Full to Overflowing . . .

September 16, 2013 By

Jesus is an interesting dude.
Full of surprises, un-pin-down-able, a fascinating amalgam of
human and divine, comforter and cattle prod.

Take the leap-off-the-bridge-into-the-chasm story in John 2, for instance.
In this narrative, Jesus is standing on a precipice.
Oh, it doesn’t look like much of a leap — he’s at a party, not a smack-down.
A wedding party, one of those 7-day deals in the ancient Middle East,
where everyone hangs around, eats and drinks and talks
and then eats and drinks a little more.

He’s just called his first five disciples, and is growing ever more surely into
his own sense of himself and his destiny. Jesus is getting ready to inaugurate
what he will soon call the Kingdom of God.
But other than some heartfelt conversations with his new followers,
he hasn’t done anything yet.

I’ve always found it fascinating that in John’s gospel, Jesus’ ‘coming-out’ party happens in
a small, country town at what was most likely a family gathering. I mean Luke has him in a synagogue, at least. And Matthew has him up on a hill, doling out powerful teaching by
the bushel basketful. Mark, who’s always in a hurry, leaps right into exorcism
and multiple healings.
But John?
In a backwater town, at a party.
And one where his mother is scurrying around, trying to make sure the tables are full,
the guests are happy, the details are being covered.

We’re moving slowly through the gospel of John at church this year, creating our own lectionary, reveling in the meatiness of this last-written of the stories of Jesus.
And the pastoral staff has called for ideas — literary, artistic, reflective —
to help us consider the story of Jesus as John presents it to us.
Yesterday, one of the resident poets  in our midst read this wonderful
reflection on the opening verses of this story: 

Mysterious Ways

    “They have no wine,” his mother said to him.
       He rolled his eyes.  “Not now,” he whispered.  “Mom,
       please.”  She didn’t care about his secrets.
       Why bear the Son of God if all he does
       is keep it to himself?  Here was a time
       to make the promise good—and please the neighbors.
       “Forget it.  Absolutely not.  You don’t
       have any idea what you’re asking me.
       Woman, no.”  And he rebuked her with
       a godlike gaze.  But mildly she turned
       and told the servants, “What he tells you, do.”
              – Professor Paul Willis (originally published in The Christian Century,
                      reprinted here by kind permission of the author) 

 You have no idea how validating it was for me to hear that poem!
I have an interesting relationship with my own son,
one that involves eye-rolling from time to time,
and whenever I read this small gem of a story,
I, too, see the eyes roll and hear the sighs heave.
But what I really love here? That off-handed comment to the servants.
Complete confidence that eventually this son would come around
to his mother’s way of thinking.

And so, with a series of simple imperatives — fill, take, bring —
Jesus steps out into the New World, the one where scarcity is no longer the norm,
where abundance surges forth from the most surprising places.
Water into wine, and not just any old wine, either.
The finest wine of the entire week of feasting,
the best stuff showing up at the last minute.

And then, like a seamstress picking up a sparkling piece of golden thread, John weaves this story together with the overarching theme of the entire book: GLORY. 
“What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory, and his disciples put their faith in him.” (verse 11)

Overflowing wine, delicious wine, the BEST wine — 
yet only the servants and the disciples know its source.
Doesn’t sound all that glorious, you know?
The crowds are not pressing in with words of acclaim,
the sky has not opened, the lame do not walk, the lepers are not cleansed.
But John tells us that GLORY happens here,
in the side patio of a sleepy town, where a party is winding down.
GLORY.

Most of the time, I live a pretty ‘small’ life.
I stay home a lot, I entertain and/or visit with family, I write notes on Facebook.
I like my smaller world these days, yet I don’t often think of anything I do
as somehow a reflection of GLORY.
But I’m rethinking that this morning.
I’m wondering if maybe we sell ourselves short,
or more importantly, if we sell God short.
Maybe it’s part of the scarcity mindset, the fear that we don’t have enough,
that we aren’t enough.
Wherever it comes from, I find myself praying today that I can
move away from scarcity thinking to reflecting on, remembering, celebrating,
and even reveling in the abundance that is mine.

Because the truth is this:
NOTHING is small in God’s economy,
NO ONE is forgettable in God’s memory.
And if Jesus can usher in the kingdom with no one
knowing it but the servant and five rag-tag disciples,
maybe we can be kingdom-bearers
in the middle of the dishwater,
the lawn that needs mowing,
the wiping of noses and the changing of diapers,
the attention we give to our school work,
the ‘hello’ we offer to the guy in the next cubicle,
the kindness we show to the salesclerk,
the interactions we have with neighbors,
the time carved out to be with aging parents,
the offering of hospitality even when we may not think we’re ‘ready.’

After all, Jesus hesitates for a moment in this story.
“Not yet!” he tells his mom.

And then, he turns to the servants. 

Joining this with Michelle, Jennifer, Ann and Emily this week:




Filed Under: biblical reflection, church year, Encouragement, Spiritual Formation, Sunday Reflections, The Church, Uncategorized, Wonderings in the Word, worship

Humble Hospitality — A Homily for Pentecost 15

September 1, 2013 By

I was invited to step in to the chaplain’s role this morning at the beautiful retirement community owned and operated by our denomination here in Santa Barbara. My mother and my mother-in-law both reside there, in Heritage Court, the Assisted Living unit for people living with memory and cognitive loss. About 65 people came to worship in their beautiful, small chapel today, many of them using walkers and/or canes, some sitting in wheel chairs. It’s a wonderful mix of people, average age about 85, I think.

But preaching on hospitality in such a setting proved to be a bit of a challenge,
especially using the text before us in the lectionary for this week.

Throughout the text of this 12 minute homily, I’ve inserted pictures from a variety of family and church settings where we endeavored to practice a bit of what Jesus teaches us in these short stories from Luke 14. Some are from our daughter’s wedding two years ago, some are from Christmas celebrations and some are from our church’s participation in a Thanksgiving meal for foreign students, a wonderful time of good food and fellowship (and a little acting out of the original Thanksgiving story). I am still learning about the kind of hospitality Jesus describes in this passage and perhaps that last, all-church event, most nearly ‘matches’ what this lesson is about.

Humble Hospitality
Luke 14: 1, 7-14, Hebrews 13:1-8,
Proverbs 25:5-6
preached by Diana R.G. Trautwein
at the Samarkand Chapel
September 1, 2013

Our gospel lesson this morning comes from the 14th chapter of Luke’s gospel. It begins with verse 1 and then jumps to a small parable that Jesus tells between verses 7 and 14. Please, hear the word of the Lord for this Sunday:

On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the Sabbath, they were watching him closely.

When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. “When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, ‘Give this person your place,’ and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place.But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you.For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

He said also to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

The Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

All three of our texts for today have something to say about hospitality, about how to behave well at a dinner party. The proverb, the words in Hebrews and, of course, today’s gospel lesson.

And speaking of that gospel lesson . . . that Jesus – he is always stirring things up, isn’t he? Here he is, invited to the home of an important religious leader – at a time when all those religious leaders were watching him closely – and what does he do?

Well, he strides right into that dining room, and he takes a look around. I mean, he REALLY takes a look around.

And what does he see?

He sees that all the guests are trying to squeeze their way into the most valued seats at the table. All of them wanting to be seen as important, worthy of honor, an insider and not an outsider.

Can you relate?

Sometimes, it’s nice to have the best seat in the house, isn’t it? It feels good to be appreciated, to be honored.

And this was a time and a place when honor was really, really important. And shame was something to be avoided at all costs. And shame at the dinner table? Well, that was very high on the list of things NOT to do.

Have you ever noticed how many times Luke mentions eating in his gospel? Almost every chapter in the book mentions a table, an item of food, a banquet of some sort. Apparently, eating was a big deal for Luke. And table manners were a big deal, too.

This little story sits in the beginning of one of the longest teaching sections in this book. Chapters 14-17 are called ‘the travel narrative’ by some scholars. In them, Jesus has set his face toward Jerusalem and he is slowly finding his way there.

In each of these four chapters, time after time, Luke takes the opportunity to tell us the heart and center of the message of Jesus. And time after time, Luke chooses to convey that message in and around table etiquette, in and around feasting together.

So the setting for this small story is really not surprising when you take a look at the whole scope of the gospel of Luke. Jesus is going out to dinner, and Jesus never misses a teaching opportunity.

That first verse in our reading warns us that Jesus is already in trouble, that he’s being observed with care.

His response?

To observe right back. And to talk about what he sees, and to take what he sees and to build Kingdom Truth around it. Verse 7 begins with these words, “When he noticed. . .” Jesus was noticing, he was paying attention. His eyes were open, his heart was open, and he truly saw what was happening around him. And Jesus does what he always seems to do: he tells those dinner guests a story, a story with a lesson, with some clear instruction. And then he tells a related story to the host, too.

That little verse that Joe read for us from Proverbs just a minute ago, remember?

Do not exalt yourself in the king’s presence,
and do not claim a place among his great men;
it is better for him to say to you, “Come up here,”
than for him to humiliate you before his nobles.

