Bob Kaylor

The Problem of Evel

I just saw the news item that Evel Knievel had passed away at age 69. Given that tomorrow is my 44th birthday, the event causes me to wax nostalgic about my childhood.

I remember watching Evel do his jumps on Wide World of Sports on Saturdays. Usually, that particular sports cavalcade was full of stuff that people usually only watched during the Olympics. As it was, the only reason I think anybody watched it was that there was no ESPN at the time and you had to watch something on Saturday afternoons when it was freezing rain in March in western Pennsylvania.

In the midst of all the bobsledding, figure skating, and international weightlifting, there would be Evel jumping over cars or busses or something else. Even as a kid I knew he was nuts, but you had to kind of admire the guy's pluck. I remember getting the Evel Knievel doll and wind-and-go motorcycle for Christmas one year and, ironically, the site of Evel and his bike tumbling end over end down a set of concrete stairs wasn't that different than the real thing. During those summers we put up ramps made out of cinder blocks and scrap plywood and jumped our Schwinn Stingrays over lines of Matchbox cars. Again, for those of you under 30, we didn't have satellite TV or even cable, no VCRs, no video games (though Pong was not long in coming), and parents who were too busy working to entertain us. "Go outside and play" was a mantra my mom should have had printed on a t-shirt and just worn every day.

My favorite Evel stunt, though, was his attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon. The chute deployed when the rocket bike took off, but at least it opened and lowered him somewhat gently into the gorge, narrowly missing the river. It was one of those defining moments of the 70s and you've never forgotten it if you were around then.

Evel did things that most of us wouldn't dream of doing, yet he touched something of the daredevil in all of us. In a world where you can do just about anything virtually, Evel was three-dimensional, analog, and a real gunslinger. Love him or hate him, he made sure that you never ignored him.

Fight the Power (Colossians 1:11-20; Luke 23:33-43) - Sermon for 11/25/07

One of the interesting things about preaching from the lectionary is that the texts that are chosen for certain Sundays often pop up and surprise you. This Sunday is one of those days. On the church calendar, this last Sunday of the church year is known as “Christ the King “ Sunday. We sit here on this Thanksgiving weekend anticipating the beautiful songs and anticipation of Advent and instead we’re hit with the brutal Good Friday scene of Jesus’ crucifixion. No postcard images here—instead we see conflict; the conflict between the person and message of Jesus and the powers of this world.

We look at two scriptures this morning, first approaching Paul’s letter to the Colossians. The city of Colossae sat on the coast of modern day Turkey, along the trade routes of that time. We don’t know a whole lot about the city since it was destroyed by an earthquake in about 60AD and has never been excavated. Its port harbor silted over and was never used again, the city never rebuilt. In the time of Paul, though, somewhere in the early 50s AD, a church had been established in the city. Paul himself never visited Colossae. But the church leader, a local named Epaphras, had apparently written to Paul telling him of some serious problems in the fledgling church. Paul responded with a letter he wrote while imprisoned in Ephesus, about a hundred miles from Colossae.

The problem for the church in Colossae was primarily one of worship. While the people had become followers of Christ, they also held on to some of their pagan traditions, worshipping what Paul calls the “heavenly powers,” “elemental spirits of the universe” and “angels,” all of which refer to the popular belief of the time that human destiny was controlled by the stars. This was more than a horoscope, but a belief that the universe was a very random place and that anything humans did, good or bad, was subject to fate and to forces well beyond human control or understanding. This belief dovetailed with the Greco-Roman pantheon of gods whom people believed pulled the strings in the background of human life. Who you fell in love with, how you made your fortune, how healthy you were, even when you would die were all pre-determined by “the powers.”

We might rightly scoff at such belief, but the reality is that 21st century America isn’t that far from 1st century Colossae. By and large, people of all faiths and backgrounds still see themselves as subject to “the powers that be.” Politicians, for example, talk about “the economy” and how it rules us. Have you ever seen the economy? Ever understood it? Yet this nebulous force seems to hold sway over us. Interestingly, politicians run on platforms telling us how they’ll fix the economy, but when they get into office and things go bad they shrug their shoulders and say, “Well, it’s the economy—it’s out of my hands.”

Terrorism is another of “the powers” in today’s world. We can’t move through an airport these days without being scanned and the threat level is constantly trumpeted to us. Human rights are violated and violence perpetrated by countries and leaders who shrug their shoulders and say “It’s what we have to do. It’s beyond our control.” Going to Israel last month the number one question people asked me was, “Aren’t you afraid of terrorism?” This despite the fact that none of the Christian sites in Israel has ever been a target and the odds of a person being killed in a terrorist attack are about the same as being hit by a meteor. Fear trumps rationality, however, and if the media tells us something is dangerous then we certainly believe it.

Actually, the media is another one of “the powers” in the present world. We’re driven by information—more information than we can possibly hope to process, and information about which we can do virtually nothing. No, I don’t think that the media is a vast conspiracy, but I do believe that it contributes to a kind of group-think. Media drives what we buy, what we wear, what we know.

Interesting, isn’t it, that when someone is successful and media saavy we call them “stars.” Go to the checkout at 7-11 or the grocery store, flip on the TV, boot up your computer and there they are, their faces shining and reminding us in not so subtle ways that money and attractiveness are two of the primary powers in the culture.

Yeah, the powers are alive and well in the 21st century, and the 21st century church is as prone to worship the powers as much as the ancient Colossians seem to have done. We look at the world and say, well, that’s too bad but there’s not much we can do about it—it’s just the way it is (it is what it is).

