God's Wide Mercy

"The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made." Psalm 145:8-9

Over the past few years, my appreciation for the Old Testament has grown exponentially. Probably my favorite theme of the Hebrew Scriptures is the change in the conception of the reach of God's blessing and mercy on the part of the Hebrew people. For much of the Old Testament, the Hebrew people see themselves as specially blessed because they are chosen by God. The descendants of Abraham quickly forget that they were chosen to be a blessing for the world, not to simply be blessed.  Not to trivialize the covenant, but the Hebrew people were chosen by God for a specific task, kinda like when I was growing up and I was "chosen" to clean up the kitchen or take out the trash.

There's a slow development in the Old Testament (if you are going by when these books were likely written) that moves from a limited understanding of God's mercy ("God is merciful to Israel") to a broad understanding ("The Lord is good to all…").  You see this reflected in many of the prophets, especially Isaiah and Jonah.  Of course, this is tied up the Jewish response to exile and a growing understanding of the larger world, moving from regional skirmishes to being in the middle of clashes between Empires. 

As a Christian, I understand Jesus as the way God has blessed all of creation - freely offering love and grace and mercy.  Jesus is the culmination and embodiment of God's steadfast love and compassion.  And what makes the crucifixion so tragic is that it shows how humanity responds to the grace, mercy, and love of God, especially when that grace, mercy, and love is offered to all people.  It can be a subversive, counter-cultural, and even dangerous thing to offer compassion and love to all people.  It can be a risky thing to offer love without regard for difference - and it breaks my heart that many of the people who resist abundant love and no-strings-attached compassion are the same people who claim to be disciples of the One who teaches us what unbounded love looks like.

For what it's worth, I'm sticking with Jesus…

I Should Have Learned By Now...

Earlier this morning, my 10-year-old daughter finished running her third 5K.  I am as proud of her as I've been of anyone in my entire life.  For one thing, I NEVER would have done that when I was her age.  I don't think that I had a tenth of her perseverance and commitment when I was in 5th grade.  For as long as I can remember, I've had as a regular conversation partner in my head a voice that says: "You can't do that."  I've heard that voice in my head specifically related to physical fitness and health.  I've spent much of my life defining myself as lazy, unmotivated, and out of shape.  Granted, in the last few years, I've done a lot better - I've been more responsible with my eating habits and I've finished six 5K's in the last 5 years.  That's not nothing…

This morning I heard that voice again, but it wasn't about me.  It was about my daughter.  After she finished the race, she had the usual (and very rewarding) post-race euphoria and was talking about her future running plans: seven more 5K's (to give her 10 total), a 10K, and then a marathon*.  The voice in my head instantly spoke up: "she's not going to do that."  Fortunately, that voice did not leave my head.  I caught myself and said to my amazing daughter that it sounded like a great plan. 

If anybody's got a legit reason to back down, beg off,
and be lazy, it's Mary.  When she was 18 months old, we found out that she had a heart murmur and we were told that these things usually correct themselves over time.  However, after a particularly persistent FNP at her pediatrician's office insisted that we follow up about what she was hearing through her stethoscope, we made an appointment with a cardiologist.  Fast forward 18 months later, and we're taking our daughter to Baptist Hospital in Winston for open-heart surgery to correct an issue related to how the murmur 'fixed' itself.  (If you're interested, her problem is a called sub-aortic stenosis and she's most likely going to be having another surgery at some point in the next few years. Prayers appreciated.)  She came through the surgery with flying colors and was ready to play and run only 2 days afterwards. 

And now, here's my miracle of a daughter just finishing up her third 5K, each one of which required 6 or 7 weeks of training.  She's ten and the survivor of open-heart surgery.  And here I was, after journeying with her through so many things, thinking: "you can't do that."   I'm shutting that mess down now.  

I should have learned by now that my daughter is defined by her tenacity, her commitment, and a desire to accomplish her goals.  I should have learned by now that my daughter will not be limited by my own hesitation, doubt, and skepticism.  While I'm at it, I'm not going to let that voice tell me what I can and can't do anymore, either.  He's not telling the truth…

*Props to my big sister for showing me what's possible and for being such an inspiring example for my kids - you're awesome!  I think that when Mary talks about her future running goals, she's got you in mind...

