Not this, but that

Last week, I wrote about a pastor who'd insisted that his congregation pastor him by, among other things, shielding him from their problems so he could concentrate on visioneering. (Click here to read my original post.) I got some interesting feedback, particularly from those reading the reposts of this blog on facebook. 

It led me to ask myself what my understanding is of my responsibility toward church leaders. Rather than doing an exhaustive Bible study here, I thought I'd simply give you a "for starters" list* of what I've gleaned along the way: 

Wittenberg Door

I will respect pastors, elders, deacons and other ministry leaders.

I will not blindly follow these leaders. 

I will accept personal responsibility for my spiritual growth. 

I will not demand spoon-feeding from those with a preaching, teaching or leading ministry. 

I will freely offer and use the spiritual gifts given me by God for use in the body. 

I will not hoard those gifts or call them "mine". 

I will be on the alert for ways I can use gifts of time and talents to bless others. 

I will not hoard those gifts or call them "mine".  

I will pray for my leaders. 

I will not not pray for my leaders. (Double-negative intended.)

I will communicate with these leaders. 

I will not gossip about them. 

In short, I will seek to love all my neighbors (inside and outside the church) in a 1 Corinthians 13 way. 

*I freely admit that I have not always successfully done the things on this list. Just in case you were wondering. 
 

My question for you: What would you add to this list?

This is your shepherd speaking...

Church leaders, past and present, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this subject.

A facebook friend posted this link on his wall a couple of weeks or so ago. (It'll take you about sixty seconds to read it. Go ahead. I'll wait here.)

Did you read it? Your thoughts?

In my exchange with the guy who posted the link, I suggested that nowhere in Scripture do you find that the the flock is charged with protecting their pastor's faith, working to keep him optimistic and shielding him from problems without "viable solutions" so he has plenty of emotional space to dream about where God is taking his their church. I understand all too well that dealing with nitpicky issues like the decor of the church and the color of the bulletin will suffocate a leader (even one who loves to micromanage!), but if this is what Pastor Furtick meant, I think he would have used his words to say so. But, as I noted in response to the guy who posted the link, Furtick appears to be putting the onus on the sheep, staffers, or both to protect their shepherd's faith. Or dreams. Or perhaps *gasp!*...his personal ambitions.

I checked in on Furtick's blog today. From his most recent post, the visionary word to his sheep: "If you’re on staff, volunteering, or simply attending, it’s your responsibility to be united under your visionary. If God wanted everyone playing your song, He would have elevated you to a place where you could make it happen. But He hasn’t. He may one day, but in the meantime you need to faithfully contribute to the song your pastor has chosen with your unique contribution. And do it with excellence."

The tricky trick of these words is that there is a measure of Biblical truth embedded in them: Not all are gifted with leadership gifts. John 17 unity is Jesus' prayer for us. Faithful service and excellence are marks of spiritual community. But I don't hear a shepherd willing to lay his life down for his sheep in Furtick's words. I hear the words of someone who finds the stink of sheep scent clashes with his own cologne. 

Lest you think I'm picking on Pastor Furtick, I am not. I am responding to his ideas - ideas that are pretty popular among a certain slice of evangelicalism in spite of overwhelming evidence that this type of leaderculture isn't quite as effective in transmitting the message of Jesus as maybe some of these "awesome" Big Dawg C.E.O. visionaries might believe of themselves.   

A couple of years ago, when South Florida DJ Brant Hansen was blogging, he had a dark, wry and painfully accurate series going called "The 417 Rules Of Awesomely Bold Leadership". I'm not sure he ever got all the way to #417, but you can click here to sample his a bit of his take on this culture.

So, you got my opinion today. I'd love to hear yours. What do you think of Furtick's words? Have you ever had a spiritual leader who talked like this? What was the experience like?

The life of the party

A few weeks ago, I received an e-mail from a friend who is a part of a local branch of a connecting ministry that links people in need with churches who are willing to meet those needs. She told me that an unemployed woman named Jenny* had contacted the ministry's local office in search of financial and food help. Jenny's boyfriend was in jail on domestic abuse charges, and she had nowhere else to turn. The ministry got involved in putting together emergency rent help, providing her with emergency food assistance and resources to assist her in her job search. 

Jenny told the ministry's intake worker that what was particularly painful about her current crisis was the fact that her disabled son was about to have an important birthday, and she didn't have anyone in her life with whom to put together a party for him. She had no family, and had been gradually isolated from outside friendships. When asked if the ministry could put together a little party for her son, Jenny tearfully said yes.

A small group of us showed up at her home on a warm September afternoon. Two people, along with a carful of happy kids, came from one local church, and a couple of others came because we'd heard about the need through the ministry. One woman brought a cake that she made that was as almost as beautiful as a Cake Boss creation. Others brought balloons, ice cream, gifts and cards. The group of us, save for the pair that came from the same church, didn't know one another before we walked in Jenny's door. But we were only strangers until we sang "Happy Birthday" to Jenny's son and ate cake and ice cream together before dinner. If ever there was a day to eat dessert first, this was it. 

We talked, and the pastor gently asked Jenny to tell us a bit about her story. She told us about her once-hopeful faith and the complex pile-on of events that brought her to this place in her life. When asked if she would like the group to pray for her, she agreed. We gathered around her and prayed for God's provision, for strength and healing so she could begin to move forward in her life, and for His blessing on the fragile life of her beloved child.

After the final "amen", her son piped up. "Hey, my mom didn't pray yet."We all bowed our heads again, and quietly affirmed both her tears and her words. It was a heaping slice of the kingdom of heaven, and had all the earmarks of a turning point for this mother and son.

