Hannah: 1 Samuel 1.4-20

I started playing musical instruments when I was in the fifth grade. I liked most instruments, but I fell in love with brass horns – especially trumpets. The trumpet is a great instrument. Whenever it’s heard, the trumpet typically plays the melody lines of songs. But trumpets also work well as accent pieces – providing sharp dissonant notes to emphasize tense moments, or broad, brassy notes to distinguish someone as royalty in a royal fanfare. But what I love about trumpets the most has to do with two of my favorite musical genres: blues and jazz. In a blues or jazz piece a trumpet, when used correctly, can act as the voice of a person wailing or moaning – expressing deep emotions, or as the congregational leader that establishes a mimicry tone of a call-and-response where the trumpet establishes a pattern and all of the other instruments follow. This is especially true in blues.

Blues has laid the foundation upon which the majority of popular music in the 20th Century has been created – specifically rock-and-roll and hip-hop. But more than a musical foundation, the blues genre finds its life being derived from a myriad of emotional experiences that are birthed out of the hardships of everyday living. In fact, if I were to put the story of Hannah into a musical genre, I would most likely place it in with the blues.

Hannah’s story is one that is commonly overlooked, not because she is unimportant; rather, Hannah is overlooked because of who her son is. Hannah’s son is Samuel, the protégé of Eli the priest and anointing-prophet that appoints David as Israel’s first king. It is because of Hannah’s son, Samuel, that Israel moves from a time of social struggle where its community leaders were divided politically and ethically, and where its religious leaders had become evil and scheming; losing focus of the God whom they were to be drawing the community of Israel into fuller relationship because they cared more about their own wealth and prosperity instead of the lives of the people whom they served. The book of The Judges (the book that comes right before Ruth in the Christian Old Testament) says that the climate of the community of Israel was one where “the people did what was right in their own eyes,” because they had no king to govern them. But where Samuel is the bridge of two religious realities – one that was broken and turned against itself, leaving no hope for a future because it was not centered around God; and the other being one rallied around the God-blessed, Davidic monarchy, the line through which Jesus comes – it is Hannah, Samuel’s mother, that sets the example of how the community of the faithful lives and should strive to be like.

Hannah is the wife of a man, Elkanah, who comes from a pious family – as we are shown through their yearly religious pilgrimage to Shiloh (a center for Israelite worship). However, Hannah is not the only wife of Elkanah. Elkanah has another wife, Peninnah. And while it might be obvious to assume that the old saying is true – two’s company and three’s a crowd – this relationship is especially tense. We read in the story that Peninnah has children, and that Hannah does not.

For many folks, this situation of Hannah’s would not cause them to bat an eye – although it may evoke a few sympathetic nods towards her direction. So Hannah doesn’t have children. So what’s the big deal? The big deal is that we read that Hannah not only does not have children, but Hannah cannot have children because “the LORD had closed her womb.” There is a stigma that comes along with this statement of barrenness for Hannah. If you read the Hebrew Scriptures, you would find that the theme of barrenness is commonplace in many different stories. Many mothers were confronted with this difficult condition, as being barren was often viewed as a sign of divine punishment. Especially in a patriarchal culture, where we find Hannah, a woman’s identity was directly related to the ability to bear children. And if a woman could not have children, the social stigma was greatly oppressive. Thus we understand the stymied relationship between Hannah and Peninnah. But here’s the twist in this stacked deck of cultural norms and expectations: where Peninnah has children and, accordingly, should own the pride of her husband, Elkanah; Hannah, who is childless, receives the desired love and attention that Peninnah so eagerly (and rightfully so) waits. It is out of this jealousy and hatred that Peninnah drives Hannah over the edge.

While on their religious pilgrimage, Peninnah openly mocks Hannah – drawing attention to her failure to produce a child for Elkanah because it is in the midst of the family’s sacrificial meal that Hannah receives a double portion of food – and an even larger portion of love and attention – from Elkanah, while Peninnah receives what is due her. Even while trying to observe her faith-dictated rituals and practices, Hannah is faced with the very fact that she doesn’t fit – that she is a disappointment – that she has no value.

And we understand this don’t we? While we might not experience the weight of Hannah’s culturally-bound duty to bear children, we do experience moments where our dreams get broken – where people closest to us treat us harshly – where we can’t seem to find compassion in the most hopeless of circumstances – where we run into leaders that seem to have blinders on, and can only focus on one thing – where rigid traditions keep us from traveling down the avenue of grace. We get pushed and pulled, and get made to feel less than what we are. We get picked on and belittled from people with no outside help. We’ve all experienced these things on various levels at one point or another. And often times we find ourselves at the very brink of where we find Hannah – at her wits end, struggling to find which way is up, and desperate enough to do something that she never thought she’d have to do.

Hannah goes to God on her own terms, herself.

This doesn’t seem revolutionary enough to us, but for Hannah her act of rising up and going to God on her own behalf was indeed revolutionary. Hannah’s culture dictates that she follow a ritual – that she seek the priest to act as an intercessor between her and God – that she offer sacrifices. But Hannah, in her frustration and her desperation, walks into the temple and begins to pray. She doesn’t recognize Eli’s authority as a priest. She doesn’t bring an animal sacrifice. She doesn’t burn any incense to please the Lord. Hannah throws off her liturgical practices that are bound to her by her religious culture, and she speaks directly to God with her own words – using her own voice – without any intermediaries.

And it is in this position of Hannah’s that we might find a meeting place in the midst of strife and a promise of help-on-the-way. Hannah’s story provides more for us than just a metaphor. Sure, we can connect the dots between Hannah’s barrenness and Israel’s emergence as a community of lawlessness and Godlessness and our own world’s problems of social stigmas – and go further to say that just as Hannah was faithful through her trials and tribulations and just as Israel united under King David so, too, can we remain faithful to God through the tough stuff and be blessed on the other side.

But there’s more than that in Hannah’s story.

Hannah helps us to see that God is involved in and is concerned about our lives. Hannah helps us to see that there is a connection that exists between God’s concern for our lives and our own understanding of ourselves as creations of God living in a world that does not accurately reflect God’s image. Hannah shows us that when we come to God in our various life situations of chaos, disorder, and anguish that God is not only concerned – but the God sees us and remembers us.

