Illustration Friday -- Your Paradise

Illustration Friday

Mighty Casey

Romans 5:1-5

John 16:12-15

My father had a habit of making my brother and I memorize poetry. Well, I say that he made us, but after a while we were happy to it, a kind of game between my brother and I—who could remember more of what poems. My dad was a huge Longfellow fan, and both us kids too a shine to it as well, really enjoying sometimes to afternoons in recitation of Paul Revere’s Ride, and the Song of Hiawatha, and the Village Smith. “Under the spreading chestnut tree the village smithy stands. The smith, a mighty man is he with large and sinewy hands; and the muscles on his brawny arms are as strong as iron bands…” That is to say, that we were total poetry nerds.

At this same time, my brother got to be interested in baseball and Dad brought home from school a copy of “Casey at the Bat” by Ernest Thayer. Reading it and going to my brother’s T-Ball games really created in my mind a sense of the imagery and of the emotion that come together in the poem. If you’ve never read it, the poem recounts a game, with the home team Mudville down by two and nearly at the end of the innings. Second and third get a man each, and the fans are holding their breath as the mighty Casey steps up to the plate. Here is the savior! The favored Mudville boy to hit the ball out of the park. But he lets two pitches go by, in a vain attempt to drive up the suspense, and then as the third pitch comes we hear in the last stanza of the poem:
Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright,
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
And somewhere men are laughing, and little children shout;
But there is no joy in Mudville—mighty Casey has struck out.

It was one of the first poems I read where it ended with such a decidedly sad and unhappy ending. After all, I knew what a defeated crowd looked like from the games we sat through on my brother’s behave (which isn’t commentary on his playing). The poem stuck with my though because the imagery bothered me, why write a poem with a sad ending?

I think now perhaps it was written to reflect the suffering that is going on in reality. After all, the author must have thought; there is a loser in every game. Now too, we have many sufferings that come to us. Not only in the world at large though that is surely enough. More soldiers killed in action, more people destroyed and displaced by war, children trying to get an education gunned down needlessly… In our local community too there is surely suffering, even in our churches and our families.
The face of the human world is well acquainted with suffering.
One of my students at Buffalo commented to me that the prayer list sometimes depressed him because there were so many people on it! Perhaps we don’t do as good a job as we should at keeping the list updated, but it is still a long one.
So, this is our world, and this is our experience from which we operate. And yet, in the lectionary reading for today we hear Paul is telling us that we should rejoice in our sufferings!
Paul might have been crazy. I actually have heard a lot of things about poor Paul, that he was a drug addict, that he was a homosexual, that he wrestled with unbridled lust… It can go on and on. More likely than any of those things is the fact that Paul was a man afflicted with suffering. There are places in the Letters that he talks about not being able to see, and the thorn in his side quite literally could have been a painful scoliosis. Paul knew what suffering was about.
And yet, in his letter to the Romans, he suggests that there is to be found in that suffering a kind of joy. Beyond that he outlines a cyclical journey that suffering can and must take to ultimately lead to hope and therefore joy. Suffering he says, leads to perseverance and perseverance to character and character to hope. I ask again, is Paul crazy?
Paul is obviously a man afflicted. In the Letters we know that the “thorn in his side” was prayed over for removal and relief and yet Paul found none. Rather than doctrine could this message from Paul simply be a way that a godly man has to deal with a persistent pain? How can we trust what Paul is saying? Do we just take it on faith and by proof of his miracles that these words he says now can be included in the Gospel truth? Let’s come back to that in minute.

