A Chosen Emptiness--March 31, 2021

 

A Chosen Emptiness--March 31, 2021

"Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus who... emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness." [Philippians 2:7]

Maybe "empty" isn't bad.  Maybe "empty" is sometimes what grace looks like... what love looks like... what blessedness looks like.

I know that sounds like blasphemy in a culture like ours, whose altars are all-you-can-eat buffets and whose unofficial religious devotion is to binge-watching tv shows on streaming services.  I know the idea that "More is better" is ingrained into our thinking from our earliest years of life--even if the "more" we are fussing over isn't something we particularly want... just to make sure we get a share of whatever it is. (That's why the old one-liner complaining about a restaurant works:  "The food there is terrible--and the portions are so small!"  We have a way of wanting more, even of mediocre stuff, because we are told we are suppose to want it.)

On top of that, we are told that real power, real strength, and real success in life look like "more."  The people with more name-recognition, more social media followers, more money, more influence, and more toys are the Big Deals in life, right?  And on the world stage, the countries with more money, more weapons, and more resources (and who keep all those things for themselves, of course, because Me-and-My-Group-First is taken as gospel!) are deemed the "winners," while we are taught all sorts of ways of patronizing and looking down on everybody else--they are "the Third World," or "undeveloped countries" or "all those poor countries" or "banana republics" or "failed states," or whatever the language of the day is.  The conventional wisdom the day is that more is better, fullness is a sign of success, and emptying, losing, or giving away what you have is all terrible foolishness.

But Christians are taught--by looking at Jesus Christ himself--to see the world very differently; in fact, we are people learning to see all of that as upside-down and backwards.  And as Jesus turns our vision right-side up again, we discover God's greatest power is in exactly what the world calls weakness.

That's what makes the image so jarring in this verse from Philippians, when Paul says that Jesus "emptied himself." This is the same Jesus who, in the previous verse, Paul insistently described as "equal with God."  That Jesus.  The very embodiment of God-with-Us.  This same One, with all the power, wisdom, glory, might, and infiniteness of being that comes with being God, empties himself in the human body of a barefoot homeless rabbi living under the boots of an occupying empire.  In the language of the conventional wisdom, God becomes a "nobody" in Jesus.  And Paul doesn't blush when he makes that claim.  He doesn't think this was a bad choice or a wrong idea on God's part--but rather, that it is exactly how God's power truly works.

That means, among other things, that "more" isn't necessarily "better." It means that "full" isn't necessarily the goal in life--after all, Paul says, God's goal wasn't "a feeling of personal fulfillment," but rather the choice to be emptied of that fullness for the sake of redeeming us.  It means God is done (or maybe, more accurately, never wasted any time in even starting) with the quest for "more," or or "fullness."  God's deepest self, expressed in Jesus, looks like the choice of emptiness, for the sake of gathering us all in.  

So many of the little choices we face every day boil down to the decision to fill me-and-me-alone versus seeking the good of others.  Do I tip generously or save those extra few bucks so I can buy a snack later for myself from a convenience store, where no tipping will be involved?  Do I spend my time listening and talking with a friend in crisis, or am I keeping all my time for my own social calendar?  Do I scowl at the thought of using my precious resources to help pay for someone seeking refuge to escape a disaster in their home country, or do I allow the possibility that such generosity might be the holiest thing I can do in life?  Am I more invested in my own quest for "fullness" that I miss out on the possibility that the best possible way to use my life might call me to having empty hands?  I know, I know--it means something like a complete reinvention of our values, and an overturning of what the world around us tells us is good or successful.  Lots of folks over the last two thousand years have just decided that sounds like too much work, or that it is easier to stick with the world's obsession with "more," but here from the beginning, the Scriptures have been telling us that God's way, God's choice, is not about endless consumption or acquisition, but about chosen emptying... for the sake of love.

What are things in your and my life that we might be led to let go of, or to stop chasing after, or to surrender and give away, for the sake of letting Christ-like love fill our deepest selves?  In other words, what might our chosen emptiness look like on this day... and how might it actually lead to being full of the presence of the living God, who is our deepest joy all along?

Lord Jesus, help us to empty ourselves of all we've been chasing after, so that we might be full of your love.

More Than A Hero--March 29, 2021

More Than A Hero--March 29, 2021

"Let the same mind be in your that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited..." [Philippians 2:5-6]

If I stop and think about it, this is really why I am a Christian.

This verse, this sentence, this idea, and the radical notion it conveys are why, for all the ways that organized religion can be such a disappointment (plus, we're not all that organized! Ba-dum bum!), this is why I continue to be a part of the community called the church and a Christian, rather than just an admirer of the teachings of Jesus.  And the crux of the matter--quite literally--is that it is no less than God who has come to us in the person of Jesus.

Look, the world is full of other role models and positive examples.  If my only reason for being a Christian is that Jesus gives me a hero to look up to, well, the glut of superhero movies and movie universes has given me plenty more "heroes."  There's a new flavor every week.  I can have my own personal favorites, my spouse can have her own, and my kids can each pick a favorite or two.  We can pore over the pages of history and find heroes to look up to as well, or to our favorite figures from literature (I've always been fond of Don Quixote and Cyrano de Bergerac, for example, and tenth-grade me was greatly impacted by meeting early Atticus Finch in To Kill A Mockingbird).  

But for whichever role models, fictional or historical or some of both, on whom we pattern our lives, let's be honest, we will always be chasing after some impossible goal of being "enough like them" to be worthy, to be good enough, to be acceptable.  And we're never going to do it.  I'm never going to have Bruce Wayne's disposable fortune or tech savvy; I'm never going to work up the never to actually fight a windmill; and I will never have the physical strength or agility to be Black Panther.  And if saving the day requires me to be adequately good enough or close enough to any of them, I will fail... and the day will be saved.

And honestly, if all religion is boils own to, "Keep trying to be good enough--here, look at another biblical role model," then we should be honest that religion is about saving ourselves with good behavior.  

But that's not how this passage from Philippians opens.  This ancient passage from the hand of Saint Paul himself, which is actually probably a quotation of an even earlier hymn or prayer, starts with God.  And that makes all the difference.  Yes, Paul's point includes us patterning our minds and mindsets on how Jesus is an example for us to follow.  But the first move is God's, not ours.  The outrageous claim of the Gospel is that none other than God came to us in Jesus, walked barefoot and homeless in Jesus, and was executed by the state as a threat to the empire and Respectable Religion in Jesus.  The radical claim of Christianity is not, first, that we have to try to be as good as God in order to get into God's good graces, but rather that God has become one of us because we are already held in the goodness of grace.  And that means, further, that at the heart of God's character is the choice NOT to maximize privilege or status for God's own sake, but for the good of others.  At the heart of who God is is decidedly NOT the motto, "Me First" or the song "My Way," but rather the choice to put others first--and a whole world full of us others, too.

Before we get to how we respond to that (and we are called to respond), it's important that we get the horse before the cart. What makes the Gospel different from every form of self-help religion in human history is that it starts with God's choice not to preserve privilege, not to pull rank, and not to stay safe, but to lose everything for the sake of what is not God--us.  It's not about us reaching "up," but about God coming close, even though that means letting go of power, comfort, prestige, glory, and respectability.

