summer time

The Pastor's blog is going on "summer time" until late August.  See you then!

Responding to Rapture

There’s a lot of talk about rapture/end of the world/wrath & judgment going around. It’s because of a confluence of at least 4 human experiences. Here’s some thoughts on the origin, before we ask, “So what?” (skip to the last paragraph if you can’t wait……) Ancientinfo+biblicalprophecy+scientificrevolution+naturaldisasters=?

Or put another way: 

*Mayan calendar

*Judeo-Christian scripture and traditions

*learning to measure & calculate

*recent earthquakes, floods, and other natural phenomenon

A sophisticated ancient Mayan civilization extended throughout what is now Central America. It is much admired for developing literacy and technology.  Their calendar, which only goes as far as 2012, has drawn considerable speculation.  Why end there?  Did they know something we don’t know?  Or perhaps, that’s just the point at which they stopped writing.                                                                        

Biblical passages in the Jewish and Christian traditions talk about “last days” and the messiah’s return. The term “rapture” appears only once, and in a recent translation by Eugene Petersen:  One day I went strolling through the orchard, looking for signs of spring, Looking for buds about to burst into flower, anticipating readiness, ripeness. Before I knew it my heart was raptured, carried away by lofty thoughts!  (“The Message,” Song of Solomon 6:11).                                     In the Bible, “Last Days,” refers to a turning point in human history, usually in terms of faithfulness to God, but accompanied by human social change. And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.  Gather yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob; and hearken unto Israel your father. Reuben, thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power: (Genesis 49:1-3, King James Version)          Or This is what Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem: In the last days the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as the highest of the mountains; it will be exalted above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.                                              . (Isaiah 2:1-2, New International Version)                                                               Prophetic writing adds an element of judgment. The change is happening because God was not pleased with things as they were. For the Israelites will live many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred stones, without ephod or household gods. Afterward the Israelites will return and seek the LORD their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the LORD and to his blessings in the last days. (Hosea 3:4-5, New International Version)                                             And finally, with apocalyptic literature, like Daniel and Revelation comes drama & practically psychedelic imagery.                                              Jump ahead a millennium and a half or so, to the Scientific Revolution, when more recent ancestors began measuring with great exactness:  distance, time.  We began to want to know precisely when, what and where to expect something to happen.  Instead of a “ruler” being the length of the current kings foot, it was a standard 12 inches.  (When’s the last time we used the president’s forearm to measure-which is what Noah’s cubit would be).   Imprecise biblical images became anticipated events. A biblical “day” (period in which something happened) became 24 hours.  A year became 365 days (with adjustments via lead year since our measurements still don’t quite fit reality). The precision applied to natural phenomenon was now brought to bear on biblical narratives and conversations written long before frame of reference came to be.                                                       Now, put all that in a situation where people are asking “what the heck is going on with the weather/ earthquakes/floods these days?”   Mix in a generation that enjoys more than a little living-on-the edge excitement and we’re looking for front row seats at the anticipated event, the Rapture. For how the idea of rapture developed in visit: http://www.askthepriest.org/askthepriest/2005/08/the_rapture.html

SO WHAT? Here’s what I think matters: Our response.

Five Responses to Rapture: (I’m sure you can come up with more!)

a) The sooner the better.

b) What, another deadline!  I don’t have time for this…

c)  a little edgy, a little energized, I’ll play along for a while.

d) Better safe than sorry.

e) How dumb do you have to be to believe this stuff?

“The sooner the better” doesn’t see any possibility that God will redeem the world “as is.”  Do-overs and escapes clauses offer a clean restart.

“I don’t have time for this” brushes off other’s people worry.  And it ignores the huge impact that apocalyptic theories have on our foreign policy and own society.

“Play along” enjoys the imaginative suspense, like a horror movie, it suspends disbelief.

“Better safe than sorry” is an old philosophical strategy.  If its not true, I have nothing to lose.  If it is true, I better be on the safe side.

