Rest Stop Revelations--August 12, 2024

Rest Stop Revelations--August 12, 2024

"But Elijah himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: ‘It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.’ Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, ‘Get up and eat.’ He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, ‘Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.’ He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food for forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God." [1 Kings 19:4-8]

When you are on a quest to find God face to face, God is already there on the journey. In fact, God is often the One behind the scenes making it possible for you to keep going on your way to see God, nourishing you so you can keep going.

The issue, it would seem, then, is not how we get to some particular location on the map in order to get where God is... but rather the question is whether our eyes will recognize the God who is present there already on the journey, even being revealed to us at the rest stops along the way.

This is one of the things I find so comforting--and also challenging--about these stories from Elijah's life. This is one of those scenes after Elijah has had a big confrontation with the king and queen and all their official administration-endorsed religious-spokespersons (they are usually called "the 400 prophets of Ba'al), who were all employed by the palace as Spiritual Advisors for King Ahab and Queen Jezebel to show off how publicly sympathetic to religion they were.  After getting himself into big trouble by exposing those official court prophets as frauds who were just there to prop up public support for the king and queen, Elijah became a fugitive. The royal family was furious at him, and they made Elijah into Public Enemy Number One (of course they did--the emperor always despises the one who is brave enough to say he's not wearing any clothes). So Elijah runs... and runs... and runs... to go find God.

That's an important detail in the story. Elijah isn't just running "away," but he is looking for a face-to-face conversation with God. He needs someone to comfort him, to defend him, to explain to him why he's running for his life after having been the good guy speaking up for the one true God against the powers of the day. So he heads due south, until he can get to Mount Horeb--the other name for the mountain sometimes called "Sinai" in the Bible, the same mountain where Moses had met God face to face and been given the commandments. Elijah feels like he's all alone in the world--he says a bit later in the story that he thinks he's the only one left who is faithful to God and hasn't sold out to the king for a cushy position endorsing the government and the government's gods. So Elijah goes to the place he figured you could go if you wanted to meet God. He goes to Mount Horeb hoping for his own one-on-one conference with God.

But here's the thing: God is already with him on the journey. And God not only sees his desperation, but helps him along the way. God sends angels to feed him, messengers to speak to him, and directions to get him to the end of his journey. Could God have just spoken to him right there in the wilderness on the way, instead of waiting for Elijah to make it to the mountain? Of course. The living God isn't tethered to shrines or steeples, and you don't have to go to the right mountain or hillside or valley to meet God. Everywhere is a "thin place," for the God of the Scriptures--you don't have to go find a certain spot where the boundary between heaven and earth is a little easier to breach. That's just not how it works.  But when we are convinced we have to go Somewhere Else to meet God, God just might show up at the rest stop along the highway to feed us so we make it to our destination.

It's Elijah who has the need to meet God in a certain spot. It's Elijah who has some expectation that he has to go to "the mountain of God" to hear from the divine. It's Elijah who isn't ready to hear what God will have to say. God goes with Elijah--sending angels all along the way--but God knows Elijah isn't ready to talk yet. So God just walks along the way with Elijah on the journey, making sure he gets to the place Elijah thinks he needs to go, and feeding him with divinely-appointed picnic to refresh him.

But it was never God who needed the conversation to happen on a particular mountaintop. It was Elijah.

That's us, too, of course. So often, we have these expectations of when or where we'll have "access" to God, when in reality, God's already been with us all the journey long so far. We assume that we'll have time for God later--you know, "once the kids' fall sports are over." Or we figure we can best communicate with God "in the quiet of a nature walk," or "once I get to church on Sunday," or "when the house is tidy and everything else is quiet." Or we say, "I'm feeling really stressed right now, but once I get all the things I'm worrying over resolved, then I'll be able to reconnect with God and make some time to work on my faith." And indeed, it may feel like any of those distractions keep us from connecting with God--but that's not because God isn't right there in the midst of the mess with us now. It's because we, like Elijah, have told ourselves we can't connect with God here--we have to wait until we get "there," wherever "there" might be.

That's our hang-up, not God's. But the thing about the God we see in this story is that God is willing to both go with us silently, even invisibly, on the journey now, and also to make sure we get to that spot in the future where we are finally ready for reconnecting with God. We may think it's only once the kids' schedule calms down, or once your social life is in order, or once you get past the third-quarter earnings report, that you can get back in touch with God... but God is there sending angels and bread along the way to make sure our souls don't starve in the mean time.