In the storytelling of the rest of this week then, just remember, it is theologically right to substitute the word "God" everywhere you see the name "Jesus," from the torture at police headquarters to the shame of the cross to being buried in a borrowed grave.  It is God who gets mocked by the religious and politically powerful (who are afraid of losing that power, while God was willing to surrender power in Christ). It is God who is stripped naked and strung up on a tree.  It is God who cries out in godforsakenness.  It is God who moves first in Jesus.

Whatever else we say about ourselves, then, is always a response to grace, never a prerequisite for it.  And that makes all the difference in the world.

Jesus is more than a hero, and more than a self-help role model.  Jesus is what it looks like when God is prepared to lose it all for the love of us.

Lord Jesus, let us recognize in your face the very face of God... even when it wears a crown of thorns.

Lucky Charm or Lord--March 26, 2021

 Lucky Charm or Lord?--March 26, 2021

"Jesus called [the disciples] and said to them, 'You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many'." [Mark 10:42-45]

There was a three or four week period in my junior high school days when I carried around a rabbit foot key chain on my backpack--you know, for good luck.

Did I really believe that the rabbit's foot would do anything for me?  Probably not... but I figured it wouldn't hurt.  Right?  I mean, sure, chances are, it's just a bunch of nonsense that the preserved paw of a woodland creature, now dyed in some unnatural shade of flourescent yellow-green, would grant me good fortune... but hey, if it turned out to be really powerful, well, who wouldn't want to hedge their bets?

That's the thing about a lucky charm: the "magic" comes without any claims on us.  You can use its power (if it had any real power) for whatever you like, whatever you wish, and the object doesn't get a vote or a veto.  It doesn't get a say about what you do, how you channel its lucky energy, or why you want to harness it.  The reason we love the idea, the myth, of lucky charms, from rabbit feet to horseshoes to lucky pennies to wishbones, is that there are no strings attached--the magic items have to endorse our own personal wants and wishes, however frivolous, silly, or selfish they are.  So, even if they usually turn out to be a bust, we keep trying... because we want the kind of power that just gives us what we want, but never calls us to do something with what we have.

I'd like to suggest--although it is not pleasant at all to have to say it--that for a lot of us, our favorite lucky charm isn't the seventh-grade rabbit's foot keychain or the trinket you keep in your pocket.  It's Jesus.  

Or rather, we want to treat Jesus like he is just a lucky charm--even though the real and living Jesus insists that he is no such thing.  It's not just us, it turns out.  From the beginning, like literally since the days of Jesus walking around ancient Palestine with a bunch of unschooled fishermen, his followers have been wanting to turn him into their righteous rabbit's food.  From James and John asking for the places of honor at Jesus' right and left hand, to other ten who were upset that they hadn't thought of this plan first, the followers of Jesus have been trying to tap Jesus' power to do whatever we want from him like he was a living lucky charm.  We have treated the phrase, "In Jesus' name" like it was a magical incantation that could give us whatever we want, and we've often treated the sign of the cross like some mystical runes that will make our businesses prosper if we slap it on our signage or grant us special privileges.

To be honest, we would rather have Jesus as our mascot than our master--we would rather tell him where to go, what to say, and what to do to endorse all of our projects and plans, rather than letting him set the agenda in our lives.  And most certainly, we are tempted to try and use Jesus to get advantages for ourselves--we imagine that just waving around Jesus' name should get us preferred status in society, or that he'll increase our second-quarter profits or help our team to win if we speak his name enough, or that if a political candidate or party drapes themselves enough with the symbols or language of religion, then they must have God's blessing on them for their policy agendas.  It's all rabbit's foot theology--and it's a load of rubbish.

Jesus himself tells his disciples that he's not their lucky charm or mascot, here simply to drum up energy to help their personal causes.  Rather, it's just the opposite.  They are being called into a new way of living where we are all called to serve others rather than aim for positions of privilege.  Jesus calls his disciples--long ago and today as well--to put ourselves last and others first, rather than making "Me and My Group First" our priority, with Jesus along for the ride to bless our agenda.  And he points to himself as the supreme example of this upside-down way of living: he, the very Son of God and Son of Man, has come, not to be serve, but to serve.  He doesn't use his divine power as a lucky charm even for himself--he doesn't keep himself out of danger or keep himself in luxury.  And then he calls us, who follow him, into the same way of life, where we give ourselves away because of Jesus' name, rather than using it as a magical talisman for making ourselves rich or happy or lucky.

As we prepare to hear again the central story of our faith in the coming days--the cross and resurrection of Jesus--it's worth remembering how Jesus himself understands those events.  Jesus doesn't see the cross as a trademarked brand, a logo for a team, or a mascot to endorse our selfishness, but the as the model for how we are called to build our lives around the good of others, rather than ourselves.  There are no rabbit's feet in the Christian life--only the wounded human ones of Jesus, leading us to follow in his steps in the way of self-giving.

It's worth remembering that today, next week, and for all our lives.

Lord Jesus, keep us from trying to treat you as a lucky charm, and instead enable us to follow you as our Lord... including on the way to the cross.

Beautiful and Terrible--March 25, 2021

Beautiful and Terrible--March 25, 2021

Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priest in order to betray him to them. When they heard it, they were greatly pleased, and promised to give him money. So he began to look for an opportunity to betray him. [Mark 14:10-11]

I suppose it depends on your position.

I supposed it depends on the question of from what point in space you are looking at it, whether it is good… or bad… or both. The black hole, I mean—the black hole at the center of our galaxy.

I am no expert on such matters, but as I understand it, those who are experts on our galaxy—namely, astrophysicists, astronomers, and other scientists with impressive titles—are convinced that at the heart of our Milky Way galaxy there is a super-massive black hole, around which the whole galaxy, all 100,000 light-years in diameter of it, spins.

Black holes, in case you have forgotten that day of science class, are so massive and so dense that nothing—not even light itself—can escape their gravitational pull (hence the name “black hole”). They are believed to be the corpses of exploded stars that collapse in on themselves. And of course, as a black hole pulls more and more surrounding matter into itself, crushing it into near-nothingness, the black hole becomes more and massive, heavier and heavier, and increasingly dense. And that means that they become “hungrier” over time, too—sucking in more and more of the mass and energy of the stars or gas or galactic “stuff” around it.

All of this means that if you are zooming in your camera lens very near to the center of our galaxy, the black hole is unquestionably terrible and destructive. It is essentially an annihilation machine, powered with merciless efficiency by the laws of physics. A black hole is a destroyer of worlds, a devourer of stars, literally tearing apart anything that becomes trapped in its pull, bending the fabric of space itself, and again literally sucking the brightness out of everything it reels in. In all seriousness, we do not need to imagine monsters in sci-fi movies to populate the universe—there is a very real monster lurking at the heart of our galaxy. And it is utterly dark at its core, infinitely heavy, and undeniably awful (in that original sense of being a thing of awe, as well as wreaking awful havoc with anything that comes near it).

