Hush

Why is it that some moments and some places just seem to call for quiet?  There are times when loud voices just seem out of place, offensive, insensitive.  When even speaking at all seems like telling an off-color joke at church, like tromping muddy rain boots across clean white carpets, farm boots in a ballroom.  Like ... well, like something that makes you shiver.  

There must have been a lot of shivering on the first Holy Saturday.  Which, I am sure, felt anything but holy to those who had to endure it.  The silence had to weigh upon them, like an unbearable burden that nonetheless had to be borne.  Trudging through the hush like waist deep in mud, every movement an effort, every action a strain.  

Every beat of their hearts pounded out the wrongness of all that had come to be in the past few days.  Every unspoken word that died on their lips shouted at the cruelty of the world they now reluctantly had to inhabit.  Every tear that rolled unbidden down numb faces bore silent witness to an inner agony of body and soul.  

The hush was a shield that kept the broken reality at arms length.  It was a full body armor that shut out those who couldn’t possibly understand; a cave within which to lick wounds too raw to expose to the elements.  It was protection as well as the pain of emptiness, it was small comfort in an experience of discomfort.  

We are uncomfortable with silence, even when that is all we have.  We feel inadequate in the face of the hush.  “I just didn’t know what to say,” we complain, we confess.  We wanted to fill the silence, but didn’t have any words.  

On the other hand, there is silence and there is silence.  There is silence that hurts, the beats down, that reveals inadequacies and there is silence that heals, that gathers up, that binds hearts.  Easter comes in silence.  Don’t think so?  Take a look.

Matthew 28:1-10  After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb.  2 And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it.  3 His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow.  4 For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men.  5 But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified.  6 He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay.  7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples, 'He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.' This is my message for you."  8 So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.  9 Suddenly Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him.  10 Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me." 

Matthew says the women went to see.  No, carrying of baskets of spices, no task awaiting them, no conversation about the weight of the stone that covered the entrance to his tomb.  They went, with silence clinging to them, to see.  To see if this terrible dream was in fact reality.  To see if all they had come to believe in was now rubble.  To see the stone of death and darkness so that they could dash their hopes against those rocks.  

Matthew the seismologist says there was yet another earthquake.  Were they standing there before the tomb weeping in the silence when the ground began to shake?  Did they see that figure, that embodied light, roll back the stone as though it had no more substance than a dream?   And did he, she, it then proceed to sit on it like a wrestler announcing victory over vanquished foes?  When he spoke did it sound like lightning slashing through the air?  Did her voice make their hair stand on end?

“I know you are looking for Jesus who was crucified.”  Were they?  Were they looking for him?  Or were they hoping not to see him?  Or were they just putting one foot in front of the other, trying to find a starting point for the rest of their lives?  But then you can see their brows furrow in confusion as the glowing figure announces that they’ve come to the wrong place.  There’s no one here by that description, he tells them.  No one lying decaying on a slab of stone that you might have at one time recognized, that you might have at one time loved with your whole being.  No, not at this address.

But wait, he grins into their confusion, he left a forwarding order.  He left an invitation, she smiles toward them.  First of all, take a look, since I can tell you aren’t with me yet, then go, gather up the gang, and get on the road.  He’s on his way.  The one you came to pay your respects to, the one you thought was lying on a stone slab behind a rock door, that one is up and about and on his way.

And they haven’t said a word.  Did you notice that?  In all this wondrous encounter, the silence still grips them.  They stumble away from the lightning clad being and start to hightail it out of there.  Going to tell, as they were told, perhaps.  But just getting away from a place of death that wasn’t anymore toward a place of hope they thought they’d lost.  But they didn’t take two steps, maybe three, who’s counting? And a suddenly happened.  Suddenly Jesus.  Suddenly death no longer had the last word.  Suddenly the end wasn’t the end.  Suddenly the certainties of living in this world were no longer so certain.  So they did the only thing that made any sense in that moment.  They fell down.  No, wait, there’s more.  They fell down and grabbed hold and they held on for dear life.  Or they held on to dear life.  The life that had been with them until it was nailed so cruelly to a cross and left to die along the side of a road.  The life that had defined them, had remade them, had claimed them.  That’s the life they clung to on that dusty road that first Easter morning.  And they worshiped.  Him, they worshiped Him.

But what did they say?  What hymns did they sing, what prayers did they pray?  What anthems rang out on that cemetery road, what sermons were proclaimed to the feet of one who died yet lives?  Nothing.  Well, nothing was recorded.  It could have been babbling, or it could have eloquent.  It could have been remembered psalms and prayers, it could have been impromptu praise.  Or, it could have been silence.  The hush of wonder and awe.