And “those dummies, ” like “I don’t have time for this” takes the easy way out.  It’s easier to belittle than to engage what’s actually a logically intricate and brilliantly developed system of thought with a tremendous influence on American culture and foreign policy.

The passage rapture theory rests on is 1 Thessalonians 4:17 (King James Version): Then we, which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Paul wrote this letter to people who were worried about what would happen to those who died before Jesus’ expected return.  Who they see them again?  When, where?  Paul’s answer is that those who have died will not return to life on earth, as they know it.  Rather, all will be swept up in God’s life by Christ’s presence.                                     It is about hope and trust in God. It is not a “proof” of a physical event much less a prediction as to when that will happen. It’s a descriptive phrase trying to convey the joyful reunion believers anticipate with those who have already died.

SO WHAT?????

Singer Bruce Cockburn asks, If this were the last day of the world, what would I do that was different?  Would you change anything if you knew there was no tomorrow?  If the answer is yes, why wouldn’t you make that change whether there’s a tomorrow or not?  I guess as someone who lost a parent at a very young age, this has always seemed very real to me.  Each day is an opportunity to live fully and faithfully. 

         Why wait to something wonderful?

         Why wait to tell someone you love him or her?

         Why wait to reconcile with someone, or with God?

         Why wait to say thank you?

         Why wait to make the world a better place?

miracles

David Atkinson

This morning, wakened early by yesterday's indulgence in an iced coffee drink, I joined royal wedding viewers.  It wasn't something I'd planned to do, but chagrin faded with the realization that television stations in the U.S.A., with those in Great Britain and around the world, were covering a worship service, and without commercial interruption.
What constitutes a miracle?
This was a convergence of human choices.
A couple's choice to marry.
A country's choice to maintance the symbols of monarchy.
Western culture's choice to go all out celebrating love, commitment and family. Media businesses' choices to give the people what they want, unobstructed viewing.
As a result of these cumulative choices, millions of people around the globle simultaneously "took part" in worship.  We listened to prayer saturated,  God-centered scripture, message, and music.  The couple made their vows in sacred time and space.  It was a stark contrast to the previous day's dominant wedding topics:  what would people be drinking and when & what would "the dress" look like?  Millions of people experienced "reverenance."  For some it will remain a novelty.  Others' souls will be permanently stirred. Some will busily adjust their own wedding staging.  Others will take to heart words that grounded the new marriage in God's love and purpose.
A miracle is evidence of God's grace overcoming human convention and physical limitations. What we make of a day like this, generously shared, is evidence of how open we are to experiencing God in what we are given.

Hanami season: beauty & mourning

On Monday morning US time, an American morning show reporter in Japan stood framed at dusk by cherry branches in full bloom. Deep in my memory something tried to call to him, "turn around, turn around." How could he speak in ordinary words while turning his back on such breathtaking beauty?

During Hanami season in Japan, people drop what they are doing and succumb in awe while nature mysteriously wraps the world in a delicate day-lit scherenschnitte blanket.  White, pink, lavender, the blossoms exert a exquisitely irresistible  pressure to pay attention.  At night, moon, stars, and paper lanterns transform the sprays into earth's fireworks. 

Later on Monday, NPR announced that Tokyo Governor Ishishihara had banned hanami parties this year.  Ishihara made news a couple of weeks ago by invoking the ancient Buddhist concept of tembatsu, heavenly punishment, in this case the Governor said, for egoism.  In prewar Japan, the judgement of heaven rested on the people's willingness to sacrifice individual needs and desires for community goals.  (Interestingly different from Chinese culture's "mandate of heaven" which rests on the ruler's responsibility to attend to the welfare of the people.)  He has retracted his statements, affirming compassion for those who had suffered the earthquake and tsunami's devastation.

Unlike ume (plum blossom) viewing parties, which tend to be more sedate, sakura (cherry) blossom parties unleash silliness and spring exhuberance.  This year, walking under unlit lanterns hanging in the cherry boughs, people spoke of the poignant absense of light.  Yozakura, evening viewing parties are more an observation than a celebration this year.  And yet the beauty endures and comforts, connecting souls at a level deeper than words.