Now, that said, if we zoom our camera lens out to be able to see the whole spiraling galaxy from a distance, we will see something different. While it is true that the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy is ripping things apart and is devouring even light itself, it is also true that all of that destruction gives off a lot of light, too (something to do with x-rays heating up the gas just at the outer edges of the black hole’s reach, I believe). And even more curious, the black hole’s immense mass is at least part of what hold the whole galaxy together. The gravitational pull of the black hole is at least one factor in why the galaxy keeps spinning and stars like our sun don’t go flying off in random directions. At one and the same time, this one phenomenon is unquestionably destructive (from the close-up view) and undeniably holding the galaxy together—preserving, holding, and stabilizing all those hundreds of billions of stars inside it. Huh…

So, if you were to ask the question, “Is the black hole at the heart of our galaxy a creative force or a destructive force?” or "Is this thing beautiful or terrible?" or to be even more crude about it, “Is the black hole ‘good’ or ‘bad’?” the answer is, “Yes.” It is both, always and at the same time.

Now, let me pose a similar question from the Gospel of Mark. Is Judas’ betrayal of Jesus—and the cross to which it directly leads—a creative force or a destructive force? Is it good or is it bad?  Is it beautiful or terrible?

The answer is… yes.

Both are true at the same time, without letting Judas off the hook for his hellish betrayal of the Son of God, but also without forgetting that Jesus himself saw that he was headed for a cross all along and in fact said that he had come “to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). Both are true.

You can’t get past the fact that, close up, Judas’ betrayal of Jesus is just about the most awful thing a person can imagine. It is terribly painful to live through one of the small or medium-sized betrayals we encounter in life—the co-worker who throws you under the bus to your boss, the family member who lets you down, the dear friend whose words cut you to the quick, the spouse who cheats and treats you as disposable. But imagine now someone betraying Jesus—the perfectly loving Son of God—and doing all that to him. It is unspeakably awful. Judas is responsible for his actions, and there is no getting around that. And to top it all off, the guy takes money for it. It is—and I mean this literally—a damned shame, what Judas does.

And yet… (and isn’t that always God’s way with us, to keep adding “and yets” to our tragedies?). And yet it is by this very betrayal that Jesus gives his life away for us, offering himself in perfect love and complete surrender. “Love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be…” goes the old hymn, “But oh, my friend, my friend indeed, who at my need his life did spend!” It is Jesus’ death on the cross that holds everything together. And I mean everything. “Through [Christ] God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross,” says Colossians 1:20. The cross—that unspeakable injustice and horrible destruction of the Son of God, in which God the Son cries out in utter godforsakeness and darkness—is simultaneously the single event which holds the universe together and binds it all up to restore it to God. Judas doesn’t stop being responsible for his actions, but those actions do not stop God from also redeeming even the betrayal to make possible the preservation, the salvation, of the world.  It's a moment that is both beautiful and terrible at the same time.

Both are true. The betrayal of Jesus by Judas is a moment of terrible injustice in human history, and yet it makes possible the justification of us all—the redemption and reconciliation of “all things” through the cross and resurrection of Jesus. Both are true. At the same time. Such is the God we have, and such is the infinite creativity of our God, who can build galaxies with gravitational wrecking balls called black holes, and who can restore and redeem creation through the betrayal and death of Jesus. Words fail here. Perhaps all we can say from here is, “Thank you, God. Amen.” Perhaps that is enough.

Thank you God, for the cross of Jesus, and what you did with it. Amen

Commandeered--March 24, 2021

Commandeered--March 24, 2021

When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ just say this, ‘The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.’” They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them, “What are you doing, untying the colt?” They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. [Mark 11:1-6]

Be careful. This story is more dangerous to read than it first appears.

Chances are, we all know the story of Palm Sunday—the triumphal entry into Jerusalem that Jesus made a week before the crucifixion, where the crowds waved palm branches in the air as Jesus rode into the city on a colt. And whether or not familiarity breeds contempt, it surely has a way of breeding numbness. If you have heard this story every year in the spring for all your life, you may have developed the ability to let the words go in one ear and out the other.

Or, just as detrimental, we may have developed the reflex-like response of, “But this story doesn’t have anything to do with me…” And of course, in some sense, that is true. At least, this story does not give you the right to steal other people’s things and get away with it if you offer the excuse, “The Lord needs it.” Fair enough—that part of the story does not give you and me license to take things that belong to others and put a religious justification on it. In that sense, it’s not about me. Or you.

Trouble is, we Christians who have heard this story before can start tuning the story out then because of its familiarity. We know that these verses don’t give us the right to go stealing people’s stuff, so as a result, we might just stop listening to these verses altogether. Or maybe we think they are just a record of something that happened a long time ago in a story we remember from flannelboard Sunday School lessons from childhood. We try and hamstring the power of these verses, hiding behind the fact that we have heard them before and know that they don’t give us permission to commit larceny in the name of Jesus.

But what if we don’t see ourselves as the disciples sent to borrow a colt, but as the owners of the colt who let it be taken? Could we dare to hear these verses as a reminder that Jesus has the right to commandeer our lives, our time, our possessions, and our best-laid plans?

In the movies, detectives on the police force or agents for the FBI and CIA are allowed to take possession of someone’s vehicle if they are chasing the bad guy. They are commandeering your vehicle, and they are allowed to do so because they are authorized to do so. They have the authority to do things like that—or at least they do in the movies and on TV—because our society recognizes the police, FBI, etc., as people who have a responsibility and power to defend the peace. They are permitted, then, to make a claim on your “stuff”—at least your car—in the pursuit of stopping a dangerous suspect, preserving justice, or protecting the innocent. So, at least in theory, you would let detectives on the police force commandeer your car because you recognize that they have the authority to claim it for their purposes for the moment.

Hmmm… I wonder if we really could dare to think of Jesus in the same way. If Jesus stepped up to you and said, “I need your time…” would you let him commandeer it? If Jesus called you up and said, “I have a claim on your money,” would you recognize it? If Jesus appeared in your life and said, “I am going to use your life…” could you acknowledge his authority to do it?

Now, change all of those “ifs” in that last paragraph to “when.” Because he does come into our lives, and he does assert a claim on our priorities, our time, our resources, and our energy. If we are going to be people who recognize Jesus as Lord of our lives, that means recognizing he has the authority to commandeer the car and steer us in his direction, even if we cannot see where we are going, what our destination will be, or how the trip will go along the way. Dare we let him get behind the driver’s seat?

Well, all of a sudden, this scene from Mark has gotten a lot more risky to read. If we take it seriously, we cannot hear it just as a quaint story that happened to other people about a fun little parade with some palm branches. We will recognize that Jesus has a way of regularly showing up in our lives and making a claim on our time, our talents, and our treasures? Will we recognize Jesus authority in our lives? And can we let ourselves hear a voice say to you and me, “The Lord has need of… you!”?

Lord Jesus, we name you as you are: our Lord—we offer ourselves to you as well as we know how. Come into our midst and use us as you will.

Team Jesus--March 23, 2021

 Team Jesus--March 23, 2021

"The Lord GOD has given me the tongue of a teacher,
that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word.
Morning by morning he wakens--
wakens my ear to listen as though who are taught.
The Lord GOD has opened my ear,
and I was not rebellious,
I did not turn backward.
I gave my back to those who struck me,
and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard;
I did not hide my face
from insult and spitting." [Isaiah 50:4-9]

So, truth in advertising, as a native of the Cleveland area, I grew up both rooting for--and often being perplexed by--the Cleveland Browns.  (If the Steelers loyalists among those who read this cannot in good conscience allow their eyes to view anything that suggests learning something positive from the Browns, consider this your warning.)  My disconcertion with the football team was, of course, sometimes from the fact that they so often managed to rip defeat from the jaws of victory in new and heartbreaking ways, but also it came from my hang-up about their name.

