Mirror, mirror

‘I thank you, God, that I am not a sinner like everyone else. For I don’t cheat, I don’t sin, and I don’t commit adultery. I’m certainly not like that tax collector! I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.’ - Matthew 18:11-12 NLT

It is oh, so obvious that the religious expert who prayed that prayer is miles off from understanding himself rightly, isn't it? I revel in Jesus' contrast of this man's prayer with the prayer of the tax collector.

It occurred to me today that this self-classification I'm tempted to do when I read this story puts me in grave risk of the Pharisee's error. "I am broken, like the second guy," I tell myself in a somber voice befitting my sense of deep humility. "I'm not like that self-righteous Pharisee".

Um...really?

And just how do I assess this? Well, I am tempted to run a sort of nutty quiz in my head, like this:

(Check one)
Do I pray like that Pharisee? Yes ___ No___

Do I dress like that Pharisee? Yes___ No___

Do I perform like that Pharisee? Yes___ No___

(Fill in the blank) Who do I know who is like that Pharisee? ________

(Essay question) Why am I a better, truer and more faithful Christian than this person? __________

And that unvoiced, arrogant self-assessment completely erases my awareness of my own brokenness, and renders meaningless the rending of my garments as I sorrow over my sinfulness.

"I thank God that I'm not narrow-minded like ____"
"I thank God that I'm not open-minded like ____"
"I thank God that I don't do _____ behavior"
"I thank God that I do _______ behavior"

Ugh. This parable today was a magnifying mirror. I engage in these sorts of comparisons, all the while convincing myself that I am not a Pharisee when I do.

God have mercy on me, a sinner.

Come to the table (Part 2)

Read part one here.

True fiction for church leaders
Part 2:

The board put the PR machine in high gear – the machine Jeff had painstakingly assembled in the name of Excellent Communication – to massage the message they’d be giving the congregation about Jeff’s impending departure. Frank made sure Jeff understood that his generous severance package was tied to Jeff’s flawless performance of the leaving rituals they’d choreographed for him to execute.

“We’d prefer to tell the congregation that you and Joanna believe God is calling you both at this time in your lives to step out in faith and explore some new ministry opportunities,” Frank said.

Instead of what, Jeff wondered. The truth? That he’d been forced out?

“You’ve gone a lot recently, traveling and speaking at other churches, anyway,” Frank continued. “We want to minimize any disruption to the church life here. If you think you can handle it, we’ll call you up front so you can make a brief announcement at the end of each service this weekend. We’ll want to see the text of what you’re going to say before then. You understand.”

Jeff already knew the answer, but had to hear Frank say it. “Who’s going to preach this Sunday?”

He saw a muscle twitch in Frank’s jaw. “Chris, of course. The board is praying he’ll accept the call to become our next senior pastor.”

Oh, he’ll accept it, Jeff thought. It’s what that Judas has been working toward since I brought him here as my associate 4 years ago.

* * * * * * *

“How could they do this to me?”

Joanna was standing at the doorway of the kitchen. He hadn’t heard her come in, but she’d obviously heard his voice. “Jeff?”

He turned to face her.

“I’ve felt the same way for a long time,” she said slowly, taking a couple of steps into the room. “Years, maybe. I hated the way things were the last few years when it seemed like everyone was turning against you. Against us. I am glad our kids are gone, living on their own out of this town. Going through this would have been unbearable for them.”
He nodded. He’d had the same thought hundreds of times.

“How was your morning?” he asked.

She shrugged off her coat, tossing it over the back of a kitchen chair. Joanna had been attending a church in a town about 45 minutes from their home the last couple of months, hoping the ritual would help her heal in relative anonymity. He’d tried visiting with her, but after their second visit, he told her it was excruciating for him to sit like an uncooked pot roast in the pew, watching the show.

All he could think about were the endless meetings he and his staffers had to “produce a quality Sunday morning experience” for the people filling the padded chairs in his own…former…church each weekend. He, of course, was the main course, tasked with crafting a clever and relevant message the people would talk about with their co-workers on Monday mornings – evangelizing them with the gospel of “come to our church”. Jeff now wondered if maybe all he and the staff had been doing was repackaging little bits of the Bible into 100-calorie snack packets. “You can go if you want,” he’d told Joanna. “I need some time. Can’t handle it right now.”