It was far and away the best party I've ever attended. No contest.

*Name has been changed

Book review: Seeds Of Turmoil

After we returned from our first trip to Israel, I was talking with a friend, describing the paradox of worship and tension that exists in the country. He said, "Honestly, I don't see what the big deal is about the place. It's just like anywhere else in the world, right?"

The short answer is "no".

Israel never was, and never will be just like anywhere else in the world. Historians, archaelogists, anthropologists, linguists and academics from a variety of other disciplines may have helpful descriptive insights as to why this is so, but at the heart of the issue is the story found in the Bible. Three major Abrahamic religions each point to Scripture's story (in various forms) to underscore their unique relationship to the land.

Pastor Bryant Wright has written a book designed to answer my friend's question. "Seeds Of Turmoil: The Biblical Roots Of The Inevitable Crisis In The Middle East" (Nelson, 2010) surveys Scripture in order to serve as a primer for Christians who are unfamiliar with the modern implications of the events described in the Torah. Wright is pro-Israel, and writes with a pastor's heart. As well as unpacking the Biblical accounts, he also seeks to make application where appropriate to his readers' lives. For example, in discussing the wife-swap (Leah instead of Rachel) Laban did to Jacob, described in Genesis 29, Wright notes:

Those of us who hear a story like this probably laugh at the fact that Jacob got what he deserved from Laban. No doubt he did. But God was using all the experiences of Jacob's life to shape him into the man He wanted him to be. The Bible says, "Do not be deceived. God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap" (Galatians 6:7)...Watch out how we treat others. God is not mocked. He'll see to it that in time we will reap what we sow. God is just, and he wants us to learn that the way we treat others is the way we are likely to be treated as well. Jacob was learning a hard lesson but a good lesson - for God has great plans for his life.

This 223 page hardcover would be a helpful starting place for Christians who find themselves befuddled by events in the Middle East. Though it sometimes drifts into a sermon-like tone (as in the quote above), it offers an overview of the Bible's story about the land, as well as a look at how those events have shaped (and will continue to determine) the interactions of the Jewish people, Muslims and Christians until the end of days.

*I received a review copy of this book from the publisher. 

Searching for signs of life in Round Lake

I've lived in this town for over four years, but had never seen Round Lake until today. I had a vague idea of where it might be, and groped my way through narrow lanes lined with workingman's fishing cottages turned year-round residences until I found it. I think I trespassed into someone's yard to get this shot. The town would do itself a great service if it put a sign up directing people to its namesake lake, which, by the way, is not round. This experience got me pondering the other signs which have defined my sojourn here...

When our boys were living here, I think we kept these people in business. Surprisingly decent pizza.

This mysterious road leads to a mysterious little airport.

There's something very depressing about this, don't you think?

Two signs, two observations: The top sign, which proudly proclaims that Round Lake won the Governor's Home Town Award (whatever that means) in 2006 has Rod Blagojevich's signature on it. It matches all those bad checks he endorsed. The 1970's-style bottom sign is an elongaged octagon. Wouldn't it be way cooler if the sign was ROUND? Just sayin'.

This is a real street.

I doubt it.

This store has been vacant the entire time we've lived here. It makes me sad every time I drive by it.

Sign of life.

Where shopping is an international adventure.

True story: The first time I shopped at this store, I found myself singing as I wandered the aisles in search of tchochkes for the house. I had no idea the chain was owned by a Christian, or that instead of Kenny G muzak they pipe instrumental worship music and hymns over the sound system. It was a most unexpected experience.

The bane of my existence. Guaranteed to get me ranting in 15 seconds or less.

Book review: Amy Inspired

Amy Gallagher is living the writer's life. No, not the one you see in the movies, where a dreamy-eyed woman wearing a crisp white blouse is tucked into a garret on a quiet fall day, a steaming cup of tea at her side, peacefully typing the orderly words that spill from her wise, thoughtful soul. (For one thing, real writers don't use that many adjectives in one sentence.)

Amy is living a real writer's life - toiling in anonymity as an adjunct faculty member at a small Ohio college by day, accumulating rejection slips during her off hours. A compulsive list-maker, Amy is trying to make sense of her vocational and relational dead ends in Bethany Pierce's second novel, Amy Inspired (Bethany House, 2010). The cast of characters in Amy's very believable world (a fundie mom, a socially-awkward office mate, a free-spirit roommate and best friend, a guy who lands on their couch due to a bedbug infestation in his old apartment) each gently tug her out of her rut and toward the kind of risk she's carefully avoided all of her life.

As Amy's layers of self-protection are peeled away, she is able to make an honest assessment of herself:

Childhood was the kernel around which my adult self had been collaged. To age was not to mature but to accumulate. Achievements, expectations, experiences, disappointments - badges applied thin and too early lacquered in place, a mishmash of cheap decoupage. But under the miscellany - the adult I had made of myself - the original self would not be suppressed; she was as close and immutable and necessary as the muscle beating resolutely within my chest. And she wanted the same thing, always...

I liked Pierce's writing, and the world she created for Amy to inhabit. And if you enjoy contemporary fiction that is as much journey to self-discovery as it is love story, you'll enjoy Amy Inspired.

*Bethany House provided me with a review copy of this book.

My morning's tutorial in aging gracefully

Though my rotator cuff woes have sidelined me from my part-time caregiving gig, the agency I work for assured me that this week's placement was companionship only. No heavy lifting, no vacuuming, no wheelchair pushing. I was to simply hang out with a woman diagnosed with Alzheimer's who is living in a nursing home.

