Reflection for Monday

I've learned over time that the cliche "be careful what you ask for, you might just get it" is true, though as a Christian, changing "ask for" to "pray for" seems more fitting.  This is especially true when we ask for things like patience or humility.  We grow more patient by being asked to wait and we grow more humble by being humbled.  Experience is a great teacher when it comes to both of those. 

Yesterday, I preached a sermon that addressed the difficulties our country is facing, especially related to the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner.  I approached it from the standpoint of a disciple who must grapple with the prophetic word that pushes us to places we would rather not go and to hear truths we would rather not hear.  As the congregation was leaving, I received some very encouraging and complimentary words from several church members.  This made me feel good about my sermon, especially one as potentially divisive as this one.   

Last night and this morning, I felt that little voice in my head threatening to get louder.  It might start with: "I guess that was a pretty good sermon."  Then it might become: "I might be a pretty good preacher."  If left unchecked, eventually that voice begins to whisper: "Maybe I'm a great preacher", followed closely by stuff like, "I should be appreciated more" or "I'm better than so and so…"  It rarely gets to that point, mainly because I've got a wife, two children, and some good friends that help me to stay grounded.  If we allow it, parenting, marriage, and ministry are some really good ways to learn humility (in an honest-to-goodness, not-being-sarcastic way).  Pride is sneaky, however, and we need all the help we can get to stay grounded and humble.

This morning as I was praying, I asked God to help me to be humble.  I was trying to quiet the sneaky voice of pride.  So I prayed that God would help me to see where I need to grow, where I need to be more faithful, where I need to work harder, etc.  While I know to be careful about what I pray for, God's answer usually doesn't come within an hour.

Shortly after praying, a gentleman who had visited the church 2 or 3 times stopped by the office to drop something off.  He was talking with our front-desk volunteer and our administrative assistant who asked if he enjoyed worship yesterday.  His response was "Yeah, but I like the woman pastor better."  Prayers answered!  In total honesty, this does not bother me at all, since it has long been clear to us that different people will relate to us in different ways.  But it was a good (and needed) reminder and an answer to prayer that helped me to remember that I'm simply a vessel (or "clay jar", as Paul would have it) for the Holy Spirit to work through.

Grace and Peace,

Wes

Breathing and Prayer

"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." I Thessalonians 5:16-18

A few years ago, I was officially diagnosed with asthma.  It's not a particularly bad case of asthma - I don't have 'attacks' and I'm able to control it with an inhaler, exercise, and watching what I eat.  My biggest issue with my breathing is dyspnea (or "air hunger").  It's not shortness of breath exactly - at times I can't seem to get a full, deep breath.  If you take a deep breath, you will reach a point when the breath feels "complete", kind of like getting over a hump. When I'm experiencing "air hunger", I can't get that feeling of a complete, full breath.  As a result, I've become more aware of my breathing and more aware of my overall health.

Breathing is something that seems so simple and that many of us take for granted.   If we are healthy, we don't have to think too much about our breathing.  Each breath does not require a conscious decision on our part.  We don't have to understand the complex mechanics behind respiration in order to do it.  It simply happens.  But the physiology behind is amazingly complex.  Breathing requires the coordination of a number of bodily systems all working together, over and over again, all the time.  The lungs are amazing organs and the way in which oxygen is carried throughout our body to nourish our cells is nothing short of miraculous.  And if you stop doing it long enough, you cannot live.  There are a lot of connections to prayer, of course.  Praying is as natural for humans as breathing and so often we do it without consciously thinking about it.  It simply happens.  Like breathing, praying does not require strategies or space on our calendars or a special skill set in order for it to be meaningful.  Also like breathing, we are not required to understand the particularities and intricate details before we pray.  Most of what occurs when we pray and when we breathe is a mystery to most of us. 