Why is it that some moments and some places just seem to call for quiet?  Because words fail us.  As much as we rely on them, as much as we need them to put shape to our experiences and to invite others to know us and be with us, there are times when they fail us.  When there aren’t words to define, to border, to shape our experience so all we are left with is silence.  But not a silence that drags us down, that burdens our hearts.  This is a silence, this is a hush that lifts our spirits and ushers us into the presence - no, the Presence -  of the Holy.  

Oh, there is a time for shouting, and it is right around the corner.  They will get to their feet in a moment and will run with the wind shouting the disciples’ names and the news they’ve been given.  But for now, in this moment... be still and know.  Hush.

Shalom, 

Derek

Parade

I've never been in a parade. Watched a few up close, tuned in the Macy’s Parade on Thanksgiving (which, by the way, my brother was in this year, or last year.  He was the really tall one walking behind the Sesame Street float.  Couldn’t miss him.  If you were watching.  For the couple of microseconds that they showed the people walking behind the Sesame Street float.  He was wearing a hat. Remember?  No?  Oh, well.) I’ve never been in a parade.

Doesn’t bother me all that much.  I mean who wants all the attention.  The adulation of the crowds, the cheers and the waves, the throng lining the streets, wanting to be you.  In that moment you are the center of attention, the brightest star in the firmament, the man of the hour, the woman of the year.  Who wouldn’t want to be in a parade?

Do you think that was why he did it?  For the attention, for the adulation.  Knowing what was to come, did he just want to soak up a little bit of honor before subjected to the shame and suffering that was to be his lot?  Who could blame him if it was the reason?  And yet it doesn’t seem quite right, that even here on this threshold, the one who would soon be on his knees washing the dust of the city streets of the feet of those called his followers, would be so self-serving on that first Palm Sunday.

We’ve come around to the parade again.  That odd little celebration marked by palm leaves and shouting in church.  Maybe if you are one of those go all out kind of churches you even bring in a donkey to parade up and down the aisle of your sanctuary, while the trustees keep a wary eye on the trailing end, just in case.  

Here is what we’re remembering this weekend.  Here is Matthew’s remembrance of what took place that day.

Matthew 21:1-11  When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples,  2 saying to them, "Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me.  3 If anyone says anything to you, just say this, 'The Lord needs them.' And he will send them immediately. "  4 This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet, saying,  5 "Tell the daughter of Zion, Look, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey."  6 The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them;  7 they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them.  8 A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.  9 The crowds that went ahead of him and that followed were shouting, "Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest heaven!"  10 When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, "Who is this?"  11 The crowds were saying, "This is the prophet Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee." 

So many questions come to mind as we read this story.  Was this prearranged or was it somehow mystical, or did the disciples commit grand donkey larceny?  If the crowd was really large as Matthew says, then who was the “whole city” asking the identity question from the fringes of the parade?  Or was this the first instance of a “preacher estimate”?  And how did Jesus manage to sit on a donkey and its colt at the same time?  What the crowd drawn by some sort of divine balancing act?  And did the home owners lining the impromptu parade route complain about the crowd pulling branches off the trees?

More importantly, however, the real question was did they get it?  This was a message Jesus was trying to send.  Matthew got it.  It may have taken him some years after the fact, but he got it.  That’s why he dredges up Zechariah’s words to help us get the point.  The king who comes, not on a war horse, but on a donkey of peace.  Did they get it?

They shouted Hosanna, that implies they got it.  Hosanna translates as “Save us!”  So maybe they got it.  Matthew says the crowd was large.  Maybe they got it, or wanted to anyway.  But then the city was clueless, who is this?  And maybe the city and the crowd were marching side by side, maybe the crowd was large but was made up of followers and city dwellers, some who got it many who didn’t.  Maybe they were marching along waving their branches and shouting Hosanna (which scholars tell us came to mean Hooray, or even Howdy by that time, not the prayer of petition that it once meant. Sort of like the word Goodbye, which was originally a blessing - God be with you - but now is nothing more than a wave, a signal, a cipher), but their brows were furrowed and they would turn to the one beside them and say “why are doing this again?”  And maybe the response would be a shrug.  Maybe it would be “That’s Jesus, the guy from Galilee.”  “Oh, right” they would say pretending to know who in the world Jesus from Galilee was.

Did they get it?  It is hard to say.  One thing Matthew is clear about is that disaster was right around the corner.  If there was any hope that Jesus was using this event to soak up a little good will, it would be shattered by the very next verse.  The parade didn’t end with handshakes all around and a few high fives for a job well done.  No, it trundled all the way from the gates of the city to the temple where Jesus turned over some tables and knocked over some dove cages.  It ended with a rumble.  The self proclaimed king of peace engages in an act of violence that left them shocked and confused.  What peace was he announcing?  What peace was he bringing?  And if you are going to strike a blow, why not strike against the foreign oppressors and not the economic machinery of our own people?  