"Millie" (not her real name) was very subdued the first day I was with her. She replied in brief murmurs to the conversation I kept going through my visit with her. When I returned this morning, the visit seemed to be going in the same basic direction as it had on Wednesday...until I said something about the work world. She launched into a 45-minute monologue about the ineptitude of her old boss, the unfairness of her work conditions, the lousy raises she'd received over the years, and her attempts to get some justice by complaining to various higher-ups.

Millie's frustration with her long-ago job was as fresh for her as today's headlines. Actually, fresher, because today is in soft focus around her. 

It was a portrait of the power of the way that our low-level irritations lodge in our souls. I'll admit that I often think of the necessity to forgive (and forgive again) in terms of Big Hurt. My visit with Millie provided me a reminder that the need to forgive extends to the bumps and bruises that come to each one of us as a part of everyday life. All those unforgiven daily annoyances have a cancerous cumulative effect.

Do I want to carry a bad boss...or the irritation of a scraped fender...the sting of being overlooked for a social gathering...or the smart of a snarky comment...with me into tomorrow? Even if I forget my name and yours, do I want to give a thoughtless "friend" or an inept boss that much airtime in my crowded brain? Millie, who once had a very busy and creative life, taught me that when the nice people I've known fade into the mist, unforgiveness keeps those adrenaline-jolting irritants center stage.

So tonight I pray, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us" and hope that they'll quietly exit stage right as I do.

Forgiveness is God's invention for coming to terms with a world in which people are unfair to each other and hurt each other deeply. He began by forgiving us. And He invites us all to forgive each other. - Lewis B. Smedes

Tabernacles

The Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot) begins at sundown tonight. The information below about the holiday, which came via e-mail from two faithful prayer warriors living in Jerusalem, blessed me today and gave me a way to pray. Perhaps it will spark some prayer in you as well:

In ancient times, sukkot were used as sheds for cattle (Genesis 33:17), as guard shacks for watchmen over vineyards (Isaiah 1:8), as thrown-up overnight shelters for warriors in the field (II Samuel 11:11). Sukkah is Hebrew for the "shelter" Jonah built for himself outside Nineveh (Jonah 4:5) from which to observe what God might do to that city. In Psalm 27:5 David trusts that God will hide him in His sukkah in the "evil day". As part of this fall "ingathering" festival (Exodus 23:16), Israel, after she had entered the land and was living in built houses, was called to rejoice (see Scripture passage above) and feast before the Lord for seven days, resting on the first and eighth day-but for that occasion she was also called to build and spend time in sukkot-decorating them with leafy, fruitful boughs of foliage, recalling that when out in the desert moving from place to place in temporary dwellings, God had nevertheless provided her with life. 

Today, we still build these tiny shelters during this festival. As we rejoice in thanksgiving before the Lord for His provision and sustenance, we remind ourselves that we are nevertheless still abiding in temporary dwellings-that, as goes the old spiritual, "this world is not my home, I'm just a-passin' thru"-that "if our earthly house, this tent-this sukkah-is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavenlies!" (II Corinthians 5:1). Yet while we are here, this same LORD who accompanied Israel through the desert will be with us all the way. 

Pray that each of those celebrating will discover that in order truly to "rejoice before the LORD for seven days", they must come first into relationship with the One who came that their "joy might be full".

Book review: Nudge

Leonard Sweet's newest release, Nudge: Awakening Each Other To The God Who's Already There (David C. Cook, 2010) will make you fall in love with evangelism again.  Or more likely, for the first time.


Many of us who follow Jesus have been exposed to evangelism as hard-sell, complete with tips and techniques. Or it's a scary guilt trip, as in "I should do this", or its corollary, "You're going to hell". Or we lean into the hopeful, beige-tinted "I hope they ask why I'm different".

Leonard Sweet wants us to know that evangelism is so much more than a single-dimensional program, a guilt trip or a wish. The title Nudge sounds like it might shrink evangelism to little more than a tiny shove in the right direction, but Sweet's book is a celebration of evangelism in ways that most of us have never explored. He believes we're to become students of the world around us - the world God in which God placed us - and learn to "read" the signs and symbols around us in order to speak to those around us. He translates the work of Umberto Eco (and others) in the study of semiotics into the language of the kingdom of God in an accessible, winsome way:

"Nudge evangelism is the planting of seeds. With a motivation of love, nudges meet people in their context and nourish their souls in some way. As in Jesus' parable of the seeds, planting frees us to be extravagant in love, yet leaves the results for God to germinate and grow. Nudging is an open-ended enterprise God may undertake directly. God may use others, and time and circumstance to grow. Or God may even employ a continuing involvement from us. The main thing is that nudgers are free to love without consequences. Nudgers are free to invest in the lives of others through the generosity of life as a conduit of love from God...Nudge is a a call to evangelize life and to face death so others may live." 

The first section of the book explores what it means to pay attention in order to both witness and to bear witness. The remainder of the book invites us to realize how God moves and speaks through each one of our senses. Sweet's playful, encylopedic presentation is meant to both spark our imaginations and provoke each one of us to action in our own context through word and silence, touch and taste, scent and sound.

Nudge is great news about the Good News. This is a rich, lovely, inspiring read - and one that connected me more fully to my own humanity, to the One who made me, and to the world he loves. Highly recommended.

*A review copy of this book was provided me by The Ooze Viral Bloggers.