Hannah’s story gives us that shining glimmer of hope that we are not alone in our loneliness, in our isolation, or in our despair; rather, we can rest in knowing that our lives – like the lives of Samuel and the Israelite community – can be birthed out of places of trust, places of humility, and places of mystical union with a God who loves us and cares greatly for us.

Like Hannah, what matters for us are not the positions and powers that we hold in life; rather, it is the condition of our hearts that connects us to God’s love and grace. That through our humility and honesty do, we find and experience a transformational connection to God.

May you, in your moments of personal barrenness, open and closed wombs, intense grief, experiences of trying to fit into social conventions, or when you feel squeezed out by cultural limitations find that your life in God calls you into being a part of the community of the faithful. That in your moments of anguish and suffering, you may persistently and boldly approach God for the healing of your soul to find that not only does God hear you, but God sees you and remembers you.

Life Imitating Life Eternal: Hebrews 9:24-28

Many of you know that when it comes to watching television, I’m a big fan of professional and college sports. I like to watch movies on occasion. I’ll watch the History or Discovery Channels sometimes. And I typically start my mornings with various news shows that my network provider offers. However, what I’ve been reluctant to confess is my obsession with reality television – especially the reality t.v. shows that place people in competition with each other and that will push people to do things beyond their normal everyday life, like Survivor and Amazing Race.

I’m not really sure what the appeal is. Maybe it’s the thrill of seeing people running in and through exotic locations throughout the world that I’ll probably never get to visit. Or maybe it’s the anticipation of seeing who’s going to get caught scheming with whom in attempt to vote another person off the island – all in a desperate attempt to win a huge money prize and a title of the smartest, strongest, and most enduring person in the game. Whatever it is, you can bet that if it’s a Sunday or a Thursday evening, you’ll catch me perched on my couch in front of my living room television with my eyes glued to the screen.

But you know, as much as I love to watch reality t.v., there is something about them that is deceptive. I mean, think of the type of show that it is: “reality” – it suggests that what I’m watching is really happening. And sure, maybe it is all happening – all of the running around, the competing, the behind-the-back deal-making – it’s all real. But most of it is all staged – the team-to-team challenges, the drama, the lines that the hosts say to build suspense. All of the acts are, by in large, repeatable – in fact, they are all repeatable – that’s why it’s easy to get hooked and watch them from season to season. You know that there’s going to be an honest person playing for something worthy. You know that there’s going to be a dishonest person that is going to sneak and connive their way to the end of the game. And you know that there will be an emotional tug from time to time as you watch relationships develop over the period of the show. But it’s not real!

This is what the writer of the letter to the Hebrews is talking about: the ability to tell the difference between, and understand what is an imitation/a mere copy and what is really real. The writer is drawing upon something that, for the Hebrew people, was central to their worship-centered life: atonement for sins through sacrifice.

[In fact, a week is still set aside in the Jewish faith communities to celebrate, remember, and act accordingly to the life that God has set aside for each person to live. The day is called The Day of Atonement. During this holiday season, Jewish people (today) will attempt to right the wrongs, correct behaviors, and seek forgiveness for the sins that she or he has committed against God and against other human beings. At the end of the observance – we know it more commonly as Yom Kippur – there is a time for communal and private confession through a series of prayer services and community gatherings. Yom Kippur has come to be known as one of the most holy days in the Jewish community.]

Traditionally, this holy observance is also where we get the understanding of a “scapegoat.” Today, when the term “scapegoat” is used, we typically are talking about someone who is taking the blame for something that someone else did – moreover, it’s usually someone who is the object of irrationally hostility. Religiously, the term scapegoat comes from the Israelite observance of Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement. On the Day of Atonement, the priest would enter into the Holy of Holies – the place where God was believed to reside – and would offer multiple sacrifices for the sins of himself and for the Israelite community. Upon the completion of the sacrifices, and to mark the end of the observance, the priest would pour the ashes from the sacrifices upon a goat – which would be paraded through the community to show that their sins have been offered to God, and then the goat would be ushered out of the city gates to die – symbolizing the removal of the community's sins and reconciliation back to God.

It’s a complicated thing, this yearly practice of atoning of one’s sins. And, in fact, it is many times that people get so caught up in the ritual itself that they forget the entire reason for the ritual’s existence. And in the light of this historical backdrop that has been painted with the priests, and the sacrifices, and the goats, and the Temples, and the one room that was only used once a year it’s easy to see how one might get distracted from the purpose of such a religious spectacle. And you know the ancient Hebrews are not alone. We tend to get lost in our rituals sometimes, too.

One of the hardest things that I’ve experienced in becoming an adult is the demand to pay things on time. I mean, I’ve got all kinds of annual fees that I’ve got to keep track of. There’s my car insurance, my health insurance, my eye insurance, my church tithe, my credit card bill, my phone bill, my satellite bill, and last but certainly not least – my student loans. I’ve got to be mindful of all of these bills I’ve got to pay so that I can keep on going. And if I get on a roll, my checkbook can get really thin, really quickly.

But did you catch what got caught up in my business of paying bills and insurance and loans? My tithe got lumped in. One of the most important things I do as part of my response to God’s gifts to me – giving back to my church – gets swallowed up in all of the duties of organizing my life. It loses its significance because I’m too busy to make sure that I stop and realize that my tithe is not a bill – too busy to remember that my tithe is something sacred.

Where I’ve got to stop and remember the difference between bill and tithe, the writer of the letter to the Hebrews is encouraging us to stop and realize the difference between something that humanity does as an act of sacrifice and what Christ has done as an act of sacrifice. And this is something that is significant for us to remember, too, in light of the different things that we create in the varied attempts of bridging the gaps in our relationships between us and God. It is what Christ has done that creates the difference between imitations and reality.

Where the ancient Hebrew priests went into the holy of holies, we as Christians have come into buildings made of wood and stone and glass – both created to try and embody all of the ideas about what a meeting place with God might look like; “a mere copy” as the writer of Hebrews puts it. In contrast, Jesus – upon his crucifixion on a Roman cross – entered into the sanctuary of “heaven itself” – into God’s very presence.

