The Joy of Giving Yourself Away--July 31, 2020

The Joy of Giving Yourself Away--July 31, 2020

 

"But we were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you have become very dear to us." [1 Thessalonians 2:7b-8] 

 

Love leads you to give yourself away.  And when you do it, when you give yourself away to others in love--even when it is costly--you would not have it otherwise, because you care more about the ones you are giving yourself away to than holding onto what was yours.

 

That's it.  That's the Christian life in a nutshell.

 

That's why we Christians are compelled to follow after the Lord we serve, and to build our lives around Jesus: because Jesus makes this kind of genuine community possible. This is what makes it worth it for us to live through petty squabbles, personality conflicts, the tedium of committee meetings, slighted feelings, disappointments, volunteer labor, and all of the rest of the baggage that may come with being "the church" in our time and place. There are those moments, sometimes right in the midst of the squabbles or committee meetings or other frustrations, when we find we are genuinely captivated by love for the other sisters and brothers in Christ around us. And in those moments, it becomes clear that we, with all of our rough edges and limited patience, could not manufacture such a community on our own. The only possible explanation for such genuine love as we hear in Paul's words here is the real presence of the living God, bringing former strangers together and binding them in love. 

 

And in those moments, we can't help but give ourselves away to the motley crew God has brought us into, because, well, because that's how grace works.

 

I love the way Paul puts it--it makes it so clear that the Gospel Good News is not just talk. He has become determined, not just to bring a verbal message to this congregation whom he loves, but that message itself compels him to pour out the heart of who he is for these people. The English phrase, "not only the Gospel of God, but also our own selves," is pretty close to the force of what Paul says, but the actual word Paul uses here for "self," is the same word that often gets translated "soul." Think about that and let it sink in: Paul says that the love of God has so endeared these brothers and sisters in Christ to him and to his co-writers Silas and Timothy, that they are giving their very souls away to this congregation, the very core of their being and lives. That's powerful stuff. 

 

Love leads us each to give the "me-ness" of me and you to give the you-ness of you to one another, risking the vulnerability of revealing our deepest selves to one another in community, and bearing the responsibility of caring for each other's naked souls as well.  Whew, I've got to tell you--that's compelling stuff.

 

There's an old saying that the world at large has become "immune" to Christianity because it has been inoculated with a weak form of it, the same way a vaccine filled with a weakened form of a virus will keep the real thing from overcoming you. Maybe the friends, neighbors, and acquaintances around us who seem apathetic about the church are where they are exactly because all they have ever seen in the church is a settling for fake niceness, rather than a love that is willing to give itself away for others. People cannot imagine that church really means all that much, because they have seen so many of us Christians barely tolerate the other people in the pews around us or keep one another at arms' length, or they've seen people confuse Christianity with their political party, or they've seen us be absolute jerks to others who didn't quite fit in. Well, I wouldn't want to be a part of that kind of congregation, either, frankly. And if I were a part of that kind of congregation, I wouldn't have much reason to invite anybody else to be a part of that kind of "community," if it could truly be called a community at all in the first place. 

 

 But to read these words of Paul's and to see that such a beautiful, compelling, honest love was built between Paul and this congregation in such a short span of time as they had together, my goodness, I cannot help but want to be a part of that kind of life, and that kind of love. And Paul would have us believe that this is precisely the kind of genuine beloved community that is available to all of us in Christ. It was surely not because Paul was such an agreeable fellow all the time--there's plenty of evidence that his personality was a hard pill to swallow for the congregations he served. The kind of love that makes you want to give yourself away and pour yourself out, that is possible in the real world with our real personalities that really do create friction on their own only because the vibrant love of the living God is gathering the people together in the first place.   That kind of love--so much deeper than what passes for "love" in pop culture--brings us to life.

 

Amazingly, the kind of affection and love Paul is witnessing to here is still held out to us--we have the opportunity to practice living in that kind of community as we rejoice with each other in our joys and weep with each other in our sorrows. It happens when we show up to listen and to pray with one another, when we bring each other meals and carry each other's burdens, and when we forgive one another and dare to risk asking for forgiveness. It happens as we are given those blessed moments of clarity, sometimes right in the midst of the otherwise tedious work of organized religion, to see the faces of the fellow disciples around us and to recognize how God has blessed our lives through those faces, hands, and hearts, along with whatever other baggage we bear from each other. And as we become even dimly aware of how God blesses us with the gift of such a community of love around us, disguised to the world as just a group of people who meet in the same building on Sunday mornings, our hearts overflow and we cannot help but pour them out back to these saints who make the love of God tangible for us and real. 

 

Thornton Wilder says that "we can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures." That is something very much like what Pastor Paul is experiencing as he pens these words to the Thessalonians. He is conscious--blessedly aware with open eyes--of how the love of God has bound him together with this congregation of brothers and sisters in faith who have wept and rejoiced with him. And the more this love fills his awareness, the more he is truly alive--and at the very same time, the more cannot help but want to give himself back to these faces of divine love. That is what the Gospel is about. That is why we gather on Sundays and throughout the week as church family. That is "the life that really is life." And it is yours today. 

 

Good God, words fail when we consider the holy and extravagant privilege it is to be surrounded by your people and the ways they become living human channels of your love for us. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lord, for the glimpses you give us now of such beloved community, and for the chance to belong among the saints you have placed among us. Your name be praised for those sisters and brothers who have blessed us beyond our telling.

Re-Introducing Charlotte--July 30, 2020

Re-Introducing Charlotte--July 30, 2020

"For the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many." [Mark 10:45]

Tonight, I had the bittersweet gift of reading again from Charlotte's Web to my children at bedtime.  They both know the story--they've even seen it in movie version, already.  So they know how the book ends.  And so tonight, when I began the chapter where Wilbur first hears a mysterious voice that offers to be his friend, my daughter said, "Daddy, is this a sad part?"  Well, of course, I knew what she was asking--she was already skipping ahead in her mind to the end of the story.  The new friend that Wilbur the pig makes in Chapter Five is Charlotte, the eponymous spider of the book's title, who will give her talent, her time, and her love to help preserve Wilbur's life as the story goes along... and who will eventually spend the last of her energy and her life to save.  My daughter knows, at seven years old, that the story will lead to her death, and that reality hung in the air in the warm light of a reading lamp at bedtime.