But like I said last week, that’s not God’s way of looking at the world. When Paul writes to Colossians, I think he is also in a sense writing directly to us. Look at 1:16—Paul says that “in him” (that is, in Christ) “all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him.” In other words, everything that there is—even the powers—have been created in, through, and by Christ. The world is not divided into the “good” part that is ruled by God and the “bad” part that is ruled by the powers—it’s all one world and God, in the person of Christ the King, rules over the whole universe.

That begs a very important theological question. If Christ is creator and ruler over everything, then what went wrong? Why do the powers still hold so much sway over us?

Well, here’s where human responsibility comes into play. The biblical narrative makes it clear that from the very beginning, humans have tended to give up their God-given call to be stewards of the world and gave the world over to the powers. Rather than follow God’s plan of wholeness and holiness, humans instead have chosen to subject themselves to a wide range of forces and powers.

If, for example, you refuse to follow God’s instructions to care for the earth, the powers are happy to take over. The faster we consume the earth’s natural resources, the higher the powers jack up the price and make us dependent upon them for the narrowing supply.

If you refuse to follow God’s plan for sexuality, then the powers will gladly jump in. Venus, the Roman god of sexuality, will be happy to show us all kinds of new and exciting pleasures at the expense of wrecked families, damaged relationships, and the scars of physical and emotional damage. Sexuality is one of the more insidious powers, and when we elevate it above God we pay a steep price.

If we choose not to listen to Jesus’ words about loving our enemies and turning the other cheek and give in to the power of violence we experience the inevitable result. When in our fear we buy a gun, endorse a war, dehumanize an enemy, we’ve given the world over to Mars, the god of war.

If we choose to ignore God’s Word and Jesus’ teachings on money, we abdicate our lives over to the power of mammon. When we pursue wealth instead of justice, when we elevate the rich and denigrate the poor, when we compromise our ethics and stuff our houses with material possessions we’re saying very clearly that money controls us.

I could go on, but you get the point.

Paul’s word to the Colossians is a call to fight the powers. In Christ, he says, you have been “rescued from the power of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins” (v. 13-14). That word “transferred” is an important one—it’s the word one uses when one is moving to a new home, a new place of residence. Here, says Paul, is the reality—the powers are part of the old world, the darkness in which humanity lived—but God has sent his Son to outshine the stars and subjugate the powers. Those who follow Christ are to move out of that old, fateful, and fatalistic worldview and into a new future illuminated by the powerful light of Jesus, who fought the powers and defeated them decisively on the cross.

OK, let’s hold up a minute. Don’t miss the paradoxical nature of that statement. For Paul, the cross of Jesus was the moment of ultimate defeat for the powers of this world and his coronation as King over the whole cosmos. The apostle could not have made a more bold and illogical statement to the people of a first century city.

It’s interesting to me to see what kinds of people wear crosses these days. You see them everywhere, usually encrusted with some jewels on the earrings of a pretty starlet. These days, the cross has become just another piece of bling. In Paul’s day, the cross was not something people wanted to even think about. For Roman citizens and for occupied peoples, the cross was the ultimate symbol of the power of the empire. The empire provided peace, protection, life itself—but it could also take that life away. The empire kept the peace by eliminating opposition and exposing it publicly, nailing insurrectionists and would-be messiahs to wooden beams on the roads leading into its cities as a reminder of who was really in charge.

We read the story of Jesus hanging on one of these Roman crosses and we’re struck by the fact of his innocence. He didn’t deserve to be there. As one of the others crucified with him said, “This man has done nothing wrong” (Luke 23:41). It seems a tragic case of mistaken identity, a misunderstanding gone horribly wrong.

But if you put the whole story in context another view becomes clear. No, Jesus wasn’t guilty of inciting insurrection against Rome—of that charge he was innocent. He did, however, challenge the powers. Look at the evidence:

The powers wanted to trumpet their belief in God while at the same time filling their pockets with wealth by exploiting the poor. Jesus came along and said you can’t love God and money.

The powers wielded violence, threatening to stone sinners and kill those who opposed them. Jesus said to love your enemies and turn the other cheek. If you live by the sword, he said, then you’ll die by the same way of living.

The powers regulated religion, appointing themselves the experts on God and enforcing religious rules. Jesus said that the only rule you needed was to love God with your whole self and love your neighbors like yourself.

The powers all gave allegiance to Caesar, the emperor, the one who called himself a “son of God.” Jesus said that another Kingdom was coming, one not from this world with all its violence and posturing, but one coming from God that would change everything, reverse the fortunes of rich and poor, and bring true justice and peace to everyone.

The powers tried hard to get Jesus to work with them, but he never did. He continued to challenge them, always. The powers don’t like to be challenged and so eventually they respond—the voices get louder, the threats more real, and then eventually they imprison and kill the challenger. The powers took Jesus and nailed him to a cross, tacking the mocking charge above his head, “King of the Jews” and stepped back to watch him die a challenger’s death. They hurled insults at him, challenging his own power—if you’re the Son of God, then come down—show us!

Every time I read that I want him to come down, to shake off the nails and walk down in front of their shocked faces, point his finger at them and say, “How do you like me now?”

But instead, he hangs there. Instead of giving in to the urge for revenge he simply says, “Father, forgive them because they don’t know what they’re doing.” Instead of responding to the evil, the violence, the power of human hate with lightning bolts and divine retribution, he simply hangs there and takes it. He fights the power in that moment by not fighting at all.

But that, says Paul, is victory.