Where the Hebrew priests (along with the people) observed the Day of Atonement year after year to offer a never-ending cycle of sacrifices of purification, many times Christians come week after week turning worship into a fearful act of guilty people that offer plea-bargains to God – all in an attempt to survive this week’s judgment trial. In contrast, Jesus – God manifested in human form - whom entered the real sanctuary of God, had offered himself as a true sacrifice that enables God to offer a once-and-for-all gift of forgiveness, so that in Christ all trials and plea-bargains come to an end.

Like the Hebrews, Christians have become consumed with the fear of God’s judgment and condemnation so much that we spend much of our time straining our mental faculties trying to figure out at what lengths we must go to present ourselves as acceptable to God. When what we let slip into the back of our hearts and minds is the very thing that we should be celebrating day in and day out: that the offering that is made in Christ Jesus makes our obsession with judgment moot.

In Christ, sin has been extinguished. In Christ, lasting forgiveness has been granted. In Christ, the present and the future can been seen in the bright light of God’s love rather than in the fearful light of God’s judgment. For it is in God’s future for humanity that salvation and redemption have become a reality, not just things that we try over and over again in struggle to achieve.

Life in Jesus Christ means that we can experience eternal life now – for if life in Christ is eternal it has no beginning and no ending – it has been going on forever, and will go on forever. Through the reality of the love God found in Jesus, we may enter into that life eternal without fear or trepidation for God has extended that life to us. Not only do we enter freely into life eternal to love and serve God, but we are also called to love and serve each other. For, as we have been shown the limitless love of God; so, too, are we called to show the limitless love of God to the world, putting aside our fears of not being accepted – not measuring up – not being good enough. Because it is through Christ that we are accepted, we do measure up, we are good enough. In his writings on this text, Episcopalian theologian and author Peter Wallace says, “Our relationship with God is no longer an issue with God; it’s an eternal reality – so why should it be an issue with us?”[1]

Indeed, the reality of our relationship with God through Jesus Christ created by the power of the Holy Spirit is an eternal reality. We can claim it – even though we might, at times, feel like damaged goods, unsavable by the most powerful of gods. The love of God that we have come to know through Jesus Christ is offered to all of us; be we saint or sinner, politician or prostitute, timid church mouse or tax collector.

God loves us. God loves you. Because of Jesus’ real and unblemished sacrifice upon a cross, we can stop playing our religious, distracting games of hide-and-seek with God. We can come out of hiding, and come into the very presence of God and God’s free and limitless love.

May you, this day, find the richness that a life, forgiven, in Christ brings; that you might find God in the midst of the Christian community that looks forward to the day of Christ’s return, and holds the love-giving sacrifice of Christ deep in their collective hearts. For it is in the Christian community that the love of God, the power of Jesus Christ, and community of the Holy Spirit dwells and helps us to see the difference between cheap imitations and our eternal reality.

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[1] Wallace, Peter M. “Hebrews 9:24-28” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Standard Lectionary, Year B. Edited by David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor (Westminster John Knox Press, 2009). 283.

Christianomics: Mark 10:17-31

We all have those times in our lives when difficult choices must be made, where steps must be taken in a direction where you may have never seen when you thought about your future. It may be the night that you decide to attend that first AA meeting, or picking up the phone to call the marriage counselor. It may come in the afternoon when you decide to sit down and talk with your son or daughter about finding the bag of marijuana in their jeans pocket. It may even be when you decide to answer a long-put-off call to ministry, and deciding to literally part with most everything that you have come to know as “life” so that you can follow Jesus. Surely, even Jesus may have had moments like this in his life where he questioned the choices that he had to make.

“Should I walk down to see John at the river this morning?”[1]
“I wonder if I should eat with these people – others might think badly of me.”[2]
“Should I restore this man’s sight?”[3]
“Should I go up to Jerusalem this Passover season?”[4]

Certainly this text, which is the Gospel lectionary reading for this Sunday, offers challenges and tensions that we in the Christian tradition struggle to deal with – if we decide to deal with them at all. The very fact that money is mentioned, often time makes some of us in the church bristle when we hear the text read. We shift in our seats, cross our arms, and begin to envision the worst possible scenarios:

“Oh, the pastor is going to preach to me on how much I’m giving.” Or, “Great, I’m going to be lectured to about how, because I’ve got money, I’m going to go to hell if I don’t give it all away.” And, “I don’t understand why we talk about money so much, I gave just last year. Afterall, we can pay the preacher and the light bill. What’s the big deal?”

And yet, in the midst of our readings, we have become so consumed with worrying about the money portion of this text that we have lost sight of what this story really does for us. While we are saying to ourselves, “Wow, Jesus, that was kind of harsh to turn someone away when all they wanted was eternal life,” and echoing the “What about us?” cry of the disciples, we miss that the story introduces us to the Jesus who’s name we claim when we call ourselves “Christian.”

The story puts us in the midst of Jesus’ ministry in Judea, just coming off a little hot-seat conversation where the Pharisees – the professional church people – interrupted Jesus’ teachings by asking him a test question regarding The Law’s rules on divorce. As was typical of Jesus, he redirects the Pharisees’ trickery aimed at him to focus on what life is like in the Kingdom of God. And in the midst of this tiring conversation, we find that Jesus takes the time to gather in little children – again as an example of Kingdom-living – blessing them before he prepares to move on.

And then it happens. Just as Jesus and his disciples are getting ready to leave town, a man whom the gospel writer simply identifies as “rich” (Matthew calls him “young,”[5] Luke calls him a “ruler”[6] – thus, the Christian tradition has embraced him as the “rich, young ruler”) approaches Jesus with reverence and expectation. He asks Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life.

Filled with love for the man, Jesus establishes that the man is a devout man of faith – even from his young age – and tells him that last thing that the man must do is give everything he has away to the poor, and to come and follow. For some reason, the man is filled with deep remorse. The reason, we are told, is because he had “many possessions.”[7] And as the man walks away, Jesus tells those around him that even the rich will not enter God’s Kingdom – that large animals have a better chance getting through small places.

