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My heart beats for love. I want to be different. I want to be who I am called to be. WORTHY and LOVED!

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Disciples Love - Matt 22: 34-46

Jesus is in the midst of being diss-ed in this passage. In a heated theological debate with the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the main two groups of religious leaders during this period, Jesus has already been asked the question about taxation and is now being grilled about what the greatest of all of the 613 commandments found in the Hebrew Scriptures is the most important. All of these questions are for one purpose – to discredit Jesus’ teaching and growing status in the Jewish community.

But the attempts failed. For all they really proved was that Jesus was a devout, orthodox Jew. This public trial was an act of desperation that backfired. For Jesus’ vast and intimate knowledge of the scriptures was nothing short of moving. When asked what the greatest commandment was, Jesus quoted two laws. One came from the Schema, also known as the Schema Israel, the crux of what the Israelites believe. It was, and still is, recited two times a day, as the centerpiece of morning and evening prayer, “Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the lord is one. And you shall love the lord your God, with all of your heart, and with all of your soul, and with all of your strength.

But Jesus didn’t stop there. He adds a second piece of scripture, “You shall love your neighbor, as yourself.” Or as one of my professors translated this verse, “you shall love your neighbor who is like you.” While others, including some religious leaders used this law to limit whom they interacted with and showed love towards, Jesus blew this law wide open, saying that we are to love all. Even our enemies. That everyone is like us, even those whom we think are radically different. For they are God’s.

These were the critical commandments in the Hebrew Scriptures, but they are also the driving force behind Jesus’ life and ministry. This is why all of the other laws exist, to give us perimeters to better love God and love our neighbor. For we cannot love God without loving God’s children, and we cannot love God’s children, without realizing that they are first and foremost, God’s.

Of course Jesus’ knowledge and application of scripture didn’t silence his critics, as they went on to ask him about David’s linage and relationship to the Messiah. But this is true of our own critics even today, isn’t it? That when someone is seeking to trip you up, they will keep asking difficult, or seemingly impossible, questions not for the sake of wanting a genuine answer, but to see you fail. What Jesus is being faced with is different then apologetics, different from making a case about what he believes; he knows that those questioning him are trying to set a trap, not only for him, but also for each other. The Pharisee asking Jesus which law is the greatest was trying to outwit Jesus, while simultaneously showing that he was smarter then those who are overhearing the question and answer, mainly the Sadducees.

This was antithetical to what Jesus had been teaching about loving God and loving your neighbor. It was not so much about what you knew or how well you knew it, but living a life that was marked by love towards others and God. This passage comes within a week’s time frame when Jesus would choose to love others to the point of giving his life on the cross, and yet those whom he interacted with still didn’t get it. But Jesus was able to take this moment of one-up-manship and insincere questions and transform it into a moment of grace and critical teaching. He was able to remind those questioning him about the nature of what love is – even to the point of answering cynical questions.

But this still leaves us with two questions – what does it look like to love God with the totality of your being, and what does it look like to love our neighbors. For while we can hypothesize about what these two commandments mean, perhaps even more important for us as disciples is what they look like in action. Two of the most disturbing comments I’ve heard about American Christians over the past few years were 1.) Christians do not know what they believe which results in 2.) Christians not being able to put their beliefs into action.

If we too take these two commandments to not only be the greatest commandments upon which Jesus commissions us, but also the marks of our faith, then what does it look like to live them out in a way that others can recognize and use to identify us as Christians. This is not to say that we should not be able to tell others in an intelligible way what we believe, but we should be able to live it out in a way that does not need a lengthy explanation.

Because God is so vast and mysterious, our human nature wants to qualify God into our own terms. As a result we try to identify with God based on certain relationships that we have or understand – God as parent, God as ruler, God as creator, the list goes on and on. One of the common bumper sticker slogans is that God is love. But how do we show love to love? Throughout history, Christians from mystics, to scholars, and even modern day worship signers have explained loving God with erotic terms – but do we really know this vast and sometimes elusive God with the same intimacy that we know a human lover with? And further, can we love God with more passion then erotic love? How do we love God?