For Christians, we pray to remain alive.  Perhaps not in the physical sense, but we pray to keep our faith alive.  We pray to keep our hope alive.  We pray to keep our relationships with others alive.  We pray because we take seriously the reality of God and God's involvement in our lives and in human affairs.  Even though the extent and nature of God's involvement is the subject of much theological debate, Scripture teaches us that the ultimate nature of God's involvement with humanity is love.  For me, prayer is an on-going, life-giving, conversation with a God Who knows me and loves me.  As a Christian, for me, prayer is "breathing".  And like physical respiration, when I am not praying, when I stop, my spiritual vitality begins to recede.  I can feel a hunger not unlike the air hunger I feel on occasion.  I can't seem to view things rightly, I can't seem to find motivation, I have a difficult time being attentive to the Spirit.  And, as with my asthma, there are triggers for my "prayer hunger" - stress, fatigue, an over-loaded schedule.  There are other triggers that are more personal  - lack of repentance, pride, apathy. 

When I was a new Christian, in my teens, I remember be very intimidated by the verse quoted above.  It's interesting that I didn't really take notice of the two commands bracketing Paul's instruction about prayer, which now seem much more difficult.  I once thought that Paul's command was out of reach, impossible.  You cannot pray 24 hours a day.  Unless prayer is not always a conscious act of speaking but rather more like breathing.  Or if prayer is not words that we say or even set apart times of contemplation (and both of those are very important), but instead our prayer to God is much more.  Perhaps it is our very lives offered to God as a "living sacrifice" to God, which in Romans 12 Paul calls our "spiritual worship".  Perhaps prayer is more than the words we say or requests we offer.  Perhaps our lives themselves are prayers - the daily, mundane things we do as well as the extraordinary, epic things we do. 

Just some thoughts I wanted to share as I seek to keep breathing well.  Grace and peace to you!

Wes

Love is Stronger Than Fear

The world finds itself in a very perilous moment.  Thinking about what led to both of the World Wars in the last century, it would not take a whole lot to set off the global powder keg once again.  And with the technological advances that we've made since the end of World War II, the amount of violence and death would be staggering in the event of a global conflict.  And it's not only about geopolitics and global religious movements - hardly a week goes by without another account of gun violence in the US.  Some days, it seems as if civilization is teetering on the edge. 

The answer to what plagues us is love, specifically the love of God revealed in Jesus.  The difficulty with that, as revealed by the cross, is that God's love in the context of a sinful world is always a sacrificial love.  This is why Jesus talks so much about the cost of discipleship - followers of Jesus have always lived in a world where selfless love and voluntary servanthood are misunderstood or cynically disbelieved, then hated and rejected, in turn giving rise to the possibility of violence and death.  So it is in our world in the present.

The good news is that the sacrificial love of God revealed in Jesus is stronger than sin and death.  This is why the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the central reality of the Christian faith.  Without the resurrection, sin and death are stronger than love, the Christian faith is futile, and we are still in our sins, as Paul says in I Corinthians 15.  The reality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is my conviction as a follower of Jesus.  My faith is in the God Who desires peace, reconciliation, and love for a broken world.  The God Who desires life.  

To love as Jesus loves is to risk death.  Yes, of course it also means risking discomfort, being mocked, being attacked, etc.  But, in the world as it is, loving as Jesus loves is to court death.  This is why Jesus teaches us that we should not fear human attackers.  He did not tell us this so that we might be irresponsible or careless with our lives, but rather that our love might outweigh our fear.  What is motivating all the unrest in the world right now is, at bottom, fear.  And of course it's not as simple as that.  The fears at the root of all of this - the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, the barbarity of ISIS in Iraq, the continued conflict in Ukraine, the situation in Ferguson, MO - are all contextually specific.  Each situation is a tangled web of history, cultural differences, old wounds, hoped-for futures, and competing accounts of reality.  

However, if we were to dig deep enough, what is there at the center in each situation is fear.  Fear of loss and change.  Fear of "the other" and the stranger.  Fear of pain and death.  Fear of what other fearful people intend to do to you and your family if you don't strike first.  Fear of humiliation and defeat.  Fear of death.  These fears are very real, very powerful, and are not easily quelled.  

The Church around the world, in the presence and power of the Holy Spirit, has an obligation as disciples of Jesus Christ to embody the love of God which drives out fear.  To live out this sacrificial love may very well lead to pain, rejection and even death.  But it is a desperately needed witness to a fearful world that love is stronger than that fear.  