It’s a legitimate theological question to ask precisely how that works. Theories of atonement try to get at the reason why Jesus died and its connection to us. Substitutionary atonement, for example, says that Jesus died in our place, taking the death that we deserved for our sin (yet, we still die). Some see the death of Jesus as the appeasement of an angry God who requires blood sacrifice before he’ll forgive our sin. Some see it as a ransom theory where God tricks Satan by sacrificing Jesus in place of the rest of us and then, because of the resurrection, denies Satan his due. Interesting theories all. I’ve studied them all, heard them all preached, even preached them myself.

But the more I study this, the more I have come to realize that these theories about the cross take us only so far. They seem disconnected from the Gospel narrative, in many ways ignoring everything Jesus did and said up to the point of his crucifixion. If Jesus simply came to die for us it would seem to me that the Gospel writers could have seriously shortened the narrative. And if Jesus’ death is merely about making it possible to go to heaven when you die, then God really hasn’t done anything about the powers or the evil that have overtaken the world he created. In that view, the cross of Jesus is a simple cosmic ejection handle—believe in Jesus death for you and you get to punch out of this evil and corrupt world because God has abandoned his good creation.

But that’s not the Gospel, the good news. You can’t build an entire theological framework on just a couple of verses of scripture. The biblical narrative is all about how God created the world, called it good, created humanity for authentic relationship with God, called that creation very good—but the humans God created rejected him for the lie that the powers of the world had a better plan, that they didn’t need God anymore. The result was a slide into chaos, evil, and the darkness that comes when we move out of the light of God’s love. God didn’t give up, however, choosing a people—Israel—to be a light to the nations, a city on a hill, a shining example of what life could be like in this world if people would only re-engage with God live out the plan of God’s good creation. Israel struggled with this vocation—the name itself means “one who wrestles with God”—and was consistently drawn away from God, giving into the temptation to turn their lives over to the powers of sin, idolatry, and self-interest. Still, God did not give up—even coming to his creation in person, in Christ, to draw his people to himself, to be a new Israel—a full and complete representative of God and of humanity. As Israel’s representative, the Christ would do for God’s people what they could not do for themselves, taking on the evil, taking on the powers and defeating them—but not in the way anyone expected. Rather than matching force with force, God in Christ took on the powers by absorbing all the evil they could throw at him. As N.T. Wright says in his brilliant little book Evil and the Justice of God, “Jesus suffers the full consequences of evil: evil from the political, social, cultural, personal, moral, religious and spiritual angles all rolled into one; evil in the downward spiral hurtling toward the pit of destruction and despair. And he does so precisely as the act of redemption, of taking that downward fall and exhausting it, so that there may be new creation, new covenant, forgiveness, freedom and hope.”

In other words, God allowed the powers to do their worst, and in doing so exposed the powers for what they were. This is Paul’s view of the cross. Look at Colossians 2—after talking about the record of evil, the case against humanity, Paul says that God had “set aside” all the legal demands that should have resulted in God’s wrath, but instead God “nailed them to the cross.” Then this in verse 15—“He (God) disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them, triumphing over them in it (the cross).”

Wright again—“What the Gospels offer is not a philosophical explanation of evil, what it is or why it’s there, nor a set of suggestions for how we might adjust our lifestyles so that evil will mysteriously disappear from the world.” Nor do the Gospels simply tell us how we can disappear from an evil world at death. Rather, the story of the Gospels, the story of the cross is the story of an event in which the living God deals with the evil in the world. It is the story of the Creator God taking responsibility for what happened to creation and decisively taking on the problem himself, dealing with it, allowing it to break him down and nail him to a cross. As one old evangelistic tract put it, “the nations of the world got together to pronounce judgment on God for all the evils in the world, only to realize with a shock that God had already served his sentence.”

Christ is the true King because he, and only he, has dealt with the evil in the world. How so, we might ask, when we still see it everywhere around us? I love how Bishop Willimon puts this, so I’ll use his words: “Paul’s vision of the Christian life is thus a life lived between D-Day and VE-Day. The decisive battle has been won; the battles we face today are part of the mopping up operation to implement that victory. In the meantime, we are to live as those who know that the decisive battle has been fought, the war has been won, and we have been liberated to live as those who know for sure who sits on the throne. There is now only one power we are to obey, in life and death, in life beyond death. That power has a human face, a face once crowned with thorns.”

Jesus fought the powers so that we might fight them, too—not with violence, but with a bold statement that they don’t hold power over us anymore.

We fight the powers every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer, recognizing God’s will being done on earth.

We fight the powers every time we decide to give our time and money to those who need it instead of feeding our own desires. We fight the powers when we choose generosity over greed.

We fight the powers every time we call for justice for the poor and stand with those who are oppressed.

We fight the powers every time we say a simple table grace, remembering that the food that we eat is a gift from God and not the result of our own efforts.

We fight the powers when we refuse to respond to evil with violence, when we choose a kind word instead of an argument.

We fight the powers when we suffer, but refuse to give up hope.

Jesus fought the powers and won—he rules over all. The power of the cross has transferred us from darkness to light, from defeat to victory. The question for us is whether we’ll embrace that victory, whether we’ll follow him, whether we’ll fight the powers. If we do that, then the world will truly know that he reigns.

Sources:
Willimon, William H., “Fight the Powers,” Pulpit Resource, October/November/December 2007, p. 41-43

Wright, N.T., Evil and the Justice of God, Downer’s Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2006, p. 92, 94.

Things I'm Thankful for...