What could I say to her?  She knows how the story goes, and I have a policy of not lying to people--not to anybody, as much as possible, and not to my children especially.  So I said, "Well, honey, if you are remembering that in the end Charlotte dies after saving Wilbur with the messages she writes in her web, yes, that is true.  That is coming in the story.  But isn't it a beautiful thing that she loves her friend enough to let go of her own life to save him?  And isn't it a beautiful thing that her babies all get to meet Wilbur at the end?  And isn't it a wonder that we get to hear this part of the story now, about how they become friends, and how Charlotte comes to love Wilbur, and Wilbur learns how to love her back?"

She smiled and nodded.  And so the story resumed, even though both of us know where it is going--and both of us know that the other knows, too.  It was a bittersweet moment, to be sure, that moment of being re-introduced to Charlotte the spider.

You can't get away from that bittersweetness in the Christian story, either.  As much as the stories of Jesus and the disciples can feel like the old family stories of the people of God, and as much as reading through the Gospels can have the feel of paging through the Church's family photo albums, we all know where the story is headed.  We know that every encounter Jesus has with someone, every miracle, every calling of every fisherman, every meal shared at a scandalous dinner party, every time he touches an untouchable hand or lifts up a lifeless limb, is a step on the way toward the cross.  That, by itself, is hard enough.  But not only do we know where the story is going--Jesus does, too.  He knows that his own story is headed toward a cross, toward death, toward burial in a borrowed grave... and yet he continues anyway.  In fact, Jesus not only seems to know that his story is headed toward death, but also that his death becomes, like a certain talking spider's, a gift that saves someone else's life.  Jesus knows that his own life is given up for the sake of preserving our lives, like "a ransom for many" as he says, and he is willing to let it be so.  Like Charlotte spending the last ounce of her strength, Jesus surrenders himself completely in love, giving himself away to his last breath, in order that we might live.  And as bittersweet as that is, there is something inescapably beautiful about knowing he has done this for our sake. We are, all of us, Wilbur the pig, given life because of someone whose life was spent on our behalf.

In the end, it's not simply that Charlotte dies that does anything.  Spiders die all the time, after all, even in fiction.  But her choice to spend her life, her energy, and her love, knowing what it will cost, that is sheer grace--and that is a rare and precious thing.  There is Gospel in that, to be sure.  It's not simply that Jesus' heart stops beating that does any saving.  People die all the time, and lots of people got crucified by the Romans, too.  But in Jesus we come face to face with God's choice to spend everything--in every day Jesus lived, every word Jesus spoke, every action Jesus took, and every tear Jesus shed--for the sake of bringing us all to life.  And so, even though we know where this story is headed, we keep retelling it, because the beauty of it, as bittersweet as it is, reminds us we are so beloved.

Yes, it was a bit difficult of a moment reading a story to my children about the beginning of a friendship that we all knew was headed toward its eventual end.  It's hard enough to face those times of loss in real life without adding extra sadness from books!  But in the knowing, we also know how we are loved.  And dear ones, you are indeed so loved.  You are so loved by the Maker of the universe that from the beginning of our stories, God knew the costs of loving us would mean spending every last breath for our sake, and God went through with it anyway.  The old midrash the rabbis tell about creation says as much--they say that before creation, God looked into the future and saw all of our rottenness and sin, all of our crooked actions, hateful words, mean-spirited choices, and rejection of God.  And after having seen all of that, God forgave it all ahead of time, and then with a determined sigh, said, "Let there be light."

God knows from the outset that loving us will be painful.  And yet God has chosen to go ahead with loving us anyway, as bittersweet as that truth is.  On the days you feel most alone and abandoned... on the day your closest confidants and dearest relationships have evaporated into thin air like the morning dew, remember how you are loved.  Remember how the story goes.

Lord Jesus, thank you for your love's endurance for our sake.  Help us to remember in this day just how we are loved.

A Dog-Feed-Dog World--July 29, 2020

A Dog-Feed-Dog World--July 29, 2020

"Love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor." [Romans 12:10]

This is the secret of life: you spend your energy and time building up others... and we (the ones you have just been building up) spend our energy and time building you up.  

We do it together, for one another, in a never-ending dance of giving and receiving, so that no one ever runs empty, and no one ever gets bloated with too much.  We extend the grace of caring for someone else at times, and we also practice the graceful skill of letting other care for us.  And because each of us is never focused on themselves alone, the great circle continues on and on, looping around and around itself like a kid with a spirograph.

Or, to use Paul's phrasing for it, we "outdo one another in showing honor."  Notice the way the apostle sets that up to be more than just a quid-pro-quo transaction.  With a tit-for-tat sort of deal, there are only two moves to make, and then the relationship melts away: I do good for you, and then you pay me back with equal good so that we're even-Steven.  We both walk away dusting off our hands like something has ended.  But that's not how Paul envisions the community of Jesus.  Instead of paying one another back exactly in honor, he invites us to keep going beyond what has been shown to us, in a delightfully upside-down version of a competition.  Instead of each of us trying to be better than the other, to have more, to know more, to get more recognition, to look tougher or smarter or more like a "winner" than the other, we are dared to go to greater lengths to build each other up and to show honor to each other... instead of needing always to make ourselves look better or make sure I (and only I) get the attention).

That's really why I picture this sort of like a spirograph, if you remember that old drawing toy with the gear shaped pieces and colored pens that drew patterns that spiraled into rosettes and daisy-like patterns.  The design of the little tooth-encircled shapes was such that you never drew just a mere single circle--the pen never ended exactly where it started, but once your hand comes back around to where you thought you began, you actually start a new loop, just ahead of where the first one was.  And from there, another, and another, precessing like a gyroscope around the page until you have an ornate geometric pattern. It doesn't just stop with one loop, but one loop creates the next and the next and the next.  That's something like the kind of chain reaction of goodness Paul envisions.