As we read Jesus’ words to the guests, it almost sounds like he is doing a little bit of biblical interpretation for the friends gathering around the banquet table that evening. His words are very, very similar to the old proverb. Maybe we could boil down his message to the guests to just a couple of simple words: be real. Be yourself. Don’t try to be someone you’re not, and don’t assume that you deserve more honor than anyone else in the room. This is a Jesus-style lesson about humility, true humility, not false humility.

One of my very favorite authors and preachers is a man named Frederick Buechner, and I like what he has to say on this subject:

Humility is often confused with the gentlemanly self-deprecation of saying you’re not much of a bridge player when you know perfectly well you are. Conscious or otherwise, this kind of humility is a form of gamesmanship.

If you really aren’t much of a bridge player, you’re apt to be rather proud of yourself for admitting it so humbly. This kind of humility is a form of low comedy.

True humility doesn’t consist of thinking ill of yourself but of not thinking of yourself much differently from the way you’d be apt to think of anybody else.

[Humility] is the capacity for being no more and no less pleased when you play your own hand well than when your opponents do.

Don’t jump for the high seat, in other words, just take the low one. If you get a ‘promotion,’ great! If not, you’re still in a good place. Don’t think more highly of yourself than you should – be honest, be careful, be real.

So. The guests are admonished to develop the gift of humility in Jesus’ little teaching moment. What about the host? What about the big Kahuna, the leader of the pack, the guy who wanted to keep such a close eye on Jesus that he invited him over for dinner?

Well, Jesus’ words to this man are a little bit more difficult, don’t you think? In fact, I think they pretty much go against every natural tendency we have!

Don’t invite people who can invite you back, says Jesus. Do invite the folks on the margins, not the rich guys, not the popular guys, not the people in the center. Go for the ones on the edges.

Sigh.

This feels awfully familiar, doesn’t it? If you’ve read the New Testament at all, this idea, this counter-cultural, unnatural, upside down kind of thinking is just all over the place, isn’t it? To the dinner guests it was this little nugget: “All those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

That one is tough enough — learn humility and live humility.

But to the host?

To the host, Jesus pretty much re-defines the whole concept of hospitality, and that little lesson feels a lot more difficult to me.

When I think about being hospitable, I think about welcoming family and friends, maybe someone new who’s coming to church or a new neighbor. I don’t generally think about the people who are really on the edges of things.

And what Jesus is describing here? Well it’s definitely the edges. “The poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind. . .” Each category outside the center of things in first century Palestine. Definitely not folks on anyone’s guest list.

These were the ones who are not welcome. Anywhere. And these are the people who, in a culture that was so strongly centered around honor and shame, would be the shame-bearers. These are the people who would never be honored guests anywhere.

It’s true that we who live in 21st century USA don’t live in a shame/honor culture that looks like the culture Jesus lived in. We keep our shame more hidden, less obvious. In Palestinian culture, everyone knew where the lines were drawn.

So Jesus says – ignore the lines! Invite everybody into the center! In my house, in my kingdom, there is no shame. There is only honor, honor of the best kind imaginable.

I wonder. In this day, in this culture? Where can we find parallels?

This has been a week of remembering the work of Martin Luther King, Jr. Fifty years ago, he helped us re-draw some of those lines of shame didn’t he? Standing on the mall in our nation’s capital, he preached eloquently of his dream for a color-blind culture. And he built that dream directly on the words of Jesus, words like these in the 14th chapter of Luke’s gospel.

Yet we still live in a racially and ethnically and even a financially divided world, don’t we? I’m not just asking you, my friends here at the Samarkand, I’m asking ME, too. I live in one of the most expensive suburbs in the entire nation and it is far from balanced. It is far from welcoming the outsider.

So what does this teaching mean for me? What does it mean for you?

Maybe it starts with how we think about those who are outside our circles. And then, maybe it moves to how we talk about others, and then to what we will listen to other people say about others. Maybe it means being intentional about cultivating the fruits of the Spirit, about practicing humble hospitality wherever and whenever we can.

For you, it might mean things like this: inviting someone new to sit with you for a meal; sharing your row in chapel with people you don’t know well. Maybe even sitting someplace new in chapel from week to week so that others will more easily find a place.

Surely it means continuing to ask God for a humble spirit, continuing to practice love in the small things, continuing to reach out to others around you with grace and warmth.

My mom is a fairly new resident in Heritage Court and she sometimes struggles to remember people’s names. But I’ve gotta tell you, she never forgets to reach out and say, ‘hello.’ She never forgets to introduce me to whomever is nearby. She never forgets to ask people how they’re doing. My mom practices humble hospitality as she is able, even at this stage of her life.

I think maybe it begins by not seeing anyone as an outsider, by refusing to set up edges, by acknowledging the shared humanity of every person we meet, wherever we are, whenever we can.

So, as you head out to lunch today, smile at someone you don’t usually smile at. Introduce yourself to someone new. Let others take the seat you want in the dining room.

Small steps.

I think Jesus calls us to the ministry of small steps: hospitality offered in humility, and centered in gratitude.

Small steps.

Amen.

If anyone is curious about the amazingly joyous wedding we recently celebrated in our family, after several years of sadness and loss, you can see/read more about it here, here, and here. 

Joining this with Michelle, Jen, And & Laura this week.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

The Beauty That Remains

August 25, 2013 By

My thanks to my good friend, Sherry Peterson, for this photo,
which she took as she was walking by us at The Samarkand. Sherry is lead chaplain there,
and mom told me she preached a powerful sermon this morning! 

We take the walker everywhere now;
her balance isn’t what it once was,
and we all feel just a bit more secure,
knowing she’s got support when she walks.

On Wednesdays, I join her for lunch.
And while the weather is as glorious
as it is right now,
we’re choosing to eat that lunch outdoors.

There’s a small cafe near the community swimming pool.
Sandwiches, salads, occasionally soup
and a hot choice.
And a small freezer full of ice cream delights. 

We don our pink hats, steer that walker towards the outdoors,
and wend our way over to the beautiful place,
the space where the sun shines and the breezes blow,
where we can talk if we wish,
or just sit and enjoy the distant mountain view.

We share a bottled Diet Coke
and laugh about the tickle-fizz of it,
and the sharp taste as it slides down our throats.
She always asks how my kids are doing.
Always.
And I say, “They’re doing just fine, Mom. Just fine.”

Conversation is harder to come by these days,
but we are relaxed about it.
She often surprises me with a small joke,
usually one that is self-deprecating.
We both laugh.

Sometimes, she seems aware of things
happening outside her increasingly small world.
We’ll touch on it gently,
and then she’ll say,
“Well, if they’d only ask us,
we could solve all the world’s problems, couldn’t we?”

That was a favorite line between us for years,
a sentiment that one or the other of us offered
whenever we spent any time lamenting
the current state of affairs in the world.

Somehow, it was a way to close off
that section of the conversation,
to move away from what sometimes
began to feel like constant complaining.

Neither of us can sit in complaint for long. 

This week she asked me something
that felt a bit as though it came from out of the blue.
I’m learning that things seldom are as random
as they might feel in this strange, half-lit world of dementia.

“Do you know this song?” she asked me.
“It’s been going through my head all the time lately.
It’s called, ‘Life Is Like a Mountain Railroad.’“

“Nope, Mom. Never heard of it. Tell me how it goes.”

She’s a bit embarrassed to sing,
her once lovely alto quavery and weak these days.
She is 92 years old, I gently remind her,
and eventually, the words come out.

Life is like a mountain railroad,
with an engineer that’s brave;
We must make the run successful,
from the cradle to the grave;
Watch the curves, the fills, the tunnels;
never falter, never fail;
Keep your hand upon the throttle,
and your eye upon the rail.

Refrain:
Bless’d Savior, Thou wilt guide us,
Till we reach that blissful shore;
Where the angels wait to join us
In Thy praise forevermore.

You will roll up grades of trial;
you will cross the bridge of strife;
See that Christ is your Conductor
on this lightning train of life;
Always mindful of obstruction,
do your duty, never fail;
Keep your hand upon the throttle,
and your eye upon the rail.

Refrain

You will often find obstructions;
look for storms of wind and rain;
On a fill, or curve, or trestle,
they will almost ditch your train;
Put your trust alone in Jesus;
never falter, never fail;
Keep your hand upon the throttle,
and your eye upon the rail.

Refrain

As you roll across the trestle,
spanning Jordan’s swelling tide,
You behold the Union Depot
into which your train will glide;
There you’ll meet the Superintendent,
God the Father, God the Son,
With the hearty, joyous, plaudit,
“Weary pilgrim, welcome home!”

Refrain

–M.E. Abbey & Charles Davis Tillman

The words are close to kitsch
and they make me smile.

My momma remembers one verse and the chorus,
and I pull out my iPhone and find the rest
on Google, astounded as always,
by what you can find in 30 seconds
in this internet world.

Hearing it sung helps me to see
the church into which I was born,
the one where my mom and dad met and married.
That old brownstone in downtown Los Angeles,
whose nooks and crannies were as familiar
to me as my own home.
That place where I learned sometimes bad theology,
but a lot of absolutely magnificent ecclesiology,
where church was welcoming, warm,
even fun from time to time.
Where I went forward to receive communion
at the rail, while my dad played the piano,
and my mom sang in the choir.
That place where Jesus was near.