In our reading from John we hear Christ speaking about the spirit. Last week at Buffalo we had a little celebration of sort in honor of Pentecost, and the birthday of the church of Jesus Christ. This week in the reading we actually go backwards in time to a point where Jesus is getting the apostles ready for that day when the Spirit comes. The First purpose of the Holy Spirit is to be the connection to God that we would have lacked after the death of Christ. It is granted to every believer today only by the salvation we receive through Jesus, but was present in the lives of the prophets before.
Jesus is telling the followers what to expect from the Holy Spirit. It was described as a mighty rushing wind with the appearance of tongues of flame. Probably something pretty mind numbing if you didn’t have at least a little warning of what was to come.
The Second purpose of the Holy Spirit apparently is to continue to reveal truth to us about the nature of God and the nature of his will for us here on earth. In the first line of the reading Jesus says that He actually has more to say to the apostles about the nature of things, but he knows that right now it is more than they can bear. An education in Christianity it seems is like all other forms of education. We must first go through primary school then secondary then collegiate, and so on. It’s the most basic form of our earthly wisdom to know that you have to “walk before you can crawl.” The same applies here. The story of the faith is building upon itself and even though Christ knows that there is more to come, he knows also that the followers just aren’t’ ready for it at that time.

So with this in mind look back to the teachings of Paul in Romans, and even to all the books of the Bible that comes after the Gospel of John. These are the parts of the Bible that have been led and directed by the Spirit. This is the Spirit of Truth in essence using the authors of the later books to reveal more of the Godly truth that was in store for us.
But there is more. We come now into a more full understanding of what the Spirit is, that it is a living essence that demands we too think and live and gain understanding under its guidance. In other words if Paul seems crazy then it is right for us to seek the counsel of the Holy Spirit on the matter. Or see if Paul can be trusted as the spirits representative. And of course Paul is trustworthy. The acts and the conversion of Paul are designed by God to show the believers that he, in fact, does have the hand of the spirit working in his life.
So then we are forced to look at this cycle of joyful pain that Paul describes.
Recently I was visiting my uncle who has been battling a disease for several years. It’s been a slow degeneration of his muscles and for a man who held two black belts in the martial arts it has been a painful process, physically and emotionally. I read this verse to him to see what he thought of it, and gave him my perspective which stems from a more accurate translation of the Greek in the phrase. When we read that word suffering the Greek is actually dokimen. Which could lend itself more to troubling experiences. What I said to my uncle was that they could be counted as Experiences of Trail. He seemed to like that, and find some peace in it.
Our experiences in life will try us, and if we can find the way to persevere, or to come through these trials with a faith in God’s power in tact then we build up a stronger character, we invigor our resolve, we look to a heavenly reward and at the end of that is a renewed Hope. And what is hope, but that wonderful expectation of what God can do. It is an anticipation, a looking and longing for, a desiring and a trusting on the Will of our God.

And know that God does not try us willfully to see if we will survive. But this broken and sinful world can hardly do anything but try us at every turn. That’s the way the game works. Only heaven and Eden were created to be a place of perfection.
Look again now to the end of the reading in Romans. Paul has outlined how to deal with experiences that test us, that seek to weaken our belief and strength in Christ, and now he makes us a promise. Hope will not disappoint you. Look to the Lord with anticipation and trust and you will not be disappointed. God pours out his Love for us. And this is the man who has been met with silence at his constant prayers for healing and the removal of a painful thorn in his life.

So, as we go out and deal with the inevitable trials of experience that the world has in store for us, we can choose to follow Paul’s example. It will never be as simple as making lemonade from lemons, the trials we face will truly test us and push us to the limit. Like the fans in Mudville our grief will be palpable at some points. Yet, with the idea of Hope in our minds we can persevere with the strength of God and the community of faith at our side. We can allow the experience to build us up instead of tearing us down and with a renewed sense of Hope and the promise of God we can be ready to help hold up others who will surely need us.

Even the author of Casey I think had some sense of hope. After all, he says in the first line of the poem that they are playing the game with one inning left to play, which can only mean that even though Casey strike out much to the disappointment of his fans, there is still one more at bat left for the team.

Then when we are faced with the trials of life, remember Paul in the batter’s box, next in the batting lineup, looking forward with hope to that last inning to conquer the visiting team.

BFF

Friendship is an odd thing. There are levels of course and there are degrees and all of that. True friends often are found at the end of grueling tests that come in one form or another. It's as if life is really against you having deep friendships and throws obstacles in your way. "Can you survive THIS?" Obstacles of time and distance sometimes make the difference. But then you have those friends who supersede all of that. People that you form a deep bond with and then, as trials of distance or time come and go, the bonds are still there. It takes only a few tentative moments to re-establish them.