That might just mean that you and I can glimpse the presence of Christ with us today--even if all the other "stuff" of life isn't resolved yet, or still feels like a mess, or has lots of loose ends--if we will simply dare to open our eyes and ask honestly how we've been getting by so far. Where have there been messengers from God sent our way already--even if, at the time, maybe we didn't recognize the people who showed up in our lives as people God had put there? Where have we been given just the thing we needed to get along for a little while, to keep us going for a season until we reached a clearing and we could speak with God again? Where have we been helped along the way without seeing it in the moment--and might we recognize that today, even if we feel like we are in the middle of a crisis, or alone and brokenhearted like Elijah, or busy with a million things on the to-do list, or just unsure of what to do next, even in the midst of all that, the living God is there among us right now, and right here?

And even if we still feel we need to get to some future space or time where, like Mount Horeb, we can see God more clearly, maybe we'll spot Christ with us on the way too.

It was never God who needed to wait for an appointment at a special time and place. It was Elijah. But we can open our eyes to see Christ's presence among us right now, like a flash of light out of the corner of your eye.

Lord Jesus in the midst of our messes, let us glimpse your presence and know you are with us, making us able to keep going on the journey.

Ready for the Party--August 9, 2024

Ready for the Party--August 9, 2024

"On this mountain the LORD of hosts
     will make for all peoples
a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines,
     of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.
And he will destroy on this mountain
     the shroud that is cast over all peoples,
     the sheet that is spread over all nations;
     he will swallow up death forever.
Then the Lord GOD will wipe away
     the tears from all faces,
     and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth,
     for the LORD has spoken." [Isaiah 25:6-8]

Spoiler alert here, friends--this is where the story of the universe is headed: a big ol' dinner party at God's table for all peoples, and the destruction of death itself.

I love these words from the prophet Isaiah, and I find deep comfort in them, whether they come up on a Sunday morning in worship, or I find myself reading them at a hospital bedside to someone near death, or I stumble upon them paging through my Bible. I love these words, and they have lifted up my heart when I have been grieving the loss of people I have loved over the years.

But sometimes I also have to stop and remind myself of just how scandalous this vision must have sounded to Isaiah's first listeners. Before these were words of deep comfort, I think they must have also been words of profound surprise, like the punch-line of an absurdist joke that no one expected.

I say that this vision of a grand divine family reunion dinner was (and is!) scandalous because of how broad and wide its scope is. When the prophet Isaiah lived, the conventional wisdom of Israel and Judah's religion was something like, "We are the chosen people, and we alone matter. God has a special relationship with us, and we are exceptional. Nobody else is really as important, and God certainly favors us and our country over everybody else."  Funny how persistent that attitude is among Respectable Religious People of all times and places, I guess.

The ancient story about God calling and choosing Abraham to "bless all the families of the earth" had somehow congealed and hardened into a rigid script that the God of Abraham only cared about the family line through Isaac and Jacob and to the children of Israel, and that their "chosen-ness" meant that God was indifferent toward anybody else on earth. We do that, we human beings. We have a way of taking a sentence like "You are special" and hearing it as, "I am better than everyone else." Well, the conventional wisdom of Isaiah's day had done about the same, and so you have to imagine it was something of a shock for them to hear the old dreamer talking about this divine dinner party.

The idea of God having a grand victory celebration might have been easy enough to swallow. Maybe even the idea of God destroying death once and for all, if the people had dared to dream of life beyond the grip of death, was fine, too. But the guest list here? "All peoples?" Really? "All nations?" What? Isaiah was envisioning something radical--a God who could still have covenant faithfulness with the "chosen" children of Israel, and who at the same time still included "all nations" to be there at the big party. This was the kind of idea that got so many prophets killed--Isaiah and his fellow prophets dared to listen when God's Spirit whispered in their ears that others were just as included, just as invited, just as precious, as the ones who prided themselves on being "in."

So consider again what it is that Isaiah is really envisioning here: that one day, the God of Israel and Judah will throw a party at which all peoples, all nations, all skin colors, all ethnicities, all languages, all cultures, and all the various and different ways of being human, would find a place set for them at the table. And there at the party, everybody eats from the same menu, even from the same platters. There is no first-class seating for the "truly chosen" with the really good food, and then leftovers and scraps for the rest back in coach. There is no division or segregation into groups. Everybody who is covered by the shroud of death is invited to watch as God rips it to shreds like an old sheet. Everyone who has wept will find their tears wiped away. Everyone who is hungry eats. Yes, the chosen people who have been stomped on by one foreign army after another will feel vindication, but Isaiah's vision of the dinner party is at the same time open to everybody.