Especially when that machinery will strike back.  Wouldn’t it have been better to keep a low profile?  Couldn’t he have just left a note, made a speech, wrote an editorial for the Sunday Jerusalem Times about the proper use of the Temple?  Wouldn’t that have been better?  Safer, anyway.  Why did he have to provoke?

All kinds of questions come to our minds when we pay attention to the parade on Palm Sunday.  Questions which, if you join us for worship this weekend, we won’t even attempt to answer.  Caught you with that one, didn’t I?  No, this is a listening Sunday.  And experiencing Sunday, not an answer Sunday.  Come and hear what the parade turns into.  Come and hear what steps are taken once he dismounts that donkey.  Come and pick up a branch and see if you want to walk along in this parade, come and see if you have it in you to shout Hosanna, or if the word gets caught in your throat.  Or mixed up with another word, one of frustration and anger, one of despair and hopelessness.  

Listen to his story and to yours.  “Who is this?”

I love a parade.

Shalom, 

Derek

Always

A teaching day today.  So now I’ve made the trip to Indy and back, sharing with a group of pastors exploring this thing called preaching.  It was a good day, a long day, but a good day.  I am often inspired by those training for ministry.  No matter their age, and many of them are second career and some are even older than me.  My daughter would have trouble with that last statement.  “Older than you?” I can hear her exclaim, incredulous.   Yes, it is possible.  Anyway, I enjoy and often, as I said I am inspired by them, their calling, their passion, their drive.  Often.  Not always.

Always is a hard word.  In many ways an inhuman word.  Always.  Who says that?  How do we guarantee always in a temporary kind of world?  Who knows what might be next.  I heard tell some years ago of a wedding couple that wanted to change the vows from until death do us part to “as long as love shall last.”  Now it is possible that they meant always.  That they were confident in that love.  It was an Irving Berlin kind of love (yes, Maddie I AM old) “I’ll be loving you Always / with a love that’s true Always / when the things you’ve planned / need a helping hand / I will understand Always.”   

Maybe that is what they meant when they wanted to change the vows to as long as love will last.  Maybe they were proclaiming an Irving Berlin kind of love.  Always.  Too old for you?  How about a Jon Bon Jovi love?  “And I will love you, baby - Always / And I'll be there forever and a day - Always / I'll be there till the stars don't shine / Till the heavens burst and / The words don't rhyme / And I know when I die, you'll be on my mind / And I'll love you - Always.”

Either way, Berlin or Bon Jovi, it is still a big word.  A romantic word, not a very practical word.  Always.  Not a very doable word.  Always.  For now, that fits, that works.  For a while, we can handle that.  But who has the capacity to say always?  Not me.  And, I suspect, not you.  Am I right?

Philippians 4:4-8  Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.  5 Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near.  6 Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.  8 Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.  

Dang it Paul.  Why’d you have throw that word in there?  That unreachable, impossible word?  That always word.  Take that word out and this is a nice little passage about being happy, about finding your joy, about walking on the sunny side of life.  It’s got a nice beat and you can dance to it.  A spoonful of sugar, all that sort of stuff.  But, no you weren’t happy with that.  You wanted something more, something deeper.  You wanted something, (dare I say it?), eternal.

Cover one eye and read this without that scary word.  Just for a moment.  “Rejoice in the Lord.”  Well, of course!  Who would say no to that.  Again I say rejoice.  Sure, keep reminding me, I need the boost.  I also need reminded of the source of this joy - rejoice in the Lord.  Certainly, I can do that.  I have done that.  I remember a time when there was joy in the Lord, in worship, in fellowship.  Sure, it happens.  Been there, done that.

And then, Paul says, let it spill out.  That joy in the Lord is not just for you.  Not just so that you get a boost, a lift, a skip in your step.  Let it come out.  “Let your gentleness be known to everyone.”  Gentleness?  Hmm.  Not sure that’s the best word, actually.  A good word, but not the best.  Doesn’t quite convey what Paul is getting at here.  Patience, some say, forbearance if anyone uses that word anymore, magnanimity if you want a real tongue twister.  Peterson’s The Message says, “Make it as clear as you can to all you meet that you’re on their side, working with them and not against them.”  I like that.  An earlier paraphrase said “Let all the world know that you’ll meet them half-way.”  It’s about hospitality, about welcome, about inclusion, about the fact that we are the judge, we don’t point fingers, we don’t accuse, we dropped our stones long ago, even since Jesus told us that only the sinless can throw them.  We aren’t looking to pick fights, to call names.  What we have to share is joy.  Joy in the Lord.  Let your gentleness be known to everyone.  Everyone? Paul almost slipped in an always there, didn’t he?  Everyone.  Hmmm.

Don’t worry about anything.  Yeah, ok, thanks Paul.  But no thanks.  I mean, how in the world are we going to do that?  It’s one thing to know we aren’t supposed to worry, but how do we stop?  And then because we can’t stop we end up worrying about worrying.  