As a kid, I just assumed the name of the team came from the color brown, which was in the color scheme of their uniforms and went with the orange color of the team helmet and logo.  And basically, I figured the color uniforms came first, maybe by random chance, and then that the name stuck after that.

Turns out, of course, I was wrong.  As you may already well know, and as an older me learned, the name wasn't chosen at random just because of the coincidental color of the jerseys, but because of the team's founding coach, Paul Brown.  During Brown's tenure with the Cleveland team, they won four championships in the All-American Football Conference (in the days before there were Super Bowls), and his legacy was important enough that the team kept the name, the color, and all the rest (including occasional mascot "Brownie the Elf"--because, of course).  All of that is to say that the name for the team turns out not to be just a fluke or an accident of history, but was directly connected to the man who first created and coached the team.  What might have at first seemed just incidental about their identity turns out to have been deeply rooted in their founder and leader, and who he was.

I know this seems a strange place to start a reflection on words from the Bible (although I still maintain that rooting for a perpetual underdog like the Cleveland Browns is good for the soul), but I'm going to ask you to follow me for a moment and see the method to my madness.  In a passage like this one from the book of Isaiah, we get a glimpse that the church has consistently understood in light of Jesus.  That is to say, even if the prophet himself wasn't picturing Jesus yet when he spoke these words, in hindsight we can look back and better understand Jesus through these words.  And here the prophet speaks of someone who does not answer evil with evil, but rather bears the insults and mockery of others without retaliation... but rather with love.  He doesn't stop to defend his honor, his reputation, his perceived "greatness" in the world, but rather bears the worst his enemies can do to him, and endures--without "turning backward" or giving way to hatred in return.  This figure, this "servant" figure whom Isaiah's later chapters spends some time talking about, does not return abuse for abuse or cruelty with cruelty, but bears it with suffering love.

And the more I think about it, the more it becomes clear to me that this was the key to the identity of Jesus' followers, not just an incidental or accidental quirk of history.  The first followers of Jesus were deeply committed to not answering evil with evil, not retaliating when they were harassed, not giving into the trolls of their world, and not being baited into hatred--and they did this, not as a random fluke, but because they understood it was at the core of Jesus' own identity.  Like the team I grew up rooting for, the early Christians formed their identity around the person of their founder and leader--Jesus himself.  And because Jesus had not only taught them not to return evil for evil, but had shown it to them as well in his own trial and torture by the empire, the early church made this into their own identity as well.  The Browns took their name, not from a color chosen at random, but from the name of their founding coach who led them to early victories  And the early church took its cues about refusing to answer evil with evil, not by accident, but directly from the way of Jesus himself, the one who had first called them and who won THE victory over the powers of death and evil through his suffering love.

The question, perhaps for us, all these centuries later, is whether we dare to let the way of Jesus still be central to our own identity even now.  It is terribly easy to get baited into hating people... or feeling like you have to get the "last word" in some petty internet argument... or to be suckered into somebody else's bitterness because they were spoiling for a fight and just like to stir the pot.  Lots of folks do all those things... lots of folks who claim in front of the world that they are followers of Jesus, too (by their cross-marked ball caps, religiously themed bumper stickers, and social media profile photos)... but our actions and attitudes reveal something different.  We so easily want to keep the name "Christian" without actually living out the legacy of the "Christ" for whom we are named.  We so easily want to lash back out at the people we have been taught to think have aggrieved us, when maybe the problem is our own insecurity, rather than actual persecution.  (Not to push the metaphor too far, but there was a time in Browns history when the team literally sold out and moved to another city, and the franchise changed its name and let go of the old connection to the man Paul Brown--and sometimes we Christians have done the same, too.)

This is a moment, then, to reclaim the legacy that's been given to us.  At the core of Jesus' being was his commitment to answer hatred with love, evil with good, violence with endurance, and rottenness with truthfulness and justice.  That wasn't just a random trait of his, but central to Jesus' understanding that God's love doesn't ultimately answer evil with more evil, and that God's love includes even those who have made themselves enemies of God.  For us, then, who want to be on Jesus' team, we are called to walk in that legacy--not simply to wear Jesus' name casually, but to let his identity shape our own.  

There was a time when anybody who saw the Cleveland football team, heard them on the radio, or even caught a mention of them in the paper would be led to think about their founder, for whom they are named, Paul Brown himself.  Well, maybe today is a day for people to see a connection between Christ Jesus and us, we who bear the name "Christian," in the ways we love.  We don't have to be the ones known for picking fights on social media.  We don't have to be known for bigotry against anybody who is different.  We don't have to be known for have such insecurity issues that we feel we have to fight back every time we feel slighted.  No, all those can be left behind or pitched into the dumpster.  We are called to be people whose very lives point to Jesus--so that people will see us, and catch a glimpse of our source and our guide, Jesus the Christ.

Lord Jesus, let your way of loving even your enemies become our way--let it become our hallmark in the world.

A Lowly Glory--March 22, 2021

 A Lowly Glory--March 22, 2021

"Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim
and the war-horse from Jerusalem;
and the battle bow shall be cut off,
and he shall command peace to the nations;
his dominion shall be from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth." [Zechariah 9:9-10]

God's kind of power has never needed a P.R. consultant to hype up God's "brand."  In fact, the God of the Scriptures has always insisted on a kind of lowly glory that doesn't need to brag or boast.  In short, if you have to talk about how "great" you think you are, or need to hoot and holler to get others to notice how "great" you think you are, you are out of step with the ways of the living God.

That has always been true, even of the actual kings and leaders of God's people, going back to the days of ancient Israel.  Israel's kings were supposed to be different.  They weren't supposed to be sovereign--they were shepherds serving under the true lordship and reign of God.  They weren't supposed to trust in their own military power, armies, wealth, or reputations--they were supposed to trust in the covenant faithfulness of God.  And they weren't supposed to judge their success or failure based on how the stock markets were doing or how rich the richest were getting--they were supposed to hold themselves accountable to whether the people were being guided to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God.  All of that was supposed to be true from the days of Israel's first kings, even though they all to one degree or another, fell short and sold out for the conventional ways of ruling: bluster and bloodshed and bragging about wealth.

So it's against that backdrop that the words of the prophet Zechariah need to be heard.  When the prophet imagine a future king coming in victory but riding on a donkey, it wasn't a random image or obscure prediction of some unlikely thing.  It's not like the way we think of "prophecies" in pop culture, or even in the old Greek myths.  In the old stories about the Oracle at Delphi, for example, the prophecies made by the Oracle were often so enigmatic that you could completely misunderstand them--that's how Oedipus ends up killing his father and marrying his mother even though he was trying to run away from bringing that prophecy about.  Or in the fairy-tale of Sleeping Beauty, Malificent's curse on Aurora--that she'll prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and thereby fall into a death-like sleep--leads the kingdom to banish all spinning wheels, but still is fated to touch a spindle anyhow.  Or in the old legend of King Arthur, the old prophecy said that the true and rightful king would be able to pull the sword from the anvil, but that wasn't the usual expected way for kings to establish their reign.  These mythical prophecies were all unexpected and even bitterly ironic.  That's not how Zechariah intended his words.