I'd rather burn out than fade away

Last week, my husband and I visited a congregation we'd first attended nearly thirty years ago. We didn't see many familiar faces - not that we even would have recognized any of them. Thirty years is a long time, and people change. It is quite possible that a few of those folks from the days from when Flock Of Seagulls songs were in heavy rotation on the radio might have been there during last week's visit. The large majority of the people there were our age (middle-age) and older. The congregation had flowered during the Jesus movement that swept through the boomer generation 30-40 years ago.

This wasn't the church we visited, but the pic sure tells the story.

It was sobering to see so much gray hair, and so few little kids. (I mentioned another small congregation with a similar demographic in a blog post here.) These congregations have a "use by" date stamped on their doors, it seems. They've not been able to transmit their DNA to a new generation.

A lot of the children of these boomer++ parents have exited the church. Many still profess love for Jesus, but have a bitter taste towards the institution that claims to represent him. We can list the many painful reasons why: politics, marketing, crappy leaders, hypocrisy, abuse (verbal and sexual), irrelevance, nowhere to share the gifts they've been given...and on it goes. My sympathies are definitely with them, though I am not convinced that foregoing any sort of corporate gathering is the only alternative for de-churched young people. (Or de-churched boomers, for that matter.) It's not easy out there, but finding a few others to prod you onward is at the heart of what spiritual community is meant to be.

"Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching." - Hebrews 10:23-25

This Scripture passage is usually used to chide (or shame) non-attenders into re-upping. But after visiting the graying, non-reproducing congregation last week, I realize that it is entirely possible to give up meeting together even when you show up for a church service week after week. Somehow, the spurring toward love and good deeds fades to a gentle poke, then a just a memory. The memory of loving and doing is so real to a sundowning congregation that it feels like action, when it is simply history.  The congregation goes gray and its story fades to black.

I would rather burn out than fade away.

Have you ever been a part of a sundowning congregation? What was it like? What attempts were made to turn things around? Did these attempts work?

A modest proposal

If all the words in the blogosphere and broadcast media about this weekend's 9/11 Qur'an bonfire in Florida and the furor over the planned "Ground Zero Mosque" were committed to ink and paper, I have a feeling the entire Pacific Northwest would be 90% deforested by now. There are a lot of people exercising (and in some public cases, abusing) their right to free speech over these issues right now.

And in all the furor leading up to this weekend's painful anniversary, I have heard nary a word about the families of the nearly 3,000 people who lost their lives on that September morning nine years ago.

1,609 people lost a spouse or partner on 9/11. More than 3,051 children lost parents.

I'd like to suggest that one simple and counter-cultural act you can do in the coming days is pray for the families of those who perished that 2001 morning in New York, Washington DC and Shanksville, PA. There is no "healing" after the sort of trauma these families experienced that September morning - the word "healing" implies restoration and wholeness. These families have experienced amputation and unspeakable sorrow.

Remember with these families, and pray God's peace that goes beyond our understanding will flow into their broken hearts in the coming days.

Dear Preacher

Dear Preacher,

I just did some math, and discovered that there have been 1,716 Sundays in my life from age 18 to now. I've been in church most of those Sundays listening to your messages. I've also listened to a fair share of messages over the years via radio, cassette tape, CD, and even recently, podcast. I've learned some useful stuff from you over the years. Once in a while, lightning will strike and you'll say something life-changing. But I've had to wade through a lot (A LOT!) of words you've megaphoned in my direction in between lightning strikes.

You know what? I think I've missed some of those great moments because a lot of you default to hectoring us with lifestyle advice ranging from "Read your Bible in a year" to "Don't complain about the way we do things/touch not God's anointed" to "Four Fine Ways to Fix Frazzled Finances"to "Arm thyself for the culture war". It is really easy to dole out spiritual principles or (worse) your opinions about the way things should be in the church and in my life by using a lot of imperative language, isn't it? You're so used to thinking of this as "powerful preaching" that you miss the point that you come off as a bit of a know-it-all or worse, a bully. Too many of you copy both habit and content of contemporary well-known pulpiteers and personalities instead of the kind of preachers honored in the Bible. People like the woman with the alabaster jar, or the newly-restored Peter, or even this old guy.  

Your job, preacher, is so much harder. Stop loving the sound of your own voice, or that cool rush you get when you realize everyone's listening to you. I'd suggest that those are temptations for anyone holding a microphone, and sin if you indulge in them. Don't try to dazzle me with your theological education, or treat me like I'm an eleventh-grader in your lecture hall. You might think you're preaching when you telling me not to drink, chew or go out with boys who do, but that is nothing more than coloring in the lines of someone else's moral convictions. Don't mistake a communications skill set for preaching.

Preaching is when you simply present Jesus to me. Real preaching requires so much more of your own brokenness coupled with your active prayer life. Real preaching "salts my oats", exposing the thirst I have for communion with my Creator. Real preaching is your own thirst made public. Real preaching brings us both to the Source of living water.

I'm on your side, Preacher. You have a daunting job with eternal consequences. I'm a writer, and these rules apply to me, too.

I'm praying for both of us today.

In Him, Michelle

Question: Have you ever heard a sermon that changed the course of your life? What made it so?

On the road again

Q: Would you drive 45+ minutes to attend an ideal church service each week or would you become a part of a church community with whom you differed on some points of doctrine and practice right in your own backyard?