I guess that’s why there is a comma there and not a period.  “Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”  Don’t worry, says Paul, but get on your knees.  Don’t worry, but pour it out.  Don’t worry but beg and plead and pound on the doorways of heaven with both fists, even as you know - not hope, not assume, but know - that you are heard and that answers are already all around you when you open your eyes again and put one foot in front of the other.  Don’t worry because you don’t have time to worry, you are so busy bending God’s divine ear.  Don’t worry because your life is now a prayer and the answers are coming fast and furious and surprising.

Don’t worry because from somewhere comes this sense that maybe, just maybe you are not alone in the universe.  This sense that maybe you do have a place, a home, an identity, an existence right here and right now that is meaningful, useful, transformed and transforming.  From somewhere, who knows where, God, it must be, comes a peace that even on your best days you can’t define or even describe.  It just is, passing all understanding, or your understanding anyway.  Where does it come from?  Stay tuned, that’s our Eastertide theme.

But for now.  Choose joy.  Rejoice in the Lord.  Always.  We’ve come back to that.  It is still there.  We can only squint it away for so long.  We can only ignore it for a time.  Rejoice in the Lord, Always.  Maybe we could negotiate with Paul.  Rejoice in the Lord, when it is convenient.  Rejoice in the Lord when we’ve got the time.  When we’re in the mood, when the world hasn’t taken yet another sideswipe at my confidence.  Rejoice in the Lord when I’ve run out of excuses not to.  Rejoice in the Lord ... Always.  Always?

How in the world do we do that?  Focus on the next one?  No, focus more deeply on this one.  Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.  Think on, dwell on, meditate on, take your cue from, be obsessed with these things.  Look at the list: True, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent, praise-worthy.  What is that?  Who is that?  Implied in the directive is the confidence that there is enough of this out there in the world to fill us up.  And not only fill us up but give us joy.  Real joy, In the Lord joy.  Always joy.  Paul says go find Christ in the world.  Go find the one you love, the one who loves you, focus on that and you will know joy.

The fruit of the Spirit love that then brings us into joy, the joy of the Lord, always.  Always.

Always.  

Shalom, 

Derek 

Navigating the Darkness

OK, you know me.  I like a laugh as much as the next guy.  Maybe more, depending on who the next guy is.  I enjoy a joke, a funny story, a blatant irony.  I do, I really do.  But this snowing on Saturday thing is starting to get to me.  I know, it will probably be gone before nightfall, but still.  It’s just the idea of it, the sheer repetitive annoyance that is wearing me down.

Comparatively speaking, no big deal.  Especially now that we are into spring.  The snow won’t last, the danger will be fleeting.  Sunshine is on the way, sixty degrees come Monday, they tell us.  And even if they are wrong this time, it won’t be long.  You can count on it.  Sure as sunrise.

Sure as sunrise.  There aren’t many things more certain than that.  Even when you can’t see it, you know it is there.  And sometimes the knowing is all you need.

Psalm 30:1-12   

I will extol you, O LORD, for you have drawn me up, 

and did not let my foes rejoice over me.  

2 O LORD my God, I cried to you for help, 

and you have healed me.  

3 O LORD, you brought up my soul from Sheol, 

restored me to life from among those gone down to the Pit.  

4 Sing praises to the LORD, O you his faithful ones, 

and give thanks to his holy name.  

5 For his anger is but for a moment; 

his favor is for a lifetime. 

Weeping may linger for the night, 

but joy comes with the morning.  

6 As for me, I said in my prosperity, 

"I shall never be moved."  

7 By your favor, O LORD, 

you had established me as a strong mountain; 

you hid your face; 

I was dismayed.  

8 To you, O LORD, I cried, 

and to the LORD I made supplication:  

9 "What profit is there in my death, 

if I go down to the Pit? 

Will the dust praise you? 

Will it tell of your faithfulness?  

10 Hear, O LORD, and be gracious to me! 

O LORD, be my helper!"  

11 You have turned my mourning into dancing; 

you have taken off my sackcloth 

and clothed me with joy,  

12 so that my soul may praise you and not be silent. 

O LORD my God, I will give thanks to you forever.  

OK, I put it in there that way to remind us that the Psalm is a poem.  Or a song.  It is a work of art expressing a multitude of emotions that range from the highest of highs to disturbingly low lows.  Which seems to be the human condition, and least this human anyway.

First of all there is that joy that caused me to select this Psalm for our Lenten reflections.  We are walking through the Fruit of the Spirit that Paul describes in Galatians for all of 2014.  And this Lent we are considering the incongruity of Joy in the midst of our penitence.  Or, as Evelyn Underhill names it, Joy on the Night Shift.  

Psalm 30 gives us two takes on joy, it seems to me.  There is the joy that is equated with dancing in verse eleven.  The antithesis of mourning and repentance.  Once the sackcloth comes off, once the mourning is done, then there is joy.  Transformation, redemption.  