That was scandalous. The conventional wisdom of Isaiah's day was that only fellow Israelites and Judeans were acceptable to God, and that "other people" were a threat to their way of life. The recurring advice of the talking heads of the day said that "If we let other people around into our lives and communities, they'll change what it means to be Israelites! We'll lose our way of life! Those other people, those outsiders, are dangerous, and they are threatening to make us lose our culture, our nationality, and our way of life! We must keep them out, out, out, or else they'll taint and infect everything we have tried to build for ourselves here!" The Respectable Religious Crowd of Isaiah's day said, "The Israel we all know and love is in danger of not existing anymore, because there are all these... other people around, and they are a threat to us! We have to keep them away... out... removed!" And then Isaiah, knowing full well how controversial it was to say this, declares, "Well, the God of Israel is throwing a party for all nations, and we'll all be seated together at God's table, right here on God's mountain. God's party is for everybody, and nobody else gets to revise the guest list."

In other words, God builds a longer table.

Whether the people who heard Isaiah liked that vision or not is another matter entirely--none of us ever likes to be reminded that God is not exclusively my personal possession, after all. But that wide, big, expansive vision is what Isaiah saw. All nations. A rainbow of faces, with cheeks dried of their tears by the same hand of the one God.

If we are going to call ourselves followers of Jesus, who was fed by vision of prophets like these, then we should be prepared for this kind of an end to the story. The prophets themselves dared to listen when they heard God speak about a party for all nations. They did not edit out the other peoples when they pictured the grand dinner table. The prophets who pointed ahead to Jesus, and then Jesus himself, had this expansive vision of who would find themselves at the table. And that made them see other people differently in their present moments, too. After all, if you have convinced yourself that someone is just not good enough to make it on God's eternal guest list, it becomes very easy to treat them like they are disposable or ignorable or less important right now when they are walking right beside you on the street, or standing in line at the store in front of you, or looking for work in your town. But if we dare to listen to the prophets and can see that all nations will be there at God's dinner party one day, you and I cannot help but treat everybody, no matter how different they are from either of us, as a future guest at the table. They may be the ones asked to scooch in their chairs to make room for you when you get there, after all!

If everybody, no matter their nationality, language, ethnicity, skin color, or culture, is going to be invited to God's big ol' table, then I should be very, very careful before I go dismissing anybody in the course of my day to day life and work. If God has said that "all nations" and "all peoples" will be there, I don't get to try and narrow down the guest list because it makes me uncomfortable. And if God says that the table has room for every tribe, tongue, and race, then I don't get to change that... and I should probably consider for a moment that such a wide invitation is actually my only hope, too, since an American of northern European ancestry like me isn't anywhere close to the actual ethnicity of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, or Jesus. My only hope of belonging is that God's table is big enough to include me, too, and that others who are different from me will be willing to slide their chairs over to make room for the likes of an outsider like me.

Taking God's table seriously also means that I am no longer allowed to picture the people of God as looking or sounding just like me. And I am no longer afforded the privilege of being afraid of "them," or of keeping "those people" out or away or removed from what I have. It is all God's anyway--past, present, and future--and God says here in Isaiah that all nations will find a place at the table. It would be damned foolish of me now to try and shoo away someone to whom God has sent an engraved dinner invitation already.

Isaiah had the courage--the nerve!--to stand up in a crowd that was dead certain God's blessings were only for people who lived within their borders, and to say, "Hey everybody! Our God is throwing a party for all peoples!" It took courage because accepting that wide vision was going to change what it meant to be the people of God, and the Respectable Religious Crowd were afraid of losing their old homogenous image of what it meant to be Israel. And Isaiah's vision of a future table for all nations was threatening to them... threatening enough that they were stirred up to silence prophets like Isaiah, or even to start setting up crosses for them, too. But Isaiah's was a joyful courage, too, because it meant allowing God's table to be infinitely bigger than anybody ever dreamed.

It still demands courage to see that, and to consider that God operates by the principle of "The more, the merrier," even when we want to imagine that God's blessings are our private possession.