No, when Zechariah announced a coming king who would ride on a donkey, heads were supposed to nod and folks were supposed to say, "Yeah! That's how our kings are supposed to be--lowly and servant, not as dictators, tyrants, or egomaniacs!  That's how God's upside-down power works!"  It was a reminder that God's ways were never supposed to be conflated with the world's usual means of piling up wealth or rattling sabers to get your way.  It was a reminder that the people of Israel and Judah were supposed to embody an alternative lifestyle--an upside-down valuing of things where justice and mercy, peace and righteousness were more important than having a bigger army or a more impressive arsenal.

And so when Jesus comes along on the day we call Palm Sunday, riding into town on a donkey--and a borrowed one who has never been broken or trained to have a rider before, at that!--it was less about checking a box for the fulfillment of some ancient oracle's prediction, and more about embodying how God's Reign was different from the rest of the world.  The Empire would be marching in their soldiers in tight formation, their matching uniforms and gleaming helmets and weapons clanging in the rhythm of their lock-step movements, to show their power and bluster and to remind people who was boss... and then there was Jesus, offering a minority report. His entry into the city was both a deliberate mockery of Rome's image-obsessed military pageantry, and also a callback to what Israel's identity was always supposed to be: humble, serving, faithful, and good.  His choice to ride the stubbornest creature on four legs--and one that had never been ridden on before at that!--would have made for a sharp contrast to the organized precision of Rome's military parade.  And the rag-tag flinging of palm branches and stray cloaks on the road rather than the matching red banners of the Empire would have driven the point home: Jesus doesn't reign like the empires and emperors of history do.  Jesus' kind of reign really is what all of Israel's kings before were supposed to be like but could never bring themselves to fully commit to: Jesus is the king who doesn't need to brag, doesn't need to shout about his greatness, doesn't need to threaten others to get his way, and who doesn't need to kill to be victorious.  He dismantles the tools of war by dying at the hands of the empire, not by killing his enemies.  He creates peace, not by coercion but through suffering love.

And this, dear ones, is our legacy.  This is the story we have been brought into.  This is the upside-down perspective through which we are called to see the world.  It is a glorious vision--but it is a lowly sort of glory, to be sure, from the world's vantage point.

Let me ask, then--what will it look like in your life today for us to be people of this lowly glory?  How can we be more dedicated to serving and putting others first rather than puffing ourselves up?  How can we see the good of others before ourselves or our own group, and see in those choices the character of the Reign of God?

Today, what if our lives were full of such wonderfully lowly glory?

Lord God, turn our vision and our values upside down to align with your own humble reign and suffering love.

Grace Goes On--Devotion for March 16, 2021

Grace Goes On--March 17, 2021

"I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you." [Colossians 4:18]

These are parting words, but the connection persists.  Love endures.  Grace goes on.

We have been working our way through the letter to the Colossians since the first few days after Christmas of 2020, and there has been an awful lot of water under the bridge since then--both in this letter's four chapters and in the world in which we live while we've been reading it together.  And now, we finally come to the end--the last words of this late-written letter, which certainly could have been the last that the church in Colossae heard from him.  Our devotions, too, will pause after today, and resume in the new week after a moment to catch our collective breath, with new reflections and new directions.  But that still means, in a very real sense for Paul, for the Colossians, and for us, that this is an ending.

But even at our endings, grace goes on.

It can be easy to get thrown off by the opening of this verse, about Paul "writing this greeting with my own hand."  But in light of the opening verse of the whole letter, where Paul named Timothy as being with him, it makes sense to understand this whole letter as something that Paul had ostensibly dictated, while Timothy was the one with the actual pencil and paper (or ink and papyrus, as the case may be).  Then, finally, like a professional may sign a letter which had been typed up by the administrative assistant based on dictation, Paul writes his final greeting in his own hand.  In other letters (take a look, for example, at Galatians 6:11) Paul was rather self-conscious as he wrote in his own hand with "such large letters"--which some take as evidence his eyesight was failing and therefore had to write in large print.  And it was not unusual to have someone else writing for you as you spoke out loud what you wanted to say in the ancient world--again, not all that dissimilar from dictation in an office today, or your voice-to-text function on your smart phone.

So there's at least reason to believe that Paul may be feeling his own body wearing out as he concludes, leaving the actual physical act of writing to his administrative assistant Timothy except to sign his name at the bottom.  Paul has put a lot of miles on his tires, so to speak, and, as Ben Gibbard once sang, "the souls of our shoes are all worn down, the time for sleep is now."  Paul knows he is getting near the end of his earthly life, and either Jesus will come suddenly, or otherwise old age will have to fight it out with the Roman executioner for who gets credit for Paul's death.  His final request to the Colossians, "Remember my chains," casts the shadow of his looming death-sentence after a Roman trial in the background.  

And yet, I also think that line, "Remember my chains," has the feel of love, more than a guilt-trip.  I don't think it comes off with the feel of, "Pity me, because I have to suffer this way while you all get to be free and live your lives," so much as, "You were worth it--you were worth the cost of me being imprisoned, if it meant getting to share the Good News of God's love in Christ with you.  Having you as part of the family of God was worth all the struggle, all the suffering, and all the scary things ahead on the last leg of my life's journey.  You were worth it."  In other words, I hear this as a reminder, "Know how much you have been loved; I chose this path willingly, because it meant I was able to share God's love with you."

And then, after that, when the tired apostle has spent his last words of his own, and said all he can say in his own power, he leaves his readers--then and now--with something more.  Grace.  After our striving is done in this life, grace goes on.

That ain't a bad place to leave things between us, either.  After all of our best efforts are done--some having met with success, and some having been dismal failures--the grace of God continues.  In the end, our lives' worth and value and meaning are bigger and more durable than our achievements--they are caught up in the grace of God who calls us beloved, blessed, and worthy simply on account of grace: free, audacious, reckless, unconditional grace.  And to hear no less a dedicated worker than Paul say to his readers, "Grace be with you," is an emphatic reminder that even the all-stars of the early church knew their lives were entirely held by the love of God embraces us as we are.

You know the old hymn--the one we'll be hearing again soon, come Good Friday: "I'll cherish the old, rugged cross, till my trophies at last I lay down."  Well, here's Paul, just about done with all of his life's trophies and ready to let go of them all, and knowing that grace is the one holding him--the same grace that was willing to go to that cross for our sake.

So, at least for a few days, until a new beginning starts for us in a new week, let this be our parting word, too: beyond whatever you have done or accomplished already in your life, and beyond whatever potential or aspirations you have for achieving great things in this day ahead, may you be held in the grace of God now and always.

Because after all of our laboring is done and our energy has all been spent, don't you worry.  There is more yet to come: grace goes on.

Lord Jesus, hold us in your grace, and let us extend it to everyone else we meet today, too.

The Mystery Mission--March 16, 2021

 The Mystery Mission--March 16, 2021

"And say to Archippus, 'See that you complete the task that you have received in the Lord'." [Colossians 4:17]

The thing I love about this verse is the very thing that leaves me scratching my head: we have no idea what "task" it was that the Lord gave to Archippus... and it's okay that we don't know.  We don't have to know what this mystery mission was.  Just he did.