The disciples are shocked! “What do you mean, Jesus!?” If even the faithful can’t get into heaven – you see the blessings of wealth and power are understood in Jewish tradition to be gifts from God to the faithful – then how are we going to get eternal life? You can almost feel the bubble of hope burst within Jesus’ heart. These disciples, who follow Jesus around – who have been chosen by God – can’t even focus on life in God’s Kingdom. They keep thinking about themselves, and their own wellbeing.

Jesus reminds the disciples that they (and others) whom have given up all of the assurance of family, security, and comfort for the sake of the inbreaking of the Kingdom of God will be blessed one-hundred times over in this life and in life eternal.

Here is a story of a man who is met by Jesus – where he is – without hesitation or reservation. Not only is this man met by Jesus, but the man is called by Jesus. Upon his request for eternal life, Jesus looks the man in the eyes and is filled with love for him.

I almost picture Jesus with a look in his eyes that is similar to the mother who witnesses her child trying so hard to complete a very difficult puzzle. The child keeps cramming and shoving different pieces into one slot, so determined to find an end to his relentless work, when all he has to do is ask his mother – who clearly sees the fitting piece just off to the side – for help. It’s that look that comes at the same time as a sigh escapes up from her lungs and through her lips. “Can’t you see that I can do this for you? I want you to get this so badly, but you won’t stop for a moment and consider your options.” So the mother lets the child continue to cram the wrong puzzle pieces into the hole, in the hopes that soon he’ll give up his struggle and ask for help.

Jesus breathes this same sigh with the rich man, whom he is overwhelmed with love. If the man would just stop for a moment from his relentless activity of doing things to mark off on his checklist of faith, he would see the heart of Jesus’ directive of giving all of his stuff away to the poor. It’s not about the man’s stuff. It’s not about how much power the man has acquired or whether or not Jesus seeks out the man’s weak spot to really test his faith. It’s not about doing. It’s about being.

Just like with the Pharisees, Jesus redirects the man’s request about doing things to inherit eternal life to talk about something bigger. Where the man’s request is focused on himself, Jesus’ answer refocuses the man on others.

Coming into a relationship with Jesus means coming into relationship with others – some of whom we’ll like, some of whom we won’t. When we take up the task of following as a disciple – as living a life that shadows that of our teacher, our rabbi, Jesus the Christ…even to the cross – we are not being called to a life in which people live as communal hermits, or lives that lack the necessity. Rather, as a disciple of Jesus, we are called to live into a new community that reflects the limitless love of God out in the world.

We are called, as the church, to put aside our differences – our stuff – and begin to live in an authentic community which provides the love and care that Jesus suggests to the rich man when he tells him to go and intersect his life with the lives of those whom he can make a real difference. Jesus then tells his disciples – those who have done as Jesus directed the man – that the things that have been given up will be returned one hundred times over, but not without persecution. And we know this to be true. For answering the call to discipleship means for us to take up a kind of living that will exist in conflict with the world’s values and, thus, arouse the world’s anger.

It’s hard not to feel bad for the rich man. Because he is, by definition, like us. He has no identity, other than (by his tradition) he is understood to be blessed by God. He, like us, has come to Jesus as a faithful person, understanding – and doing - all of the things that are required of having great faith. And he comes to Jesus with a deep and earnest expectation that Jesus will do something so that he might have eternal life. And yet, Jesus doesn't do anything.

Jesus doesn’t wave his hand over the man, in some act of bestowing a blessing, healing him of all his sins. Jesus doesn’t embrace him, imparting words of forgiveness and peace. Jesus doesn’t even rise up against him to tell him how stupid he looks for even asking such a question.

What Jesus shows to this man is what Jesus shows to each of us. He sighs, looks the man in the eyes, and loves him. He responds with love to each of us who are trying so hard to get it right that we miss the whole point. And he responds with love to each of us who have entered into community and lose our focus. And he responds with love to each of us who have faithfully lived our lives directly in Jesus’ shadow of love and forgiveness. For it is not in our doing that we inherit eternal life – for an inheritance cannot be earned, it is freely given. Rather, it is in the being of our grace-filled, love-dipped lives that we come to understand what life in the Kingdom of God is like.

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[1] Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:9-11; Luke 3:21-22 (NRSV)
[2] Matthew 9:10-11; Mark 2:15-16; Luke 5:29-30 (NRSV)
[3] Mark 10:46-52 (NRSV)
[4] Mark 11:1-11 (NRSV)
[5] Matthew 19:22 (NRSV)
[6] Luke 18:18 (NRSV)
[7] Mark 10:22 (NRSV)

A Litany of Praise & Thanksgiving: 2009 Prentiss County Cluster Charge Conference

One: We are called as Christ’s church to go and make disciples of all people. Together, let us celebrate with one another the work which God is doing in the midst our individual communities of faith that make up this part of The Body for the transformation of the world.

Many: We give thanks, O God, for the ministry you would have us do as disciples of Jesus Christ.

One: For realizing that the church is not a building, but a people who are renewed through clothing the naked, supporting short-term missionaries, participating in The Walk to Emmaus, and celebrating the stewardship of the gifts given to us…

Many: We give thanks, O God, for the ministry you would have us do as disciples of Jesus Christ and for Liberty United Methodist Church.

One: For the ability to financially support our Mississippi Conference by paying our apportionments in full, helping non-churched families through the holy seasons of Advent and Christmas, dramatically growing our ministry to middle school and high school students, and our continued support of rebuilding the lives of our brothers and sisters on the Gulf Coast…

Many: We give thanks, O God, for the ministry you would have us do as disciples of Jesus Christ and for Thrasher and Grace United Methodist Churches.

One: For a growing mid-week Christian education program where all are made to feel like part of Christ’s Body through shared meals, adult, young adult, intergenerational, and youth Bible studies and small groups, and children’s and adult choirs…

Many: We give thanks, O God, for the ministry you would have us do as disciples of Jesus Christ and for Booneville-First United Methodist Church.