Though we've all been told that consumer Christianity is a bad thing, the truth is that since the Reformation, Protestant believers have often sought out the fellowship of like-minded compadres. We also know that that the thousands of different flavors of fellowship can be micro-variants of one another- kind of like choosing between vanilla bean, French vanilla, vanilla-flavor and Madagascar vanilla ice cream. I can point to streets in my county where there are at least 4 different evangelical congregations within a mile or two of one another. All affirm the same core beliefs, assent to most of the same doctrine, and probably sing at least one Chris Tomlin song each Sunday morning but yet, there they are: a veritable Baskin-Robbins of worship. In a culture like ours where we have the luxury of choice in our church affiliations, it isn't usually the nuances of theological difference between the congregations that helps us decide we belong with a particular group. It is more often the sense of community, of belonging.

And if our choices get stripped from us, say, in a wave of persecution or a serious economic collapse, I am convinced that those who are part of a healthy spiritual community will flourish. In fact, it is this reality that has put Bill and I back on the road to find a church home, bone-weary of the journey as we are. 

For two and a half years, Bill and I made the schlep to an Anglican congregation that was at least 45 minutes from our home. Our Sunday morning drive was equivalent to the amount of time we actually spent at church. We appreciated the church's sacramental approach to worship, and the fact that the church was just a little bit different than the evangelical/Charismatic (and throw in a couple of fundamentalist groups for good measure) congregations of which we'd always been a part. The fifty-mile round-trip drive each week was our way of exercising the lovely luxury of choice.

That luxury had a serious downside; one I don't think we fully realized when we first began attending the church. The huge negative is that the distance made it extremely difficult to form meaningful relationships. (We did try hosting a small group for a while, but everyone who attended lived at least a half an hour's drive away from our home.)

Struggling through the decision to try to find a church closer to home was a tough one - we had months of anguished conversation about it in our home. Bill enjoyed being a part of the congregation's leadership advisory team and still misses the worship. Though I appreciated the liturgy as a way to connect with God, it didn't spill over into meaningful human connection for us. And our commitment to the far-away church prevented us from forming those connections with those in our own backyard.

It sucks to be on yet another quest to find a church. I'm sick of vanilla ice cream, to be honest.

There have been times in our lives we've been launched on this journey because of rotten doctrine or leadership sin (pastoral embezzlement, porn addiction, or flaming nepotism). Or at least that's what I thought the reason was. I'm pretty convinced that a sense of committed spiritual community can carry a group of friends through a lousy season of leadership or even a flirtation with heresy.

My question at the beginning of this post might be a bit of a false dichotomy. "An ideal church service" is an hour or so each week. What we're searching for are people who want to be the church - together in mission, aching for the Bridegroom - all 168 hours each week.


How about you? What has launched you in your search for a new church community?

Stage mom Mary?

Friends in liturgical churches are honoring Jesus' mother Mary (Miryam) today/tomorrow. Suffice it to say that the various traditions have a pretty wide range of opinion about the way she lived and died. I can gladly rest in the fact that this faithful Jewish teen said 'yes' to the Lord in ways that most of us can begin to comprehend.

Because I use a daily devotional put together by an Orthodox priest, some of this morning's readings focused on Mary, including this account where Jesus turned gallons and gallons of water into a beverage that even the wags at Wine Spectator magazine would have scored at at least a 95. It struck me as I read this account that most of us who've heard a sermon or two about Jesus' first public miracle hear about a very different Mary than the sweet, innocent teen girl we put in our manger scenes at Christmas.

I've heard Mary at the wedding presented depicted in far less respectful terms, usually with a painfully bad Borscht-belt imitation Yiddish-flavored shriek:

"Oy vey, Jesus! Their simcha* is going to be the laughingstock of Cana with their dry bar. What kind of a wedding has no wine for the guests? Why don't you fix it already, my number one Son? So why am I even asking, after all I've done for you? So you're going to fix it already?"

Really? How did the humble, obedient girl described here become the pushy stage mom thirty years later at this wedding?

Scripture tells us that in the miraculous days after Jesus' miraculous birth, Mary "treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart." (Luke 2:19) Did she gradually stop cherishing her miracle son and degenerate into the middle-aged harpie we like to imagine at the wedding?

I doubt it. She was there each step of the way, until the very last breath of his life - not a stage mom, but a follower, full of the same hunger and obedience that birthed her 'yes' the night her Son was conceived in her.

Strip the silly caricature from the story, and re-imagine the scene with a Mary who'd lived with this perfect Son, teaching him to walk and talk and eat. All the while, Mary was learning her Son, being taught by his purity, and perhaps, experiencing his ability to do a creative miracle or two in the privacy of their family circle.

What if her behavior at the wedding was simply the overflow of her no-longer-containable conviction that the kingdom of God was alive and among them? 

What if we read her words at the wedding as if they were accented with joy, not pushiness? 

*Simcha means joy, and is often used as a noun signifying a festive occasion.

Book review: The Devil in Pew Number Seven

A campaign of terror waged by a church member furious at the changes a new pastor has brought to his little corner of the world ends in violence.

The story would be unbelievable...

...unless you've ever been in church leadership. Then, except for perhaps the degree, you'd recognize all the stock characters of the grim drama in Rebecca Nicols Alonzo's compelling story, The Devil in Pew Number Seven (Tyndale, 2010)*. Veteran writer Bob DeMoss shaped the heartbreaking story leading to the violent death of her mother and the complete nervous breakdown of her father after a church member began a campaign to drive the young family out of town. When the usual church politics failed to work, this powerful man, Mr. Watts, escalated his game plan. Among other crimes, the church and the Nichols' family parsonage was bombed a total of ten times over a span of several years. Still, in the face of this obsessive behavior of Mr. Watts and a handful of his cronies in their small southern town, the church continued to grow. Though another man pulled the trigger, killing Nichols' mother, it seemed that Mr. Watts had created a spiritual environment around the family that allowed the violence to flourish.