In fact, it's not even clear that the rest of the folks in Colossae knew what "the task" was, either.  Paul just says, rather cryptically, "Remind Archippus to finish what Christ has told him to finish."  And that's it.  We don't know how long he had been working on it, whether it was a short-term task or a lifelong mission, or something in between. It could have been something as concrete as, "Finish setting up that planter box for the community garden so the hungry folks in town will have a place to grown their tomatoes," or as wide open as, "You've got to stay sober this time, Archie--don't fall off the wagon again."  Or maybe it was something like, "You said you were going to work on your anger issues--keep it up, brother!"

But we don't have to know what it was in order for this member of the church in Colossae to have done it, and neither did the rest of the congregation.  More importantly, they could all be called up on to be cheerleaders and encouragers for Archippus, even if they didn't know what he was tasked with doing.  Or, if they did know, they could be supporters and helpers while letting his work be his to do.  The fact that Paul doesn't say any more than this lone enigmatic sentence might seem mysterious or obscure to us, but maybe it can give us clarity for our situation.

Maybe it's ok, in fact, if I don't know what God has called a sibling in Christ to do.  I don't have to know what work the Spirit is doing in their lives, or how Jesus is leading them to a particular project, ministry, or vision, in order to cheer them on.  In fact, sometimes it's none of my business what "task" the Lord might have led someone else to complete, and I don't always need to go nosing around to find out!  What I can do is encourage people around me to do what they know they have been called to do... and then to learn to be ok with them doing their work their own way, even if I would have approached it differently.

That's a hard learning in this life, isn't it?  Sometimes we are so passionate for doing our best for God that we step on other people whom God has called to do their own work, because we want to swoop in and micromanage their way of doing it... or to criticize the way they do it... or get fussy when they don't immediately take our free advice and do things MY way.  We mean well--we always mean well, don't we?--but sometimes we can't stop our good intentions from souring into meddling, micromanaging, or, a particular challenge for my gender, man-splaining.  I have a hunch none of those are needed for the kind of work the Lord calls anybody to...  and maybe, instead, I am called simply to trust that God is leading them to do what they need to do, and will lead me to do what I need to do.  And sometimes, that will mean I need to learn to allow God to be big enough--and God's Kingdom work to be vast enough--that your life's mission may be very different from mine, and yet we can each be doing "the task we have received in the Lord."

Some congregations see their task in housing the food bank or the clothes closet; others help the homeless and bring meals to those in need of them.  Others create holy moments of sanctuary in the peace of their Sunday liturgies for weary souls, while others are coming up with creative ways to engage children in a deeper trust in God, and then still others are called to welcome those most on the margins who have been burned before by religious hypocrisy or hatred.  We can recognize that God has called us to our niche without insisting that everyone else's ministry look the same, and we can recognize that others may be called to different work and yet still be called by the same God to do it.  And the same will be true with each of us individually--your faith may lead you to work against human trafficking, while another follower of Jesus may be fed to speak up against racism in their community, and another will share their faith with strangers at a coffeehouse inviting them to hear about grace.  We don't all have to do the same work to be working for the same Lord.  But we can cheer and empower one another in the calling each of us has been given.

So that's the plan for today: how can each of us cheer for and support the people around us so that all of us can complete "the task," whatever it is, we have each received from the Lord?  Let's get to it.

Lord Jesus, allow us the maturity to see the many ways you call us, and the many ways you lead us--and others--to serve.

Through the Gray--March 15, 2021

Through the Gray--March 15, 2021

"And when this letter has been read among you, have it read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that you read also the letter from Laodicea." [Colossians 4:16]

Maybe it's enough to say we don't have all the answers, and just let that put up a guard-rail around our path for the day... and a gate over our mouths.

There's a bit of a head-scratcher in this verse.  Maybe you've spotted it already.  If not, then go ahead and turn in your Bible to the Letter to the Laodiceans.  Go ahead, I'll wait.

Are you done looking?  

Did you give it a second try?  A third, just to make sure you weren't skipping it or misreading it in the table of contents?

Are we done searching for what's not there?  Are we ready to say it out loud?  Okay, here goes:  there is no letter to the Laodiceans in our Bibles.  Hmm.  Well.... hmmm.  What does that mean?  And what are we supposed to do about it... or think about it?

Let's start here again with the verse itself.  In these closing remarks before the letter we know as "the Epistle to the Colossians" concludes, the apostle references a neighboring congregation in the nearby town of Laodicea.  Paul's instructions are clear:  "When you're done reading this, pass it along to your neighbors, since there's stuff in here that would be helpful for them as well, even if I wrote this first for you."  And a second part follows, "In fact, why don't you trade letters, and then you can read what I wrote to them, too.  There's good stuff in there for you all, too."  So, that all suggests that by the time the letter we've been working our way through for these last few months was written, Paul had also already written to their neighbors in the next town over.

The trouble is... we don't have it.

Well, we might not have it.... or probably don't have it... or maybe only have it by the wrong name.  Confused yet?

Like your survey of your Bible's table of contents has shown you by now, our New Testaments don't have an Epistle to the Laodiceans in there.  Some scholars think that the book we call "Ephesians" has been misnamed, and that it's really the letter written to "the Laodiceans" but we have all been mistaken in our title.  Other think that a pretty suspiciously late-appearing and derivative writing that calls itself the Letter the Laodiceans (which emerged about fifty years after Paul would have died and was circulated by an early heretical sect called the Marcionites) is the real thing, even though it is basically just a cutting and pasting of other verses from Paul's letters into a bad mixtape.  And then there are a lot of folks who just come to the conclusion, even if it's a little uncomfortable to think about, that we just don't have this letter.   This, in all probability, is most likely the case.

So let's think about this for a moment, and just let it sit with us for a moment.  It means that there are other words that the apostle Paul wrote... that didn't make it into our Bibles.  (Honestly, there are other places where the same is evident--reading 1 and 2 Corinthians makes it clear that there are other missing letters of Paul's that haven't survived.)  And if we are going to go down this rabbit-hole, then we should also recall that even the writer of the Fourth Gospel pointed out that there are a lot more stories and sayings of Jesus that aren't written down for us (see John 21:25).  

That means, dear ones, that there's more that could be said--about God, about Jesus, about faith, about the inner workings of the universe, etc.--but we don't have it all in the covers of our Bibles.  Now, that doesn't mean necessarily that we are "lacking."  The theologians of an earlier generation used to talk about the "sufficiency" of Scripture, meaning that we have all that we need in its words and stories.  No one needs to be worried that some long-lost letter of Paul will turn out to say, "Turns out you really are saved by your works after all--my mistake about all that grace stuff."  And nobody needs to worry that in some missing account of Jesus, the Messiah ends up saying, "Forget that love your enemies stuff--go kill your enemies before they kill you!  And by the way, Hail Caesar--he surely knows how to make the Empire great!"  We can rest assured that whatever is in the missing letter to the Laodiceans is in concert with what he has already written to the Colossians--that's why he invites them to just trade letters.  And the Gospels give us a plenty clear picture of who Jesus is and what matters to him, too, that we don't have to worry that in a lost story he would turn out to be someone completely different from what we've come to know from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

But we are going to have to live with the realization that we don't have all the words of Paul. And we're going to have to face the truth that we don't have all the answers, either.  That's the fact we have to own if we are going to take the New Testament on its own terms:  the Bible itself tells us that there are more parts of the conversation that we just don't have anymore, for whatever reason.  Pretending that this verse isn't here isn't honest.  And pretending that the Bible all fell down from the sky as a finished book (bound in faux-letter with faux-gold lettering, too, no less) isn't honest, either.  What we call our Scriptures is a compendium of writings in many styles, by many authors, over a long time, and it took time to gather it all together.  Unlike when you buy a board game at the store and the full set of instructions comes with the box, all ready to go and printed out for you first, the New Testament took a while to come together, and there was even a fair amount of debate about what should be included in it or not.  Knowing that doesn't have to shake our faith or make us doubt God's reality--it just means the picture is more nuanced than, "God sent us the instruction manual for life--we just need to follow it."