As if when we meet these distant cousins again our spirits wait and say, "Is it still the same? do they care for me? can i still trust them?" All of which are essentially answered in the first few moments together.

Friends are perhaps the most dear relationships we can have on earth. Aside from spouses, which is however, and entirely different relationship. Because, even those with spouses still need close friends, and even must have them I would say in order to continue in a healthy spousal relationship. But the friend, the pure and true, is something that can transcend the confusing morays of sexual tension, and tack closer to the heart of love. Agape? If the spousal relationship is the best expression of Eros, then friendship is--perhaps Philloi would be a better description. Agape, perhaps is for the deepest kinds of friends. In which one could treat the other with undeserved mis-care, and then, years later, want and receive a reconciliation.

There are lots of people out there saying that friends must be of like minds. In fact Amos states as much in 3:3, but is perhaps better fulfilled in Proverbs 27:17--stating that iron sharpens iron. Friends can be different, in fact very different, in fact are sometimes better friends the more different they are! We need to have people that challenge us in a loving way to expand our opinions, to believe new things to take interest in new things. Not to shake the foundations of our understanding with accusation, but to certainly tend to us and ask us to believe differently.

Philloi (Philia) is the key then. That love that must direct our actions the love that resounds within us the idea of caring for this person. Aristotle says in "Nicomedian Ethics" that only the lovable are loved. We tend to think on that the wrong way I think. We think of lovable as pretty or cute, or fuzzy and cuddly, but the scripture can put that into perspective. Proverbs 18:24 says that one who would have friends must show themselves freely, and be willing to stick with people in trouble. Being "lovable" is nothing more than making yourself able to be loved. By being a trustworthy person, by being able to stick it out for your friends, to care for them, and most importantly to be open with ourselves.

People, then, who have shallow friends....

I've spent the weekend with some very dear friends. Friend who accelerated my own Christian journey on the path. From them I learned a great deal about Christ, about His will in this world, and about the inspiring power of His blessings. I've had some friends show their true colors and turn out to be complete bastards, and I've discovered friends where I thought them least likely to appear. Proverbs 11:14 also talks to us about the fact that having counselors and supporters in our lives will ensure our success. How often, when we feel alone, or troubled, do we simply need the kindness of good friends to uplift and support us. And again, as a part of being emotionally available in order to be a friend, we must allow people to hold us and help us.

Jesus' closest friends were people of all types, some got it, some didn't. Some where there at his last moments, some hid in their fear. But all of these friends responded out of committed love for their friend Yeshuah. Not out of obligation, or need, or want, but out of friendship and love that they had for the boy from Nazareth.

I'm glad for my friends in all the places they are, they are a blessing in my life continually regardless of their actual presence. They are the strong council that lifts me up. They are the teachers that help me re-examine my life, my thoughts and my decisions. They can hold me accountable, and give me some slack when I need it. They are the hands of Christ in my life here on earth.

Nobody Know, Nobody Sees

John 13:31-35

Acts 11:1-8

Revelation 21

Lately I haven’t felt a whole lot like loving people.

I don’t necessarily mean the people that we meet and greet and see everyday, I don’t really mean family, I mean, filled with that all reaching love for all our fellow people in the world. The kind of Love that Christ is talking about through this verse in John.

Honestly, I’ve felt like kicking the tar out of a couple of people in the world. My mother calls that reaction “righteous fire,” which she says, and I believe her, that I received from her blood. There seems to have been a rash of bad news lately. Starting with the university shooting, and ending, for me at least, with an interview with an author on TV.

The author they were interviewing was Christopher Hitchens, who recently came out with a book entitled, “god is not Great.” I’d like to show him some righteous fire right where it counts. I repeat, I do not feel like loving people.