Practice?! We're Talking About Practice?

As I was playing guitar one afternoon in preparation for praise team practice, I was struck by how boring practice actually is.  I mean, I've known this for a long time - I played a lot of Little League sports when I was a kid and I HATED practice.  When I began learning how to play guitar (over 20 years ago!), it was different.  I loved it, mainly because typically after a couple of hours, there was noticeable improvement, even though I'll admit that playing chord changes over and over and over again does get a little tiring.  I remember one afternoon sitting in my dorm room trying to figure out The Battle of Evermore by Led Zeppelin, slowly struggling through the chord changes.  After about 10 minutes of me playing disconnected and very rough-sounding approximations of chords, an angry voice from the floor below asked what I was playing. I can't repeat the actual wording of the inquiry.

During the first year of learning to play guitar, it got frustrating simply because there was so much I simply could not do.  After a while, my comfort level grew and I learned that by playing at least 10 minutes every day, those things that once seemed impossible would eventually be in reach. Take barre chords, for example.  These are chords that require you to hold down 5 or 6 strings on the same fret with one finger. Once you get comfortable with barre chords, it opens up a whole range of possibilities for what you can play.  But for a beginner, strengthening your hand enough to make a clean barre chord can be extremely frustrating.  I've known a couple of people who quit progressing (or playing altogether) because they simply couldn't get their barre chords to sound right.  My roommate (and first true guitar instructor) told me when I was struggling with barre chords that one day, it would simply happen.  You'd pick up the guitar thinking you couldn't play barre chords and then - all of a sudden - you were playing them.  This is exactly what happened to me.  One day, after months of working on it, I found that I was playing the chords with relative ease.  What made the difference? 

Practice.

There are good reasons why Christians talk about "spiritual practices" - those things we do to deepen and strengthen our faith:

1. Spiritual practices are not very glamorous nor do they often produce immediate results.  Years ago, I was serving in a church that was trying to start a praise service and I was asked to take the lead in putting the praise team together.  I had scheduled a first practice with several musicians in the church and I anticipated working tediously on 2 or 3 relatively easy songs.  It was going to be a boring hour and a half of chord changes, conversations about counts and tempos and verse-chorus-bridge.  You know, practice.  I found out a few days before that the whole church had been invited to that first practice of the praise team.  Not cool.  I didn't want a bunch of people watching us stumble through those songs - how could I ask these already-hesitant musicians to put themselves through that?  By the same token, we shouldn't invite people to take a front-row seat to watch our spiritual practices.  That's time for us to pray and stumble and try and mumble the same "I'm sorry's" to God.  That's what Jesus is getting at in Matthew 6:1.
2. Spiritual practices are designed to be repetitive actions that form and shape us to 'get in the game'.  Another early song I learned was Gallows Pole (by Led Zeppelin as well).  The chord changes are very fast in that song and by learning those changes, it helped me to learn how to move rapidly when playing.  But it took playing those chords over and over and over again.  If I had only tried to play that song a couple of times and then gave up because I didn't seem to be getting anywhere, my playing of any other songs would have suffered as a consequence.  Taking the time to get those chord changes right in that one song had a huge impact on the rest of my guitar playing.  The same is true of our spiritual practices.  We might find journaling or centering prayer or fasting to be awkward when we first try it, but if we persevere, it can have positive impact on the rest of our life. 
3. Practice reminds us that doing something well requires work and commitment.  I don't know how many times I've had people say to me: "I wish I could play guitar. I've always wanted to learn."  I'm always polite in my responses.  I fully understand the time and commitment it takes to learn an instrument.  But, I'm tempted to say in response: "You might have wanted to play guitar.  You didn't want to learn to play guitar."  If you want to learn to play guitar (or do pretty much anything, for that matter), it can be done.  You've got to work for it.  The same is true of discipleship.  So many of us want a better prayer life, to know the Bible better, to have greater discipline or patience or humility, etc.  What we want so often is the end result, but we resist the work it takes to get there.  Why?  Because it's slow and unglamorous and it takes time and commitment. 