On this Thanksgiving Eve, here are the thankful thoughts I'm thinking:

• I'm thankful that Jesus will be returning quite soon. How do I know this? Duran Duran and Loverboy both released new albums this week. A middle-aged Mike Reno trying to squeeze into those red leather pants has to be a sure sign of the apocalypse.
• I'm thankful that we live in Utah--a state where no one does any serious (or even frivolous) presidential campaigning, hence we shall  be spared the constant spate of candidate ads that say nothing about the candidate in question, but spend a full minute trying to convice us that their opponent is a mouth-breathing troglodyte.
• I'm thankful for having a potentially meaningful NFL game being played in Detroit on Thanksgiving Day. I'm thankful also for Brett Favre, who my wife finds interesting enough to allow me to watch the game without rolling her eyes.
• Speaking of the NFL, I'm thankful for the fact that I now get to watch every game in 3-D with surround sound--meaning that my son runs through the house during the game with a football cradled in his arms while crashing into the furniture as he reenacts every play.
• I'm thankful for people who make the lives of writers and preachers so easy; people like Paul McCartney's ex, Heather Mills. She is asking for $100 million in the divorce, but simultaneously says this about wealthy people: "Sadly, you have to mix at a certain level of people to raise the level of funds you need to bring about the greater good," she said. "Because people are very snobby. These people who have lots of money, they're either snobby or they're stingy. If you have lots of money, you have to be stingy — because why would you want that amount of money?" Seriously, you just can't make this stuff up. Ms. Pot, allow me to introduce you to Mr. Kettle.
• I'm thankful for bookstores that serve coffee and don't bug you if you want to come in and sit awhile.
• I'm thankful that Chipotle Mexican Grill is now a fixture in Utah, which means that I can now enjoy a real burrito (yes, I'm talking to you Blah-hio).
• I'm thankful for LL Bean, my official clothing supplier. The other day I looked at myself in the mirror and realized that everything I was wearing except my underwear and socks were from Bean. The clothes look better on the guys in the catalog, mind you, but I do like 'em a lot.
• I'm thankful for the memories of Thanksgivings past. Tonight I'm thinking of that childhood picture of my mom and grandma buzzing around the kitchen the night before the big meal, always calling me in to lick the whipped cream off the mixer beaters. They're both gone now, but I can still smell the pie.
• I'm thankful for the best wife, mother, and partner a man could ask for, for two awesome kids, for a warm house, food on the table, a meaningful job and the ability to enjoy it all. I pray that everyone can have this, and I'm reminded that God calls me to work for what I pray for.
• Lastly, I'm thankful for my readers. Have a great Thanksgiving! 

The War on Thanksgiving

About two holiday seasons ago we were all bombarded with the so-called "War on Christmas" in which salvos of vitriol were launched from certain sectors of Christendom toward the secularization of the day celebrating Jesus' birth. Saying "Happy Holidays" in the checkout line at WalMart, for example, could get you a very nasty self-righteous response from that pridefully pious Christian pushing her shopping cart full of holiday materialism toward the door. I wrote a piece on this for Homiletics last year ("The War on Christmas," Nov-Dec 2006), which subscribers can find online.

Now that particular conflict has spread to Thanksgiving, with those same quarters of Christendom howling that people are being thankful but not necessarily to the right deity, if any at all. There seems to be a general thought in the culture to "thank goodness" instead of thanking God.

OK, I get this. If you're a Christian you have a specific reason for thanking a specific God--the Creator God who provides the daily bread for all. Interestingly, however, not everybody gets their daily bread. People go hungry every day. How do we thank God for the abundance we have been blessed with? We gorge ourselves repeatedly. Perhaps Christians would be better served to quit grousing about their perceived dissing by the culture and instead treat these holidays for what they are--opportunities to DEMONSTRATE God's grace and compassion for the world instead of simply making sure that people get their terms right.

I gotta say that I'm pretty tired of this kind of Rodney Dangerfield Christianity ("We don't get no respect"). If the Christian world universally practiced what it preached then the whole world would be truly grateful.

We'll be eating our Thanksgiving feast with some friends, but we'll also be donating some hot food for a local detox center for the homeless, as will many others in our congregation. I hope you'll show your thanks to God in some tangible way this Thanksgiving--without requiring the recipients to take a theology exam.

For Whom the Bell Tolls...

One of the most vivid memories of my childhood was the Saturday after Thanksgiving when my mother and grandmother would bundle my sisters and I into our snowsuits and drive into Pittsburgh to for the annual holiday shopping trip. Even before the turkey hit the freezer on Thanksgiving Thursday I started dreading this trip. The problem as I saw it through my ten year-old eyes was that my mom’s idea of Christmas shopping and mine were radically different. To me, spending a couple of hours in a toy store trying out all the new stuff would be time well-spent. After all, then I’d know what I really wanted Santa to put under the tree. Mom’s idea of shopping, though, was dragging us through as many large department stores as possible having us try on all manner of clothing—usually consisting of polyester dress pants and shirts with lots of buttons. I would be so bored on that Saturday that I wouldn’t notice Mom stuffing all those bags in the trunk of the car and that those same pants and shirts were the ones I opened quickly on Christmas morning before moving on to the good stuff—kind of like eating your vegetables before dessert.

Still, Mom always promised us that if we were good and kept moving our little feet from store to store we’d get to sit on Santa’s lap at the end of the day and tell him that we didn’t want any more socks, thank you very much, but that motorized fire truck I saw in the window at Gimbel’s would do quite nicely. Visions of the jolly old elf dancing through my head, I trudged along the streets of the Steel City through the soot-covered snow with about as much determination as a boy can muster.