He hadn’t noticed until she sat down heavily at the kitchen table that Joanna’s face was blotched and swollen and her eyes were red. “Fine. Not fine,” she said. “You know what, Jeff? You ask how they could do this to you? These last few months, I’d been asking God why he let them get away with it. I wondered why they seemed to thrive after they betrayed us the way they did,” she said.

“You used the past tense, JoJo. ‘Been asking.’ Like it’s over.”

“A lot of bad stuff has happened to us, Jeff. But I’m beginning to think we’re not just victims in this.”

He straddled the chair across the table from her. “How can you say that? After the way they screwed us…”

“I’ve been listening to people interact before and after the church service these last few weeks. No one really knows me, and it’s a great big church. I just listen…” She swallowed hard. “I hear too many of their conversations focused on the same things we’ve been consumed with the last few years. The building, the staff, the programs. I hear constant striving for position, and endless silly politics. Such a waste…”

Hackles raised, Jeff leaned across the table. “What are you saying? That none of anything we’ve done had any value? That we’ve wasted our time in ministry?”

Her voice broke. “I wanted to yell at them: All of you people want the same things we wanted at…at…” She paused, reaching for the right word. “From…our old church. They all want the same things we wanted. Frank, Chris, the rest of them... I think we’ve wasted a lot of energy trying to get something from other people that didn’t belong to any of us in the first place.” She nestled her face into her folded arms on the table and wept quietly.

The truth in her words flicked lightly across his pain like a whip, goading him…where? Jeff wanted to scream “You’re wrong! They did this to us!” but tried…and failed…to form a less-visceral response. The protest inside of him slowly dissipated until finally, his soul fell silent as he sat at the kitchen table with her, the only sound, the steady ticking of the kitchen clock.

Come to the table

If you've ever been involved in church leadership, the following work of fiction might read like a true story...

(Part 1)

Jeff was parked in his ancient recliner, wearing a shapeless pair of gray sweats and an “In It To Win It” T-Shirt. Sections of the morning’s super-size paper surrounded his chair, forming a moat of newsprint. Jeff stared at the tube as the Sunday morning talking heads debate the president’s latest economic stimulus package, each insisting they just wanted to help the American people.

At the commercial break, Jeff hit the remote. He loathed the suffocating silence in the house, but couldn’t listen to one more syllable of political grandstanding this morning. The true addiction of those rarin’-to-go pols and wonks on camera, and their sycophants pimping off-camera? A thousand meetings, alliances and brokered deals in order to score the addictive emotional cocaine of power.

“They call what they do ‘helping people’, but if any of that happens, it’s only after they’ve gotten their ego fix,” Jeff mumbled out loud. He walked into the kitchen, dumping the remains of his lukewarm coffee into the sink and fishing the last blueberry Pop-Tart out of an almost-empty box. He ate it cold while continuing impassioned sermon to his canine congregation of one.

“Man, they all use each other. They use people and spit them out when they’ve outlived their usefulness or have the misfortune of choosing the wrong allies.”

Like he had.

He tossed the dog the last bit of his untoasted toaster pastry, and the same weary incomplete thoughts crawled around the rutted track the betrayal had made around the perimeter of his mind.

He mumbled the only prayer he’d been able to say in weeks: “How could they do this to me?”

* * * * * * *

Frank’s emotionless visage told Jeff everything he needed to know when he walked into that conference room eight months ago. Frank was going to keep this cordial and businesslike, just as Jeff had always coached him to be through the years two had tackled management issues in their organization.

“You probably have some idea what this meeting is about,” Frank said.

Jeff nodded. After weeks of sensing he was about to get axed, and months before that of losing one workplace political battle after another – this, after years where everything he touched turned to gold – Jeff had steeled himself for the inevitable.

Almost robotically, Frank began his carefully-rehearsed speech, acknowledging Jeff’s years of faithful service, and how Jeff had been instrumental in building the amazing organization around them, and how difficult the decision had been, and just how sorry the entire board was to see things end this way.

“We want to make sure you’re taken care of,” Frank said, pushing a stack of papers toward him from across the conference room table. “We put together a generous package that will give you and Joanna time to figure out what’s next for the two of you. We’re grateful for your years of service to us.”

As Frank wrapped up his speech, Jeff noticed the muffled soundtrack of office activity humming in the background. He could hear the sound of the copier running. Two phones ringing. Though it was after 4 PM, the outer offices were still half-full of employees laughing, talking, finishing up their work day. Jeff had been involved in hiring each one.