So, again, let this be your spoiler alert: a prophet who got a glimpse of the end of the story saw that all nations and all peoples are there at God's table. If any of us has a problem with that, we'll have to take it up, not with the other nations or peoples, but with none other than God.

Get ready. Someone whose story, whose face, whose language is quite different from your own will very likely be the one scooching their chair over at God's party one day... to make room for--you.

Lord God at whose table we are fed, give us the grace and humility and courage to regard all people we encounter today as future tablemates at your grand celebration. Get us ready for your party.

Putting Food on the Table--August 8, 2024

Putting Food on the Table--August 8, 2024

  "So God commanded the clouds above
  and opened the doors of heaven,
 raining down manna upon them to eat
  and giving them grain from heaven.
 So mortals ate the bread of angels;
  God provided for them food enough.
 The Lord caused the east wind to blow in the heavens
  and powerfully led out the south wind,
 raining down flesh upon them like dust
  and flying birds like the sand of the seas,
 letting them fall in the midst of the camp
  and round about the dwellings.
 So the people ate and were well filled,
  for God gave them what they craved." [Psalm 78:23-29]

When I hear people recount growing up in hard times, particularly for children of the Great Depression, I often hear them say, "We didn't have much, but there was always food on the table."  I hear grown adults looking back on how their parents scrimped, saved, and sacrificed for the sake of their families.  And I hear those adults voice a deeper appreciation for what their parents did now that they themselves are the grown-ups who know how difficult it can be to manage a family and provide for hungry children.  But the recurring refrain I hear is that for however hard it was, they knew they could count on their parents to provide enough to get by.  And somehow even if there was hardship in those lean seasons of life, the assurance that your family would make sure you got to eat has a way of binding your family together.  You might not have gotten the fanciest clothes or newest shoes, but you knew you were loved because Mom and Dad put their own needs and wants on hold, if necessary, in order to make sure that everybody in the house got to eat.

Hold that in mind when you read this poetic snippet from Psalm 78 (which was the appointed Psalm for this past Sunday in the Revised Common Lectionary).  It gives a glimpse of how ancient Israel remembered its own corporate childhood, so to speak, and how God provided like a parent during the lean years of the wilderness wandering.  Despite all the challenges of living as migrants and nomads across the empty spaces on the other side of Sinai, the Israelites told their family story a certain way: they told it as the memory of God providing, to make sure everyone got to eat, even when times were tough.  They even were willing to commit to memory how often they had been ungrateful and spoiled in the face of God's provision--and how God continued to be faithful and forgiving. (That, by itself, is a wonder--nobody wants to face the memories of the times we were spoiled or ungrateful in our own childhood, and yet ancient Israel didn't edit out its failings when it remembered the wilderness years and the gift of manna in the desert.  That says something about the importance of truth-telling in our own lives, too, I suspect.)  Even when they were like entitled little children living through lean times, ancient Israel knew that God was reliable, and that God provided for them.  Like a good parent, God made sure there was food on the table, because daily bread isn't something you have to "earn" in a family; it is a gift of grace (and, as Jesus would put it in Luke's Gospel, God is "kind to the ungrateful and the wicked" like a merciful Father).

This is the core memory of ancient Israel's self-understanding.  They were freed from enslavement (before there were any commandments given, so it wasn't a reward for their good behavior or rule-following), and then they were fed and sustained through all their wilderness journeys (despite the fact that they were regularly ungrateful and unappreciative) by a God who gave daily bread to all.  Their whole way of life--the life God traced out in the Torah's instructions--flowed from an understanding that God had fed them in the wilderness, despite their childish complaints, as a gift of grace.  It was like a family, rather than a club: everyone in the household gets to eat, even when times are lean.  The whole rest of Israel's story in the Old Testament unfolds in light of being people whose first memories were of a God who put food on the table faithfully, and on whom they could rely through whatever came next.

All these centuries later, as people who, through Jesus, claim to be adopted into that family story, it is worth us remembering that story, too.  Much like many of us were born too late to have lived through the Great Depression ourselves but still come from families who did have to go through those times, we didn't directly go through the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites--but we do trace our family story through those who were fed with the manna.  And that means we do start from a place of trusting God to be reliable in providing, to feed everyone in the family apart from our earning or deserving, and to care for our essential needs like daily bread.  Our fundamental belief is not that "God helps those who help themselves," or that "Everyone has to earn their own keep," but rather that we belong to a family in which God, like a loving parent, commits to putting food on the table for all.  That's where we start, and everything else flows from there.  