Grace and Peace,

Wes

Reflection on Psalm 29 - God's Voice Over the Waters

The first image we have of God in Scripture is of God's "breath" or "spirit" hovering over the "face of the waters" in Genesis 1:2.  This verse is exceedingly deep and mysterious ("...the earth was formless and void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God/the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters.")  It conjures images of primordial darkness and mysterious depths.  I remember reading this as a child and my mind would be filled with really interesting images.  I'm pretty sure that's the point - the start of Genesis inspires our imaginations.  

There's a lot to unpack here, but I want to hit the high points briefly before moving to Psalm 29:

• I usually read from the NRSV, though I will also read from the ESV and NIV on occasion.  Most translations say "the Spirit of God".  "Breath from God" is not out of bounds, though.  The word here in Hebrew is ruah (pronounced "ruwach") and can mean "breath, wind, spirit".  It's the same thing that God breathed into Adam in Genesis 2:7.  I imagine God's presence moving over the chaos of whatever there was before God spoke order into existence.
• For ancient peoples, "waters" were not relaxing or pleasant.  The "waters" symbolized chaos and the unknown.  Chaos was the great enemy.  This image of the sea as chaos appears several places in Scripture - notably, in Job, when Jesus calms the storm, and several places in Revelation.  We can probably throw the Exodus story in there as well.  And it could lead to some really interesting places when we think about baptism. 

• The word translated "hovered" is rachaph and can also mean "brooded" or "relaxed" - "brooded" makes me think of a mother hen whereas "relaxed" gives me an entirely different picture of God.  In most ancient creation mythologies, the god/gods had to go through some struggle or engage in some kind of sexual act in order for the creation of our world to take place.  In Genesis, we see a God that is pondering, hovering, brooding, relaxing over the fact of the waters.  In other creation stories, if a god or gods were faced with chaos, it was usually represented by some kind of monster, often a sea monster (Job has a little bit of this when God mentions Leviathan).  The god subdues the chaos monster and creation can begin.  In Genesis, Elohim is chilling out over the water, just pondering, and then God speaks and begins to order existence.  No fighting, just the voice of God.

That leads me to Psalm 29, specifically the first part of verse 3: "The voice of the Lord is over the waters".  Given the stuff I've mentioned about Genesis 1:2, this image gives me great comfort.  Our lives get pretty chaotic sometimes.  There are moments when I feel like I cannot hold everything in my mind or that if somebody asks me to do one more thing, I'm going to drop it all.  For me, those moments are fleeting, but for some of you, that happens quite often.  Here's some encouragement for us - God's voice is over our waters, waiting for us to hear His voice, so that He might bring some order into our chaos.  Not dogmatic, legalistic, micro-managing order, but the order that Jesus talks about in the Sermon on the Mount: "seek first the Kingdom of  God and all these things will be added to you."

And I think about how difficult it is to hear God's voice when I feel like I'm drowning in the waters of chaos (or stress or busy-ness).  What is helping me today is the possibility of Genesis 1:2 saying that God was "brooding" over the face of the chaotic waters.  Brooding, like a mother hen, waiting for new life to emerge.  God broods over our chaos, speaking through the Spirit, through His Word, through other people, through many other ways.  God broods over our chaos waiting for us to hear and to remember that God can bring order and peace and new life even out of our worst messes.

I pray that you might hear the voice of God in your own life today.  I pray that when you feel overwhelmed and your life seems chaotic, that you'll hear the voice of God's Spirit offering you peace and new life. 

Grace and Peace,

Wes

Reflection on Psalm 23:5

For the past month, I've been starting my day by prayerfully reading a Psalm and looking for a word or phrase that "jumps out" at me.  I then use that word/phrase as a centering prayer.  I try to avoid making this an academic exercise, focusing instead on how the Spirit is leading and speaking through this word or phrase.  I will be posting reflections several times a week and decided that Psalm 23 is a great place to begin.