Recently in Bible Study we looked at trusting God through three different books, one of which was The Five Love Languages of God. The author, Gary Chapman, poses the following thought – that God is big enough to love each of us in different ways and God is diverse enough to receive the love we extend to the Holy in our own unique ways. What a simple yet radical thought – the love that we show to God does not need to look the same for each of us because God created us to be different. Some of us speak of God’s goodness and give praise unto God, some sing, others dance. Still others bring all of their gifts to God in dedication or spend quality time with God in prayer and devotion. Part of knowing how we as individuals can best love God is to identify how we experience God’s love to us best. When do you feel that God is closest to you and how can you use that experience to show reciprocate love to God?

Because God has created each of us, we belong to God, regardless of whether we recognize that or not. So how do we love our neighbor, especially when by this definition everyone we meet and even those we don’t meet are our neighbors. Does it mean doing good things for others? Acts of charity or justice? More and more I have been convicted that loving our neighbor means paying attention to them. How often do we walk down the street and ignore people, or ask people how they are, only to really wish for a senescent answer? What if loving our neighbor means giving them the attention they deserve simply because they are a child of God? And after we pay attention to them, and are in relationship with them, then we can ask them the more intimate question of what they need and how we can best love them. For just as God is diverse enough to be loved in different ways, so are people. But because people are more then one united being, they often cannot receive all of the different types of love we show them equally, as God does, even if they come from an authentic place. This is to say, how we best love people is not necessarily what they need or how they interpret or receive love best. But everyone wants to be respected enough to not be ignored or pushed aside, so this can be a common starting place.

Jesus did not say that the commands that he lived by were easy to follow, but as his disciples we have picked up his yoke and carry it. And part of carrying that yoke is knowing what Jesus taught but also knowing ourselves well enough o be able to identify how we can best live out these teachings – how do we best love God and love our neighbor. These are not questions with easy answers, for they require time of deep introspection. But when we can live out of our most authentic understanding of these verses for ourselves, we will be people who put our beliefs into actions in meaningful ways.

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Disciples Rejoice! Phil 4: 1-9

Humans have forgotten how to rejoice. We have become so caught up in our own expectations of what something is supposed to be like that we block our ability to celebrate those times that truly need to be marked. We manufacture holidays to give us an opportunity to try to celebrate, but even in those times we see rejoicing as a task to be accomplished instead of an opportunity to embrace. In our business we set aside time to rejoice instead of letting it spontaneously bubble up within us as a response. We become jealous of when others rejoice without us. It has reached the point, where as a society we are better at fighting then rejoicing.

As Christians we are even more guilty of not rejoicing in all circumstances. Some see corporate gatherings, a time to come together and rejoice in the Risen Christ, as just another thing to do, a hurdle to get through before Sunday can really start. As a community we really only focus on rejoicing over Jesus’ birth and Christ’s resurrection, two occasions, two weeks out of the fifty two in a year. If someone came into our gathering today, would they see us as a people who rejoice or even a people that have something to rejoice about?

I think people’s hesitancy towards rejoicing comes from confusion between joy and happiness. You can rejoice whether you have joy or happiness, but one is temporary. Happiness is simply a fleeting emotion, like any other. But joy, well that is something that comes from deep within our being, no matter what the circumstances. We seek out happiness; joy is something that is given to us as a gift. Yet all too often, when our expectation is that something will make us happy, and then it doesn’t, we do not rejoice in the joy we can still experience from the situation or circumstances.

We all face this confusion between joy and happiness from time to time, and my guess is that there have been times when you have not rejoiced when it was warranted as well. And for times like those, Paul has something to teach us from today’s scripture lesson.

Paul is entering a time of great reflection in his life – he is facing his impending death. As he examines his life and pens this letter for the church in Philip, his favorite gathering of people whom he has ministered to. He urges the community to come alongside two women in conflict to help them remember their struggles for the work of the gospel. Paul is not seemingly upset with the women for their disagreement or any tension that it may have caused in the community; he simply names it and asks that the community support them.