Our faith emerged from the real lives of real people, who lived in real time and space.  That means letters were written, and sometimes they were saved, and sometimes they were lost in the mists of history.  We have some stories about the central people in our faith story, but not all the ones we might wish for.  We have some of Jesus' opinions on some of the issues of his day, but we don't have a policy paper from him on every question we might bring to him now--there's no dissertation of Jesus on the subject of how to use social media, for example, or what the capital gains tax rate should be.  Sometimes we have to take what we have and figure out, as well as we can, the trajectory of how to be faithful in our situations based on the direction of the arc we can trace from the stories and sayings we do have. That means the Christian life is less like a test in which there are always correct and incorrect answers, which are all deducible from plugging Bible verses into a sort of moral calculus, and more like a journey we are on, in which we don't always see very far down the road.  It means being okay with not always having the answers in black and white, but being okay with following Jesus through the gray, through the uncertain, and through the unknown.

I get it--that can be scary.  But we are going with Jesus.  And if he is with us, then we can bear the truth that we don't have all the answers.  And we can just put one foot in front of the next, and go where he leads us.

Lord Jesus, give us humble minds that can admit when we don't know something... and then to trust that you'll give us enough clarity for the day.

Because of Her Love--March 12, 2021

Because of Her Love--March 12, 2021

"Give my greetings to the brothers and sisters in Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house." [Colossians 4:15]

She was a leader in the early church, the host who welcomed a band of early Christians into a congregation that met in her house, in a time when it was both dangerous to be a leader and necessary for those who led to be faithful and strong... and I confess to you: I just learned her name.

True confession: for all the time I have spent reading the Scriptures, as both a young person studying in college and seminary, and as a pastor, too, for just shy of a decade and a half, I don't ever recall having paid attention to this verse, or the woman Paul names here.  And I say that to my shame, because here, she was clearly a hero of the faith, one of just sixteen women referenced in Paul's letters by name, and mentioned here as a pretty significant leader in a house-church in greater-metropolitan Colossae/Laodicea (they weren't far from each other, and we don't know for sure where her house was).  But while I know plenty of church's named for Saint Paul, as well as some Saint Timothy, Saint Mark, and even some Saint Barnabas parishes, I've never known a church named for Saint Nympha.  Like I say, I had never even recalled or known her name before looking at today's verse.  And it's not like she's not here--she is.  I had just selectively ignored her importance.  I had skipped right over her in past times wading through this book of the New Testament, even though she has been there all along in the pages of my Bible.

Of course, Nympha isn't the only one--not hardly.  We could have quite a conversation about Junia, whom Paul names as an "apostle" in the end of Romans, or Phoebe, who quite possibly delivered and read the letter to the Romans when Paul sent it to them, or Chloe, or Euodia, or Syntyche, or Priscilla, all of whom were women who were leaders in the early church whom Paul names and counts among his co-workers. Or Lydia or Tabitha, who were significant members of their own church communities in the book of Acts. And that would be before we even got around to talking about the women who not only financed Jesus' ministry, but also those women like Mary Magdalene who were the first to announce the news of the resurrection--the first to preach an Easter sermon! Their names and stories are there, in the pages of the Scriptures themselves, and yet, it is awfully easy to ignore them, downplay them, or assume they didn't do or say anything of importance, all on the flimsy logic of, "Well, I've never heard of them before..." or "I've never thought about their accomplishments before... and therefore they don't have any."

But here is a chance to begin to rectify that, and to find myself enriched by taking a second look, and discovering that there are even more ancestors in faith to be thankful for, like Nympha, whose courage and dedication made it possible for the Good News to spread beyond the confines of Judea and Palestine, to include, eventually, me and my story.  It is because of saints like Nympha, who kept at it, gathering Christians in her home for worship, for mutual support, for teaching, for encouragement, so that they could continue living out and sharing their faith, that I can belong in the household of Jesus, too.  It is because she was willing to open her doors, to be the pillar of wisdom and courage that others would look up to and find strength in, to welcome those seekers who came to her house wanting to know about Jesus, and to step up to the role of leadership when there was the need.  And until just a few minutes ago when I sat down to read this verse and reflect on it, I didn't even know her name.

So this is an opportunity to stop and discover more reasons to be thankful to God than I knew I had before:  I am grateful to God for Nympha.  Because of her love for the people who gathered in her house, I have come to belong in the family of God, too. I am grateful to Christ for Junia, Phoebe, Mary, and all the long line of strong and faithful women whose lives and witness loved me into being (to borrow a phrase of the good Mr. Rogers) from before I was ever born through to this moment.  Their dedication ensured that there would be space and love for those disciples who came after them.  Their wisdom in teaching and fierceness in love protected the infant church when it was very much at risk of being snuffed out by the empire like a flame.  Their willingness to serve--and their daring to believe that they were indeed empowered by God to lead--has blessed me in ways I have not fully appreciated.  And the women I have known in my life, too--pastors, Sunday School teachers, bishops, mentors, colleagues, friendly faces who welcomed me to their tables and let me come in to their homes through the garage door entrance, wise matriarchs who put up with the silliness of a young pastor, brave women who shared their stories and faith-journeys with me to help pull me out of closed-mindedness, loving women who worked tirelessly behind the scenes without seeking or needing recognition--these blessed saints, along with Nympha, have been blessings to me beyond my telling.

We don't need to wallow in guilt for not having said or done enough for the likes of Nympha (or Junia or Mary Magdalene or anybody else) to recognize them--they have, for certain, gone to their reward and did not need my approval to be of worth.  But maybe this is a moment to stop and to ask, each one of us, who are the people God has worked through, to love us into being, whose stories we have not bothered to learn, whose names we have forgotten to speak, whose faith has enriched ours even if we didn't realize it.  Perhaps all the times in the past that I have overlooked Nympha and her sisters in Christian leadership can be just that--in the past--and I can strive to look for the faces, names, and stories of strong women and faithful women who have things to teach me, insights I can learn from, and gifts to be recognized and cherished.  And perhaps each of us will discover that there are many more lives we have to be thankful for, those blessed ones through whom God has worked, in a long line of disciples, eventually to grab hold of us so that we could belong, too.

And now, I can look forward to the day in glory, when I get to meet Nympha--and all the ancestors in faith to whom I owe thanks--and to offer my gratitude in person, as together we lay down whatever crowns there are among us, at the feet of the God who has loved us all into being.

Lord Jesus, thank you for the many people you have placed in our lives whose gifts have enriched us and whose faith has brought us to this point, even when we hadn't taken the time to learn their names.  Help us now to do just that--to learn the names of those, past and present, who we too easily ignore or push to the margins.  Help us to see the many people through whom your love reaches us.