We never sang that song while I went there.
Oh, we sang lots of gospel music,
a gift for which I am deeply grateful.
But never this one.

Somehow, it feels perfect for this summer luncheon,
perfect for this old saint and her old daughter.
Thank God for the brave engineer,
the One who will carry her safe-home.

And me, too. 

Here is a link to Johnny Cash, the Carter Family and Earl Scruggs (among others) recording two verses of this old chestnut. (They use ‘railway’ rather than ‘railroad.’)

It’s perfect. 

“Life is Like a Mountain Railway”

Joining this one with all my friends on this lovely Sunday evening. Most of my writing efforts this week will be directed toward a small sermon, to be preached next Sunday in my mom’s ‘church,’ the chapel she can walk to from her room.


Filed Under: Aging, Beauty, Church, death, Encouragement, family, God's gifts, memoir, parenting, personal journey, The Journey with Mom, Uncategorized

The Crazy Lady – A Deeper Family Post

August 22, 2013 By

Somehow, I managed to lose sight of the fact that the first Thursday of August was also the first day of the month. So, I blew my assigned date for the first time. However, my editor was gracious enough to allow me to fill in a blank spot on this month’s calendar. So for August 2013, I am posting on the THIRD Thursday rather than the first. Thanks, Megan! You can click here to read the rest of this rather strange essay. My husband says it sounds ever-so-slightly Sybilesque (as in the multiple personality case made into a book and a film many years ago). See what you think:

So, here’s the truth. Unvarnished, and throbbing.

Inside my head, there is a crazy person, a woman who runs around, wringing her hands, spouting out worst-case scenarios for every unknown thing in my life. I swear, there are days I can feel her stuttering footsteps banging against my brain, her worried hands dropping balled up pieces of Kleenex just behind the hippocampus.

I don’t like her much and I surely didn’t invite her in. But there she is, alive and well, thriving on all my insecurities, worries and deepest fears.

Did I mention I don’t like her?

And that fact does not seem to trouble her in the least. The woman never takes a hint. She is relentless, and surprisingly nimble. I’ve seen her leap over hurdles of monumental proportions. Hurdles like reason, intelligence, even clear evidence to the contrary of whatever it is she’s obsessing about at the moment.

And energy? This girl never sleeps! She inhabits my dreams, interrupts conversations, gets louder when I get quiet. To tell you the truth, she runs circles around me, and when she is doing her thing, I end up exhausted and empty.

She does take breaks now and again, and that’s always a relief. Earlier this year, in fact, I thought maybe — just maybe — she had moved out for good. I actually enjoyed several months of rest from that incessant jabbering in my head.

But this summer? Man, she showed up big-time, complete with roller bag and backpack. I think maybe she plans to stay a while and I’ve gotta tell you, I’m seriously bummed. Because this ‘guest?’ She is no friend of mine. I so enjoy practicing hospitality, but this one? I’d like to kick her to the curb. Hard.

In the middle of the most amazing family vacation we’ve taken in years, I turned around one day and there she was, earnestly trying to convince me that we were getting too old for this kind of thing, that our kids and grandkids no longer enjoyed our company, that we were on the outside when we desperately wanted to be on the inside. And oh, yeah, that I was the dorkiest grandmother of the century, big, awkward, loud and b-o-r-i-n-g.

Sigh.

Even if you DO think I’ve lost my mind, come on over and read the rest at A Deeper Family. It does get a little more hopeful. Really, it does.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

A Necessary Lament

August 18, 2013 By

When we built our worship center nearly 10 years ago,
our community was in a time of transition.
A long-term senior pastor had recently left
to assume a denominational position,
a kind-hearted interim had come to guide us
through the building process,
and I was serving as general encourager and history-bearer for all of us.

Construction took a little over two years,
and as we neared the end of it all,
we invited the entire congregation to travel over
from the gymnasium
(our worship-home for ten years)
to the still rough-around-the-edges new space.

We handed out felt markers to everyone
and gave this word of instruction:
“Everywhere you see plain concrete beneath your feet,
take a marker and find a space that is yours alone.
Write down your name,
and if you have a family, write down their names, too.
Then, next to your names, write a favorite scripture verse
or other words of worship.”

For the next hour or so, about 300 people spread themselves
across the front of the sanctuary
and down the aisles, right into the foyer.
And everyone got down on the floor and wrote.
When it was finished, we had a wild looking collection of
words, names, dates and love.
There were hearts and flowers,
there were whole sections of scripture.
One adolescent who sang in choirs
wrote out the entire mass — in Latin.

It was a stunning and beautiful sight to see.

About six months later,
as all the final details were coming together,
we laid down some lovely, soft, green carpet over it all —
all the words, all the promises,
all the names of the body of Christ in this place at that point in time.

Anyone who was not a part of us then would not know this.
But those of us who are still here,
who cannot imagine being anywhere else —
we know it’s there.
And we thank God for it.
It is a beautiful picture, a hidden treasure,
a reminder of bedrock,
our foundation, the ground beneath our feet,
the place on which we stand.

When times get tough — as they always do —
we remind one another:
“Remember that Sunday? Remember those words?
Remember how blessed we were to see it all spread out like that?”
We carry that sweet, secret autograph party in our hearts, 
and when we need to, we pull it out and look at it, again and again.

Remembering.

We were not sad that day,
though we were feeling the weight of transition.
We were not fearful that day,
though we wondered what sadnesses
might lie ahead of us.

Since that time, surely not always or even very often,
we have indeed had occasion
to feel sad,
to feel fearful,
even to wonder where God is,
to sense an absence where once there was presence.

Such wonderings are a part of life, a necessary part of life,
providing a necessary season of lament from time to time.

Why necessary?
Why spend time in lament?

Because we all need to remember who we are,
and who we are not;
to remember that we need saving;
to remember that we cannot do this life well
by ourselves;
to remember that there is a Shepherd
who truly loves us crazy, lost sheep.

Every.Last.One.of.Us. 

The broken ones,
the unhealthy ones,
the frightened ones,
the wandering ones,
the little ones.

The ones who fake it really well,
and the ones who don’t.
The ones with gigantic chips on their shoulders,
and the ones who always think somehow,
they’re to blame for something or for everything.

The ones who cheat on their taxes
or their spouses,
the ones who sit in judgment on everyone else.
The ones who cannot hold things
shared in confidence,
the ones who cannot find the courage
to share the things that matter.
The ones who bleed neediness,
the ones who don’t know
how truly needy they are.

ALL of us need to remember where help is found,
to remember again the things that are hidden.

We all need to know that we stand on the promises,
we stand on the Word,
we are loved and kept and saved,
even when all feels lost. 

“Restore us, O God;
make your face shine on us
that we may be saved.” 

 Three times, the psalmist cries out these words in Psalm 80.
In the midst of confusion,
loss, painful suffering and sin,
the only hope for the community of Israel
is God.
God alone.

The people are ‘eating tears,’
the vine of Israel is dying,
rotting away.
Where is God?

Your vine is cut down, it is burned with fire;
    at your rebuke your people perish.
Let your hand rest on the man at your right hand,
    the son of man you have raised up for yourself.
Then we will not turn away from you;
    revive us, and we will call on your name.

 Even here, if we read with the eyes of the early church,
even here, buried in the ancient, worshipping words
of a traveling, tribal people,
we see signs of the Shepherd,
the one who tends the sheep and who is the vine,
the New Vine,
to whom we are grafted,
and in whom, we are found. 

The One to whom we cry out: “Restore us, O God.”

Restore us.

 

My thanks to Don Johnson for his fine sermon on this psalm this morning, to Bob Gross and Pam Herzog, our intentionally small worship team, to Jeanne Heckman and Martha Johnson, who fought back their natural urges to create an altarpiece with a dying vine, to Sherry Peterson who offered such beautiful words in prayer (many borrowed from Flora Slosson Wuellner – if you don’t know who she is, you should),
and to Jon Lemmond, who read scripture, powerful scripture,
for us to contemplate as we entered into the preaching time. 

Joining with Michelle, Jen, Laura, Jennifer, em, and Ann today:

 



Filed Under: Uncategorized

Midweek Service: Inside Out and Upside Down

July 31, 2013 By

This will be the final sermon in this 10-part series of oldies.
I preached it in the last year of my ministry
and began it with a Readers’ Theater reading of the text,
something I love to do from time to time,
just to encourage people to really listen to the words.
It’s from the Old Testament, which is a favorite place for me.
Because mixed up with the violence and the seeming primitiveness
of those long ago times, there is beautiful, lasting truth.
Truth about human nature
and truth about the story God is telling in the universe,
the story that centers on grace.
This sermon touches on a lot of things that are close to my heart,
and I think, if they should ever read it,
my grandchildren might find
something good here to hang onto.
I think maybe this is my favorite one.

Inside Out and Upside Down
2 Kings 5:1-17
A Sermon preached at
Montecito Covenant Church
July 4, 2010 (Communion Sunday) by Diana R.G. Trautwein

Independence Day is traditionally a day for family gatherings and for family story-sharing.  Well, have I got a story for you today.  Oh my, this is a good one – one of the best-crafted of so many well-told tales in the Old Testament.  This one takes place in about the 9th century before the birth of Christ – and it’s found in 2 Kings – chapter 5, to be exact.  And today, I want to encourage you to have your Bibles open, but to just listen to this story as we read it for you.