So, today, find a quiet place to be for a few minutes, put down the phone, step away from the screen and practice…

Waiting for the Concrete to Dry

Blogging through Galatians was a bit of a bust. It was a promising start, but I faded somewhere around the middle of the second week. I can admit it - I'm a lousy blogger. Great intentions, not so much on the follow through. But, since it's all about Jesus, grace abounds (I hope). 

And so…hello Philippians!

"I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ." Philippians 1:6

Discipleship, sometimes...

For three summers in college, I worked for the NCDOT Bridge Maintenance Division in Rowan County. For a college student, it was a good job that paid pretty well. One of the jobs we did on a fairly regular basis was patching holes on bridges, which was especially fun on Interstate 85. We'd get to the site in the morning and after no small amount of deliberation, we'd patch the hole (which took around 2 hours, if memory serves). We'd break for lunch and then…wait for 2 hours. We were responsible for closing one lane of a very busy Interstate and if you drove by our crew around 1:30 in the afternoon, you'd see us standing around waiting for the new concrete to dry.

I was especially entertained by those motorists who felt it necessary to make comment about our activity level. I remember one man in particular, leaning out of his car window with a scowl, angrily yelling: "Get to work!" Many just looked our direction and shook their heads in frustration, surely thinking about their tax dollars going to waste.

Now imagine if we had opened that lane with the patch and a motorist had found themselves hitting a sizable hole filled with wet concrete going 80 mph. So, yeah, we stood around for a couple of hours while the concrete dried. Half of our crew left to go work somewhere else and those of us who stayed behind could only clean debris off the bridge so many times. And those who were uninformed about our work yelled and fumed, not realizing that waiting was a necessary part of completing the work.

Being a Christian is a journey that takes time. It actually takes a lifetime. And some of the work that God does in/through/on us is evident: repairing potholes in our lives, removing debris, pouring a new Spirit into us. 

Then there's the work that nobody can see and that most people don't understand. Our fellow Christians might even pass by us and want to yell: "Get to work!" But if God is working on you, trying to teach you something and you start moving before you're ready due to the expectations and demands of other people who don't understand what you and God are working on, there could be a lot of trouble. 

So much that God does in and with us is not seen or understood by other people. It can be quiet, slow work. Waiting for concrete to dry work. Cleaning off debris from our bridges, again and again. And at times, it's like taking a jackhammer to the damaged places - it feels like just more brokenness in the moment, but God doesn't leave us with an empty hole. Those broken places are cleaned and filled, stronger than before.

Just remember that there's some patience required, some standing around leaning on your shovel.

Don't lose heart.

Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength… (Isaiah 40:31a)

#thestruggleisreal - Bearing/Sharing Burdens

In May and June, Toni Ruth and I (and Richard) will be preaching a series based on Paul's letter to the Galatians called #thestruggleisreal.  During this series, I'm going to be posting regularly with some brief thoughts on various passages from Galatians.  I hope that you follow along as we look for God's grace in the midst of some very real struggles!

Galatians 6:2 - Bear one another's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

I'm not sure how many times I've heard it from older people, when it comes to their family. Typically in a nursing home or from those who are dealing with long-term health issues: "I just don't want to be a burden."

I've heard several older people deploy the "I don't want to be a burden" statement like a well-aimed, highly effective guilt bomb.  Most of the time, however, this statement comes from a legitimate place of pain and a keen sense of loss.

Suddenly, it must seem, the one who has been the caregiver, the provider, the protector finds themselves in a position where the person(s) that they provided and cared for are now caring for them. This new situation brings up a mix of emotions: guilt, frustration, sadness, grief. And while there can certainly be a great deal of love, gratitude, and joy that is shared, it's also not uncommon (especially when it comes to people struggling with the early stages of dementia) for there to be feelings of resentment, distrust, and dismissiveness.  It's a very hard place to be and very hard thing to feel.

Paul teaches us that followers of the Way of Jesus need to become pros at burden-bearing.  It's a very difficult thing that Paul is asking us to do: share our burdens with another. Embrace the fact that you will need to carry someone else's burden.