The other joy reference sounds different to my ears.  “Weeping my linger for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”  Similar to verse eleven, but different, perhaps.  In the later verse it seems a done deal, the joy has come and we only look back on the sackcloth, we are dancing and we look back on the mourning.  But the earlier reference seems like we are still waiting.  Joy comes, not joy is here in this morning light.  It may be night time word, a darkness hope - confident, but still a hope.  A sustaining hope to be sure.  A light in that dark night by which to navigate.  The promise of joy sustains.

But how do we hold onto that hope?  How do we have confidence in joy, even in the midst of struggle?  Well, the psalmist tells us, not by our own strength.  Certainly we have those moments, we are on the top of the world, when all is going our way, when prosperity is the order of the day.  But despite our claim that this is they way it will always be, that we shall not be moved from this lofty position, movement is always in our future.  When we push God away, God is gracious enough to go.  And then we fall from the perch of security we have erected for ourselves.

How do we hold on to hope?  Not by bargaining, not by telling God how much God needs us.  “Will the dust praise you?”  Well, Jesus told those who thought his supporters were making too much noise on that first Palm Sunday that even if these were silent, the stones would cry out.  So, I guess the answer is yes, the dust can praise.  As difficult as it is for us to comprehend, God doesn’t need us.  Creation can praise, the heavenly host can serve.  God doesn’t need us.  Which makes the fact that God wants us - to praise, to serve, to love - all that much more incredible.  

So, how do we hold onto hope?  How do we reach for joy even in the darkest night when our eyes are full of tears?  Well, our over emotional psalmist gives us a hint.  When the writer moves from looking inward to looking outward, then we find a clue about how to navigate through the darkness.  When the text moves from me and I to us we are on to something.  “Sing praises to God’s name, O you faithful ones, and give thanks to His name.”  Gratitude.  That is the key to holding on to hope.  Because gratitude takes vision, takes the ability to see beyond your self and your own circumstance.  It takes the ability to recognize the interconnectedness of the world in which we live.  How we are woven together in a glorious whole, dependent upon one another and upon the one who gives us life.  

Let it snow.  That’s my interpretation of Psalm 30.  Let it snow.  Because spring is coming.  The sun will shine.  Even though I can’t see it or feel it right now.  I know it.  Even though I walk in darkness, I can find my way because I know the light.

Shalom, 

Derek 

A Better Resurrection

I’m back.  Did you miss me?  No, you don’t have answer that.  I did get a comment or two from folks who wondered why they didn’t get a Late Night Bible Study last week, but for most of you I assume it was a momentary blip.  Let me explain.  I was not preaching last weekend, and I was leading a retreat on Friday and Saturday.  So, I just didn’t fit it in.  And I almost had to say the same this week.

I’m late, I’m late.  Feeling like the White Rabbit from the classic Alice in Wonderland is a common occurrence for me. OK, I had a mentor gathering this morning early.  Mentee gathering, I was the mentor.  These are folks entering into the process into ministry with the United Methodist Church and I am working with them.  Yes, please, pray for them.  Luckily it’s not just me, there is someone else alongside to keep me from wandering off the beaten path and sending them running for the hills.  So, that is how my day started. 

Then I had to go work with a group who is thinking about visual art in the new worship service (which is going to launch in six Sundays!).  We thought about worship, we wandered the building, and then I left them to get to it, while I came home to work on this.

I got home to a hungry college kid home for spring break and unable to find a thing to eat in the house.  And the crazy dogs who were needing some attention. And a voicemail telling me that one of our dear saints is in the ICU with a stroke.  

I made a passing comment during our Ash Wednesday service a couple of weeks ago that I was considering giving up preaching for Lent.  It was a joke at the time.  Now I’m not so sure.  Maybe there is a message in this.  Maybe life is just too busy, or too complicated, or too distracted to spend time on stuff like this.  Maybe it would be a better use of everyone’s time to just sit in silence and collect yourself, so that you can get back out there into the fray with a little bit of equilibrium.  That would be gift enough, wouldn’t it?  Just a pat on the back and a “there, there” would keep us going, don’t you think?

No.  I don’t think.  And I’m not saying that just because I’m the preacher.  We need more than that to keep running this race.  I need more than that.  And, frankly, my life ain’t all that bad.  At least I haven’t been sawn in half lately.

Hebrews 11:32 - 12:2  And what more should I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets--  33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions,  34 quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.  35 Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, in order to obtain a better resurrection.  36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment.  37 They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented--  38 of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.  

      39 Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised,  40 since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.  

     12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us,  2 looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.  