In a nation turned toward rebuilding, toward hope, the blossoms provide a wordless way to touch inexpressible loss and grief.

Dancing Trees

Resting my eyes, I lay my head down on the work table for a minute.
My perspective changes entirely.  Not just tipping, but drawn out the window where branches of the neighbors' trees are dancing.  I've been so focused on the unwanted piles of snow that I haven't looked up today.
And there they are, waiting, in all their lyrical beauty.  They dance whether I notice them or not.  They'll still wave their lovely long arms when the sun goes down shortly.  I have no affect on them, but to notice, and to celebrate the lifted heart, and to say, "thank you," God, "for showing me the dance.

Beyond

Hmmm, I just realized that the last time I updated this blog was the last storm.  What kind of theme is this?  This snow, like last month's ice, is beautiful.  But it come at time when my heart has turned toward spring. It doesn't fit my expectations.

Yesterday I was imaging recreating the United Methodist Church. (What do you do in your free time??) I find it easier to visual patterns, so I went into my pre-loaded graphics.  Nothing fit.  All the charts and templates, created for business models, follow existing patterns (Duh, my logical mind interjects).  But we're reaching for something totally new.  That's probably why there's more than a little hesitation about business models, even new ones, framing the way forward.  I'm willing to fill in "dashboards" so that leaders can collect better congregational data, but I"m under no illusion that data is the portal to the future. (Even though one of my favorite authors, James Gleick, posits in his latest book that everything real is information).

Something is happening among faith-full people, some folks say "emerging," that doesn't fit existing models. Its just beyond, where we can almost touch it, but not quite.  We can almost visualize it, but not yet.

Last Sunday in worship, several people shared things about our present reality that are beyond our little church's control.  The earth's population is pushing 7 billion.  Technology is offering choices to make our heads spin.  We have access to more stuff, more knowledge, more experiences than ever.  Shopping is coming to us, via social networking techniques, like groupon and open table, rather us going and searching out what we want. Inter-racial families are no longer unusual. We travel and bring back new customs and insights.

Phyllis Tickle says that about every 500 years culture experiences a sea change that forces faith communities floating on the sea to re-examine their boats.   Alot of us get attached to the baggage while others start to scan for the horizon.  We can't ignore what's going on outside the boat. (Tickle says that in the "tick-ups" to those sea-changes churches have an every five hundred year garage sale, emptying out our attics of what is not longer useful, and reclaiming things we'd tucked away and forgotten about.).

So no matter what size our own community is, population changes demand that we rethink how we use the earth's resources.  And no matter what technology we prefer, what becomes normative in our culture will develop new communication patterns.  (Did you know that in many work setting people text or use a social network to set appointments for phone calls?  Unexpected calls are startling in some of these sites).

How will we share the gospel as more people get out of the habit of church-shopping?  How can we take what God's given us to where people are instead of trying to attract them to where we are? How can we celebrate the diversity of cultures and customs enlivening our communities?

Because its not that what God's given us isn't needed any more.  The gospel is not ours to tuck away in an attic hoping that someday someone will come along and dust it off. Some of the ways we've grown accustomed to offering it may become obsolete.  But study after study (PEW trust, the National Study of Youth, Barna, ....) finds a growing hunger for spirituality, a way of saying that religious options aren't working for a god-hungry world.  There's also a growing hunger to serve.  To know that your life matters for something.

So welcome to the garage sale, as we share each other's best memories.
Welcome to the horizon watchers, as we live into God's ever growing kin-dom.

Mother Nature's Mardi Gras

Yesterday Mother Nature gave us a perfect Mardi Gras landscape on Kents Hill. Every limb twisting toward the sparkling sunlight was hung with rainbow-tossing crystal beads in a glorious parade down the streets and over the hills. The light danced.

Revelers wandered foolishly about in shirt sleeves despite nose nipping temperatures.  Even the rice-crispy sound (thanks for the phrase, neighbor, Babs!) of rattling trees added to the festive mood. Steam rising off melting tarmac added a sense of mystery. 

