Armored Submission

I have a wedding this weekend.  In fact I’m here right now in my office at church instead of at home writing this.  It means things are out of sorts.  Not in the right place.  And who knows whether I’ll get this done before I need to go and do the necessary.  But I thought I’d give it a try.  Trying to while away the time as I wait.  

Oddly enough, the couple didn’t choose Ephesians 5 as the scripture for the wedding.  To say that it is contentious is an understatement.  But to say it is misunderstood?  Well, there is argument about that too.  And it’s not so much the interpretation that is a struggle, it is the application.  How do we live out this text?  Should we live out this text?  Or ought we just consign it to the dustbin of history?  A necessarily forgotten relic of a different age.  What am I talking about?

Ephesians 5:21-33 Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ. 22 Wives, be subject to your husbands as you are to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife just as Christ is the head of the church, the body of which he is the Savior. 24 Just as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be, in everything, to their husbands. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, 27 so as to present the church to himself in splendor, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind-- yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hates his own body, but he nourishes and tenderly cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh." 32 This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the church. 33 Each of you, however, should love his wife as himself, and a wife should respect her husband.

Oh, right, you’re thinking, that one.  That submissive bit.  We don’t like that word.  We don’t like it in general, but when applied to marriage it just seems to lead to all kinds of ... well ... abuse.  We want our daughters to be strong, to stand up, to make their own way, not to just surrender themselves to some man just because he’s a man.  It’s just not right.  Or so we think.  It doesn’t sit well with us.  So we move on.  

We’re finishing the letter this week in worship.  If you’re just getting on board, we have been tackling large chunks of scripture week by week on Sunday mornings.  Four weeks to read through six chapters of this most impressive letter.  Last week we ready chapter four verse one through chapter five verse twenty.  So this week we jump into this final chapter and a half, chapter 5 verse twenty-one through to the end, chapter six verse twenty-four.  Which conveniently allows us to skip these uncomfortable verses here at the beginning.  By the time we’ve read through, we forgot they were there.  We get carried away by Paul’s rhetoric, we climb the heights again and find ourselves suiting up for the real battle.  Not against flesh and blood, not against limited understandings and ancient ways of living in community.  No we battle against something far bigger, something more evil.  Paul calls them rulers, authorities.  Then he says the cosmic powers of this present darkness, the spiritual forces of darkness in the heavenly places.  Oh my.  No wonder we need armor, we need protection from this evil that threatens to overwhelm us.  

Ephesians 6:11-17 Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. 12 For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. 14 Stand therefore, and fasten the belt of truth around your waist, and put on the breastplate of righteousness. 15 As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace. 16 With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

We wrap up in the protection that God offers.  We hide behind God’s truth, our shared righteousness in Christ, we run to speak not of self but of the One who sends us, we hoist our faith to shield us from the consuming fires of living in a dangerous world, but we wear, on our heads, the crown of our lives, our salvation.  Our salvation.  Which is ... what exactly?  A ticket to a new world?  An admission into an exclusive club?  A get out of jail free card, a promise that everything that doesn’t make sense now will make sense someday?  What ... exactly?  

The helmet of salvation.  Wearing a helmet isn’t an easy thing.  Sometimes it limits vision.  Sometimes it feels like a weight.  It cramps one’s style, some say.  It looks silly for others, odd perhaps.  But it helps you know who you belong to.  There’s that logo on the side, the team mascot, the battalion you belong to, a sign and symbol that you belong to another.  You’ve submitted to another’s authority. 

Be subject to one another.  Why?  Because that’s how we learn to live.  By giving ourselves away. By loving.  We make a big deal out of the fact that Paul says women have to be subject to and men have to love.  Like it is something different.  But it isn’t.  Not really. To love is to be subject to.  To be subject to is to love.  Two sides of the same coin, and the model for it all is not us and our fleeting emotions that fade and scatter, but Christ.  Christ’s constancy, Christ’s care.  Love like Christ, Paul says to the husbands.  Love sacrificially, love by surrendering all, love by putting the object of your love first before self. Love like Christ.  And to the wives he says, be subject to the one who loves like Christ.  Give your all to that kind of loving, that kind of giving.  Give yourself to that sacrifice.  It’s not the love of any person that is worthy of that, but God’s love, Christ’s love as it is lived out in us.  Because we chose it.  We put on that helmet.  We lifted that shield, put on those shoes, strapped on that belt.   We’re polishing up the armor we wear over our hearts.  Making it shine so that when we look into it we see a reflection.  But it’s not our own face we see on that breastplate of righteousness, it’s His.  If we’re doing it right.  It might just be a glimpse, a momentary thing, here and then gone.  But when we subject ourselves to a love that comes from Christ, then the face we show is His face.  Armored submission.  It’s a high calling.  And a deep joy and fulfillment.  To have and to hold from this day forward.  Be subject to one another.