And now, he was being dumped like a bad blind date. Frank had just fired him from the church he and Joanna had started in their living room 14 years earlier.

(to be continued...)

Story reprise

Slices of StoryChicago:

1. "Weakness brings liberation. Confession transforms" - Dave Gibbons
2. "Propositions will not save you." - Chris Seay
3. Note to self: Get that Frederick Buechner book already (Telling The Truth: Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale) since it keeps coming up in conversation.
4. "We censor our stories when we only talk about our success." - Mike Foster
5. A drumline is a great way to announce the beginning of a session.
6. "'Be the person God designed you to be'. I don't know what that means!" - Donald Miller
7. Musicians, story characters, communications people in a sea of macs and iphones.
8. Won a copy of Skye Jethani's Divine Commodity - and missed picking it up from under some seat at the Paramount Theater, the site of day 1 of the event because I couldn't access twitter that day. More on twitter for day two.
9. "Instructional method of preaching is a failure. It does not challenge people's perceptions of reality." - The Guy Who Wrote The Book I Won And Didn't Pick Up.
10. "The cross tells the story creation never could." - Thomas Fluharty
11. "Being convincing is salesmanship. Being compelling means people are drawn to you." - Kevin Sterner
12. "How did you get here from there?" Me, to Ron Martoia, after hearing him talk today and realizing he attended Trinity in the mid-90's.
13. My twitter account got hacked midway through day 2 of the conference. Spam Me sent my 261 followers some garbage link. I nearly cried when I saw what had happened.
14. "We dwell in the truth. We don't try to get it in deadlock." - Ben Arment
15. I would have welcomed a few more opportunities experience others' stories (short video vignettes of slice-of-life stories, artwork, a wall with graffittied praises, stories from other cultures?) as part of the mix.
16. It was a typical evangelical conference. And it wasn't anything like a typical conference. Mostly the latter! Thank you, Lord, for allowing me to be there. Help me to use what I've learned, seen, felt to encourage others and honor You.
17. Grateful, grateful, grateful.

The fact that I could list so many quotes from the event (above) should tell you how much I enjoyed the event. I rarely take notes anywhere I go, but I took notes for two whole days. I didn't even take two whole days of notes during two years of full-time college.

Listen to the Quiet - and contest info!

Listen to the Quiet

---

I love the sound of a house full of kids. (Well, most of the time, anyway!) As my children neared adulthood, I wondered how I'd handle the echoing silence of an empty nest.

Perhaps "wondered" is too mild a word. I feared the silence. I was mourning the end of my active parenting years, to be sure, but the truth was that my dread was deeply rooted in some painful early experiences with loneliness. That loneliness resulted in unwelcome, unwanted silence. I honesty didn't believe there could be any other kind of silence.

During this time, I had the opportunity to go on my first guided, mostly-silent retreat. I was simultaneously introduced to the delight of extended meditation on a single passage of Scripture. As I embraced the spiritual discipline of solitude, God brought me face-to-face with some of the familiar old hurts that had previously motivated me to avoid silence at all costs. I discovered that silence does not equal loneliness. It can be rich with God's presence.

The psalmist sang these familiar words from the heart of God to each of us used to tuning our lives to the cacophony around us: "Be still, and know that I am God!" (Ps. 46:10) To paraphrase His imperative invitation: "Shhh...come, listen to the quiet so you can more fully experience and respond to who He is."

Over the last few weeks, several people in my life have remarked that they'd welcome an opportunity to participate in a "mostly silent" retreat. As a result, I'd like to know if there are others living in the Chicago-Milwaukee area interested in gathering for a "Listen to the Quiet" 24-hour retreat either February 26-27 or March 5-6, 2010. Location (probably at a retreat space somewhere in S.E. Wisconsin) is yet to be determined. Cost including 3 meals, will likely run in the $60-70 range. A "mostly silent" retreat means there will be time at the beginning and end for prayer, worship and fellowship, but that the core of your time will be spent in silence shaped by a bit of devotional instruction on how to enter into your time of quiet with the Lord.

If you're interested in participating in the "Listen to the Quiet" retreat - or simply knowing more as plans are finalized - please e-mail me (mishvl@yahoo.com) no later than Saturday, November 14.

---

Your opportunity to win!

This fall, two different projects to which I contributed have released. The first is a gift devotional for women entitled Quiet Reflections of Hope (Baker/Revell). This simple, thoughtful volume offers busy women a bit of focused time with the Lord each morning. The second is the beautiful Holy Bible: Mosaic (Tyndale). This gorgeous Bible offers writings and artwork from believers from every century and continent. You can read more about this Bible here.