And, as I say, it is just the opposite of the conventional wisdom in the world around us.  All around we hear voices that tell us it's a "dog-eat-dog world" out there, and that everyone's got to look out for Number One.  "You have to live that way," they say.  "You have to put you and your group first, and you have to consistently put your own interests first. That's just the way of the world," they insist.  They tell us, these faceless but omnipresent voices, that you've got to look at life as though everyone else is in competition with you for scarce resources, and if you don't get them, they'll get you.  So in every situation, they say, you have to make yourself look greater, make others look weaker or lesser, and whatever you do, don't dare give honor to someone else.  Don't give credit to those whose shoulders you stand on.  Don't acknowledge that even your opponents can be right, or decent, or principled.  Don't admit to being wrong--ever.  And don't ever give praise to someone else unless they have already given praise (and bigger praise, at that) to you first.  That's exactly how the big, loud (and obnoxious) voices of conventional wisdom teach us to see the world--and they sometimes fool us into believing they are right.

But Paul--following Jesus, I do believe--dreams of an alternative.  That's us.  That's what church is meant to be: an alternative lifestyle to the sociopathic Me-and-My-Group-First, kill-or-be-killed thinking that passes for conventional wisdom these days.  We are meant to be an alternative, following the way of Jesus, to the life that is bent in on self.  We we meant to be a community that puts one another ahead of ourselves, knowing that the others in the circle are putting us before their own needs at the same time.  We are meant to be the proof that it is possible to live in this world and not succumb to the dog-eat-dog mentality that is shouted and tweeted at us around the clock.  We are Jesus' dog-feed-dog community, where each of us are called to lift each other up--not to get to a point of being "even" when we can be done and walk away, but where we can always keep going beyond the goodness shown to us... where we can always look for creative and new ways to encourage, to build up, and to support each other.  And yet, since there is no bean-counting in this community of Jesus, there is never a thought of "But I haven't been built up quite as much the person next to me..." but rather, we can keep looking at each other and saying, "We're square."

That's a beautiful vision--and that's what I want to live my life being a part of.  That feels like being fully alive.  That seems to me to be what we were made for, instead of the pathetic quest to puff myself up that the Loud Voices around us think passes for greatness.

And here's the thing: you are already free to begin living this way.  There is nothing stopping you, or me, right now, from beginning this chain reaction in community by starting to spend our energy encouraging and building others up.  Who knows what will come of it?  Who knows how it might unleash a movement of goodness on your family, community, congregation, or world?  Who knows how far a small commitment to building others up might go?

Maybe, it might never stop spiraling out at all.

Let's begin.

Lord Jesus, give us the courage to dare to build others up without worrying first about ourselves, and at the same time, raise up others who will encourage us in turn as well.

A Chosen Smallness--July 27, 2020

A Chosen Smallness--July 27, 2020

Jesus told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened." [Matthew 13:33]

The smallness is not a defect.  The quietness is not a liability.  The ordinariness is not a sign of unimportance, but of just how vital a thing can be to the miracle that is life in this world.  These are the things Jesus chooses to describe how God's Reign permeates all of the universe--like yeast hidden in the flour that will become this evening's bread... like a tiny seed planted in the soil... like the unassuming labor of a someone farming or baking.

We tend to assume the loudest, the largest, or the showiest things are the most important.  And, to be sure, when it comes to making bread, of course, the flour is essential, too.  But the yeast does something amazing precisely in its smallness.  It gives itself up to make the rest of the bread (all the non-yeast ingredients, like, say, those three measures of flour) more like itself.  The yeast's self-surrender makes the bread into bread.  And its smallness allows it to do that. Reverse the proportions, say, with three cups of yeast to one pinch of flour, and you would have a disaster, not dinner.  

It seems important that Jesus chooses images like yeast to give us glimpses of how God's Reign operates in world.  He is never sloppy with his illustrations; he never blurts out an analogy only to have to re-think it later.  So if he is intentional in his storytelling, that means the smallness and the quietness are not only purposeful choices in his parable, but that they are purposeful on God's part, too.  It means that God chooses to reign in the world in quiet ways.  It means that God's ego does not need to be the showiest, or the flashiest, or the loudest... it means that God is willing to work without getting credit for it--that the work itself is worth doing, regardless of whether we properly applaud God for the labor.  A farmer, after all, keeps planting the crops even if the neighbors don't give a standing ovation--the work is worth doing, because the family and neighborhood need to be fed.  The woman who heads the household bakes the family's bread even when she is taken for granted by the family and the kids just assume there will be food for their bellies, and she does it, without waiting for praise, because she loves them and wills what is good for them.

The smallness of the yeast, and the quietness of the mixing, these are the choices God makes as well in reigning over the universe.  And maybe that even changes our assumptions about what it means to "reign."  If we assume that leadership requires loud boasting or showy pageantry, we'll miss the point of what it means to talk about God's kind of reign or kingdom.  But a farmer is clearly the "leader" who orders and directs things in the farm, and the Mama of the house is clearly charged with being the head of her household, and yet they do their work behind the scenes.  Their leadership does not require saluting nor fanfare, but rather looks like self-giving love, love that is secure and confident enough in itself that it does not need constant approval from others.

And this is the key, Jesus says, to how God rules the universe.  God is not at all like the arrogant Caesars whose images were carved all around the world during the days of Jesus.  Nor does Almighty not need buildings built in God's honor, monuments erected for God's glory, or God's name chiseled in stone.  It turns out, according to Jesus, that God continues to provide for the life of all creation--like a farmer planting the food his family and friends will eat at harvest, or like a matriarch of the household baking quietly in the early morning--simply because of God's love and care for all the world.  This is what God's reign looks like: not the flashy, brutal spectacle of the Roman Empire, but the way a mother heads up her household by making decision and doing the work to feed her children.  It is strong, without being coercive.  It is leadership without arrogance.  It is vital work without needing to be loud or noticeable.

This is how God runs the world.  And if we will be people of this God, then, we are free from needing to make ourselves look tough or strong or powerful or to get fanfare for the good work to which we are called.  We can simply do the good things we are made for, just because it is worth doing, and because we love the people for whom we do them.  We can spend the time, the energy, and the attention today, just because the world God loves needs our labor... so that all may be fed.