One: For the connection of loving like family through the participation in children’s Bible study programs, revivals, Christmas and Easter programs, and sharing meals with both members of our communities of faith and some 400 others who came at Thanksgiving time for Community Thanksgiving Diner…

Many: We give thanks, O God, for the ministry you would have us do as disciples of Jesus Christ and for Pisgah and Carolina United Methodist Churches.

All: As lay and clergy together, we invite you, O God, to continue to inspire our hearts that we may be persistent in showing to our broken world the radical, healing love that we have come to know through your Son, Jesus Christ, and by the power of your Holy Spirit. Amen.

I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends: Galatians 6:1-10

When I say “friend,” what images come to mind? Do you think about someone who let you cut in line at the water fountain in kindergarten? Or do you think about someone who stood up for you against a bully? You might think of an older sibling that showed you the ropes of life. Maybe the word “friend” conjures up the memory of someone who donated money to a cause that you hold close to your heart. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the word “friend” as, “(1) one attached to another by affection or esteem, (2) one that is of the same nation, party, or group,” and, “(3) a favored companion.”[1] Certainly, all three of these definitions of “friend” could have been thought of by Paul as he, with the help of another, wrote to the Christians at the church in Galatia. The Galatians held a special place in Paul’s heart because they were a church founded personally by Paul, and shared much of his experiences of conversion to Christianity.

We know that Paul visited the church in Galatia on all three of his missionary journeys.[2] Surely, all of this time spent with the Gentile Christians[3] in Galatia created special relationships with individuals and Paul, and the whole Christian community and Paul. Paul was in a sense, the Galatians big brother in Christianity – he taught them, he looked out for them, he gave them advice, he counseled them, and when they got out of line he would straighten them up so that they might continue to walk in the way of Christ. Paul loved the Galatians, and he wanted to see them succeed in living lives of faith.

Certainly, like any church in any place and time, things – people – got in the way of living good and faithful Christian lives. For the Galatian church, they struggled with remembering Paul’s teachings on Jesus (maybe this was why Paul visited them so much!). In the case of this letter from Paul to the Galatians, Paul addresses a recent incident in the church that has left it pitted against itself. Brother against brother – sister against sister – Christian against Christian.[4]

A group of Jewish Christians had come to Galatia, following Paul’s visits, and began teaching the church that in order to be fully Christian they must follow all of the Mosaic Laws, observe the Jewish rites and festivals, and they must become circumcised. They stressed that Paul’s focus on faith at the expense of the Jewish Law was of his own creation, and not from God – that everything that Paul had taught them was mostly right, but he was lacking essential elements of faith. As you might imagine, this comes as a frustrating threat to Paul. Not only are Paul’s teachings being questioned, but the very foundations of his faith are being scrutinized and deemed inauthentic and false.

It’s hard to stand up for what you believe when you are so feverishly questioned about your faith – when your inquisitors seem to know every loophole in your faith statements. Thanks to the church when I was growing up, I was trained to know the answers to theological questions regarding my faith, salvation, heaven, hell, Jesus Christ, miracles, angels, and any other churchy question that one might throw my way. The scary part was that I was good at it. I could remember the arguments for and against theological issues, and normally I could make people look really stupid. I would dare people to come at me with a question. Sometimes I would argue just for the sake of arguing.

I think that we all like to do that sometimes.

I was so trained to know the right answers, and ask the right questions, and think the right ways that often times I missed the whole point of the conversation. I would forget that the person that I was “talking to” had a history – where their answers were different than mine because they had experienced God in a different way.

I lost sight of the importance of the role of love in relationships – especially friendships.

Christians have an uncanny ability to turn on one another at the drop of a hat. At the very time when one is crying out for support and encouragement, crying out for affirmation and assistance, we risk authentic relationships in the face of sustaining holiness and preserving purity. We don’t want to get our hands dirty, so we send someone else to do the work for us.

This is what the scribes and Pharisees did. They were so focused on being right all of the time that they often applied the law more harshly toward others than to themselves. In an attempt to at least appear to have a severe rejection of sinful habits, the Pharisees almost stoned a woman to death,[5] they became insensitive to the laws by taking advantage of the helpless,[6] and they neglected their responsibilities to their families.[7] They had become calloused individuals that were so caught up in their own faith that they forgot to see to the positive faith development of their own people.

Joe Cocker’s 1980 cover of The Beatles “With a Little Help from My Friends”[8] asks a very poignant question in such a way, that those who listen to it can’t help but to want to reach out and embrace the singer of the first few lines.

What would you do if I sang out of tune?
Would you stand up and walk out on me?
Lend me your ears and I’ll sing you a song.
And I’ll try not to sing out of key.

The singer pleads for an audience from a friend, but is afraid to risk offering what he’s got because if it’s not good enough he’ll be left alone. Yet, the singer pleads, “Lend me your ears and I’ll sing you a song. And I’ll try not to sing out of key.” The singer gets it. I’m going to probably mess this up, but I’m going to give it my best. I’m going to try anyway.

Paul’s vision for the church at Galatia, and arguably for the church universal, is that it must live its life oriented to fit that of the cross. For Paul, this is what matters. Paul’s life testifies to the supreme message of the cross. Paul is no longer whom he was – a person bent on persecuting others for what they believed. Rather, Paul has become a new person living entirely by God’s grace – both inwardly and outwardly.

Unlike the missionaries whom Paul is fighting with over the souls of the Galatians, Paul’s orientation is to the cross – Christ’s benefit – not his own. Paul’s focus lies neither in self-preservation or fundamentalism; rather, Paul’s focus lies in the love-centered gospel of the cross that speaks of God’s free and uninhibited love to all people without discrimination so that all might find renewal and grace. Paul’s focus orients himself with God’s focus – that is relationships with one another. For we, as a Christian people, are created to love and be loved – to share our burdens and carry the burdens of others.

To be unified as the Body of Christ we must begin to act as friends toward one another, upholding one another, and building up one another in mutual love and affection. It is as one Body that we realize that our worth comes not from playing games of one-upping each other, but from the realization that integrity and spiritual wholeness comes from holding one another accountable for both our earthly and spiritual lives. When we carry our own burdens and take responsibility for our faith formation, then we can begin to carry each other’s burdens and be about the work of building God’s Kingdom of love on earth as it is in heaven.