READERS’ THEATER FOR THREE VOICES – 2 KINGS 5:1-17

Reader 1:           Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram.
Reader 2:          He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded,
Reader 3:          because through him the LORD had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier,
Reader 1:          but… he had leprosy.
Reader 3:         Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young  girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. She said to her mistress,
Reader 1.         “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”
Reader 2:         Naaman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said.
Reader 3:         “By all means, go,” the king of Aram replied. “I will send a letter to the king of Israel.”
Reader 2:         So Naaman left, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and ten sets of clothing.  The letter that he took to the king of Israel read:
Reader 3:         “With this letter I am sending my servant Naaman to you so that you may cure him of his leprosy.”
Reader 1:         As soon as the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his robes and said,
Reader 2:         “Am I God? Can I kill and bring back to life? Why does his fellow send someone to me to be cured of his leprosy? See how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me!”
Reader 1:         When Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his robes, he sent him this message:
Reader 3:         “Why have you torn your robes? Have the man come to me and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel.”
Reader 1:         So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and stopped at the door of Elisha’s house. Elisha sent a messenger to say to him,
Reader 2:         “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed.”
Reader 1:         But Naaman went away angry and said,
Reader 3:         “I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy.  Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?”
Reader 1:         So he turned and went off in a rage.  Naaman’s servants went to him and said,
Reader 2:         “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, ‘Wash and be cleansed’!”
Reader 1:         So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of  God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.  Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said,
Reader 3:         “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel. So please accept a gift from your servant.”
Reader 1:         The prophet answered,
Reader 2:         “As surely as the LORD lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing.”
Reader 1:         And even though Naaman urged him, he refused.
Reader 3:         “If you will not,” said Naaman, “please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the LORD.

 

Pretty good story, right?  Surprising people in surprising places, doing surprising things with surprising results.

A story filled with — the unexpected, the serendipitous, even a bit of the hilarious: curses that become blessings in disguise, important people who act like children, and children and servants who literally save the day. 

Here in this story, nearly 900 years before Jesus was even born, we have a pretty powerful illustration of the crazy mixed-up nature of the kingdom of God that Jesus taught his disciples about as they walked along the dusty roads of Palestine. 

In this story, as in so many of the stories of Jesus, the outsider is brought in, gentle words are more powerful than anger, the no-named ones make the difference, the high and mighty behave like the wild and wacky, the littlest, least likely one puts the whole thing in motion, and it all comes down to grace – pure and simple, free and fabulous, grace.

For that is the center of this story — and any story worthy of telling, it seems to me.  Grace is all around us, readily available to us, but…we must follow Naaman’s lead and step into it. 

We have to step into the water of grace.

What does that look like for you? for me? for us?  I think it looks like at least these three important truths:

  1. It looks like: Paying attention
  2. It looks like: Making space inside
  3. It looks like: Following through

Paying attention…to the people and the events and the space around us, and maybe most importantly, the space within us. 

Paying attention means listening carefully enough to our own hearts to discover the thing we want most in this world – not merely what we think we want. You know, those wishes and dreams that float to the surface pretty fast — like a new car or a better body or a perfect relationship or admission to just the right school or enough money to have whatever we want whenever we want it.  

And not even those things that we think we ought to want — like better habits, or a stronger character, or a more loving personality, or a deeper sense of compassion and a greater desire to help others. 

No. 

I’m talking about the thing that’s way the heck down deep in there, the thing that we take great pains to cover up with all kinds of other stuff just to distract us from the deepest yearning of our hearts. And that yearning goes by a lot of different names in our culture — names like…wholeness, fulfillment, completion, connection, even love. 

These are all fine things, good things – but they are not at the center of our most honest desire.  For the very truest thing about us, as human beings, and the truth that is foundational to all those fine things our culture thinks are at the top of the list – the very truest thing about us is that we were made to deeply desire the one true God – the God who made us, who calls us to be our best selves, who loves us even when we’re a long way from those best selves, who sees us and knows us and wants to share life and love and relationship with us.  That’s what we want.  That’s who we want.

It’s just that we have this bent place in us, a broken bit that pretty consistently calls us away from that deep truth and tells us to just go ahead and fill up that yearning, that space inside, with all kinds of other stuff – like those I listed out just a couple of minutes ago. 

We simply move one or more of those perfectly fine things into the space that was created for the one true God. And they do not fit. We work really, really hard to make them fit.  We even get addicted to them.  We even begin to act as though they are god and we convince ourselves that they can fill up that space just fine, thank you very much. 

And then we place layer upon layer of almost anything or anyone else we can think of right on top of that God-shaped space until there is no room to be found.  Very soon, our lives have become so filled with distraction that we simply cannot pay attention.  We haven’t the time or the energy or finally, even the ability to . . . stop. 

To slow down.  To peel back the layers a bit and look around in there.  But…and this is a lovely and grace-filled word for us human creatures… but…we can sometimes find a little help for our distracted busyness, help that comes from people and places that might surprise us.

Naaman needed help to pay attention, and it came from the most surprising people: a captured little girl with a message of hope and healing in the beginning of the story; and faithful, humble servants whose calming truth brought a little coolness into the heat of his temper tantrum near the end of the story. 

Sometimes we need a little help, too.  Maybe, just maybe, we can help one another to learn more about paying attention.  I know several of you have certainly helped me to do that at various times over the last 13 ½ years.  You’ve sent a sweet note, or written a provocative poem, or suggested a thoughtful book or website that helps me find my way back to center.  Because it’s at the center where paying attention becomes easier, more natural, more revealing.

And that brings us to the second truth for this morning – the importance of making – or perhaps more accurately – re-discovering that center, that space inside, that space that’s just the right size for grace, just the right size for God.

You know, I think Naaman was probably a pretty good guy.  We’re told three times in the first verse or two that actually, he was a great man, a recognized and famous man.  I imagine his life was full, busy, scheduled up the yin-yang.  If he wasn’t in the middle of one military campaign, he was probably at the map tables, busily laying out the next one.

We know he had servants and a household to run as well as an army.  We know he was part of the royal court of Aram.  We know he had immediate access to the king.  We can surmise that his servants thought pretty highly of him, which tells us that he probably was a pretty good guy, as well as a great military leader.

But all his fame, and all his great military prowess, and all his household possessions could not make up for the fact that he was a sick man.  He had a serious skin condition — not serious enough to keep him socially isolated — but serious enough for a little slave girl to be aware of it and concerned about her master’s overall well-being.  And that little girl brought something new to the table with her wide-eyed comment to the general’s wife — “Hey, I know a guy who could heal your husband.” 

This caused the busy, great man to stop.  To pay attention.  To seek the help he needed. 

But he still had a lot to learn, and discovering that space inside was at the top of the list.

Boy, he loaded up those donkeys, didn’t he?  He brought lots and lots of really cool stuff to the King of Israel, things that would look impressive, that would buy good favor, that would grease the wheels in the local power system. 

Sort of a picture of all the stuff that was likely piled up inside the man, too, don’t you think?

Now the king of Israel wasn’t exactly the sharpest pencil in the box – probably a bit of an editorial comment by the writer to let us know this king was a bad, idolatrous king and that the only help for Naaman, who was — let us not forget to notice this very important point — NOT an Israelite, but a Gentile, an outsider — in fact most of the time, an actual enemy of the state.  (So perhaps the king’s hissy fit is a little more understandable?) 

The only help for Naaman was not going to be found within the walls of the royal palace, but in the countryside abode of the man of God, the prophet whose name was Elisha.  So, Naaman lugs all his piled up stuff over the hill to the prophet’s house and waits to be greeted with the acclaim and admiration due a man of his stature.

Not gonna happen, Naaman, not gonna happen.

The countryside prophet wants to make it abundantly clear that he does not do magic, that he does not do parlor tricks, that he himself does not do anything to bring about the healing that will come.  And that healing can only happen if Naaman divests himself of some of those trappings and receives the healing as it is intended — a gift of grace.

Funny thing, though.  There doesn’t seem to be space in Naaman for anything except his aggrieved sense of entitlement and his unholy anger. 

Wow. 

What is it in us that makes us so prickly sometimes?  Why do we take offense if we feel like we’re not being treated ‘right,’ whatever that is?  Why do we so often hurl insults at the very things that will bring us hope and help and wholeness? 

A lot of the time, I do believe, it’s because we don’t have any room inside us to let the grace flow in.  We’re so full of ourselves, so full of self-righteousness, our own agendas, our own ideas of the way things should be done, so full of our own uncertainties and fears, that we have no space left to allow God to break through with healing love, with the help we need.

Once again, that help is on the way, however.  This time, it is the faithful servants who have accompanied Naaman on his journey.  They step into the heat of his anger, offering good and wise advice. 

(What was it Paul said in our Galatians passage?  “Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently.”  Ah yes — his servant-friends helped Naaman to make some room for grace.)

But ultimately, the decision to follow through had to be made by Naaman himself. 

With a little help, he was able to pay attention. 

With a little more help, he was able to open up some space inside. 