You bear the under-the-radar signs of God's reign into the world today.  Let your mere presence in the world be a reflection of God's goodness.  And whether anybody knows to give you credit or praise for it, let your presence in the world make a difference for good today.  That's what the Kingdom is all about.

O God, work for good in your world in us and through us today.

On Needing the Eggs--July 24, 2020

On Needing the Eggs--July 24, 2020

[Jesus said:] "For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father." Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. So Jesus asked the twelve, "Do you also wish to go away?" Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." [John 6:65-69]

We keep coming back to Jesus, even when he says things that shake us up and challenge us, because, well, we are more fully alive because of him.  More so than anybody else in our lives, any other voices, any other loves, his is the one we really can't do without.  Others come and go in our lives, perhaps, and we learn how to get along with the changes of those comings and goings.  But Jesus?  Somehow, I just can't walk away from his voice, his presence, his love, even when he has difficult things to say--like Simon Peter says it, "Where else would I go, right?"

And maybe it's because Jesus has proven to us time and again that he will be there for us, and that he does have our interests at heart, that we can trust him in those times when he says things that make us uncomfortable... or challenge us... or provoke us... or even upset us, that we can stop, catch our breath, and take in what he has to say.  I know I have a hard time with that from others--when someone says something that challenges me or criticizes me or causes pain for me, I withdraw to lick my wounds.  I want to dig my heels in. I want to get defensive.  I want to find a million ways the other person is wrong, or doesn't know what they are talking about, or needs to check their sources and their facts, or some other excuse for why I don't have to deal with what they are making me come face to face with.  We are all like that to some degree or another, I suspect.

But with Jesus, somehow, I am learning to let him say what needs to be said--and I am coming to recognize that when he says something to me, it's not because of his need to get something off his divine chest, or to vent something, or to deal with his own issues, but because I need to hear what he has to say.  That means learning to let down our defenses.  It means allowing Jesus to get in beneath the armor plating we put up.  It means, too, that I need to keep working on immediately protesting my "rightness" every time someone says something that challenges my way of seeing the world.  (I know, in this age of social media and angry internet trolls, we can all convince ourselves that it is each of our job to single-handedly vanquish all opposition to our own points of view, but it just might be that Jesus is speaking through someone who disagrees with you on something, and instead of immediately attacking with vitriol, maybe it is worth starting with asking, "What can I learn from this person... and what about their words is provoking such a strong reaction from me?")

Sometimes I just need Jesus to jar me out of complacency--and in those times, as uncomfortable as it can be, I need Jesus to show me the ways I have been indifferent or apathetic to the sufferings of others because I can't relate to them.  In those times, I need Jesus unsettling voice to make me listen to the concerns of others that I have been ignoring (or have tuned out because I'm engrossed in my rectangle of technology).  Sometimes I need Jesus to unmask the idols I have been suckered into worshiping.  And it can be difficult to let him point out to me the ways I have traded my allegiance to him for some other loyalty--to nationalism, or to racism, or to political partisanship, or to my bank account, or to my own status and reputation, or the quest for "greatness."  Nobody ever wants to have to see the ways they have been duped into giving their hearts to an empty-promise-making idol rather than the living God.  But when Jesus confronts me about those things, I need to learn to listen, instead of insisting I am right.  And I need to listen, even when the message doesn't come from an angel or a beam of light or a vision in the night, but from another person, someone who is surely fallible in plenty of ways, but who has a point and a perspective I need to listen to.

Respectable Religious people are great at inventing ways of defending ourselves from having to listen to Jesus when his voice challenges us.  We insist things like, "He can't have meant what it sounds like he is saying here, because that would mess up the whole theological system I have built here." Or we say, "Jesus can't really be calling me to give up on X... or to let go of Y... or to change directions on my plans for A, B, and C, because I don't like that!" Or we become afraid that taking Jesus seriously will be like pulling at a thread in the fabric of our whole lives, and we realize we are really afraid of losing the systems we have built on our lives on.  So we tune Jesus out, soften his words, or find ways not to listen, while looking pious at the same time.  Like Kierkegaard once put it with his characteristically incisive wit: "Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God.  Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament."  He's right--when Jesus says things that upset our collective apple carts, we start looking for the exit... or for nails.

And yet, there is something about him that keeps pulling us back.  Like Peter says, Jesus has the words of eternal life--even when they cut us, they are like the surgeon's scalpel, and the incision is meant to excise the things that are killing us.  We keep coming back to Jesus because, like the old joke says, "we need the eggs." (The man whose wife thinks she is a chicken goes to the psychiatrist for help, and the psychiatrist asks, "Have you thought about having her committed?" and so he answers, "I would, but I need the eggs.")  Sometimes it seems impossible to bear the ways Jesus challenges our old assumptions about the world, and our lives, and our calling to love neighbors and strangers and enemies, and yet we can't ignore him, because he is the one who brings us to life.  We can't bail out on him--we need the eggs.

Maybe what finally makes Jesus so compelling to me isn't just that he's right when he calls me out on my issues, but that he is also willing to be vulnerable.  Jesus doesn't just start pounding desks or lobbing insults at his disciples when they get upset at his words.  He remains vulnerable.  He risks being wounded... or rejected... or to be walked out on.  Instead of yelling or screaming at the disciples or calling them "losers" because they don't like what he says, he simply asks, "Do you also wish to go away?"  There is no threatening, no bullying, no melodrama--there is the offer to bear rejection rather than give in to bitterness or hatred.  And of course, contrary to the loud voices that pass for conventional wisdom these days, that is exactly how Jesus reveals his strength.  He is the one who can bear rejection, even when we get defensive.  He is the one who can speak the truth in love to us, even when we cover our ears and run away.

That's why we find ourselves drawn to him over and over.  He is right about what he has to say to us... but he is able to be right and vulnerable at the same time.  He is compelling without being coercive.  His love risks that we will keep bailing out on him, and yet he will not go of his grip on us.  And maybe unlike so many of the other voices in our lives that just give up when something comes between us or someone says something the other doesn't like, Jesus doesn't bail out on us, even when we are ready to bail out on him.