By removing the things that get in the way of walking in the light of Jesus Christ, we may begin to draw attention to God’s love. And when we begin to pay attention to God’s love for us and the world, we begin to allow for that love to complete the work of healing and restoration – a restoration that can only come from following in the footsteps of Jesus the Christ. It is when we realize that our wholeness is more whole when the Body of Christ is united, that we realize that we can do more than just get by with the help of our friends. Our wholeness is brought to completion because we help our friends through living as Jesus lives, serving as Jesus serves, and loving as Jesus loves through the power of God’s Spirit.

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[1] http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/friend
[2] Acts 13:50-14:28, 16:6, 18:25
[3] Galatians 4:8, 5:2
[4] Columbia Encyclopedia, studies by H. D. Betz (1979), R. Y. K. Fung (1988), and R. N. Longenecker (1990).
[5] John 8:2-11
[6] Mark 12:40
[7] Mark 7:10-13
[8] Joe Cocker: Live at Rockpalast, 1980.

Getting in The Way: Mark 6:6b-13

I’m not one for slogans. I know that people spend a lot of money to go to school and earn an education so that they can tap into the minds of consumers and create revenue for certain companies or for certain goods and products. And I know, too, that organizations – businesses, non-for-profits, clubs, and restaurants – pay people a lot of money so that their product can be mainlined, mainstreamed, and in the center of the public media’s eye. Even the church - individual congregations and denominations – have spent time and energy into making the church more appealing – more user-friendly – more seeker-sensitive.

My own denomination, The United Methodist Church, has been operating off a slogan that is now in its eighth year (since 2001) of usage. The short quip of a statement, “Open Hearts. Open Minds. Open Doors” was embraced as a tool for ministries that sought out to create a sense – a feeling – better yet, an attitude - of hospitality in and among the United Methodist churches across The United States.

So, while I’m not one for slogans, I do understand the underlying attempt of embracing and using slogans. However, the risk that we run with the usage (and sometimes gross over-usage) of slogans is one of trivializing and watering down the importance of the message or product that one is trying to spread around…or evangelize, if you will. This isn’t a knock on The United Methodist Church’s slogan, or marketing in general; rather, it’s a reminder that slogans are just a few of the things that we can create that can get in the way of seeing and experiencing something that is much more important than we realize or give credit to.

Jesus, I think, realized this when he sent out his closest disciples (Mark refers to them as “the twelve” NRSV) to have “power over evil spirits” (6:7) If we look at how Jesus sent out the disciples, we see what is at the crux of what it means to be the church – to be followers of Jesus - both individually and communally. Jesus doesn’t send the disciples out with backpacks full of food and water, and suitcases with multiple changes of clothes, and shoe-inserts for when their feet get tired. Jesus doesn’t even send the disciples with money to pay for a room for a couple of nights at the local Holiday Inn. Jesus sends his disciples with the clothes on their backs and the shoes on their feet, and with the directive that they were to rely on kindness of others for food and shelter. And – this is my favorite part – if they aren’t received, Jesus tells them “if any place will not welcome you and if they refuse to hear you,” (6:11) they are to “shake the dust off [their] feet as a testimony against them.” (6:11)

That’s it. That’s all the disciples were to do. They were wear the clothes that they had on, rely on others to feed them; and when – because you know they were turned away – they weren’t received, they were to shake the dust off of their shoes as though they were shrugging their shoulders and saying, “Either you get it, or you don’t. We tried. We’re done here.”

How differently would your life be if you actually lived this way?! I mean, really, what would your life look like if you were so centered on being a missionary of Jesus’ that you went around with just what you needed, and you shrugged and moved on when you came up against someone that didn’t receive your message? I guarantee you that your life would be different.

There’s something in that life, though, that often times keeps us from doing and being church isn’t there? It’s that word, “missionary,” isn’t it? There’s a stigma that comes with the idea of being a missionary. The life isn’t very appealing to many because of the way that missionaries are perceived. In his book, So Beautiful: Divine Design for Life and the Church[1], Leonard Sweet writes about the image that many of us think about when we hear the word “missionary.” Sweet writes,

A missionary…always works in Africa, is poor, has awkward social skills, dresses poorly, and is completely out of touch with reality. At best, the status of ‘missionary’ is seen as an elite spiritual position to which only a select few are called. At worst, ‘missionary’ is a backward calling for those who can’t make it in the real world; people who will no doubt impoverish the ‘natives’ and put them at risk, making them easy prey for persecution and elimination, by devaluing local customs and promoting Western values.[2]

And if we were honest with ourselves, we would find that we likely agree with that assessment of Sweet’s.

The thing is, we as Christian people – as followers of the rabbi Jesus, the Christ – are created for mission. As children of God we find ourselves coming from, and worshiping, a God that from there very beginning is in mission – or doing something with a purpose. Our purpose as Christian people is not just to spread the message of God’s works of mercy, grace, and love through the life and teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus. Our purpose as Christian people is to be in relationship with one another, as modeled both by the Trinitarian God that we worship (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit/Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer) and by Jesus with his disciples and by the disciples with each other.

How many times, though, do we focus so much of our energy on other things that we forget that we were created to be in love-relationships with each other as we are in love-relationships with God? How many times are we like Peter in the Gospel of John (John 21:22), where we are so concerned with what our neighbors are doing to follow Jesus and the holy relationships that our neighbors are engaged in, that we lose sight of where we are and what holy relationships we are trying to create? I think that Jesus’ response to us would be the same as it were to Peter. “What’s it to you? You need to follow me, so work on that.” (a LOOSE paraphrase, I know).

Like Jesus’ disciples, we are first and foremost sent to be in mission to the world and to each other.

We are not sent by ourselves, but we are sent as a Body of believers, empowered by the Holy Spirit, so that we might be in relationship with each other and the world. We are not sent to be ourselves, but we are sent to be the embodiment of Jesus to a broken world that seeks healing and wholeness. And we are not sent in, but we are sent out to continue in a life of mission of love-giving and love-relating – a mission that has no ending, no off-switch.