Everything about the day seemed to cry, "shake it, Baby, shake it."

But today the air has been graying toward the evening's Ash Wednesday Service.  It doesn't feel like penance for yesterday's celebration....more like a rebalancing of energy as the next storm approaches.  Its tempting to push the metaphor too far, into a natural cycle of life.  But there's nothing natural about Ash Wednesday, at least not these days.
In days gone by, Mardi Gras/Fat Tuesday, was the day when everyone scraped together the last bits of fat and feasted as best they could before the long final fast that awaited early crops and hunting.  After the feast, as reality set in, people would go to church to be "shriven" of their sins, to confess and cleanse their souls. Today, I went to the store to stock up before rain sets in again. Instead of going to confession to cleanse my soul, I'll brush my teeth before I go to bed.  Its quite a reversal of fortune from what my scandinavian ancestors knew.
Two of the practices lost in Protestantism's hey day are confession and fasting.  If you don't have to, why put yourself through it? Party on!
So how do we get in touch with the reality of life's storms and our complicity in so many of them?  Can we really just skip over the depris piling  up around us, perhaps arranging it artfully or ignoring it altogether:  hurt feelings that lead to lost partnerships, missed oportunities to be the hands and heart of Christ for a stranger, the gluttony of daily coffee intake, chocolate tea, out of season fruits and vegetables trucked miles and miles and miles while we bemoan the price of gas and ignore the toll on underpaid farmhands.
Will it really all go away if we just ignore it?  Or might we accept the moments of clarity offered by a Lenten Fast, setting aside non-essentials while what is vital emerges:  our fears, our addictions, our hubris, all the accrued debris in our souls that Jesus offeres to sweep out and replace with space for grace.

Church lives in Christchurch

New Zealand

tumbled

shaken

reaching out tendriled 

nerves

from ruined stones

touching our cut hearts

open

wondering.

Prayer, love, awe

flow back toward

resilient sister

brother

child

elder

shoveling, lifting, carrying

muscles

alive in the body.

Be well, beloved.

we pray

3 conversations

This morning in worship we looked at John 4 as three conversations:
1. The Samaritan Woman's talk with Jesus.
2.  Jesus' followers' talk with him.
3. The court official's talk with Jesus.

The first conversaton is happenstance.  She's not looking for him and he doesn't seem to have been looking for her.  But they both stop and talk when opportunity presents itself. He's physically thirsty. She's spiritually parched. He asks for her help.  She asks for his. The obstacles that others would see to their conversation even taking place don"t seem to phase either of them.

We modern non-Jewish readers are actually the ones with an obstacle.  What on earth is Jesus talking about?  It seems like he's ignoring her very real problems, talking right past them. What on earth is this mysterious "living water?"

But "living water" was a core religious practice in Jesus' day and in the Holy Land.
Purifications, changes in status, preparation for Sabbath or holy day-these new beginnings were marked by immersion into the living waters of a mikveh.

When an archeologist unearths the remains of a particular kind of stone pool, they know they have found a Jewish home or gathering place.  3 steps down into a small pool, bor, sized to hold a constant 40 sa'ah, or about 200 gallons, of water coming through a small opening in a natural flow of rain or spring water.  in the pool the living water would mix with water brought from any source available, saturating them standing water with rebirth.

The mikveh's constantly refreshed living water recollect Eden, paradise's waters, the source of all water in the world said to flow from 4 rivers into all the other rivers and streams in a perfect state of constant renewal.  In a mikveh, the living waters flow into the womblike cavitiy of the bor. (Aryeh Kaplan “Waters of Eden:  The Mystery of the Mikveh”)


John the Baptist prophetically enlarged the rebirthing place and brought it out into the open -to the Jordan river.

And Jesus completed the extension of this powerful, physical metaphor, "I am the living water."  Immerse yourself in my life and you immerse yourself in God's life.

Do his words sound strange to us? Perhaps we've forgotten the daily renewal of living water, the ever at hand power of remembering our baptism, of being reborn, immersed in God's life.