"God prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies…"  Psalm 23:5a

For many Christians, Psalm 23 has been de-fanged, tamed, domesticated.  It has almost become a cliche for many and it's difficult for cliches to unsettle, challenge, or inspire.  We often think of this Psalm as one of comfort and there are certainly comforting images in abundance here.  But in identifying this Psalm as one of comfort, it's possible that we'll miss being challenged and convicted.  I'm guilty of this and in not really taking this Psalm seriously, it's easy for me to push cruise control whenever I hear/read this Psalm.

Like many of you, I've been hearing this Psalm my entire life, and because of this familiarity I assumed several things about this verse:

1. The table that God is preparing is only for me.  I always assumed that God was making this table for me.  In my mind, I've pictured a long table, outdoors in a green valley.  The sun shining, a spread like you would see at old-fashioned covered dish meals.  Not catered, but homemade food - the good stuff.  Desserts included.  And one chair.  For me.
2. The meal is a victory celebration.  As I turned over this image in my head during my reflection time this morning, I began to realize that what I've pictured most of my life is that this meal is a form of gloating.  God is preparing a victory feast for me so that my enemies could see it and know that God had chosen me and given victory to me.

3. God is serving me.  Altogether inadvertently and uncritically, when I pictured this particular verse, I imagined that God was actually serving me, even celebrating me.  How presumptuous!  The picture in my head was that of God preparing this table for me, celebrating a victory that I assumed was mine. 

4. My enemies are out of luck.  And in my overactive imagination, these imagined enemies of mine hate to be left out.  They know they are defeated, that I am victorious, and no, they can't have any fried chicken or banana pudding.  This is my table, my food, my victory.

I don't want to be to harsh on the uncritical images that formed in my mind when I was young.  After all, these are the images of a child and it's not surprising that a child would think in simple and self-centered ways.  The problem is that I never really took the time to actually update the image as I grew in my faith.  So, pretty much every time I heard or read Psalm 23, this image would flash in my mind.  As a result, I've been missing the point.  Badly.  Here's what the Spirit helped me understand today:

1. This table is for all.  There are more chairs than can be counted.  There is room for everyone who is hungry and willing to grab a seat.  Notice, the Psalmist says, "God prepares a table before me" NOT "God prepares a table for me".  That's a pretty big difference.  Though I'm still going to picture the old-fashioned covered dish…
2. The meal is God's victory celebration.  There is no gloating here - no losers, only winners.  One thing about the victory of God - it is reconciliation.  God's victory in Jesus Christ makes this reconciliation possible.  It brings together that which has been broken, healing that which was fractured, mending that which was torn.  If there is boasting, "let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord." (2 Corinthians 10:17)
3. God is serving all.  This is the radical nature of the Gospel - every seat at this infinitely long table is a seat of honor.  And Jesus is serving.  We might share Peter's response - no way, Jesus.  You're not serving me.  I'll serve you.  I picture Jesus smiling and saying to us: "No, that's ok.  Why don't you serve one another?  Your sister three seats down would probably enjoy some of that casserole."  The word that kept coming to mind during my prayer time was hospitality.  If Christians and churches would simply look for ways to be more hospitable to all, what a difference that would make in our world!

4. There are no enemies.  Jesus Christ came to save us from sin and death.  He also wants to save us from our willful stupidity and eager desire to make and then destroy enemies.  Jesus tells us to love our enemies.  That's hard.  It's downright impossible without God's help.  That's why God prepares a table - sit down, fix a plate, talk it over.  Of course, life's not that simple.  But you've got to start somewhere and breaking bread together has always been a good starting point.

A word on that last point:  No enemies?  Isn't this naïve?  Wishful thinking?  The possible responses are familiar - "what about murderers/rapists/terrorists/etc.?"  "There are people out there that want to kill us!"  "What about Hitler/Bin Laden/whoever?"  "This is not the way the real world works!"  Perhaps not, but it is the way the Kingdom of God works.  It's helpful that we don't decide the boundaries and we don't set the rules.  Neither do we set the table.  God prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies, so that we might break bread together and be reconciled.  May it be so...