Not Mine Exclusively--March 11, 2021

 Not Mine Exclusively--March 11, 2021

"For I testify for him [Epaphras] that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis. Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas greet you." [Colossians 4:13-14]

It would be fair to say that every sunrise is a gift; but that does not make a sunrise your exclusive gift.

It would be theologically accurate to say that every rain shower is a sign of God's graceful provision for you; but the rain is not only for you.

And as anyone with siblings knows, your parents worked hard to provide for you--from earning the money that put food on the table, to the actual cooking of that food, to the washing of the dishes afterward... and yet, all of those gifts weren't just for you, but for the whole family.

A lot of our lives is spent learning that these blessings in life aren't any one person's exclusive possession--they are common gifts for our common life.  And an awful lot of our lives' struggles come from times when we can't accept that something isn't a zero-sum game--that something good for you doesn't mean less of a good thing for me.  Like the saying goes, it's not pie:  more for you doesn't mean less for me.

This couple of verses is one of those reminders for me that the blessings in our lives--whether we're talking about the beauty of a sunrise or the importance of a dedicated friend like Epaphras was--are not our exclusive property to claim.  Paul mentions that Epaphras has been a dedicated and devoted servant-leader, but not just for the community in Colossae--also for other people and other places, too.  The people of Colossae can be thankful for Epaphras, but they can't claim his as "theirs alone."  The churches in Laodicea and Hierapolis have been blessed by his hard work, as well, and they count for something too.  I get the feeling that Paul is reminding the Colossians, albeit in a friendly way, that like parents cooking dinner for all the children in the family, not just one, this Epaphras is here to help serve and lead everybody, not just their immediate group.  

We have a way of doing this with Jesus, too.  We treat grace like it's "my" private possession, or that saying "Jesus loves me" means you can't claim him, too.  We can be possessive little stinkers, can't we?  And then Jesus up and sends someone into our lives, like Epaphras was sent into the lives of these Colossians Christians, who reminds us once again that God's goodness and provision can't be hoarded.  We can never hold God's blessings in such a way that they can't leak out for anybody else--it's the other way around.  We are always held within the vast ocean of God's goodness that surrounds not only us, but everybody around us. When we realize that, we no longer have to be envious, fearful, or upset when someone else has something good happen in their lives.  We are free, at last, to simply be happy for them--knowing that in the Reign of God, ultimately all of our good is interconnected.

Today is a moment to be grateful, not only for the people or things that are directly good for you, but for the people and things God uses for others as well.  Today is a moment to practice seeing God's blessings, not as the object in our grip that must be held tightly in our grip, but more like the air in our lungs that also fills and surrounds us all over like an ocean... as something beyond our ability to hoard.  

Let's see what such a change in perspective does in our lives today.

Lord Jesus, help us to see the gifts you place in our lives as gifts for all, rather than our exclusive property.

Grown-Up Souls--March 10, 2021

Grown-Up Souls--March 10, 2021

"Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you. He is always wrestling in his prayers on your behalf, so that you may stand mature and fully assured in everything that God wills." [Colossians 4:12]

It's a humbling thing, isn't it, to leave yourself open enough to let someone else pray for you.  It's both an honor, in that someone cares about you enough that you would be on their minds to pray for you... and at the same time humbling, in that someone else can see needs in your life that you might not have recognized.

This verse does both at the same time.  It's a beautiful think to consider that someone else was praying so hard and so fiercely for the Christians in Colossae that it's like "wrestling."  That suggests someone else as your advocate, as your champion, as your support--fighting for you, speaking up for you, using their voice for your well-being.  How amazing to be prayed for that way!

And at the same time, what a humbling thing to get to overhear what Epaphras had been so diligently praying for for the Colossians:  that they would be mature and grounded in God's will.  It's not for money or success or power or a bigger house.  It's not even church-growth, the way we usually think of church growth: Paul doesn't say that Epaphras prayed they'd get a hundred new members in the next three months, or that their offerings would grow enough for them to build a gymnasium and coffee shop for their members.  Instead, the prayer is for maturity.  It is a prayer for them to become--or to remain--spiritual grown-ups.

Imagine it for a moment.  Someone else being so focused, so concerned, that you would be brought to maturity in faith that they wrestle over it--that they are up nights and giving up sleep for you, and that of all the things they could spend their energy on, they dedicate themselves to you... and your coming to maturity.  That sure makes it sound like it's important.  

So often, our prayers for others (when we can get ourselves out of the habit of centering ourselves and my individual wish-list) focus on their physical health.  We pray for cures for sickness, food for the hungry, strength for doctors and nurses and such--but, wow, I honestly have a hard time remembering the last time I prayed for someone else to be granted maturity in their faith.  Surely it's been even longer since I dared to ask something like that of someone else--we don't really want to ask someone else to pray for us to be mature, do we, because that sounds like an admission that we each have some growing up to do.  And nobody wants to admit their immaturity.

For that matter, we do seem to be living in a time that doesn't just allow immaturity in our character, but almost seems to revel in it, celebrate it, and often praise examples of it.  We teach our children (in theory) not to resort to bullying or petty name-calling, and then we end up turning glorifying the public figures who are rude jerks and immature name-callers, or we give them a pass for doing it.  We can't help but get baited and drawn into petty arguments on social media when we know better--and when we know that the person baiting you isn't looking to attain truth, but just to argue and try out their same tired one-liner they heard from their favorite talking head on the airwaves.  We look down on the people who listen carefully and think measuredly before they speak, as though they aren't "tough" enough or "strong" enough, when maybe they are really just the ones who are adult enough not to shoot first and ask questions later.  And for us as people who live in such a time and culture, it seems almost surprising to hear a prayer for maturity as something so urgent as to require "wrestling" in prayer.

But that's all just part of how we are called to be different, isn't it?  Followers of Jesus are called to seek after a different wish-list than the world may be used to.  Instead of striving for our own wealth and power, our own political advantage, or our own leg-up in life, we're called to be the kind of people who pray for other people's needs with such passion that the best word to describe it "wrestling."  And we're called to pray, not just for a smooth recovery from surgery or a safe flight on a plane, but for others to be brought to maturity from being childish.  We are going to look and sound weird, honestly, if we are going to be people like that.  The world will wonder, if they overhear us at all, why we aren't just making divine wishes for our own self-interest--larger paychecks, easier work-weeks, or whatever--and instead why we spend ourselves so intensely seeking for the needs of other people... and for their maturity, at that.  

What do you think it will look like when you are more fully mature in Christ?  What things that you struggle with now will no longer be a worry for you?  What are ways you can see and feel the pull toward childishness in yourself--and what would it look like to open yourself up to someone else enough to ask them to help you to grow, to pray for you, and to aid you in becoming more mature?  What could happen if you and I dared to ask other people to help us to recognize our blind-spots--the places in our character where we can't see our jagged edges or the ways we harm others--and to ask others to help us to see, change, and address them?  What kind of people could we become if we dared to ask others to pray for our maturity... and then lived daily as people who are being prayed for into spiritual adulthood?

I want to find out, don't you?  Let's dare.

Lord God, bring us into maturity, past our childish ways, and into new depths of knowing you.