Mayim is the Hebrew word for water.  It has the same root as mah, or water.  When a person is immersed in water, he or she is nullifying their ego, cut off from oxygen, it becomes possible to answer the question,"what am I," in a new way.

When the Samaritan woman meets Jesus, it becomes possible for her to become someone new as je guides her gently into the living waters of God's life.

The second conversation is not happenstance.  Jesus' followers return from foraging for food, determined to feed him.  If we could ask those followers,"what are you?" I wonder what they might answer at this stage in their journey.  I wonder what we might answer as we busily work at serving Jesus.

It seems like their determination to do what they think they ought to do may be getting in the way of understanding what Jesus is talking about.  We've seen that before, in his interactions with other teachers and leaders. Their certainty is like a wet suit, with goggles, getting between them and the living water he offers! They can't get very wet until they shed a few layers.

In the conversation, a court official frantically seeks Jesus out. "Save my son," he pleads.  It is the cry of any parent whose child's life is at stake. He knows what is most important to him. What he needs is who he is at that moment. Jesus meets the need.

David E. Holwerda talks about John's Gospel as a "trajectory of faith."  Reading John as a whole this winter, we noticed how Jesus returns again and again to the simplest of images:  water, bread, word, life.  We also noticed how again and again he starts by saying, "I tell you the truth!"

Could it really, truly be this simple?  Hear the truth, walk this way, rely on God's sustenance (water, bread).

We train ourselves to crave fancier things: soda, cofee, fructose enhanced juice, when what our 70%water bodies really crave is.....water, fresh, clean water. We train ourselves to rely on expert opinions and institutional processes when what we really need is the fresh readily available living water of Christ, poured into our world, poured into our lives, in constant renewal of God's loving purpose.

Another perspective

Here's another thought provoker on perspective.  Our generation (children of Baby Boomers) had our glance radically reoriented when we saw through the eyes of astronauts.

Maybe the religious leaders in John 9 are like astronauts who have been "away" from everyday life for so long they can't even ask the right questions any more!

Disciples: liars ,fools or open to possibilities?

Sunday's courtroom drama message by Susan and George provoked lots of great observations and  questions for me. (Thank you for the gift of sitting in the pews this week, friends!).  So I thought I'd make this week's worship post a hop skip and jump through this chapter, touching on my thoughts as I listened.  You add yours in the comment section!

I've long subtitled John 9 as "Adventures in Missing the Point." (read John chapter 9 to see if you agree)
George and Susan's version really reinforced that for me.  (Check out www.injoy-karen.blogspot.com for another version of this).  It seems like a collision of received truth, codified in tradition, vs. encountered truth, in flesh and blood. Its not that one is better than the other.  The question seems to be (along the lines of our conversaitonal approach to this gospel), how do they communicate.

The once-blind man couldn't seem to care less what the religious authorities think.  What matters to him is that he can see.  He knows, with ever breathing vibrating cell in his body, that his life had been radically changed because he has been radically changed.  Every time he repeats the story, he grows more confident in the telling.

Question 1:  What good news has changed your life?
Question 2:  Who have you told and how has telling it affected you?

The religous authorities aren't really interested in this man's experience at all.  They're trying to figure out what Jesus is up to. And he's not there to ask.  Of course, the man born blind couldn't see until after Jesus healed him.

Question 3:  What prevented the leaders from "seeing?"
Question 4:  What are they afraid of?

Once the man has witnessed, publically, to his experience, they call him a disciple.

Question 5:  Are you a disciple?
Question 6:  What's the point of the story as you read it, and what might you or I be missing?

When United Methodists receive new members, we're asked to affirm our discipleship will include your presence, your gifts, your service and your witness.

Question 7:  How would you write the next chapter in this man's life?  What form might his gifts and service take now that God's story has written healing into his life?

Question 8:  What might the next chapter in your own life look like as you think about these four aspects of discipleship?