Makes you wonder what we’re complaining about, doesn’t it?  Yeah, I’m busy.  Yeah, there are a lot of demands on my time.  So, why is it that we struggle more with our stuff than these heros of the faith did with theirs?  How did they conquer kingdoms and administer justice when I can’t get people to agree on a paint color for the sanctuary?  How do they obtain promises and shut the mouths of lions, how did they quench raging fires when I struggle with family with different points of view on proper care for aging parents?  And what in the world is a better resurrection?  I mean, resurrection is resurrection, wouldn’t you think?  The reference is to Elijah and the widow of Zarephath or Elisha and the Shunammite woman, both of whom lost only sons and then had the prophet raise them from the dead.  What else could you ask for?

Reminds me of the story of the woman yelling on the beach that her son was drowning in the ocean, only to have the lifeguard dive in and swim out to rescue him.  When the boy was brought back the mother glares at the lifeguard and says, “when he went in he had a hat.”

What is this better resurrection?  What is it that these giants of the Old Testament didn’t get?  This incompleteness, this promise unfulfilled, and how in the world is that fair, given all that they lived through?  And do we, who may or may not be wandering about in the skin of goats, also miss this better resurrection?  Is this one of those falling through the cracks between the Testaments things?  Too bad for those guys and gals, they had the misfortune to be born before Jesus and therefore, well, tough luck! 

Or is there something bigger going on here?  Look to Jesus, that’s what the writer of the letter tells us to do.  Look to Jesus, the pioneer (the one who did it first, this better resurrection thing) and perfecter (the one who did it right) of our faith.  Looking at Jesus we see what sustained him on this journey, through the darkness of the night shift.  “Who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross.”  For joy.  Not that the cross was joy, but that joy was within reach, even on the cross.  That joy was visible even in the darkness of that suffering. 

That’s what we are contemplating this Lenten season, you remember, joy on the night shift.  Not the loud exuberance of celebration, but the quieter sustaining confidence that you are not alone, even in the darkest night.  It is the trust that says even if you can’t see beyond the end of your hurt, God is with you and will make you stronger because of that hurt, will hold you closer, will carry you through.  It is the joy of knowing you are loved, even if the evidence seems to contradict that truth.  It is the joy that comes from Jesus.  Not from us, not from the situations we find ourselves in, not from circumstances.  It comes from Him.

That’s why it is a better resurrection.  Two things: first of all, this resurrection is into eternity.  Those boys raised by the Old Testament prophets died again.  Maybe the timing was better, maybe the moms were gone by then, maybe they were able to live out the potential of their lives, but they still died again.  

Secondly, that resurrection was a singular experience.  The better one is corporate.  Communal.  “God provided something better, so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.”  That’s what they didn’t get, us.  The community of faith, the body of Christ.  Hebrews tells us that none of us know joy completely until we all know joy.  That as long as you are wandering lost in the darkness of your own brokenness, I too am broken.  And as long as I stumble in despair you cannot be perfected in your faith.  This joy that comes from Christ, binds us together, makes us seek out the lost not to pass judgement but to love them into relationship.  Into the family.  Into the kingdom.  The same one we are trying to live into.  To run into, listening to the cheers of those who have gone before, even as we cheer on those who will follow us.  

So, now I’m wondering, are there brackets in this tournament?  Go team.  

Shalom, 

Derek

Buzz Kill

“Every Party has a pooper and that’s what we invited you for.  Party pooper!  Party pooper!!”

Ever had that sung at you?  Yeah, been there.  Taunted by those you thought were friends because you wouldn’t go along.  Or maybe you just raised a question about the appropriate of the actions in which the group was engaged.  Or maybe you just didn’t feel like it, maybe it wasn’t a judgement call against anyone, but simply you just weren’t in the mood.  And the wrath of the gang came crashing down on you.  “Party pooper!”  Or in a little more modern parlance we say “you’re a buzz kill!”

The buzz, that’s what we’re after these days.  Whether the buzz is the center of attention, being talked about; or that is the excitement of doing something dangerous, or difficult; or that euphoric feeling that comes from life or a variety of substances, legal or otherwise; it is all about the buzz.  And the worst thing we can do to anyone is kill that buzz.

We Christians have a reputation of being a buzz kill.  The rather sobering read from a few years ago titled “UnChristian” reminded us all just how the world views us.  This was a research project done by a couple of students from Wheaton College in Illinois, asking young adults who did not consider them a part of the faith what their view of Christians was.  A buzz kill is the nicest interpretation we can receive from this work.

OK, there are some buzzes that probably need killing, I admit that.  But after working our way through the fruit of the spirit that is love, it pains me that we aren’t first and foremost known as those who love.  That we don’t put forward the face to the world that says we love first.  We stand in the place of the One who loved first, the One who came because of love, who lived because of love, who died out of love for us and the whole world.  Why isn’t that our lead?  Why isn’t that our distinctive mark, our reputation? This is what  Paul urged the church to do and be.  Again and again, he called us, as John does in the letters, as Jesus, for heaven’s sake, calls us to do and to be.