Eventually both the shooter and Mr. Watts were tried and jailed. However, Pastor Nichols suffered a series of breakdowns as he was tormented by second-guessing his conviction that he needed to stand his ground in the face of Watts' demonic persecution. Nichols died in his mid-forties, leaving his two young children orphaned. A loving aunt finished raising Rebecca and her brother to adulthood.

The story isn't solely about the terror unleashed on this young family. Nichols emphasizes the power of forgiveness as the key to why she and her brother were able to survive and go on to serve God. "My need for God trumped my need to be mad at Him," she writes. In the end, her willingness to forgive was a key to Mr. Watts receiving Christ while he was in prison.

The Devil in Pew Number Seven left me with some questions that no one can answer. I found myself second-guessing the wisdom of the family staying in place somewhere around bomb number six or so. I wondered why the church would continue to allow the pastor and family to stay, even buying them a trailer outside of the town in a safe place in which they could sleep at night. And I was troubled by the fact that even the feds didn't seem to be able to put together enough evidence over the years to pin the crime on this small town thug of a man, until it was too late for Mrs. Nichols.

Of course, hindsight is 20/20, right? In the end, the example of Rebecca Nichols Alonzo and her brother being able to forgive is the real story here. Her story is of value for anyone who has been victimized by another person, and finds themselves imprisoned by the trauma of the past.

*I received a review copy of this book from the publisher. 

Not for sissies

Writing isn't for sissies.

I have been journeying with a friend as she's worked on her doctoral dissertation. A while ago, she'd asked me to do help her with some editing and offer some constructive criticism on her content. I reminded her that I do not possess even a bachelor's degree*, but that I'd be happy to look for misplaced modifiers and call her out on her use of passive voice in her sentence construction. It's been a lot of fun to watch her progress as a writer - and the subject of her dissertation has the potential to change the lives of many struggling elementary-school students.

Besides serving as a proofreader, I have occasionally been called on to rally her spirit. Though she'd written plenty of papers for her bachelor's and master's degrees, she's never done anything quite like the kind of writing she's now doing. She needs to have precise, well-crafted communication in order to create a compelling case for the kind of ground-breaking study she's planning. She has a team of experts who are evaluating her content in terms of what it will do to advance their professional field of study, and a couple of lay-readers (like me) who have been tasked to read her work to see if it makes sense to people like us.

She's expressed all the emotions of every serious writer's journey: inspiration, hopefulness, frustration, self-doubt, confusion, exhaustion, joy, sadness, courage.  Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

"How can you do this?" she asked me a few months ago after a particularly bumpy stretch of bad road. "I don't understand how you can keep writing."

When I hit a bumpy stretch of bad road (in the form of a form rejection or too much mindless internet surfing to distract myself from the fact that my ideas are coming as far apart as exit ramps on a North Dakota highway), I ask myself the same question.

And then I keep writing. Or surfing, as the case may be.

I've been writing for most of my adult life. I don't know how not to write. The sweetness of shaping a string of words into a sentence that moves a reader is simultaneously addictive and freeing. It is the way I connect to God - writing is at once prayer, confession, absolution and worship.

My friend is apprenticing into this life now. I know she thought she was getting her PhD., but she is learning the writers' vocation as well. Whether she continues after she completes her dissertation, I am certain she will never look at the printed...the written...word the same way again after this experience.



* * * * * * *
A nice note from my own writing odyssey: Last week, I received a hot-off-the-presses copy of Hope Journey, a book penned by the father-daughter team of Bob and Amyann Hartley. A young woman I once mentored now serves in Bob's ministry, and suggested I help with editing of their self-published project. Their book was a combination of memoir and Bob's teaching about how to bring the hope of God into every arena of life. They were a delight to work with, and as I held the finished product in my hands, I believe they have been changed and stretched by going through this process.

Writing isn't for sissies, indeed! Congratulations to their team!



*There was talk about me completing my degree when I first got a full-time position at Trinity two years ago, but I left the job before anyone there got serious about making me actually take any classes.

Unsoiled hands

I'm looking forward to speaking at a local congregation this weekend about the parable of the unmerciful servant, found here. I had an opportunity to re-read the chapter I wrote in my first book, Parablelife, meditating on this story both in its original time and place and in the here and now. 

Sometimes allowing my imagination to ponder Jesus' now-familiar words back in the time when they were first spoken jolts me afresh into realizing how very radical Jesus' words really are. Here's my riff on the this story about forgiveness...  

I wonder if Eliud sat looking at his hands in the fading light his first night in prison. His hands were the unsoiled, smooth hands of someone who’d spent his life negotiating deals and pushing paperwork, not doing manual labor.

Eliud’s hands had perhaps offered the Near East equivalent of a handshake on the agreement he’d struck with the king some time earlier. He’d borrowed enough money from the king to fund his latest building project – constructing the ancient equivalent of Trump Tower in downtown Jerusalem. “Yeah, king…I’ll even name the building after you,” he gushed. “This is the investment of a lifetime. Once we’re open for business, I’ll be able to repay you easily. The money will roll in the front doors. It’s a sure thing.”

The king, who’d heard a sales pitch or two in his life, examined Eliud’s track record. He was a sharp businessman with a decent credit history. But this project was ten times the size of anything he or anyone else in the kingdom had ever done before. The king asked him what sort of collateral he was willing to offer.

“I’d bet my life, my family, all that I have. It’s a sure thing, I tell you.”