Well healed vs. well heeled

Yesterday George and Susan created a wonderful court scene for our Sunday Morning Message, an interpretation of John 9.  It was a challenge to consider our own reactions to the man born blind and healed by Jesus' mix of spit, dirt, word, and love. This marvelous video by lemonjelly makes think about the constrast between staying in our orderly rows (ruts?) and allowing something new to invade our consicousness.  (For bible study reflections on this passage, visit www.readfieldumc.blogspot.com) 

Who is God? #1

Alanis Morisette and Joan Osborne's song asks about a very human God, one way of understanding Christ's idendity.  How does it challenge your own idea of who God is?

Tempest in the Temple

NY Times 1-1-11, QUOTATION OF THE DAY

 "Whatever your vice is, we're your folks."

TENA ALONZO, director of research at Beatitudes nursing home in Phoenix, which gives Alzheimer's patients whatever they want.

This online/headline caught my eye last month.  The Beatitudes name makes for serious irony. (coincidently the Beatitudes are this week's lectionary gospel passage Matthew 5: 1-2.)  How many church leaders/pastors/employees wear themselves out trying to keep everybody happy instead of challenging each other to please God?

The current edition of Christian Century has a book review of G. Jeffrey MacDonald's "Thieves in the Temple:  The Christian Church and the Selling of the American Soul."  Right in line with last Sunday's message from John 2.  In the review, Lillian Daniels writes, small mainline churches are not immune to the temptation to bend over backward to meet people's desires.  We think if we provide it and they like it, they will come.  Conservatives and liberals share the same consumer orientation and the same temptation to put people pleasing programs about disciplined faithfulness.  

After some years of pastoring, I no longer find the labels "liberal and conservative" very useful.  But that aside, MacDonald and Daniels have put their cooperative fingers right on the point.  Every group I've ever worked with that was "high expectation" thrived.  And I've watched every one that aimed for the lowest common denominator as it bottomed out. 

Our denomination, the United Methodists, have spent quite a bit of energy developing hospitality in the past few years.  I think there's real value in welcoming each visitor as we would welcome Christ.  

But what if Christ came in swinging, as he did in John's account of his visit to the temple?  What do we do with the angry people?  Would we surround Jesus with "simmer downs" so he doesn't disrupt our careful cultivation of the right people and programs? Or would we have the presence of mind (soul?) to look at what sheep, cattle, coins, he was shoving toward the door?

MacDonald takes whacks at the prosperity gospel and "vacationaries," (those who do good to feel good).  But I don't think the rest of us should let ourselves off the hook too quickly.  Are we trying to give people what they think their hearts desire?  Or are we offering the real soul food of a gospel that challenges our hearts, minds and souls to be renewed by the power of a living Lord and the presence of the Holy Spirit?

Jesus Parable

No one has ever seen God. 
It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, 
who has made him known.


I've been thinking about yesterday's responses in worship, about we're noticing in John.  The one I'm focused on at the moment is Brian's observation that the parables are missing.  Well, maybe not gone missing, becuase they were never there in John's account.  But missing to our minds.  The "synpotic gospels," Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that form the backbone of our usual lectionary based worship ignite our imagination with "ahah" inducing parables.  But John is one conversation after another, held together with movement between Galilee and Jerusalem.  And, to be truthful, Jesus' part in those conversations gets prgressively more lopsidedly long and strange.

Meanwhile his cousin John keeps saying, look at him, look at him.  And Jesus keeps saying essentially, "when you see me you see God." (as Cindy noticed.)

What if instead of telling parables, Jesus IS the parable in John?  What if Jesus is the strange Word of God sent to provoke our "ahahs?"  Afterall, everything he does in this Gospel seems designed to get attention, while at the same time he insists that we turn that attention to God.

When the first would be followers approached Jesus, he asked, "what are you looking for?" (John 1: 35 NRSV) and when they ask where he's staying, he answers, "Come and See."
Jesus' encounter with Nathanael is basically a case of "I see you, can you see me?"

John calls Jesus, "light, "full of grace and truth,""Lamb of God,"
Jesus's signs, the surprising things he does, "reveal his glory" (John 2: 11).