Looking back, I don’t remember any of the toys that I asked for, but I do remember being fascinated by the city. The window displays were beautiful, the street lights glowing in the fading afternoon light, people waiting in large crowds to cross the street. Each department store piped Christmas music to speakers out on the street and everywhere you could hear the sound of bells ringing, because on nearly every busy street corner and in front of Horne’s, Gimbel’s, Kauffman’s and all the other stores there was a bundled person ringing a big silver bell next to the red Salvation Army donation kettle. My mom could never pass one without dropping something in. We were a working class family, but mom knew that there were plenty of others out there who were less fortunate than us and that we needed to help them. I remember thinking that it would be great to give them all those extra dress socks.

Christmas shopping nowadays is quite a different experience. It’s easier to shop by pointing and clicking your computer than it is to drive downtown and, even if you did, most of the big old stores have moved out. Stores in malls start putting up their Christmas decorations before the Halloween displays are down, which dilutes the whole season. And, most tellingly, you don’t often hear those silver bells anymore. If the Salvation Army kettle is there at all, there’s a person standing there silently waving a cardboard ringer. After all, we wouldn’t want the sound of a bell interfering with the constant drone of pre-recorded advertising.

I read somewhere recently that the Salvation Army has been hit hard by the decline in kettles and even more so by the lack of ringers. In Knoxville, Tennessee, for example, the Salvation Army had to pay out about $30,000 to hire people to man the few kettles that would be around town during last Christmas season. The decrease in funding that this important charitable organization receives is alarming, but I think the greater problem is that in a culture where the gap between rich and poor gets wider every day, the absence of those bells makes it harder to people to remember that while they’re spending buckets of cash on Christmas there are people down the street who don’t know where there next meal is coming from. Those bells used to ring out tunes of hope, responsibility, giving and benevolence. People used to take pride in standing there, stamping their feet against the cold, because they knew that their volunteering would make a difference.

So if you're out and about this season and you happen to spot the rare bell-ringer, tell them thanks. They're doing a lot more than raising money. Maybe you could call your local Salvation Army and pick up a shift for yourself!

The Rainmaker...Epilogue

I noticed that it rained in Atlanta yesterday....

The Rainmaker

Saw this item on Slate this morning about the governor of Georgia's new program to combat the drought that is ravaging the state. Several times now the governor has simply offered public prayers to God asking for rain.

It's interesting to see the reaction. Comments ranged from "God is not an extortionist" and "You can't make up for years of water mismanagement with a prayer session" to "It's worth a shot." The comments reveal  a lot about what people think of prayer in general. Interestingly, the sun broke through the clouds during the governor's latest prayer, though the forecast called for a 60 percent chance of showers the next day.

Slate's view of the whole thing is that, "Intercessory prayer is an experimental failure." That assumes, of course, that prayer is always about results. God is not an ATM machine that responds with what we want if we just type in the right code. Prayer is really, at base, about putting ourselves in God's space, God's mind, God's will. There's certainly biblical precedent about praying for relief from drought (witness the stories about Elijah in I Kings 18, among others). In most biblical cases, however, the prayers for rain were coupled with an admission of guilt. External circumstances caused the people to look inward for a cause. I think that prayer is designed to do that. When we pray for God to act, we're essentially putting ourselves in a place where we can get clearer about ourselves. If we pray for someone's healing, for example, we can put ourselves more clearly in that person's place and be moved to help. If prayer is more about listening than demanding (and I think that's the case) then time spent in prayer is really time spent hearing what God would have us do and how God might have us live and grow in the midst of our present circumstances. As I heard one of my colleagues pray once in worship, "God, help us to work for what we pray for."

If the governor's prayers get more people thinking about how to be better stewards of the resources God has provided, then I'd say those prayers certainly weren't an "experimental failure." God may not "help those who help themselves" as Ben Franklin said, but God certainly does help us see that we need help!

So, say a prayer today for rain for the people of Georgia and the other states gripped by drought. Do it every time you turn on a faucet, however, and I'm gonna guess that prayer will take hold.

Gripped by a Classic

One of the (mostly) good parts of my year has been the rather extensive pastoral evaluation process our staff-parish relations team and I have done together. In addition to our new conference evaluation process (which also involved a congregational self-evaluation and a pastoral self-evaluation), I also underwent a 360 degree review which involved input from 26 people both in and outside the congregation.

The results of those reviews turned out to be very similar and my self-evaluation was pretty much in line with what others think. I suppose that's a good thing--at least we know that neither of us is too delusional!

I tend to get high marks in things like preaching, teaching, and decision-making, but my weak spots tend to lie within the realm of interpersonal relationships. Truth is that I've always been pretty task-oriented, responsible, able to get things done. The shadow side of that orientation is that sometimes some of the "soft" skills, the deeper people skills, aren't always my first inclination. Most clergy tend to fall into one of two camps--either they're a good upfront leader or they're a good, empathic listener and counselor. Truth is, though, that the pastoral role requires both and we all need to do our best to maximize our strengths while working on our weaknesses.

I realize, for example, that when I get overly busy on Sunday mornings my encounters with people are often very superficial. While it's not possible to give your full and undivided attention to some 300 people individually and still lead a worship service, I have learned from my review process that when I'm too task-oriented on Sunday it can be off-putting to some folks  who are simply looking for some acknowledgment, a smile, a friendly word. Instead of watching and listening to people, I'm often watching the clock and listening for the start of the next service. In meetings I can often be terse and directive--a great quality for an Army officer, but for a pastor, well, not so much.