I'm cool with that. In fact, doing that helps me to feel useful and needed. Within reason, of course, I ain't Superman. But, that's why Paul is speaking to the community as a whole and not just certain individuals. We are to be burden-bearing and burden-sharing. Many hands makes light work...

No, I don't need help
Why do you ask?

Unless you're talking about my burden. That's a different story. Don't worry about me, I'll be ok with this elephant that I've got precariously strapped to my back. And, no, I don't feel like talking about it. I'm happy to help you carry yours but I'm not about to let you carry mine.

That would be too personal, too needy, too weak. Which is fine for all you other people, but not for me. I've gotta stand on my own two feet.  You don't need to trouble yourself with me, you've got enough on your plate. I don't want to be a burden.

Maybe Paul didn't know what he was really asking of us, instructing us to reveal our struggles and our weaknesses to one another.  What am I supposed to do? Just blurt out my problems to the people at my church, in my small group, in my Sunday school class?

Yes.

As Christians, we are called by God to be people of Truth. And a lot of times we fail spectacularly at answering that call.  But maybe if we are honest with one another and do the hard work of sharing the burdens that we're carrying, maybe we can learn something about trust, about being humble servants like Jesus. I'm not saying that be truthful about your burdens and allowing others to help shoulder the load won't be a struggle - it will be.

But maybe in sharing one another's burdens, we begin to see some growth peeking up through the concrete that too often surrounds our hearts: some love, a little sprout of joy, the first signs of peace, a sprig of patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

As followers of the Way of Jesus, we are called to be honest with one another and to love one another in the midst of our brokenness.  To bear each other's burdens with patience and mercy and grace.  You know, just like Jesus, who took the form of a slave, carried our burdens, and gave himself for us.

What a witness that can be in our world.

#thestruggleisreal - I Gotta Work on That Whole 'Gentleness' Thing

In May and June, Toni Ruth and I (and Richard) will be preaching a series based on Paul's letter to the Galatians called #thestruggleisreal.  During this series, I'm going to be posting regularly with some brief thoughts on various passages from Galatians.  I hope that you follow along as we look for God's grace in the midst of some very real struggles!

Galatians 6:1 - "My friends, if anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness."

Some time ago, there was a somewhat controversial vote at Annual Conference1. I was sitting with a good friend of mine and some other pastors that I knew, though not very well. These colleagues were more ideologically inclined than my friend and I were and the mood on our row reflected the mood in the entire auditorium: tense. There was an exchange in the midst of the voting (which was, of course, beset by various complications, painfully drawing out the process interminably) between my friend and another pastor who had always demonstrated love and kindness, in my experience of him. In this instance, however, that charity and kindness were not on display. My friend and I, both for our own reasons, chose to abstain from the vote. The previously kind pastor lashed out at my friend in a way that is still crystal clear in my memory, accusing him of cowardice. The anger in his face and voice was surprising and I was momentarily taken aback.

Sadly, this is how many
people view Christians...

I've been in ministry long enough and have dealt with people long enough that I was not ultimately surprised by the outburst. Controversial issues and heated debates inspire passionate responses from people and I'm not naive enough to think that we can or will simply lay aside our deeply-held convictions in the midst of such debates. I was, however, disappointed. In the moment, this follower of Jesus Christ and pastor seemed to allow his commitment to one particular side of an admittedly contentious issue to dictate his treatment of a brother in Christ and colleague in ministry.

In case you think I'm coming down hard on this pastor or claiming some kind of superiority for myself, I find myself doing the same thing. Not in the same way and maybe not even out loud, but nevertheless, I will often put my theological opinions, political leanings, Scriptural understandings, even college basketball allegiances2 ahead of the fruit that the Spirit wants to bear in my life. And if I am tempted to think that simply not acting on these feelings of superiority externally gets me off the hook, Jesus is pretty clear about where the damage of sin starts.

