel we Christians proclaim – is it a Gospel that talks about the reality of the world, but also proclaims the promise of resurrected and transformed life?  Or is it a gospel that proclaims hopelessness, dystopia, and where death has the final say and the ultimate victory?

What would happen if we asked ourselves what Gospel we are proclaiming before we post, before we speak, before we act, before we judge, before we forgive, before we do or say anything.  I wonder what the world would look like?  Maybe it would look like the unfolding of the Gospel in our midst.

The Gospel lesson for this coming Sunday talks about the necessity of a grain of wheat to die in order for new life to blossom.  What needs to die in our life?  What needs to die in our congregations?  What needs to die in our work? What needs to die in our social media?  And what about us needs to die, so that resurrection and new life can take hold?

Alternative gospels that declare hopelessness, death, destruction, and power need to die – that’s what.

Are we willing to take these things off of the life support that we are maintaining?  Or are we afraid of this death?  Or are we afraid of what resurrection will be and how it will be different and out of our control?

The Gospel is waiting for us – seeking us out in our daily lives.  God will continue to hound us and hunt us down, pushing forward no matter how many times we bat it and God away from us.  God is relentless like that.  And that’s a good thing.  It’s what guarantees that the Gospel that is proclaimed and lived out is the Gospel of hope, peace, resurrection.  A Gospel of unbelievable love.  A Gospel that many find hard to believe.  But a Gospel that gives life.

How not to read the Bible

01 Friday Sep 2017

Posted by in Church, Politics, Theology

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I was going to write a nice long piece on how to read the Bible.  Then I read this.  And it was good.  And I would encourage you to read the post.  The author suggests several important elements to reading the Bible.

And then I read this wonderful article by Brian Zahnd and found this gem of a quote:

If we suggest to serious-minded, good-hearted people that the Bible is a word-for-word, verse-by-verse perfect revelation of God and God’s will, thoughtful readers will eventually run into some serious problems. At that point the Bible, instead of being a nourishment for Christian faith, can become a deadly toxin to Christian faith.

Oh so true, Brian!  Oh so true.

The other day while I was driving, I scanned through the radio and stopped on a “Christian” radio station.  Two guys that I presume were pastors of independent churches were having a conversation about the Bible.  I stopped scanning to listen.  It went downhill pretty quickly.  I started yelling my usual “It doesn’t say that…” at the radio when they started making claims that the only way that Christianity can be saved is through the preservation of certain American attributes and ways of living.  Yes, they were equating America as essential to the survival of Christianity. I can’t make this stuff us.

Why not throw in an endorsement for a political party and leader on top of it just for good measure?  Since when did Christianity’s survival rely on human made political arrangements?  Yes, even American ones.

Maybe the people on the radio missed this past Sunday’s Gospel lesson in which Jesus asks Peter – “Who do you say that I am?”  Peter responds by saying, “You are the Messiah, Son of the living God.”  (Matthew 16:15-16) Peter didn’t say, “you are Jesus, but our faith is really in the nation and certain political leaders.  Don’t worry Jesus, they have your back.”  Maybe that version is in another book – say Wisdom of Sham where Jesus gives his Polititudes.  Most of the Polititudes start off with Blessed are the politicians, for they shall save everyone, not Jesus.  You know, good wholesome stuff that Jesus never said.

Maybe the guys on the radio aren’t aware of this coming Sunday’s Gospel reading in which Jesus says “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” (Matthew 16:24)  I don’t see anywhere in that verse where Jesus says, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny the basic foundation of following me and take up the platform of a partisan political ideology and follow it.”

It’s becoming a lot easier these days to hear really bad theology for what it is.  When the Bible is used as a political tool, that’s bad theology.  That’s a poor reading of the Bible.  When the Bible is used as a support for a nation, then that’s bad theology.  It places the nation as the foundation and the Bible as a mere support of that foundation.  It’s mixing something human-made with something divinely inspired.  No where in the Bible is America.  Or our partisan political parties.  Or our Constitution.  They aren’t divinely inspired.  People can debate how good the country is and what direction it is heading in – that’s fine.  But please don’t use the Bible as a political tool to advance your own beliefs.  That’s just poor theology.  We have enough really bad theology that is mass consumed already.  We don’t need to wrap it in the flag on top of it.

Who do you say that I am?

28 Monday Aug 2017

Posted by in Church, Theology

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This is the phrase taken from Sunday’s Gospel reading.  It’s Jesus asking the disciples the question – who do they say Jesus is?  Jesus wants to know – do they think of Jesus as just a nice guy who makes people feel good about themselves?  Do they think of Jesus as just another spiritual teacher?  Maybe Jesus is a prophet?  Or maybe they see Jesus as someone who has some good advice to give?

There’s hesitation in the answer – no one wants to answer.  But Peter makes the bold declaration – “You are the Messiah, the son of the living God.”

Ut-oh.

I wonder if Peter even knew what he was doing when he said that.  If Jesus is Messiah, son of the living God, then there are consequences for that. If Jesus is just a nice guy with some wisdom to teach, there are consequences for that too.  It’s a lot easier to smile and nod and pretend to take in something that is said from a nice guy with good life advice.  You can’t do that though if we’re talking about God.

If Jesus is God, then that means Peter’s whole life is about to change.

This is what happens when Jesus encounters someone – lives change.

Jesus isn’t just asking Peter – “Who do you say that I am?”  He’s asking us this same question too.