It was this call from Christ himself that draws us here now.  But, for those who may be keeping track, aren’t we moving on from love?  Isn’t this a change of season?  Aren’t we ready for joy?  Well, I certainly hope so!  But what I read, both in the scriptures themselves and in a variety of commentaries and reflections on these fruit of Spirit ideas, is that if we don’t grasp the love thing, the rest won’t fall into place.  In other words we first need to have some understanding of love, some experience of love, some recognition that we are loved and that we can love in return.  Without that we aren’t open enough for joy - or for peace and patience and kindness and generosity and faithfulness and gentleness and self control, for that matter.

But, praise God, once we have an inkling - not a full comprehension, but an inkling (the size of a mustard seed, let’s say) then joy comes rushing in, and takes up residence.  And cannot be removed.  Believe it or not.  Take a look.

John 16:17-22   Then some of his disciples said to one another, "What does he mean by saying to us, 'A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me'; and 'Because I am going to the Father'?"  18 They said, "What does he mean by this 'a little while'? We do not know what he is talking about."  19 Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, "Are you discussing among yourselves what I meant when I said, 'A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me'?  20 Very truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice; you will have pain, but your pain will turn into joy.  21 When a woman is in labor, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world.  22 So you have pain now; but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

Uh, wait.  Up there it seemed like you were talking about us being a buzz kill.  But here it seems to talking about someone buzz killing us.  What’s the deal?  How about, I messed up?  I genuinely intended to write about us losing our buzz, about all the things that happen to us to cause us to lose our grip on what is good about our faith, about all the things that squeeze the joy out of our lives.  At least that is what I intended to write.  And then I read the passage again.  “No one will take your joy from you.”

I mean, if that is the promise, then we can’t really spend the time whining about those who steal our joy, can we?  Unless we want to say that Jesus got it wrong.  Which isn’t a position I want to hold very often.  Like, at all, come to think about it.  Except that I know the experience of having my joy stolen.  I’ve been there.  So, was He wrong, or is there something I’m not yet getting?

Maybe it is like the disciples in this passage.  They weren’t getting it, they didn’t have a clue what he was telling them, and they were flopping around like fish out of water trying to figure it out.  Doing everything except asking Him apparently.  Luckily He is perceptive that way, or has really good hearing, or reads blank faces and furrowed brows.  Whatever.  He tells them that there will be pain now, there will be grief now, but when we see him again, then we will have joy.  So, we’re still waiting.  The joy hasn’t come yet.  This is Kingdom joy, this is Someday joy.  It isn’t here and to expect us to have it now is unrealistic.  Isn’t it?

“When I see you again.”  Did that mean at the end?  When the trumpet sounds and the dead rise from the grave?  Or when One dead rose from the grave?  He saw them again after he went away, didn’t He?  And when He saw them, they became different people.  Still carrying the wounds of their experience, they launched a movement that changed the world.  Because it was no longer about them.  It was about the One they wanted to share with the world.

That is where joy comes from, the kind of joy that can’t be taken away, from surrender.  It comes from recognizing that the true center of all that there is and all that there will be is not us, but is something that leans in our direction.  And all we want to do is grab hold of that glory.  All we want to do is worship.  All we want to do is love.  Because all we know is that we are loved.  And we know that with a confidence that no one can take away.

Not pain, not grief, not suffering of any kind, nothing that happens to us in this world can take away that confidence, that contentment, that driving knowledge that love is all we need, indeed love is all there is - love that drives us out of ourselves into the lives of those around us, love that gives the world a color that can only be seen through the eyes of the beloved, love that sees beyond the surface into something deeper, something more real.

That’s where joy is found, in loving like that, not holding back, not saving some for later, but encountering the world the way God did when God sent the only Son, God so loved the world.  And if that is how we are to engage the world, we ought to repent when we are experienced by way too many as buzz killers.  If anything we should be buzz enhancers.  Or maybe, more safely, we can say we are joy givers.  At least I hope we can be.  Not worrying that we might lose it, since no one can take your joy.  Thus saith ...

Shalom,

Derek

Shining in the Dark Places

Last Sunday afternoon, I was due to be in Indianapolis in preparation for a clergy conference that I was helping to lead.  I went a little early so that I could stop in the hospital to visit Ron and his family as they sat and waited for his beloved wife Millie to breathe her last breaths.  The ventilator had been turned off earlier that day and while she was breathing on her own, everyone knew it wouldn’t be long.  

It was one of those terribly tragic stories, a relatively minor treatment, a nerve block, an injection, and something went horribly wrong.  Almost immediately she was gone, no brain function, massive heart attack, she lingered on the machinery for a few days with the wild hope that something would change.  But it didn’t.  We celebrated her life this morning, even as our hearts were breaking and our minds were reeling from the suddenness of it all.  