Once we take that seriously, it will affect our outlook on the rest of our lives, I suspect. We will be less fussy over who has the right "attitude" to be worthy of compassion, or food, or necessities.  We will be more honest about our own privileged positions and spoiled attitudes that God is willing to set aside while giving US our own daily bread.  And we just might come to see that if we as Christians have been adopted into the family story of ancient Israel like latecomers to the party (or prodigal sons welcomed back home), then maybe God reserves the right to include others still under the roof of mercy to find a place at the table as well.  Maybe there really is "food enough" as the psalm puts it, for all of us.

Lord God, help us to see ourselves as children in your family who have been given a place at your table by mercy, so that we will welcome others to your family table, too.

More Than Good Service--August 7, 2024

More Than Good Service--August 7, 2024

"Then Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.' They said to him, 'Sir, give us this bread always.' Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty'." [John 6:32-35]

If you have ever eaten a truly delicious meal out at a restaurant somewhere and have asked your server to pass along your "compliments to the chef," you are acknowledging that the person who carries the trays out from the kitchen wasn't really the one who prepared your food.  The server's job is to wait tables.  The chef is someone else, often unseen, who is doing the real preparation--probably with a whole staff including a sous-chef, station chefs, and other skilled hands.  When you eat a splendid meal in a restaurant, you know there is someone else to thank behind the swinging butler doors who has actually made your food.  The waiters and waitresses are important in their own way, but you know they aren't the ones commanding the saucepans.  A good meal comes from a good chef, even if it also comes through the serving and by the hands of good wait staff.

Well, I mention this simply to say that Jesus is only pointing out the same here as he continues to make connections between himself and the story of the manna in the wilderness that fed the freed Israelites after their liberation from slavery.  Everybody remembered the big hero of that story was Moses, the great leader who had confronted Pharaoh, parted the Sea, and led the people forward into the land beyond.  He was remembered as the one who had been in charge when the Israelites ate the mysterious "manna" that fell like dew each morning for all the years they were emigrating from place to place in the desert.  But Jesus points out that Moses was really more like a waiter in a restaurant than a chef in the kitchen.  Moses had simply been the means through which God's provision was provided, like a server bringing out trays of entrees that had already been carefully and skillfully prepared in the kitchen.  If you wanted to know who the real Source of the manna in the wilderness, the "bread from heaven," really was, Jesus points us toward none other than God.  And his point is to say that it's really been God all along who provides for us, sustains us, and brings us to life.  It is God who has taken on the responsibility of feeding a hungry world and filling us with good things.  Moses did a fine job as a server, but he was never the chef.

That's important because God is still in the business of filling the hungry with good things and bringing people more fully to life.  Even though Moses is gone and no longer able to offer any help these days (you could say his shift at the restaurant has ended, and he's off now), we are not without sustenance.  The wondrous food of Israel's ancient memory didn't really come from Moses anyway, but came through Moses' assistance from the living God.  God has always been the One who takes responsibility for feeding the hungry.  Even now God still is the One who feeds us and fills us where we are starving, in order to bring us back to life.

And ultimately, Jesus says, God's way of bringing the world back to life is through him--through Jesus' own way of laying down his life and offering himself to us to be our sustenance.  Moses couldn't do that--he couldn't give up his life to save anybody else, but had to keep surviving personally himself in order to keep leading the people forward.  But Jesus is different.  Jesus can offer up his life for the sake of the world, like he is the very bread from heaven in his own person, not merely the wait staff who bring it out on trays.  And this is the critical difference Jesus makes.  Jesus brings us directly into the presence of the living God, who has been the hidden chef behind the kitchen doors all along, and he also offers his life up like he is the very bread we need for our lives.  This is Jesus' gift to us--and if we dare to believe him, his gift to the whole world--he offers up his whole life for the sake of ours.  Less like he is paying a penalty we owe, or placating a bloodthirsty deity with self-sacrifice, but giving us his own life to feed us like bread to hungry mouths.  This is why it is worth staking our lives on Jesus. 

It is a lovely and fine thing to have a good server at a restaurant, but at most their job is to bring the food someone else has prepared to the table where hunger diners will eat it.  Jesus, however, brings us both the loving care of the Master Chef and the actual sustenance of the Bread that renews our strength.  Jesus gives us what we have most deeply needed all along. Jesus offers more than good table service--he gives us himself.