But . . .
All on his own, he went down to that riverside.
All on his own, he dipped his fevered skin into the Jordan River.
All on his own, he emerged from that seventh dip with the cleansed, restored skin of a young child. 

And see what happens!  This is not just a healed man that emerges from the Jordan.  This is a changed man, a converted man, a redeemed man.  The angry, entitled man of just moments before is transformed into a humble man, a deeply grateful man, a man filled with grace to the point of overflow. 

One of the first Gentile conversions recorded in scripture.  The only healed leper in all of the Elijah/Elisha sagas in the book of Kings.  One of the two Gentile believers noted by Jesus in the very first sermon of his ministry life. 

Naaman, the over-busy, easily-angered military leader becomes Naaman, the humble recipient of grace, eager to worship the one True God.  And he replaces some of his own stuff with Israelite dirt to form the base of an altar dedicated to Yahweh, the God of Israel, now the God of Naaman.

That’s what grace can do. 

It can wind its way into the tiniest available space and bring about wholesale transformation and change.  Grace will always seek us out, but it will not control our choices. 

It is there for us to receive, if we pay just a little bit of attention, if we open up just the smallest of spaces inside of us, and if we follow through on what we find. 

For it is the gift of grace that can bring healing and hope into the midst of sickness and despair. 

It is the gift of grace that can bring us into the inside out, upside down center of real life, where God is God, we are God’s loved children and Jesus is our elder brother and our Redeemer. 

It is grace that can change a small, torn piece of bread and a wee cup of grape juice into life and hope and promise. 

It is grace that can turn a roomful of strangers into the family of God. 

Praises be!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: biblical reflection, biblical study, community, Encouragement, ministry, preaching, Sermons/Homilies, Uncategorized

What I Did Yesterday: A Photo Essay

July 29, 2013 By

If you know me very well, you quickly become aware
that I am a mass of contradictions.
One minute, calm and self-confident,
the next minute, a mess of insecurities and fears

I’m working on it, but somehow perfection eludes me.

Case in point —
I live in fear that something I say or do
will embarrass my children.
Some days, this fear stays quiet
and seems to be fast asleep,
hiding comfortably under
a bushel basket of busyness.

Other days, however,
like these days — right now —
when I am living without a schedule,
without deadlines,
without commitments.
Well, on those days,
that fear gets loud and snarly.

We are vacationing at the same time as two of our three kids.
We’re not exactly vacationing together,
but we’re staying in close proximity and doing things
together from time to time.

Yesterday the whole kit and kaboodle of them
(one kid/wife/one of their two kids, one kid/husband/three kids,
one kid’s spouse’s parents (who NEVER embarrass their children),
one kid’s friend’s family of 5 . . .
if you’re counting, that makes a group of 15 so far)
decided to take a snorkel tour up the Napali Coast.

They invited me to go along,
and I said, YES, surprising us all.

Four hours long, beauty that stops the heart,
a chance to swim with tropical fish,
and a big old turkey sandwich and cold guava juice
to finish the day.
Oh, yes. And a one hour return ride
through the afternoon swells,
directly into the wind.

My husband gets seasick,
so he kept the 3-year-old and they had a ball.
I carefully sun-screened my entire body,
wore one of Dick’s t-shirts over my suit,
packed (as usual) more stuff than I’d need
and quietly clomped my way down the stairs
to join the crew.

So there’s this piece:
I have two bad knees
and a recently flaring achilles tendonitis.
Oh, and I’m old and a scaredy-cat.
So the opportunities for
being awkward, slow, and
so-much-less-than —
well, they abounded.
Yes, they did.
They ABOUNDED. 

But, I went anyhow.

And I am so very glad I did.

Getting there required:
driving down the hill from our condo
to the town of Hanalei,
parking behind the garbage container of a seafood restaurant;
(not the ideal aroma before a sea voyage of any kind);
waiting to sign in and get a waterproof bag for our stuff;
waiting four times for a 12-passenger van to shuttle
50 people to two 25-passenger boats;
riding said van to the river that flows into the bay;
then walking through knee-deep water
to board a six-passenger dinghy
which would take us out to the boat.

I, of course, was in the very last dinghy.

On board, I sat next to someone I did not know.
And out of all the towns, and all the rivers,
and all the boats in all the world,
I sat next to a woman who,
when I asked where she was from,
said to me: “Santa Barbara. Well, actually, Carpinteria.”
“Oh,” I said, “my kids are from there,”
pointing across the aisle,
“and my DIL practices medicine in Carp.”
“Omigosh,” she hollered.
“That’s my most excellent doctor right there.”

So SHE took that embarrassing moment I was so afraid of,
and captured it all for herself.
YIPPEE!!

The trip up the coast was magical;
there is no other word for it.
The captain set a leisurely pace,
stopping to look at caves,
waterfalls,
dolphins, hikers, kayakers
and green, green valleys.


At one time, about 3000 Hawaiians lived and fished
in these valleys, leaving only
when they needed medical attention
because of infections brought by explorers and traders.

When you look up these cliffs, you cannot imagine
how anyone ever lived here.
In the winter months,


40-foot waves hit these walls with such force,
they leave permanent scars of white calcium
and red-dirt run-off.

Parts of the Pali are open to campers,
with permits,
but the trail is rated a 9 out of 10 for difficulty,
and is often slick, muddy and very, very narrow.

If I were 40 years younger and a whole lot fitter,
kayaking to the first valley might be on my list.
(I say ‘might’.) But hiking it? Not a chance.
 After we got to our snorkeling spot,
at the very end of the northern tip of the island,

I waited and was nearly the last person into the water.
Once all my children and their children
were safely looking down into the water through their masks,
I oh-so-gracefully,
slid myself over the side of the boat
and  plunged into the warm Pacific.

Maybe someday, I’ll have a photo from
my son-in-law’s underwater camera to
add to this story,
but for now, you’ll have to take my word for it:

God is a genius.
A GENIUS, I tell you.
Coral of all sizes, types and color,
tiny fish, mid-sized fish
and one midling sea turtle —
yes, a real live sea turtle,
the sight of which made me say
through my snorkel,
“this is so cool, so cool, so cool.”
(So glad none of my kids can hear me through that snorkel.)

The trip home was. . .  how shall I say it?

Strenuous.


But  you know what?
It was tremendous fun.
We got bounced and bumped and WET.
But we also saw a pod of about 30 spinner dolphins,
three of whom jumped the wake of our boat.

Sittin’ on the bay, waitin’ for the dinghy to go home.

And that night, we all ate together, saw the best sunset yet,
and enjoyed watching some neighbors
sail paper lanterns,
lit with specially coated, biodegradable wicks,
while all the children around sang
that song from “Tangled.”

Magical.
That’s the word for the entire day.

And I didn’t embarrass my kids.

There was that one time I laughed a little too loudly, 

but they’re pretty much used to that.

And there was the fact that I cannot, in any way, shape or form,
manage to straddle a picnic table that’s low to the ground.
Other than that, I think I made it through
and lived to tell about it.
I’m glad I chose adventure
over my fears and insecurities.

And I loved every minute of it.
It was nearly completely dark, so this is very blurry, but I loved that lantern against the colors of the sunset.
It’s Monday, so I’m joining this one with Laura, Jennifer and Michelle, because even though it happened on Friday rather than Sunday, that snorkeling was the most wonderful worship experience in a long while.

 

Filed Under: Beauty, Confession, Encouragement, family, Family/Travel, friendship. personal journey, memoir, personal journey, Photo Essay, The Sea, Travel, Uncategorized

Midweek Service: Coming Home

July 24, 2013 By

We’re nearing the end of this summertime series of oldies,
and this one is about 10 years old, I think.
In honor of our time away on Kauai
this window is from the beautiful historic church in Hanalei,
where we worshipped yesterday morning. 

Coming Home
Luke 15 – The Parable of the Prodigal Son
A Sermon Preached at
Montecito Covenant Church
by Diana R.G. Trautwein
sometime in 2003 is my best guess

What is home? Where is home? How do we get there? What does it mean to go home, to come home, to be at home? What are the ingredients required to make home home?? Can one be at home without ever having a house? On the other hand, is it possible to be at house without being at home?

The story before us today deals with questions like these.  Because it is, at its heart, a story about homecoming, a story about welcome, a story about celebration, a story about grace, uncommon grace – the kind of grace, the kind of mercy, that we don’t understand, the kind of grace that we sometimes find puzzling, uncomfortable, unreasonable, unfair.

Grace, unfair? Yup!

Grace, unfair.Totally, completely, unhesitatingly, undeniably unfair. Because that is, after all, what the word means: unmerited favor; undeserved goodness; unwarranted kindness, forgiveness, acceptance, welcome, at-home-ness.

And most of the time, we haven’t got a clue what to do with it! We just do not get it. We need help, we need open eyes, open minds, open hearts.

The gospel of Luke tells us a whole lot about this grace, this weird thing that God does, this remarkable, divine grace that God puts flesh around in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. Luke tells us about the surprises of God’s grace, God’s mercy, from the very opening verses of his gospel story. He puts it in the mouths of those two great singers in chapter 1, Zechariah and Mary. “For God has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant,” Mary sang out.  “God, the Mighty One, has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts, he has brought down the powerful, he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”

Surprise! Grace pays no-never-mind to wealth and power. What you have and who you control have no impact on the gifts God wishes to give. In fact, the less you have, the more you are likely to receive. Weird stuff, this grace.