I brought up The United Methodist Church’s slogan at the beginning of this, and I brought it up for a reason. Not to complain about it, or critique it, or to suggest a new slogan, but because it reminded me of a time when I was in a seminary class where it was critiqued and complained about. The class did, in fact, come up with a new slogan for The United Methodist Church in its current incarnation. As a joke, a group of students took the, then five year-old, slogan and tweaked it to say, “The United Methodist Church: Our Doors Are Opened, But We’re Not Coming Out.”

Now while that “new” slogan might bring a chuckle or two, when you get right down to it – it’s a serious statement. The line that, “truth is often found in jest” is deadly serious in this regard.

Who cares what the Baptist churches, or the Presbyterian churches, or the Christian churches around the corner are doing? Who cares about why that pastor is meeting with this group of people, or why that person is heading up this committee?

Care about what your church is doing to show the world God’s love. Care about how your soul is sitting with God. Care about what you can do to follow Jesus. Stop competing with others to prove how much of a Christian they're not. Refocus on showing how much of a Christian you are by out-loving one another.

Leonard Sweet, again, tells a story of Martin Niemöller – a German Lutheran pastor that was a contemporary of Dietrich Bonheoffer’s and one of the founding organizers of the anti-Nazi/anti-National Socialism group, The Confessing Church. Before his death in 1984, Niemöller lectured at Sweet’s school (Drew University) about a recurring dream that involved the voice of Adolf Hitler. Sweet writes,

Niemöller said in his dream he heard a voice speak from the clouds: ‘Before I pass final judgment, do you have anything to say in your defense? And from behind him he heard an answer. He tried to turn and see the voice that was at the docket, but he couldn’t get it back far enough. However, he recognized the voice.

‘I never once heard the true gospel message,’ Hitler said.

Niemöller’s point was that even the most evil, especially the most evil needs to hear the gospel. And it is our mission to get it there…[3]

There are lots of things that can get us tripped-up, can act as a stumbling block, can get in the way of reaching our final destination: Jesus. The question is not, really, what is getting in the way? Rather, the question is what am I doing to get in The Way?

You see, the early church members were not called “Christians.” The early church members were called “followers/people of ‘The Way.’” (Acts 11:26) They were Jews and Gentiles that would travel from home to home, worshiping Jesus – God made manifest in human form. They were missionary pilgrims on a journey to share the message of God’s love known through Jesus Christ. Their destination was not Africa or China or Central and South America. Their destination was Jesus. They didn’t know when they would get there, and they didn’t know who they would meet along the way, but they would welcome them in and along the journey. What these pilgrim wayfearing followers of Christ did know was that their means of transportation was The Spirit, and that their fuel was their relationships with God and with each other.

May you be reminded of your life’s never-ending mission of sharing the grace-filled love of God, made real through the life and teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and through the power of the Holy Spirit, so that you might continue the journey in The Way towards Jesus.

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[1] Leonard Sweet. So Beautiful: Divine Design for Life and the Church (David C. Cook: Colorado Springs, CO, 2009).
[2] Sweet, 57.
[3] Sweet, 65.

Its Not Always Milk & Cookies, Sometimes Its Chicken Livers & Brussel Sprouts: Ruth 2:14-23

If I were a betting man – which I’m not – I’d be willing to guess that almost every single person remembers a time when they were a child where they were forced to eat food that they thought was utterly disgusting – so repulsive that they’d risk being punished by their parents to the ends of the world, so long as they didn’t have to take one bite or swallow one morsel of that food. Did you ever have one of those foods? What was it?

I remember hearing one story of my second oldest cousin, Kevin, where he and my grandmother, Memaw, had it out at the dinner table because he wouldn’t eat. You see, I was raised in a family where you ate what was put on your plate – even if you didn’t like what was being served. And if you didn’t like what was being served, you could sit and wait until everyone else finished eating or you could excuse yourself from the table and go hungry for the night. That’s just the way it was. And we all – most of the time – abided by that rule. But one night, Kevin was spending the night with my Memaw and Pawpaw because his mom and dad – my aunt and uncle – were going out for the evening. As dinner time approached, as I was told, the house filled with the good smells that can only fill grandparents’ houses. You know that smell – fresh baked bread, other dishes boiling on the stovetop – in my family’s house, food was the smell of love. If you loved somebody, you cooked for them. And if you really loved them, you’d eat with them! (We were obviously good Methodist folks from the very beginning!)

Well as dinner was served, Kevin pulled up to the table only to find the one thing that he just could not put in his mouth as a child…Tuna Noodle Casserole. Kevin refused to eat. He sat at the table watching my grandparents eat their meals, eventually excusing themselves to other things. As Kevin went to get up, my grandmother stopped him where he was and demanded that he sit back down and finish his meal.

“But Memaw, that stuff is GROSS! I don’t want to eat it! It’ll make me puke!”

And so the battle began. For three hours my cousin and my grandmother screamed back-and-forth at each other at the dinner table. One insisted that the food was good and good for them, while the other maintained that it was the most disgusting food on the planet and that he wouldn’t feed it to his dead dog.

Another cousin of mine, his nickname is “Pea-Eater”, would stuff green peas back into his jaws until dinner was over, and then go to the bathroom and spit them into the toilet – all the while, fooling everyone into thinking that he was such a good boy who sat up at the table and ate his vegetables. For me, it’s chicken livers and brussel sprouts. I can chew and chew and chew, but no matter how hard I try, I just CANNOT swallow them! They don’t taste good, they don’t feel good in my mouth, and they just won’t – make – it – past – my – mouth! I’m shuddering just thinking of having to eat them!