If you haven’t heard of this book yet, its subtitle tells it all: “How religions poison everything.” He begins in the book to dislike the three big world religions equally, that is Judaism, Islam, and Christianity – but it becomes quickly apparent he reserves a special viciousness for the Christians. In this book he espouses that we have no more need to call upon God, when “God is entirely superfluous in order to make sense of the world.” I tell you the world doesn’t make any sense to me at all without God at the core of it.

The rest of the book is ill conceived and poorly thought out garbage about how all the wars in the past 300 years were created by religion. Which is true only to the extent that it was the people of these religions, not God, who began and fought these wars. So, if anything the book should be called, “People are not Great,” which is something I’m sure we all know very well!

I would like to leave room in my anger, however, CS Lewis was, after all, a staunch atheist before his powerful conversion experience, so I will say that many of the criticisms that the book has about the people who profess Christianity are pretty well founded. He talks about blatant money-grubbing, jaw dropping hypocrisy, and sex scandals, of course. And rightfully, these are all the things that any person of faith would be able to conceded that the denominations should do without, and in fact do struggle against constantly. Again though, I’ll point out, that’s all about people not being great, not God.

And yet, Hitchen’s opinions are often echoed by the atheist society. Which just really boils my blood. The truly great scientists will be the first to tell you that there are things, even now, that exceed the greatest of our understanding. The physicist Freeman Dyson said that, “the universe behaves as though it knew we were coming!” The more we learn the more is revealed how little we know. Einstein himself was a God-fearing man, who is often misquoted by the atheists as their poster child. Even when he was alive they did this, much to his great disgust! Einstein began his early adulthood as a devout Jew who then at one point in his live, gave up his faith entirely. And yet, at the age of 50 he began the journey back to God, because what he was uncovering about the universe, for him, held no other explanation. And when even asked about Christ he replied in and interview that “ No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates ion every word. No myth is filled with such life!”

This is the great atheist mascot.

And yet, in some way, some how, the faithful out there when reading this book, or listening to the interview, or when approached by a colleague or co-worker, will have their faith shaken by the information, by the inquiries into their faith. Some will be undone.

Though who among us hasn’t lost faith? A hiccup in an unshakeable understanding? For some the devil’s words of doubt can reach us just after a time of great crisis, or pain in our lives. We can be culled from the herd of the faithful more easily when we are spiritually sick. I have felt faith slipping away, heard the panting of temptation close by, and wondered what I was going to hold on too. There is a song that says, “my faith is like shifting sands, and so I stand on Grace.” And what is Grace but Love? The Love that Christ has, that the Father has, that Love that accepts the children into the fold regardless of deed, the love that does not expect works, the Love that is the stable stalwart thing that makes this existence mean something.

We are more easily broken I think the more rigid we are. The more we think we know everything about God, or Christ, or the Holy Bible the more easily we are felled when tragedy comes. In John 13:33 Jesus calls us children, and how true is that? Like children we cling to things we think we understand and when something new comes along we shout and stamp and say NO NO NO! It has to be THIS way! The Jewish church in Judea we exactly the same. Peter, and remember now this is Peter, who was WITH Jesus during his ministry, there in the garden as he prayed, on of the closest to him of the apostles, and yet they balk at his understanding of Christ’s teaching for the world. They did more than that really, the Greek form of the word, contend, or criticize is diek rin onto which means truly to stand against, to oppose, to create a division. They were lining up on the other side of the room, ready to have it out with him.

And we can identify with that can’t we? Here are the believers who, up to this point assume three things about Christianity: (1) that followers will have to be Jews first, (2) that they will commit to the Law of Moses, and (3) that they will observe all the ceremonies and rituals of Judaism. After all they saw Christ as the Jewish messiah that had been awaited. And they were right. But that wasn’t the whole story.

Their faith was shaken, and to the core really, because what Peter does us upsets the basic foundation of the religion up to that point. This is huge, and when he gets back they are ready for him boy, they have been stewing about this the whole time and they are ready to bring him to the ground for this. Because their faith has been shaken. I’ve been reading a book recently by Rob Bell in which he compares an unhealthy faith is like a brick wall. Everything is built up on top on another, and if one of the bricks at the very bottom is found to be flawed--the whole thing comes crashing down. And that’s what was happening here in Judea and what can happen here just as easily.