And Zechariah, that strange old priest who fathered that strange young prophet – he gave melody to these words: “God has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors. You, my child, will go before the Lord, to give knowledge of salvation to God’s people, by the forgiveness of their sins. By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

Surprise!  God’s mercy and grace are nothing new. They’ve been a part of God’s story from the very beginning.  The mercies of God have been promised from the earliest tracings of God’s dealings with the human family. And those who sit in the darkest places will be the first to see the light of God’s promises fulfilled.

Amazing grace, surprising mercy, remarkable love.

That’s the heart of the gospel message. That’s the heart of Luke’s story. That’s the heart of Jesus, who came to show us the Father. And the One that we’re looking at in this sermon series entitled, “Introducing Jesus.”

And this story, this parable, this teaching tool from the lips of the Savior — these 21 verses located about 2/3 of the way into Luke’s larger gospel – and told only here in the New Testament – this story contains some of the most important truth that we, as followers of Jesus Christ, need to know.

Before we dive into it, let’s pray together:

 Lord God, Maker of heaven and earth.
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and our Father,
what in the world can I say about this tiny gem of a story
that hasn’t already been said a thousand times?
The story is old, the story is wonderful,
the story is rich and thought-provoking,
weird and wonderful,
and we’ve all heard it about a million times before.
Help us all, O God, to hear it again.
To hear it with new ears, with hearts that are open
to hear old truths in new ways.
Your word is the truth, and our only hope for finding our way.
Will you use it today to help us receive you,
to help us see you?
Thank you, Lord, that you hear and answer prayer. Amen.

Brent has read for us this remarkable and very familiar story, this story of fathers and sons, of going away and coming home, of wasted potential, of earnest hard work, of pig slop and fatted calves and great rejoicing and bitter rejection. A study in contrasts, a series of lessons we have such a hard time learning.

Who are you in this story today? At various times in our lives, we are at least one of the main characters described here.

Are you the wastrel today, the younger child, demanding your inheritance, going your own way, determined to have a good time, the consequences be damned?

Are you the hard worker, the older child, staying at home, doing your duty, secretly  angry, angry, angry and resentful beyond belief?

Are you the parent, rich in resources, but lonely for the children you love?

Who are you today? Where are you today?

If you were there in the crowd that day, listening to Jesus tell this story, you might have found it hard to hear. “Something’s wrong here,” you might have thought. “Something’s not quite kosher. Clearly the father in this story is wealthy. He’s got hired hands and he’s got slaves. He’s got goats and he’s got fatted calves. He’s got robes and rings and fancy shoes. But right there, at the very beginning of the tale, he’s as good as dead, no matter how much stuff he’s got. He lets that younger kid break up the estate, run off with his third of the money, and he gives the ranch over to the older one before he has even died! The old guy is basically giving up everything that means ‘life’ and identity and substance and ‘being’ in our culture. What kind of a story is this, anyway?”

If you’re part of the crowd that was testing Jesus – those Pharisees and scribes who wondered what in the world Jesus was doing hanging out with such riff-raff –if you’re a part of that high-falutin’ crowd, you’d really wonder where Jesus is going with this story.

And if you’re part of the riff-raff, you’d know that this gentle rabbi, who loved a good laugh and a good glass of wine, was bound to be upsetting folks before long!

By now, most of you folks who’re listening to Jesus teach – no matter which crowd you’re a part of – by now, you’ve gotten used to his methods. He likes to tell stories, just like a lot of the rabbis of the day.  He likes to tell stories that make you listen, that make you think, that make you do a large part of the work. He likes you to have to wrestle the truth out, to wonder what the point is, to take some ownership in the whole learning process. And right away, you can see that this story is no exception. And as the story begins, it’s anybody’s guess just where Jesus is headed.

(Well, there are a couple of clues in those other two stories he told right before this one -the first one about the lost sheep and the other one about the lost coin. Some common threads are showing up: things that are lost and then found, great parties, great rejoicing.)

“But what,” you might wonder, “is the real point of the deal?  How is this story an answer to all that grumbling the Pharisees have been doing?”

If you’re paying attention to the story the rabbi is telling, certain words, certain phrases, certain ideas begin to leap out at you, to catch your ear, and then your mind. Sometimes those words cause you to question and to wonder, sometimes they give you an ‘a-ha’ kind of experience, sometimes, they leave you just plain speechless.

But a lot of that depends on who you are today as you listen to the rabbi tell his stories –are you an older sibling or a younger one? a Pharisee or a sinner? An insider or an outsider? And which is which in this story, anyhow?

The younger child’s story is filled with ear-catching lines like these: ‘Father, give me my share…” “So the father divided his property…” “When he had spent everything…” “…he hired himself out to a man who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs…” “But when he came to himself…” “While he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion…” “…let us eat and celebrate; for this son of mine was dead and is alive again…”

If you are a part of the riff-raff today, standing with those whom the Pharisees resent, those the scribes look down on, if you’re a part of that crowd of listeners, you probably hear these words of Jesus with recognition and relief.  You hear the rabbi’s story and you think: “Surely, that young man’s journey is much like mine! I have wasted my potential in wild living, I have hired myself out to keepers of swine, (those Romans for whom I collect all these taxes are certainly swine-like!) I, too, have yearned for the bean pods and found no one to feed me, no one to help me. I have felt cut off from my home, my people, my God. I wonder, have I come to myself yet? Is that what this rabbi is calling me to do? To come to myself? To come to the father? Could it be that the God I have turned my back on is anything like the father in this story? Can I trust myself to such a God?”

Yes, I think if you are in the noisier, earthier section of Jesus’ listeners, you see yourself in that younger son today. And you might even feel hopeful about your situation, hopeful for the first time in years.

But what if you’re part of that team of questioners, quibblers, and leaders, those righteous rulers who grumble and gossip and complain about the company Jesus keeps? Where are you in this story? As you listen, you’re beginning to see where Jesus is headed with this whole thing, and you don’t like it at all. You know where righteousness and justice are found even as the story begins. Some of the very same phrases that catch the ears of those riff-raff over there are catching your ears as well.

But somehow, you are not hearing the same things at all. “Who in the world does that young whipper-snapper think he is?” you wonder. “Everyone knows you don’t ask your father for your inheritance ahead of time, it just isn’t done, it isn’t done! And imagine the frustration of that poor older brother! He gets to stay at home and work like a dog, for what? So that his doddering old dad can waste that calf they’ve  been fattening up!  Why, that noble man has probably been holding that calf in reserve to impress some important potential clients, buyers of their livestock and produce, perhaps – and that crazy old man is wasting such a great prize on that scamp of a brother! Why, I don’t blame that guy one bit for his anger! I’d be madder than blazes myself, that’s for sure! What is that old geezer thinking?? He’s got a righteous son, a dutiful, obedient son, a hardworking and industrious son, a loyal and subservient son – and is the thanks he gets??? What kind of a story is this, anyhow?”

Ah.

We seem to have a bit of a problem here, don’t we? The riff-raff can find themselves in the story. Those who have been broken by life, by their own poor choices, by their own sin – they can see themselves for who they are. They can acknowledge their own weakness, they can hear the words of the younger son and say them with him: “I have sinned against heaven and against you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” They have nothing left to lose, and they see their humble return to the father as the only road available to them.

But the righteous rulers can’t see themselves at all. Well, actually, they do see themselves, they just don’t see themselves as Jesus sees them, as God the Father sees them. And that is the core issue here, isn’t it? Grace and mercy can only be perceived,  can only be re>ceived by those who are willing to admit that they need it, that they have done absolutely nothing to deserve it, that they are hopeless and helpless without it.

The older brother begins the story as the one on the inside, the father gives him all that he has. But somehow, he cannot see it, he cannot receive it, he cannot appreciate it. He cannot receive this loving gift from his father because he has not been willing to relinquish his right to have it. He insists that he can earn it, that he deserves it, that he is in control at all times of what should be his by right. He ends the story on the outside, looking in with anger, jealousy, resentment, bitterness and a stubborn refusal to join the party.

The younger son, on the other hand, begins the story on the outside, breaking up the family and leaving for a far country to live in ways unworthy of his home. When he loses it all, he sees the truth of his situation. He ends the story on the inside, the recipient of the father’s uncommon grace, his loving compassion and mercy. He is warmly enfolded into the center of family life, forgiven, renewed, restored.

I ask you now, what is fair about that??

Absolutely nothing.

There is nothing fair about it. Jesus, as God’s word enfleshed, completely redefines the world’s ideas about justice, about fairness, about righteousness, about goodness and grace and mercy. The father in this story loves both of his children, he goes out to both of his children, he offers gracious gifts to both, he includes both in the celebration of homecoming.

The younger child enters in, gratefully receiving all that the father offers.

The older one remains outside the door, and we are left wondering, will this much-loved child let go of pride? Will this one let go of the need to win? Can those powerful, culturally ratified ideas about rights, fairness, righteousness, the requirements of duty be let go? Will this child join with the father, join the party, join in the rejoicing because the one who was dead, is alive, the one who was lost, has been found?