What is our answer?  If our answer is similar to Peter’s then are we prepared for the consequences of the answer?  If Jesus is Messiah, then it impacts what we do.  It impacts our relationships.  It impacts our work.  And yes, it impacts our finances and our identities.  If Jesus is Messiah, son of the living God, then we can’t just cherry pick what Jesus says – we are called to live it out, we are called to imitate Jesus.

Jesus asks us – “Who do you say that I am?”

What’s your answer?

Spam

18 Friday Aug 2017

Posted by in Society, Theology

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When I look at my e-mails I am sure to have some spam.  Every time.  I didn’t ask for any of it.  I don’t care which shampoos can supposedly cause cancer.  If these people actually knew me, they’d know I shave my head and that shampoo is just not that important to me.

I didn’t ask to receive spam e-mail for dating Russian women and other things unsuitable for this blog.  How in the world did they even get my e-mail.  If they knew me, they’d know I was happily married.

I didn’t ask to receive spam e-mails that is going to show me shocking footage of Hillary Clinton screaming at someone.  Seriously?  Isn’t she old news by now?  Who needs that when you can easily be distracted by the President’s tweets or speeches.  If they knew me, they’d know that I’m registered non-partisan and find both parties to be seriously lacking, stale, and flawed – and certainly not placing any hope of salvation in either party or any politician.  Certainly not the current crop of politicians that claim to be leaders.

I don’t ask for any of these e-mails, yet they show up.  And every day when I get them, I unsubscribe from every single one of them.  But they keep coming.  It never ends.

Often times, life is like spam e-mails.  Things just show up that we never asked for.  Often these are annoyances, sometimes they are worse.  And sometimes they are down right offensive (like the second set of spam I receive – Seriously, how did they get my e-mail and don’t they get the message that I don’t want anything they have to offer?).

Often we are bombarded with what I call spam messages – you could call them spam gospel messages.  These are message that tell you that if only believe this, you’ll be great.  If you buy our product, then you’ll be in much better shape.  If you do this, you’ll make a fortune.  Then then there are literal spam gospel messages – messages that are theological based, but are just as baseless as any ad that tries to separate you from your money.  These are the Rapture theologies, the Prosperity gospel, and the televangelist “send in your money to receive a reward or healing” – often they call it seed money.  Who’s seeds are you planting though?

We get inundated with lots of spam.  We don’t ask for it.  We don’t even want to hear it or see it.  Yet it shows up – in our e-mails, on our TV’s, in the ads we see, on social media, in conversations we overhear in the grocery store, in political campaigns, and in sporting events.

But then we also receive some actual good news too.  Sometimes the message of good news gets lost because we are so upset or distracted by the spam.  But the good news will never go away.  It’s there, just waiting to be celebrated.  That’s the role of the church – to share Good News with people.  Church, I’m speaking directly to you – people want to hear good news.  They welcome it.  Let’s stop apologizing for talking about the Good News.  The rest of the news is spam frankly.  There really is no comparison here.  We have the best news in the history of creation.  It’s time to proclaim Good News to people.

Being fed and feeding

07 Monday Aug 2017

Posted by in Sermon Prep, Theology

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Yesterday’s reading in the Revised Common Lectionary were all about feeding.  Isaiah 55 spoke of coming to the water, and asked why spend money on that which is not food.  Our Gospel story was from Matthew 14 and told of the miracle of Jesus feeding the 5000+ in a desolate place.

There is a great deal debate over this reading – did Jesus do a real miracle by multiplying the loaves and fishes, or was the real miracle that people saw Jesus sharing what little there was and they began to share.  I don’t think it matters – regardless of the how, thousands were fed – that’s a miracle.

Instead, I would rather focus on the fact that this was a desolate place – that’s the terminology we are given.  Desolate, deserted, empty – they all mean the same thing ultimately.  These terms signify that there is no life, nothing of value.  And this is where Jesus goes.

The people go to where Jesus is.  I think it’s quite fitting that the crowd would search out Jesus in a desolate place.  Desolation isn’t just a physical place – it’s a state of being for some people, maybe for many people.  So many people are empty, exhausted, and their state of being is desolate.  There is no life where they are.  Yet, if they are searching, they are hungry.  They are hungry for food, for love, for attention, for care, for mercy, for forgiveness.

But where there is desolation, Jesus shows up and amazing things happen.  Jesus shows up and people are fed.  Not just enough to kill the hunger pains, but we are told to their fill.  But it doesn’t stop there – the disciples collected the leftovers and found 12 baskets full.  That’s because when Jesus shows up, there is overflowing abundance – never to run out.

Jesus shows up and amazing things happen.  People are fed love – in overwhelming ways.  Where they had only received conditional love, Jesus gives unconditional love – to the point of death.  We are overwhelmed by God’s love and have more than enough to give to others.

Jesus shows up and we receive forgiveness.  Forgiveness that we don’t deserve and can’t possibly do enough to earn.  Yet, it is given – in overflowing abundance.  So much so that we take the extra and give it our to others who need forgiveness.

Jesus shows up and we receive mercy and grace and so much more.  And we receive these things in overwhelming abundance.  So much so that we give it away.

The miracle isn’t that God is this good.  The miracle is that we are invited to participate in handing out God’s overwhelming abundance to others.  The miracle is that it doesn’t run out – ever.  When Jesus shows up to places where there is desolation – to lives where desolation runs rampant – lives change in overwhelming and abundant ways.  Thanks be to God!