Peter is right--Jesus has the words of eternal life.  Where else can we go but to him?

Lord Jesus, speak to us and bring us to life, even when your words challenge us.  Draw us back to you, even when want to give up and walk away.  Keep loving us even when we are impossible to deal with.

The Right Outfit--July 23, 2020

The Right Outfit--July 23, 2020

"As God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience." [Colossians 3:12]

When you know who you are, you don't have to spend your time and energy trying to get everybody else's attention so they can tell you who they think you are.  You are free.

Or maybe to be more precise, when the answer to "Who are you?" is "Beloved of God," you don't have to waste one breath trying to get other people to think you are "great" or a "winner"... or strong or important or attractive or wealthy or smart or anything else.  When your identity is grounded in being beloved of God, you are freed from the endlessly tedious game of finding the perfect outfit, having the "right" hairstyle, driving an impressive car, owning a bigger house, or proving to people how correct and smart you are.  You are simply free.

And once you're done worrying about whether your wardrobe is fashionable enough, you can get on a set of clothes that are considerably more functional and comfortably broken in: you can dress for the work that needs to be done and clothe yourself, as Colossians puts it, with "compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience."  Those are the things that matter anyhow.  Those are the things that will stay in someone else's memory.  

When I get to the end of my life, I think I will be far less interested in whether people remember what I wore to this big event or that special occasion.  I have a hunch that I will no longer care about what my hair has looked like, either, since every time I have tried a new hair style in my life in the quest for "cool," a few years later I would find myself blushing and shaking my head to look at old pictures of myself.  And honestly, if when someone remembers me, what they remember is, "Oh, he was the guy with the purple bow tie... or he was the one with the Chuck Taylor All-Star high-tops..." or whatever other odds and ends from my closet have stuck in their memory, rather than remembering, "Oh, he was the one who loved genuinely," or "He was the one who modeled how to endure with patience and grace," I think it will have been a waste of a lifetime.

So I have resolved not to care anymore--not to spend the money, the time, the fuss, or the mental bandwidth, on worry what other people think about the appearance stuff.  And instead, the letter to the Colossians is teaching me to spend the time learning to love... learning how to amplify others' voices rather than needing to be the center of attention... learning how to accompany others through difficult times without needing to make myself the hero.  Those, I suspect, will take more time and energy and thought than picking out an outfit or getting a haircut, and I will need all the time to practice that I can get.

And yet at the same time, being free from all the game-playing of caring about others' expectations makes me feel more fully alive.  And that, after all, is what God has been up to all along in my life, and in yours.  God is bringing us more fully to life, and we are more fully alive when our lives are clothed in compassion and kindness, humility and patience.  Then we're not hiding ugly souls in fancy outfits--we are learning to be the beautiful creations God made us to be all along.

Or maybe it's less like learning a new skill, so much as it is about learning to be comfortable in our belovedness.  Because this whole verse from Colossians starts with recognizing who and whose we are--we are beloved and chosen by God.  It is God's choosing, God's choice to love us, that makes us holy... and when we trust what God says about us, we don't have to worry what anybody else says or thinks about us.  And because God's love frees us from comparing ourselves to others or needing to be "better than" or "smarter than" or "richer than" anybody else, we can be comfortable in our own skin for once and treat others with compassion and grace. Like the song by the Afters goes, "Love will make you beautiful."  It will.  It already has.  And when we see that and dare to believe it, we can treat others in ways that recognize that they, too, are beloved of God, without feeling threatened that God's love for them somehow takes away love from us.  It doesn't--it isn't pie.

So as we face another day, friends, before you go through your closet or dresser drawers to find the right outfit for the day, and before you fuss about whether your hair looks right or not, start with this: remember that you are beloved.  Remember it. Say it out loud.  Own it.  And remember, too, that there is no one you will meet today (or ever) who is not beloved of God, too, just as much as you are.  And treat yourself, and everyone else whose path crosses with yours today, accordingly.  Remember whose you are, dear one, and whose we all are, and then all the other constricting and complicated game playing can be done. 

You are free of it all, already.

Lord God, let our belovedness sink in to our minds and hearts today, so that we spend our energy where it counts--in being people of compassion, rather than worrying about our fashion.

Being Un-losable--July 22, 2020

Being Un-Losable--July 22, 2020

[Jesus said:] "My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish.  No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father's hand. The Father and I are one." [John 10:27-30]

I don't believe I can imagine a worse sentence to hear than, "You've lost me."  I'm not sure there's a harder sentence to have to speak to someone else, either.

Not merely in the sense of "I don't understand you," or "I can't follow that train of thought, so would you try and explain it again." I mean those few terrible times in life when trust is broken, or respect is lost, or a relation is severed, and you find yourself saying--or hearing--"You've lost me now."  Maybe you know that song lyric by A Great Big World that goes, "Say something, I'm giving up on you," but man, every time I hear those chords and that line, it brings me up short like a verbal punch to the gut.  I think that song clocks in at the third-saddest song I know, because it centers on that feeling of having to hear someone say, "You lost me."

Sometimes you actually say the words: there have been a couple of times in my life where a politician or elected official has so completely sold out that I have taken the time to write to their office and explicitly say, "You've lost me."  (I know, that probably doesn't mean much to whatever staff person had to read it and send back a form-letter reply, but I had to say it.) And sometimes you don't bring yourself to say the words out loud, but they are just hanging there in the air, separating you. Someone says something or does something that makes you lose respect for them, and the relationship can't recover. Or they keep throwing you away like you are disposable, and at some point you just decide not to keep coming back for more.

I shudder to think of times in my life I have been the reason for someone else to think that of me--to fear that I've been the reason someone has felt further from God, or that I've been the disappointment they've struggled with, or that I've broken a trust. However it may happen, whether it's out loud or spelled out on paper, or just out there unspoken and unnamed, it's a terrible place to feel like someone has done something so terrible, so damaging to whatever was there before, that there's no hope of going back.  Whether it's being disillusioned by a leader you had looked up to, betrayed by a close confidant, or let down by someone you depended on, being in a place of "you lost me" is just about one of the worst spots you can be in.