So when I read what Paul says in the first verse of chapter 6, my thoughts immediately went to my colleague and his unloving response to my friend. If my colleague thought that my friend was in the wrong or guilty of some transgression, then his response should have been to speak to him with gentleness when he felt that he was able to do so. And honestly, in the fractured and divisive climate of the debate surrounding the UMC's response to homosexual persons, we are corporately guilty of ignoring what Paul is saying here. A large number of us are guilty of putting our agendas (theological or political) above our brothers and sisters in Christ. This is not only sad - it is disobedient. Further, it is maddening that pointing this out is often met by cries of: "well, they were being disobedient first!" Our debates and arguments reliably disintegrate into playground taunts and stunningly juvenile name-calling. To echo Paul, this ought not be so…

Here's the really frustrating thing about Jesus: when I say things like the above paragraph, I'm really comfortable putting all of that on the shoulders of other people. I'd prefer to 'take the high road' and assume that I have the right perspective and the best approach. But Jesus won't let me rest easily with my assumptions. Even if in my thoughts or assumptions I'm unloving or I'm lacking gentleness when it comes to those with whom I disagree or those whom are "detected in transgression", I'm disobeying God's clear command to me to be loving and to treat them with gentleness. The reconciliation project that God is undertaking in the world is not just for those people I disagree with - God's got a lot of work left to do in me.  So yeah, #thestruggleisreal…

1Annual Conference is the yearly gathering of United Methodist clergy and lay delegates from their particular Conference. A Conference is a geographically determined area - for example, I am a pastor in the Western North Carolina Conference, with the 'dividing line' between my Conference and the North Carolina Conference bisecting the state just west of Burlington.

2With that said, Go Heels!!!

Thursday, May 26th - Faith Working Through Love

#thestruggleisreal - I'm Going to Stop Counting The Days, OK?

In May and June, Toni Ruth and I (and Richard) will be preaching a series based on Paul's letter to the Galatians called #thestruggleisreal.  During this series, I'm going to be posting regularly with some brief thoughts on various passages from Galatians.  I hope that you follow along as we look for God's grace in the midst of some very real struggles!

There's an inherent risk for me whenever I preach or teach on a passage from Paul. Things can get so complicated so quickly and I find myself in the middle of tangle of points and notes and side comments. Not to mention the temptation to bring in stuff from other letters, or from the Old Testament, or from the Gospels.  It gets pretty muddled and needlessly complex. This has happened this morning as I finished mapping out my sermon for Sunday. 

I tend to 'map' my sermon using boxes (I think of them as 'movable chunks') and arrows that indicate the flow.  There's nothing earth-shattering or radical or particularly unique about my sermon-writing technique, but wow, as the picture to the left indicates, Paul has a way of making a mess of my puny, little 'technique'…

There are moments of precious clarity, however.  Chapter 5 verse 6 is one of those moments: "the only thing that counts is faith working through love." Wow, that's powerful.  Of course, true to form, my questions start immediately: in what way does faith working through love 'count'? How does faith 'work'? And how does it work through love? Whose faith?

My understanding of what Paul means here, incomplete as it may be, is that it is the faith of Jesus that led him to the cross to die (see Philippians 2:5-8) makes our salvation possible and the way that saving faith 'shows up' in our lives and in the world is through the love given to us by the Holy Spirit.  The reconciling work of God - in the world, in the church, and in me - does not depend on the strength of my faith nor on the power of my love.  Both my faith in God and my love for God and others varies day to day and both are subject to fluctuations - high points and definite low points. It's a blessing that my faith and my love aren't what saves me - neither are up to the task.

It's also not my moral perfection that saves.  Righteousness is not an accomplishment, but a gift. Paul was pleading with the Galatians to not fall into a way of thinking that a person can be saved by perfect moral performance.  It's a recipe for all kinds of bad stuff and it's ultimately destructive to the community of Jesus followers (see, for example, the mess in Corinth).  I am thankful for God's grace that saves and for moments of powerful clarity in Paul that lead me to this grace.

So, brothers and sisters, whatever you're struggling with today, I want you to know that God's grace is bigger and stronger than what you're facing.  God's love is deeper than your deepest struggles and stronger than your toughest trials.  I'm praying that you might know today - in big and small ways - God's grace and love in your life. 

I feel a little like Loki after writing a sermon
on a passage from Paul..."puny sermon technique..."