Perhaps Paul has had a change in heart and tone since his earlier years in places of ministry much as Corinth, where he took a much harsher stance with a church that had feuds within it, or maybe Paul just reassessed what was important in this, his potentially last message to this church. As he nears the end of his own metaphorical race for the Gospel, Paul tells his brothers and sisters in Philip that they are his joy and his crown, the ones whom he loves and longs for.

Paul and his audience would have been very accustomed with crowns – as they were often the sign of victory for Roman athletic events. As early as the 5th century BCE, crowns were placed on the heads of those who won to show elevated status or honor. But the victor is not the only one who is credited with the victory. No athlete was celebrating apart from their city, knowing that there are many behind an athlete that make both completion and winning a possibility. When an athlete achieved the honor of a crown, it was handed to him by the king or the priest of the area where the event took place, who wore it during the competition, which upheld the honor even more.

Paul considers this group of people to be his crown from God, a visible sign accepted on behalf of the people and all who came before him who made his witness to the gospel possible. In Paul’s passing, he wants the people to continue striving for the crown of God, by coming together as a community, inspire of how others may view or treat them. The mission is difficult, but the glory for the entire do comes from God, in whom all things are possible.

Paul goes on to tell the people to rejoice in the Lord, always! Do not worry about anything along the journey, but turn everything over to God in prayer, both asking God for what they need and bringing their praises of thanksgiving before the throne of grace. If they do become discouraged, Paul urges those gathered in Philippi to concentrate on the things that come from Christ – those things which are honorable, pure, true, pleasing, commendable, and excellent. Those things that are worthy of praise. For when focused on these things who can help but live in Jesus and rejoice, no matter what the circumstances? And if you should become discouraged as an individual, the rest of your community is there to support you, and help you strive after your communal mission, for the work for the kingdom of God is at hand.

Brothers and sisters, times will come when we get weary. When we will become drained by the heaviness of the world and seem unable to rejoice, because those around us have not taught us how. But that is the task of the church! To teach others how to rejoice! What a beautiful mission! We have good news that should change people’s lives – we have the mission of Jesus Christ who changed the world! We worship a Lord who is not just to be rejoiced in during Christmas and Easter but throughout the entire year, and in the seemingly mundane. Each day is a gift to us, a chance to experience and live out Christ’s resurrection in our own lives – and I can think of nothing more worthy of being rejoiced in then this truth.

This is not to say that there will not be times when we need to lament, but brothers and sisters I tell you that there can still be joy in the midst of lamenting, even when we are deeply grieved or saddened, for Christ never leaves or forsakes us. We should also not become discouraged if we cannot rejoice in all circumstances, because that is truly a mark of maturing in the faith, a mark that we may never reach in this lifetime. But that is why we gather together each Sunday, to ask each other, is it well with your soul? How can I be praying for you? How can we rejoice together?

If we truly believe that our faith means something, that God is near, the Spirit is moving, and Christ is the Risen Lord, then we should be people whose lives radiate something to those around us. For joy is incomplete unless it is shared with others. And our rejoicing, dear friends, and our joy is subversive but necessary and beautiful to a culture with so much pain and hostility. We live to show others that we are not put on this earth to strive for happiness or those things that we think will make us happy; even those of us who rejoice know that we are not the source of our own joy. The God who is alive and is at work in our lives and the lives of those around us, for the kingdom of God is one of celebration.

We live in a culture that is struggling and is moaning for the rebirth that comes in the freedom of rejoicing. This past week we have heard the cries across the nation with the Overtake Wall Street movements. These were not the first protests of their kind, nor will they probably be the last, but they reminded me of a story of how a small community took something that causes pain and anxiety, and used it to rejoice in God and spread joy. A group of Christians in Philadelphia, called the Simple Way, were awarded $10,000 a few years ago in a lawsuit against police for misconduct. Shortly after this settlement was passed they were given another $10,000 as an anonymous gift. The group came together and prayed about how to use this money in a culture where money controls so many, to rejoice in God. They changed the money into bills and coins and headed to Wall Street. At 8:20am one morning, during the peak of rush hour, the group assembled and declared that as a nation we were a community of struggle, who needed each other and God to heal our brokenness. They went on to declare another world was possible, another world has already come to be and it is here. And coins and bills were thrown across the streets around Wall Street. Bubbles were blown and sidewalk chalk was used to create murals.