Shalom,

Derek

A Life Worthy

I forgot to mention my absence last week.  If anyone noticed. I was away from Fort Wayne, participating in a consultation led by Discipleship Ministries out of Nashville, our denominational headquarters.  We met in Dallas at the seminary I graduated from back when dinosaurs roamed the earth (it seems to have changed since I was there), to investigate a program there designed to help preachers be better at their task of preaching.  We have been meeting for a year now, investigating other continuing education models, and asking the question what does it mean to be a good preacher in the church today?  In fact, the next task is to answer that question.  What is good preaching?  The United Methodist Church recently produced two documents presenting the theology and practice of the sacraments in our denomination.  The task of the consultation is to prepare a similar document for the “Sacrament of the Word” –  i.e. preaching. 

I drew the short straw.  Meaning I get to write the first draft, and then let everyone else pick it apart and start all over again.  Still, I’m excited about the prospect, though humbled by the task.  The idea that we can get everyone, or even most folks to agree on what constitutes good preaching, might seem impossible.  Yet it didn’t stop Paul.

OK, he wasn’t really answering that question.  He was dealing with a bigger picture.  Not what is good preaching.  But what is the Christian life?  What should it look like?  How will we recognize it?  How will we live it?  That’s what he was trying to answer in the Letter to the Ephesians.  

We’re in part two now.  We dove into part one, chapters one through three, and immersed ourselves in the outpouring of God’s grace through Jesus Christ.  We sat in wonder and awe as we considered all that God has done for us.  The gifting, the claiming, and the empowering that has been lavishly poured out on us.  It was almost more than we could comprehend.  Especially when we let the words just pour over us.  We didn’t stop to examine the detail of every nuance of language or thought.  We just splashed around in it.  Not because studying is unimportant or unnecessary.  That’s how we usually approach these scriptures.  But once in a while, it’s good to be overwhelmed.

But having jumped into that pool we now climb out to our usual question.  Now what?  Or perhaps, so what?  I mean all that’s great and everything, but what am I supposed to do with it?  What does it mean for me?  For us, the church and community of faith?  Now what?

Ephesians 4:1-8  I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all. 7 But each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ's gift. 8 Therefore it is said, "When he ascended on high he made captivity itself a captive; he gave gifts to his people."

“Lead a life worthy of the calling.”  That’s how Paul starts part two.  And in so doing he reminds us of two very important things.  First of all, everything we do is a response.   This is why part two is part two and not part one.  We couldn’t start with chapter four ... even if we renamed it chapter one.  Because it only makes sense in light of what came before.  This call to live in certain ways only works if we understand that we aren’t doing it in order to receive the grace that comes from God.  It only becomes possible if we understand that we aren’t doing it to earn God’s love, Christ’s sacrifice, the gift called salvation.  It has to be this way.  All that we do as Christians, as followers comes only after we are set free to love.  

Which is the second thing he tells us.  Which might sound a lot like the first thing he tells us.  He being Paul, the writer of the letter to the Ephesians.  (Which I still cling to despite the voices that say it was someone else.  To them I say ... phooey. (I know, I shouldn’t use such esoteric theological jargon, but couldn’t help it.  Where was I?)) And that is the ability to live the life to which we are called comes from Christ and not from us.  Our natural state is one of limitation, one of captivity to our self-centered view of the world and our place in it.  But now we are free to be all that Christ calls us to be.  We are free to be humble and gentle and patient and loving, we are free to live in peace.  Because the captivity of our nature has been made captive in Christ.  

He then goes on for a chapter and half.  Well, I mean we are going to read a chapter and half about what that means.  Actually we are going to read three chapters, but take two weeks to do it.  For now read on to 5:20.  It gets ... messy ... after that.  We’ll tackle that next week.  But for now we read in  these verses a glimpse of the life we are called to live.  No, that we are set free to live.  Paul talks about what we can set aside, ways of living that might sound good, but really aren’t.  But he also talks about what we take up.  What we can fill our lives with, and it is all about engaging, connecting, relating to God and to our fellow followers and to those who as yet have not experienced a life of grace from God, have not yet claimed the gift that has already been given to them.  There is a joy in helping others find their gift, find the grace and forgiveness that is already theirs.  Much more joy than in condemnation and judgement.  Despite what many who claim to be following might think or say.  

But go and read.  Read from chapter four verse one all the way through to chapter five verse twenty.  And what you’ll find is that Paul comes back to the how.  How are we to live this life worthy of the calling.  And not a how as in six easy steps to a better life now, or four infallible principles of growing in your faith, or the magic prayer to prosperity and clear skin.  No, not that how.  But a how as in what mode, what attitude do we bring to our living a life worthy?  What does it feel like to be around us, to be with us?  

Ephesians 5:18-20 Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit, 19 as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, singing and making melody to the Lord in your hearts, 20 giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

We’re party people.  People of joy, of singing and celebration.  That’s the life worthy, not a drudgery of servile obedience and rigid purity, but one of connection and joy.  We are set free to live fully, to live alive every moment.  That’s the calling to which you have been called.  That’s a life worthy.