And if I am going to be completely honest with myself, Jesus should be saying that about me on an almost daily basis.  There are surely lots of ways I've not merely messed up, but broken Jesus' heart.  There are surely ways I have been an obstacle to Christ's work, ways I have gotten my own agenda confused with his, and ways I've brought harm to people Jesus loves dearly. There are ways where I don't merely miss the mark, but act and speak in ways that run completely counter to the way of Christ.  Every time I fall into the same old, "Me and My Interests First" mentality... every time I allow myself to be cruel to someone else... every time I preach love and practice selfishness... every time I worry about looking like a "winner" or pursuing my own "greatness" rather than being concerned about the folks who have been told they are "losers" in this life, I've done a disservice to the way I represent Jesus to the world. And yeah, if I were in the Messiah's spot and I looked at me, I'm sure I would have given up on me long ago and said, "Sorry, pal--but you've lost me."  

I would have bailed out on me for blowing it in this discipleship thing.  It's an unpleasant truth to face, but I probably need to. 

And part of the reason I need to face that truth is that it is part of the wonder of grace.  For all the ways I deserve Jesus to send me a sternly worded email telling me, "You've lost me," he doesn't ever say that.  He hasn't lost me yet.  And if I am understanding these words of Jesus from John's gospel correctly, he never will.  Jesus describes his relationship to me--and to all of us--in starkly one-sided terms of unconditionality.  "No one will snatch them out of my hand," he says of us, like we are sheep and he is our shepherd.  "I give them eternal life, and they will never perish," he says, without so much as a loophole or an escape clause for him to bail out on us for our bailing out on him.  Jesus' promise seems to be that no matter how many ways or times I deserve Jesus saying, "You have lost me," that he won't say it, and he won't lose me.... and I won't lose him.  He has chosen to be stuck with me, despite all the ways I disappoint him, sell out, give out, burn out, and walk out on him.

Part of the assurance is in the metaphor he picks.  Jesus doesn't cast himself here as a boss speaking to employees--employees can be fired for poor performance, after all.  He doesn't cast himself as a judge speaking to a defendant, either.  He doesn't use the image of a marriage, the way God was often described in the Hebrew Scriptures as being Israel's spouse--because, as it turns out over and over again in Israel's history, they were unfaithful as they turned to other gods and other loves, and that did in fact bring about exile and a breaking of the covenant.  Jesus doesn't even speak here about us as his "friends," because even friendship, for all its durability, has a certain assumed mutuality and accountability.  All of those kinds of relationships are susceptible to being broken permanently, because all of them bring a certain amount of conditionality to them.

But a shepherd's commitment to the sheep is unconditional--it doesn't depend on the lost-ness or found-ness of the sheep, and it doesn't depend on how many times the sheep goes astray.  A shepherd remains committed to the sheep even in spite of the sheep's own waywardness.  That means the shepherd never gets to a point of saying to a sheep, "You've lost me as a shepherd--I'm giving up on you."  It is not dependent upon the sheep's goodness or badness, willingness to try harder, or past history of getting lost.  It is simply a promise... a gift.  That is to say, it is grace.

This is the heart of the Christian faith, dear ones.  Ours is a Savior who refuses any "out" to walk away from us.  Jesus has thrown his parachute out the window and insists on staying with us in the plane and bringing us to a safe touchdown.  He promises, no matter how much we might bail out on him, or how quickly we would have bailed out on ourselves if we were in Jesus' sandals, not to bail out on us.  He promises that no matter how many ways and times we get ourselves lost, that he won't say back to us, "There, now you've done it.  You've lost me."  

To a world still steeped in conditionality, a world that only can conceive of sticking it out if you get something in return, that is radical.  To a world that is used to bailing out when it gets difficult or walking away when you've been hurt, here is Jesus, still bearing the wounds we have given him, saying to each of us, "You won't lose me.  In fact, you can't."

That's the message we've been entrusted to bring to the world.  Not religion as some kind of deal that says, "As long as you are reasonably good and pious you'll make it to heaven." Not faith as some kind of boss-to-employee relationship that can be ended if you don't live up to the job description.  But as a free gift and a promise, like a shepherd makes to the sheep even if they don't have a clue what lengths he will go to for their sake.  The Gospel is nothing if it is conditional, but if we hear it in all its unconditional, unshakable, scandalously un-losable unconditionality, it's everything.

When I look over the course of my life at the ways I have blown it with other people and left things in shambles... when I consider the times someone else may have left an unspoken, "You've lost me," hanging in the air between us... and even when I have said the same to others (whether they knew or cared I had said it or not), I realize what an awesome thing it is to be loved by Jesus.  At every point when we ruin things, he keeps on saying, "Nothing will snatch you from my hand."  At every point we let him down, he continues to raise us up to life again.  And for every time we have earned a "You lost me. I'm giving up on you," he keeps saying, "You are mine.  You cannot lose my love."

Somebody you know needs to hear that today.  Find them.  Tell them.  Maybe even the face in the mirror.

Lord Jesus, don't lose us.  Don't lose us.  Don't lose us.  And make us to trust your promise that you won't.

A Bigger Hope--July 21, 2020

A Bigger Hope--July 21, 2020

"For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God." [Romans 8:19-21]

Any time I hear a radio preachers or televangelist fire up their audiences with promises that God will make them rich (provided they make a contribution to their ministries, of course...), I think to myself, "Friend, you are setting our sights too LOW."

You read that right--my complaint with prosperity preachers and the health-and-wealth style Name-It-and-Claim-It voices of religion out there is not that they promise too much, but that they offer too little to hope for.  My goodness, if all I'm following Jesus for is to make myself more money or get that boat I've always wanted, there are quicker ways to make a buck in this life.  But that's not the issue; it's that just getting more money or piles of stuff isn't worth pinning your hopes on this life.  There's more to look forward to.

For that matter, any time I hear Respectable Religious folk reduce the gospel to an over-simplified, "Jesus is your ticket to heaven when you die," kind of message, I find myself thinking, "That is too small a hope if that's all you have to say to us!"  And it's the same thing as the ones promising money: it's all just too narrow a promise, too self-focused a gift.  The living God keeps stretching our hopes wider than we dared to dream was possible--God turns our hopes outward beyond just me-and-my-interests to the renewal of all creation!