And do you know what happened? The rejoicing that a few started was caught by many, for joy is contagious. People started bringing food for each other. Started to share their winter clothing We may think that this was crazy, but often rejoicing will be viewed by those around us as crazy. It is not the norm. But it is what we are called to as ones who have been given such a gift.

So may we rejoice together. May we uphold each other. May our gatherings be ones of celebration in the Risen Lord, who is here amongst us! And may we creatively rejoice in this truth in our neighborhoods and workplaces, where we shop and where we eat, where we play and where we relax, so that those around us will catch a glimpse of the contagious joy of Christ. For we rejoice always, not because of ourselves, but because of the One who has given us every reason to celebrate, every day.

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Lost

I spent several hours this weekend being lost, or perhaps in the words of c.s.lewis via Brooke Fraser "just less found". I went on the hunt for a dairy queen today in order to satisfy a craving and avoid a traffic jam, going about an hour out of my way only to find that the dairy queen had shut down in that particular area. Actual, so much in that particular area were closed, just like areas that I have seen time after time the past few weeks that are devastated. They are the areas you have to leave the beaten path to see, but hold the lives of so many people.
I also got lost in the city this week, on the way to a show. Which gave me a chance to hear so many interesting stories. Stories of destruction, stories of protest, stories of privilege that is blind to itself and others. Then I went to a play that was all about stories - stories of women through different phases of life's journey. And I started to think about how there is a difference between being a person of privilege and being privileged as a person (more on this on a different day in a different post)
I would miss so much in life if I wouldn't have been lost, if I wouldn't allow myself to get lost. What do you miss when you just go from point A to B and miss all of life's lessons along the way?


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Family

This past week I've been thinking a lot about family - both biological and the family that transcends biological bonds. Drew had been that type of family for me. And our family had had a rough year - classmates passing, trusted elders retiring and moving, classmates having accidents, marriages, babies being born, babies being born too early, babies not being born. We've been through so much together that we have to be family just to survive. We love each other through good times and bad and uphold each other in every possible way. May the bonds of this family never break.


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Sunday, October 2, 2011

Commands for the Disciples - Exodus 20: 1-4, 7-9

I like rules. A lot. I actually find them to be freeing. When I know the perimeters that I can work in, then I feel that my creativity can soar. It is for me, as one of my professors in seminary wrote on her syllabus, “If it is not expressly prohibited, consider it to be a possibility.

I truly believe that the God we worship is one of both, order and creativity, both of which are expressed in the commandments that we find before us in today’s scripture lesson. God crafted commands, which he handed down to Moses, as a response to God’s saving act and resulting covenant.

Often we may find ourselves asking why we need rules in life. As children we may try to test our boundaries or resist authority over us, by bucking the rules. But our parents have set the rules in place to help us grow into our greatest potential. They created boundaries out of the response of loving us enough to want us to thrive. Thus the rules. Even if we do not realize the purpose or intent behind them as such, at the time.

Like, children we can sometimes push back against God’s commands, sometimes as going far as deliberately breaking them. It is as if something inside of us tempts us to test God – as if we need to make sure that God’s grace and love will be extended to us, even if we do not follow God’s commands. Brothers and sisters, I am here to tell you today that God’s grace can wash away any of our stumbling and sins, but above all God has given us commandments not because God could, or as a way for God to exert power over us, but because they are for our best interest. They are crafted to help us be the best disciples that we can be.

Like the Israelites, God has brought us out of the house of salivary as well. We may not have been oppressed by the Egyptians, but we were salves to sin and evil. So God sent Jesus Christ, fully divine and yet fully human, this great mystery of a person, to do something even more mysterious to us today – Jesus choose to love us to the point where he handed himself over to death on a cross, so we could be freed. And so, God has delivered us through the grace and power of Jesus the Christ. If the Israelites were given these rules because God loved them enough to save them and give them commands to help them fully grasp their choosiness, then how much more should we yearn to follow God’s commands because of God’s love that came to us in the form of Jesus, so that we could be called God’s beloved ones.