This is what it’s all about, isn’t it?

Recognizing our need, relinquishing our rights, rejoicing in finding the lost. This is the mission of the church of Jesus Christ: to seek and to save those who are lost, to rejoice when they are found, to rely completely upon the  uncommon grace, the welcoming, loving mercy of the Father.

It’s all about moving from the outside to the inside, it’s all about recognizing home, coming home, being home, celebrating home, offering home, and welcoming others home.

Home is where the Father is, and Jesus shows us the way.

Let’s pray together:

 We come to you this morning, Lord,
as those who are in need of home.
Help us to see our need,
to acknowledge our need to you,
to know that there is absolutely nothing
that we can do
or earn
or win,
that there is
no amount of hard work,
or dedication to duty,
or any self-made righteousness
that can bring us home.

It is only by your mercy that we can come in,
it is only by your grace that we can be saved.
Here and now, Lord, help us to let go of
our need to be right, our need to prove a point,
our need to keep score!
We want to give it all over to you, O God,
because we know from your word that you don’t keep score.
And what a blessing that is!
Thank you for your grace, for your love,
for your welcome home.
Because of Jesus we pray,
Amen.

 

Filed Under: biblical study, Encouragement, God's gifts, memoir, preaching, Sermons/Homilies, Uncategorized

Midweek Service: Freely Gifted, Freely Given

July 17, 2013 By

We are on vacation with family and friends for the next 3 Wednesdays, so these archived sermon posts will be coming to you from the gloriously beautiful island of Kauai.
As I see the date on this sermon — one I loved working on and one that I think is central to our understanding of faith and life, of suffering and joy — I remember that our son-in-law at that time was struggling through the last few months of a long siege of struggle, pain and suffering, a siege that led to his death just four months after this sermon was preached. I think perhaps I needed this one most of all.

Freely Gifted, Freely Given

Matthew 9:35-10:8, Romans 5:1-5, Exodus 19:2-8
Preached at Montecito Covenant Church
Sunday, June 15, 2008 by
Diana R.G.Trautwein

I want to begin today’s sermon by reading for you the gospel selection from the lectionary for today’s date.  The other scriptures that you’ve heard this morning are also taken from that list – the Psalm with which I began our service today, the words from Exodus and the words from chapter 5 of Romans which Anne just read – all 4 scripture lessons are part of today’s worship service.  And, in a way, all four lessons are part of this sermon, as I’ve been living with them, and thinking about them, and praying through them all as I’ve read and studied and pondered.  So, hear the word of the Lord as it is recorded for us in the gospel of Matthew, beginning with verse 35 of chapter 9 and continuing through verse 8 of chapter 10.

This passage of scripture marks the transition from one big chunk of Matthew’s book to another, from one of his five extensive ‘red letter’ sections of Jesus’ teachings, which seem to many scholars to be designed by Matthew as a parallel to the 5 books of the Jewish Torah – the 1st5 books of what we call the Old Testament.  And as we read together today, it’s good to remember that the very first readers of this book were undoubtedly Jewish Christians, men and women who brought with them their religious and biblical heritage as they began to follow Jesus, and who deeply understood things like: the Torah – and the covenant – that agreement which God struck with his chosen people – whom God called, as our Exodus passage put it: “my treasured possession;” and the biblical imagery of the sheep and their shepherd, which occurred in one form or another in all of their sacred writings, from Exodus through the Psalms and into the writings of the prophets.  See how many of these Old Testament echoes you can hear in these 12 short verses:

Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness.When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness.These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon, also known as Peter, and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed him.

These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.” NRSV

This is the word of the Lord for us today. Thanks be to God for it.

The rest of chapter 10 continues with Jesus’ words of instructions to his closest followers about how to be . . . well . . . his closest followers. It’s pretty much a training guide for discipleship 101, with clear instructions and advice about how to go about doing what he himself has been doing. This commissioning of the 12 disciples happens at a relatively early point in Jesus’ ministry life, and he places some pretty serious parameters around what they are to do and where they are to go.  It’s their first foray out into the world of ministry and they’re sent out in twos – they’re even listed in twos by Matthew – to preach the kingdom message of Jesus, which is to say – to tell people that God is near!  God is here!  See for yourselves!

And then they are given the authority and the power to do the kinds of things that Jesus himself has been so busy doing – touching those in all kinds of need with healing, cleansing, releasing. And they’re to do it as generously and unreservedly as Jesus has been doing it. On this first trip out, they are to restrict themselves to ‘the lost sheep of Israel,’ honoring God’s special relationship with his people. Later on, if you turn to the end of Matthew’s gospel – after the crucifixion and after the resurrection – and Jesus prepares to leave this earth and the era of the church really begins – his words to his disciples are much, much broader. The Great Commission – the very last verses of Matthew’s gospel in chapter 28 read this way:

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded.  And surely, I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

But here, in these opening verses of chapter 10, just as his active, in-the-flesh, on-earth, kingdom-announcing, healing-the-sick, raising-the-dead days really begin to get going, Jesus’ words are more particular, more pointed, more specifically directive, more elemental.

And yet, from these beginning words of instruction – in fact, included as a centrally important part of these words – there is this one powerful, central, formational, life-changing truth. A simple word that is true not just for beginner disciples, but for more experienced ones as well. A truth that, I believe, is as completely applicable to the words of the Great Commission in Matthew 28, or the words of praise and exultation in Psalm 100, or the words of promise in Exodus 19, or those of hope in Romans 5 — as it is to these words of instruction in Matthew 10:8:

“Freely you have received, freely give.”

What you have received from me, Jesus says to his friends, you paid not a dime for, you did do and you can do absolutely nothing to earn any of it. It is offered to you as a gift,gratis, Grace.

But what can I possibly tell you about grace – that lovely word, that amazing concept,  that hard-to-grasp reality – that you haven’t already heard about a million times?

You know, I tried to make this sermon go in a different, slightly less hackneyed direction.

I thought for a while about the message of the kingdom of God – that great good news of God’s nearness – of God’s breaking into our world in a new way –- that Jesus traveled around telling the towns and villages of Galilee, his home county.  And I suppose I will tell you a little bit about that today.

And I thought about concentrating on those words in Romans that speak of peace, peace with God. I thought for a while, that I might tell you about shalom, that great Hebrew word which means so much more than our English word ‘peace,’ that Old Testament concept that includes so much more about wholeness, and righteousness and well-being than it does about a kind of cease-fire — which is what peace seems most often to connote in English. And I will probably tell you a bit about that, too.

But then I also thought about last week’s wonderful sermon on ‘breaking,’ and how nicely that topic dovetails with Paul’s words about suffering producing perseverance and perseverance, character and character, hope and how hope does not put us to shame…

And I know I’ll touch on that sometime in the next 10 minutes or so.

I even started to head in the direction of that evocative word image in our Exodus passage, where Yahweh reminds Moses to remind the people that he carried Israel ‘on eagle’s wings and brought them to himself,’ And I suppose it’s entirely possible that I could head down that road as well today…

But as I kept thinking about all of these words, these ideas, these grand themes that are found in all of our texts for the week, the single word that kept coming back, like a lovely, silvery dolphin, rising out of the deep waves of God’s glorious Word, was grace –unmerited favor, unearned reward, unexplained tenderness, unreasonable tolerance, unbearable acceptance. Grace.

And there is nothing capricious about this favor, nothing unstable about this reward, nothing uncertain about this tolerance, nothing unplanned about this acceptance.

God’s grace is highly intentional, completely inclusive, open to all. God’s grace is free-flowing, yes, but it is also deliberate, enduring, unchangeable and very, very dependable. And it is the grace of God which infuses and surrounds and undergirds every one of the scripture passages for this morning.

It is the grace of God which inspires the psalmist to acknowledge, indeed to know that the LORD is God, that he is the one who has made us, that we are his.

It is the grace of God which miraculously frees the people of Israel from their slavery in Egypt, long before they ever enter into any kind of covenant agreement.  God rescued Israel, carrying them on eagle’s wings, before he asked for their obedience.

It was the grace of God, as made flesh in the presence of Jesus of Nazareth, which healed the sick and cast out demons and raised the dead before any kind of condition was put on those who received those gifts and blessings.

It is ‘this grace in which we stand,’ according to Paul in Romans 5.  It is this grace that makes peace possible, that can cause us to glory, or rejoice, or even boast in our sufferings, of all things.  In our sufferings? Yes.  God’s grace is evident even there.

Because here’s an important thing to understand, a critically important piece of the puzzle that is, at times, what this journey of faith feels like.

Grace is a gift – a gift at just the right time, Paul writes – while we ‘were still powerless, Christ died for us,’  ‘while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’

But grace is not a guarantee of a trouble-free life. Grace is not a shield behind which we can hide from the trials and travails of the human condition; grace is not designed to provide supernatural protection from either the slings and arrows that come our way because we are inhabitants of a fallen planet, or to prevent the hardship, pain and turmoil that can happen because we are followers of Jesus.