Eliud’s rock-solid certainty began to dissolve into rubble as one problem, then another plagued the project from the start. He had troubles with suppliers. There were weather delays. A couple of the guys had accidents at the building site. He played one set of subcontractors off of another, loaning money to some of them in order to keep them on the job. He bounced checks to others. The whole project had turned into mountain of loose ends until finally all work on the structure had ground to a halt.

The half-finished building hadn’t been touched for over a year. The failure was more than he could face - he’d lost his “sure thing” gamble. And Eliud was unable to see himself as a loser. He hadn’t gotten to where he was in life by thinking of himself as anything other than a shrewd businessman. He was convinced that the project’s failure was everyone else’s fault.

He was almost able to forget about the truth – that he’d borrowed a boatload of money from the king – and he was the one responsible for repayment. He busied himself with the rest of his life, taking his wife out to dinner, going to his children’s soccer games and ballet recitals.

Until the day he got the summons to appear before the king asking for repayment of the loan.

His route to see the king that day took him past the half-finished hulk of a building. He’d carefully avoided it for months, but that day, he forced himself to go look at it. He found himself wishing that the building had magically constructed itself and this was all a bad dream. Nope. It was as unfinished as it had been the last time he’d been at the site. Excuses circled in his head like vultures as he walked toward the king’s home.

The king smiled as he greeted him. Unbeknownst to him, the king had given him some extra time on the loan, injecting a dose of mercy into the process. The king had occasionally visited the building site, and genuinely hoped that the man would be able to get the project moving again.

But the king couldn’t wait forever. He knew that one day, maybe not so far in the future, the responsibility of running the kingdom would be handed down to his beloved son. The king wanted to make sure that all was in order before that time came. And this loan was a huge piece of unfinished business on the books.

The king extended his hand to the man. Eliud’s looked at him and threw himself onto the ground, prostrating himself, his unsoiled, smooth businessman’s hands extended toward the king, begging for just a little more time. He was painfully aware of what he’d bartered for this loan. He and his family were going to spend the rest of their lives in slavery working off the debt if he couldn’t figure out a way to repay it. He pleaded for more time, excuses spilling from his lips in a blizzard of words.

But when he looked up at the king, he could see that the king had already made his mind up about what his punishment was going to be. He said quietly, “I’m going wipe the debt off the records. It’s gone as of this moment.”


Eliud departed from the king’s home that day certain of only one thing – that he was indeed innocent of any wrongdoing in the whole affair. His hands were clean.

Later that day, he ran into one of his subcontractors to whom he’d loaned a C-note a few months earlier. The sub…the low-life!...hadn’t repaid the loan. Revenge-tinged rage rose up in Eliud, geyser-like, from an angry place inside of him that was like an uncapped well. He grabbed the subcontractor around the neck and screaming, “Where’s my money? Where is it?” Though the sub was a big, burly guy, he was no match for Eliud’s rage. He threw the sub on the ground, screaming at him and choking him with those unsoiled, smooth hands of his until the sub’s lips were lilac and his eyes bulged. Bile spent, Eliud summoned a cop and had his subcontractor arrested for robbery.

Then he went home and threw his family a party. He was off the hook for the building debt!

It didn’t take but a few hours for the word of the scene in the street and the subcontractor’s arrest to reach the king. The cops came right in the middle of the family party going on at Eliud’s home and dragged the lot of them before the king.

Eliud had crumpled up mercy like it was a wad of filthy paper towels, tossing it aside with those unsoiled, smooth hands of his. He’d never really believed he needed it. His loan shark treatment of the subcontractor told the king that what this man really valued was justice. The king told Eliud angrily, “You want justice instead of mercy? It’s yours, starting now.”

Sitting in a prison cell that night, Eliud sat staring at his unsoiled, smooth hands. Those beautiful hands were about to become the rough, dirty hands of a slave…after his will had been broken by the jailers given the job of torturing him into submission.

* * * * * * *
Before Jesus told this story, He’d been talking with His disciples about the best way to handle things when someone sinned against another person. He gave them a way to confront hurt that both addressed the hurt and offered protection to each party in a dispute (Matthew 18:15-20). The thing He didn’t give them was a promise that if they followed these steps, it was a guaranteed happy ending.

Jesus’ friend Peter heard that omission loud and clear. So he asked Jesus the question, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?”

Jesus’ famous seventy times seven response isn’t a math problem, it’s an answer. He tells each of us that metering out “forgiveness” by the numbers isn’t forgiveness at all. In God’s upside down accounting system, Jesus tells us that we stop the free flow of mercy into our lives when we insist on trying to exact repayment from the one who has taken something from us unfairly.

This flow of mercy is the true happy ending, not the temporary rush that comes with repayment extracted from another by revenge.

Why not take a few moments to put yourself in the story today - as the king, as Eliud, and as his late-to-pay subcontractor?

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall

I was working on a devotional piece for the Caspari Center newsletter this morning. I looked at a couple of the previous ones I'd written for them, and thought I'd share one of them here in this space today. One of the quiet ministries Caspari does in Israel is facilitating some gatherings where Jewish and Arab followers of Christ can come together, outside of the physical, spiritual and cultural dividing walls that separate them.

I wrote the piece below with that setting in mind, but it is definitely applicable here in the U.S. as well. We do love the comfort of our dividing walls, don't we? But those artificial walls come at a high cost, and in the end, they will not stand.

*****

Come Together

“You won our first-ever playwriting contest!”

I’d entered a script to a competition held by a local junior college. I listened to the theater professor on the other end of the phone explain that my winning script was going to undergo a metamorphosis over the next couple of months. I would be invited to campus to help cast the play. The actors would read the script to an audience of students, who would then be invited to provide feedback. I would then have a couple of weeks to revise the script. After another reading and revision, the actors would perform the play for the public.