I'd like to send one reader two copies of Quiet Reflections of Hope, and one reader two copies of Holy Bible: Mosaic. Each winner will have one volume to keep and one to share with a friend. (Or, if you're feeling especially generous, two copies to give away!) Simply e-mail me at mishvl@yahoo.com before Saturday, November 14 with the subject line "Drawing". Please include your mailing address in your e-mail.

Review: Can God Be Trusted?

With a title like Can God Be Trusted? (FaithWords/Hachette), I imagined the content of Father Thomas Williams' book could be summed up in four words: Yes. So do it. The plain white cover of the hardcover volume didn't do much to convince me that the book was going to be anything more than a restatement of those four words for 206 long pages.

My first impressions were wrong. Williams, a professor of theology at Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University in Rome and a Vatican analyst for CBS News, offers a gentle, accessible and thorough exploration of the nature of trust in this volume. Penned for a popular audience, Williams tackles topics including the downside of distrust, God's rivals for our trust, what to do when God lets you down, and God's trust in us. Williams explains, "...we are not called to diminish our desires, but to enlarge them. In the end, we need to be more audacious with God, not less. We need to think big, bigger than we ever have before. Strange as it may seem, we always expect too little of God, and never too much."

I struggle to trust God and other people. My once-childlike trust in God has been enclosed in thick layers of callouses in order to protect myself from further hurt. Williams' kind, encouraging pastoral voice and an approach that was both intelligent and simple had a healing effect on me as I read. Can God Be Trusted? is a very worthwhile read for anyone who is weary of the weight of their own callouses. Recommended.

(Note: This review copy was provided me by the publisher.)

Three Days (1, 2, 3) re-post

The series below was originally posted in early July of this year, but one of the posts has been hacked, so I'm reposting the set of three here and deleting the original series.

Enjoy a fresh perspective on this Scriptural account.

THREE DAYS
(part 1)
After the rumored resurrection of Jesus son of Joseph, the strange little sect known as The Way had experienced a stunning resurgence across Jerusalem.

This.
could.
not.
continue.

The city's elders dragged Stephen, one of the group's ringleaders, outside the city gates to execute the Law's justice with hurled stones, then seized the moment to finish off this wrong Way once and for all. They launched fiery, ambitious young proteges on a mission to root out every single follower of the heretic rabbi, convinced that these mostly fringe people posed a Defcon 5 threat to more than a thousand years of Jewish faith and tradition.

A young Saul made a name for himself as a dedicated member of the A-team, ferreting out followers of Jesus in the city and bodily dragging them to jail. And then, the ultimate company boy asked for extra credit homework from no less than the Big Kahuna himself, the High Priest: letters he could carry a week's journey to Damascus to the synagogues there, explaining his mission, enlisting help so he could continue his Rambo-like campaign to ferret out the both male and female rats that had scattered from Jerusalem.

Damascus was near when out of a quiet blue sky a white hot-bright ball of light enveloped him - an explosion. He fell to the ground, a mortally-wounded soldier. In the confusion, a rumble carrying echoes of a roar. Saul writhed like a newborn baby exposed to the elements for the first time. Flat on his back on the hard-packed road, he stared directly into the high noon sun without blinking, and whispered "Who are you, Lord?"

The contingent with him stepped back in fear and confusion, the sound of thunder piercing the cloudless sky. When he staggered to his feet a few moments later, he waved his arms wildly looking for balance but finding none. One of his companions rushed to Saul's side. Saul grabbed onto him, steadying himself. His pupils were as wide as platters.

But he couldn't see a thing.

(part 2)
The contingent headed toward Damascus was now without its general. It wasn't just his sudden blindness after the disorienting encounter on the road from Jerusalem that drained the burning bile from Saul's leadership. It was the Voice he heard in the flash and thunder: "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"

The Voice knew his name. The Voice knew what he'd done.

"Who are you, Lord?" he whispered. Those on the road with him could taste the fear in Saul's words. If there was an answer given, it was drowned in the sudden downpour of thunder enveloping their visionary leader.

And then, it was over. All was silent. Dazed, Saul staggered to his feet, and rubbed at his eyes. Then he rubbed harder, stumbling in sloppy circles until he bumped into one of his terrified traveling companions. Saul grabbed the man's cloak in his mid-day darkness. "Did you hear what He said to me? Did you hear?"