On the contrary, in those additional red words in chapter 10 of Matthew’s gospel, the ones that follow the ones we read just a few minutes ago, Jesus carefully reminds his disciples that they are being sent out as ‘sheep among wolves,’ and he as much as promises them that they will be flogged in the synagogues, and brought before governors and kings, under arrest, that family members will betray them, that ‘everyone will hate you because of me.’

Yowza.

Can’t we climb our way back to the peaceful, sonorous tones surrounding the word ‘grace?’ Can’t we stick with those images of sheep in the pasture, with a loving shepherd nearby? Let’s get back to that great song, “Grace Flows Down,” that we sang a few minutes ago, okay? Somebody hit the rewind button here.

Ah, but if you’re going to hit that rewind button, you’ll find something pretty remarkable, I think. You’ll find that the grace of God simply cannot be separated from all this other stuff – we must somehow hold onto both the beautiful, poetic, soul-soaring words like the praise of the psalmist or the graceful theological leaps of the apostle Paul, and we must also hold onto Jesus’ words of warning and Paul’s teaching about suffering.

It’s of a piece, you see. And while for a moment or two that might feel like bad news, I’m here to tell you that this is good news, really good news.  Even great news.

We are grace-fully saved from our sin and our brokenness, while we are right in the midst of our sin and our brokenness. The grace of God restores to us relationship with him, the grace of God goes before us and behind us and beside us even before we choose to receive it. The grace of God is a free gift, yes indeed.

But it is a gift designed to be shared, to be radiated outward in the middle of a world that far too often doesn’t know what in the heck to do with it, can’t recognize it when it sees it, and isn’t at all sure it wants it when it’s offered. Because, you see, we live in a sinful, broken world populated by sinful, broken creatures whom God desperately loves, whom God deeply desires to restore, whom God breathes grace on every second of every hour of every day. But that breathing, my dear friends, is done by . . . you and by me.

“The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few,” Jesus told his disciples.  “Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” That’s the plan, that’s the design, that’s the program.  That’s how grace finds legs – and arms and hands and eyes and ears and mouths to speak out the good news that, ‘the kingdom of heaven is near.’ God’s grace was evident all the way through the characters and the stories and the poetry and proverbs of the Old Testament – grace was there, God was there, intervening to save his people, to give them the law as a guide, to create a nation of priests for the world.

But the grace of God needed fuller expression, richer demonstration. So Jesus came into this world, singing out the good news, acting out the good news, living out the good news, dying the good news and rising again with the good news of God’s gracious love and forgiveness.

And Jesus turned right around and passed the baton on to his disciples – beginning with the 12 in Matthew 10 – and extending that assignment of grace-giving to each and every one of us – and maybe even more importantly, to all of us together – all who have said, all who do say and all who will say yes to the gift and yes to the giver. “Freely you have received.  Now, freely give.”

Are you struggling with something intense and painful right now?  Have you lost someone you love?  Are your children giving you fits?  Are you battling your own personal demons or addictions?  Is someone you love battling those demons?  Are you overwhelmed by financial worries?  Are you old and tired and lonely?  Are you young and confused and lonely? Are you wondering what’s coming next in your life and how you’re going to handle it when it does come?

Here’s the good news: you are not alone. Do you notice where Paul puts his sentence about suffering in those opening verses of Romans 5?  He puts it right in the middle of all that wonderful talk about peace and love and grace and hope. Which is exactly where your suffering belongs, where it is, by the grace of God, if you have eyes to see.

There is nothing that happens to you or to me or to those we love that falls somehow outside of God’s providential, graceful care of us.  Even when we feel like there is no way out of whatever it is we’re facing – God is at the edges of the box, God is in the box with us.

Do you want to know how I know this to be true? Besides my own experiences of learning and stretching and being shaped by the word of God, and the struggles of this life, I know this to be true because so many of you have taught me, have shown me, have told me and have encouraged me to believe and to know that it is true.

Because that’s how it works.  The grace with which we, by the goodness of God, are filled when we say ‘yes’ to the gift — that grace is not something that is containable.  It’s like a rich golden liquid that flows out and over us right into the lives of others, when we let it. Never believe that a note, or a phone call, or a meal, or a prayer shawl, or a kind word on the patio, or a quick prayer offered on behalf of another is wasted effort, or that it is small and somehow uncountable.

Every single time you reach out to someone else who is suffering in any way, you are the grace of God at work.  Every single time you open your heart to genuinely receive an offering of any kind from a follower of Jesus, you areseeing the grace of God at work, you are inhaling the very breath of God, you are receiving life and love and peace and joy and hope and grace.

In his famous sermon, “The Weight of Glory,” C.S. Lewis noted that,

“There are no ordinary people. Our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbor, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ verelatitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.”

Your neighbor – anyone whom God places in your path – is ‘the holiest object presented to your senses.’ And if that neighbor is also a believer in Jesus, The holiness goes up a notch – not because of the neighbor, but because of the Jesus in the neighbor, the grace of God that fills him or her, the grace of God that fills you, even in the midst of the darkest, most difficult place you can imagine – the grace of God is still there. Freely you have received, freely give.

Freely you have received, freely give!

 Oh dear God,

I don’t want to make this sound trite
or nonsensical or impenetrable.
Because it’s so mysteriously simple
and so simply and beautifully true.

“Out of the depths,” the psalmist cries at one point.
But he cries to YOU because even there,
>even in the depths,
your gracious presence can be found,
your sweet Spirit can sustain.

One of your friends from the early years of the last century said,
“We may doubt, but it is in God we doubt.
We may kick against the pricks, but they are God’s pricks.”

And so often, oh God, you choose to use us
as carriers of that grace,
as vessels for that sweet Spirit,
that you are in the doubts.

Lord, give us eyes to see you,
in whatever way you may choose to reveal yourself,
but most especially, give us eyes to see you in one another.

We pray this earnestly, and with great humility
as we remember once again that you have chosen us
to bear your grace to the world.
For Jesus’ sake.  Amen.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

“Activist Faith” – a Book Review

July 15, 2013 By

 

“Being an everyday activist doesn’t mean you need to quit your job, sell all your possessions, and move to a Third World country to feed starving children. In fact, one might even argue that staying in your job while finding ways to impact the world around you might even give you greater opportunities to discuss your faith with coworkers.

Being an everyday activist simply means that you are taking advantage of the opportunities right in front of you and embracing what God is calling to you do—and doing it with the full devotion you’d give if you were serving Jesus Himself. Because in truth, you are!”– pg. 11

Maybe you’re like me. Maybe you know there is more you could be doing, maybe even more you should be doing, about a whole lotta things that are wrong with this crazy world of ours. But the truth is, there is so much wrong out there, that somehow it feels easier to keep doing the usual, to take care of me and mine, than to actually come out from under the covers and begin. I often feel overwhelmed by blog posts, Facebook comments, editorials in print and online newsmagazines, all urging me to do something, to change my lifestyle, to change my world view, to morph into a different person than I am and become a crusader for any of a long list of causes.

And that overwhelm? It pretty much leads to paralysis – at least for me. And also to some finger-pointing guilt, with all fingers pointing to moi. If any of this feels familiar to you, I encourage you to read a book that is releasing TODAY, a book written by three men, one of whom I know personally, a book that looks at twelve of those hot-button issues and offers some practical, how-to suggestions about how each one of us can make a difference for good. The book (and accompanying website) is called “Activist Faith: From Him and For Him,” and it’s co-authored by Dillon Burroughs, Daniel Darling and Dan King.

And the twelve topics highlighted include: human trafficking, immigration reform, poverty, environmental care, disaster relief, homelessness, abortion, war/terrorism, the persecuted church, parenthood, marriage and sexuality, prison ministries and orphan care.

I will add one caution here at the top – this book is written from a conservative point of view, conservative theologically and conservative politically. The selection of topics tells you that, perhaps most directly in the chapters on abortion and marriage. It also shows in the decision NOT to look at other issues which are important for Christians to be concerned about, gun control being the most glaring omission to me. In some places, I wish the authors were a little less up front about their conservatism because I know that quoting certain authors and choosing some topics over others might cause some of us to purse our lips and shut the cover.

I urge you, however, not to do that. Because if you do, you will miss some important things. First of all, you might discover – as I did – that you are already doing some things very right indeed. I was encouraged to find myself nodding here and there, nodding in agreement and in recognition. “I do some of this,” I thought. (Not all of it and not nearly enough of it, but . . . some of it.) And that small slice of encouragement was what it took for me to read through to the end.

And more importantly, you would miss the rich variety of resources and personal testimony that this book contains. Each chapter is designed to be used in family or small group settings, with reflection questions, suggested lifestyle changes and/or ministry opportunities, and a list of recommendations for further reading on the topic at hand. I resonated most strongly with the chapters on immigration reform, disaster relief, and homelessness and I am sure I will return to these pages for information and suggestions in days to come.

This book is thoughtful, practical and a veritable treasure chest of information for anyone who is seeking to follow Jesus into the real world, where real people with real problems live and suffer. None of us can do everything that needs to be done. But all of us can do something. And this book is a helpful guide to discovering what your something might be.

Here is a link to the book at Amazon – order your copy today!

 

I was honored to receive a galley copy of this book from my friend, Dan King. The review above contains my own honest responses and observations.

 

Filed Under: Uncategorized
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