This same book by Rob Bell, suggested that a healthy faith is more like a trampoline. Our faith really is like the fabric part, the part we bounce on, the part that lifts us up. The spring supporting the fabric, are the tenants that we believe that support our faith. You can take one out, examine it, look at it, and the trampoline still works. You can even change it a little, make it longer, or shorter so that it changes the bounce. Yet, through all of this it still remains a spring.

Peter is preparing the people of the church in Judea for the revelation of John years later. Part of the reading this week covered a chapter in Revelation, the beginning of Chapter Twenty-One to be exact. In that reading it talks about John seeing the promise of the new heaven and the new earth and the old things passing away, and the promise that there would be no more tears or sorrow in this new place. Look deeper into the prophecy though, and what do you find?

We must be willing to accept the passing away of the old things, before we can exist in the new. And at first that might sound easy, but how often we find our bad habits to be the most ingrained. We cannot let them go! Yet, the vision f John says that we can only have the sorrowless life if we can let the old things pass away.

Peter says that in order to come into the fullest expression of the Love Christ charged us with we must do this new thing! We must have this New understanding, as told to me by God.

So let the Atheist come. I’m not afraid of Hitchens and his book, let it be published, let it be wrung out in the streets, I’ll host him a book signing in my own living room even. Because this church, this collection of the faithful I know will stand firm or Grace. Will stand firm on that love of Christ. Love will be that KEY spring in the trampoline of our Faith together. Go ahead, take it out examine it! Look at it, dissect it, and try to twist it. Put it back and I’ll be lifted up twice as high.

Then we can all say, “I have new understanding every day. I see the new heaven and a new earth. I am ready to let the old fall away.”

Let’s let Peter come back to a welcome, instead of war. Lets bring him back and say, “Pete, what is this new thing you are doing? It sounds CRAZY, but tell us more. What’s God been saying to you?” Because you know what? I am determined, not to build a wall out of my faith.

We can make our faith stronger, so that in the times of trouble when we are going to be vulnerable, we will survive without being shaken. We can meet tragedy with the knowledge that God is Lord. That the great I am, IS, and will always be.

Because what does Christ tell us? That there will be love. This is one of the greatest in the last of the instructions that he is giving to the apostles before the crucifixion. If you want people to know you as my followers, the love each other.

And in this moment, there are no parables, no stories, just utter simplicity. Love each other.

That my friends is how we support one another through these trials of faith, through these great tests that life is going to inevitably throw at each and every one of us. Because in a community of faith there isn’t just one person on a trampoline, it’s a whole field full of people on trampolines all hooked in together. And it’s up to us all to say to the person that has all their spring taken out, “hey, that’s ok, hook up to my springs and you can bounce on them for a while till we get your back.” And it might be easy to think about a few people in a church who you wouldn’t mind really sharing with, or holding up, and that’s ok, because the natural tendency is to gravitate like towards like, but the true purpose of the faith, as charged to us by Christ himself is to be prepared, ready and able to meet with true and honest love all the members of the body. Because what was Christ love if not true and honest and the most pure and free of maliciousness or hurtful thoughts? And it’s his model we follow.

So let’s look to the vision of John at Patmos and seek out the New World that God has prepared for us, let’s look to Peter and see what new understanding is coming to us on the horizon, and lets meet all of these with emotion of Christ’s love and support for one another. Because, even when I feel like I can’t love, or when I am in no mood to view the world with the Kindness of Christ, I know I can turn to my brothers and sisters to hold me up, and make me strong, until I can do so again in the name of Jesus’ love.

Illustration Friday -- Neighbor

I miss him. I miss that my kids probably won't ever have anything as good.

Illustration Friday

Powerless

Recently I've succumbed to the Powers of the almighty facebook. Just another facet in connectivity to all the spread out friends and family we all have these days.

Though, in the wake of this VT massacre I had to stop and wonder if it was really such a great thing.