I could go on, but you get the point. It's sometimes hard to hear feedback like this, but where there's smoke there's some kind of fire. Having talked about this a lot with church leaders, awakened at night thinking about it, and bouncing my own feelings off some mentors I trust, I have decided that I need to go back to some human relations fundamentals.

To begin that process, I bought and am now reading what is probably the quintessential book on human relations (besides the Bible, I mean)--Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People. The book was written in the 1930s, but it's still very, very relevant. The principles are so simple that I find myself whacking my forehead often. The illustrations are poignant, the quotes priceless, and the advice solid gold. I started reading it a bit reluctantly, but as I pedaled away on the exercise bike this afternoon I found myself nodding my head a lot while I was reading. Truly, I needed this refresher course.

If you've never read this book I can't recommend it enough. Critics say that it seems a bit like manipulation, but I think that's an unfair criticism. Carnegie was simply trying to get people to focus outside themselves. Bill Selby, who is one of my mentors, often says that "life isn't always about you." Being able to see things from the perspective of the other, taking a genuine interest in people, goes a whole lot further than simply getting more done. After all, at the end of your life what kind of list do you want to characterize you: a list of accomplishments, or a list of people whose life you have touched immeasurably?  I'm learning to choose the latter.

For all those folks I've blown by on Sunday or in the grocery store without spending a moment being fully present, I offer my sincerest apologies. I just want you to know that I'm working on it!

Wednesday Wrap-Up

Random observations for a Wednesday:

- Television and motion picture writers went on strike this week. It's fascinating to see Hollywood types out trooping the picket lines and stopping production of shows for the new fall season. Can't say that it affects me at all (not to be narcissistic or anything...). I haven't watched a network sitcom or drama (or reality show for that matter) in years. If it's not on Discovery or History or doesn't involve the throwing of a ball or shooting of a puck I'm not terribly interested. Perhaps when they're out walking in circles these writers might actually drum up some original ideas beyond cops, docs, and lawyers.

- Ever notice that when someone begins a sentence with, "Don't take this personally..." that you automatically take it personally?

- I got an invitation in the mail today to be one of the 40 participants in the Oxford Round Table in the spring of 2008. It came first class mail, hand-signed, so it doesn't seem like one of those invitations like "Who's Who" or anything. The forum is focused on the relationship between religion and politics and involves government officials, university presidents, academics business heavyweights and other movers and shakers. Could be totally out of my league, but it's fascinating stuff. I wrote the Oxford people to see why they sent an invitation to such a prestigious and heady event to a pastor with a mere master's degree serving a church in the mountains of Utah. No reply yet. The thing ain't cheap, neither. The Forum itself is $2940 US, plus airfare to London. I can't blow my whole continuin ed budget on one event. Still, it's intriguing to be invited. I'll keep you posted.

- If you haven't yet had a Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks, stop reading this and go get one...right now. Very, very good and will put you in a Thanksgiving mood.

- Ed Gonzalez, our maintenance guy, and I moved a big-screen TV and a sofa bed out of a condo today for donation to the church and our furniture mission. Ed and I are both small guys and it must have been comical watching us huff and puff this stuff into Ed's truck. To wit, three burly guys from a plumbing company were working in the condo at the time and literally stood and watched us move the stuff without offering so much as encouragement. Helping us lift a 300lb. couch must have been against union policy or something. So much for random acts of kindness!

- I can't think of many things I'd rather do more than have lunch with a very good friend. Had lunch today with my friend Brian, who pastors First UMC in Salt Lake. That made my day. The lingering effect of the large burrito I ate at Loco Lizard, however, did not.

- Last night at my son's Cub Scout pack meeting the boys were supposed to get some plastic badges with their progress toward rank beads to put on their uniforms. Interestingly, they were allowed to see them, but not touch them or put them on their uniforms. Why, you ask? The plastic badges were painted in China, thus had some lead in the paint. OK, I get that that's a problem for toddlers who stick everything in their mouths, but do they expect 8 year-old boys to lick these things like lollipops? How much lead do you think was in the paint of every single toy those of us over the age of 35 slobbered on when we were kids, yet somehow we made it to adulthood without going crazy (mostly). Seemed a bit over the top paranoia to me, but I'm glad the leaders are looking out for the kids' safety.

Pardon me now while I go look for some plastic to chew...

Wiki Christianity (Sermon for Community Sunday, 11/4/07)

I was driving down to Provo the other day bringing communion to someone who’s homebound and I was driving down Provo Canyon I was listening to my XM radio’s public radio channel where there was a media critic talking about the decline of network news ratings. It used to be that the big three—CBS, ABC, and NBC—were the only sources we had other than the newspapers to tell us what was going on in the world. Remember Walter Cronkite? He was known as the “most trusted man in America,” and when he ended every broadcast with, “And that’s the way it is,” you knew that, well, that’s the way it is. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t have known otherwise.

Nowadays, though, people don’t have to wait until 6:30 in the evening to find out what’s happening in the world. Everything is fresh, up to the minute. Log online and you can get your news from a wide variety of sources as it happens. Information is no longer confined to the realm of single “expert” sources. We now live in a world where anyone can publish news online and provide commentary on it. You don’t need to be an expert, for example, to have a blog (I have one, which firmly illustrates that point).