Many of us as children – and even still as adults – would rather indulge in the good, tasty, and unhealthy foods that we can eat: ice cream, Nutter-Butter Bars©, milk and cookies, bratwurst, babyback ribs, cole slaw, baked beans – you know, the good stuff. But really, we know what it takes to maintain healthy eating habits so that we’re fit and able to maintain a life that honors the bodies that God has given to us. It takes work. It takes discipline. It takes commitment. It takes a willingness to make yourself better than you are. Not necessarily because you want to awe and inspire the folks that see you at the beach or because it makes you feel better when you’re with a not-as-healthy-as-you friend; but, rather, because you realize that what you have is a gift from God, and that you believe that your body is a temple for God to live in and work through.

And so it is with Ruth and her story that is found in the Hebrew Scriptures (what we Christians call the “Old Testament”). Ruth is the quintessential picture of work, discipline, commitment, and dedication. Though a short story, Ruth’s four-chapter-long book gives to its hearers and readers the understanding of what a life of faith really looks like.

Up to this point in Ruth’s story, Ruth has gone through many life-challenges that might make the ordinary person throw up their hands and call it quits. Her husband, brother-in-law, and father-in-law all die; leaving Ruth living with two women, that she’s not at all related to, to fend for themselves in a world where women were seen merely as child-bearing, blood-line extending, household-preserving, pieces of property that could be just as easily traded for a flock of camels as they would be to have been added to a collection of wives.

Ruth has lost her family, her livelihood, and her connections. And now the only other person that she knows is leaving to go back and live among her own people – Naomi is going back to Judah – leaving Ruth alone. Ruth decides to follow her elderly mother-in-law back to Judah so that she might live with, and take care of, her. Ruth vows to Naomi that “Wherever you will go, I will go and wherever you will live, I will live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.” (1:16) And so it goes that Ruth and Naomi make it back to Judah to find rest and respite, and to begin a new life together. But with Naomi unable to work, Ruth must go out and risk her life working in the fields where she runs the risk of foreign-worker exploitation, rape, and even murder.

Ruth finds herself in the fields of Boaz, a family member of Naomi’s (and by virtue of her marriage, Ruth’s). Boaz seeks out the story behind this woman, Ruth. He finds out about her husband’s death, her vow to care for and love Naomi, and her conversion to Naomi’s God – the God of Israel. And it is because of Ruth’s familial and religious dedication, that Boaz shows favor towards Ruth – offering protection for her from his farmhands, instructing other workers to leave extra food behind that Ruth might come back and pick it up for her and Naomi’s survival. Boaz even invites Ruth to his personal dinner table so that she might eat and rest in safety.

It is because of Ruth’s faithfulness that her scary world becomes a little less so, and that her empty stomach becomes full, and that her cold nights find warmth.

I have to admit that up until about three weeks ago I hadn’t really read the story of Ruth. It wasn’t until I was looking at small group Bible studies for our youth – in which we are in our third week of studying Ruth - that I took to heart the words of Ruth’s story. And what I realized is that the life and struggles of Ruth and her relationship with Boaz bears a striking resemblance to our faith lives as Christian people.

When thinking about, and working on our faith-lives, would we – do we – as Christians look for the “milk and cookies” when really we should be trying to swallow “fried chicken livers and brussel sprouts?” In other words, how many of us like to be Christians when all we have to do is show up at a worship service, attend a mid-week meal, and plop a couple of dollar bills into the offering plate? But when we have to embrace the teachings of Jesus - when we have to show kindness to the stranger - when we have to look at the empty, outstretched hands of one who just needs a little help to get through the day – when we are called upon to pray in public – when we are asked to take a leadership role in the community of faith – when we are asked to clean up someone else’s mess – when we have to give up something that is close to us – do we still desire to walk in footsteps of the One who leads us to an eternal relationship with God?

When we actually have to work to better our faith-relationships with God and with each other, do we still desire to be Christ-followers?

Sure, there are times when we are completely engulfed by the work of the Spirit; when days are so good that we think that we couldn’t be any closer to God than right now. But what about when the days aren’t so good, when your faith life is struggling? What about the times when you know that there’s a Bible study that might be beneficial to your own spiritual growth, but you convince yourself that you don’t have the time go and sit for FORTY-FIVE MINUTES and talk about the Scriptures – or the times that you’re being internally tugged to prayer, but you’re too afraid what people might think of you if you stop what you’re doing and take on an attitude of conversation with God – or the opportunity arises for you to get away for a time of spiritual renewal and instead of anticipating the reality of God’s showing up to commune with you, you grab your seats at the local sporting arena and scream out your vocal chords to death? What about those times? You turn to Ruth and her story of faithfulness and determination amidst the darkest times of her life, and you find hope and encouragement and inspiration.

Ruth’s blessing didn’t come to her just because of whom she was – she was Boaz’s family – Boaz was obligated to help her survive (look at Lev 25:25 and Deut 25-5-10); rather, Ruth’s blessings came because of the love that she gave. Ruth’s blessings came because she was encouraged to faithfulness even in the face of harassment and ridicule. Ruth’s blessings came because she continued to labor in Boaz’s fields despite the judgment of others.

Many of us have gotten comfortable being spoon-fed our faith. We’ve come to Jesus because we want something. Like the people in John’s Gospel, we often come to Jesus because we want real food that we can put in our mouths and chew not because we realize that Jesus is the Christ – the One who was raised in victory over the trappings of sin and death (Jn 6:22-26).

God’s gift of grace – God’s gift of salvation – is a free gift that we can neither earn nor create ourselves. We are given a free invitation to come, sit, and eat at God's Table. It is a gift that is offered to all through the life and teachings, death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ. Just as the gift is not easily given – Christ suffered and died so that we might not suffer and die eternally – the gift should not taken lightly. The depths of our own faith-lives take work and dedication in responding to God’s love for us and for the world.

Real, deep faith doesn’t just happen – it takes working in the fields, facing ridicule and harassment, risking our lives to reflect the radical love that was, and is, shown to us from God on a daily basis. It takes the realization that while we will have nights where we can dunk our cookies in a tall, cool glass of milk; there are also times where we must endure the work of picking up the fork and putting the brussel sprouts in our mouths, chewing them up, taking them in, and swallowing them. For it is only with the taking in of the things that will strengthen us that we, in turn, will be strengthened.

May you be strengthened by the love of God today not because of the work that you do, but because of the blessings that you receive.