It's not that I don't think God will provide for us--I do.  And it's not that I don't believe Jesus assures us of life beyond the grip of death--he does.  But reducing the Gospel's Good News simply to the individualistic terms of prizes for me, whether before or after death, seems like burying the lede here.  We have so much more to hope for, if we dare to believe the Scriptures.  God has so much wider a vision than we do, if we can trust these words of Paul the Apostle as he wrote to the Romans.

As Paul sees it here, the Gospel is bigger than just individual people making one-on-one transactions with God in order to secure their spot in the afterlife.  It's bigger than believing the correct theological facts in order to win material wealth in this life, too.  It's about all of creation longing to be put right.  It's about the whole universe being mended in love.  It's about renewal beyond the power of death for the whole world, not just me, or people I approve of on my personal list.  God dares us to hope a bigger hope--resurrection and re-creation for heaven and earth themselves.

That includes me, to be sure.  And... it includes you.  My hope for my own life beyond death isn't really complete, though, until it includes the hope for you and for others as well.  It includes "being with Jesus when we die," but it also includes more than that--it includes Jesus putting right all that is broken in the world... Jesus healing the wounds within us and between us... Jesus bringing justice where we have stepped on one another... Jesus restoring all the places we have wrecked the beautiful interconnectedness of life in God's world.  So, yes, that means I trust God to give me my daily bread... but it also includes the trust that God will provide yours for you, too (after all, Jesus taught us to pray in the plural, "Give us today our daily bread..."  And that means, too, that I can't be satisfied any longer with a shriveled and shrunken faith that reduces Jesus to my personal heavenly fire-insurance, here to guarantee me a spot on a cloud some day in the great by-and-by, if that faith does not also push me toward the hope of all creation being renewed, all people being drawn to God in Christ, all of our relationships being made just, and goodness overflowing for all of God's handiwork. That's what Paul holds up for us to look toward--something that includes each of us, but goes so much wider and farther than any one of us alone.

That's why, I believe, in the ancient statement of faith we now call the Apostles' Creed, we profess our belief not only in my life after death, but in "the communion of saints," "the resurrection of the dead," and "the life everlasting."  These words remind me that Christians from the beginning have been taught to hope a wider hope than just for themselves, but to see each of our salvation as a piece of God's sweeping and saving work that reaches beyond me--to you, to our neighbors, to strangers, and to our enemies.  From the beginning, voices like Paul's have been telling us to think bigger than just Me-and-My-Personal-Ticket-to-Heaven, but to hear the Gospel as God's wide-reaching commitment to make all things new.

Once you've stepped into that radiant kind of light, the old self-centered schemes of the televangelists seem pretty dim, don't they?  Once you've seen that the Good News includes me... and yet is vastly bigger than just me, you'll never want to go back to such an impoverished and undernourished hope.  It's bigger than just me. It's wider than just getting my soul into the Heaven Club.  It's deeper than just increasing my personal bank account.  The Gospel's promise is about a hope so wide it includes all creation.  Anything smaller just won't do any more.

Today, go and hope bigger.  That's not to say, "Go and wish for more stuff for yourself," but rather, "Allow God's goodness to overflow beyond the bounds of just Me-and-My-Group-First thinking, and to see God's good intention to renew and restore all things."

That seems like a wide enough vision to start with.  Dear ones, don't settle for something smaller.  Hope a wide hope.

Lord Jesus, make us new as you are making all things new.  Redeem us as you are redeeming all of creation itself.

In the Day of Trouble--July 20, 2020

In the Day of Trouble--July 20, 2020

"Incline your ear, O LORD, and answer me,

    for I am poor and needy.

 Preserve my life, for I am devoted to you;

    save your servant who trusts in you.

 You are my God; be gracious to me, O Lord,

    for to you do I cry all day long.

 Gladden the soul of your servant,

    for to you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.

 For you, O Lord, are good and forgiving,

   abounding in steadfast love to all who call on your.

 Give ear, O LORD, to my prayer;

    listen to my cry of supplication.

 In the day of my trouble I call on you,

    for you will answer me." [Psalm 86:1-7]

I don't know about you, but these days, it seems like every morning I wake up waiting for another shoe to drop.  We have been living through a difficult season, this whole world, and especially our country, our state, and our communities feel like they are being rocked with new challenges daily.  Just when we think we've gotten a handle on "how the world is," there's a new reality to deal with, and we all have to go back and re-strategize how to get a toe-hold in shifting terrain.

Our families figure a workable way to make a living... and then someone loses a job, or gets furloughed, or a business can't find a way to keep open with limitations they have operate with, or someone gets sick and now an income stream is lost.  And so lots of households I know feel like they are struggling just to keep their heads above water, without anybody knowing for how long they are going to have to keep treading (and while knowing that the length of time we are treading water depends in large part on the behaviors of other people around us that we cannot control).

Our communities are feeling tensions and worry, not just over sickness from the pandemic, but over disagreements on what we should do about schools, how to support local businesses, what things should or shouldn't be open, and even how to deal with our disagreements. All of that is layered on top of all the other unrest that was simmering already, along the fault lines between us. And there are times when it feels like we're coming apart at the seams.

We wake up ready to face the world that existed when we went to bed... only to discover the sun has risen on a different world.  And that is utterly exhausting.

But here is what gives me hope on a morning that feels anxious with the anticipation of the next shoe to drop: the living God remains constant when everything else has been thrown up in the air, and this God is forever meeting us at the point of our need.  The living God, the God we meet in the Scriptures, the God to whom the psalmist cries out, knows that he will find in God a willingness to show up, without any promised deal or transaction for what's "in it for God."