Lord Jesus, sustain us for the day ahead with your own gift of life.

The Good Stuff--August 6, 2024

The Good Stuff--August 6, 2024

"When [the crowds] found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, 'Rabbi, when did you come here?' Jesus answered them, 'Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal." [John 6:25-27]

You know the scene: you go to a nice restaurant, and after your server brings you a basket of rolls wrapped elegantly in a cloth napkin, someone wisely reminds the table: "Don't fill up on bread--the entrees here are so good you'll want to have room to eat your meal!"  And sure, you probably already know not to fill up on bread before the salad course even comes, but it's worth remembering.  It's not really much different from the same reminder I give to my kids when they are circling the pantry like sharks in the water shortly before dinner, insisting they are "starving right now," and when I tell them that if they eat junk food now before dinner they won't feel hungry when the real food is set out, and then they'll end up hungry again (for junk food) late at night.  And that's not good.  So, yeah, don't fill up on bread... or chips and salsa... or any of those things.  You don't want to miss out on the good stuff.

Well, if you have been either on the giving or the receiving end of that bit of culinary wisdom, then you also know where Jesus is coming from when he talks to the crowds who had been fed by the thousands on the shores of the Sea of Galilee.  The day after the miraculous "feeding of the five thousand," Jesus has made his way across to an opposite shore near Capernaum, and the same crowds have tracked him down.  Jesus knows, of course, that what got their attention was the free lunch from the day before, and not just the food but the spectacle of it all.  And it's not that it was wrong or sinful somehow that they ate that miraculous feast--no, of course not, since Jesus was the one who had offered to provide the meal for them all.  But it's more that Jesus doesn't want them to fill up on bread, so to speak, and to miss... the good stuff.  Jesus doesn't want them to miss out on the even more glorious gift he has to offer them in himself.

"Don't work for the food that perishes," he says, "but for what truly lasts."  And he's not talking about Twinkies (despite their famously long shelf-life).  It's more about not spending your life pursuing things that may not be "evil" but are ultimately empty.  Like Jesus says in Mark's Gospel, "What will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?"  Or like he teaches in the Sermon on the Mount, "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."  The same theme runs throughout Jesus' teaching--that while there may not be anything innately wicked about having clothes, food, or a house, if we center our lives on just accumulating more and more possessions, we're missing out on what live is really all about.  We're filling up on bread or chips for the moment, and missing out on partaking of The Good Stuff--the kind of life that Jesus shares with us.

It's worth noting that the early church understood it, too. The first Christians continued to pass along the teaching they first learned from Jesus that when we chase after money or status or privilege or power as the center of our lives (things which may by themselves be morally neutral), they very easily become obstacles that get in the way of participating in the fullness of life God intends for us.  The late New Testament letter we call First Timothy, for example, closes with these words of guidance (and warning):  "As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life" (1 Tim. 6:17-19).  We're back to a question of gorging ourselves on junk food a few minutes before dinner, or instead filling our plates with what is genuinely satisfying.

A culture like ours has a hard time even imagining that "more" isn't always better, or that having more "stuff" might be incompatible with a truly fulfilling life.  But Jesus has been telling us as much all along.  It's fine to have been fed with loaves and fishes at the Miraculous Meal Jesus hosted on the shores of Galilee in the first century, or to have gotten to eat breakfast today in the twenty-first century. But it is a terrible shame if we let shortsighted interests like making a larger pile of money, or getting a grander house, or obsessing over the day's close in the stock market get in the way of "the life that really is life," which is centered on what Jesus gives.  It's like skipping the gourmet meal and the perfect glass of wine because you filled up on stale potato chips and Mountain Dew before dinner was served.

I don't know about you, but I want to taste the good stuff--even if that means recognizing that what Jesus knows about the REAL "good stuff" sounds crazy to a culture fooled into believing it's all about bigger bank accounts and fancier possessions.  I want to dare to trust Jesus and not to fill up on empty spiritual calories, but to partake of what will really nourish me.  I want to spend my life on what matters, even if it's not the same as what the Talking Heads on television or Experts in Success think matters.  I want to savor what endures, not to fill up on garbage.  And if that's where you are, too, then maybe we can share this life in community, striving to encourage each other to take up Jesus' invitation to center our lives on the Really Real, on the food that endures, on the treasure that doesn't rust or corrode.  Maybe that's why we live this life as Christians together, as table companions in the Beloved Community: because together we can remind each other of the wisdom some part of us already knew--don't fill up on dinner rolls.  Focus on partaking of the good stuff.