Shalom,

Derek

Breaking Down the Walls

What a day it has been.  Which is why I am late.  It has been a full day, and joyous and frustrating day, a deep and profound day, and a minutiae and logistics day.  La Donna and I were asked to come present the Spiritual Growth Study that we did at Mission u this summer.  We condensed 8 hours of teaching into one and a half.  It was a fasten your seatbelts kind of experience.  We said we weren’t going to solve things, just stir them up.  We weren’t going to give answers or even all the questions, maybe just draw some lines around the general area.  And what area was that?  The Bible and Human Sexuality.  Right, that one. Easy stuff.  Surface level stuff.  Right?  Or rather the kind of stuff we won’t really talk about because we won’t know whether they are there.  They?  You know, they.  The they who frighten us, the they who differ from us, the they whose opinions cause us distress.  You know .... they.

From there we drove to Frankfort, where dad is.  He had been moved to a different room and for some reason not everything got moved.  Plus his phone wasn’t working for some reason.  It was when I left it for him.  Anyway, we got there late and worked hard, moved some heavy stuff.  I think I just figured out why they didn’t move it.  Unhooked and rehooked up his computer so now he can communicate again.  We’re still working on the phone.  But between arranging and rearranging, plugging and unplugging and replugging, shifting and moving, and sweating, they keep those places warm, we finally got it all done, or the part we could handle tonight.  And we chatted and promised to return and we left, driving the two hours home, wondering why they weren’t taking care of the things we needed taken care of.  Even though we didn’t always know what that was.  But they should, shouldn’t they?  And why they didn’t bring the other stuff?  And why did they let his phone die?  And why did they let it get so blamed hot in there?

They.  The ones to blame when you’re tired of looking at yourself.  They.  The ones to fear because a good enemy gets people motivated, but often in knee jerk kinds of ways.  They.  The source of all your troubles, why you didn’t get the promotion, why you didn’t get elected, why you aren’t chosen for the team, they did it, they set me up, they are out to get me.  They.

Ephesians 2:11-16 11 So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth, called "the uncircumcision" by those who are called "the circumcision"-- a physical circumcision made in the flesh by human hands –  12 remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. 15 He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, 16 and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it.

We are still swimming in the sea of Ephesians.  This passage is only a part of what will be presented in worship.  A small part.  We are galloping through another chapter and a half in worship on Sunday.  A chapter and half.  How in the world can we hope to understand a chapter and a half?  Well, we won’t.  We can’t.  This is an exercise in experience not knowledge.  The words wash over us is a torrent and we feel the erosion working on us.  And what is supposed to be eroding in this section of Ephesians?

The dividing wall.  The us and the them.  This torrent of words is designed to wear away our suspicions and our distrust, designed to help us see what connects us and not what makes us different.  Not what keeps us apart, but what brings us together.  For He is our peace, writes Paul.  There is, in short, a possibility for reconciliation, for unity, for community.  Because of Jesus Christ.  We are made one in Him.

This second half of chapter two and all of chapter three is all about being made one.  Not necessarily choosing unity, or accepting unity, or embracing unity, but about being made into a unit.  Wait, what?  If I don’t choose it, it isn’t going to happen.  Right?  Well, no, frankly.  It’s not up to you, you don’t have that kind of power.  Oh you can choose.  You can choose to be in Christ or not.  You can choose to follow Him or not.  But once you’ve made that choice then you surrender the right to choose very much else.  Once you have given yourself to Him, you then begin to live as He calls you to live.  

Once you claim Christ you get the world thrown in too.  How about them apples?  Choosing Christ, is choosing unity, even with those who aren’t like you.  Those who are far off.  In other worlds, in other realities, in other ways of knowing and being known.  That far.  Because they get to choose Christ too.  And in return those folks, the former they, they get something thrown in too.  They get you.  How about them apples?  They get you to be in community with, to love like they love themselves, to love only a little less than they love God.  Oh, man.  It’s almost too much.

No wonder Paul ends this first section (chapters one through three) in the letter to the Ephesians with a prayer.  God, I hope they get it, he prays.  I hope they can figure this thing out.  I hope they understand just how wide and high and deep God’s love for them in Christ is.  But also just how wide and high and deep their love for each other will become as they move closer to Christ.  Because they move closer and the others move closer, and in moving closer to Christ, we end up moving closer to each other.  It’s not our choice, it is just the reality of the movement.  It just happens.  Get used to it.  

Even though it is almost incomprehensible that I would learn to love one of them.  Insert your them of choice here.  I can’t even imagine doing that.  I can’t imagine going there.  I can’t imagine loving like that.  I just can’t  

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

Far more than we can ask or imagine.  Hmm.  Imagine that.  Thanks be to God.

Shalom,

Derek 

A Prayer for the Church

It’s the anniversary of a terrible day.  Or an amazing day of grace and life and hope and community. Depends. It depends on which you want to acknowledge, which you want to remember.  We could be reminded that we are vulnerable, that we have enemies - but where’s the news in that?  Anyone who has studied history already knew that, we didn’t need a tragedy to be told that.  Or maybe we did. Anyone who has read the Bible seriously knows that we are vulnerable, that we have enemies, Jesus told us that, prophets too many to name in this space told us that.  We didn’t need a tragedy to be told that.  Or maybe we did.  