What I find moving about the commands that we are looking at today is that they are all about our relationship with God. Because if we do not have our relationship with God right then we won’t be able to be the best neighbor that we can be either. So God gives these commands to help shape those who follow the Holy One so they can be witnesses for what God has done in their lives. So the God that delivers, starts by giving the following commands to the Israelites, and to us as modern day disciples:

You shall have no other God’s before me: This first commandment and all that follow, do not stand as simply good advice, friends, they emerge from the history of a saving God. And yet, even though God has saved us time and time again, we often look to other gods, other things, to place our trust and hope in. God’s first command is a reminder to us to be loyal to the only God worth having allegiance to.

Whose are we? The easy answer to give is God’s, but as disciples do we live in such a way that reflects this statement. Or does it look like we worship the gods of status, power, money, and security. Do we put our trust in other people, presidents, nations, or kingdoms, or do we look to the God who has delivered us? When times get hard, who or what is the first thing that you turn to. God’ s first command today and every day is not rooted in unfairness or God’s assertion of power. No. This command exists to help us get it straight – through good times and bad – that we are God’s and nothing else should come before this, or block us from exuding this truth to others by the way we live each day.

You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or one he earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. If we are truly loyal to our God who saves, then we should not be crafting other things that lead us to worship or give glory to another. This can be so hard today, brothers and sisters, in a culture that cries out for us to be narcissistic – we see people around us making themselves into idols – who we can be seduced into worshiping before we even realize what we are doing. When we make something or someone into an idol, we forget that they are God’s too – that God calls them beloved. Instead, we think of them as self-sufficient and worthy to be followed or modeled, when this is not the case.

You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name. For the people of Israel, God’s name was to be revered. It was so holy that it was not even written or spoken in its most Holy form. If people began to call on the name of the Lord in improper way, or did not show God reverence, then they were not being witnesses to what God has done in their lives, or the blessings of God extended to humanity. If they did not respect the name of the God who has done so much for them, then they were showing their neighbors that their God did not need to be taken seriously, even if this was not their intent. I do not think any of us set out trying to disrespect the name of God; we have simply forgotten how much God is to be revered, which can lead us to not showing God the respect due.

Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but on the seventh day give your Sabbath to the Lord. Friends, I have attended several trainings and meeting over the past two weeks where I have been convicted time and time again by this commandment. This is the only commandment of the ten that we brag about breaking. I’m sure you know colleagues who brag about how much they work, or perhaps bemoan how much they extend themselves to the cause of their work, never taking a break. But Sabbath is God’s gift to us, given because we cannot constantly work. When we do so, we find ourselves forgetting that we are beloved – thinking that we need to prove ourselves or earn God’s love. We start to replace God with worship of work. Therefore, we must take one day to worship God.

Further, this worship of God is not simply an hour or two on the Sabbath, rushed through in order to get to our “rest”. Our worship of God should bring us true rest, peace, because we know that we are in the presence of the Risen Lord! Sabbath is not the same as a day off, or a time to do the errands that we did not get to the rest of the week. Sabbath is for us and God alone. When we cease from our work and just be, we are reminded that the world goes on without our toil.

What an amazing gift to the Israelites, who were slaves without ceasing. And what an amazing gifts for us as disciples in such a fast paced world. How we worship God the rest of the day each Sabbath may look different for each of us as we leave this place, but it is a reminder to put God is God’s due place – as master of the universe.

Brothers and sisters, commands are not just meant to be followed. They are meant to be revered so we can see them in all of their goodness and beauty. They are to be embraced so we can live our lives with a true freedom that comes from knowing our perimeters. And they are to be examined, so we can see how we are doing as disciples. Are we living into these commands in their fullest? Are there ones that we struggle with more then others? Why? How can these commands help us be the best witnesses to God’s grace, mercy, love, and salvation that we can be? May these questions and others stay with us this week, as we seek to grow closer to the God who created, redeemed, and sustains us. Amen.