Lord Jesus, help us today to stop chasing after illusions and empty calories of the soul, and to be fed with what really lasts--your own life and love.

How Jesus Sets A Table--August 5, 2024

How Jesus Sets A Table--August 5, 2024

"When it was evening, the disciples came to Jesus and said, 'This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.' Jesus said to them, 'They need not go away; you give them something to eat.' They replied, 'We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.' And he said, 'Bring them here to me.' Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds." [Matthew 14:15-19]

Honestly... nobody knew what was going to happen next. But, for all the ways they could sometimes be dense or doubtful, in this moment, Jesus' disciples trusted his directions even when they made no sense, and they got to be participants in an utter miracle.

For all of us who have heard this story before (it is, after all, the one miracle other than the resurrection that's found in all four gospels), the surprise plot-twist is spoiled already. We know what to expect. We have been taught to call this story "The Feeding of the Five Thousand" (which gives away the ending right there in the title) rather than "The Time Jesus Told His Disciples To Do Something Crazy With Some Bread." But that familiarity means we might miss what a leap of faith it is for the disciples to do what Jesus says here. And we might not realize how that foundation of trust makes it possible for them to play a role in Jesus' amazing act of love here for a hungry crowd of thousands.  But this how Jesus sets a table.

At the start of this story, Jesus' disciples actually sound like the collective voice of reason here. They're the ones gently nudging Jesus to call off his impromptu free clinic curing the sick until evening, and they're also the ones suggesting it might be wise to send the crowds home early enough that they could all find some food on their way home back to their villages and towns. They're not being stingy, miserly, or selfish--they're just realistic about the size of the crowds, the lateness of the hour, and the utterly colossal amount of money and resources it would take to feed the literal thousands of people there on the hillside. Their first proposal to Jesus ("Send the crowds home for today so that they can get back to their homes and get some food...") is a sensible plan to manage the large crowd and keep them from becoming a hangry mob (you know, being angry from being hungry is called "hangry," right?). By contrast, when Jesus tells them to take what might have been a passable lunch for maybe two people and tell the thousands to sit down and get ready for a meal, it sounds patently absurd. No rational person would look at the mere handful of morsels they had in hand and conclude, "This is enough for everybody here!" It wouldn't have even been enough for Jesus' inner circle of twelve disciples!

But when Jesus directs them to do it, the disciples dare to believe that there is a method to his madness. They will trust him, and they will do as he asks, even if they don't know what he has in mind or up his sleeve. They have faith in him--not merely in the academic, catechetical sense of "memorizing correct theological facts about Jesus"--but they trust him enough to do what he directs them to do, whether or not they understand what difference it could make. Like the famous line from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's classic The Cost of Discipleship puts it, "Only those who believe are obedient, and only those who are obedient believe." In other words, when Jesus tells you to have the crowd sit down and prepare to distribute five little dinner rolls to feed thousands of people, actually believing Jesus means doing what he says, regardless of your understanding of his plan.  It requires a willingness to let Jesus set the table the way he wants... for everyone he wants to include at this table. 

That is precisely what the disciples do--they dare to believe him, by doing what he calls them to do. And when they carry out Jesus' directions on faith, they are part of a colossal act of compassion for the hungry crowds. They are moved beyond what is "reasonable" to what embodies Christ-like love, by letting themselves become a part of Jesus' miraculous meal. They don't know how he will provide for everyone, but they believe it is worth doing what he says--and so they help carry out a mass-feeding that communicated Jesus' love for all those people gathered in the grass.

Something changes in us when we let our first question be "What is Jesus' love for all people leading me to do, even if I don't see how it will work?" rather than "What is reasonable, rational, and sensible?" Something happens in us when we allow Jesus to spread a table larger than we dared to imagine. It's fine to want to be logical, but Jesus is always going to reserve the right to pull us into something bigger than our minds can comprehend, and in those times, we need to be prepared to do what Jesus calls us to do whether or not it fits anybody else's definition of "reasonable." Jesus' kind of compassion is always more than our tiny, shriveled, miserly thinking about being "reasonable" can grasp.  And Jesus' kind of meal is always going to have a bigger guest list than even his own disciples think is proper. Like the hymn goes, "Build a larger table, not a higher wall."