But what would be better to remember is that we did come together as a nation.  That we set aside differences long enough to care and support and heal and strengthen.  In the dust and ash of the falling towers, race didn’t matter, in the shouts of pain and the echoes of promised support, accent didn’t matter.  In the rubble of our arrogant confidence in our individualism and nationalism, tribal origin didn’t matter.  In our cry for the loving arms of our God, how we prayed didn’t matter.  Just that we prayed.  With words and with tears, with sacrifice and with hands outstretched to help and to hold, we prayed.  Fifteen years later it is possible to forget that we prayed.  And that prayers were answered by those like us and those not like us, those we know and trust and those of whom we are now suspicious.  What brought us together is what we need to remember.  And not just the tragedy, but the will, the will to rise and to care and to give and heal, the will to be a nation of community and trust, of sacrifice and goodness.  The tragedy did not define us, the response did.  Let us live into that definition.

All year long, in the background of our worship experience, there has been a prayer.  A prayer for the church from the Letter to the Ephesians.  We now turn to an examination of that letter.  Ephesians is divided into two sections, chapters one through three and chapters four through six.  For two weeks we will examine part one, then we’ll take a breather and then two weeks on part two.  The prayer for the church is the hinge around which the two parts turn.  Part one is about what God has done in Christ.  Done for us, done in us.  About grace and inheritance, about the presence of God in Jesus and how we tasted that presence in our adoration of him, and how we were brought into the glorious light. Part two is the so what part.  It is our response to all that has been done.  Because of Christ, we now live.  And what does that life look like?  Because of grace we are empowered, so how do we employ that power?  Because we are reconciled, brought back into the light of Christ, we can see, ourselves and our world and the promises on the horizon.  So what do we see and how do we speak of that seeing?  

That’s what Ephesians does for us.  So, we need to sit in that light these weeks.  But we’re going to study this word in a way that will feel strange to us.  To study means to dig down and mine for the nuggets of knowledge and insight.  We need to take notes and ask questions, we need to wrestle with interpretations and possible meanings.  We need to engage our brains.  That’s how we study.  How we usually study.

But this time, these weeks, we need to engage our hearts.  We need to engage our souls.  No, we don’t turn off our brains, but we release our brains to listen and flow and let the light come how it comes. Four weeks for six chapters.  Each week we will be presented with a chapter and half of this amazing letter.  Too much to attack with tweezers and scalpels.  We are, instead, riding on the surface of the poetry of the language, letting it carry us where we need to go, seeing who we need to be.  Letting it wash over us, like standing under a torrential rain, or a waterfall that pours down over us.  We can’t swallow it all, we can’t digest each drop, but we can be soaked to the skin by a word of grace.  Which is just what we need.

At least I believe it is.  We need to be still and listen to God’s Word.  Even when our brows furrow from the unfamiliarity of the phrasing, the words that cry out to be interpreted.  We’re going to let them stand on their own.  Stand, no, the Word doesn’t stand.  It washes over us, it cleanses us, it carries us away.  The Word of God is living and active.  It doesn’t just stand.  If it seems to just stand, if it feels like we are just letting it stand there, like a marble statue to be gazed at and then walked away from, then it is because we haven’t opened ourselves up enough, we haven’t prayed that the Word will come alive in us.  That’s the prayer we pray this week.  Let the Word come alive in us. That we might come alive because of the Word.  That we might know life, the life the Word wants to impart, to breathe into us.  We aren’t attacking the Word to wrestle out a meaning, we are encountering the Word so that meaning takes root in us.

If you’re able to worship with us at Aldersgate, then you’ll have an opportunity to encounter this Word in worship.  I invite you to come prepared to be exposed to God’s Word, vulnerable, risky. Come expecting to be challenged and transformed and loved.  If you’re not able to come, you can wait and listen online (www.aldersgatecommunity.org) and let the Word speak into your ears through the computer.  Let that spoken Word, that performed Word come alive in you.

Or you can read it yourself.  Find a Bible (I’m not pasting the passage here - go look for it), turn to Ephesians 1:1 and read through to Ephesians 2:10.  Read it as if it mattered.  Read it as if it were a letter from your lover, from your mother, from your teacher, from the friend you hurt a long time ago and have carried the guilt for that hurting ever since.  Go and read it as though it was written for you. Because it was.

Next week in this space we’ll do some background on the Letter.  I almost did it here, but decided to wait.  Right now, I’m just inviting you to dive in.  Into the deep waters of the Word of God as found in the Letter to the Ephesians.  I’m praying for you as you read, or listen, or dangle your toes in the waters of life, or dive into the depths.  I’m praying for you, with Paul.  And this is our prayer:

Ephesians 3:14-21  For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. 16 I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, 17 and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. 18 I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. 20 Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

And amen.