It’s not only news that’s affected, however. It’s information in general. For example, remember when the encyclopedia salesmen used to come around? I remember as a kid having this guy come around once a year or so and try to sell my mom a whole set of Britannica. I think she bought one volume once just so he’d leave—like “G-I”—which wasn’t all that helpful unless I was doing a report on germs or India. Still, I used the encyclopedias at school—they were almost like magic books. You figured you could find just about anything in there.

The encyclopedia, though, has virtually become extinct. Not only that, experts aren’t the only ones putting out the information any more. These days if you want to look up a quick summary on a subject, you Google it or, for more concise detail, you log on to a site called Wikipedia (it usually pops up first on a google search anyway).

Wikipedia is a terrific resource when you need a quick answer. In fact, the name “wiki” (pronounced wee-kee or wick-ey) means quick — it comes from Hawaii, where the “wiki wiki bus” is the fast bus from the airport.

Wikipedia is a free open-source encyclopedia, which means that anyone can log on to it, add to it, or edit it. Yes, that’s right: anyone. Young or old, well-schooled or street-smart. The encyclopedia now has more than two million entries in 76 languages, and it is getting bigger every day.

But is it any good? Some people are saying, “Beware of Wikipedia.”

Academics are upset because they see it as an example of information anarchy — they criticize it for a lack of reliability and authority. You might be surprised to learn, however, that it rivals the Encyclopedia Britannica in breadth and accuracy, and it has peer review technology that weeds out errors. It’s certainly becoming an 800-pound gorilla in the information world, with over a million entries in English alone. Compare that with the relatively limited 65,000 articles in the 2005 Britannica.

So while some experts might issue stern warnings, others are saying “Wiki is the way.” There’s good reason to believe that a large group of people is actually smarter than a few elite individuals.

Now I know that you’re wondering where I’m going with this…

Jesus certainly had a problem with the elite scribes of his day, men who liked to strut around town in long robes, enjoy places of honor at banquets, grab the best seats in the synagogues, and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces (vv. 38-39). According to Wikipedia, scribes originally acted as secretaries of state, but then, when the nation Israel lost its independence, they turned their attention to matters of the law. In the time of Jesus, the scribes were allies of the Pharisees, who supplemented the ancient written law with their traditions. Throughout the New Testament, the titles “scribe” and “lawyer” are virtually interchangeable.

“Beware of the scribes,” says Jesus. Beware of the lawyers.

They seem to care little about the truth of God, or the welfare of poorer members of society, and Jesus condemns them for saying long prayers for the sake of appearance, and devouring “widows’ houses” (v. 40). While it’s not exactly clear what it means to “devour widows’ houses,” it may be that these scribes entered into a kind of parasitic relationship with the rich widows of Jerusalem, offering guardianship or companionship in exchange for a life of wealth and power.

In any case, Jesus denounces such selfish and self-serving relationships. He condemns the scribes for turning away from their role as experts in religious law, and putting their energy into acquiring social power and influence. They saw themselves as the one religious information source for the people.

Then the scene shifts to the temple treasury, where many rich people are dropping in large sums of money. A poor widow comes in and deposits two small copper coins, which are worth a penny (vv. 41-42). Jesus senses a teaching moment, so he calls his disciples and says to them, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury” (v. 43).

When we were in Jerusalem a couple of weeks a go I went into a shop that sells antiquities, things that have been unearthed there and lo and behold they had some of these very coins, which date back to as early as 100BC. The “lepta” in Greek was the smallest denomination of coin minted, worth about half a cent in today’s money (though it cost me $50)—so insignificant was the coin that it’s edges aren’t even finished, just a little rough hunk of copper with a stamp on it.

At the time of Jesus, the Temple was one of the most magnificent structures in the ancient world. Pilgrims came by the thousands, walking up the wide stone stairways and entering the Temple courts. It was the place to see and be seen. The disciples are watching all this, doing the mental math. How can two lepta given by a widow whom nobody would have noticed otherwise equal the gold coins that the rich are dropping?

Jesus continues by saying that all of the rich “contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on” (v. 44).

What matters is not the size of your gift, according to Jesus — it’s the seriousness of your commitment.

We Americans are closer to the scribes and the rich people of Jerusalem than we’d care to admit. Like them, we tend to see charitable giving as an option, and we do it out of our abundance, after we’ve paid our mortgages, our utilities, our car payments, our tuitions, our club dues and our credit card bills. Like the scribes and the rich people in the story, a lot people give only out of what’s left over after all their personal needs and wants are satisfied. The average charitable gift in America is 1.7% or income—10% would be an improvement! Tom Sine, a Christian futurist, puts it this way: What most American Christians want is the American dream with a little Jesus overlay.

Truth is that a lot of people see the church primarily as a business that dispenses religious goods and services. When I need those services, they come. Some people come only at the holidays when they can get a little charge of sentimental religion. Some people only participate if they’re in some kind of personal crisis. Some people only contact the church when they want to have a child baptized, or celebrate a wedding or have a funeral. For much of our culture, even for many people who consider themselves members, the church is a place for hatching, matching and dispatching. Some people view their giving as a fee for services. I’ll never forget someone telling me that their weekly gift to the church was about $10 because they figured it was about the same entertainment value as a movie.

Hello!

Maybe it’s time we started taking a hard look at what Jesus is saying to us.