Today, there might be moments when you know you are being called to join into what Jesus is doing in our time and place--and you might not be able to see where it's leading, or how your part will make a difference. Maybe sometimes the smallness of our efforts, our power, and the vastness of the need makes it seem futile and irrational to even try to do what Jesus calls us to. Maybe it feels like taking five loaves and two fish and trying to feed thousands with it. But... for the disciples, this became the moment they trusted Jesus even when they didn't know how his plan would work out, and because of that, they could be instruments of help and compassion on a huge scale. When you think that your voice, your time, your efforts, and your energy are too small to make an impact for good, it's worth it to stop and say to yourself, "I will trust that Jesus knows what he's doing--and I will be a part of his movement of mercy in the world." That's how faith opens the door that leads into the dining room where Jesus is setting a table.

Lord Jesus, call us where you will, and give us trust enough in you to go where you lead, and to do what you call us to do, even if it seems impossible.

The Real Virtuoso--August 2, 2024

The Real Virtuoso—August 2, 2024

“Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen” [Ephesians 3:20-21]

There are hard and fast limits to what I can accomplish by myself. But there are virtually no limits to what the living God can accomplish through us. A pretty good chunk of the Christian life is learning the humility to accept that first notion, while also nurturing the faith to believe the second.

In a sense, though, it is the truth of so many things in our lives: instruments which have little ability on their own can do extraordinary things in the hands of a master. A piece of copper wire will just sit there on its own impotently, but if you run an electric current through it, energy will flow through the wire that can illuminate a room, power a toaster, or charge your computer. A bow for a violin is just some coarse horse hair strung on a wooden stick, but when it is drawn across a violin by a gifted musician, it can bring forth music that soothes, encourages, or moves us to tears. A brush can’t paint a masterpiece by itself, but in the hands of an artist, it can produce a work of beauty that speaks in ways that words cannot.

Well, to hear the book of Ephesians tell it, we who count ourselves among the people of Jesus are instruments in the hands of the real Virtuoso. By ourselves, we are copper wire, horse hair, and brushes. But in the hands of the One “who by the power at work within us” we are conduits for God to “accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.” There is nothing shameful in that acknowledgement; there is only the humble recognition that we aren’t here to achieve our own little agendas, but rather to be participants in God’s grand magnum opus, a whole new creation.

When we recognize that difference—that we are instruments for God’s creativity, rather than God being a divine power tool for me to use to my own agenda—we begin to understand our lives rightly. Mother Teresa of Calcutta knew that well. As the line attributed to her puts it, “I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God, who is sending a love letter to the world.... He does everything, and sometimes it is really hard because it is a broken pencil and he has to sharpen it a little more.” There are both the humility and the tremendous honor: each of us might be, on our own, broken little pencil stubs. And a pencil, even fresh out of the box, doesn’t have the right words in it—a pencil requires the mind of a writer who pulls the sharpened lead across the page to craft a novel or create a poem or write a letter that says to a Beloved, “You are mine.” In the hands of the right author, a little broken pencil can be the most powerful thing in the world. And here, Teresa would tell us, like an earlier love letter to the Ephesians puts it, is the place our whole lives as Christians take place: we live out our days in the hands of a God who is writing a love letter, painting a masterpiece, and composing a symphony that will electrify and illuminate the whole universe.

Taking this seriously, of course, will come at the cost of our old personal agendas. We don’t come to God with our little laundry-lists of private blessings we want or selfish favors, and we don’t get to use God like a tool, or wield prayer as a magic formula to get what we want. We come, surrendering our own myopic visions (“I want to make more money so I can have a bigger house…” or “I want my political party to win, so I’ll tell myself that MY party has the backing of GOD!” or “God’s will is for interest rates to go down so I can finally buy that boat that will make me the envy of my neighbors!”), in order to be useful as instruments and tools in the hand of God. We let go of our old assumptions and agendas in order to be a part of how God the Master Artist creates something beautiful that was beyond our capacity to conceive of. We open our hands and let go of our scripts for “The Way Life Is Supposed To Go” in order to be surprised at the glorious key change in the finale of God’s symphony—and even more astounded that God has used us to add color to the harmonies with our meager notes from the back of the orchestra.

This is the kind of life we have been drawn into as the people of Jesus. And we can only imagine where it will take us next…

Lord Jesus, work through us in ways beyond what we could even dream of, using us as we are to be a part of your beautiful handiwork.