Shalom,

Derek

This Fellow Began to Build

It was a long hot week of manual labor and family memories.  That’s why I was absent last week.  I went to Tennessee to attack Dad’s house, to see if we could get it to the state where it would look presentable to someone who just might want to buy it.  It was a daunting task.  But we chipped away, bit by bit, load by load, five trips to the recycling center in town, four trips to the Resale Shop off the courthouse square, and one big truckload to the dump on the edge of town.  At the end of the week the place was transformed.  Like a real house, instead of the dumping ground it had become.  We had a sense of accomplishment, a sense of bringing order out of chaos, of moving forward to the next chapter in all of our lives.  Good has been done here, as Bob the Tomato has been known to quote in the Veggie Tale videos we watched with the kids all those years ago.  Good has been done here.

Wait, did I say dumping ground?  That’s a bit unfair.  I mean, sure it seemed like junk and a lot of it was junked.  But it was more, it was memories, years and years of memories.  It was life lived, not just one life - my mom now resting in the arms of her savior, or my dad now unsettled in a new place back in Indiana, whose life had been turned upside down in a matter of days. Yes, they were present in all the detritus of those two from whom we all sprang, but there were more, lines of family back through the years, farther than we could countenance as we sifted through the piles, family we knew in the dim recesses of experience and family we had only speculated about, storied about, and even family we didn’t recognize and couldn’t pin down as belonging to any particular branch.  Family galore, family abundant, some long gone and others lost in the busyness of living a life apart from them, and some a Christmas card acquaintance at best.  But family.

Not just family.  Those memories included family of a different sort.  Families of covenant and not blood, of faith and not shared history, except for the history of now, or of at one time.  There were representations of churches in many states and eras, groups and structures that jangled dim recognition and others that rang clearly even through our weary fog.  Gatherings of people from eras long gone, with funny hair and clothes that seem too out dated to me retro.  Yet, they were smiling and holding on to one another, closer than people usually are in most places, like they genuinely enjoyed one another’s company, like they belonged together in a way deeper than shared DNA.  Like they would be there for one another when push came to shove, no questions asked.

We didn’t know most of them.  At least we didn’t know their names or what church they came from or what era they belonged to, whether we were even alive when the photos were taken.  Yet we knew them.  Knew that they had been a part of the church, part of the flock, part of the family of followers, of disciples.  Because in addition to the joy, there was a seriousness about those faces.  And rightly so.

Luke 14:25-33 Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, 26 "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, 'This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' 31 Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. 33 So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.

Can I go back to cleaning out the house? ...  Was it because there was a large crowd following Him?  Did He turn around and get scared by all of them and then think “what can I do to the thin the herd?”  Why does Jesus have to make it so hard to follow Him?  He says, follow me, but we’ve got to leave everything to do it.  Why?  Why can’t we add it to our long list of other interests?  Our overfull schedule of appointments and good deeds?  Why can’t Jesus be satisfied with giving Him what we have the time to give?  At least that’s something, right?  At least we’re giving it a try.  When we can.  When nothing else is going on.  When the kids aren’t in town.  When we haven’t been out too late the night before and that dopey pastor put the real worship service at an hour before God gets out of bed!  Surely that ought to count for something.

“Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.”  Um.  Not going to happen.  Let’s be honest here.  It just isn’t.  At least in the usual way we understand that word and that experience and that emotion.  We’re good at hating, frankly.  But this list isn’t the one we use to list the objects of our hate.  OK, maybe moments we get angry enough at them.  Maybe we know of those whose home experience is so terrifying that hate is the only human response to the abuse and neglect they received.  But that’s not most of us.  And it seems to me that there are other places where Jesus tells us to love and care for one another, to forgive over and over, to not condemn, to ... Well, you get the point.  This passage doesn’t jibe with our overall understanding of what Jesus asks us to do.  It just doesn’t.  

So, we have two responses.  One is to just pretend we didn’t read it.  I know, you smiled at that one, didn’t you?  We say, we can’t do that!  But we do it all the time.  We pretend Jesus didn’t say a lot of things that he said.  We just focus on the doable stuff, the stuff we like, the stuff that affirms us as we are.  And bleep over the unpronounceable words in the larger text.  But, and let’s be clear, I’m not advocating that approach.  Even though I’m as guilty as any.

Which leaves us with response number two: go back to the text and wrestle with it a little while.  Maybe there is something there, a hint, a translation error, an editorial gloss we can undo and get back to something that lets us breathe a little bit better.  Or, failing that (and believe me, I hunted for a long time for something like that - no luck) we listen again trying to find some meaning that is escaping us.  We wrestle, like Jacob at Jabbok’s Ford, and risk coming away with a limp because we’ve seen the face of God.

Skip ahead.  We’ll come back to that sticky verse.  The bulk of the passage is two parables about making plans, about counting the cost.  One is a king going to war, or preparing for a war that is coming and deciding whether he can wage this war or he needs to sue for peace.  The other is a construction worker who is building a tower and needs to know whether or not he has the means to finish it.  Jesus is clearly asking the large crowd behind him whether they really want to make this journey, whether they want to fight the battle that is coming, whether they want to build the tower that he wants them to build.  Are you in or not in?  And, let’s be clear, it isn’t going to be a walk in the park.  This is a battle for your own and everyone else’s soul, this is nothing less than the construction of the kingdom of God going on within and around you.  Are you committed to this transformation, are you willing to invest the blood, sweat and tears it is going to take?  