It is a truly unbelievable sacrifice that the widow makes. Many would have thought it excessive, but it’s the kind of sacrifice that Jesus himself would make. Go back earlier in Mark 12 and there’s the little story about “paying to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” That’s often a story used to talk about the necessity of paying taxes, but it’s really much more than that. Roman coins were stamped with the image of the emperor. For Jesus, that’s about all they’re worth—a tribute to one man. All of us are stamped with the image of God at creation—we give Caesar his coin, but we are to give God our whole selves because we belong to him. It’s not a ten percent commitment—it’s all or nothing.

In my years of serving churches I have noticed that most often it is the people with little financial means who give the most percentage wise in support of the church. I’ve also noticed that the people who worked the hardest during the week tended to do the most volunteering. Their commitment is born out of sacrifice and if you asked them they’d tell you that they weren’t giving or serving out of obligation but because they saw their lives as first belonging to God. Strong faith, strong trust in God, leads to strong commitments. For people like the widow in the story, their very lives are an offering to God.

Look back at the lesson today from Acts 2:42-47. The early Christian community was a participatory one where everyone was devoted, committed, giving of their lives, their time, their finances. Everyone put in their all. It was the original Wiki-church!

During the great Depression in America, a government agency had the task of traveling through backward mountain areas, in search of poor farmers, to whom they gave some grant money for the purchase of seed, or repairing their homes.

One agent came upon an old woman living in a shack. It had no floor. Several windows were broken and covered over with tar paper. The old woman had but the basic essentials, and was just barely scratching out a living on a miserable plot of land.

The agent said to her, “If the government gave you $200, what would you do with it?”

Her answer was immediate: “I’d give it to the poor.”

Now, that’s a widow’s might!

Understand me, I don’t think that Jesus is calling all of us to a life of poverty and full-time ministry, but I do think he is clearly calling all of us to re-order our priorities. If we’re gifted at making money, we should be equally gifted in giving it away. If we are gifted with talents and abilities, we should be investing those gifts for God’s glory. If we are gifted with time, we should use that gift of time to serve others. If everything we have comes from God—time, talent, treasure—then God ultimately has claim over them We are merely stewards called to invest them wisely for his Kingdom.

See, I think Jesus calls us all to a kind of Wiki-Christianity, one in which we all join together in passionate commitment to the work of Jesus Christ. Without reservation. Without thought of financial reward. We are called to be an open source church where we are challenged to offer our energy, intelligence, imagination and love without compensation — Wikipedia has had hundreds of thousands of contributors, and only one paid employee. We are dared to contribute time and talent because we are totally devoted to our subject—Jesus Christ--and because we want the world to benefit from what we have discovered and learned. Like the writers of Wikipedia, we are asked to create something great by freely sharing the best of what we have. Like the widow at the temple treasury, we are invited to put in everything we have. It takes all of us.

What does a Wiki-Church look like? I think it’s a congregation that takes its commitments seriously. Every time we bring in a new member we ask this question:

As members of this congregation, will you faithfully participate in its ministries by your prayers, your presence, your gifts and your service? In my 4 and a half years of asking that question, no one has said no. Everyone answers yes. We have more than 400 members who have taken this vow. Yet in our church, like most churches, 20% of the people do 80% of the serving, 20% of the people give 80% of the money, and 20% are involved in some kind of group or opportunity to grow spiritually as part of the church community.

Truth is that Jesus calls us all to be a hundred percent church—where a hundred percent of those who follow him are giving a hundred percent effort.

Imagine, for example, one hundred percent of our church membership being present in worship on a weekly basis. Sure, there are times that people have to be out of town or are sick, but imagine a church where people are so committed that the first priority on Sunday morning isn’t whether there’s fresh powder on the ground but rather giving praise to God for the ability to enjoy such a place and giving attention to God’s Word. Giving God our time and effort in worship is foundational to being the Church.

Imagine one hundred percent of our church membership being engaged in some kind of small group or Bible study designed to help them grow individually and collectively in the knowledge and love of God. God says that his word never returns empty—imagine the impact that 400+ people learning, growing, and praying together would make in changing the culture around us?

Imagine a church where the whole membership gave sacrificially of their personal finances—people who decided to give God the first fruits of their labors. Imagine a church where so much money came in that we’d have to meet regularly to discern what new ministries we could start and what umet needs in our community God was calling us to meet. Imagine a church where we’d never have to hold another financial campaign because everyone who joins gives generously beyond their means.

And imagine a church where one hundred percent of the membership was involved in a ministry either within the church, serving as teachers for children and youth, taking care of the administrative tasks, helping welcome our many visitors, keeping the facility in good order—and outside the church serving in ministries with the poor and in other places we are called by Jesus to go. What would the impact be on our community and on our region if more than 400 people caught this vision?

Last week I asked a question that I once heard posed that’s been weighing on my mind. That question is this: If our church were to disappear tomorrow, would anyone in our community notice?

You know, when I first came here I asked some people in our community who aren’t members and don’t attend what their impression was of the church. Generally, they were pretty positive, but over and over again I heard them use terms like “country club” or “it’s a great place to see and be seen,” or, “it’s a very nice building.”

Folks, I’m hoping that there’s a much different answer to that question. I hope that people in our community see this as a place where people are committed to practicing what they believe—a place that whenever someone comes to worship or meets one of us on the street they know that this is a place where people take seriously the call of Christ to change the world.

That will only happen if we’re committed to being a hundred percent church—a Wiki-church, where the power is found in all of God’s people using all of their gifts, as they give everything they have to the work of Jesus Christ. A large group of people really is smarter than an elite few — and a large group is more faithful and loving and creative and effective, as well.

The early church was small, but a few people committed to a greater cause can indeed change the world. Imagine what 400+ people could do?