“We’ll make sure to do lots of advertising so we pack the house for those final performances,” she said. 

I felt a little queasy when I hung up the phone. I didn’t fully realize all that would be required of me when I entered the contest. How would I ever be able to take the bare bones of the script I’d submitted and have it ready it for a public production?

But what I experienced during the process both shaped my life as a writer and, more importantly, painted an unforgettable image onto my soul of what it looks like when a group is deeply committed to working together toward a common goal. Every single person involved in the production seemed to take ownership of our mission to bring the play’s joyous message to the community. I watched in awe as this rag-tag group of community college thespians and staffers went the second, then the third mile to bring those in-process pages to the stage.

By the time the final curtain fell, I no longer thought of Fairy Tale Academy as “my” script. After an intensely collaborative effort, it had become “our” play.

This experience shaped my thinking about what it can look like when believers come together to serve Christ. If there is an urgent call to a mission larger than our own individual agendas and each person’s gifts are desperately needed in order to complete the mission, our differences become beautiful strengths. His body becomes far more than the sum of its composite parts.

Paul underscores this truth in his letter to his friends at Corinth:

^“The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I don't need you!’ And the head cannot say to the feet, ‘I don't need you!’ On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” (1 Cor. 12:21-27 NIV)

If we are our Messiah’s body, disconnecting from one another is not an option. Nor is creating carefully-crafted truces in order to figure out how to coexist.

The interdependence Paul describes is animated by our response to the Father’s love for each one of us. The fact that Paul had to address the issue demonstrates that it doesn’t come naturally to any of us. Our life together is supernatural, transforming the rag-tag lot of us into a tangible expression of His character. Each person’s gifts are desperately needed by the others, every role must be filled. Our mission is far bigger and more eternal than simply creating a performance. We are invited to follow our Savior into the world.

Together.  

*****

Have you ever experienced a setting when the mission at hand is bigger than the artificial dividing walls that keep people from coming together?  

De-plaquing Mark 9:35

There are times when some of the more well-known things that Jesus said become plaques. The words get torn from their context, decoupaged to a piece of plywood, and hammered onto a wall.

I've done it. Maybe you have, too. 

This morning, some study time in the Word forced me to yank the plaque off the wall.

The oh-so-familiar verse? 

Mark 9:35 -"If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all."

Though it's pretty obvious that Jesus speaks these words to his disciples when none of them will answer his question about why they'd been bickering on as they traveled to Capernaum earlier that day, I'd never noticed what may have led to the dispute about who was greatest among them. It's easy to imagine these young men reverting to playground tactics as they bickered: 

   "I am more important than you are!" 

   "No way, dude!"

   "Yes, way!"

   "Shut up!"

                              *shove*   *push*   *jostle*

But today it hit me that the context for this mature, unselfish debate on the part of the disciples came in the wake of their very public failure to be able to do what Jesus had empowered them to do (You can read the account here.)

What I do when I've experienced a little humiliation? I try to jack up my ego as quickly as I can, even if it means I have to put my ego jack on someone else's back. The disciples' debate - and Jesus' silencing words - turned that plaque into a mirror rimmed in grace this morning.

Jesus' balm for the disciples' wounded egos? Drop the jack. Go lower still. 

Just like he did. 

300!

I've been blogging since 2006, which I estimate is equivalent to at least a half a century in Internet Years. A lot has changed in my life during that time (address, job, church, family, car, pet), but every time I drive down Route 41, I remember that there are some things that never change - The Full Moon Restaurant, open for business twenty-four hours a day.


In honor of my 300th post on this blog, here's a repost of an entry I wrote way back at the start of theparablelife about one of my favorite greasy spoons.

I met a friend this morning at one of the truly fine dining establishments in the Chicago area - the Full Moon restaurant, conveniently located on a desolate stretch of Hwy. 41 between the sprawl of Abbott Labs and Great Lakes Naval Training Center. They feature a concoction I've never seen on a menu anywhere else - the Carbetsi omelet. I think "Carbetsi" is a Greek word for "wipe everything on the greasy counter into the pan".

Besides the Carbetsi, this dining establishment had something I haven't seen for years: a cigarette vending machine. Maybe I don't hang out in enough divey places. I dunno. Seeing that machine jammed into a corner near the washrooms was like a 3-D flashback to a time when cigarette machines were everywhere. My dad, a 2 pack-a-day Parliament man, sometimes bought his smokes from a vending machine. And when I was first toying with adult behaviors as a 13 year-old, the tired Holiday Inn on the other side of the fence just behind my house had a vending machine. I could walk over there and buy (really stale) Marlboros any time I wanted.

The world quietly moved on from the days when gas stations, bowling alleys and restaurants way nicer than The Full Moon had tobacco vend-o-matics. And though Jesus spared me the anguish of a lifelong nicotine addiction, seeing that vending machine today was like a flashback to the ordinary moments of my childhood: my dad sitting at the table, telling stories about his day's adventures in insurance adjusting. He'd flick his lighter open like he had about a bazillion times in his life, putting blue flame to the end of a cig. While he talked, my mom would be pulling the electric broom out of the closet so she could vacuum the avocado carpeting in our kitchen. (Yes, we had carpeting in our kitchen. Eeew.) My sister was usually parked in the den, watching "Speed Racer".

Just like that - launched into the past by a Carbetsi and a cigarette time machine. 

 

Do you have a joint like The Full Moon in your town?