Sure, we shout, confident souls that we are.  At least right now, in this moment, safe and secure from all alarms.  But when the going gets tough, then what?  When we stumble and fall, then what?  When tragedy strikes, then what?  That’s what He is asking us to consider.  And when we sober up to the reality of the question, we can say, “we want to.  But what will it take?”  And He’ll answer, give up everything.  Everything.  Every thing.  Father, mother, wife, children ... Everything is a daunting list.  Your own life.  Your pride and greed, your gifts and talents, the things that give you joy and the things that make you roll your eyes and sigh.  Everything.  Give it up.  

You can’t be serious.  He can’t be serious.  Ah, but He is.  Give it up.  And follow Him.  Carrying His cross.  On which hang father, mother, wife, children, you own life.... Everything.  Here’s what He asks.  Don’t love them with your love, love them with mine.  Don’t cling to people or things because they meet your needs or serve you.  Receive them as a gift from the One you follow.  Because we can’t love them like they need to be loved, we can’t even love them like we want to love them.  But in His love we can love like He loves.  Compared to His love working through us ours is feeble and broken and selfish and temporary, and almost looks like hate.  So, give that kind of love up.  It doesn’t serve.  Instead we can love like He loves.  We can see through His eyes, we can serve with His hands.  Then when we pick up, in His love, those we call family, we find more than what we thought we had.  Then when we begin to build, we might actually finish, even as we are being finished in Him.

Shalom,

Derek

Set Free on the Sabbath Day

That’s better mama.  It’s a thing we say in our house.  A sign that something has been fixed.  Something has been accomplished.  That’s better mama.  Something was wrong, out of whack, in the wrong place, something just wasn’t right and we made it right, we made it ... better.  That’s better mama.  Rhys said it first.  When he was little.  When he didn’t want to fix all his own problems. When he was under our care completely.  When all his problems were relatively small ones, relatively fixable ones.  He would come distraught about something, or confused by something, or uncomfortable with something and she’d fix it, like moms do, all the time.  And he’d smile that little sunshine smile and say “that’s better mama.”  And it was.  Much better.

I miss my mama.  Actually, I’ve missed her for a long time now.  No, not just since her death or even since her dementia.  Not just since her moving to Tennessee, either.  It’s been longer than that.  It was that moment when I realized that I couldn’t run and crawl in her lap and let her make everything right again.  When the things that go bump in the night became real things instead of the workings of my imagination.  And there was probably a time when I said I don’t need that any more.  When I was glad to be out on my own.  Solving my own problems, making my own way in the world, responsible for my own debts, my own growth, my own sense of better.  There was a time when I was pretty sure I didn’t need her to make things better any more.  I know more now.  And the depth of my own need is one of those things.  But at the time ...

It hurt her, I know that now.  When I launched off on my own, stood on my own two feet, it hurt her. It made her proud too, I also know that.  It was the way it was supposed to happen.  It was what we were building toward.  What she was making me better for, to be independent, to be capable of living in the world.  But I know it hurt her when I said I don’t need you anymore.  I don’t mean I was rude about it.  No prodigal son running off and throwing family back in the face of those who had provided for you.  No, it wasn’t an angry act, not a line in the sand act, not even a conscious act really. It just was.  I just was.  On my own.  But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t hard, for her, for me, the one who made things better and the one who was made better.  

Luke 13:10-17 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11 And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, "Woman, you are set free from your ailment." 13 When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14 But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, "There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day." 15 But the Lord answered him and said, "You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?" 17 When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

He could have waited a day.  A few hours really, until sunset, and the Sabbath would have been over and he would have saved a lot of grief.  Would have satisfied the hardliners.  Would have made things easier on himself.  Maybe even the woman he healed that day, we don’t know but she may have been under attack by the same folks who were grumbling at Jesus.  And yeah, it was a bunch.  Not just the leader.  He’s the one who voices the complaint.  But the last verse reveals the rest.  “All his opponents.”  That’s a side you don’t want to be on.  But why not wait?  Why not make it easier on Himself and perhaps on her?  On the followers later?  On us, to be frank.  

It seems spontaneous.  He was there teaching on that day.  Probably because that’s the day that folks might be willing to listen.  Oh, I know He could draw a crowd any day, and did.  But maybe it wasn’t the usual crowd He was wanting.  Maybe it was the ones who only think of faith things once a week. Who think that maybe all this stuff doesn’t really matter to them, doesn’t really affect them.  They’ve got lives to live and bills to pay, they’ve got family issues to solve and health issues to learn to live with.  They’ve got plans to make and miles to go before they sleep.  So, they make a deal with the Almighty, they’ll give Him an hour a week, and think that should cover it.  Maybe those were the folks He was hoping to speak to, to connect with, to offer more.  