There's something truly profoundly beautiful in the way this prayer, which we know as Psalm 86, begins.  That's because the poet doesn't make any attempt to cut a deal with God, but simply trusts God's constant faithfulness in a world that is hard to deal with.  The one praying simply says, "I need you to listen to me... because I am poor and needy."  Look at that--the reason he trusts God will listen is simply his own need.  Not, "and if you help me, I'll promise to pay you back with lots of sacrifices"... and not, "you owe me one, God, because I have memorized so many Bible verses."  And not even, "I have a religious bumper sticker on my donkey so people will know I believe in you, so won't you help me out in return?"  The poet doesn't see the relationship as one of commerce, but one of grace.  In other words, it is not dependent on having something of value to offer God in return for assistance.  It is grounded in the faithfulness of God, in the "steadfast love" God shows to any and all who call on God.

That's what lifts up my soul on a day like today.  We can hope for relief from other quarters, but we know that politicians, employers, and the bigger structures and systems we live within are all still bound by the thinking of transactional self-interest: they do what they do if they think it will pay off in profits or votes or a better bottom line for the investors.  That will always limit how much any of them can do, or are willing to do, in "the day of trouble," as the psalmist puts it.  But a God whose reputation is staked on steadfast love for the poor and needy, simply on the grounds of our need... well, that's a God you can rely on even when bills are stalled in Congress, when businesses are out of money to keep people on staff, and when shoes keep dropping like rain from the sky.

We simply cannot rely on the fickleness of transactional, deal-making self-interest; maybe the anxiety of these pandemic days is simply making clear to us what was already always true but which we did not want to recognize.  But through a season like this, we find that our prayer can be much like this ancient poet:  we can count on God to show up for us, and to lift up our lives, not because of what we can give God in return, but simply because of who God is.

In the day of trouble, we can't count on the deal-makers and dignitaries for help (because they may just calculate it is not in their self-interest to help us).  But we can always count on the living God--for ours is the God whose reputation is staked on steadfast love for the ones with empty hands and troubled hearts.

Come to our aid, Lord God, for all the worries and troubles we bring today. Come to our aid, not because of what we can do for you, but because of who you are.

Grace in the Plural--July 17, 2020

"Grace in the Plural"--July 17, 2020

“For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.” (Ephesians 2:14) 

The thing about grace is that it cuts both ways. 

In the end, that’s a good thing, but it can also make us squirm uncomfortably in our seats, too, in the mean-time. 

Here’s what I mean. Everybody likes the me-side of the grace equation. Everybody likes to sing about how grace was “amazing” for “a wretch like me.” It’s great to know that even when I was a mess, and even when I still am a mess, Jesus loves me through it all, and has forgiven me and accepts me. In other words, when grace is a first-person-singular experience (grace for me, welcome for me, a new start for me), I’m all for it. 

But if grace is what allows me know God has put away the failures of my past, then—and here’s the hard part—grace also gathers in other people into the mercy of God… even people I don’t know, or don’t like, or don’t want to see forgiven. Grace includes people whose politics I don't like, whose experience is very different from mine, whose tastes, preferences, family situations, and loves are different from what I know.  Grace includes people for whom I have lost respect... and grace includes people who have lost respect for me.  Grace includes rule-followers who kindly and dutifully do all that is asked of them because they care about the well-being of their neighbors, and grace includes the selfish stinkers who think the rules don't apply to them and want to revel in their stupidity. Whether I like it or not, grace includes, and keeps on including, people in every direction. Grace tells me that I have been brought into the family of God, not by my earning but because of God’s overflowing kindness—and that means that grace is bringing in other people, too, regardless of whether they meet with my approval. I don’t have to like someone in order for God to love them. 

Grace isn’t just first-person singlular (me), but second person (you), and third person (them, too!). And frankly, that can be difficult for… me. 

It’s more “fun” to be the returned prodigal son, reveling in the abundant mercy of a forgiving and generous dad, than to see ourselves cast as the older stick-in-the-mud son who wants to poop the party because he doesn’t think his younger brother is worthy of all the attention at his homecoming. But that’s the thing about grace—if grace is what “will lead me home,” as the song says, then everybody else who’s there in glory will be there by that same grace, whether I would have let them in or not. 

That brings the humbling reminder that grace is Christ’s gift to give, not my personal get-out-of-jail card for me and me alone. Jesus doesn’t have to ask my permission before he welcomes in a Zaccaheus, or a Matthew the tax collector, or an anonymous Samaritan woman who can’t seem to settle down, or self-important Martha, or skeptical Thomas, or blowhard Peter, or insecure Paul. That puts each of us in our place—and it also, at the very same time, is what makes a place for each of us at the table. I can’t help but offer welcome to you here in the family of God, because God has welcomed me the same way. That might be tough, but it is also such a source of comfort, too. 

This is the key to what it means that Christ Jesus is our peace. Not merely that he taught to live in peace. Not merely that he made a helpful suggestion that we try our best at being peaceful. Not even that Jesus can give us a warm, fuzzy feeling inside that will make us like each other better and therefore be more agreeable. But Jesus is our peace, because only a Lord who rules by grace can make us able to welcome one another. 

If I am still stuck in the old me-and-my-group-first mentality, I will be always comparing myself to the next person, trying to edge them out, get a better spot or ranking than they have, acquire more, do more, etc. And when that happens, I cannot really be at peace with anyone around me—they will always be threats to me getting enough of what I want. But Jesus makes peace because he breaks the old ‘earn your way’ thinking by grabbing a hold of all of us apart from what we deserve and simply on the basis of his choosing to love us when we didn’t earn it. There’s no comparing anymore between me and you. There’s no need for fear that if you’re in the group then my place is threatened. There’s no more pretending that I’m “in” with God because I have the right heritage or do the right deed or even that I have memorized the correct set of religious facts. 

For the Christians in Ephesus, who came from Jewish and Gentile (anybody who wasn’t Jewish) backgrounds, all of this was very real and very important. Each side, each group, had to come to the point of admitting they were there, not because of their own religious accomplishments, but by grace. And once they could accept it about their group, they realized that Jesus had given the same gift of welcome to the others. He was their peace. 

The same is true for us: because Jesus has claimed each of us, regardless of our actions, Jesus really is our peace. That’s good news for me… but not just me. 

O Christ our Lord, give us the joy to see not only ourselves, but the whole Christian community, caught up in Jesus our Light. Amen