When I walked into that room last Sunday it was filled with family and friends who were stunned into an uneasy silence.  The love and support in the room was tangible in the touches and the whispers.  When we prayed together I could feel them all leaning into the Spirit, with sighs too deep for words and they clung to each other, and reached out to touch Millie, wanting to call her back, wanting to gather her up, but knowing that she was already in other hands.  

Ron asked about the weather, he’d been cooped up in that hospital for days and he wasn’t sure whether winter had passed into spring and he missed it.  The sun was shining, I reported.  The whole trip down it was almost too bright to see.  Really?, he responded, unbelieving.  And he wasn’t the only one struggling to comprehend that light.  There were others in the room who seemed just as dubious.  How can it be, they wanted to say, how can a light be shining when the world seems so dark?  

You’ve been there, so lost in a never-ending darkness that you doubted whether there was such a thing as light any more.  To speak of light, and hope and joy, seemed almost offensive, ringing hollow in the emptiness of your soul.  You’ve looked for straws to grasp, for signs of a Presence speaking of a tomorrow worth living for, and had occasion to doubt whether you would ever know love again.

The things that really matter seem frightfully elusive in this life.  It is no wonder we tend to cling too tightly to material things to find our meaning and purpose.  Things we can hold, things that will last, things we can pull out when the doubts come back. It is hard to hold on to love.  It is hard to snuggle up to hope.  It is almost impossible to stand confidently on grace.  Yet that is our call.  In light or in darkness we are called to hold on to hope.

This is Transfiguration Sunday.  You know event of the Transfiguration, don’t you?  That odd little moment on a mountain before Jesus began his journey into Jerusalem.  The special effects laden encounter with historical figures and a voice from above, that sent the inner circle of disciples straight to their knees with permanently furrowed brows and shoulders that wouldn’t shrug any more.  Shining faces and clothes that glowed, you remember.

Liturgically, Transfiguration serves as a hinge that lets us swing from the revealing of the light of Christ in the season of Epiphany to the journey of self-examination and sacrifice of the season of Lent.  It is a rest stop on the pilgrimage of following Christ from birth to life and ministry, to passion and death, and then, incredibly, resurrection and life eternal.  We pull off that highway and take time to climb a mountain, and see ... well, we see God.  

When planning for this Sunday, I assumed that everyone was confident and perhaps even a little bored with the Transfiguration.  After all I had covered this ground year after year for who knows how long.  So, I thought it would be good to approach it from a little different perspective.  I decided instead of telling the story again, we would take a look at the Epistle reading for this Sunday.  

2 Peter 1:16-21   For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.  17 For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, "This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased."  18 We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain.  19 So we have the prophetic message more fully confirmed. You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.  20 First of all you must understand this, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation,  21 because no prophecy ever came by human will, but men and women moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. 

There is some debate - because biblical scholars love nothing more than a good debate - as to whether this was actually written by the Apostle Peter.  All the usual objections, the timing isn’t right, the language doesn’t sound like Peter, etc. etc.  But the most interesting argument is that this depiction of the Transfiguration doesn’t sound like the ones in the Gospels.  And if it had been Peter, surely he would have included all those details, the glowing clothes, the magical appearances, his own offer to build tents for Jesus and Moses and Elijah to ... to take a nap in, or whatever.  

I’m not enough of an expert to say whether it was Peter or not, but I don’t find it difficult to believe that Peter wouldn’t be giving a complete account in this passage.  He had a specific purpose in these verses and it wasn’t recounting everything that happened on that mountain.  

He is dealing with doubt.  He is dealing with those who are beginning to question whether Jesus is really coming back, whether this Kingdom of God thing is really real or was just something we imagined while he was here among us.  Maybe this is a good as it gets.  Maybe this is all there is.  Maybe we were just fooling ourselves.  He is dealing with the darkness of unknowing, of being afraid, of experiencing loss and not knowing how to hope any more.

No, he says, Peter or his spokespersons, No, we didn’t make this up.  There was a moment, he says, where the mask of this world slipped a little bit and the light from the next one shone through.  There was a moment, he writes, when the doubts fled before the Presence, when hope rose in our hearts, when joy filled us and we knew - we didn’t wonder, we knew that he was who he said he was, and that we were his, not just for a moment, not just for now, but we were his for eternity.  And in that moment there was nothing I wanted more than that, to belong to him.  And nothing, not time, not fear, not loss or injury or doubt or darkness can take that away.  When you’ve heard the voice, you can live in the silence and still hope.

Memories?  No, much more than that.  We look back on the moments of pure joy, the encounters of profound love, the connection of mind heart, body and soul, and nothing, not even death can take that away from us.  In the dark places that this life seems too full of, a light is shining.  That Transfigured Presence is with us always. That living love, those saints who opened the door to eternity will never leave us.  

God bless you Millie.

Shalom, 

Derek