But then in the midst of the teaching, she walked by.  Hobbled by.  Did she come to hear Him?  Or was she just there, doing her Sabbath duty?  Had she stopped looking for help?  Maybe she just figured this was her life.  This was what had been dealt to her and she was just living with it.  Who knows?  But Jesus saw her and called her over.  Woman you are set free from your ailment.  Set free. Not you are healed, not you are forgiven, not you are made well.  This time Jesus says you are set free.  I know, I know, we shouldn’t make too much of it.  It’s all the same in the end, isn’t it?  Just words.  It all means the same.  “That’s better mama.”

It is better.  She is better.  But is that all she is?  Notice too that Jesus says “you are set free” and then touches her.  Seems like he should have said “you’re about to be set free.”  Or “hang on, freedom is coming.”  Or “give me a sec, I’m gonna set you free.”  Fix you up.  Make you better. Unless.  Maybe there are two things going on here.  Maybe there is a setting free and then a healing.  Maybe the ailment isn’t her physical condition.  Maybe the physical condition is simply a sign of a deeper bend in her soul.  That’s why in conversation with the complainer, Jesus says that Satan had bound her for eighteen long years.  Maybe in year one she wasn’t as bent over.  But the weight of the bondage almost broke her in half.  What Jesus saw was a soul in torment twisting a body in pain.  And wanted to set her free.  Right now.  Not one more minute.  Sabbath day or not.

Which caused the problem.  There are six days to work, couldn’t he have waited a few hours?  No, he couldn’t.  For two reasons.  First of all, there was this woman, this child of God in bondage to pain, and He couldn’t let that go on one more second.  He just couldn’t.   And second, it was the Sabbath day.  

Wait.  It was the Sabbath day?  He had to heal her on the Sabbath because it was the Sabbath?  That doesn’t make any sense.  The Sabbath day is for resting.  For not doing anything.  Sitting like a lump, which somehow honors God.  Right?  Hmm.  Doesn’t feel right all of a sudden.  The Pharisees had good intentions.  Really, they did.  They took one of the ten commandments and tried to put a fence around it.  Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.  Because God rested, we need to rest.  Don’t work, just .. Sit there.  So, the Pharisees came up with a whole pile of rules as to what constitutes work, and sneezing real hard broke a half dozen of them.  They split the proverbial hair on this one. Even though splitting hairs was probably forbidden too.  

For Jesus, however, it wasn’t about not working.  It was about not working for you.  Take a look at the commandment (this is the longest one, by the way, all that explaining.  Exodus 20:8-11).  Verse 9 says “Six days shall you labor and do all your work.”  Your work.  Caring for others wasn’t your work, it was your way of honoring God.  For heaven’s sake, Jesus said, you’ve got provision for animals in your observance, why not a child of God? 

Jesus had a different view of the Sabbath than the Pharisees.  They were all about keeping yourself pure.  He was all about honoring God.  Serving God.  Worship and praise with our lives and not just our words.  Six days are yours, give God this one.  Because this one is for honoring God.  For setting free.  

In Jesus’ view the woman needed healing because it was the Sabbath.  Honoring God is setting people free.  Because God is in the setting free business.  So what else would you do on a day set aside to honor God?  Woman ... Man... you are set free from your ailment.   That’s better mama.

Shalom,

Derek 

South Wind Blowing

It’s been hot lately.  I know, duh, right?  But still, hot.  Humid.  I got in my car one afternoon after it was sitting in the parking lot and the car thermometer thing said 103 degrees.  Yikes.  It cooled down as I drove home, into the 90's, cooler, way cooler.  I have a little section on the weather app on my phone, it tells the time and the forecast and few other things and then has this section titled “feels like”.  It’s 88 degrees my phone cheerfully tells me, but it feels like 96.  Wow.  How do they know what it feels like?  I don’t, but I know when I read it I feel worse.  It’s a head thing, I guess.  A sign of things to come.

The signs are all around.  I tripped over some of them in the hallway.  I got texts about them, questions too.  Signs of the next diaspora.  Maddie’s heading back to college.  You can’t miss it.  She just said to me with a certain amount of despair, “I’m not sure it will all fit in one car!”  We’ll make it work, I said.  “You sure?”  Yeah.  “Well,” she sighed, “I talked with Meesh and she is bringing even more than me, so I guess that is good.” Yeah.  Good that there is someone else filling up the apartment you are moving into and not just you.  There are signs.

That’s not the only movement upstairs these days.  No another space is being made ready.  Rhys is coming home next week, so his mom thought he needed the bigger room.  Up to now that room had been the place where she dumped centuries worth of family heirlooms (read junk) and papers and photos.  Now, she’s transferring that to the smaller room which is also her home office where she works on her online course with the graduate students who are teaching her new levels of patience and exasperation.  

I just keep my head down.  I’ve learned to read the signs.  We all have, we all do.   It’s part of living in the world, living in community with people who have feelings and expectations and hopes and dreams and such.  Paying attention to the subtle signs that all is not well in the world around you, in the world of those whose lives impact yours on a regular basis.  But how good are we at reading those signs?  That’s part of the question that Jesus is asking in our text this week.  At least it seems to me. Take a look.