Now here's the rub.  If Jesus is the parable who reveals God to all who come and see, then what are we as we become the Body of Christ?  Are we peculiar enough to be authentic God revealing parables ourselves?  Or are we content being mass produced?

Hmmm....if I were a parable..........

Hurdles

I've finally made time (well okay, the 2 feet of snow in Boston made time) to get into Warren Carter's book, John:  Storyteller, Interpreter, Evangelist.  Its a most helpful companion to our current journey through the conversations in the Gospel According to John. I've heard Warren speak.  He combines just the right amounts of erudite and down to earth insight.

In his discussion of the plot, Warren makes a nice outline of the four major elements previewed in this gospel's prologue. Here's my interpretation of what I'll call the "four hurdles."
Hurdle 1.  Jesus' credibility, which rests on the claim that he is God's original agent. John 1: 1-5
Hurdle 2.  A "behind the scenes" struggle (after their executions) between Jesus and John's respective followers. John 1: 6-8.
Hurdle 3.  The choice readers face of whether to follow Jesus or turn away, particularly in light of how countercultural, even dangerous, Jesus' way can be. John 1: 9-16.  (Verses 1: 10-13 have a nice plot summary)
Hurdle 4. How can Jesus be more important than Moses,  hero of the exodus and bringer of the law?

You may have noticed that the first and last have to do with "who the heck does this guy think he is," and the middle two are "then what should we do about it?"

Luckily, the Gospel encourages us not to puzzle over it alone, like this poor guy.  By creating a "revelatory biography"  (Warren Carter's term) that is a series of action linked conversations, the author shows us that insight comes from holy conferencing (John Welsey's term) or just plain good conversation.

That's the approach we're taking in worship right now, and on the pastor and church blogs.  We're also going to try a "virtual small group" and are eager to enlist participants and ideas about what platforms to try. So, let me know! 

The Host with the Most

The sermon I didn't preach last Sunday was titled, "The Host with the Most." ( I didn't preach it beacuse I rewrote to respond to Saturday's awful shooting in Arizona.)

Here's what I was thinking about John 1: 19-42 (the Message or check out John 1: 19-42 for the King James version-its interesting to put the two translations in conversation with each other).

 This story starts the gospel right off with conflict.  A crowd, seeded with questions by power seeking leaders, challenges John the Baptist (a different John from the one associated with creating this Gospel itself).  "Who are you," they ask, and "what are you doing?"  John replies that none of the names they try to pin on him are right.  He is the one pointing to something, or someone, new.  He doesn't really want to talk about himself at all.  He's all about the greater one who is coming.  But the authorities don't seem to hear (perhaps they're not very good listeners).

There's another sort of conflict in the background. We see it in the Gospel according to Matthew (Matthew 9:14 and chapter 11).  John and his cousin, Jesus, were both emerging as public figures. Many think that Jesus followed and learned from John for awhile.  What does a teacher do when a student starts to outshine them?  Especially when the teacher's other followers start following the upstart cousin....

Whatever bumps and rubs there may have been in the actual ministry situation, by the time this version of the Gospel gets written down, there is no doubt where the light shines brightest.  Its all about Jesus.
In fact, you can almost hear John say, "you idiots," as he tries and tries to say, "not me, him!"

Jesus is the host with the most and John the Baptist is his biggest cheer leader. I wonder how many of us would settle as garcefully into second fiddle.  How did John manage that transition?

It must have helped that they had the same goal-the salvation of their people, re-union with God. There must also have been a healthy helping of reality.  John knew his role.  He probably knew that if he tried to be something he wasn't it would end badly.  But if he went with the flow of gifts God poured into him, it was grace upon grace, not overcome even by his own "bad end" at King Herod's hand. (That's the guy who gave John's head on a platter to his dancing step daughter.)  The story John was part of, Jesus's story, was so much bigger and brighter than anything jealous powers could try to snuff out.  Its note the ratings light of a host that attracts the biggest following. That's resurrection light we see shining. The same resurrection light that meets us when Christ hosts the Lord's Supper or that glistens in drops of Baptism water tossed in the air over the head of the beloved.