What got me started was seeing a couple of Facebook Groups spring up today. "God be with V Tech", "Praying for VT", "VT Support" Etc, etc.

Is that really the best we can do?

I understand completely why we all feel the need to join these groups. We are so well informed now that most of us probably heard of the shootings as they were happening, if not immediately thereafter. People all over the world have information on it by today, and the details are spreading, spreading... Which isn't necessarily a bad thing though. But we have all of this information it seems and no real way to act on it.

Our human condition more or less dictates a sense of empathy for all of the people who are left behind in a tragedy like this, in some ways I would say that it hits us even harder than something more catastrophic like Katrina or something because the numbers are LOWER. There is only so much we can realistically process and pass emotion on. Honestly we probably would feel better if there were say, 4000 students shot. Because we wouldn't be able to really feel that. It would be tragic, but I think we can all really feel the gritty emotion of 32 people being killed. Much more than that and it's just a world wide statistic for most of us.

I wonder about the real use of e-groups because they are on the same par with all the other Joke groups that spring up on Facebook and its ilk. So, in that way first, it seems to cheapen the gesture. Additionally (and maybe this is just me being a cynic), if I knew someone in those shootings, I would feel no better that some prom queen in Duluth was showing her support of my pain. I mean really. How many times could you possibly read that someone thought it was tragic, and they were in their engineering building, and they are thinking about me in my hour of need... The monotony of it all would just make me feel like no one -really- understood anything about the whole thing and it was just -another- bandwangon that people were jumping on to make themselves feel better.

But that's true isn't it? We do it to make ourselves feel better about an awful situation. We all have this human need to DO something, but we are removed physically or emotionally from the situation so our options are limited. And then here is this little e-group where we can commiserate and share and make ourselves feel like the world isn't full of mad people and get on with our life. Be cause we feel powerless when things like this happen. We want to ask why and rail at the sky and get together with like minded people and make it all go away.

So, maybe they do serve their purpose in their own way, but as an emotional experience for everyone else, and not really for the people who are actually connected to the experience.

As for the prayer. I'm just not sure of it. I mean, here I am even as a Church Person, and yeah, we take prayer requests at the church and the community of faith shares with one another the things that we have on our hearts and minds and the things we take to God.
But for us to broadcast the fact that we are praying for these people outside of our own community. I don't know. Again, to me it wouldn't really mean as much as knowing people in my own church were praying for me, the people who were really connected to me and some frat-man in Hawaii.
I guess on that there is a point where we become like the Pharisee, who walk up to the center of the church and pray loudly for everyone else to hear. If you want to pray, pray, the One that matters hears you, you don't have to join a group online to state that you are praying over people for a tragedy. Unless I suppose you are going to use the group to actually get together and actually pray for these people.

Tragedy, Tragedy everywhere, and not enough to drink...

The way it is...

So this is the way Christ works....

Yesterday there were these few people.... Let's call them biddies. Who were on my case for basically nothing. and i mean that seriously, I know that I can be a slacker sometimes and forget thigns and leave stuff around. But, I made a real effort the day before to have everything squared away. And you know how crappy that feels when you make the effrot to do something and you still get yelled at for it? Yeah, well, that's what happened.
So all yesterday I was in a royal FIT, and just cursing at everything and grumbly mubly etc.... And this morning wasn't MUCH better, but I set some of it aside, and read some things in Acts, and felt lots better. And I had to cause I was helping out with Three Services today (Good Friday).

And at the end of the service I helped serve communion. And I served it to the biddies.

That's how Christ works.

It's like, GARRRRRR. And then you serve them the symbol of the ultimate love and forgiveness on this earth, and they look you in the eye, and you say, "The Body of the one who loves us, broken for you," and they say, "Amen." And then you feel like an enormous jerk.

Stupid anger. Stupid forgiveness making people feel better and stuff...

Sometimes we all liek our anger don't we? It's like this warm horrible blanket that is all around us. Which is too bad really. Cuase it's prickley on the outside. Sigh.

God is Good, all the Time.