Luke 12:49-56 49 "I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! 51 Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! 52 From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; 53 they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law." 54 He also said to the crowds, "When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, 'It is going to rain'; and so it happens. 55 And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, 'There will be scorching heat'; and it happens. 56 You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?

Jesus seems upset, having a bad day perhaps.  He isn’t usually one to resort to name calling.  Makes you wonder what is going on here.  I mean, I understand that fire thing, once in a while burning it all down and starting over sounds like a good idea. Wash your hands, just walk away, Jesus.  Let them be, don’t resort to arson.  Take some deep breaths, count to ten.  Breathe, just breathe.  There now. Feel better?  That messiah thing gets to you every now and then, I would suppose.

Ahem.  Before I go too far and see lightning bolts on the horizon, let me quickly say, I don’t think that’s what going on here.  I mean, sure Jesus probably had bad days.  We were told he wept over Lazarus’s death, or the despair in the folks around him.  He wept over the city of Jerusalem. Remember that day?  Palm Sunday, he was riding into the city, and came around a corner and saw it all displayed there before him, the skyline shot.  And it just got to him, because he knew he had the power to save them, to bring them life and wholeness, joy and peace, but they wouldn’t, they just wouldn’t.  And it felt like a weight on his shoulders, in his soul, and he wept.  So, yeah, he had his days. And maybe there is an element here of that.  Of the frustration of trying to get people to see what is right in front of their faces.  Literally.  I mean he was standing there.  The answer to all their uncertainties, the hope of all their hearts, the fulfillment of all their unspoken needs.  And they didn’t see it.  Didn’t see him.  See him for who and what he was.  What he brought to them.  They didn’t see it.  And he wanted them to burn.

Not burn up.  This isn’t that kind of thing, not a threat, but a promise.  I came to bring fire, he says, it is what I’m all about.  John said that way back at the river, on baptism day.  He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire!  You have to put that exclamation point there.  Probably should be capitalized: Fire!  Maybe all caps, knowing John: He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with FIRE!  

Jesus came to bring fire, but no one really understood him.  He was accused of consorting with demons, of working with the Lord of the Flies (Beezelbub), that’s who deals with fire, isn’t it?  The disciples thought it was a punishment - shall we call down fire and burn them up, when a city refused their missionary efforts.  There’s a great evangelism model, offer them Christ, but burn them up if they say no.  

How I wish it was already kindled, Jesus says.  Already at work, purifying and empowering. Equipping and transforming.  How I wish it was already at work, bringing this world closer to the kingdom I can see every time I open my eyes but they haven’t got a clue.  They are frozen into the ice of this cold world, how I wish the fire was burning so they could see it, warm up to it, live into it. “ I’ve got a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed!”

Wait, what?  Fire and water don’t mix, Jesus.  Pick one metaphor or the other.  And you’re stressed? Some argue that this baptism is His suffering and death.  Sure He’s under stress.  Sure this weighs on Him.  Who would expect anything less?  Except, He doesn’t really say stressed.  The Greek word is hemmed in. Constrained.  He is limited by the flesh He so willingly put on for us.  Until He goes through His own personal fire, He is limited by time and space, He can’t reach us all.  Before this baptism is completed he is here and not there.  Afterwards He is here and there, and there, and over there, next to you, and within you, behind you.  

So, choose.  Choose to be set alight.  Choose to burn with passion for love of the Lord and the world He died for.  Choose to be fully alive even when it feels like you are on fire.  Even when others say no.  Even when others, important others, close others, say no and tell you to say no.  Choose even though the choosing causes division, disagreement, even disappointment.  Choose.  Because the time is now.

Can’t you see it?  That’s His final question.  Can’t you see it?  You see so much, you’re good at watching the sky and knowing whether those are rain clouds or not.  You know this, red sky at morning, sailors take warning.  You can read the signs.  You know when the market is going to go up, or when the bottom is going to drop out.  You know when the best time to buy a new car or when the mattress sales are going to happen.  You’ve got it all figured out.  You can read the TV schedule, a cookbook recipe, you can instagram and snapchat, you’ve poked all sorts of folk on facebook and have caught a boatload of pokemon. But can you see what really matters?  Discern a good time to pray for a friend, know when to offer a helping hand and when it’s a shoulder to cry on?  Can you find that passage that says just what you daughter needs to hear?  Can you send your son off with a blessing that sticks with him as he walks?  Can you meet a grieving widow and a new mother, can you console a friend who’s lost a job without resorting to platitudes?  Can you invite, can you offer a neighbor to mentor them in the faith, to walk with them through a difficult time?   There is a wind blowing and it isn’t just bringing some heat and humidity.  It is the wind of the Spirit, it is a opportunity to grow, to widen our circles, to build on the foundation that is Jesus our Christ.  It’s time to ride this wind.  Can you feel it?  Can you read it?  The fire is burning.

Shalom,

Derek