Saul had been a heat-seeking missile, bent on eradicating the cult of Jesus from his beloved Damascus as a demonstration of his fealty to all-important religious elites in Jerusalem. And now, after the storm, He told his companions He'd spoken with Jesus. The blind man stood weeping in the middle of the road, hands raised in surrender.

What?

Fragments of confused, angry diagnoses now spilled into the silence after the storm from the others: "Demon", "Fever", "Heatstroke", "Spy". The chaos built around the weeping Saul like another storm until he was able to pull himself together enough to speak. "We're going to Damascus. He told me to go there and wait for further instructions."

The rest of the group shook their heads in disagreement. But there was no where else to go at this point of the journey except to Damascus. Two of them reluctantly reached to take Saul's hands...

(part 3)
There were a few chaotic moments when the head rabbi of the synagogue in Damascus walked into the courtyard to greet his guests from Jerusalem. A dozen voices tossed a confused confetti of words into the air, recounting the sudden ambush of their spiritual general, Saul.

"He was attacked by a demon," some yelled. The adrenalized frenzy of their near-miss with a representative of the netherworld filled the air.

"There must be some hidden sin in his life," others cried. One young man tore at his garment in grief over the idea that his battalion leader had fallen.

Saul stood silent, his unblinking stare fixed beyond them at the setting sun. The military man had been rendered a dove, placid after his initial confusion on the road. He listened now, a habit he'd not cultivated to this point in his life. He'd lost track of time in his new darkness, but recognized the song the birds began to sing at the end of day's light. The prayer he'd prayed at least three times a day for as long as he could remember surfaced in his soul, a breath. A heartbeat.

"Oh Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare Your praise..." He paused, his companion's cacophony swirling around him. He closed his mouth, his silence a prayer.

The voices of his companions and the rabbi calmed suddenly, as the group began to recite the same prayer he'd begun. He listened mutely, and as soon as the group had sung their final amen, their voices stayed low as they began to murmur together. A plan was being formulated on his behalf.

"We're going to have you rest here for a few days, friend." A voice with a Damascus accent was speaking to him as if he was an idiot. "We'll send for a doctor, and my wife will prepare you foods that will restore your strength. Perhaps this is temporary..."

Saul shook his head. "Thank you for your kindness. I will try to rest, but I will not eat. I must wait and pray for what will come next." Because something would come next. He could not imagine what...or when. Though he couldn't see, what he wanted above all was to hear the forgiveness and fire of that Voice again.

They led him into a secluded room in a far corner of the house. The next 72 hours were a blur of the religious elites of Damascus coming and going, praying and chattering and diagnosing and gossiping. The news of Saul's affliction spread like wildfire through the Jewish community in Damascus. Those who'd accompanied Saul from Jerusalem put their mission on hold while they debated about how to proceed from this point forward. Saul was useless to them, what with his seeming capitulation to the other side and his refusal to take even a single sip of water by the third day of his fast. He still looked like a man on a mission...but now it had all the marks of a suicide mission.

Prayer in his darkness, hunger and thirst focusing Saul's insistent imprecations until his body began to pull in on itself, his brain fogging from dehydration by the end of the third day. The darkness wasn't just outside of him. It was inside of him. It had always been so, but he'd called his darkness light and insisted it was good.

He was too dry to weep.

He couldn't go back to the life before the flash and the Voice. And he couldn't go forward until he heard the Voice again. Of that, he was sure. Even if he perished before the Voice spoke to him, he knew he'd hear the Voice for eternity, sitting at the right hand of the Father.

Anaias of Damascus, Christ-follower, marched into the lion's den after the Lord spoke to him in a vision, asking him to to do so. Empowered by the Voice, he strode up to the still figure with the vacant stare laying on a pallet in the corner of the rabbi's house. Ananias spoke with authority to this man who'd been sent to the city to punish him and all the other followers of The Way just like him.

Placing his hands on Saul, he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit." Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul's eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, and after taking some food, he regained his strength. (Acts 9:17-19)

After a lifetime that lasted three days, Saul could see. And simultaneously, his hearing was 20/20. The Voice had come once again to him. Saul's interior was immersed in Him, forgiveness rushing into his soul as if a dam had broken.

A resurrection of a dead Man after three days - the parallel to his own experience from flash to filling could never be captured in human language. But the Voice expressed it with a single Name: Jesus.